3 weeks in Japan: Part 3 - Kyoto

By Mike Daikubara in Kyoto, Japan

Kyoto used to be the capital of Japan for over a thousand years (before moving to Tokyo) and they also managed to keep the 'traditional Japanese look' throughout the entire city. It's a beautiful place being a tourist destination for not only people from over seas but for the locals as well.

It's been over 2 decades since I last visited Kyoto but I have many connections to this city. My brothers family lives here and so does my wife's sisters family. Kyoto is also considered a sister city of Boston. It's good to be back and to be able to explore this place for a few days.

The train ride from Osaka to Kyoto was really quick. 

Walking towards the in-laws house we passed by Yasaka Jinja - a well maintained shrine with lots of tourists as well as people praying by ringing the ceiling hung bell with the thick rope.

 

The next day we went to go see my brother-in law Yoshimasa Ishibashi's stage performance for the opening day of the Kyoto International movie festival. He's a Film director by profession and he conducted all the stage performance for this show. It was a free event so we arrived a few hours before the performance to get front row seats (well no seats but).

This was the perfect opportunity to get some sketching done.

After a couple hours of waiting, the stage performance by Maywa-Denki Finally started. I knew about them for years but this was the first time seeing them perform live on stage.

They're quite unusual in that everything they use to create music with is hand made and also quite strange. Whole lot of fun watching them though.

As it came near the end, lots of dance performers came out on stage and the giant 'Otamatone' Robot in the back started shooting flames from the mouth. It was a blast to watch.
I'm also glad we arrived early since this place was jam packed with people!

After the show I got to meet the person from Maywa-Denki as well as Yanobe Kenji, the artist that created the giant robot. I liked their autographs with little pictures they wrote on my sketchbook for me. The 3rd signature without the picture is my brother-in laws. These were the 3 people that created this show.

The next day I was able to meet up with some local sketchers for a few hours of sketching. Takeuma-San, who I had met through Flickr conducts monthly sketch outings in the Kyoto area and I was able to meet up with them at Nanzenji Temple.

The main gate was quite impressive in size and immediately caught my attention.
For a fee, people were able to climb up to the 2nd floor balcony.

Not sure what this building was but you were able to go inside.
I had to go back to meet up with the sketch groups so I ran out of time for this sketch.

Eikando is not part of Nanzenji but was walking distance and real close.
The leaves were starting to change color and that's when Kyoto gets lots of tourists. It was already quite beautiful so I could only imagine how much more amazing this place would look.

After the sketch session, we met at a nice Tea shop to chat and to show our sketches.
I also went out for a drink with Kato-san and Takeuma-San (the 2 people on the right) and had a blast. Thank you for your hospitality Takeuma-San and Kato-San!

The next day was my last day before heading back to Tokyo.
My brother in-law told me about this impressive placed called "Sanju Sangen-do" which has 1001 Buddhist sculptures housed in it. I saw a picture and was immediate fascinated and went to go check it out.

The building was really long with a long narrow corridor inside that allowed you to see all the sculptures. I was told each sculpture had a different expression and if you looked hard, you were able to find one that looked like you. I had never seen anything like this and was quite impressed.

This place was also huge challenge for a sketcher - There were lots of people that needed to walk down this narrow corridor so there were no places to sit or even stand without being in the way of people.

In the center of the building I finally found a small standing spot right slightly out of traffic in front of the largest main Buddha so I began to sketch. 1.5 hours from Pen to Color,  I was completely wiped out from doing this sketch - physically and emotionally. It must have been the amount of people that were in close proximity to me as well as being surrounded by 1001 Buddhist sculptures.

I was quite happy to be able to get this sketch done though since right as I was finishing this up, a monk came to me and whispered to me that sketching was not allowed here.

Before leaving, I got another quick sketch. I wanted to see how many sculptures I could sketch but eventually ran out of energy and patience....

I headed back to Tokyo that night feeling good about the sketches from Kyoto but also completely drained..

~ To be continued to part 4.

