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Deep Kyoto: Walks Paperback Edition Now Available

November 27, 2020 By Michael Lambe

This is a delightful collection of essays written by a diverse group of writers who share an obvious and contagious affection for Kyoto.
– Matthew Stavros (Author: “Kyoto: An Urban History of Japan’s Premodern Capital ”)

I am delighted to annouce the release of Deep Kyoto: Walks as a paperback edition. This is a print on demand (POD) edition and has been independently produced via Amazon’s Direct Publishing service. Here are the details:

Deep Kyoto: Walks
Publisher: Deep Kyoto
ISBN: 979-8561499616
Price: $15.99 / ¥1,840
Available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.jp, and Amazon.co.uk

Editors: Michael Lambe & Ted Taylor
Authors: Jennifer Louise Teeter, Bridget Scott, Miki Matsumoto, Robert Yellin, Pico Iyer, Chris Rowthorn, John Dougill, John Ashburne, Stephen Henry Gill, Sanborn Brown, Joel Stewart, Izumi Texidor-Hirai, Perrin Lindelauf and Judith Clancy.

Here’s the official blurb:

An anthology of 18 meditative strolls in Japan’s ancient capital, Deep Kyoto: Walks is both a tribute to life in the city of “Purple Hills and Crystal Streams”, and a testament to the art of contemplative city walking. In a series of rambles that express each writer’s intimate relationship with the city, they take you not only to the most famous shrines and temples, but also to those backstreets of memory where personal history and the greater story of the city intersect. Join Pico Iyer, Judith Clancy, Chris Rowthorn, John Dougill, Robert Yellin, John Ashburne and more as they explore markets and mountains, bars and gardens, palaces and pagodas and show us Kyoto afresh through the eyes of those who call it “home”. Included are:

  • 18 walks
  • 17 photographic illustrations
  • A specially commissioned woodblock print by Richard Steiner
  • 12 detailed maps
  • Cover Art by internationally acclaimed artist Sarah Brayer

The e-book edition of Deep Kyoto: Walks has been available since 2014 and has received many fine reviews. The text of the new paperback is essentially the same as that of the e-book, but some typos and errors present in the digital text have now been corrected for the print edition. In addition, while the text of the e-book includes color photographs, this was not possible for the paperback which is in black and white. Happily, all the photographs have turned out very well in black and white and the paperback also has one extra image (courtesy of Ted Taylor). Moreover, the glorious cover by Yutaka Nakayama is still in color, and Richard Steiner’s “Abiding” print is also reproduced in color on the back cover.

The completion of this project is due in large part to the tireless work of our designer and technical maestro Rick Elizaga to whom I offer my eternal gratitude. Many thanks also to all the contributors for taking part in this project and making this a very splendid book! Order now to get it on time for Christmas!



Kyoto Botanical Gardens by Izumi Texidor Hirai

February 5, 2015 By Michael Lambe

Pond (Medium)
Image © Izumi Texidor Hirai

In this post we have a special excerpt from Deep Kyoto: Walks written by Izumi Texidor Hirai. In her walk through the Botanical Gardens, Izumi weaves personal recollection with finely observed details of life in the gardens as they pass through the four seasons. Let today’s excerpt from Izumi’s walk serve as a happy reminder of all the special seasonal joys that the year ahead has in store.

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The Botanical Gardens
IZUMI TEXIDOR HIRAI

The Rose Garden is my favourite part, like stepping into an English garden. A couple of tables shaded under tall trees, roses blooming in every colour I can imagine, grass and gravel under my feet, and then Mount Hiei quietly standing there at the end. Before I notice it, my steps have become smaller and slower. My eyes want to look at all those roses, every single one of them, and my lungs want to breathe in as much of their aroma as they can. In full bloom, this garden is spectacular and many people gather here to take quick photos or to slowly sketch their favourite bloom. However, I quite like it around November, on a cool, rainy day. I like the smell of wet earth and the rain drops on the flowers and on the leaves, and I like to see Mount Hiei mysteriously surrounded by grey clouds. I like that there is no one around and all I can hear is the continuous whispering of rain. I wonder if it sounds the same down here amongst the roses, as up there, at the top of Mount Hiei. In the spring, I will sometimes sit at one of the tables under the big pine trees and read or study. It is one of those special places where time stops as people come and go.

Now I have had my fill of roses, I want to explore the rest of the place, so I stand up, leave the Rose Garden behind and head north. Depending on the time of year, I will see camellias, or irises coming out of a lotus pond, or big hydrangeas if it is June. The lotus pond has an interesting bridge that often reminds me of classic Japanese novels. It is not a straight bridge or even a typical slightly elevated bridge, it goes right and left, and then right and left again, making you understand that the point is not to go from here to the other side, but to walk slowly and look around, maybe even stop a couple of times and enjoy a certain spot. When I get off the bridge, I start walking freely, no longer really having any direction in mind. All that zig-zagging. Wherever I go, I am always shaded by big old trees that must have seen a hundred years go by. There are more than twelve thousand species of plants and trees in these gardens, and birds live in some of these trees. I have often seen bird watchers with the latest cameras, moving silently in groups and taking fast snaps. Like modern ninjas.

Picture 14 Bridge by Izumi Texidor Hirai (Medium)
Image © Izumi Texidor Hirai

Then the sound of bamboo makes me slow down again. It is not a big forest, like the famous bamboo forests that people visit in other parts of Kyoto, yet still bamboo has this way of standing there, strong yet soft, that always transmits depth. At least it always makes me have deep thoughts. I think of how graceful the bamboo shoots look, but how strongly rooted they are to the earth, and how fast they separate from it, to grow higher and higher, while their roots go deeper and deeper, in a constant yet invisible effort to live. And then there is that sound. The wind finding its way through the shoots and the leaves. And the shoots and the leaves moving together with the wind, being flexible, but never bending, always going back to their straightness. It makes me think of how I want to be.

Still half lost inside my green thoughts, I continue my stroll. If I go north, I will see a big fountain that makes kids happy during the summer months, and just next to it, an area with all sorts of seasonal flowers. I like walking in there, not only because of the colours and all the flowers I never knew existed, but also to feel the effort that someone put into that seasonal garden. This is something that I have always admired in Kyoto, the effort people put into their tiny entrances, filling them with small pots neatly cared for. These minuscule urban gardens make such a big difference. A small effort will surely always make a difference.

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Text and photographs by Izumi Texidor Hirai. To read the rest of this story, you can order the anthology Deep Kyoto: Walks as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.jp, or Amazon.co.uk.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Izumi Texidor Hirai

photoIzumi Texidor-Hirai is half Japanese and half British, but born and raised in Barcelona. She first came to Japan in 1998 to study at Tokyo University. After many travels she returned to Japan to work for FIFA during the 2002 Japan/Korea World Cup. She decided to stay on after the event and moved to Kyoto, where her family have roots. Izumi had always admired kimono and took this chance to go to a kimono school, where she trained to become a kimono teacher. This course led her to the world of cha-no-yu (tea ceremony) which has since become her passion. Izumi is currently working towards a degree in Traditional Chinese Medicine, studying QiGong with a sensei in the Imperial Palace grounds, wearing kimono most days and continues to be very passionate about cha-no-yu.

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Kōtō-in – An Excerpt from “Deep Kyoto: Walks” by Joel Stewart

December 15, 2014 By Michael Lambe

This month’s extract from Deep Kyoto: Walks is taken from a very fine ramble by the artist Joel Stewart, titled “In Praise of Uro Uro”. Uro uro is a Japanese expression for aimless wandering.

