Ohkini, Kyoto.

Early on Wednesday morning, we took a taxi over to the Fushimi Inari shrine.  On the way there, the taxi driver was excited to point out all of the sakura (cherry blossoms) that popped up along the Kamogawa river.  He insisted on taking our photo outside of the entrance to the shrine., More torii than anyone could possibly know what to do with.  It was nice and quiet there in the morning. Only a few people there, most visiting the shrine to offer prayers.  We did come across our first Japanese nekko (cats) here.  One was friendly enough to us pet her.  Later in the morning, Kristin walked over to Ryukoku University for her conference presentation.  While she was discussing the fascinating ins and outs of monetary policy, Cory spent the day Nishiki (fish) market and department stores. We’ll likely write more about them when we return to Kyoto next week.

Later in the afternoon, we met back at the hotel and headed over to the Tenjin-san market at the Kitano Tenman-gu shrine.  We were lucky to be here today, the market only runs on the 25th of each month.  On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at a shrine that was apparently a favorite of athletes, especially soccer players.

It is better than delicious.

For dinner, we went to the Grill Miyata. Kristin had her first steak in 10 years, figuring she could beg forgiveness at the Buddhist temple tomorrow.  The owner, Mr. Hiroshi, is friendly elderly gentleman who learned how to cook during the U.S. occupation.  He then opened his own steak restaurant in the early 1960s.  The décor looks to be unchanged since then. At one point, he invited us back to his cramped kitchen to watch him grill the meat.  In addition to the a cold salmon salad, crab and shrimp croquettes, corn soup, fries and steak, Hiroshi-san made sure we had cold sake, then warm sake, then Japanesch Zaky.  The bottle for the last of these, an aged, amber sake, served on the rocks, promised that “It is better than delicious.”

We can’t wait to come back here with Kelly next week.  We’re hoping the rain in the forecast doesn’t destroy the sakura before then.

More photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/CoryJGolden