james_thieman
Mount Koyasan Japan
Mount Koyasan, Japan. I stayed here for two nights at a Shukubo with the Zen Buddhist Monks. They prepare vegetarian meals (Shojinryori) for breakfast and dinner and let you participate as they chant in the mornings and meditate in the evenings. This was also my first introduction to the public Japanese baths as that is all they had. (This was just good practice for Nozawa Onsen.)
Women were not allowed in the town until 120 years ago. Prior to that the different monastaries were passed down from Head Priest to their best student. Once women were allowed they started getting married and passing them down to their eldest sons who became head priests.
The mother of the head priest joined me for dinner one night. She was quite old. When she was very young she said she went to Tokyo to study English. It was over a 12 hour steam train ride from Osaka back then. (Nowdays it is just around two hours by bullet train and, by the way, Koyasan is not too close to Osaka either.) In Tokyo she enjoyed her English studies and had no intentions of ever returning to Mt Koyasan but with the breakout of WWII and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, her parents convinced her she may be a bit safer on the mountain.
There is one main temple, 117 sub-temples and, two monasteries on this tiny mountain top. They are a part of the Shingon (True Word) sect of Buddhism.
Mount Koyasan, Japan. I stayed here for two nights at a Shukubo with the Zen Buddhist Monks. They prepare vegetarian meals (Shojinryori) for breakfast and dinner and let you participate as they chant in the mornings and meditate in the evenings. This was also my first introduction to the public Japanese baths as that is all they had. (This was just good practice for Nozawa Onsen.)
Women were not allowed in the town until 120 years ago. Prior to that the different monastaries were passed down from Head Priest to their best student. Once women were allowed they started getting married and passing them down to their eldest sons who became head priests.
The mother of the head priest joined me for dinner one night. She was quite old. When she was very young she said she went to Tokyo to study English. It was over a 12 hour steam train ride from Osaka back then. (Nowdays it is just around two hours by bullet train and, by the way, Koyasan is not too close to Osaka either.) In Tokyo she enjoyed her English studies and had no intentions of ever returning to Mt Koyasan but with the breakout of WWII and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, her parents convinced her she may be a bit safer on the mountain.
There is one main temple, 117 sub-temples and, two monasteries on this tiny mountain top. They are a part of the Shingon (True Word) sect of Buddhism.
Mount Koyasan Japan
Mount Koyasan, Japan. I stayed here for two nights at a Shukubo with the Zen Buddhist Monks. They prepare vegetarian meals (Shojinryori) for breakfast and dinner and let you participate as they chant in the mornings and meditate in the evenings. This was also my first introduction to the public Japanese baths as that is all they had. (This was just good practice for Nozawa Onsen.)
Women were not allowed in the town until 120 years ago. Prior to that the different monastaries were passed down from Head Priest to their best student. Once women were allowed they started getting married and passing them down to their eldest sons who became head priests.
The mother of the head priest joined me for dinner one night. She was quite old. When she was very young she said she went to Tokyo to study English. It was over a 12 hour steam train ride from Osaka back then. (Nowdays it is just around two hours by bullet train and, by the way, Koyasan is not too close to Osaka either.) In Tokyo she enjoyed her English studies and had no intentions of ever returning to Mt Koyasan but with the breakout of WWII and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, her parents convinced her she may be a bit safer on the mountain.
There is one main temple, 117 sub-temples and, two monasteries on this tiny mountain top. They are a part of the Shingon (True Word) sect of Buddhism.
Mount Koyasan, Japan. I stayed here for two nights at a Shukubo with the Zen Buddhist Monks. They prepare vegetarian meals (Shojinryori) for breakfast and dinner and let you participate as they chant in the mornings and meditate in the evenings. This was also my first introduction to the public Japanese baths as that is all they had. (This was just good practice for Nozawa Onsen.)
Women were not allowed in the town until 120 years ago. Prior to that the different monastaries were passed down from Head Priest to their best student. Once women were allowed they started getting married and passing them down to their eldest sons who became head priests.
The mother of the head priest joined me for dinner one night. She was quite old. When she was very young she said she went to Tokyo to study English. It was over a 12 hour steam train ride from Osaka back then. (Nowdays it is just around two hours by bullet train and, by the way, Koyasan is not too close to Osaka either.) In Tokyo she enjoyed her English studies and had no intentions of ever returning to Mt Koyasan but with the breakout of WWII and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, her parents convinced her she may be a bit safer on the mountain.
There is one main temple, 117 sub-temples and, two monasteries on this tiny mountain top. They are a part of the Shingon (True Word) sect of Buddhism.