Imperial Kyoto

We spent a day and a morning in Kyoto. I didn't think that was enough time, but since it was so hot, many students were less excited to be outside exploring the plethora of shrines the old imperial capital had to offer. We went to the Golden Pavilion with its beautiful zen gardens and tea house, Heian Shrine, and Nijo Castle with a local tour guide. She was a little hard to understand, but I was able to ask her a lot of questions in Japanese so it was helpful.






The next morning I took some of the students that wanted to up a long hill to a buddhist temple called Kiyomizu. The view from that temple was amazing, and we were surrounded by Japanese junior high school kids who needed to ask us questions in English for their assignment. Our girls were especially tickled when we were asked "which one of us is your type?" Emily had a hard time choosing and kept pointing from one little boy to another. It was hilarious.
We also visited the temple with a thousand buddhas. It's amazing that the structure survived a millenium, and it holds fierce warrior like gods and their boddhisatva attendants.