Kyoto

I am officially moving to Japan. Forget friends, family, school, crawfish, all that, Japan is like a drug...once you've had a taste, you gotta have seconds.

My mouth is sore from all the praise I keep giving Japan. Every time I go out to eat, it's "MMMMM, oishi, oishi, oishi!!!" Every time I go to see a sight, it's "WoWWWWowowooowwww!! Kirei, kirei, kirei!" Every time I see a Japanese woman, child, or pet, it’s “D’awww!!! My god sooooo kawaii!!!” You would think after a while I’d be so tired of how perfect everything is and just become jaded and unimpressed, but seriously, I just keep getting more and more impressed when even I don’t think it’s possible!!

I wish I were just being cheesy, but Japan is like a dream I've never dared to dream. It's beyond beautiful, but mostly because Japanese society and people are the most civilized and sophisticated in the world. I have never seen children more well groomed and better behaved, women more stylish and demure, locals more helpful and polite, tourist locations better managed, transportation systems more efficient, food better prepared, people more meticulous....I guess what I'm trying to say is, yes, Kyoto is beautiful, but its attractions would not be as pleasant to visit if it were in any country other than Japan. The tender love and care, and most importantly respect, put into the exquisite preservation of these cultural sites is what sets this completely apart from other famous tourist circuses (ex: Angkor Wat, UGH)

Here is the difference between Japan and the rest of Asia: Japanese people go to watch the evanescent beauty of cherry blossoms, sit quietly to ponder the meaning of life and love, share neatly boxed lunches with their family, and gather all their trash on their person to take home. They leave the area more pristine than before they came. I kid you not, but here is what I witnessed from a group of chinese tourists (this was only ONE of many instances of disrespect): Ran around trampling the grass and flowers, giggling like mad and taking pictures at every tree as to get in the way of everyone else’s photographs, yelling boisterously and picking the sakura, and get this…they brought a fucking HUGE RED CHINESE FLAG, spread it all over the lawn, and took millions of pics with it. Who the hell does that? Next time I go visit France, I’ll be sure to bring a huge American flag and wave it around yelling “USA! USA!” or bring a huge Vietnam independence flag to China and lay it across the Great Wall.

OK, enough ranting. About Kyoto: it's basically the ancient capital of Japan. If you like temples, gardens, geishas, and tradition, come to Kyoto. I visited a million of the temples and got really tired of them after a while, so I'll just post the best ones.

Zen rock garden. How the hell do they make those lines in the sand without stepping on it?

A temple amongst the trees. A hell of a climb up to it though!

Japanese gardens...what the fuck man. How you so stunning? How is that moss so green, those trees so dewy? 

Don't get excited: they're fake geishas (pay a ton of money for the day, get dolled up as such). I will tell you about my extremely fortuitous encounter with a real geisha afterwards.

How adorable are Japanese schoolchildren? Each school has its own awww-inducing uniform and they walk around together everywhere making me want to die of cute overdose

Japan temples have these little prayer papers where you can write down things and either hang them up or, like this one, dissolve in magic water

This was seriously the only problem I could think of at the moment

It really does dissolve!

There were "love stones" at this temple where you had to close your eyes and walk from one to the other. If you reach it without opening your eyes, your love is in your life right now. If not, your love is still wandering out there somewhere. This girl was being guided by her friend so not exactly fair lol.

I consider a "nice walk" a stroll in Piedmont Park with all the pigeon poop and hobos. Japanese people walk right outside their backdoor and take a walk along this. Imagine all these trees during April when the sakura is in bloom in Kyoto. FML.

Remember the scene in Memoirs of a Geisha when the little girl runs down a gorgeous hall lined with red torii?

This place was much more amazing in real life! I was mostly astounded by how well preserved and freshly painted the toriis were. There were soooo many of them. I couldn't even walk through the whole thing....have no idea how many of these red giants there were, but I would guess in the thousand. And each one was different in some way!

Also in Memoirs of a Geisha was the bamboo forest. I was like, how does this place actually exist? Looks too good to be true...

I was in utter shock for half an hour just standing there watching the bamboo sway in the wind and the occasional flutter of gold leaves fall from the sky

People tie all the bad fortunes around the temples and take the good ones home with them

This was a temple painted in real gold!

I saw a guy in Japan with my backpack...I'm not special anymore :(

The geisha district at night. They're not prostitutes like most people believe, just highly skilled entertainers in the traditional arts :)

Story time! So I was walking down this exact street in Gion, marveling at how beautiful all the old buildings were...it was a full moon, the lanterns were on, the tourist vans had all left and Inoel and I were the only ones walking down this quiet alley. I turned to snap this photo. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of blue kimono. When I turned around, I saw a geisha running into a small wooden house a few meters up the street. I nearly screamed and gasped in excitement, "OMG THERE'S A GEISHA!!!" Inoel said, no way, because geisha are extremely difficult to see in their natural environment (walking around in the street from appointment to appointment). The only way you can see them is usually at some performance or event, or have fat stacks to shell out for a very exclusive night with geisha entertainment. Other than that, geisha rarely walk because their kimonos are deathly expensive, and when they do, it's only to hop from the taxi to their destinations, and damn they are super fast walkers in those ridiculous wooden shoes! I insisted that I saw her, and noticed the taxi was still waiting at the end of the alley. I decided to be patient and wait, so that eventually she would come back out and hop into the taxi. I was right! After about 20 minutes (yes, I am a huge desperate stalker), she emerged in all her glory and ignored all of our begs and pleas for a picture and scurried away like the swiftest little bunny straight into the awaiting taxi. You know how in the movie, they say that a geisha can stop a man dead in his tracks with one fast glance? Well, I am no man, and she certainly did not bother to glance my way, but damn my heart literally stopped. I was ready to propose or at least give her all my money. It was spell-binding and magical...I can't believe we were the only ones who saw her so late at night! Inoel told me that I was extremely lucky. The only time he or any of his friends had ever seen a geisha was when everyone in his tour group paid about $7,000 for one night of tea, dancing, music, and quick conversation with a 2 maiko (apprentice geisha) and their big sister. I only paid $2 for the bus ride to Gion :D

Traditional sit-down restaurant

What's a trip to the ancient capital without sushi?