teamEggers

Nikko, Now Extra Templey!

You know the Three Monkies? (see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil?) I know you’ve heard of this. But do you know where it comes from? I do, I do, I do!

It’s Nikko! Doesn’t that just make you love nikko even more? Oh, those monkies. They’re actually part of a set of life lessons, but this one was the most marketed for whatever reason.

To be fair, the others aren’t as catchy. Like “no matter how high up you climb, there will always be higher to go”. And “Choose a life partner because you’ll weather the storm better than way”, etc.

This next picture excites me simply for its age. Imagine how old those cedar trees must be, to be that tall! Here’s a fun fact: Cedar (sugi in Japanese) is often associated with sake, because the cedar trees are said to shelter the sake gods in certain areas. Also, the sugidama (cedar ball) hanging outside a storefront lets you know that sake is one of their specialties!

Photo c/o okadots.

But back to Nikko.

The cold wouldn’t bother me so much if I could stay bundled up. Unfortunately, almost every place we went to wanted us to take off our shoes and walk barefoot on the outdoor wooden floors. Ugh.

Most of the places didn’t allow you to take photos inside, which I think is a shame. I have the memory of a goldfish. Aside from telling you all about our travels, teamEggers is really a way for me to remember what the heck I did yesterday.

We found some nice strangers to take our picture. This country is way more trusting than most – I never fear that the guy behind my camera will run away before giving the camera back, and I’m not constantly checking that my wallet is still there in bars. It’s kind of great.

When you’re chilled-to-the-bone, there’s nothing like hot soup and noodles to perk you up. Mountain Folk know what’s up. This was my lunch of yuba soba:

The end of our day brings us dragony goodness. We found this shop that painted dragon pictures! Really neat ones! Jon loves him some dragon, so we got one.

And with that, it’s time for us to head back to the city. Until next time…

Nikko, Day 2

Hello! Have you met Dana yet? No? You’re going to love her. Dana has been making a behind-the-scenes guest appearance on the teamEggers show for about a year now. She’s Will’s lady friend, but mostly she’s just a rad girl. We’re glad to have her around.

If I haven’t mentioned it already, Dana & Will came up to Nikko with us this weekend! It’s great to have travel partners:

We had some time to kill before meeting up in the morning, so Jon and I checked out the gardens. I’d called them Japanese Gardens, but that seems a bit redundant, no? Like French Onion Soup in France – Let’s just call it “onion soup”, shall we?

For some reason, I decided that I should rock the pandaMuffs today. All day. They’re in almost all of our pictures. In ten years, I will shake my head at my poor life choices and grumble about “what a nice picture that would have been”. Though, let’s be honest. In ten years, Photoshop will have a “remove pandaMuff” tool and it won’t be a problem. OR in ten years, all of our pictures will move around, like in HARRY POTTER.

ahem

Look at this poor tree. It wants nothing more than for it to be spring. I want springtime. The trees want springtime. Can’t we just convince the damn snow to take a break, already?

I love… moss. It’s green. It doesn’t make me sneeze. It’s soft. It covers things with a vengence.

Nikko’s claim to fame is that it’s Old. Really old. We’re talking the 700s, old. Look at this tree. You don’t get trees like this by sitting around and makin paper all day, folks.

Some days I take an embarrassingly high amount of pictures. Other days you’re lucky to get a few snapshots out of me. This morning was one of those times where I rejoiced in the digital world, and the fact that I didn’t have to pay to develop all this shit. I’m on a texture kick. Behold, my absolutely senseless adoration of the texture:

Hey, let’s finish this later. I don’t want to overwhelm you with pictures, eh?

Jizo, the Baby-Lovin Buddhas.

The Turtle Inn suggested we take a walk up the river, to a path lined with stone Buddhas. I never tire of these things – it was really pretty.

They weren’t exactly Buddhas, as I’m sure the woman at the front desk knew, but easier to explain that way. These particular statues looked a lot like the Bodhisattva “Kasa Jizo”, and some internet research afterward told me I was right!

In some areas, Jizo’s referenced as a transient spirit – like a gondolier in the river of the afterworld, shuttling the souls of children to the the next realm. You’ll often see these statues in shrines dedicated to unborn children – the aborted, miscarried, and early to death. Communities of women will knit red bibs and hats for them at the new year, and allow them to fade and wear as the year goes on. Those little white specs are snow. It was cold.

For the same reasons that Jizo is believed to guide the spirits of children, it’s also thought to be a guide to travelers! Where do you think the money that’s collected at these public statues goes?

While there’s lots of takes on this story, the basic idea’s the same:

The story of Kasa Jizo is about a grandfather and grandmother. It is New Year’s Eve. A weaver, the grandfather goes to town to sell his hats to earn money to buy food for the holiday. But as he sits by the roadside, no one buys his hats. Finally he gives up and heads for home. It is snowing. Seeing six stone jizo, hatless and cold, he gives each a hat. When he returns home and explains, the grandmother says, You have done a good thing. We’ll just have ochazuke (rice soup) tonight. At dawn they hear sounds. The jizo have come to return the favor. New Year’s gifts are piled up by their door.

