Emily: I’m tired and it’s only 8:31 PM here! Anyway, woke up a little after 7:30 because I hit the sleep button once. We walked to Sizuya and bought breakfast. I had a panda pastry and Mom and I both had little pizza-like bread pastries. We also got grape jelly and some water. We walked back to the room and ate it and we left the room a little after 9:15. We walked to the bus stops (right outside the station near the Kyoto Tower Hotel. We stopped at the ticket building and bought two single-day bus passes for 800 yen each. We went to bus stop D2 and took bus 206 to Gion. The bus was pretty crowded so we had to stand. The bus took about 20 minutes!

Pam: (Paragraph breaks courtesy of me) Emily: It was about 5 minutes to 10 when we got off at Gion. After getting off the bus we looked at the directions for the Maiko Studio and it said to go to Shijou street and we didn’t know where that was so we asked a guy nearby and he told it where it was. Well, it was one street over so that was no big deal. Then we proceeded to look for the studio. The directions said we had to turn right at Kiridoushi, so we were looking for it. Mom found a different street before it and said “Doesn’t the address say this street?” It was Hanamikoji. So we turned there and wandered down the street totally lost. The address from the internet also said it was the fourth floor of the Ouka building so we were looking upward at the signs that had the individual stores/businesses for each floor of each building. We couldn’t find it so we turned left and wandered down another small street and still couldn’t find it. I called the studio and was like “Yeah, we’re lost” in basic English and Japanese. All he told me was “Kiridoushi! Kiridoushi!” So I’m like (in Japanese) “Is it close?” and he’s like “Kiridoushi!” So I said “Okay thanks” and basically decided that his directions were useless. We walked back down Shijou Dori and were approaching a street when I looked at the map again and realized the side street was supposed to be somewhere in between the street we were approaching and the street we first turned on. So we went to the small street (with no street signs anywhere) and walked all the way through and couldn’t find it. I asked a guy on a bike for directions and he walked us back about 20 feet to the location, which was on the FIRST FLOOR of its own building. The stupid online address lies or something! That or Japanese addresses are really rude. Bah. So we thanked the guy and he went on his merry way.

The studio was marked by a little hanging cloth curtain thing (you know those little hanging cloths you see in doorways of some sushi restaurants and stuff? Yeah) with its name on it. We went in and told the guy that we were sorry we were late but it was fine. We sat down in the entryway and filled out a form with our name and address (so they can mail pictures). Then a lady came and escorted us to a locker room where we stuck our stuff in lockers and changed into little white cloth robe-type outfits. Basically an undercoat type thing. I put my camera in a little basket. We also put on little socks with an indentation between the big and the second toe for the geta (Japanese sandals like flip flops type thing).  Pam: They are called “tabi”, in case anyone wants to know.  

Emily: After we changed we went upstairs to the makeup area and the lady put makeup on us. We got white makeup put on and bright red lipstick and eye makeup and mascara and everything. We had our hair in a little hairnet too. It was a weird experience! I got my white makeup finished first (I looked like a ghost) so I went to the adjacent room to pick out my kimono. I picked out a blue one with cranes on it. Then I went back to my seat and got my makeup finished. Mom picked out a black kimono. Pam:  She picked the one I would have gotten, oh well.  Emily: We got dressed (so many layers!) and had the hair pieces put on. We walked to another room where they take photos and the lady helped take photos with my camera. Then the guy from the front desk area and the one who also sucks at giving directions came to take our pictures professionally. I went first. He was really nice though and I was able to understand almost all the Japanese that he and the lady used throughout the process. When we were doing makeup the lady said people probably look at us and think we can speak Japanese. Hahaha. So anyway I got my pictures taken.

I took pictures with an uchiwa (a round fan), a folding fan, a ball-thingie, a little package thing, a paper umbrella, standing up, sitting down, looking at the camera, not looking at the camera, everything! I took a ton of shots. Then Mom got her pictures taken but hers went by faster because she told the guy her head was hurting from the heavy hair piece. After she took her pictures (similar poses), we took pictures together. The last two shots we got to pick our poses so we did one with the peace sign and one where our bodies are facing backward but we’re looking at the camera. After that we went to the dressing room and Debbie and Candace were finishing getting dressed. We got pictures taken of the four of us (included below) and then Mom and I went downstairs to the washing room (powder room) to wipe our makeup off. We walked back to the locker room and changed into our normal clothes. The next appointment (three teenage girls) were in there changing too. After we changed we went back to the powder room so Mom could wash off the rest of her makeup (she didn’t get it all). Then we went to the front room and we got our photo sheets with about 26 photos on it. We got to choose three from each sheet to get printed so we each chose two individual and one pair shot from our sheets. We also got to choose one to get touched up so we chose our close-ups. We also bought the CD-roms (to come in the mail) of all 52 photos! We asked the photographer/sucky direction giver man what time Debbie and Candace would be done and he said around 2 (it was 1:20) so we walked down the street to Starbucks.