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Kōtō-in by Joel Stewart

I really don’t think much needs be said here about Kōtō-in, other than it’s a real escape from the city, right in the city. And beside all the interesting history you can find about this place, I think essentially, its purpose hasn’t changed that simple fact. It is, by design, a perfect example of understatement; a deceptively simple and brilliant combination of layout and materials meant to change your awareness and heighten your senses, starting as you make your way in. Highly calculated without it seeming to be so at all, Kōtō-in is refreshing and cleansing.

One of my favorite tricks for people visiting from abroad is to send them first to Kinkakuji, the Golden Pavilion, with all its over-the-top no expense spared attitude broadcasting loudly, its crowds and, yes, all that gold. Once done with that, bring them here to Kōtō-in’s less traveled, quieter, more inward-looking space, to show the other end of the spectrum of the Japanese aesthetic-meets-spirit equation. Kōtō-in still functions as a place of respite and refuge…

The entry way alone is worth the price of admission: several scenes are framed in succession as you go in, each frame helping you shed one more layer of the city behind you, and by the time you make it to the veranda overlooking the garden, you are lost in love and have forgotten why. You’ve been set up. Today, like before, I make my way in my socks to the veranda and sit. And sit some more. Bamboo high above, a vast carpet of moss below, and thread-like layers of maples in between. Silent except for the leaves rustling above and a bit of conversation by the couple beside me. In the center of the garden stands a craggy old stone lantern acting as a lone sentry. This scene is rich with the barest minimum. I feel no hurry, and since it is always so hard to leave, I just wait until my butt tells me it’s time to get up. Some places are just conducive to the simple act of observation… and letting the mind wander.

On the opposite side is the teahouse known as Shoko-ken, designed by one of Sen no Rikyu’s disciples, Tadaoki Hosokawa (who also happened to be the samurai warrior-cum-daimyo apparently responsible for Kōtō-in itself). It’s worth a visit just to scratch your head…..”What is ALL the fuss about these teahouses?…It’s SO DARK, mumble, mumble, etc…”. And yet. If you sit there a bit, let your eyes adjust, details start to emerge. I check out the stained earthen walls, the textures and planes, and note the hushed outside world. Everything but the absolute essential is removed from this space, for the guest who is about to receive tea. Senses are honed by what is there, and equally so, by what is absent. It’s sort of like blindfolding someone and placing an ice cube in their hand.

Time passes and my accustomed eyes see how the tokonoma and shoji window are placed in relation to each other so that the filtered light comes in at a diagonal and softly illuminates the base of the alcove like a subtle spotlight. Imagine what a single flower in season would look like in a rustic, hand-molded vase right next to you as the tea master passes you a warm frothing bowl of tea out of the shadows… Cool stuff to ponder in the darkened silence here.

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Text & photograph by Joel Stewart. To read the rest of this story, order or download our book here: Deep Kyoto:Walks.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Joel Stewart
joelJoel Stewart is an American artist from Washington State who has resided in Kyoto since 1986. His work is in the permanent collections of several US museums and can be seen online at both “Joel Stewart Art” on Facebook and www.joelstewartart.com.

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Up & Down the Ki’ – Two Extracts from Deep Kyoto: Walks by Michael Lambe

November 19, 2014 By Michael Lambe

This month we have two extracts from Deep Kyoto: Walks. Both are from my own piece on a musical tour of Kiyamachi bars conducted by my good friends Mark (Max) Dodds and Ryotaro Sudo in late November last year. On Saturday November 29th 2014 Max and Ryotaro will again perform this tour for the tenth and final time, so a couple of short excerpts from my account seemed timely. In the following passage we have reached Tadg’s bar, and the musicians and the audience are all having a splendid time when suddenly a song of Max’s induces a mood of wistful reverie…

kiya

Two extracts from Up & Down the Ki’
A Musical Tour of Kiyamachi & Pontocho with Mark Dodds & Ryotaro Sudo
by MICHAEL LAMBE

…There are a small group playing Irish music as the rest of our party arrives and Max and I, in honour of our roots, dance a little faux jig as they play. Max manages to persuade the fiddle player Peter Damashek to join himself, Ryotaro and four members of another local band, Dodo, who are due to join them for a full band experience: one fiddle, two guitars, an accordion, bass and two percussionists. This is going to be good.

The magnificent seven raise their glasses in a mutual toast and then play for us a spirited set that is one of the highlights of the night, starting appropriately with a Pogues number before moving onto Max’s originals. Everyone is dancing now, and laughing, the musicians are smiling as they play and Tadg himself happily taking pictures is absolutely beaming. I suddenly feel rather moved at the scene before me, for it doesn’t feel like a show as such but a big family gathering. And then they play Max’s “Glory Be”. I absolutely adore this song: on the surface it is a toast to a loving relationship that has yet outlasted life’s trials and turmoils and with that in mind, I feel a pang for my own girl Miu, remembering that time we swayed to this song together just a year ago.

Babe you know who I am
Without needing to understand
I am just a grain of sand…

As the day winds down the night winds up
And we will share a loving cup
Of the sacramental wine

Tonight though, there’s something else, I feel like the song is also a serenade to this old town and the people in it and that the band is raising a loving cup to us all.

Every soul will be delivered
Somewhere up or down this deep, dark river
Every drop of rain, every grain of sand…

And so another memorable night at Tadg’s draws to a close, and Lawrence and I head over to Urbanguild ahead of the others, as Lawrence says, “to get the pints in”…

In this second extract we have now reached Urbanguild and things are about to get wild!

…It’s well after eleven for we are running late and whatever performances Urbanguild had tonight have now finished, but the audience and performers are unaware that Max and Ryotaro are about to treat them to some indoor busking. Back in Tadg’s, Ryotaro was talking about “having a rest” and playing a few quiet songs outside by the elevator. But they don’t do that. And they don’t set up their gear on the stage either, but in the middle of the floor between the wooden benches. As the onlookers gather round in a smiling but curious half-circle, our rebel rockers commence to play. Lawrence pulls out a harmonica and joins them in his shy way, diffidently floating round the edges. He clearly hasn’t got enough pints in yet. But Max has, or he’s simply high on the music, hunched over his guitar and leaning into the mic, singing “Stone Cold Blind!” with a passion. As for Ryotaro, he is on fire, strutting about, teasing his audience with wild flourishes of the accordion bellows. The musicians are clearly enjoying themselves and their enthusiasm is infectious as the audience responds with appreciative whoops and cheers. This is the second high point of the night. And as they replay Circus of the Sun, the song takes on a new tone, and the blessed freedom they sing of seems both proud and ecstatic…

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Text, photograph and second video by Michael Lambe. Glory Be video by John Wells. Original song lyrics by Mark Dodds. To read the rest of this story, download our book here: Deep Kyoto:Walks.

To follow the tRace elements musical tour of Kiyamachi one last time click here: The 10th & Final Kiyamachi Tour.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About-Michael-Lambe-256x300About Michael Lambe
Michael Lambe is from Middlesbrough in the North East of England. He moved to Japan in 1997 and has lived, worked and studied in Fukushima, Saitama, Tokyo and Kyoto. He has been writing the Deep Kyoto blog since 2007 and doing odd jobs for Kyoto Journal since 2009. He is the Chief Editor of the Deep Kyoto: Walks anthology and has written articles for Japan Today, Morning Calm, and Simple Things magazine.

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To learn more about Deep Kyoto: Walks please check the following links:
About the Book
Extracts
Reviews
Videos
Interviews

Not Sure Which Way to Go – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by Robert Yellin

October 3, 2014 By Michael Lambe

In this extract from Deep Kyoto: Walks, Robert Yellin encourages us to seek chance and adventure along the Path of Philosophy…

IMG_0093-1 (Medium)
The Philosopher’s Path – Photograph by Robert Yellin

Not Sure Which Way to Go
Let’s Get Lost on the Philosopher’s Path!
ROBERT YELLIN

One autumn twilight moment I was standing on a small bridge overlooking the Philosopher’s Path’s canal and saw a young couple staring at a map, eyes flittering over the horizon and at each other, each looking to the other for direction, it obvious that neither knew where they were, except that they were on the Path of Philosophy! The guy trying to act like he knew what to do said, “That’s the direction we should go, no wait, let’s head that way!” The girl, in all her feminine wisdom replied, ‘Let’s get lost!” Yes, I thought, that’s what one should do on Philosopher’s Path, get lost and discover.

