The Big Buddha is Upstairs

I am back from Japan. I spent my last day there with a subway day pass, and just kept getting off at various stops and seeing what there was to see (without wandering very far each time, because I can't say anything in Japanese except for 'hello' and 'thankyou,' so how was I to get directions if I got lost?). I spent my day buying socks, and reading what English-language books I could find in bookstores, and eating as much dessert as possible.

The highlight of the day was by far stumbling into a Buddhist temple. It was beautiful, with lovely pagoda-esque buildings and sand and statues and trees. There weren't many signs in English, so I was left mostly to guess what everything was, but I was intrigued by a paper sign in English taped to the side of a stairway: 'THE BIG BUDDHA IS UPSTAIRS.' Big Buddha? What big Buddha? I had to find out.

They really weren't kidding. Buddha was about three stories tall and made out of wood. He was sitting cross-legged, and smiling mysteriously between a stylishly thin mustache and goatee. People kept coming in and bowing their heads before him in prayer, then tossing some money in a wooden box and leaving. Some cans of orange juice had been placed in offering at his feet.

I watched a girl awake from prayer and walk toward this door at the base of the buddha statue. So I followed. It led to a little passage-way that curved around Buddha's bottom. On the walls were pictures of really scary demons barbecuing babies. At the end of this tunnel of terror was another doorway, which led into a pitch-dark (no kidding - pitch dark, not even some cracks of light) winding passage that curled its way back out the other side of the Buddha. Kind of a strange meditative trust-walk, I imagine. I tried entering twice, chickened out twice, then finally went all the way through. My fingers never left the walls. I've never been so afraid of trap doors or people jumping out at me (of which there were neither, except in my head).

After the Big Buddha, I went downstairs into a wide temple (picture the scene from Lost in Translation when Scarlet Johannsen visits the temple. it looked just like that). A group of Japanese ladies were kneeling on the floor, clanging bells together and singing. I don't know what else I was expecting - robes, perhaps - but they were just in their jeans and shirts. Some guy came up to me and asked a question in Japanese. I just said yes, which seemed to please him, because he smiled and said something else and walked away. Good save.

On my way out, I saw a sign in English that explained a few things about the temple, and apparently I was supposed to have seen a statue of the Thousand-Hand Goddess of Mercy, dating all the way back to something nuts like the 1100s. Couldn't find her, though. Shame.

And now I'm back in Korea, and to celebrate Andy and I went out and bought a box of tissues and a stuffed animal (which Andy has dubbed the giraffe-erpillar). Apparently the Koreans like strange creatures.