Tag Archives: Buddhism

As Above, So Below

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I’ve decided to, as usual, travel out into the middle of nowhere and explore some off-the-beaten-track sights pertaining to death, stored inside a massive Buddha. The news of another 7.9 magnitude earthquake and a subsequent megaquake warning drifts across the speakers at Kanazawa Station. The warning now in place for the coming week just reminds me of how fragile everything is.

After a lengthy train journey, I leave Komatsu Station on foot. The mid-April sun burns at a scorching 30 degrees. I do understand that we orbit a giant fireball, but in April it shouldn’t be this hot, and my skin actually feels like it’s going to melt. It’s as hot as hell. I’m walking in the direction of Mount Hakusan, its 2702 metre peak hovering above the skyline, the snow from two days ago now gone. It’s a ninety-minute walk to my destination, and every time I pass a tree, I slow, hovering in the shade for the briefest of moments. I eventually arrive at the Buddha, which marks the entrance to the Hanibe Caves.

But first, I need to pay for a ticket. There is nobody at the little booth, so I head inside to the gift shop to find a member of staff. I get the feeling this gift shop also doubles as somebody’s house. I find an old lady watching earthquake footage on the television, disturb her, and after she apologises about fifty times, she walks me out to the booth, takes my money, and hands me a ticket.

Inside, a shrine for dead children. Thousands of small green statues, each one representing the soul of a deceased child. I suppose it’s meant to offer comfort to a grieving parent, the souls of the children they never had, protected here, preserved, placed on a shelf forever, so they won’t have to stack stones for eternity in the afterlife.

Some of the statues have been recently decorated with ribbons or cloth, others have flowers, stuffed toys, or figurines beside them, and others are long forgotten. The place feels endless. Shelf after shelf, through corridors and doorways, rooms upon rooms. There are even a couple of empty shelves remaining, slowly filling up.

I head back outside and up the mountain path. Mossy stone steps that don’t look to have been stepped on in years. It’s here that I see my first snake, slithering in front of me before disappearing into the trees. I quicken my pace, reach the top of the steps, which turn into a forest, and now every snap of a twig or rustling of leaves sets me on edge.

Eventually, the forest opens into a clearing. There is a reclining Buddha statue here. I notice there is no route map or signs in any language, so trying to figure out where to go next is challenging, as everywhere appears to close in on itself.

I head back toward where I encountered the snake and notice some steps heading down in the other direction. I follow them and finally come to an unmarked cave entrance.

Inside, it is freezing cold. I follow the sound of dripping water through dimly lit corridors, deeper underground. There are hundreds of sculptures in here, most depicting some form of death. If this place were conscious, it would probably describe itself as a theme park for damnation.

I pass devils and tortured beings, giant spiders, a pile of what look like human skulls. People with menacing grins carry knives, surrounded by dismembered limbs. It’s a juxtaposition of surreality, physical beauty and violent death. A woman is missing an eyeball. A man has come up against the great King Enma Raja and is missing his tongue. A monster is covered in snakes.

I find four demons sitting around a dinner table. There is a sign: “Doesn’t this seem like fun? The feast has reached its climax, stained with blood. Those who have fallen here at the end of debauchery and madness are filling the stomachs of the demons. Another guest has arrived. Very well, come and sit on this table.”

It is unnerving being here. The cold, the dark, and knowing that I’m not only lost in a forest somewhere in the middle of nowhere, with nobody around, I’m also lost in a maze carved through an underground cave network, which is also trying to be a haunted house.

If I died in here, nobody would likely find me for days. I want to be alive. I want to feel alive. This place does that. Despite the death around every turn, threading through the darkness of the tunnels, I do enjoy places like this. Not just the unknown, either. The depictions of what the Buddhist interpretation of the Gates of Hell looks like, and the overly enthusiastic marketing of calling it that. As I try to figure out where I am, occasional noises echo around. A click. Something tapping in the distance. Someone else is here. Something else.

I leave the same way I came in, or so I thought. I exit into a small town. I’m lost and completely disoriented. Somehow, I have left the Hanibe Caves, but it doesn’t feel like I found the way out.