The Philosopher’s Path or Tetsugaku no Michi in Japanese, stirs up such grandeur in its lofty name that one might even expect to be enlightened somewhere along the way. Some may hit that satori state along the path, as when Ikkyu in 1420 heard a crow not far off the path and got it! And that’s the beauty of this fabled Kyoto walk. It’s not only what one discovers on the paved canal-lined stretch; it’s what one encounters when they step off the guided way. After all a path is a great metaphor for life itself, getting lost often brings the greatest discoveries within and without. Getting lost—and finding oneself—on the Philosopher’s Path: what a grand way to spend a day in Kyoto.

Michi (also read as dō) means not only path or road, but also means ‘The Way’ in Japanese. It is not only an integral part of the essence of the Philosopher’s Path or The Path of Philosophy, but can also be found in many names of Japan’s great martial and cultural arts, such as Budo or Chado. Each person’s ‘michi’ will never be the same as anyone else’s and again is a great metaphor for each step taken along this most quaint stroll.

Where to take the first step? Most start from the ‘Tetsugaku no Michi’ signboard that hugs the corner of Imadegawa and Shirakawa streets diagonally across the way from the signboard with the dancing Octopus. Walking east along this entrance one can see Daimonji in the distance with its trapezoidal deforested area where cut lines can be sensed; those lines form the kanji character for Dai—or Large—and a huge bonfire is set alit each August 16th in that form to guide souls back to the otherworld. A fitting view for the first few steps on the path as Daimonji has seen millions of tourists and pilgrims start from the same spot and the mountain never knows where each unique journey on the path will end.

For me I start the path with maybe one or two spots on my list to visit and then let intuition take over. Of course, walking straight along Imadegawa and heading towards the Silver Pavilion one will pass many shops such as a cheap, delicious Japanese eatery next to a coffee shop with a big Teddy bear that has been sitting at the counter since the 60’s; a Michelin-starred restaurant; an open-air Italian spread; the estate and museum of the famed Nihonga painter Hashimoto Kansetsu (1883–1945); and of course countless vendors selling traditional Kyoto staples. The Silver Pavilion is of course a must visit and best at opening or before closing, if those times are possible. Here, so much of Japanese culture crystallized in the 15th century in what is known as the Higashiyama Bunka or Eastern Mountain Culture. Based on the illusive aesthetic ideals of wabi-sabi, Higashiyama Bunka under the guidance of the Silver Pavilion’s retired Shōgun Ashikaga Yoshimasa directed new developments for such famed Japanese arts such as the Tea Ceremony, Flower Arrangement, Noh Drama and Calligraphy. Living itself changed for the elite with the introduction of the ‘Japanese room’ or washitsu.

Bordering the mountains and in Yoshimasa’s time quite inaccessible from the city, the location was chosen for the quiet contemplation of life, nature and man’s fleeting position between the two; surely Yoshimasa would approve that one major stop on the Philosopher’s Path is his subdued ‘palace’ surrounded by his moon-viewing sand cone (resembling Mt.Fuji) and his exquisite garden. Get lost in time.

A noticeable shift in the air occurs a few minutes’ walk from the Silver Pavilion, passing by rows of ordinary homes (not on the Philosopher’s Path, part of the Getting Lost Path) heading south when the trees of Hōnen-in Temple appear. It strikes the senses immediately, the crispness of the air and the ionic air change in energy, the smell, the tingle. There are magical spots all around Kyoto, many to be found along and nearby the Philosopher’s Path, yet none is as serene as Hōnen-in. It’s one of Kyoto’s hidden gems.

Hōnen (1133-1212) was an extremely important Buddhist figure and the temple bears his name. Once, I stood enraptured for many minutes before a hanging scroll depicting Hōnen; a simple portrait it was, yet never before have I seen a face so full of compassion, light, and sheer contentment. That same energy fills the space of Hōnen-in. Walk up the stone steps from sunlit lightness into a moody shaded grove and in the distance is The Gate. Beaming from its open wooden doors is a radiant light that is heavenly. The stone path leading to the thatched gate is uneven, for a reason. You’ll figure it out.

A gate is always another metaphor in Japan, passing from one world to the next, from the mundane daily existence to a silky world of divinity and beauty. There are always two long rectangular sand mounds upon descending the other side of the Hōnen gate where a theme of water is always seen. These are called Byakusadan. The message from Byakusadan is that you walk between the two mounds in order to ‘use’ the water to cleanse your body, mind and spirit. Next, wander about the very small compound and you might even find a small block that says, ‘Listen, Think, Accept, Practice, Believe’—but not necessarily in that order. I believed once that if I left my new bicycle unlocked at Hōnen-in in the height of the autumn tourist season that it would still be there when I returned. It was.

Picture 5 Honen-in by Robert Yellin (Medium)
Hōnen-in by Robert Yellin

Hōnen-in is not a tourist place to see things per se, but a space to feel, to sense the magic of shadows and light, man entwined with nature, the ‘now’ connected to all time. My brother visited once and was amazed at the ‘quality of the silence’ and noted that silence is not simply the absence of noise. There’s a vibration to silence that one can sense. Maybe it’s the spirit of Hōnen himself.

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Text and photographs by Robert Yellin. All rights reserved. To read the rest of this story, order the book Deep Kyoto:Walks.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake. Deep Kyoto: Walks is available as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.jp.

About Robert Yellin
Robert YellinRobert Yellin is an American Japanese ceramics specialist who has resided in Japan since 1984. He writes regularly on Japanese ceramics in numerous publications. For ten years he wrote the “Ceramic Scene” column for the Japan Times, the largest English newspaper in Japan. His articles have also appeared in Daruma magazine, WINDS magazine, Ceramics Art & Perception, and Asian Art Newspaper. Robert is the author of Yakimono Sanka published by Kogei Shuppan, a book about sake utensils which was later translated into English under the title Ode to Pottery, Sake Cups and Flasks. He is a member of the Japan Ceramics Society (Nihon Toji Kyokai) and his articles have appeared in its monthly publication Tohsetsu.
Robert owns and runs Robert Yellin Yakimono Gallery in Kyoto in addition to an informational website: www.e-yakimono.net, and an online Japanese ceramic art gallery: www.japanesepottery.com. Robert is available to give lectures and lead tours dealing with Japanese ceramics.

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See also: Deep Kyoto Walks Movie: “Not Sure Which Way to Go” with Robert Yellin

Time Travelling on Gojō – An Extract from Deep Kyoto Walks by Jennifer Louise Teeter

August 6, 2014 By Michael Lambe

Gojo Pottery Fair - Click to visit the official site (Japanese)
Gojō Pottery Fair – Click to visit the official site (Japanese)

Gojō Pottery Fair, in which pottery stalls line Gojō street all the way between Kawabata and Higashioji, begins August 7th and continues to August 10th. Simultaneously, in nearby Rokudo-san temple, is Kyoto’s very own festival of the dead, the Rokudo Mairi spirit welcoming festival. Jen Teeter explores both of these events and more in her DKW essay “Time Travelling on Gojō”, so here’s an excerpt to whet your appetite…

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The evening before the festival, potters were meticulously assembling their stalls. Incorrectly, I assumed they were only preparing the skeletons of their tents and shelves so that they could quickly fill them up with their inventory the following morning. When I stepped outside again around midnight, hundreds of unguarded stalls, all filled to the brim with precious pottery, bordered the expanse of Gojō. The sense of trust that people can have for each other here can be so uplifting.