Mom bought two Kyoto Starbucks mugs for gifts and we both got Zakuro Peach Frappuccinos. Pam: We think the Zakuro peach must be a regional fruit; in any case it was very refreshing and delicious. It also has pomegranate.  By the way, the weather today was GREAT – the coolest and most comfortable it’s been for the entire time we’ve been here.  The rain yesterday must have helped the weather, unfortunately we both got mosquito bites in spite of using repellant (washed off by sweat and rain, probably).  Bite count – Emily=2, Pam=3.  BOOOO! Emily: We wandered up and down the streets and scoped out places to eat for lunch and places to shop. We got back to the studio at 2 and the Chiyas were sitting looking at their photos. They picked out the ones to get printed and then we walked to the street corner (opposite end of the street from the bus station) and ate at Nishin Soba.

The restaurant was downstairs from street level. The service was pretty fast there. I had anago soba. Anago is saltwater eel and soba is buckwheat noodles. Mom had tororo soba but they called it imokake soba. Strange. Anyway, after we ate we shopped around a bit. There’s like three stores off the main street for Chirimen Craft Museum place where they have a whole bunch of little sewn bunnies and bears and creatures like frogs and stuff and jewelry and watches and belts and hairclips and hanging things and things that collect dust and everything! At the third shop I bought a little thing that has a flower shaped frame that’s a little image of creatures (I don’t remember what. Frogs?) in the hot springs. It was cute. All the time we were shopping there were these huge vans going up and down the streets making loud political announcements. The vans were black and had writing on them. I took a picture. The guys looked like they were wearing camo too. We stopped in assorted little shops but just bought stuff at a tapestry store where Mom bought a long rectangular cloth image she wants to put in the hallway at home. It had goldfish on it.

We walked back to the bus station and took bus 206 again to Higashiyama Nijo because we wanted to go to the Kyoto Handicraft Center, which is behind Heian Shrine. We got lost again. There were a whole bunch of police people barracading random streets so that didn’t help much either. It looked strange because there were police at every street corner. Luckily the police presence around a particular building helped us identify that we were in front of Kyoto Kaikan (a large hall/building/meeting building type place). We looked at assorted maps and figured out we were going too far for Heian Shrine. We backtracked a street or two and crossed the river and we spotted the Kyoto Handicraft Center right ahead of us. At the Handicraft Center I bought two Japanese books (one on usage of particles and one on idioms) and a pair of geta (Japanese slipper type shoes). I asked the salesperson why there were all the police in town and she said that there’s a big political meeting and there is a large group that opposes it so that’s why the police were around. Interesting. Candace bought a pretty blue yukata and a light blue obi. We walked down to the bus stop (turn right and right again) and took bus 206 back to Kyoto Station. This time I got to sit but I was falling asleep on the bus!

When we got back to the station we walked to the JR ticket office and got reserved tickets for tomorrow to go to and return from Hiroshima. Then Mom and I went off shopping. We walked to Porta, near the subway station, and looked for male clothing stores so we could find Alex a hat. No luck. Do guys not have their own clothing stores? We went to the Cube in the basement and there’s a bunch of cool clothes stores (some the same as Shibuya 109) so I said I want to go there Sunday. There was a shoe store but I didn’t see anything that “spoke” to me. We were looking for a store Mom had seen with Japanese style pajamas in it but Mom couldn’t remember where it was. Finally we went to Isetan and bought the tonkatsu-don that Mom said was really really good and had its own special sauce. We walked to the outside vending machines and bought water and lemon water. Then we returned to the hotel room and ate our food. After finishing Mom said she wanted dessert and I agreed. But, Mom didn’t feel like leaving the hotel room. So I took some money and went to the department store and stopped at a little counter to get cafe mocha for Mom and shortcake (strawberry) for me. I brought it back to the room and they didn’t give us utensils so we used a spoon Mom has for stirring coffee. The dessert was really really good! Hmm. That’s about it. I’ll post pictures now.

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Mom and I (my eyes are freakishly large. I don't think we look related!)

Candace, Debbie, me, and Mom

Anago Soba

Loud Political Truck