2 April 2009

The class met Don at 8am in the hotel lounge this morning to head to Nara for a day of temple and shrine visits. We travelled there by means of the express train, and it took about an hour. I slept the entire way on the train again, since I have been exhausted from my very busy schedule. Once in Nara, we hoped to take the local bus to begin our trip at Horyuji Temple. We had just missed the bus however, so we instead started at Kofujie Temple. This was a very early Buddhist Temple, and it was comprised of a pagoda, octagonal hall, and main prayer hall. This was also my first encounter with the deer at Nara, and I was surprised to find them everywhere. It is amazing that they always know the people who have food on them, and many of my classmates were heavily followed since they had snacks in their backpacks.
After Kofujie Temple, we walked back to the bus stop to catch the next bus. We hopped on and geared up for a long bus ride, since Horyuji Temple was 15km from the stop we boarded at. The bus was extremely crowded, and I gave up my seat multiple times to older people riding the bus. I surprisingly did not get motion sick either, which I was very thankful for since we took the bus for such a long time. Upon arriving at the Horyuji stop, the bus fare was 760 yen. Don didn’t realize the bus ride would be that expensive for each of us, so he said he’d buy lunch for everyone with the program money since we each had to pay for our bus fare. We had a short walk to get to Horyuji Temple, and it was amazing once we arrived at the site. It is regarded as one of the oldest wooden structures in the world, and it is the most celebrated temple in Japan. The temple site was enormous, and we visited two different gardens within the site.
It was a little past noon after we left Horyuji Temple, so we were all hungry from so much travelling. We split into two groups and went to two Japanese restaurants. I ordered pork cutlet, and it also came with rice, miso, cabbage salad, and daikon. It was by far the best pork cutlet I have ever had, and it cost 1,000 yen. I think almost everyone at our table ordered pork cutlet, and it was even better since Don will reimburse us all for the cost to compensate for the bus fare we had to pay. After lunch, a couple of us got Japanese ice cream to complement the saltiness of our lunch. I tried tangerine flavor, and it was spectacular and very authentically fruity. It cost 250 yen. To avoid paying the extremely high bus fare to get to our next destination, we opted to walk to the JR Line station. We took the JR Line for about ten minutes and got off the train in Central Nara. To once again avoid the high bus fare, we voted to walk for 30 minutes to get to Todaiji Temple. This was the last destination on our trip in Nara, and it is the largest wooden building in the world. The scale is inconceivable, and the Buddhist statues within the main temple were about 50 feet tall. I still cannot even explain how immense and monumental the scale of the figures and structures were. Wow!
So in the Todaiji Temple main hall, there was a wooden column with a small hole at the base. Supposedly, if you go through it, it is good luck. A group of us watched a guy get pulled through it by his friend, and then it was my turn to try since I was by far the smallest. The hole was shaped somewhat like a rhombus, and upon entering the hole, it became much smaller than it seemed. I could not keep my body angled correctly to move myself through the hole, so my horizontal body became stuck. I had my arms sticking out one end, and my feet were sticking out the other. Everyone was photographing and video taping me struggle to get out. Finally, my friend Scot came over and pulled me through. It was absolutely hilarious, and it is a moment I won’t forget anytime soon.
That night, once back at the hotel, Trudy, Derick, and I went out to find a Mos Burger. It was past 10pm, so we ended up not being able to find it. Since we were still hungry, we ended up resorting to eating McDonald’s. I got a Filet-o-Fish meal, and it tasted so good! It was the first taste from the U.S. I have distinctly had since arriving in Japan. The greasiness of the burger and fries somewhat upset my stomach, but it was all okay in the end. I finished the night with doing two pages of Japanese homework for tomorrow morning and completing a presentation for my architecture studio class also due tomorrow. This was a busy and very exhausting day!