When I set off early the next day, the normally drab pavement had been transformed into a bustling pottery-lover’s paradise. Upon approaching a stall selling clay incense holders, I was astonished at how a piece that was surely worth 5000 yen was going for a mere 1000. The artisan explained how potters looking to clean out their inventories for the next season are willing to part with their creations for a fraction of the original price.

On a mission, I began to weave my way through rows of crystalline Kiyomizu-yaki kettles and charming Shigaraki chawan. My husband had been looking for large ramen bowls for ages, and I found the perfect ones- leaf-shaped and earth-rusted, the sparkling, aquamarine waves of Okinawa flooding the inside.

“If I buy four big ones and four small ones, can I get a discount?”
“No, but I can give you these four sauce holders to complete your set.”

Score! After collecting my winnings, I carried on up Gojō-zaka. At a small side street called Kaneicho, I took a right and it was just as if I had slipped through the rabbit’s hole. Amidst the forgetful cityscape, there stood the wooden self-built home of master potter Kawai Kanjirō.

Kawai Kanjiro's House
Kawai Kanjiro’s House

The unassuming home dressed with an arched, bamboo inuyarai to keep dogs from relieving themselves on the walls, was the first of a whole street of renovated machiya. Two unpretentious wooden rabbits kissing at the front entrance greeted me as I ducked in. Making my way down the hallway, I clumsily took off my shoes, and gave 900 yen to the woman at the counter, who I would later learn was the granddaughter of Kawai.

Wabi and Sabi:
The beauty of poverty,
Ordered poverty.

Kawai’s haiku radiates his artistry and appreciation of wabi – beauty in poverty, and sabi – elegance in simplicity, emphasizing the intertwining of the human spirit with the imperfection of “perfect” nature. The chestnut walls and chairs of his sturdy house give a sense of permanence, reflecting the strong influence of Kawai on his environment.

My eyes immediately turned to the hearth that dominated the center of the home. An image sprung to mind of Kawai and his fellow artisans gathering around the fire for tea on a frosty, winter day. Exemplifying his ability to lure the extraordinary out of the ordinary, Kawai had concocted the stout chairs around the hearth out of wooden mortars for pounding rice. Next to the hearth was a jolly two-faced wooden statue, and as I continued around the first floor, I kept meeting its Janus-faced relatives hidden in corners here and there. One of them was even posed to give me a peck on the cheek.

Around the house curious items are present in unexpected places. In the courtyard, a miniature stone monk collects meager offerings in front of his person, while a dog-sized, beckoning, stone cat balancing coins on its head welcomes guests at the entrance to the giant kilns. These kilns were once fired up several times monthly and shared by twenty different families in the community.

Kawai seemed to have an affinity for the human hand, the female hand in particular. A hand, which must have been severed off of the Statue of Liberty, adorned one of the shelves near the kilns; there were hands with fingers pointing up; and others were holding flowers. A turquoise ceramic figure, with its rising index finger, seemed to embody the potential of human expression.

Returning back inside, I climbed up to the second floor to find a yet another statue of two rabbits kissing, this time cast in bronze. In the drawing room was a giant tree stump-turned-table, its surfaced smoothed by human touch. Two wooden chairs with seats carved perfectly to support the human buttocks, kept the table company. The vitality of the tree from which this chair was forged emanated from the swirly tree rings carefully positioned exactly where the left and right buttocks hit the seat. After a momentary break in the chair, I headed back downstairs.

After bidding farewell to the granddaughter and the spirit of Kawai whose presence reverberated through the home, I headed to Toyokuni Jinja, dedicated to daimyo Toyotomi Hideyoshi . Taking a left I followed the street lined with pottery-filled machiya, passed the stone with the “Don’t pee on me” sign, and turned right at the dilapidated machiya at the end of the row. Down the hill at the next intersection adorned with cigarette machines, I headed south until I arrived at the wall which forms an impressive, stone perimeter around Toyokuni Shrine. Covered with moss, and almost twice my height, I could not imagine how people had managed to schlep the Goliath stones to the temple, let alone assemble them as if they had been forged together by fire. As I was about to ascend the stairs to the shrine, a huge, grassy hill crowned with a granite statue attracted my attention.

Children playing on teeter-totters ignored me as I pulled myself up to the sign in front of the hill. Mimizuka or “Ear Hill” (originally Hanazuka or “Nose Hill”). What on earth could that mean?

Mimizuka
Mimizuka

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Text and photographs by Jennifer Louise Teeter. To read the rest of this story, download our book here: Deep Kyoto:Walks.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Jennifer Louise Teeter
jen teeterJennifer Louise Teeter is lecturer at Kyoto University in Japan. Born in a suburb of Chicago and having lived in Japan for 12 years, she serves as the Media and Campaigns Coordinator for Greenheart Project which is developing an open source hybrid sail/solar cargo ship tailored to the needs of small island developing states while volunteering as an editor for the Heartwork section of Kyoto Journal (www.kyotojournal.org). She blogs with two other women at Ten Thousand Things (www.tenthousandthingsfromkyoto.blogspot.jp). She is also a “singer in a rock-and-roll band,” called the Meadowlarks.

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To learn more about Deep Kyoto: Walks please check the following links:
About the Book
Extracts
Reviews
Videos
Interviews

Hiking Mount Atago – An Extract from Deep Kyoto Walks by Sanborn Brown

July 28, 2014 By Michael Lambe

atago
Today’s post is an extract from Hiking Mount Atago by Sanborn Brown in which he details his participation in the annual Sennichi Tsuyasai pilgrimage to the top of Mount Atago which takes place each year on July 31st. In this excerpt from our book Deep Kyoto: Walks, Sanborn describes his ascent with an eccentric tea ceremony master, and other pilgrims, to the top of Mount Atago, during this very special festival. For those who don’t know much about this festival, here’s a brief explanation from Sanborn’s excellent Cycle Kyoto site:

…on the night of July 31, Mount Atago witnesses a huge number of pilgrims. On that night, from roughly 9 pm, Mount Atago plays host to “Sennichi Tsuyasai,” a festival that is all about fire, both good and bad.

It is a holy and profound and magical night not to be missed.

The origin of the festival derives from the hope for a thousand days of flame (cooking, heating), and also for a thousand days without home-wrecking fire. From top to bottom, the hike is roughly four kilometers. Hikers gather in the village of Kiyotaki at the base of the mountain around dusk. To guide them, the city strings up lights from Kiyotaki to the very top at Atago Shrine. Families, couples, older people, and groups make the hike up a crowded and sociable affair. Once at the top, pilgrims can purchase good luck charms that are said to ward off fire and bad luck…

Picture 12 Mount Atago by Sanborn Brown (Medium)

From “Hiking Mount Atago”

From the stone steps in front of the imposing gate of Ninna-ji Temple and its two wooden Nio-san deities protecting the walled compound, a Japanese friend who calls himself Amigo and I head west on squeaky single-gear mamachari bikes. It is 8 pm on a sultry late July night and a bright moon lights our way. After an up-down stretch along which homebound commuters in cars speed past us, Lake Hirosawa spreads out on our right. This manmade lake was dug out around 969 C.E. so that the monks at nearby Henjō-ji Temple would have a better view. Today it is popular for bird watching, strolling its 1.3 km (almost a mile) perimeter, or paddling about in a rental boat. On our left, in the darkness, the smell of farm fields is pungent. We continue on to the northern outskirts of Arashiyama. Panting our way up a narrow bumpy slope lined by traditional homes and buildings, we park beyond Adashino Nenbutsu Temple (once a dumping ground for corpses) in a bike lot set up every year on this one evening. The barely lit tree-covered lot is manned by a lone uniformed guard in reflective gear, and is already filled with hundreds of bikes.

