Visiting Kamakura City/Carlos Pueblo

Visiting Kamakura City/Carlos Pueblo

After visiting Tokyo three times, I finally arranged a time to visit Kamakura

city for the first time, a city 31 miles south southwest of Tokyo. Kamakura

is a medieval capital city of Japan, Kamakura Bakufu era, famous tourist’s

point including the Kotoku-In, the great Kamakura Buddha. I arrived at the

city very early in the morning, started walking toward the great Buddha

hill, it was a long walk. The main street is on the other side where I exit, is

very neat, street signs and very traditional. I felt like going back to my

childhood neighbor. After making a right turn, it was a real long walk and

I had to ask several times to make sure that I was on a right track. In my

Japanese textbook, there is a lesson that an American tourist family hiring

A car to visit Kamakura. I didn’t do that because of some concerns of budget

and safety.

I stopped by a small Buddhist temple with a very bright golden Kanji character,

written by a famous admiral, Togo Hehachiro, later of my 3 weeks trip, I followed

Togo’s memorial to Hagoshima , his hometown of Satsuma, and Etajima, the old

navy academy and current day Japan Self Defense Naval School.

I have been fascinated by the traditional Japanese movie and story. I watched a

movie set about the founder of Ashikaga Shogunate.  This was an era immediately

after Kamakura era. Kamakura was the first shogunate in Japan, after its founder’s

death, the power of the bakufu or shogunate, went to his wife’s family, that family

lead Japan twice expelling Mongo’s invasion, 1274 at Hakada, and 1281 at south

Kyushu Island, all with the help of hurricane, kamikaze, the wind of god.

I did reach to the great Kamakura Buddha, Kotoku-In, on an edge of a hill; however,

the Buddha statue was under face lifting, yet there was an old temple called Hase

Kannon-In in front of the Kotoku-In, worshiping  Avalokitesvara 736 years old. It has

A very unique landscape, old pines, high pagoda, and stone monument. I can feel

that these kinds of temple and shrine building are all over Japan especially a city like

Kamakura. I walked back to the station and stopped by a bakery and gifts shop for

some present.

In the afternoon, I went to Asakusa for additional temple visit, actually I got lost and

did not find Asakusa Temple yet found a restaurant district near the station. In the

evening, I watched a political rally to protest Primer Abe’s military expansion plan.

A man explained to me that the upper house would hold a vote in July, if succeed,

The lower house would schedule a vote to decide Abe’s future as a premier.