Kamakura

In the first week of last month (sorry I have been waiting--and am still waiting, but no worries--for more pictures), I went with my friend Ayako (Tokyo Ayako) to Kamakura, an area on the Southern/Eastern coast of Japan, not far from Tokyo that is another of the ancient seats of government. (Mini-Japan lesson: Edo (later renamed Tokyo), Kyoto, and Kamakura have all been the seat of government for Japan over the course of history.) We went to Kamakura to sightsee and spend a relaxing vacation day. The area has lots and lots of temples and shrines. AND one of the biggest statues of Buddha (Daibutsu at Kotokuin temple) in the world! After lunch (very good soba and tempura at a nice little restaurant with great service), the big buddha was the first thing that we went to go see.

Wow, he was a big buddha!

See the little people in black and red standing in front of the big buddha? That's how big he is!

It is 37 feet tall and weighed a whole lot and is the second largest in the world! He has survived a bunch of earthquakes and has recently been restored to be made even stronger. For something like 20 cents, we were able to. . . go inside the giant statue of buddha.

Ayako said, we can go inside him if you want.
What!? I replied, continuing, We can go inside the big buddha!?
Yeah, Ayako looked a little worried about me.
How many people do I know, well do I know at home, who have said they have been inside a giant buddha? None. That's how many! Let's go inside!

Inside the buddha was pretty dark, and the stairs were pretty steep. There were some windows in Buddha's back that let in some light. It was neat to see how solid this ancient creation still was. But mostly, we looked around, I tried to get some pictures, but it was too dark.

But, have you ever been inside a big buddha?!

Next we went to a temple. It was near the top of a mountain like, sea-side geographical feature, with the other buildings belonging to it trailing down below it, along with a small stream, which gathered near the entrance and was the most beautiful koi pond I have seen yet. Near the pond was a building with big windows making up most of the walls, inside someone was re-copying the books of buddha, so they would never be lost. Behind this building was the entrance to a small cave, carved into the rocks of the cave were small figures of buddha, chapels (for lack of a better word) of antiquity used by monks, a thousand years gone, for meditation.

Climbing up and up the stairs rewarded you with the sight of a large beautiful temple, golden figures surrounding an image of the Nirvana-seeking man just visible through the enormous, opened doors. In front, incense sometimes billowed and sometimes danced up towards the cloudy sky. To the right was the giant bell they had rung for new years just a few days before. To the left was a small building that was filed with a wooden and glass box, lumbering in circles under the weight of ancient paper and scrolls, the writings of buddha. Archaic tradition says that if you walk the box once in a circle, you can gain the knowledge of reading all the words.

(There was also a nice looking restaurant.)

Then, we began walking up the steep path to get a great vantage point of the Pacific Ocean! I loved the short hike; Ayako says that my walking quickly until it's hard to breathe must make me feel alive, like thunderstorms and earthquakes do.

I took some pictures and watched some local art school looking kids working on some great sketches. I wished there was some way to capture the grey sea and sky, the green hills, the feeling of an age past, and all the bright-colored quaint-seeming roofs and homes. The whole huge landscape of it. To the far left, more tall ridges grew out of the low-lands, so green they seemed to be alive themselves. In my periphery, on the left, were the building of the temples, where tourists, worshipers, and the in-between wandered together, all fairly quieted by the presence of the spirit of "Past." Across the expanse of civilization was a pale beach, mottled with
driftwood, and the quiet grey ocean, deep cold and silent. Enfolded between these commanding presences were more buildings than you might think possible, each cuddled close to the next, allowing only the minimum distance to let people or cars pass between them, as though they had settled there themselves, growing up rather than out, straining for the best view of the sea and the hills. Most were bright colors or an unobtrusive cream, so as to make each distinguishable to the rest. Perhaps someone looking from the temple could pick out home when she made her offerings and prayers; perhaps someone out on the sea could pick out his roof, and smile at home.

Then we climbed down; we laughed and talked, and looked for somewhere to get coffee. I bought a nice green scarf and we wandered toward a very small and very ancient shrine, where I may have received a bad omen from a black bird, if I was to put stock in such things.

We eventually decided on the convenience store Lawson's to bring us out of history into the present with hot drinks, chicken nuggets, and koala cookies. We sat on a concrete retaining wall and looked out at the beach and the sea. Then we ran out to the edge of the water, which I leaned over and touched, with just the tip of my finger, before selecting a couple of shells and heading back toward the train station. It was nearing sundown and was time to head home.

One of the stops along the way had a gorgeous view of the sea, right from the stop. So we stopped their to take pictures of the sun setting into the Pacific. (I know the sun sets into the west, not the east. But you see, Kamakura is on a peninsula which defines the western-end of Tokyo Bay, so it is possible. It confused me too, until I checked out some maps.) We got back on the train and decided we were hungry and would go out for Italian food on the way home. (It was really good.)

All in all, I got on something like 12 different trains that day! (One because I got on the super-express because I wasn't paying attention when I was supposed to be getting on the local. That was funny and actually made me less tired. Because it's hard to laugh at yourself and be really tired. At least at the end of a good day it is.)

Current Music : Otis Reding, Dock of the Bay (nice coincidence)