From there, it is a fifteen-minute walk up and over a hill on an old mountain road. Normally, pedestrians and cyclists are allowed to make a white-knuckle trip through the 500-meter long single-lane tunnel once used by trains. On this night however only vehicles are permitted to enter. We are already coated in a sheen of sweat when we reach the top. In the distance below us, at the opposite end of the tunnel, there is lighting and people are milling about in hiking gear; some have finished, others like us are about to set out.

Kiyotaki

Here, at the foot of Mount Atago, we find our party waiting in front of the Toenkyo Bashi (“Monkey Crossing Bridge”) that spans the Kiyotaki River. Fellow pilgrims, they will hike with us to the top of the mountain tonight, returning in the early hours of the following morning. Like Amigo, they are all learning sado, the Japanese tea ceremony. After short introductions, the group forms a circle, and in the center our leader – the rotund, elephant-kneed, and blustery tea Sensei – does a quick head count. All incline toward him toward him; then, on his command, we set off.

Having proceeded 20 meters, Sensei calls us to an abrupt halt in the middle of the bridge that will take us into the village of Kiyotaki. We have to check for the legendary Japanese giant salamander, which is said to inhabit the cool and clear waters of the river below. Sensei gives a brief talk on the creatures while we peer into the darkness below…

…After the brief lecture concludes, followed by a thirty-second scan of the dark waters below for a possible sighting of one of the reticent nocturnal giants, Sensei orders us onward, “Let’s go, let’s go! We’ll find one on the way down.”

Sensei wobbles on in front, his two wooden hiking sticks flailing out on either side of his torso as we press through the village. His bulk heaves in syncopated locomotion. The village is thronged with hikers and nighttime activity, but we move through it quickly to the entrance to the trail – passing under the vermillion torii gate that signifies that we are entering holy ground – and begin the ascent of the 924-meter high mountain, the highest in Kyoto.

Sennichi Tsuyusai Festival

This nighttime trek up an ancient pilgrimage route is part of the annual Sennichi Tsuyasai festival, which is held at Atago every July 31st until the early hours of August 1st. It is a hike to the peak on which Atago Shrine sits.

Our ascent commences in the aforementioned Kiyotaki, a rural hamlet made up of an art gallery, several restaurants, and a handful of houses. On this night, a tent has been set up in the village; under it sits a cluster of firemen who will be there until morning ready to respond in the event of injury or an emergency. Kiyotaki is one of several entrances to the mountain but the main one for the festival (it is also the “male” entrance to Atago; a “female” entrance can be found near JR Hozukyō Station on the other side of the mountain). The distance to the top is marked in two ways: by Jizo statues, adorned with red bibs and spaced roughly 109 meters apart; and, more legibly, by umber-colored placards set up by the fire department. The latter breaks the hike into forty stages, and each of the forty signs has a hand-written fire prevention slogan.

“Go on ahead! Go on, go on, don’t wait for me; it will take me hours to get to the top,” barks an out of breath Sensei after the initial climb. This is the first of his many breaks along the route. “Besides, we have all night, and someone has to keep an eye out for Tengu!” The mythical Tengu, the legendary long-nosed creature in Japanese folklore, is thought to have resided at, among other locations, Atago since ancient times.

The first nineteen stages are a steady climb, busy with colorfully dressed pilgrims in every manner of hiking gear. From that point, the trail becomes less severe, even flat in places. At one rest place, near the 20th stage, we take a break. From here, the lights of Kyoto twinkle far below in the distance through an opening in the trees…

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Text and photographs by Sanborn Brown. To read the rest of this story (and learn more about giant salamanders!), you can order the anthology Deep Kyoto: Walks as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.jp, or Amazon.co.uk.


DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Sanborn Brown
Sanborn Brown teaches at Osaka Kyoiku University, and writes for www.CycleKyoto.com and www.JapanVisitor.com. He is from Philadelphia, USA, and has lived in Kyoto for more than a decade.

Author photo by Stéphane Barbery.
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Into the Tumult – An Extract from Deep Kyoto Walks by Pico Iyer on BBC Travel!

July 22, 2014 By Michael Lambe

This weeks extract from Deep Kyoto: Walks is brought to you by the BBC! We are all very pleased that BBC Travel have used a version of Pico Iyer’s article “Into the Tumult”, to launch their new Words & Wanderlust site. The version published on the BBC site differs mainly in the second half, though there are numerous small changes throughout. To read the original, buy our book!

pico iyer kyoto article for BBC

The BBC version of Pico’s article is entitled “The walk that made me love Japan” and is splendidly illustrated by wandering artist, Candace Rose Rardon. A big thank you to both Pico Iyer for his continued support for this project and also to BBC Travel for referencing our book with the article. Here is an extract:

Into the Tumult

My favourite Kyoto walk begins at a half-hidden temple called Gesshin-in ­– two-storey, white-walled, eminently missable – on a lane dominated by huge Buddhas, high towers on either side, and shops selling exquisite prints of kimonoed women and samurai warriors. It’s in the very centre of Japan’s ancient capital, between the can’t-miss sights of Maruyama Park and Sannenzaka, just next to the steps leading up to the temple known as Kodaiji.

As you stand on this narrow street, Nene-no-michi, looking west (downtown happily obscured by low bamboo fences and thickets of flowering maples), you’ll see scores of visitors surging past you, south, to climb the narrow sloping streets of Ninenzaka and Sannenzaka. Glamorous Japanese couples linking arms, foreigners with Nikons around their necks, chattering matrons and (in the daytime, at least) school groups – all are hurrying towards one of the last pilgrims’ districts in Japan, leading up to the legendary Temple of Pure Water, Kiyomizu.

Sannenzaka is golden in the late afternoon, and though it’s full of souvenir shops crammed with Hello Kitty key chains and posters made for Bieberites, though its lanterns sometimes come with outlines of Mickey Mouse’s ears on them, it’s still quite magical, with its walkways between shops selling dark blue Kiyomizu pottery, its tatami tea-rooms, the sight, as you ascend the steep paths, of slanting grey roofs extending below you towards the city. At the top, behind Kiyomizu, you come to a waterfall surrounded by hills that take you back to the world that might have been here before a soul had seen it. The temple itself was in place two centuries before the second millennium began.

But even as the crowds throng toward these postcard vistas, I recommend you move in the other direction, towards what ultimately looks like chaos. Turn right, and start walking towards the Gionkaku Tower at the end of the street, beside a modern temple. If you want to absorb Kyoto, you have to head into the clamour of downtown and find those graces that are not incidental to the place, but at its very heart. Both shopping streets and templed hills, after all, glow in the late November light with a magic-hour sharpness that deepens the blue above even as it catches the leaves whose turning speaks of coming winter and coldness and dark.

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To read the rest of this story, purchase your copy of Deep Kyoto: Walks. The book is now available as an e-book or paperback from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.jp, and Amazon.co.uk.

About Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Pico Iyer

pico-iyerAcclaimed travel writer, Pico Iyer, is the author of 15 books, including The Lady and the Monk which describes his first year in Kyoto. He has been based around Kyoto and Nara since 1987.

You can find more of his articles online at http://picoiyerjourneys.com
Follow his travels on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/PicoIyer
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This is actually not the first time Deep Kyoto has been featured by BBC Travel! See also this article from 2012: Living In: Kyoto.

