the tall blond guy goes to japan

Kyoto is weird.

Kyoto

There's a kind of mall here too

Within 20 minutes of arriving at their very weird, glitzy, and full or stairs new train station, I saw these:

The Yellows

There are people in yellow undersea diving outfits wandering around Kyoto station.

A few minutes later, outside a Buddhist temple, I was accosted by Mormons.

"Er... ich kann kein English rehten!"

Speaking of Germans (or speaking German, as the case may be), there was a whole tableful of them sitting next to me in the evening at the "P&G Curry House". They were nattering away, unaware that I could understand everything they were saying. Also, I could hear the staff trying to figure out what language these odd, loud gaijin-san were speaking. When I left, I bid the Germans a "guten Abend" which surprised them quite nicely, and to the staff I explained "doitu-go". German.

"Ah soro desu ka!" ("Ah, that's it!")

Back to the train station for a minute. It's really tall. About 15 or 20 stories, at least, and it's in a big V shape. the centre of the V is the main enterance and the middle of the plaza. On the right side is a big shopping centre with stairs on the roof, leading to a rooftop plaza and helicopter landing pad. On the left is a big theatre and hotel with stairs on the roof that don't go quite as high as those on the top of the mall.

Nice view fom up there.

My flexible schedule is not quite as well planned or as flexible as I'd thought. I gave myself about half a day in Kyoto. I have to leave tomorrow around noon in order to be in Nagano early enough to find a hotel and see some stuff before going skiing on Sunday. Too much to do! Kyoto is a beautiful city, with lots of things to see and do. It's really unfortunate that I have to leave so soon. I didn't even find the one temple that I was looking for, Kiyomizu temple. I found some kind of mosoleum that wasn't even on my map. Ah well. It did have a cool golden hangy thing though.

Pretty hanging golden thing.