tokyo, japan - hachiko

a friend of ours told us about a movie called hachi, starring richard gere and joan allen.  i was balling at the end of the movie.  it is based on a true story from japan - hachiko (dog's name) would go with his owner to the train story every morning to see him off (he was a professor).  every afternoon hachiko would arrive at the station and waited for his owner.  one day his owner never showed up (he passed away), but hachiko, being the loyal dog that he is, waited and waited.  he waited for 9 years.  people would feed him and tried to give him a home, but he would always come back to the station.  in honor of hachiko, the people of japan built a statue in his honor and named the station exit after him.  of course i had to go see hachiko. 

tokyo, japan - food

i am ramened out!  but i would still eat udon and sushi any day.  here are some pictures of what we ate in tokyo.

ice cream vending machine - look at all the options!

close-up of one of the flavors

food vending machine - select what you want, put money in, receipt comes out, hand it to the chef and voila!  find a seat and eat.

rice and pork bowl

yummie udon

tempura - although this one hardly had any substance of veggies, was a little disappointed

kyoto, japan - nijo castle

before heading to tokyo, i visited nijo castle, which was about 10 minutes from our hotel room.  the castle was built in 1603 - it was neat to see buildings that was built about 500 years ago.  i paid 500 yen ($5 in US) for an english audio guide. i love the history of the castle - click here to read more about it.

entrance

entrance to garden

one of the palaces 

top of garden area

view from top of garden

view from top of garden

home!

after 9-1/2 hours in the air, we are home!  i am still jet lagged - i am hoping that i can get a full night's rest tonight.  it only took us about 15 minutes to go through customs when we landed.  guess they saw how many bags tuan was pushing and just let us through after they asked if we had any plants or illegal stuff.

would i go back to japan?  definitely!  but i would not go back in the summer - i'll go in the spring where there will be a ton of cherry blossoms blooming.

narita express train

lianne having fun on the train

observation deck - we went home on one of those planes

another view from the observation deck

kyoto, japan - hotel granvia

hotel granvia is one of the nicer hotels i've ever stayed in.  kristen and i loved the rain showerhead.  think i took 3 showers everyday because it was so hot and humid.

the mirror steamed up from the shower, but two areas did not - pretty cool huh?  except it was a little high for me as i could only see half of my face.

hotel granvia

kyoto, japan - sanjusangen-do temple

pictures were not allowed in this temple and once you see the picture that i found online, you'll understand why.  it was a breathtaking experience when you turn the corner and you see rows and rows of the thousand armed kannon.  click here for history.

kyoto, japan - kiyomizu-dera temple

entrance

one of the few temples that have 3 pagodas

cleansing area

single women can go through the "good luck" gate and wish for a suitor

kyoto, japan - heian shrine

heian shrine is pretty too.  i love all the gardens at the different temples and shrines.  reminded me of hakone gardens, which is where aaron and i got married.

click here for some history of heian shrine.  and click here for six differences between a japanese shrine and japanese temple.

entrance

lanterns outside the entrance

"halfway to heaven"

these symbols means something, but i forgot what the tour guide said :)

looks like there is snow on the branches

white stuff are actually fortunes.  after you pray, you shake this metal box and a fortune stick comes out.  hand it to the cashier and she gives you your fortune.

if you like your fortune, you tie it on the branch so that it will come true.  if you don't like it, you keep it.  i kept mine - not necessarily because i like it, but for souvenir and also to ask my mom what it says (fortune is written in 3 languages - japanese, chinese, korean)

kyoto, japan - imperial palace

the imperial palace is massive.  in order for you to enter the palace, you must apply in advance for permission to view the palace.  since i was part of a tour, the tour group did all that for me.  no children are allowed in the palace.

some history - the kyoto imperial palace is the former ruling palace of the emperor of japan.  the emperors have resided at the tokyo imperial palace since 1869.  the preservation of the kyoto imperial palace was ordered in 1877.

one of the many residences or halls of the palace

we were not allowed to go through that gate - the emperors used to reside in that building behind the gate

i noticed that there were a lot of gates

another view of the gates

another gate entrance, except this one was for women only.  gate was not as big because women back then were not viewed as an equal.

garden area

isn't it beautiful?  so serene and peaceful.

one of the residences for visitors of the emperor

if you are important, you stay in a residence that had gold surrounding it