Zen and the Art of Samsara Cycle Abeyance

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A woman on the train loudly tells her tourist friends and the entire carriage that Kanazawa might be the most Instagrammable place in Japan.

Leaving the station I see a map showing thirty-seven points of interest, and for someone who enjoys walking as much as I do, and with my long legs, it appears everywhere today will be within walking distance. Following a gaggle of eager tourists, I end up at Omicho Market.

This massive indoor fresh food market has been operating since the early 1600s, and the tourists are here for it. The smell of freshly caught fish fills the morning air. A sign at one stall says, “All the firefly squids are sold out,” which is a shame, as they’re something I’ve always wanted to try. As I move through the haze of cacophonous chatter, a multitude of languages echoes from stall to stall, and staff shouting welcomes from every direction feels somewhat overwhelming. So much so that I begin to suffer from a not-so-Instagrammable headache.

I fall out of the market and seamlessly into a garden, specifically Kenrokuen. Ponds, streams, famous trees, mountain views: the garden has everything. With seven individual entrances and two huge car parks, it also boasts a sixty-minute standard walking course. Unfortunately, the popularity of such a place is again a massive draw for tourism. They gather around the only cherry blossom tree whose petals have avoided abscission, blocking views of the ponds, and the paths themselves. And worst of all, the silence.

I honestly thought being in a garden would be a tranquil experience, but my head thumps as a tour guide with a megaphone ushers along a group of ten or so tourists. People shout, crunch food loudly, and whatever calm I had disappears. Even here, surrounded by what should be peace, I can still hear the beeping of a distant pedestrian crossing.

Trying to leave also becomes a challenge. Despite there being seven exits, I can’t seem to find any of them. I imagine this place is better early in the morning, because despite my complaining, it is still quite a good garden, and the views of the city can be pretty nice from up here too.

Outside, I find another map and a name I recognise: Daisetz Suzuki, a famous Buddhist philosopher, religious scholar, and authority on Zen. He has a museum here in his hometown of Kanazawa; well, it probably used to be his museum, he died in 1966. I do almost miss the entrance though as I become distracted by a massive bee hovering at my eye level, buzzing rather loudly.

An information booklet that comes with the ticket price opens up to reveal just a blank white page, and nothing else. I do love minimalism, it’s part of this blog’s identity, so I fully appreciate this. I decide to stand by the Water Mirror Garden for a time, listening to the soft sound of distant running water, the stillness, finally achieving perfect silence.

Over at the Contemplative Space, a white room by a window where the sun comes through, I sit thinking. Looking at the suspended water mirror’s reflection, I try not to think. I quickly realise that I can’t not stop thinking, and then try to work out which part of that sentence was the double negative, which only makes me think even more. That’s the problem with meditation or mindfulness; silence becomes a game of Russian roulette, only the gun’s loaded with your own thoughts.

I continue further on, into Shofukaku Garden, a stroll garden around a pond. A Designated Place of Scenic Beauty, and free to enter, I’m quite surprised to find I have this garden completely to myself. I wander around my own secret space, take it all in, watch the carp, absorb the spring colours, before being chased off by that angry bee from earlier.

I next head up some moss-covered steps into a forest. It’s so incredibly silent here, just the twigs crunching underfoot and the occasional bird, there’s nothing else, and I don’t need anything else. So I pause and stay, for a while, just here, just being, before eventually forcing myself back into the cycle of the noisy world I had briefly escaped. That fleeting moment, now gone.

I walk in the direction of the Higashi Chaya Tea District, which apparently looks a lot better at night. Again, tourists bumble noisily. Regardless, it does still feel like a step backwards in time, with rickshaws, tea ceremonies, pairs of women in kimono, evening geisha performances, so much so that I plan to come back later to take a couple of night shots.

