Nara (continued), Japan 2019

Nara

In Nara’s center, city maps with marked attractions and signs to them are everywhere but if you step away from the center everything including street names is in Japanese only.

I was glad to see that many new private houses are built in the traditional Japanese style with fancy roof tiles as on the photo above. Another thing that I could not stop admiring is lanterns. Kasuga Taisha, a Shinto shrine, has over 1,000 of them. It was impossible to stop taking photos of lanterns.

A Shinto shrine is a good place to send wishes to gods and spirits. In Japan, the way to communicate your wish to them is to write down a prayer on a small wooden plaque and to hang it in a shrine.

A few prayers were in English. They all asked for someone’s well-being. One plaque was in Russian and I found it to be rather funny. It said “Let my bestseller become popular all over the world and in Japan. Let it bring joy, happiness, and love to people’s hearts. Let it be successful and money-making for me so my income will be over $1 million a month starting 2021. So be it by New Year 2020.”

In order to escape the midday heat, I went to a free origami class at the Visitor’s center. There, I was given all necessary materials and printed instructions on how to make a deer. I produced my own origami in half an hour but forgot to cut the horns into two halves. A staff member smiled and said that I made a unicorn. With her help, that was corrected.

Pagodas can be found all over Japan. Their hollow construction with a central column allows them to withstand earthquakes. They do not have stairs inside and therefore are not supposed to be entered. Pagodas were built to house remains of kings and saints or a sacred relic.

I walked past many temples in Nara. Most of them were closed and I could not see them inside. The last but not least temple that I visited in Nara was Gangoji Temple. It is a rather large complex with a museum, garden and a cemetery. Inside the temple, there are explanations of different kinds of Buddhist meditations and how to practice them.

Here is one example:  Shingachirin meditaion

“Meditation by observing the full moon in the mind. When the mind is dark (when you are not observing the full moon in the mind) everything you encounter is felt as a misfortune. However if the mind’s eye becomes clear (so long as the full moon is visible to the mind) then at times you will encounter various treasures.”

I always respected Buddhism and thought that it is too advanced for me. Now, I know for sure that there is no way for me to get close to an enlightened state.

Horyuji