Trudging from door to door in rain

One of the longest walks I’d had in mind for Kyoto would have started at the Higashiyama Jisho-ji, better known as the Silver Pavilion or Ginkakuji, and would have ended at the Gion, by way of the Philosopher’s path, several temples and eateries, and a bit of the recent Meiji and Showa era history of the city. I’d forgotten to factor in the weather that dogs my steps in Kyoto so often, namely unrelenting rain. The morning’s drizzle had turned to rain as we left Ginkakuji and turned towards Tetsugaku no michi, the Philosopher’s Path.

Our first stop was a small Buddhist temple called Honen-in. It’s not one of the major tourist stops in Kyoto. This was exactly why I wanted to see the temple. Even in the rain, perhaps specially in the rain, it was a place of calm. The featured photo shows the thatched main gate of the temple; the moss on the thatch is a feature, not a bug. Do and mon, way and gate, are two important philosophical constructs in Japanese culture. A gate connects two realms, and the way is your journey. Past the gate, the road leads between two raised mounds of pebbles, an unusual dry garden. The patterns worked on to the flat space on top change with the seasons. Today’s was ripples in a pond.

Beyond it we stopped at a pond and watched ducks. Turning away from the buildings, we walked under trees where the rain collected into large drops and fell down my neck because the umbrella slipped from my hand when I took a photo. In the building people were gathering for a funeral. We left because we did not want to intrude.

We had a Buddhist lunch in a restaurant across the road. When we came back out, the rain was pelting down harder than before. Our walk would be a little more difficult than I’d anticipated. We passed a little roadside shrine with its Jizo statues all dressed up. Next to us a canal appeared. I hadn’t noticed where it came from. Across the narrow canal I noticed a terribly modern house. Such change was perhaps to be expected in this neighbourhood where the philosophy of wabi sabi was first developed.

There are many little temples here, each with its own history. Beyond them I could see the ridge of the eastern mountains, the Higashiyama. The dressed stone of the banks of the canal and the iron bridges across it made me wonder whether it was one of the waterways dug here during the first wave of modernization in Japan after the Meiji restoration. If the weather had been better we would have ended our walk along the Keage incline where the Meiji era pumping station can be seen. Perhaps we were seeing the same Meiji era industrial architecture here. There were many shops open to the road; no life, no bustle because of the rain. Our progress was slow, and we decided not to look into the shops. We did stop briefly at the Otoya-jinja, the shrine with guardian mice, but only to peer at the statues of the guardians.

We passed the Eikan-do temple, famous for two things. One is the Kamakura era statue of Amida Buddha looking over his shoulder, and the other is the suikinkutu. This buried pot makes musical sound when water is poured into it. The Family said “It will be full and silent today.” The rain had found its way down my clothes now. I was happy that I’d decided not to bring my camera with me. The phone was monsoon-safe and would not suffer in this rain. We decided to give the temple a miss, and turned to walk through a Showa era row of houses towards the Nanzen-ji temple.

I was thoroughly soaked, and not in a mood for further exploration. The Family walked on to take a quick look at the temple as I decided to use the historic San-mon, a rather ornate gate, as a windbreaker. I was too cold and tired to even step back and take a photo of the gate. In the 16th century the outlaw Ishikawa Goemon was boiled to death here. I wouldn’t have minded a quick dip in the Goemonburo myself. My walk had come to an end. It only remained for me to meet up with The Family and take a taxi back to the hotel and soak in a warm bath. Even though it rained so much, when I look back on it, this was a nice walk. Each one’s walk is different, and the rain has become my way of seeing Kyoto, my Kyotodo, 京都道 .