Gods, Monks, Secrets, Fish – An Extract from Deep Kyoto Walks by John Ashburne

July 9, 2014 By Michael Lambe

Today John Ashburne takes us on a mouth-watering tour of Nishikikōji market and along the way adds a sprinkling of zen spice from the Buddhist teacher Dōgen Zenji…

IMG_8004 (Medium)
Daiyasu

Maintain an attitude that tries to build great temples from ordinary greens, that expounds the buddhadharma through the most trivial activity, handle even a single leaf of a green in such a way that it manifests the body of the Buddha. This in turn allows the Buddha to manifest through the leaf.

Two and a half decades ago, I would have read the above, and dismissed it out of hand. Buddhist transubstantiation? Temples made of lettuce! Bah humbug! I would have snorted. Not anymore. When the missus announced the other day “If a person is unhappy inside, you’ll taste it in their food”, I just nodded in silent agreement. Reverence. Awareness. Cooking as meditation. Sounds good to me. And I reckon if Dōgen had lit out for Venice Beach, he’d have made a killing.

Whilst you’re in Kyoto, you should push the boat out once and eat at one of the great restaurants. Sakurada is one of the best. Here’s a tip. Reserve a table for lunch. It’s the same with all the ryōtei, you still get the fabulous cuisine they serve in the evenings, just at a third of the price.

Head up Karasuma, across the busy Karasuma-Shijō crossing, until you reach Nishikikōji-dōri and turn right. Head past the Christian off-license advertising ‘Wine for Mass’ and Trappist Butter, and where the proprietors never, ever smile. If you’re hungry but the budget doesn’t stretch to Sakurada, try Eitarō, the noodle shop underneath Irish Pub Field. Their yuzu ramen with Japanese citron is excellent, especially on a cold winter’s day when the aromatic fruit are at their freshest. Or you can just wait till you hit the market. We’re nearly there now.

As you enter Nishiki from the Western entrance, notice the fabulous paintings of cockerels by the market’s most famous son, Itō Jakuchū who ran his father’s grocery, Masuya, before becoming one of the Edo period’s most celebrated artists. Jakuchū’s ‘Colourful Realm of Living Beings’ is a masterful collection of paintings of the very highest level, and it always puzzles me that he hasn’t achieved the fame in the West accorded to the likes of Utamaro and Hiroshige. I’d put him up there with the Old Masters. Not bad for a grocer’s lad from Kyoto.

Known nationwide as Kyō no Daidokoro, ‘Kyoto’s Kitchen’, the Nishiki market has existed here since the 17th century. Back in the day, the market specialized in footwear for samurai, and was known as Gusoku-no-kōji, ‘army footwear alley’, but the locals abbreviated it to Kuso-no-kōji, the rather less flattering ‘shit alley’. Its current name – Silk Brocade Street – was bestowed upon it by Emperor Go-Reizai, in 1054, and the market has been pandering to Imperial appetites, and basking in the approval of the upper class and the wealthy, ever since. And rightly so. Nishiki rocks.

The market is in fact a long, narrow, covered arcade, the 130 or so stores facing each other across a paved walkway of ishidatami ‘stone mats’. As you enter Nishiki from Takakura-dōri the smell of charcoal and roasting shellfish draws you immediately to a perennial favourite, Daiyasu.

Picture 9 Nishikikoji Market View by John Ashburne (Medium)
Nishiki Market View

‘Daiyasu-san’, the old man hauling oysters from a crate, greets me with a warm smile. “This foreigner knows his Japanese food, all right” he tells two young Japanese tourists. They look more bemused than impressed. The phrase Daiyasu-san uses is washoku no tsu, washoku meaning Japanese cuisine, and tsu a cross between gourmet and expert, but not at all snotty unless you use it of yourself. I wish we had a word like that in English. I can’t stand the self-congratulatory element of ‘foodie’, and ’maven’ sounds like a witch. ‘Gourmet’ too posh. I reply with sono koto nai, the diffident denial expected on such occasions, but secretly I feel pretty chuffed.

Those of us long enough in the tooth remember when Daiyasu was just a regular, unassuming fishmonger. Now it’s turned into a fish shop-cum-izakaya, the in-place to eat fresh magaki oysters from Toba, Mie Prefecture, oasari giant venus clams from Aichi, fresh hotate scallops and sazae turbo. The latter are cooked in the tsuboyaki style, ie roasted in the shell directly over a flame. Watch out for their super bitter wata intestines and reproductive organs, the Japanese gourmet’s delight and very much an acquired taste. As a good friend succinctly put it, “Like a shit bomb going off in your mouth”. When I reported this to another mate, he replied “Well actually, in gastropods, the anus is located on the head”. For once, I didn’t know what to say.

At Daiyasu I usually content myself with Toba’s finest, and a cold beer. “Shellfish are the prime cause of the decline of morals and the adaptation of an extravagant lifestyle” harrumphed Pliny the Elder, clearly not a fan. Jonathan Swift deemed oysters cruel and uncharitable. Not these, they are superb.

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Text by John Ashburne. Daiyasu photograph by Michael Lambe. Nishiki Market View by John Ashburne. To read the rest of John’s stroll through Nishiki Market order Deep Kyoto: Walks.

DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake. It is available as an e-book or paperback from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.jp.

John ASHBURNE for Canon 1About John Ashburne
John writes on Japan, and in particular on its Food Culture, for a host of publications including the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, the Japan Times, etc. He has lived in Japan for 27 years, and calls Kyoto home. His hobby is extracting ‘dashi’ from a variety of seaweeds, fishes and certain mystical mushrooms that you’ll only find growing half way up a mountain in Gunma.

John blogs at www.johnashburne.com/

See also: “Gods, Monks, Secrets, Fish” – A Deep Kyoto: Walks Movie with John Ashburne


Kamogawa Musing – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by John Dougill

July 2, 2014 By Michael Lambe

In this extract from Deep Kyoto: Walks, John Dougill walking by the Kamo River, the nature reserve that cuts through the heart of Kyoto, muses on history and literature…

Leisure activities on a cloudy day at the meeting of the Kamo and Takanogawa
Leisure activities on a cloudy day at the meeting of the Kamo and Takanogawa

“The flow of the river is ceaseless and its water is never the same. The bubbles that float in the pools, now vanishing, now forming, are not of long duration. So in the world are man and his dwellings.” – Kamo no Chomei in Hojoki (tr. Donald Keene)

Kyoto ranks among the world’s great cities. What other town can boast of 17 different World Heritage properties – and it could have been so many more! One only has to think of the places left out: Fushimi Inari, with its seductive tunnel of torii; Daitoku-ji, home to Zen and the making of tea; the Former Imperial Palace and detached villas, including the exquisite Katsura estate.

To live in such surrounds is to be blessed indeed. I’m reminded of this every single morning as I open my curtains to gaze onto the great Dai of Daimonji and the thirty-six peaks of the Eastern Hills. I live next to one World Heritage site (Shimogamo Shrine), and I work next to another (Nishi Hongan-ji). From my writing desk I look up towards holy Mt. Hiei, ‘mother of Japanese Buddhism’. Culturally, one could hardly ask for more; it’s like living in a treasure box.

Yet for me, Kyoto wouldn’t be the city I love unless it were for the life-sustaining river that runs through its heart, forming a sliver of greenery and wildlife within the concrete city. I walk the river almost every day, for I live next to the lower reaches of the Takano where it merges with the Kamo to flow southwards towards Osaka. Most days I walk down to the Starbucks at Sanjō (Third Avenue) to set up office in the basement, but today I’m heading all the way down to Shichijō (Seventh Avenue), before turning west along the thoroughfare to my university.

The walk offers ‘time out’ from the daily round of urban life, a place for solitary contemplation of the larger matters. Here the spirit swells and relaxes. Here the mind can think in centuries. Here immersed in the rus in urbe I lose myself in observation of the wild life and muse on the seasonal round. There are fish that flash silver in springtime, large funa that glide improbably in the shallow water, even the occasional carp let loose in the river water and looking lost.

