Wednesday 5/5: Childrens Day

On Wednesday morning Sirocco and her mom took us on a walk to this Buddhist Temple that our class will be visiting in a week or two. The place was truly amazing. The thing was surrounded by a ton of graves, and small statues of Buddha (?) where people would leave offerings. All the statues were wearing red and white bib-like things. Apparently red and white are the colors of children (the word for baby is akachan, which means red cute thing) and so wearing those is kind of a warding off of evil spirits with the innocence of children. The temple was really beautiful, but what surprised me most is that it had posters, letters from buddhist leaders, childrens drawings, etc.- the type of stuff youd see at any other house of worship- but the temple was built centuries ago.

In the afternoon we went back to downtown kanazawa- Sirocco went to the art museum and I sat in the shade and read ENDERS GAME and did homework. I was hoping to see some Childrens Day stuff going on, but alas there was nothing around the museum (I think most activities are at elementary schools and such). I did go to some of the tourist shops by Kenrokuen to get some presents for people. It was a very good day overall :)