This is moss. I adore moss. It’s the ideal ground-cover.

…and this is jon and I, bundled up against the snow, wishing for some warmer weather. I don’t look very happy, eh? Can I go back to springtime now?

I’m such a bundle of joy. Next time you see jon, pat him on the head for being such a saint and dealing with grumpy michelle.

Stay tuned. Later today we’ll meet back up with Will & Dana and check out all the templey goodness that Nikko has to offer!

Nikko by Night

Let’s pretend we were in Nikko yesterday and not last week, shall we?

After leaving the shrines that afternoon, jon and I realized that neither of us printed out a map to our hotel. We’re so responsible. Luckily we had a pretty good idea of where it was, and it was early yet so wandering around wasn’t an issue. Though… it was cold and the next day would be even colder.

The Turtle Inn in Nikko was a great place for a traveler to stay. The people at the front desk spoke English, and were were helpful for what to do around the area. It was affordable and the rooms, while sparse, were all you really needed.

In the interest of honesty, I’ve stayed on much more comfortable tatami mats. Really not a deal breaker though – the room was large and there was a little onsen in the building. Jon appreciated the TV, as it let us tune into the sumo tournament. I was excited to snuggle up next to the heater. You could see the river from our window – I bet it would be beautiful in summer.

We found a really neat little steakhouse for dinner, which served up some local specialties:

Yuba. Yuba is well known in both Nikko & Kyoto. It’s tofu skin. It sounds weird, but it’s really good. And I love it.

Tempura’d Maitake, or Hen of the Woods Mushrooms. Normally you would dip tempura into a really light broth, but here they gave me a puree of more maitake. It almost tasted like cream of mushroom soup. I’m not going to lie, I basically licked the bowl. Doesn’t this look like a hedgehog?

Jon got trout, and you could tell the quality of place we were at just by the presentation. The trout was tender and flaky, paired with lemon and a compound butter.

Did I mention it was good?

***

The highlight of my trip tends to coincide with what we get to eat. I’m sorry if you don’t love my food pictures as much as I do – Let me know what you’d like to see more of and I’ll shift the balance for you!

So what’s next? Breakfast, of course. I was disappointed that the hotel breakfast was “Western Style” because I kind of love the traditional miso-and-fish-breakfast that you sometimes get. I shouldn’t have worried. The Turtle Inn didn’t steer us wrong.

Turtle nicknacks adorned their dining room. Kitchy, but cute.

One thing that the traditional Japanese breakfasts lacks is that sweet nectar of the gods. I actually packed a water bottle full of iced coffee, just in case, but it turned out that I didn’t need to. I don’t want to underestimate how excited this made me.

Breakfast was simple: fresh fruit, hard boiled egg, and a few pieces of buttered toast. Oj and have I mentioned the coffee?

Tune in Next Time: Jon and I take a walk down a path of stone Buddhas. It’s pretty and there’s a history lesson.

Nikko, day 1

teamEggers, meet teamNikko.

These 2.5 hour train rides out of Tokyo and into the mountains are becoming Old Hat. I positive that jon and I take more weekend trips than anyone else I know, and definitely more trips into the Japanese Alps than any of our Japanese friends! I would kill for a train system like this going through the Willamette Valley, I tell you what.

Our first look, outside of the station:

I was a poorly behaved traveller and didn’t pack any snacks for my train ride.  When we got off, we were famished and we stopped at the first ramen restaurant we found.  Thanks to Will’s great literacy skills, he can recognize the word!

Honestly, I had high hopes.  Too high.  Too easy to be let down, I suppose.  I love wontons in my soup. I love egg in my soup.  So why was my garlic-soy sauce ramen so disappointing?  Well, check out the layer of garlic chunks and fat floating on top.  Meh.

But onward and upward, shall we?  We’ve got temples to see! Hotels to check into! This may be vacation, but jon’s a wicked slave driver when it comes to getting places on time.  Go, go go!

First stop in Tour de Nikko was the famous bridge. It’s supposed to be one of the most unique bridges in all of Japan. There’s lore associated with it, a tour, you have to pay to walk on it, etc.  Needless to say, I was expecting more than this:

I mean, it’s pretty. Don’t get me wrong but….

…And we’re on with our adventure.  What is that adventure, you ask?  Glad you did.  It’s the World Heritage Tour! Part of me loves it when things are easy.  It makes it more vacationy.  Adventure is for the rest of your life?

Luckily (for the length of this post) things seemed to close up very early ’round these parts, and we were only able to take in one temple today.

It was a compound though!  This place has mucho historical cred – built in 1602 (even though the history of the temple goes back to the year 766!) and somehow managed to avoid the laws saying that there needs to be separation between temples and shrines (buddhists and shinto). Because this was so uncommon, it’s especially neat to see imagery from the two co-mingled.

Now would be a good time to show you an example of that, but I don’t have any pictures handy.  What I do have is this lovely one of jon and I.  Look moms, here we are!

I leave you with a teaser.  Because there’s much more dragon in our adventure, yet to come.