On Thursday i went to Nara, an old town about 2 hours from my town by train. Nara is famous for being the old center of buddhism in Japan, and is home to something like 7 UNESCO World Heritage Sites. During my travels through China and Vietnam with Term in Asia in 2004 i became a little cynical about World Heritage Sites and their reputed fabulousness. It just seems to me that whoever assigns the title of 'World Heritage Site' needs to be a bit more discerning (for instance the temple in Nara that gained the title only by have 1,000 year old roofing tiles when those tiles covered about one square meter and had been replaced everywhere else clearly doesn't rival the bronze daibutsu or say the Taj... yeah, you get my point).
In any case, I think we only saw 3 or 4 of the World Heritage Sites at Nara, and for the most part they were fabulous. Inside one temple is the world's largest bonze image of the buddha. Woah. Actually the part i liked was that the daibutsu had sadly lost its head repeatedly in fire and other damage. It's current head was made in the 17th century. Another famous site is the five-story-pagoda. We also did lots of wandering to discover another of Japan's botanical wonders - wisteria. There is all this hulla-baloo about sakura (cherry blossoms) so i hadn't even expected all the trellises (trellii?) of beautiful violet blossoms. And of course, with the holiday season there was no shortage of festival foods - instead of lunch that day i had sakura ice cream and strawberry ame (fresh strawberries dipped in sugar syrup that hardens). Yummm!
So after the success of my Nara day trip i embarked on another adventure - an actual road trip to Fukui! For the first time in more than 9 months i got to ride in a car going MORE THAN 50 KM PER HOUR!!!! I relaxed into the seat as i felt the oh-so-familiar hum of the speeding vehicle and the forgotten concerns of traffic and stop lights and so much more (though not the forgotten concern of cost.... the reason no one ever drives on highways that their cost is so prohibitive... the two hour drive to Fukui cost $30!!!). I didn't really have any ideas about Fukui before, but i think its like a big secret in Kansai. Its mountainous and on the coast and beautiful and not really that far away. First we went to Eihei-ji Temple, a center of zen buddhism and a famous hide-away for trainees. It was phenomnal, built both as an enclosed building/structure and open to the elements. Every hallway or stair case had one wall and one open to the green hillside. If it weren't for the fact that i'm a chick, i would totally try to train there.
Then on to the Fukui coast, to cliffs crowded by tourists and stalls of snacks and food, and area made famous for the frequency of suicides that used to occur there. Yeah, not so fun now. But, besides being mostly terrified, it was a beautiful view of the sea. and there were dozens of more stalls packed with ice cream and roasted corn and takoyaki (fried octopus balls) so again, i skipped lunch and opted for festival food. My rationalization being that its about to be rainy season and surely all the touristy stuff will shut down and then where will i find my sakura ice cream?
All in all, Golden Week was a completely fabulous success. If only I could be looking forward to another one coming up now, instead of a full week of school and a cold :(
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