The shops here sell the usual fish-shaped waffles but this time laced with edible gold leaf. Kanazawa is the biggest producer of gold leaf in Japan. In fact, gold leaf here is everywhere. There are gold leaf cosmetics, face lotion and hand cream. One shop is trying to get in on that action and is offering gold beer. But most beer is already gold. There are people queueing to buy gold leaf soft serve vanilla ice cream. I even see one lady come out of the shop holding her ice cream, pose with it for an Instagrammable selfie, before casually tossing it into a bin. She might well just cancel her trip and get AI to generate her holiday for her.

Amongst the tea shops and cafes there is also the Kanazawa Yasue Gold Leaf Museum, so I decide to take a look and learn about this 1/10,000th of a millimetre thick foil that requires extreme focus, almost Zen in its precision. There was supposed to be a hands-on workshop so I could try to apply gold leaf myself, but sadly it’s been cancelled, so instead I admire some art adorned in flecks of gold, before checking to see if there’s a golden toilet on the way out. There isn’t.

By the time the gloaming arrives, my gold leaf soft serve vanilla ice cream has all but melted. I sit in the evening light, sipping a golden beer. I realise now that my headache too has almost faded. You can sort of tell these things.

The Men Who Scare At Boats

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There’s a massive clock outside Kii-Katsuura Station. Each tick sounds like a nail being hammered into a coffin. About a twenty-minute walk from the station, between the mountains and sea of Wakayama Prefecture sits Fudarakusan-ji, a small, unassuming Buddhist temple with a wooden boat outside.

The temple was built to face the Pacific Ocean because that is the perfect location for casting boats out to sea. The only problem with these boats was the reason they were cast out; the priests inside them were trying to reach Fudaraku, the Pure Land.

The boats were designed with a sealed cabin, no windows or doors; a claustrophobics nightmare. Ever had a dream about being buried alive? The priests here lived it. They’d climb inside, and the boats would be nailed shut from the outside. The orange wood and torii gates surrounding all four sides of the boat are a nice touch.

Water, a small supply of food, and a fuel lamp were placed inside before the priest’s departure. The lamp was there so the priest could keep reciting sutras and appeals to Kannon until they found the Pure Land, until they reached the end of their journey, or their life.

Some of the boats washed up in Kii-Katsuura Bay. A few priests escaped. Most died of starvation, drowning, or dehydration. To stay on theme, I book a night in Urashima. To get there, I have to board a boat myself. This one features no death, just a turtle mascot. The four huge buildings making up the backdrop are all part of my hotel: one on top of a mountain with an observation platform, one at the side of the mountain connected through a network of tunnels, one at the base of the mountain by the dock, and one that isn’t shown on any maps but is there, accessed through the labyrinth.

Checking into my accommodation I’m provided a map. The hotel is so large it features a multitude of interconnected buildings attached through tunnels and cave systems carved into a mountain. The place describes itself as a resort and spa. It has everything: five onsen baths, a games centre, karaoke rooms, a Lawson Stores, shopping streets, massage parlours, restaurants for eating, ballrooms for dancing, ball rooms for ball games, conference rooms, well you get the idea.

There’s one area where I have to take multiple escalators rising the length of 154 metres that take about five minutes. There’s rest areas between each escalator with sofas and tables, just in case the standing becomes too much. I exit onto the 32nd floor and admire the view.

On one of the random floors, I find a replica of an original painted tapestry held in the Treasure Hall at Kumano-Nachi Taisha Grand Shrine. I’ll visit there tomorrow, weather permitting. The full tapestry features the Nachi Pilgrimage Mandala, which displays all the details of this area, from the top of the waterfalls down to Fudarakusan-ji. Here, at the bottom, one of the boats is being cast away into the Pacific Ocean.

Walking through the hotel, I feel as though I’m in some cult dystopian movie. Everyone is walking around in matching yukata. Some of the tourists are not Japanese and wear their yukata crossed the wrong way, for funerals. Everyone goes for breakfast at the same time, for dinner at the same time.

The hotel feels almost haunted, some entire areas are abandoned. It would be the perfect setting for a horror movie. It makes me feel like a rat in a maze or a character in Severance as I navigate the hotel’s endless, echoing corridors.

