Oideyasu! Please take off your shoes.
http://www.j-blog.com/movies/jizou-bon1.mov (QT mov, 9.8 MB)
A glimpse of Jizou-bon festival, mostly bon dance, in Miyagawacho, Kyoto.
(L to R) Greg in his Deko-Boko Friends yukata, sewn for him by a neighbor of my mother-in-law. In the morning and afternoon, he participate in Jizou-bon festivities in the neighborhood where we live. A priest came and chanted at the neighborhood Jizou shrine in the morning, then there were games and prizes in the afternoon. Then Yoshiko and Gregory went to Grandma's house in the evening; (Center) Where the pretty girls are, so is Peter. The blue tarp was unfortunately necessary because it was raining lightly off and on; (Right) The festival chow line prepared by neighborhood ladies, with fried chicken and beer and breaded, deep-fried vegetables on skewers.
Daimonji2005.mov (3.1 MB QT mov)
A short, handheld shot of crowd by the river at demachiyanagi and then the big kanji 「大」 "dai" being lit up. 大文字五山送り火 Daimonji Gozan Okuribi is the official name of this festival dating from at least the 1600s, and the three strokes in order are about 80, 160, and 120 meters long.
Restaurant (don't ask me the name) garden shelter and villa beyond in the mountains behind Kiyomizu Temple, Kyoto.
The cat welfare scam has recently become a common sight in high-traffic areas of Kyoto such as bridges and station exits. Dubious-looking gentlemen (to say the least) solicit donations under the pretense that they are animal welfare angels, and indeed they have rounded up some stray cats and put them in boxes or cages, along with pictures that seem to be cut out of magazines or brochures. Please don't feed the scammers.
We just returned from acouple days in Shirahama, a seaside onsen (hot spring) resort in Wakayama prefecture, about 3 hours by express train (Ocean Arrow or Super Kuroshio) from Kyoto Station. Here's the southward view out the window of our hotel room, and Greg lounging in yukata after his first-ever swim in the ocean.
