Coffee Pasta Curry Sandwiches!

The next day we went to see the Golden Pavilion, a UNESCO World Heritage site. It was a beautiful, peaceful Buddhist temple, minus the thousands of Japanese tourists. They did provide entertainment of course. We were once again interviewed by a group of students on a field trip, this time, boys. Much different than the girls. No giggling and no smiling in the picture.

Afterward, we headed off to Pontocho-dori where the Geisha theater was. Of course, we just happened to be in Japan the one month out of the year there are performances by geisha. So we first attended the tea ceremony. Since we weren't quite dressed for the occasion (we in shorts and T-shirts and everyone else in nice summer dresses/business casual) we sat in the back. This was also a good spot because it allowed us to keep an eye on what was appropriate behavior (should we bow? should we drink now? should we eat now? etc.) and it conveniently hid us and any of our faux pas. At the end of the session, we noticed everyone's plates were gone and we had seen them turning their plates upside down and wrapping them in the placemat. So we did that, but no one came to pick it up. So I went to ask one of the waiters what I should do with the plate, but he just made a pushing away motion with his hands. Fortunately a man behind me said, "It is gift for you!" Apparently, we were allowed to KEEP our plates as "gifts." The geisha performance was a good cultural experience, but not the most lively entertainment. In fact, we counted 5 Japanese women around us sleeping. We then headed to a temple Daniel had heard had a flea market that happened every 3rd Wednesday of the month. We checked out some of the stuff, but unfortunately it was closing up.

We found the place we were staying. A 200 year-old working shrine. Essentially, we were staying in the "town church" for the evening. We had this huge room which was basically the living room of owner's home. That night I tried Japanese curry at a local fast food curry place, CoCo Curry, but was not a huge fan. We also explored a Pachinko parlor. Pachinko is like a cross between pinball and slot machines. People sit in their for HOURS. And I have no idea how they do it because it is both the loudest and smokiest place I've ever been in my life. I guess Japanese people can just handle a lot of sensory stimulation. We then walked down to the nightlife area and did some people watching and enjoyed a street performer's guitar-playing skills. On our walk, we saw a restaurant sign that said, "coffee pasta curry sandwiches." Laura and I found it hysterically funny. Since we'd walked so far, we decided to take a cab home, but the cab driver didn't speak English. The phrasebook came in VERY handy and we managed to get back to our shrine.