Hallelujah Chorus

"I'm here! I'm here! Let the bells ring out and the banners fly! Feast your eyes on me! It's too good to be true, but I'm here! I'm here!"

Sumimasen, Japan. All is forgiven. 

If you detected a small whiff of cynicism and self-righteousness in the previous post, I apologize. And now I‘m going to set things right with a glowing report on my time the following day in Nara and Koyasan. THIS is what I’m talking’ about.

Nara & The BIG Buddha

Behold Daibutsuden, until recently the largest wooden building in the world. Holy fuck! Look at that thing! In person, it’s both overwhelming and awe-inspiring. And it’s only 2/3 the size of the original.

And what’s inside?

Oh, just some more ridiculously huge shit. This statue is bronze and weighs -  oh I don’t know - as much as the sun. It certainly seems like that.

Supposedly if you can crawl through this hole (the exact size of the Buddha’s nostril) you’re guaranteed a long life.. Michael d’Eça claims to have made it, which undoubtedly accounts for his youthful looks and vitality. I didn’t even bother trying. God, I’m sad.

Obligatory deer shot. The poor things. They remind me of the geisha controversy in Kyoto - constantly taunted and harassed by asshole tourists and then insulted when they get fed up and respond. Sorry. Couldn’t help it.

Koyasan 

Koyasan is absolutely loaded with temples, but I wasn’t wasting any time or energy on them. I was going for The Ultimate Prize - the Okunoin, a 2 km long sacred area which contains over 200 000 gravestones,  memorial pagodas and towering cedar trees and ends with the great Kobo Daisha’s mausoleum, where according to believers he remains alive and in eternal meditation for the betterment of mankind. They still bring him 2 meals a day (which blasphemously makes me wonder how they explain the leftovers. “ See, Haraki? Didn’t I tell you he doesn’t like pickles?”)

And guess what? I had the place virtually all too myself

I’m not going to cheapen the experience by blathering on and on about it and trying to think of as many superlatives as possible. Honestly, fucking magic.

Japan, I love you.

Japanese Fun Facts

 Let’s talk police cars - briefly. Police in Japan do NOT drive giant SUVs. In fact, they drive featureless sedans, most of which look like they came out of a sleazy used-car lot. The interesting thing is that most - but not all - of them have this crazy light setup on the roof. When they turn on the flashers, the lights raise up with a scissors-like apparatus.

Not only that, but they have a loudspeaker that would wake the dead. I have no idea what they’re broadcasting over it when they pull someone over, but believe me, they sound like they mean business.

The other odd thing I’ve noticed is that in rural areas they’ll sometimes put on their flashers, drive down the road at the exact speed limit (or less) for a random period of time and then just pull over and stop. 

Why? Top secret.