Last day here in Kyoto

Well, a long day today. Started out with a journey by foot to the Chion-in　temple, which is nestled into another moutainside... as in another long walk up a steep hill to get to it. The temple was very large, and we were able to witness a buddhist ceremony in progress. The monks all processed in, and they sat in a line on the side of the room in the order of their rank. The abbot (most senior monk) then led the prayers, with the other monks and the laypeople responding, and then answering. I couldn't make out any of their japanese, but then again, i can't understand any sung japanese, and little sung english, so them's the brakes. We also traveled around to a grave site (where the man who made the front gate project run over budget and come two months late committed seppiku, along with his wife for their shame), and a painting of a cat whos eyes seemed to follow you no matter what angle you stand at. We saw the oil umbrella in the roof that the builder left there to ward against fire (since umbrellas are supposed to call for rain, the temple has never burnt down) and we saw the large rock, 25 small rocks, and azealia bushes where the Buddha and 25 bodhisattvas came down from heaven to absolve the sins of the people of Kyoto (this was explained in japanese to me by a monk who was walking down the hallway in the other direction and decided we should know this story).After we left the temple complex, we took a cab to the museum of Kyoto, where we saw a special exhibit about the shinsen gumi. the shinsen gumi were samurai retainers of the Shogunate, formed in response to the ronin who were part of the anti shogunate movement in the 1860's era of japan. They were modern troops, with a mix of cannon, matchlock rifle, swordsmen, and pikes. They defeated the head of the anti-shogunate plotters by ambushing an inn late one night in the middle of a meeting (and killing almost all the plotters) and were later used when the Shogunate had a civil war with the emporer. They were officially disbanded when the Shogun handed power over the Emporer Meji, who then led japan through a period of modernization )and this is when the counterrevolution was held, and the traditional samurai, ala Tom Cruise's movie, came into play). The rest of the museum was fairly boring, some small collections of art work and items that were seen as part of Kyoto's history. Next we went to Gion Courner, and saw several traditional japanese entertainment forms. The first was a tea ceremony, then some women playing the koto (a 13 stringed instrument, much simular to a guitar on the floor, with handpicks), and some ikebana (flower) arrangement. We heard a musical piece from the court form (Gagaku) with a dancer, who both, in turn, sucked. The next bit was amazing, a Kyogen play (comical twin to the traditional Noh plays). The plot line ran something like this: the japanese lord was going away, and he knew that his two servents would most likely get into his precious sake if he left them alone. So through various tricks he ties both of their hands up. One behind the back, one with arms out tied to a pole. he then leaves on his trip. The guy with the pole figures that he is still able to open up the sake place, reach with a bowl to get the sake, and at least feed his friend. But he can't give himself the sake because his hands are too far away, so he give a full bowl to the guy with his hands behind his back, who stands, and they both get very drunk. The lord comes back and sees that they're drunk, and stands so that his reflection can be seen in the sake bowl. Both of the men just think they're drunk, but are unnerved. The lord eventually makes himself known and they all three go running off. I do a terrible job retelling it, but even understanding little to none of what they were saying, it was very funny. The next art form was a geisha girl dancing in the Kyomai style (a kyoto style dance) that was meant to be preformed in small spaces (she really only needed a 5x5 space at most). The last thing we saw was a Bunraku, or puppet play, which was masterfully done, though it did need three men to one puppet. I met a woman from Denmark while I was at this art preformance, and we talked for a long while: she used to work as an architect in tovoli gardens but was now traveling the world. Very interesting, and I got some good tips on hotels. The next event was another tip of hers, that there's a festivle starting tomorrow here (when we leave of course) and that we should head over to the other side of the river. There we were in a blocked off area that must have had 20,000 people in it, and we (my sister and I at this point) saw many different cultural things: a puppeteer in the street, a childrens orchestra working on a parade float etc. but the coolest thing was a Japanese drum band. If you've never seen it, it's something like this: there are a series of small percussion instruments, blocks, chimes, symboles, etc. and there's one very large bass drums and several medium sized drums. All of the drummers (there are about 10 total) have two thick wooden sticks, and they strike the drums in various beats. The thing of it is that the sticks and drums are so large that they have to take turns hitting the big ones, and they rotate through. The drums are also hit in a highly stylized mannor... which I guess will be hard to put into words, but it was one of the top three things that I wanted to see coming here to japan and it was awesome to see it. I got my picture taken with them at the end, very cool. Well, that's all (I know, gasp! shock! all?) for tonight, tomorrow it's on to Kobe... the home of Kobe beef, said to be the finest steak in the world... I'll let y'all know how that goes. -J