Day 3 – Temple in the rain

First things first, check out. Reader, I did this with all the confidence I was lacking the night before when I was trying to find the entrance. If it isn’t on the ground floor, I’m always sent off on a wild’s goose chase, and I’m very inclined to enter the first door that claims to be an ‘Entrance’. Sometimes, it doesn’t have to even have a door, it just needs to say ‘Entry’, so keen am I on admission, that I’ll just follow. It doesn’t help that the signs for ‘Entry’ and ‘Exit’ are yellow…it’s like putting a yellow label on a sandwich: it demands to be rescued!

The umbrella outperformed its constitution and lived up to the price. I got a foldable one, which comes at twice the price but half the strength. It did fall apart at some point, and not cause of the wind, but probably cause of the way I was impersonating Gene Kelly (short of dancing), and spinning it this way and that. The whole walk took more or less 30 min, and it was quite enjoyable. I did really do some ‘slow looking’, and because the rain was as vertical as ropes hanging from the sky, I was at little risk of getting wet.

On each side of the street leading to the temple there’s these wooden lanterns, a few meters apart, which, I found out at the gates of the temple, have the 48 prayers of Amida Buddha transcribed on the stone tablet. I’d imagine the shadow play artwork for each of them would look great when being lit and its dark outside.

The slight slope nearer to the temple gave it quite a nice feeling of achievement at having reached the first gate. Once you enter, on both sides there’s shrines, and other buildings not for visitors, then you walk past the street which holds the various merchant stores, then you’re at the main gate.

The Temple of Benevolent Light is said to hold the oldest Buddha statue in Japan, and it has been more than 1400 years since it was first constructed. It is quite an impressive temple, both in its atmosphere and feelings it inspires, but also the architecture and the set-up. It makes sense that the whole city was built around it.

The rain intensified the scent of incense in the big burner right at the centre of the path. With a ¥100 one can pick up a small bouquet of incense sticks and add them to the burner. Inside the temple there’s still prayers recited and soon after the bell rings and everything falls silent. That is, apart from the gentle hum of the visitors, but it’s not loud. There is a calmness about the place that stays with you.

To the left there’s volunteers speaking English to help with questions, and the stalls to queue for the goshuin stamps*. To the right the fountain for the ablutions, before you enter to pray.  I got omamori (lucky charms) for my friends, and was told than one can keep them. They are meant to be kept for a year (I didn’t ask if this is a calendar year from the day of purchase, or if this is the just till January, when the Year of the Dragon gives way to the Year of the Snake).

After, you’d have to bring them back to the temple to be burnt – you can’t just dispose of them. The collection of omamori is quite extensive, from health related ones to relationship goals, safe child-bearing, economic status improvement, business ventures, academic achievement, or simply fulfilment of wishes. There’s one for safe driving, which should cover many a people on a daily basis. It would be handy to have one for buses being on time, but that would involve a whole chain of lucky charms starting with weather conditions, the road works networks, the drivers, the commuters…I simply didn’t have enough ¥ for that.

After I got my stamp, it was time to hit the market. There were spices, sweets, souvenirs based on local crafts, and gourmet treats to try out. That, on a separate post, dear Reader.

*Red ink stamps and calligraphy samples you get at a temple, all collected in a special booklet you can purchase before hand in a stationery shop or at the temple.