Spiritual Japan: Temple lodging on the Sacred Mountain in Koyasan.

Spiritual Japan: Overnight on the sacred mountain in Koyasan. Hello and good morning or evening my dear. While writing this I was travelling with the crazy Mr Superspeed – the Shinkansen Hikari Super-Express – from Kyoto to Tokyo (in only 160min for 460km/ by car it takes you over 5hours). Well, my dear, this post is going to be a little bit more silent meaning more of the spiritual kind. As the main religions Shinto and Buddhism (mostly Zen-Buddhism) are very important to understand the Japanese culture, I thought it would be a good idea to get in closer contact with the religious lifestyle and to experience Japan from a more spiritual perspective. I decided to go to the Sacred Mountain Koya and its village named Koyasan. It is actually quite far from Kyoto, especially because one part of the train route is closed right now as there had been a serious accident months before. Still, I told myself it is going to be worth it as I heard a lot of this peaceful place already. In my hotel in Kyoto the staff was quite excited that I planned to go to Koyasan and Ayoki – a lovely lady from the reception team – helped me in planning my trip. It took me over 4 hours to get there and I needed to change the train several times to finally take the bus for the last 45minutes. Please have a look on the cute map Ayoki wrote for me, with this in my hands, I was always feeling safe. By the way I shortly stopped in Osaka, I did not see anything but when you plan to see Osaka on your Japan trip, it is really close to Kyoto, so no need to check out your hotel as this just means losing time. You could just go there for a full day trip for example. When I finally arrived in Koyasan or actually when already sitting in the bus for the last part of the route, it started to rain heavily, really heavily. This was also the first time I was kind of afraid as the route to the mountain was quite narrow, the bus driver looked like being really old and tired somehow and we had serious water on the road issues on our way up there. But we arrived safely and he asked all the people in the bus where we stayed at. Everyone gave a different answer (all in temples – later more on that) and he said I had to go on another bus to arrive to my temple. Well, I thought okay. He said I needed to walk for 10minutes to get to the other bus station. Oh shit, meanwhile is was more a flood than rain. And I was just wearing my no function but nice pink (much more important) light jacket from Zara. Then I suddenly remembered that Micky and myself got a welcome package at the Shangai Street festival in Singapore (Do you remember? The ticket, we got from a nice guy there for free.) where we also received a rain cover within the goodie-bag. I looked in my backpack and found it! So at least covered a little bit – I started walking. I need to mention here that I was lucky to travel only with light luggage to Koyasan as I decided to come back to Kyoto for one night, so I could store my big luggage in the hotel. When walking – oh holy shit – it was sooo cold, it started to snow (snow-raining – I don’t know if this word exists in English, but it was snow-raining). And so damn cold! After 20minutes I arrived at the bus station and after another 10minutes my bus arrived when I was almost frozen. Got in the bus and they took me to the Ekoin Temple, my stay for one night. It was now already 5pm, quite late. This kind of staying in a temple is named Shukubo and stands for Pilgrims Lodging in a Temple. In Koyasan there are 117 temples of which 52 provide temple lodgings. Originally, these were simple lodgings for itinerant monks and later for the increasing number of pilgrims. With lodging in a temple you get a real experience of the Japanese religion and culture. I was warmly welcomed by a monk when entering the Ekoin temple and he took me through all the rules, guidelines and also through the agenda of my stay. Food would be served right now, he said, as eating is always early in the temples. So I quickly checked in and had dinner in a kind of dining room just for myself. The room was again simply but beautifully furnished with nothing more than Tatami mats and impressive hand-painted paper walls that are called Fusuma. To share my Japanese knowledge with you and that you understand the pictures of this post, some points that you need to know about Shukubo or temple lodging or what it mainly stands for:

1. Shojin Ryori: With you lodging you always enjoy included breakfast and dinner. The Shojin Ryori means traditional vegetarian cuisine (monks only eat vegetarian) that uses only fresh and natural ingredients cooked with a great deal of time and effort! Meanwhile the Koyasan food is registered at UNESCO World Intangible Cultural Heritage! So really an experience and very good food! All veggie! Especially, the Tofu is world famous meanwhile. Also the food is three stars awarded in the Michelin Green Guide Japan (for Heidi P., there exists a green guide Japan!).
2. Otsutome: Are Buddhist Ceremonies at Temples. A Buddhist service is held in the early morning every day at Shukubo temples. During the ceremony, the chief priest and monks of the temple chant Buddhist sutras in the main temple hall. It is not a tourist thing at all, monks have to do this as their daily ritual but you as a guest are allowed to join this impressive ceremony.
3. Ajikan Meditation: Ajikan is a form of Shingon meditation for integrating the practitioner with the Buddha. Only a few Shukubo temples are able to offer this experience in Koyasan. Ekoin does!
4. Shakyo: Stands for Sutra Copying and is also meant for meditation. One of the central texts of Buddhism is the Heart Sutra. It is taught that copying sutras brings peace and harmony to mind and body. You get the papers at the reception of your temple and practice in your room for yourself.

