Touring the City

Well, I’m a bit behind here. I’ve already spent a couple of days here at my host family’s house and toured around the city with my host sister, Sakiko. My room is surprisingly spacious, so I’m thinking that they must have given me the biggest room in the house, since there’s actually plenty of room for my things, which is saying something. It has been VERY hot and humid though. My first night I woke up in the middle of the night sweating, but I think that it’s getting better though. Saturday morning there was a small memorial service for the 7th year anniversary of one of the family member’s deaths. For this, my host father’s siblings came over and then a Buddhist priest came and chanted, struck a gong-like bowl and beat rhythms while kneeling at the family shrine in the formal living room. I spent the entire afternoon with Sakiko, first at Shijo, which is a street with a number of shops that are very popular with local young people. After that we walked to Gion!!! This is probably Japan’s most famous geisha district, especially since it was where ‘Memoirs of a Geisha’ was set. Grr. If you want that rant you’ll have to ask in person, I’m afraid. Anyway, we had to pass by Pontocho in order to get there, which is where my hero Liza Dalby lived as a geisha to do research for her book. The shops in Gion were beautiful but way too expensive for me, except for Yojiya, which appears to be Kyoto’s most famous cosmetics store, where I bought Uguisu no Fuu, which is a cosmetic that has been used in Japan for centuries. Afterwards, Sakiko treated me to tea and ice cream with red beans (adzuki) and sweet rice dumplings (dango).
-Buy a fan. It’s worth it.
-Buy strong deodorant and antiperspirant even if you do not usually use them at home.
-In Japan it appears that they honour the 3rd, 7th, and 15th anniversaries of someone’s death with decreasing amounts of ceremony.
-Japanese people seem, almost as a whole, extremely fashionable. I'm going to have to step up my game!
-You can buy foreigner-sized clothes at UNIQLO, just be prepared to buy an extra-large.