21 May 2007- 3:20pm: Kyoto

Tigers won. And did a VICTORY balloon release! It was so cool. The memory card filling up halfway through the game was not cool, though, damn it. I guess I got good shots, just not as many as I wanted.

Afterwards I got stuck in the absolute worst post-game foot traffic ever. Worse than Kenmore post-Fenway by a lot. So bad I had to wait ten minutes en masse just to cross the street to get to the train station.

Laura and I went to dinner at a ramen place. Yay and yum! I reorganized all my crap once home...now it fits into just 4 bags (as opposed to 5). My shoulders hate me for carrying everything around.

I'm in a park inKyoto right now, trying not to get POd at my guidebook, which is all uppity about spending an "absolute MINIMUM of two days in Kyoto" and how the city is a "TOP PRIORITY" for any tourist. Blahhh blah blah. I mean, if I HAD the time, I WOULD be here for a week or so, gladly. But I have an afternoon. And my book will not give me any suggestions for a mere afternoon. Thus I am in a field, relaxing and writing postcards, and I think this is still a pretty good deal. I stumbled into this temple (To-ji) earlier; its grounds were being used for a giant outdoor market that takes place on the 21st of May and January. The market just kept going- paths and stalls everywhere. I couldn't find the actual temple buildings at first, but now I can say that I've been to one.

I'm trying to decide what else to do here. I want to go find a carp pond in a garden, or a Zen garden. My shinkansen leaves at 8pm; it's 3:30 now. I figure I'll spend an hour and a half at the train station before leaving, because I'm not enthused about roaming at night. I like not having to rush around to all the temples here, though. If I come back, I'll spend more time doing that.

I'm sad to be leaving- there's so much that I didn't get to see. But the baseball has been great, no question. I loved Koshien- real grass is the way baseball should be played.

I can't wait to actually go through the photos! Yay! Hopefully tonight with Tegan. It's nice that she'll likely not get bored just seeing baseball baseball baseball. Same for my parents, and Lorna and Jeffrey.