Having just about explored every length of the hotel, I decide to end the day by soaking in the healing power of a hot spring bath. Of the five to choose from, I opt for the one carved into a cave that looks out onto the Pacific Ocean.

The onsen is so peaceful that I no longer feel as though I’m in a hotel. Sadly, I’m not allowed to take photographs in the onsen, for obvious reasons, so instead, here is the view from the 32nd floor looking out into the bay, the 40 degree sky, and the town of Nachi-Katsuura.

I sit, submerged in hot water, staring past the cave and out to sea. I think of the lost souls who once set off from this shore, sealed inside a boat, nailed shut.

A Spiral, a Darkness, a Fever, and a Staircase

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I wake up in pain. Cramp. My leg screams. I’m in Fukushima Prefecture, Aizu-Wakamatsu, an old samurai town with a historical past. I’ve been here for a few days. I feel oddly connected to this place in a way I’m really not sure how to describe. Aizu is famous for its samurai and a red cow named Akabeko (translated to mean red cow).

I leave my hotel. The sun is so bright that the sky isn’t blue, but white, yet there are no clouds. It’s like walking through a thick fog of heat. Imagine you’re a little tiny person the size of an ant, walking through an oven set to 180 degrees. That’s what it feels like. I walk across the sheet pan in the direction of the mountains, vaguely knowing that I will arrive somewhere spirally important.

In Aizu, the legendary red Akabeko cow can be rubbed and is said to heal illness or sickness. The thing I like about Akabeko is that they have bobbing heads, so every time I walk past one I push its head down and smile as it nods up and down.

A little further up the road, Aizu-Wakamatsu is offering politeness lessons:

Don’t talk to women outside. Must bow to your elders. The two conflicting lines bother me, because as I photograph the sign, an elderly Japanese woman starts speaking to me in Japanese. Obeying the rules, I just bow my head and walk away.

A black Seven Eleven with none of the usual green and red stripes greets me funereally; I’ll soon find out why it’s black. The cascading sunshine and the black stripes make me feel as though my eyes are glitching. Outside the entrance to Sazae-do Temple, there are sweeping steps that twist all the way up, but someone has placed an escalator to one side. You have to pay 250 yen to ride it, but the cramp is threatening to return.

I don’t know what it is about today, but as soon as I step off the escalator and into an open area of monuments, the suddenness of place hits me, catching me off guard. To summarise what happened: on October 30, 1868, during the Battle of Aizu, the Byakkotai, a group of teenage samurai thought they had lost the civil war. They saw smoke in the distance, thought the castle had been sieged, so they killed themselves, not far from where I stand. Learning this, I become swallowed by sadness.

Their bodies were left outside for days, until a man, Isoji Yoshida, decided to take it upon himself to move the bodies of the dead children and bury them. For this, he was arrested. Katamori Matsudaira, the 9th lord of Aizu, wrote a poem in their honour. It goes:

“People will visit, and their tears will fall upon your graves. You will not be forgotten.”

There are monuments here for everyone involved. For the dead children, for all who died. The tomb of sixty-two fourteen- to seventeen-year-old samurai. It’s devastating. I try not to bring myself too much into these stories. But this place, these dead children, their story found its way in. I think what gets me is they don’t mention the word suicide, they explicitly state every time that they killed themselves.

I weep my way around a cemetery before turning toward the temple I originally came up this hill to see. There is a prayer wheel that, when you turn it, creates a mournful sound said to be heard in the underworld, comforting the spirits of the Byakkotai warriors. “Please turn it quietly with your heart.”

Sazae-do, a wooden Buddhist temple constructed in 1796, is famed for its distinctive spiral staircase that ascends and descends in an intricate, intertwining path. Encircling the ramp are 33 Kannon statues, each believed to grant the same spiritual merit as completing the entire Aizu Pilgrimage route to anyone who passes by them.

At 16.5 metres tall, three storeys, and shaped like a hexagon, you enter from the right side, climb the spiral staircase, and exit back down another way. You never see another soul. This valuable structure is the only wooden building of its kind from the mid-Edo period still standing in the world. It’s also the only known double-helix-shaped wooden structure in existence.

