Monkeys with the best real estate
For me, Kyoto is the heart and soul of Japan, the mystic old capital, where GeishaTraditional female entertainers. Trained in such arts as singing, dancing, and playing Japanese traditional musical instruments. still walk the streets, Golden Pavilions sit over motionless lakes, and monkeys have the best real estate in town!
Kyoto has a unique history, and is filled with everything you read about Japan in the tourist guides and so much more. Search the streets of Gion and Pnotocho for Geisha and Maiko dressed in their finest, visit stunning Temples, Shrines and Castles, feast on some of the most delicious foods in Japan-especially the sweets!-wind through bamboo forests and climb mountains to find monkeys playing around with the best views of Kyoto!
A great time to visit Kyoto is during the Gion Matsuri, held every year around July. I went a few years back and it was such a fantastic festival, thousands of people filling the streets at night dressed in their summer Kimono listening to Taiko, eating choco bananas and sipping on ice cold beers.
Kyoto is not only beautiful in the Summer. In Spring, Cherry Blossoms fill the streets and you can even watch one of the spring dances performed by Geisha and Maiko from the area. In Winter, the skies are a perfect blue and if you are lucky you can experience the temples dusted in a light coating of snow. In Autumn, the leaves are magnificent shades of yellow, red and orange, and sweets to match.
Whichever season, Kyoto is without a doubt one of the best places to see in Japan. Take a few days, stay in an OnsenA hot spring, often used for bathing. Bathing facilities are often, but not always, communal. May be outdoor or indoor. hotel, and really make sure you see as much of the beautiful old city. It will be well worth your while.
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Comments (1)
I have very mixed feelings about this Kyoto propaganda. Yes, the temples and shrines are ancient and lovely, the natural beauty (where you can find it) is wonderful, and the history is starkly apparent in many places.
However, there's no getting around the fact that it is an ugly, ugly city, bathed in concrete and neon. The "geisha" are more often than not Japanese tourists who paid about 10,000 yen to play dress- up, the weather is nearly unbearable in summer and winter and the crowds are unbearable in spring and fall. The locals have shocking superiority complexes about being from the "old capitol", and frankly the gion matsuri bored me to tears, as did the jidai matsuri. (I never made it to the other "big three" festival where they burn the characters on the mountain- that one is probably more fun)
That being said, Kyoto has many beautiful, subtle, and hidden places, but they're all far out of reach of the average tourist. I guess the old standard system of clamping your eyes shut until the bus drops you off at kinkakuji has been working for years to keep the myth of Kyoto going strong, but theres something about it that just doesn't sit right with me.
Posted by Alisa | June 8, 2007 10:40 AM