My name is Brandon
Barker. I am majoring in Political Science and Asian Studies, and am minoring
in Japanese with a Business Emphasis. I decided to travel to, you guessed it,
Japan for the fall semester to mainly improve my ability in the language.
I have been studying at
Kanto Gakuin University in the Yokohama area, but during a break between
classes I decided to travel to Kyoto and see some classic Japanese culture.
Kyoto was the former capital of Japan, and as such has a rich history dating
back to when there were Shoguns and samurai.
The best way that I
could describe Kyoto would probably be as a nicer version of New York that has
shrines, temples, and castles every now and then. It's a really fascinating
contrast between modern society and classical Japanese history. I went while
the trees were all changing color, which made for some great sight seeing.
This picture is of the
front of Fushimi Inari Taisha, the shrine best known for its long trail of
orange gates which climb up and around the mountain it sits at the base of. The
shrine is for the Japanese Shinto god Inari Oukami, who is the god of many
things, but primarily rice. Its messengers are foxes, and as such there are a
number of fox statues throughout the shrine's grounds. I originally intended to
climb to the top of the mountain, but I took the time to explore a number of
sub-shrines on offshoots of the gates' path. They were all gorgeous and
peaceful, but the estimated time to climb the mountain I had read did not
factor this in, and after a couple hours I just could barely keep climbing. By the time I had reached a spot where I could see all of Kyoto, I was pretty satisfied. I decided to rest at a cat cafe along the road to the train station, which was adorable. You can eat some snacks, play with the cats, and and read some manga while you wait for your legs to work again.
Speaking of being able
to see all of Kyoto, I hiked up Arashiyama mountain the next day, where there
is a monkey park at the top. The view is absolutely gorgeous, and there are a
ton of monkeys all over the place. They're all quite docile, and you can feed
them if you buy a bag of apples or peanuts inside of a small shop inside. The paths going up and down the mountain are also stunning. Japan's summers are quite hot and humid, but the tradeoff is that the plants are all more vibrant than I have ever seen. Even in the fall some of the brightest red, yellow, and green leaves I have ever seen cover the trees.
One of the last big
stops that I made was to Kinkaku-ji, which was originally a house built by an
aristocrat, was then purchased by a shogun, and finally was converted into a
Zen Buddhist temple. The original was burnt down in 1950, but it was rebuilt in
1955 thanks to donations. The second and third stories are entirely covered in
gold leaf, and while it is stunning, visitors are unfortunately not able to go
inside. The grounds surrounding the building, however, help to make up for it.
I went to a couple of
other places while in Kyoto but these are the locations that I would categorize
as a "must-go" if you visit. One thing to note though is that I
encountered a little bit of an issue due to the fact that the region speaks in the
Kansai-dialect of Japanese. By this point I was pretty much always able to
communicate effectively enough in the Yokohama/Tokyo area, and was really
working on getting the intonation right for the standard Tokyo dialect. When in
Kyoto, however, I ran into some issues with people understanding what I was
saying despite being certain that I hadn't misspoken. There is actually a
surprising amount of English in Kyoto though, which was convenient, even if I
really wanted to practice the language more during my mini-vacation.
- Brandon Barker, Hogs Abroad Alum of the KGU Exchange during Fall 2016
--
Interested in spending a semester abroad while paying your normal U of A tuition? Take a look at an exchange program!
For information about our exchange with Kanto Gakuin University, see http://studyabroad.uark.edu/exchange/kantogakuin/
For other exchange options through the University of Arkansas, check out http://studyabroad.uark.edu/programs/exchange.php
