Day 16 - Asakusa 7 and Harajuku Photoshoot
Early, and not with a concrete plan I randomly threw out a thought to go beat the crowds at empty Asakusa.
I arrive, take a few videos to show for friends, and decide to get a fortune, 100 yen well spent, apparently it’s great fortune, and I had the same one 4 years before, at the same location, so lets make the most out of it.
After taking a few more pictures, I think about it, and decide it’s time to start collecting Goshuin stamps from every shrine I visit, as I will probably visit a few hundred of them in my journey.
I get the booklet, and ask where I can get the first stamp. The lady points me to a specific hall in sensou-ji and there’s a small queue. I wait for about 15 minutes, which isn’t as bad, I see a lot more people with their books full of beautiful calligraphy, and I see the whole procedure, how they say the name of the stamp, in this case the name of the god, Daikokuten, and if not, they can also ask for a special temple stamp, that usually changes according to occasions.
When my turn arrives, I ask for Daikoku-sama, and get it done pretty quickly, big bold strokes, a few red stamps, and a small paper with instructions, that is fully japanese, so I take it with me without thinking much.
One stamp done, something interesting, I feel like I should explore Asakusa just a bit more, so I go to my map and see there’s a cat shrine, as in, shrine full of cat statues a few minutes walking.
I pass one of the exits towards the river, and see a bigger queue and some more shrine maidens, doing something and don’t think too much of it, I got my stamp, these were probably selling the usual trinkets and amulets, but I realize I was wrong a bit later on.
Before hitting the cat shrine, I arrive naturally at a shrine full of Daikon (japanese radish) and I see it also has a few characters for Goshuincho, I follow the path to the shrine, take off my shoes, see the local monk. Give him my booklet and he asks in perfect English if I want this or that type of seal, I say this one, that related to the deity of the shrine. He also gives me a map and says, here are the 9 shrines of Asakusa, here are the seven gods, go and follow…
Filled with purpose, I go towards the cat shrine. As I arrive, the shrine is small, but the cat statues are plenty, unfortunately either there is no monk to do calligraphy or they still do what was the covid friendly way of giving away the Goshuin, the guy at the shrine says, paper only, I said fine, and grabbed one paper copy. I researched and apparently it’s okay to glue them in.
Next shrine is 20 minutes away, I pass by some baseball fields, everyone is playing in some local team equipment, maybe a high school league, it’s hot,around 25 degrees, I arrive to the most northern shrine on my map, the local shrine maidens ask me, what seal do I want, i check my map and say, this deity please. They take away my book, write it and notice a few things. They tell me the paper version I picked up was not a deity, but instead the shrine name… I say, well I guess i’ll come back to it later. By this time I also noticed sensou-ji is not one temple, but two , one being Asakusa temple the other being sensou-ji, so it has two gods instead of one.. I forgot about that one. But I see we have 9 shrines and 7 gods, some of the repeats are ahead, and we’re humans anyways, all about making mistakes, so I proceed to the next shrine reading about Kūkai
On my way to the north eastern shrine, I grab some Inari zushi and chomp them down pretty quickly, as my breakfast was pretty small this morning, and I probably walked half the calories already. Another shrine done, another one of the lucky gods, the next shrine takes a long while, they have a more professional system in place, a shrine maiden takes your booklet, gives you a small ticket number and you wait.. I probably waited for 30 minutes, doing my lessons and just reading more about the whole path I set up myself into. 30 minutes later, I walk down to the last shrine, realizing i am back in Kappabashi, the town of Kappas, the weird human turtle creatures. The town is also known for selling kitchenware, every street is full of plates, knives, chopsticks and other more professional kitchenware. Time for another coffee, find a highly rated, modern coffee joint, ask for a brazilian coffee and an asakusa tiramisu, which just looks like tiramisu with matcha powder on top. I was wrong, it tasted horrible, matcha did not help, it was neither sweet, nor sour… it was some cream that either has gone wrong, or was just flavorless to begin with.
Last shrine is done, I bow to all the gates, thank the shrine and head back to Asakusa, thinking I could go to Skytree, I do, get over the Sumida river, the day is hot, and think of grabbing lunch at Skytree, but the mall itself is so busy, I don’t bother, I will be back probably to see it on top, my legs are starting to hurt so I head to the station, and remember there was a good recommendation of Kisa you next to my hotel.
As I approach it, I see the queue of about 30 people, and guess it’s back to sandwiches for me, I pass a few more options on my way to the hotel and decide to grab a snack from a place later… grab my laptop, put work mode on and finish a few more bits.
As 8pm arrived, I had planned to shoot my guitar teacher, he suggested Harajuku, but that was quite a boring location to shoot, as the spots were devoid of any significant lights or neon… we quickly realize that and caught a train to Shibuya.
Busy as it can get on a Friday night. We stroll around some places, take a few more shots, he seemed pretty happy with the result, I was feeling a bit tired from the day I guess, but as long as he likes it. We passed by seven eleven to grab a drink, I grab another sandwich as my dinner options were lacking.
We do a few more shots before heading to the station, I arrive at my hotel, grab a protein drink from downstairs and a sandwich for tomorrow morning. Take off my weight of the day and crash
