Dragon Deer

Just got back from a trip to Japan with my mom and Aaron. We saw temple after shrine after garden after carp pond after rock garden… which was amazing... and which will probably soon swirl together in my mind into one beautiful and well-kept blur, if that’s possible.

While in Japan we visited Nara, one of the ancient capitals. There are about 1,000 sacred deer roaming freely through Nara Park, and along the streets and around the temples and shrines, as well. The deer allow the tourists to photograph, pose with, and pet them, in hopes of getting the tourists to buy deer crackers to feed them. Some of the deer even bow their heads repeatedly, in a polite manner not entirely unlike how many Japanese bow to each other.







Aren’t they cute?

We saw lots of cute things while in Japan. They really know how to do cute there, and people seem to eat it up. There are a lot of these plush toy claw machine arcades, generally filled with adults.



Some things were so cute they were scary, though…



Anyway, back to the deer. Rather than bowing, some took a less polite approach to getting food. Aaron gave a cracker to one deer, and then seeking more snacks, she followed him around the park for quite a while, and eventually began headbutting him…





...which I thought was hilarious until later in the day, when a few of the deer I was feeding began prodding my hip and back with their antlers. And then one bit me – see below for a shot of the deer spit and grass he left behind on my shorts.



Aside from the overzealous deer, Nara was peaceful and pretty…

Lanterns along path to shrine


Art student painting in the shade


Prayer tablets hanging outside shrine


Sandals left outside shrine


We found Tokyo to be a big, fun, quirky city. Other than the run-in with the deer, I think the funniest part of our trip to Japan was when the three of us tried to board the Tokyo subway during rush hour with all of our luggage. Absolute genius! Unfortunately, I was too focused on shoving myself onto a train to get a photo.

comic book shop in "Electric Town" area of Tokyo


woman entering Tokyo subway


lantern plant


women dressed as maids, handing out flyers for a "maid cafe"



While in Tokyo, we visited the Tsukiji Market, the largest fish market in the world.





It doesn’t smell very fishy, but you can’t forget where you are as there seem to be baskets of fishheads lurking around every corner.

After the market, we went for a sushi breakfast at a restaurant down the street. I'm sure it was the freshest sushi I’ve ever eaten, but it honestly wasn’t all that appealing to me after sloshing around in the blood and guts of the market.

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We also went to Kyoto, where we stayed in a “Japanese style” hotel room, which was a lot cosier than it looks in this photo. Actually, no it wasn't - but it was clean and cheap and different.

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In Kyoto we visited the Fushimi Inari shrine, which has hundreds and hundreds of orange torii gates winding along wooded pathways. It felt exactly like The Gates installation in Central Park from a few years back (except for the Japanese writing on the back-side of the posts).

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We also visited a fancy food market filled with the now notorious $100 watermelons and all kinds of foods I couldn’t identify.

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Anybody know what this is?

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One day we wandered through one of the older neighborhoods in Kyoto and saw a geisha walking with a young man.

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I thought it was a somewhat rare sighting, but later we came across another few geishas out for a photo shoot. They seemed to enjoy the attention they were getting from the people on the street, so I took some shots while the professional photographer fluffed the flowers in one geisha’s hair. It was blazing hot the whole time we were in Japan; more impressive than the beautiful robes these ladies wore was the fact that they didn’t look all sweaty in them.

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