I breathe a heavy sigh before exiting through the gift shop and buying a shirt featuring Akabeko. I think about people, those loved and lost, on days when we exist together, and days when we don’t. At five o’clock, Yuyake Koyake starts playing, the song that tells the children to go back home. It elevates my sadness.

I head to a steak restaurant for dinner. I eat the red cow’s bleeding heart.

Quivering Heights

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I’ve come to Mount Hoju in Yamagata Prefecture to experience one of the best views in Japan. At the base of the mountain is the usual buzzing of tourist-targeted shops selling shaved ice, overpriced noodles, and fish-shaped waffles. Beyond that is the oldest beech wood building in Japan, home to a massive wooden statue of Buddha.

The statue is Yakushi Nyorai, the Buddha of healing. They say that if you have an illness or ailment, something you want cured, you rub that part of the Buddha, then climb to the top of the mountain and you will be miraculously healed. Naturally, I rub the Buddha on the neck and hope my scars fade.

Next, it’s time to climb the mountain. The road to the temple is 1,015 stone steps surrounded by thick woods and strangely shaped rocks. Cedar trees make up the mountain forest. The Risshakuji Temple at the top of the mountain means “Mountain Temple,” which is the perfect name for it, considering it is atop a mountain.

Some of the steps are in sections of 108, to represent the 108 Buddhist sins. There are Jizo statues scattered throughout the ascent adorned with coins. There’s a monument engraved with another poem by Basho, and it’s a famous one:

Such stillness,
the cicadas’ cries,
sink into the rocks.

After the second set of 108 steps I’m already worn out. Half a million steps last month, I now find myself humbled by a mere 216. I’m already close to spiritual defeat. The day is hot, the air quality poor, and it’s very humid. It has a way of wearing me out, I suppose.

It’s so hot that every now and again there will be an ever-so-slight breeze, and every time there is, I notice it. A lot of the Japanese people are carrying these little portable electric handheld fans. A country famous for fans, so it makes sense. At about 550 steps there’s a massive rock that everyone is photographing.

Further up, there’s Risshakuji, founded in 860 AD, a small temple of minimalist qualities. From here I realise just how high up I am, that I can make out the city below. The thing that’s unusual is there is no barrier here. I could fall off the mountain in an earthquake, and that’s exactly what almost happens.

The mountain shakes, ever so slightly. A shift. Nobody else seems to react or notice. It’s just the subtle shift. The whole thing took a tiny step to the side. The mountain itself… adjusts. It’s not dramatic. Nothing tumbles. There’s no sound. But I feel it. And for a moment I am filled with dread. Then it stops. I wonder if being on a mountain is the worst place to be during an earthquake.

Very close to the top of the mountain is a post box. At the bottom of the mountain there is a post office, a mere 940 steps away. I naturally feel sorry for the postman whose job it is to walk up and down a mountain every day to collect what is likely just the odd piece of mail.

1,015 steps. I reach the top. The cicadas’ song fills the humid afternoon here, sharp and piercing, like needles being driven into a heart. Their cries echo, sinking into the ancient rock.

A cemetery at the top concludes the climb. Crooked gravestones pushing through moss. Everything here is slanted, aged, dignified in its entropy. I sit beside the tombs, trying not to melt into them. The mountain temple echoes these themes of death, decay, and transcendence as it climbs through cemetery terraces and silence.

I stand to rest, to catch my breath, to take it in. My shirt clinging to me like skin, thirst calling me to a vending machine back at the base of the mountain. But I linger. Amongst the graves, everything feels tilted. Stones, time, even thought.

Walking down is the reward as I can see it all. All the views, all the way down. There’s something about a good vista. I say goodbye to the top of the mountain, and goodbye to the vista. Hasta la vista. Until I see the view again, opening like lungs exhaling. I can see the whole valley now, softened by haze.

Back at my capsule hotel, I voluntarily entomb myself in a plastic drawer like a very polite corpse.