After you know what Shukubo stands for and you also know now what I went through. A really great and special experience. After the great vegetarian evening meal which I enjoyed in this beautiful room, I went to my room to do the Shakyo practice. And by copying the sutras you really get relaxed. I personally got tired which is always a good sign that I kind of release. I studied all the papers that had been in the room and as I had arrived late, I could not join the meditation training with the monks unfortunately. So I did the practice alone in my room. The whole place was really peaceful, so you automatically calm down which I found very relaxing after all the exciting experiences that I had so far. After meditation, I went to bed early (a Futon again) as I wanted to join the morning session at 6:30am the next day. Well, I do not know why but I could not find sleep this night at all. Maybe it was too quiet, the whole holiness to impressive or just that I needed to digest the whole trip, but I did not sleep at all in that night in this beautiful temple. Between the thin paper walls, you also do hear everything, meaning really everything. I was the one with the alarm in the morning (although I was awake), so everyone else also got up. Did I mention that you share bathroom and shower rooms in the Shukubo? Well, it’s like this. But all spotless clean, so not a problem at all. After I woke up the whole temple with my unholy iphone alarm, we were all on time for the so called morning service, the morning ritual of the monks. This took place in the (bitter cold) main temple and was a really impressive thing. In the light of candles and lanterns, I listened to sutras that were calming down my thoughts and sounded well to my ears although I did not understand a word. I practiced the meditation technique again (mainly how to breathe) and all of this has been a very special start in a new day. After the morning service, there was also a fire ceremony – another ritual the monks had to do every morning. We went to another smaller but even nicer temple where the whole thing took place. The evening before you could hand in your wishes, written on little wooden sticks, and these ones were burnt during the fire ritual. Again very impressive. We were only a small group, and everyone got quite emotional. A very special experience, I found. After over one hour of rituals, the breakfast had been prepared and served in the dining room. This time I shared the room with the rest of the group and we were lucky to enjoy a very good Japanese breakfast, all vegetarian. On my day in Koyasan I wanted to see one of the most famous sites: Okunoin. Okunoin is a cemetery and sacred area that extends about 2km from the Ichinohashi bridge to Kobo Daishi`s (he built Koyasan) mausoleum. It is really famous all-over Japan! The path you walk is lined by hundreds of centuries-old beautiful cedar trees on both sides. And among the trees there are over 200,000 gravestones and memorial pagodas for people ranging from very rich and famous to locals. The cemetery is the most beautiful one I have ever seen. Sounds strange, but true to me. I know it is a little morbid, but please see the pictures, there lies a natural beauty in it. As I am sharing my thoughts with you here, I was really wondering the whole time when seeing this, why our graves are always so ugly, cold and unemotional. Well, the tour is also offered as a night tour by the temples but as it was raining that much the night I arrived, the tour had been cancelled. I was lucky as there was sunshine this morning, a crystal clear blue sky but still very cold. I walked the tour by my own and spent about 1,5 very peaceful hours there. Afterwards I walked through the nice little town or village Koyasan, saw more temples and also finally the white temple dog of the old Japanese race Shiba Inu. In the early afternoon, I headed all the way back to my beloved Kyoto, this time I made it in only three hours. A big Hello in the hotel again, so lovely, they all wanted to know how Koyasan had been and it seemed that every one in the team knew that I had been to Koyasan. So cute. After check-in I had another teatime in Gion, enjoyed 2 liters of Matcha and Green Sencha tea and had great Soba noodles with soup and tempura as a Kyoto good-bye dinner. I walked Kyoto by night and found it very safe, even when it had been quite dark when I crossed parks or even temples at night. Back in the hotel I tried to pack all my lovely little souvenirs that I had collected during the trip. Every piece of paper meant a lot to me as I felt that I had to leave this beautiful country soon. You know, I am very bad in saying good-bye. Well, yes, I had to say goodbye to Kyoto the next morning (yesterday when you read this) and I sadly left with a really, really heavy heart. Strange but I simply loved it there. The hotel team and Ayoki who helped me during my stay with every question I had, personally said good-bye to me. I do not know if it was because I was travelling alone (with so heavy luggage) but people really took attention. They were involved somehow. Much more than a hotel normally is. Ayoki gave me a typical Origami Swan that she made herself – so lovely, together with another hand-written card. This time I was prepared and also gave her a hand-written card of myself. She was nearly crying when I handed it over to her. With all my tiny little treasures in my luggage I took the shuttle bus to Kyoto Main Station and after a last Matcha Soft ice-cream at the train station (love this ice-cream!!!), I jumped in the Shinkansen back to Tokyo. While gaining in speed, I knew for sure: Kyoto really, really got me(ez) and definitely is on the list of destinations that I need to visit again!