Tag Archives: Japan

Kyoto Station

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I’m just posting some of the night photographs that I took of Kyoto Station, and surrounding area, during our visit there a few days ago. The station itself was impressive on its own. But, it was surrounded by other fantastic pieces of architecture, such as the Kyoto Tower. Inside the station, the Christmas tree was especially magical – with Christmas music timed together with the lights on the tree. Crowds gathered on the steps, opposite the tree, to watch it.

Enjoy the photographs… (the first one is a typical ‘Ally’ night shot)

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Japan Day 13 – Japanese Onsen Hotel

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After leaving Osaka, we travelled through Himeji to an Onsen Hotel in Akaho. This was the first Onsen Hotel of two that we are staying at.

We had planned to go to the famous Himeji Castle during the day, yesterday, on our way to Akaho. But it was raining Japanese cats and dogs, so it wasn’t really a viable option. However, the weather cleared up later on to give a lovely sunset on the final part of our drive to the hotel. Continue reading →

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Half-English Breakfast

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This morning we ate breakfast in the hotel and I was pleasantly surprised to find a spread that included some nice looking fruit (photograph 1).

Tell me: why is that we, as humans, feel the need to saunter into a breakfast room, walk up to a table and move a chair about 2 inches before we go up and start drooling over the breakfast delights? I guess it is a form of staking ownership on territory. In the animal kingdom, of course, an animal will mark its territory by urinating around the edge of it – something that I think the restaurant manager, this morning, would undoubtedly have frowned upon. Continue reading →

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Japan Day 12 – Nii-san in Osaka

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Greetings!! After yesterday’s ‘constipation crisis’, today you must watch out for vegetable tourettes whilst reading my blog post. I may at any moment spontaneously shout out the random name of a vegetable or fruit. I’m rather missing my fruit and veg, you see, and yesterday’s “very berry smoothie” was a BIG disappointment.

Before I begin, Nii-san means “older brother” (not to be confused with a certain Japanese car manufacturer), and the reason I’ve included that as part of today’s headline is that EVERYONE seems to think that I’m Mark’s older brother. Having received a couple of comments about it in the last few days, Mark has taken it upon himself to constantly remind me about it! I would, therefore, like to go on record as saying that I am the Otouto (younger brother) and not the Niisan, Sunny! Continue reading →

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Misfortune Favours The Unfortunate

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I’m not greatly into the whole ‘fortune telling’ thing (to say the least). But, yesterday, Liz and I paid some money into a little fortune telling machine here in Kyoto. Hey, it looked like fun, what harm could it do? I’ve attached a small video to this blog post, so that you can see what it was like. I’ve also included a photo of the fortune itself.

Quite simply, the fortune machine included a wooden lion dancing robot mask thing (great description, eh? Mark came up with that one after I asked him what it was!). After we put our money in, the ‘wooden lion dancing robot mask thing’ danced around a bit, bowed several times and then grabbed a fortune and dropped it down the hole. Liz and I immediately unwrapped our fortunes and read them. Mine was said to be an “excellent” one. So, no need for me to locate a tree and tie it to it… or so I thought. Here are some of the things it said (my comments are in brackets): Continue reading →

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Japanese Archery (Kyudo)

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Kyudo means “way of the bow” and is the Japanese art of archery. Notice my use of the word “art” there. Unlike the standard types of archery that we see practiced in the UK, Kyudo is much more to do with meditation and seeking a natural release, whilst shooting to hit the target. For that reason, it takes many hours of learning the meditation side of things before you would normally pick up a bow. So, our little attempt at Kyudo would only be a very basic, fun demonstration.

On our final day in Kyoto (day 11 of my trip), Mark and Sayaka took me along to a little place just outside of the Kiyomizu Temple. The lady instructor handed us a bow and we were told to sit down facing the wall, as if on a horse, and hold our bow at 90 degrees to shoot down the tunnel. Continue reading →

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