But this is not so much a river of fish, as of birds. Birds that swoop, scavenge and shriek in sheer delight at the oasis of water and greenery. Kamogawa translates as Duck River, and along with the duck varieties are pigeons, sparrows, cormorants, herons, wagtails, egrets, hawks, Siberian seagulls, crows galore, even the occasional kingfisher. These are my companions on my solitary walks. And the wonder is that you get all this while passing through downtown Kyoto. It’s almost miraculous.

The things I’ve seen on these river banks. A trumpeter sounding the Last Post on one long blood-red sunset; the cherry blossom delight of merry picnickers stretching away into the northern hills; the sad, sorry sight of flooded cardboard boxes belonging to the homeless; hawks snatching rice balls out of the hands of the unsuspecting. Strangest of all, one January dusk I saw a group of people in the river immersed to their waists like frozen statues. A trick of the eyes? A joke? An art performance? No, it turned out to be a karate club performing winter austerity rites. Walking this river can be an education too.

For it’s not just wildlife that enjoys this strip of water and greenery – it’s a vital playground for humans too. This is where people take time out to stretch and play, eat their bento or strip off to sunbathe. Old folks do gateball, youngsters play American Football. This is where musicals are rehearsed, Noh verses recited, tunes learnt, haiku composed, and dogs walked by dogged owners. Foreigners practice tai chi here, prompting children to tug at their parents in wonder, while TV crews add Kyoto glamour to their documentaries and celebrities pose for fashion magazines.

For me personally, the pleasure of a city like Kyoto derives from the way physical space is enhanced by the patina of time. ‘No city or landscape is truly rich unless it has been given the quality of myth by writer, painter or by association with great events,’ wrote V.S. Naipaul. In this sense Kyoto is rich indeed, for every corner of every street is fraught with poetic or historic significance. Here passed a poet, here martyrs were sacrificed, and here stood the palace of a shogun.

This walk along the river is thus about much more than physical movement. It’s about the passage through time and how the past has shaped the present. And there’s a personal dimension too, for the surrounds give me pause to reflect on the curiosity of my own life. Kyoto was founded in 794, and as it happened I first came here to live in 1994. For the city, the 1200th anniversary was a cause for celebration; for me, it marked the beginning of a whole new era.

An egret rests on one-leg, determined not to stick its neck out.
An egret rests on one-leg, determined not to stick its neck out.

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Text and photographs by John Dougill. To read the rest of John Dougill’s Kamogawa Musing, purchase your copy of Deep Kyoto: Walks.

DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake. Deep Kyoto: Walks is available as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com and  Amazon.co.jp.

John-Dougill-2-242x300About John Dougill
John Dougill is the author of Kyoto: A Cultural History, Japan’s World Heritage Sites and In Search of Japan’s Hidden Christians. Born in the UK to a Czech mother and a Yorkshire Viking, he studied Russian and Slavic Studies at university. However, a lust for wandering took him to the Middle East, where he married a Yemeni, before travelling around the world for a year. He set up house in Oxford, but fate intervened to send him to Kanazawa where he was a lone gaijin on the backside of Japan, dreaming of one day teaching in Kyoto. Now he has to pinch himself every morning as he looks up from his bed at Daimonji. When not playing chess, writing haiku or walking along the Kamogawa, he works as professor of Cultural Studies at Ryukoku University.
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See also: Deep Kyoto Walks Movie: Kamogawa Musing with John Dougill

Old School Gaijin Kyoto – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by Chris Rowthorn

June 25, 2014 By Michael Lambe

In Old School Gaijin Kyoto, Chris Rowthorn takes us on a hilarious tour of the bars and eateries of Kiyamachi as he revisits the haunts of his reckless youth with the ironic eye of experience.

Nagahama Ramen on Kiyamachi.
Nagahama Ramen on Kiyamachi.

From “Old School Gaijin Kyoto” by Chris Rowthorn

I first arrived in Japan in January 1992. I was a kid of 26. Green as a sapling. I had graduated from college a few years earlier and had worked a string of meaningless, poorly paid jobs, none of which advanced my ambitions of becoming a writer. I wanted out of that situation and out of the States for a while, but I had no idea where to go. The leading destinations for footloose Gen Xers at that time were Prague and Alaska, where you could drink coffee and can salmon, respectively. Somehow, I wasn’t drawn to either place. So, when I heard that my old college mate John was studying Buddhism in Japan, I quickly called him up to find out more (the only people who used email at that time were employed by NASA).

On the phone, John painted me a vivid picture of Kyoto: it was a city of temples and shrines, surrounded by mountains. There were shops that sold noodles that were good and cheap. There were these places called sentos where you could bathe in huge tubs of steaming water. And John said he lived in an old wooden house by a small river and spent his days studying ancient texts, slurping noodles, and soaking in these hot baths.

Needless to say, I was utterly sold, and my excessively romantic imagination conjured up something straight out of a Chinese ink painting: secret temples materializing out of the mist, surrounded by improbably steep mountains, populated by the odd hermit and dragon, and, conveniently enough, plenty of cheap noodle joints.

Best of all, John said, you could easily get a job that paid ¥5,000 an hour for sitting around and chatting to Japanese people who wanted to practice their English. At the time, that was about US$35 (the yen was weaker then), which was utterly beyond my comprehension, since I was accustomed to earning about US$8 or $9 an hour doing menial and tiresome tasks. I imagined that US$35 was about what brain surgeons earned. I figured that I could probably retire in two or three years on that kind of income. Surely, I thought, he’s exaggerating a bit, but even if they paid half that, I’d be on easy street.

A few short weeks later, I found myself in a Northwest Airlines 747 coming in to land at Osaka’s Itami International Airport (this was a few years before they built the fancy new Kansai International Airport out in Osaka Bay). As the plane taxied to the gate, I peered blearily out the window and was surprised to see Air Force One sitting on the tarmac. I didn’t know George Bush (the elder) was coming, too! It didn’t seem like a good omen (and it certainly wasn’t a good trip for the President, who later that evening vomited onto the lap of Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa).

I cleared immigration and customs and found myself in a world of sinister policemen – the place was thick with them on account of the President – and purposeful salarymen. I stumbled out of the arrivals hall and confronted Osaka. It was straight out of Blade Runner – enormous neon signs written in wild Chinese characters loomed over streets filled with warrens of shops and restaurants and a legion of strange people scurrying about speaking an incomprehensible language. Where were the temples in the mist?! Where was the old wooden house beside the small river?! This was not what I had in mind at all! My jetlagged mind recalled a line from the film Withnail and I: “We’ve gone on holiday by mistake!” Only, this was no holiday – I had moved to an entirely different country by mistake!

Still, there was nothing for it, so I somehow found the bus to Kyoto and got on, with my old school suitcase (not even a proper backpack!). Things just got worse from there as we made our way out of Osaka and motored down the Hanshin Expressway. Every single inch of the place seemed worked over, modernized and transformed into some crowded futuristic jumble that eased neither the eyes nor the soul. The only thing that kept me from falling into a complete panic was sheer fatigue. Finally, as the bus made its way into the outskirts of Kyoto, I saw the illuminated pagoda of Toji Temple rising above the endless expanse of cheap concrete apartment blocks. Ahh…I thought, maybe there’s something here.

At that time, Japan was still high from the Bubble. It had burst a few years earlier, but most people hadn’t realized it yet. There was mad money in the air. All the Japanese seemed to have loads of it, and they truly seemed to be the supermen that books like Black Rain warned were about to take over the world. They were confident in their stride, everything they had and did was better, and the women were sexy as hell. I felt like some Okie hick pulling into Broadway circa 1925.

