Kyoto, Japan. with pictures now

either I'm getting smarter about how to travel out of the country or I'm getting mellow with relative age. I can't remember the last time I planned something to death and it all fell through, only to find that what is happening is much more enjoyable than the alternate. I certainly did not plan on editing the short application from the director of the Hagi museum to have his town accepted as a cultural treasure. I did not invite myself to macha tea in the tiny tin shack of the keepers of some obscure temple.
I can't anticipate talking about "god" with a yellow-fingered acid freak at the epicenter of the bomb blast in Nagasaki, nor happily suffering a crush the night before on the shark sent to me by the bar-maid to play out a few rounds of billiards.

No amount of cajoling or subtlety could get my college friend in Kyoto to guess his travel budget three months ago so I had a clue of how far we would venture together or for how long. nor could a simple sentence reveal his state of mind at this time, so different from the tattered hat under which he found himself the last time I saw him. And I could not guess that I would find such kindness in the hands of one couchsurfing host in Tokyo, and dislike the other as much as I did. I did not expect to spend such a lusciously large portion of my time here meeting new people of all colors and creeds, relaxing with them, eating, enjoying more, and again, invitations unfolding like so many wrappings on the secret contents of bento

boxes on the super-fast trains that I take from Kyoto to everywhere.

Japan is not all that beautiful in winter. The heavy lines of all those roof tiles, the stubble of fallow fields, the milky gray pollution, the pallid, ubiquitous concrete. at least the weather has been kind to me. sun in Tokyo and many days besides. only in Hagi was my umbrella blasted inside-out. only today, december 26, are my hands so cold as they grip the handlebars of a bicycle that I feel sure that I must stop or they will fall off. But here we are, warm among friends at Christmas. The dessert selection says it all- marzipan from Barcelona, rum balls from Isaac's mom in Minnesota, intense fruit cake to impress the Brit, macha suger-bombs, dutch licorice, a soft tiramisueish custard from the neighborhood baker..

I have seen many amazing ceramics, of course.
even though I end up in Hagi on a monday (museums closed), and the two around here that I most want to see are in winter renovation... bah-... but my eye is not so finely tined as to see a difference between museum quality and the kind that sells at high-end antique shops. it's still not my personal aesthetic inspiration, but my appreciation expands..

Not to mention awesome wooden creations of all sorts, boxes, tools, lacquerware, temples, faceted glass, silk kimono, tranquil gardens, beautiful women (geishas in the streets!), food-art, mirror-shine wooden walkways for socks (surreptitious running and sliding), paper lanterns in the doorways, and a man who still walks through the neighborhood tapping sticks to remind people to extinguish their hearthfire in this town that has burned so many times..