Sooo, hows that election going? I hope Californians show the world that they are a little more sensible than the rest of the country in electing their leaders....(lots of talk about this in the hostels...internationally, arnie as governor is quite a joke) They had an article out here about last minute mudslinging and in big headlines, they called him the "Gropinator" and had this enlarged picture with the text wrapped around it of him sticking his hand out reaching (actually just to shake someones hand it looks like, but who knows?)
Did another little walk today from the Heian Shrine (one HUGE shrine) through a small little mall along the canal (kyoto has lots of canals and 1 river) where i ate some cheap octopus balls (not those kind) and okonomiyaki, then all the way down to the train station to get some info, then down on to Gion where i saw some Geishas/Maiko skittering across the streets. They looked amazingly busy. I also was lucky enough to see a little advertisement in the tourist magazine for a sumo match that is coming up on the 15th. Cheapest tickets are 2500 yen for unreserved 2nd floor seats but all in all not too bad.
Oh yeah, almost forgot that i toured the former Imperial palace yesterady! It was the first tour ive had and it was pretty good, describing the 3 different forms of architecture used (The oldest form had no tatami and the doors opened vertically and were held by hooks, the latest form uses tatami and sliding doors). There were also some nice gardens and they had the special chairs in which the emperor sits for his coronation. Turns out that the last emperor coronated in the Imperal palace was Showa (?) (his name now that hes dead) or Hirohito. The current one was coronated in Tokyo and had the special chairs airlifted there.
Interesting fellow popped into the Uno House yesterday from Denmark. Hes like 60+ years old and is a writer. Apparently he writes travel books and has been almost everywhere! Hes doing Japan, China, and Korea for 3 months. Has some pretty funky stories about Pot in Copenhagen (its everywhere), pot in columbia (police bribery), getting held up in Uruguay and taking a run for it, being a bartender in Israel, and multitudes of other things i forgot. Hearing about all these places makes the list of places I want to go to longer and longer and longer (except for uruguay)...aigh..
On my way to yet another walking trail and stumbled across Kyoto University which is where i am now. Looks pretty nice so far albeit a little tiny.