Day with Aya and Heian Shrine
Today I met another of my japan-guide friends, Aya. I met her at the bus stop at 2 and then she came over to my house briefly and gave me cakes that her little sister made and then we decided to go to Qanat, a huge department store about a ten minute walk from my house. This place is seriously awesome. We looked around at everything and then had Starbucks frappucinos. I also bought pineapple Mentos. They are amazing.
There's a huge manga and game store, some stores with Western sized clothing, a supermarket, a foreign food section and more. Completely awesome. I will have to make sure I never bring a lot of money with me when I go.
I mentioned to her that I needed some Kyoto postcards, so after a bit of thinking, we decided to head down to the Kyoto Handicrafts Center. I can take the 206 bus to Kamo-Jinja-Mae to get there (for my future reference). I found a holder for my hanko (my name stamper), a non-girly change holder for Teddy, which was amazingly hard to find (he hates putting coins in his wallet, but everything under 1000 yen is a coin, so I thought he'd want a change thingy), a Christmas present for Aiden (that he probably can't use right away, but Steph specifically asked me to get this for him) and a keychain for Ricki, because she has a rule that if I go somewhere that she doesn't have a keychain for, I need to get her one. I also got my postcards.
After that, we walked over to Heian Shrine. It was beautiful! I have pictures:
The gate:
A statue (maybe a guardian?):
One of the buildings:
I think you throw coins in here:
Detail of the railing:
The eaves of one of the buildings:
Another building:
Another:
The other statue:
The torii:
Me and Aya. She's so tiny!
After visiting the shrine, she walked me to the bus stop and then I came home (about 6:30). I'm proud to say that we spoke in only Japanese except for saying hi at the beginning and bye at the end. :D She said that next time, Teddy and I can come over and that maybe we can go to Gion together! :)
There's a huge manga and game store, some stores with Western sized clothing, a supermarket, a foreign food section and more. Completely awesome. I will have to make sure I never bring a lot of money with me when I go.
I mentioned to her that I needed some Kyoto postcards, so after a bit of thinking, we decided to head down to the Kyoto Handicrafts Center. I can take the 206 bus to Kamo-Jinja-Mae to get there (for my future reference). I found a holder for my hanko (my name stamper), a non-girly change holder for Teddy, which was amazingly hard to find (he hates putting coins in his wallet, but everything under 1000 yen is a coin, so I thought he'd want a change thingy), a Christmas present for Aiden (that he probably can't use right away, but Steph specifically asked me to get this for him) and a keychain for Ricki, because she has a rule that if I go somewhere that she doesn't have a keychain for, I need to get her one. I also got my postcards.
After that, we walked over to Heian Shrine. It was beautiful! I have pictures:
The gate:
A statue (maybe a guardian?):
One of the buildings:
I think you throw coins in here:
Detail of the railing:
The eaves of one of the buildings:
Another building:
Another:
The other statue:
The torii:
Me and Aya. She's so tiny!
After visiting the shrine, she walked me to the bus stop and then I came home (about 6:30). I'm proud to say that we spoke in only Japanese except for saying hi at the beginning and bye at the end. :D She said that next time, Teddy and I can come over and that maybe we can go to Gion together! :)