Another Golden Day In Kyoto
We're back with our loyal friend and guide today, Hikaru. What's for lunch? Ramen? No not today, maybe tomorrow. For today we are having okonomiyaki! First tasted with Kumiko in Hiroshima, but today we are trying Kyoto-style — less cabbage and sprouts, quite a different flavour we're told.
Our table at Gion Tanto is authentically good, seated on the floor, by a window with view of a stream. The okonomiyaki is also a sight to behold, the best kind of savoury pancake... that's not a pancake, but the best word this western vocabulary can muster for this delicious pancake meets omelette.
We're dining in the Gion area because today is another show day and Gion is home of the Kuburenjo Theatre and Kyoto's famous geisha district. In Kyoto dialect, geiko and maiko, the former being geisha and the latter being a geiko (read geisha) apprentice. After lunch we walk through this historic area to the theatre and Hikaru informs us that if we see any, not to ask for their photo. We'll make them late... The show must go on!
In the spirit of the season, we're here to see Miyako Odori, the Sakura Cherry Dance. In it's 144th presentation this is a showcase of all four seasons and the women's talents in dance, music and song. Pre-show our special tickets afford us a traditional tea ceremony, which in itself is a show, albeit it brief. Sip, swallow, done. No sooner are our commemorative plates packed safely in our bag does the the show begin and we are surrounded by a wall-to-wall symphony of stages — centre, left and right. We are certainly wrapped — in the seasons and with their performance and the intricacies of their craft, right down to the fabric made especially for each year's show.
The show has wet our appetite again, for a little something to take home with us. So we hit the streets in search of a piece of art. We seem in be the right area, with many small traditional stores and galleries specialising in ceramics or wood-block prints. Unfortunately many seem closed or don't hold a "love, must-have" piece and we're short on time.
We move on, reluctantly but with great speed, across the city in a taxi. We arrive at our destination, Kinkaku-Ji, the Golden Pavilion with five minutes to spare before their gates shut for the day. How lucky we are, to have Hikaru as our guide and to have gained entry so late in the day. Everything about this place is magical, a Disney kind of magical. But fantastically real. The pavilion is of course gold but this isn't some out-of-a-can gold. We're talking gold leaf, the real deal. Teeny-tiny sheets of bling, all perfectly placed and shining at us. Blinding good, as are the trees, and the water, and the... Enough is enough.
As we leave the glow of the Golden Pavilion and the sun starts to go down, the temperature drops and our appetite kicks in. Of all the dining options Hikaru mentions on our bus back into the city, we have meat on our minds. Wagu it is, at Toraji. Technically this is a Japanese BBQ restaurant so there is more on the menu, but we go straight for the wagu — various cuts to grill, wagu sushi, then more wagu cuts. That are finally washed down with a final order of the best wagu on the menu, grade 5. All expertly ordered by Hikaru and demolished with groans of delight by us.
As we peel our beefy backsides from our seats and leave the restaurant, Hikaru asks us if we'd like a nightcap. It's a given, to help cut through all this fatty beef of course. We say our farewells for the evening over Japanese whiskey and make a brief stop on the way home via the local convenience store — where Hikaru shares with us the delights on offer. Japan you are too good to us.