And, living in their midst, there was this gang of “gaijin” (foreigners) who were happy to pick up the generous crumbs that fell from the groaning table. And the Kyoto gaijin were a special breed. While Tokyo attracted serious business types who were strictly after the money, Kyoto got the culture vultures and the bohemians. Indeed, you could still sort of smell the patchouli in the air and hear the strains of the sitar in the distance. For Kyoto was one of the great K’s – a somewhat obscure member of the list that included Kabul, Kathmandu and Kuta. Kyoto was the place where you came to earn some money so you could get back out on the hippy trail – a few months teaching English and you could spend an entire year smoking hash in India or trekking in Nepal.

In Kyoto, it was expected that you’d live cheap. People boasted about how small their rents and rooms were, like hippie versions of Monty Python’s old men: “My place is three tatami mats and costs ¥20,000…So, my room is one-and-a-half tatamis and I have to sleep standing up, but it’s free and all I have to do is water my landlady’s bonsai.” This sensibility immediately appealed to me, since I was used to thinking of milk crates as furniture and US$10 as a lot of money. And everyone – the gaijin that is – was from somewhere else. Sure, there were plenty of Americans, but we also rubbed shoulders with exotics like Kiwis, Aussies, Israelis, and Swedes. And everyone had been everywhere: They tossed off names of Thai islands and Delhi bhang shops like they were local convenience stores.

IMG_6417 (Medium)
Osho – Chinese food

So, intending to stay a year, I stayed 18. I came with a suitcase and I left with a wife, two children, and more stuff than you can cram into a shipping container. While we now spend much of the year in Bangkok, Kyoto still feels like home. I cannot walk a single street downtown that does not have some memory attached to it, some ghost waiting to ambush me. Despite myself, visiting these streets brings forth an unbearable sense of loss: for the years gone by, the people who are no longer there, and the young man I once was. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s not so good, but it’s always there.

So, the other day, in a fit of extreme nostalgia, I decided to retrace my earliest steps in Kyoto, starting from the place I spent my first night, and ending up where I spent most of my time in those early days: the bars of Kiyamachi.

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Text by Chris Rowthorn. Photographs by Michael Lambe. To read the rest of Chris Rowthorn’s Kiyamachi adventures, you can order the anthology Deep Kyoto: Walks as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.jp, or Amazon.co.uk.

DeepKyoto-cover-0423-finalAbout Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake.

About Chris Rowthorn
Chris Rowthorn in BhutanChris Rowthorn was born in England and raised in the United States. In 1992, Chris moved to Kyoto, and started studying the Japanese language and culture. After the mandatory stint as an English teacher, Chris started writing for the Japan Times in 1995. In 1996, Chris was recruited by Lonely Planet Publications to work on their guidebooks to Japan. Since then, Chris has written over 25 books for Lonely Planet Publications. He is the sole author of the Lonely Planet Kyoto City Guide, and has been the lead author of the last seven editions of the Lonely Planet Japan country guide. He’s also written guidebooks about several other countries and articles for National Geographic Explorer, Arthur Frommer’s Budget Travel, BBC Online, and many more. Chris runs Chris Rowthorn Tours (www.chrisrowthorn.com), which offers private tours and consulting about Japan, and InsideKyoto (www.insidekyoto.com), an online guidebook to Kyoto.
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Ghosts, Monkeys & Other Neighbours – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto: Walks

June 6, 2014 By Michael Lambe

14.Corrugated Politicians
Corrugated Politicians

Today I am posting a short excerpt from our ebook Deep Kyoto: Walks. In Ghosts, Monkeys & Other Neighbours, Bridget Scott meditates on her personal connection to her neighborhood on a well-worn stroll from Shisen-dō to Manshu-in…

In Kyoto, the act of walking itself has taken on a new meaning for me. This awareness began over twenty years ago with my first butoh class: feel your feet moving on the earth, I was told. In my shiatsu training I began connecting my whole body to the earth through my feet. In my traditional Japanese dance training, I step with each breath guided by my departed teacher’s taped voice. In the main hall at Shisendo, in our zazen group, we walk after sitting for forty minutes, as we inhale and exhale. [Read more…]

On Foot in the Ancient Capital by Judith Clancy ~ An Exclusive Excerpt from Deep Kyoto: Walks

May 7, 2014 By Michael Lambe

Disclosure: Some links in this article are affiliate links from which the owner of this website may earn a commission.

judithKyoto Journal have posted an an interesting interview with Judith Clancy in which she reflects on her life here in Kyoto and the many books she has written about this city.

Kyoto city is an affair of the heart for me. I love the history, the art, design sense, spatial images, space of houses, safety and quiet. If you live abroad, you have to conform to the standards of the society, if you’re really going to live in it. I like Japanese standards of humanity, morality, safety, friendship… Kind of 19th century ideas perhaps, but they suit me. I like going to the shrine with neighbours every year to be blessed. It’s very comfortable to live in this city… LINK

Judith Clancy has lived in Kyoto for more than 40 years, writing and teaching about Japanese culture. She is the author of four books about Kyoto: Exploring Kyoto, Kyoto Machiya Restaurant Guide, Kyoto Gardens, and Kyoto City of Zen. Her books have opened up this city’s culture, architecture, religion and cuisine to countless visitors and long-term residents alike. I am very pleased that Judith is also one of the contributors to our book, Deep Kyoto: Walks.

To whet your appetites for our book here is an exclusive extract in which Judith reflects on life in her traditional Nishijin neighbourhood.

On Foot in the Ancient Capital

In many neighborhoods, neat rows of blooming potted flowers, set out in tiered rows seem to magically appear just as they are beginning to bloom. One wonders: where have they been all this time? Could these tiny homes have a secret storage area that my house lacks?

My 88-yr.-old neighbor and I stand over her forget-me-nots or tiny camellia bushes, and discuss how their seed arrived airborne years ago and decided to stay. Too elderly now to repot and replant, she marvels at the floral display that gives her such pleasure, merely in response for a twice daily dosing of water from a battered 2-liter bottle. Other neighbors are out front of their miniature gardens plucking deadheads, discussing the weather, or admiring each other’s gardening skills. Since most homes have baths nowadays, this morning ritual has seemingly replaced the public bathhouse as a chance to share local gossip.

Looking up a little brings into view the lattice frontage of old homes that mark a proud architectural heritage – one that I now love looking at, but that took years for me to appreciate. It is one of the details that embellish the cityscape in the most minute ways that only walkers can appreciate: a round clay window, curved bamboo fencing, a tiny clay image of the demon-queller Shōki . Local residents take them for granted, but coming to Kyoto when I was young, fast-forwarded me into this process of seeing. It seems that people staring at their smart phones while walking the streets of Kyoto deny themselves something precious and real.

spring in kyoto
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Text by Judith Clancy. Image 1 courtesy of Kyoto Journal. Image 2 by Michael Lambe. All rights reserved. To read the rest of Judith Clancy’s On Foot in the Ancient Capital, purchase your copy of Deep Kyoto: Walks.

DeepKyoto-cover-0423-final

About Deep Kyoto: Walks

Deep Kyoto: Walks is an independently produced anthology of meditative strolls, rambles, hikes and ambles around Japan’s ancient capital. All of the writers and artists involved in this project have lived and worked in Kyoto for many years and know it intimately. The book is in part a literary tribute to the city that they love and in part a tribute to the art of walking for its own sake. Deep Kyoto: Walks is available as a paperback or e-book from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.jp.

See also:

Kamogawa Musing – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by John Dougill
Not Sure Which Way to Go – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by Robert Yellin
Gods, Monks, Secrets, Fish – An Excerpt from Deep Kyoto Walks by John Ashburne

Learn more:
Exploring Kyoto
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.jp
Kyoto Gardens
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.jp
Kyoto City of Zen
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.jp
Kyoto Machiya Restaurant Guide
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.jp

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