today i visited the Golden Temple and another temple whose name i don:t have handy. they were both very beautiful but i was generally underwhelmed by my first temple visits today. the walks i took were very nice but i also felt like i was getting hearded thru like cattle, signs marked the way said "usual path", everytime i tried to get of the "usual" path i was dead ended or found out i was trying to enter thru the exit, so i had to turn back to th usual path. i guess they did not want me to miss the vendors selling gourmet sweets and snacks right outside the exits. the highlight of my temple visits happened just inside the gates of the Golden Temple. I really wanted to ask someone to take my picture. but who to ask? i hesitated....then! heard spanish!!! i asked the man behind me: puede tomar mi foto? it was incredibly satisfying to use my spanish in japan.
on that note i met a woman from Colombia last night. she was waiting for a bus to KYOTO in the same cafe as me. i thought how unfortunate that her bus was leaving an hour after mine. i was kind of hoping to meet a friend on my bus to KYOTO. i walked away wishing we could have spoken more in spanish. i had been wishing to meet someone who spoke spanish, a wish i thought was a little silly and impracticle but a wish all the same. i thought maybe we`ll run into each other tomorrow.....and sure enough we did! by chance in KYOTO station. wow! now that is karma or something. so we blundered around this morning in the station trying to figure out where to go so early in the morning. i took her email so we could connect late and we went our separate ways. she has a friend from studying in london who is from Kyoto, so i hope i:ll be able to get together with them. it would be nice to have a group to spend time with in the evenings when i am not too keen on venturing out on my own.
it was so funny that yesterday after the whole day alone i decided tomorrow i make a friend and then i did and the funny thing is while i really really hope we are able to meet up again, i also felt like i am not sure i want to sightsee together. it dawned on me when i was reading the Gutsy Woman travel guide (which i admit i am finally getting too, sorry girls, mostly because i lost eat, pray, love) she talks about how indulgent it is to solo travel because you get to make all the decisions. and i realized this is so nice. there is not pressure about it. you only have to worry about yourself. if you:re disapointed oh well. if you get on the bus oh well. if you decide to just wonder you can, hungry? stop and eat. i do like this and i am not to keen to give that up quite yet. esp with someone i don:t even know.
a few other highlights of the day:
- wandering up "flower road" in a local neighborhood
- having a security guard run after me when he sees i did not understand the universal symbol for do not enter (hands making a X) oops... and he caught me just as i layed my hand on the door
- making a print at a tiny little woodblock print museum/store
- restraunt where you use a machine to pay and order food by pressing the picture and getting tickets!!! yummy yummy udon, cheap and fast
- Kyoto Musuem for World Peace. the museum wasnt AMAZING but i loved their moto and just the fact that they have a museum for world peace. in chronicled japan:s 15 year war to the atomic bombings to the holocaust up to the gulf and iraq war. they even talking about poverty as social violence.
- somehow not being tired even tho i did not sleep enough last night
- my first visit to a public bath.... (this warrants its own post)
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