Studio Takeuma from Kyoto Japan

Those of you that use Flickr might recognize his sketches but I wanted to introduce Takeuma-san from Kyoto Japan. I just love the short capture of thoughts he includes in the sketches he does.
Here's a few samples of his work with a rough translation of the story captured in his sketches.

Hope you enjoy and be sure to check him out at Flickr!

 

2014 January 2nd: Happy new year. There was a man with a red suit case either going or returning from a trip. He had a lot of presence and also looked really happy. I had eye contact with him a few times while I sketched him. He knew I was sketching him but he let me go. Thank you very much.

2014 July 24th: There was a person working standing up with a Mac in one hand looked like his shoulders were getting tense. A seat opened up so he sat down and continued to work on the computer. The bow tie looking thing is his headphones.

A little boy kept on calling for the tigers attention so the tiger came over over real close and the little boy started crying. "What do you want me to do?" I felt like this is what the tiger was saying.

2013 November 19th: Kyoto Zoo. How the tiger walks: Right front leg -> Left rear leg -> left front leg ->right rear leg

 2014 January 9th: The weather was nice in Kyoto but was gray when I got to Tokyo. Lots of people had their umbrella's on the Yamanote train. It looked like it was going to start raining any moment but I was going to go back to Kyoto quickly and I wasn't going to let it rain - was what I was thinking but I'd be bummed if it was raining back in Kyoto. There was an elegant looking elderly gentleman that looked very much like a person from Tokyo. It turned out he got off at the same stop as me and took the bullet train. He was from Nagoya.

 

2014 August 19th: I once again went camping to Wakayama with Nariyuki Circus and came to the sea. The mountain and skies seen from inside the ocean was beautiful. I sketched while getting wet from splashes of water.

Article by miked

Japanese tea cermony inside a 100 year old house from Kyoto @ Boston Children's Museum !?

A while back our friend Nao had mentioned she was taking a Japanese tea ceremony class and had asked my wife and I if we wanted to visit. I've always wanted to sketch a tea ceremony and she mentioned that her teacher (Sensei) did not have any issues - great!

She mentioned that the class took place inside the Boston Children's museum. This felt odd since in my mind I could not find a link between Japanese tea and the Children's museum.
Once inside, another thing that amazed me was that there was an actual 100+ year old Machiya house brought over from Kyoto Japan! To commemorate the 20th year anniversary of sister city relationship, Kyoto had sent Boston this traditional urban house which once belonged to a silk merchant family in Kyoto’s Nishijin neighborhood. So the tea ceremony class took place inside the 2nd floor of this Machiya house!

The first tea ceremony lesson we watched was an advanced class taught by Glenn Sensei.

He's been studying tea ceremony since 1981 and it was quite inspirational watching him teach and explain through many stories and detailed reasons on the why of every movement/procedure in the act of making/serving tea.

My image of a tea ceremony was this very quiet atmosphere where one was not allowed to talk but both Glenn Sensei and Miho Sensei made it a very friendly environment encouraging people to ask questions and saying it was ok to talk.

Next we moved to the smaller room next door to watch Nao take her class taught by Miho Sensei.
She even encouraged me to squeeze in the corner so I could get a better view to be able to sketch!

Here's me quietly sketching in the corner.
Note the white 'Tabi' socks that I'm wearing. Wearing a pair of clean white socks was a requirement for coming to the tea ceremony so I wore my brand new pair of traditional Japanese socks.

Lastly I had Tea made by Nao and a 'Wagashi' (Japanese confectionery) made by Miho Sensei which was just amazing! The tea was really good too and Nao mentioned that Glenn Sensei only selects the best.

We were about to leave and my wife showed Miho Sensei my sketches then everyone gathered around to take a look. Glenn Sensei and the class in the next room even postponed to come take a look! Everyone seemed to have liked it and I was thrilled!

If you're ever in town or is interested in Japanese Tea, I would encourage you come visit (Urasenke Boston). They were very welcoming people and I sincerely felt they just wanted to share good tea and a nice moment with people.