Day 13: 13 April (Nara and Osaka)

LOCATION: NARA AND SHIN-SEKAI
MOOD: ADVENTUROUS
LISTENING TO: GOOD CHARLOTTE – BREAK APART HER HEART

CRACKERS, TREES AND BUDDHA:

It's forecast to rain tomorrow, so today I hopped on a train for Nara. Nara is a small-ish city about 45 minutes away from Osaka by train and most well known for Todai-Ji, the world's largest Buddha. To get to Todai-Ji you have to walk through Nara and up into the moutains, where the temple is nestled in the expansive Nara national park.

You also have to pass this McDonalds. I'm thinking of submitting this photo for Pulitzer consideration under the title 'East Meets West'.

I also passed by this pagoda, which was completely made out of wood. It's apparently the second-tallest wooden pagoda in Japan, pipped by a mere few centimetres by a pagoda in Kyoto. Why didn't they just do what Malaysia did with the twin towers and elongate the spike at the top?

Apart from Todai-Ji, the most iconic emblem of Nara is the deer: in ancient Japan they were afforded semi-divine status, and even now there are around 1200 wandering around the forest and the parks in the city. They're almost as tame as the pigeons in Fed Square/State Library, and if you buy deer crackers from any of the numerous street stalls you can feed them. I even had a couple of them follow me around looking for a bite to eat.

'Wazzup?'
'Nothin...just chillin', watchin' the game, havin' a brew...sup witchu?'

Although I wrote of eye-candy fatigue in my last entry, Todai-Ji was a big enough hit to jolt me back into action. The actual temple complex is impressive enough, but when you enter the shrine and see the massive Buddha it's hard not to be impressed by its size.

I don't think this photo really does justice to the scale of the operation, but it'll have to do. And to boot, this hall is actually two-thirds the size of the original. The little dots in front of the temple are people.

This freakish looking character is apparently a healing saint. You're supposed to rub the part of the statue that corresponds with the part of your body that's afflicted. One only hopes that STD rates were lower in the 16th century.

Well that's not really that impressive, is it?

Well ok then! Now THAT'S what I'm talking about.

After finishing up at Todai-Ji I decided to explore the rest of the park complex. The further you get away from the city the deeper you get into the forest, and the park descends into a maze of winding paths, small shops and temples. The scenery is really quite serene, and I could easily imagine myself coming back here just to chill out for a while if the need ever arises. I can easily imagine the local kids coming up here for some buddha, although not quite the type that the tourists come for.

I'm thinking of making a jigsaw puzzle out of this. You can place orders by e-mail.

'Yo brother, you got anything to eat? There's so much buddha around here that I've got the munchies and I'm just jonesing for some crackers...'

Country Road.

I took a peek around a couple of temples, but after a while they all started to look the same. So I did what every self-respecting tourist does when they get bored - I bought stuff. Like this Shinsengumi uniform. It was really only a matter of time before this blog got ridiculous.

For those not in the know, the Shinsengumi were a group of samurai who were essentially the enforcers for the military government that controlled Japan from around 1600 to 1868 when the government was overthrown by Imperialists who wanted to restore the Emperor to power.

This one's gonna come back to haunt me, but oh well.
Totally worth it.

I could have complemented my outfit with all manner of arcane weaponry, but getting it through customs would probably have led to a Matrix-esque debacle.

THE CITY OF LIGHTS:

After purchasing what is likely to be a constant source of embarassment when I run for President later on in life (oh yes I can!), I then decided that it was time to head home. I was pretty tired after a few days of fairly intense walking, so I decided to take a quick stroll back to Shin-Sekai to check out the Tsutenkaku Tower, which I had passed on last time I was there. I already had day shots of Osaka's skyline, and I wanted a few night shots to round out my collection.

Shin-Sekai by night.

Brushing off the aforementioned roving packs of youths and boozy hookers I made it to the tower and wandered around taking snaps of the blanket of lights that composed the Osaka skyline at night. It took a while to get the right settings on my camera to get decent pictures, and I made sure I took several of each shot just in case some of them came out blurry.

And this was with a point and shoot. Imagine what I could do with a chunky SLR and a tripod.

I'm glad I didn't come here during Earth Hour.

My hotel was down there somewhere. Don't make me go all Google Earth on you.

The only other thing to note about Tsutenkaku is the curious statue they have on the observation deck called Billiken. The strange sculpture was apparently created by an American early in the 20^th century, and is now the defacto mascot of Shin-Sekai. Legend has it that if you drop a coin in the donation box and rub his feet, your dream will come true. The inscription around the base of the sculpture designates Billiken 'The God of Things As They Ought to Be', but given the present state of the district he represents I figured that Billiken probably wasn't a deity whose help was worth invoking.

I felt a little guilty about going all the way up the tower and not dropping in a donation, but there was a pack of pretty young things there at the same time who gave the little fella a nice rub down after I had taken my photos.

Tsutenkaku Tower by night. Going from the serene hills of Nara to the neon chaos of Shin-Sekai was a bit jolting, but all in a good day's work.

PS: Sorry for all the stoner deer jokes. Once the idea got into my head I just couldn't get rid of it.