Philosopher`s Walk with Dad

After our Zen temple expeditions, Dad and I hopped a bus over to the East side of Kyoto to explore the Philosopher`s Walk pathway that follows a small canal lined with cherry trees and connects several temples of great importance.  The pathway got its name because a local professor of philosophy walked along the canal every day, no doubt ruminating over the evanescence of the cherry blossoms and autumn leaves.

It`s really very lovely and we had a wonderful time following the shallow waters as they curved around blocks of old houses and temples and snacking on yatsuhashi, the cinnamony triangular rice cakes Kyoto is famous for.  We took a couple of detours along the walk, one of which led us to a temple tucked away to the side a ways off the canal at the base of a heavily-wooded mountain.  It had a very imposing entrance gate with a thatched roof that was completely overgrown with moss and small plants.  Inside the gate were two enormous sand structures that are probably flattened and shaped every day by the monks, with designs raked into the tops of the mounds.  Photos to come.  It was really beautiful.

After we explored that temple and finished the Walk, we split ways.  Dad really enjoyed the bustling mid-size city feel of the area around our hotel, and he wanted to wander and peek in a couple of shops.  I took off to see a shrine that I`ve been curious about since I saw Memoirs of a Geisha...

For anyone who has seen the movie, at one point the young Sayuri runs through a long, long lane fenced in by vermillion torii gates.  That place actually exists, and it`s in an area southeast of Kyoto called Fushimi.  I set out by bus (it`s a bit of a hike) and wandered the trails lined with the gates for some time.  I have to say that they`re rather worn with time and age... many are pink and splintering, but it`s still a very cool sensation to be walking through an endless path of them.  The story behind the gates is that local businesses, in the hopes of securing prosperity, donated the gates to Fushimi Inari shrine, which is dedicated to the fox, the helper of Japanese kami.  What this means is that all along the walkway, the beautiful gates, all of which are imprinted with the donor name, say the Japanese equivalent of ``Bubba's beer shop - drive thru beer all nite`` or ``Maude`s boutique and nail salon``.  Kind of hilarious.

After meeting back up, we were starved and found ourselves sitting at booths in a technicolor version of a Japanese Denny`s, complete with chintsy food and kind of bored-looking early-college waitstaff.  Dad got really excited at the sight of a tame-looking omelet plastic food outside the restaurant entrance.  I tried to give him a gentle reality check that we are, in fact, still in Japan and that this would be a Japanese omelet.  That means that tomato sauce-covered rice garnished with green peas and bits of chicken constitute the omelet filling.  While he speculated that this was basically a chicken pot pie wrapped in egg, he decided to go for it and seemed to like it!!!