Kyoto holds a
false glamor. It’s a tourist town, filled with expensive cameras, sweaty
foreigners, and overpriced souvenirs. I’m sure this is unfair, but that’s what
I experienced. Kyoto’s power emerges, like a cicada from its mystical slumber,
during the festivals.
During the day,
Raquel and I went sightseeing like the tourists we were. We saw the Golden
Pavilion overrun by Germans and hiked across the city to find Kiyomizudera
Temple covered in tarps. The only thing I really liked was Inari Shrine.
Inari Shrine is
home to more Torii Gates than any other place in Japan. There’s thousands of
them, each paid for by someone (corporations included) eager to appease the
gods. It might sound hokey, but I like it. Millions of dollars are spent to be
part of this place’s power, and you can feel it. It’s not just me either, more
people were praying at Inari than anywhere else I’ve been in Japan.
Walking up the
mountain path, through the gates, is glorious. Tourists huddle here and there,
and they add to the magic of the place. Because of their presence, you truly
notice the moments when you round a bend and find no one. No family. No Germans.
No National Geographic Photographers. All of a sudden you’re alone, with 1000
Torii Gates to yourself. When this happened to us, we’d do what any good
tourists would do, I waxed philosophic about the timelessness and beauty and
blah blah blah while Raquel shamelessly shot videos on her phone.
The real fun of
Kyoto comes out at the festivals.
Raquel was eager
for street food and I was excited to buy tallboys of Asahi “The Extra” and
drink them on the street.
Crowds
overflowed the Gion festival. People of all ages were dressed in Kimonos:
beautiful couples, young women with exquisite hair and self-conscious men with
that special look of pride and foolishness that only comes when a man knows
he’s doing something to get laid. There were respectable older women taking
pictures of floats, single twenty-somethings preening around for other single
twenty-somethings, grandiose old men, adorable children and more beautiful
women. There were so many people that one point that crowd simply stopped
moving, completely, for 3 long minutes. No one seemed to know why, but we were
all glad to escape the crush.
Everyone was there
to see the floats. The floats are astounding. They tower over the crowds, decked
in lights. Each is unique, hundreds of years old and home to the Kami, Japanese
deities somewhere between a God and a spirit. Each float had a stamp, and for
the low low price of 100 yen, I too could have a stamp in my notebook! This
confirmed my suspicion that collecting is a deep rooted part of the Japanese
psyche. Figurines, pokemon, stamps of the Kami, they collect it all. I, a
former pokemaster, queued up with the locals. I got seven stamps before I got
too drunk to continue, and I’m damn proud of that entire statement.
Meanwhile,
Raquel was hunting for food. We bought ayu
earlier (read more) but we also ate stir-fried noodles, crepe on a
stick, tentacle on a stick, meat on a stick, and Raquel’s favorite,cucumber on
a stick. It was lightly salted and served ice cold. She was in heaven. 
Other
entertainment of the night included catching fish with paper nets, a task as
impossible as it sounds. I am a pet addict, and could not pass up the
opportunity. Drunk, I mangled my paper net in seconds. I resorted to dunking my
bowl into the kiddie pool of dying fish. Victorious, the carnie (do you call
them carnies in Japan?) bagged my catch and sent me on my way.
Raquel was not
happy.
“What are you
going to do with those stupid fish?” she fumed.
I laughed and
boasted but quickly realized she was right. In my drunken stupor I believed I
could get them back to Takayama without issue, but once there I’d need to buy a
pump, a filter…
“Darling, do we
have any big glass bowls or vases?”
“You are not
putting those stupid fish in a Kitchen bowl.”
These fish were
going to eat into my beer money. I needed to dump them, and fast.
Adults are for
the most part, rational, sane human beings, so I targeted the exception:
parents. “Sumimasen!” I’d yell to a
dad already carrying a bag of fish and hold up my catch. They cursed me with
cold smiles, then politely declined before their children realized I was
offering them more heartbreak they’d have to flush down the toilet.
Then, I saw
them. A young couple, sitting on the curb, holding plastic bags of water up to
the light of a thousand paper lanterns.
“Sumimasen!” I said, and held up my bag
of fish.
The woman hopped
up and held out her own bag, eager to compare our catches. They had turtles.
Perfect. Getting turtles at a festival is even more irresponsible than getting
fish. This was my moment. I held my fish to my chest, then extended them
towards her. From me to you. She
scratched her head, careful not to mess up her perfect hair. I repeated the gesture,
gave a little bow. Thank the Kami. She understood.
She slowly
reached out for my bag of fish. I shoved them into her hands, desperate to be
rid of the commitment and the guilt I’d feel at their eventual death.
“Arigato Gozaimas!” I yelled, and got the
hell out. I glanced back and saw her boyfriend staring at the fish, terrified
of all the time and money the little bag implied, of all the work and energy I
had escaped, then I lost them to the paper lanterns and silk.
We stumbled back
to the hotel, carefree, drunk on irresponsibility and “The Extra,” glad to have
experienced Kyoto, and glad to leave.
Joe Darris currently lives in Japan with
his wife where eats weird things, drinks too much, and generally makes an embaressment
of himself. If you enjoyed this story please +1, share and subscribe for more!
