Final Friday

After five days of hitting the sights of Kyoto, I woke up on my final day and realised I had succeeded in going where I had wanted to go; with a few extra sites thrown in for good measure. But I still had a day left and I wasn’t going to waste it sitting around in my warm room browsing the internet (although the idea was tempting). Instead, I applied my usual layers of clothing and headed out to Nishiki market.

If you can eat it, and there are a very wide range of things you can eat in Japan; then you can find it at this market. It also provides drinks, sake to be precise; which is why I was there:

*This man sold me alcohol *

Of course I also had to snap a few snaps:

A bouquet for my baby

Whatever next, tofu pizza?

Everyone’s bemused

Arigato gazamous

I don’t care if you buy or not

Tasters

Chestnuts? No more sticky pockets for me thank you

Hey, puffer fish! No problem, I’ll prepare it myself at home

Fresh veggies

Whatever you fancy

Picked up some snacks to bring home (not tofu doughnuts), and then made a trip to Isetan to obtain some vital cosmetics for my wife.

Crucial shopping completed, there were still some hours of daylight remaining and so I took another wander down the philosopher’s path and then headed back towards my accommodation with the intention of visiting Shinnyo-do temple. The light failed before I reached there, but I did stumble upon a pagoda:

In the garden there was a Japanese girl with a Hasselblad, trying to take a close-up photo of some leaves which were swaying in the wind:

I don’t know if she succeeded, but she will have gone home with a handful of carefully crafted photos; whereas I went home with gigabytes of stuff of varying quality and would then spend a week sifting through them in order to select some to display. I wasn’t sure which of us had the right idea, but it seemed appropriate that my shot of her should be the last photograph of the trip.

Went for an excellent final dinner at Goya (seaweed tempura!), washed down with plenty of hot sake. Slept very well.

Comments 🔗

2013-12-06 | Kevin Moore says

really impressed with the colours and sharpness of the images, especially those indoors in the market. looks like the EM-1 is a solid workhorse.

2013-12-06 | John Rochford says

Thanks for the photographic tour de force, outstanding coverage

2013-12-07 | Andrew says

Ah Nishki market - I used to work just across the street from the west entrance and often headed down there during lunch - bought a couple of handmade kitchen knives there and was served tea while waiting for the fellow in back to sharpen them on a huge whetstone- not cheap but amazing knives ( one was for sushi - what a deadly weapon! )…your photos brought back all the smells as I wandered down the market…thanks for that…

2013-12-07 | Andrew says

ps- the tofu donuts sound absolutely delicious compared to some Korean fare : http://i41.tinypic.com/snl1qu.jpg

2013-12-07 | Spike says

Yeah, you should buy another one!

2013-12-07 | Spike says

Thanks John; was a lot of work to put all the posts together so glad to know you enjoyed it.

2013-12-07 | Spike says

I went into a knife shop, some amazing implements. And indeed there were some lovely aromas.

2013-12-08 | How says

Another picture of Retro Girl. Are you hinting you want one….the Hasselblad I mean ?

2013-12-11 | Spike says

Yes