Something to Declare

Arrival in Kyoto, May 13, 2026

Wednesday, May 13: This morning we left Kanazawa on the Shinkansen (Bullet Train), changed trains in Tsuruga, and arrived in Kyoto. The Kyoto train station was also a modernist work of art.

From the Kyoto Station, we went to the Daitoku-ji monastery. But first a Zen Vegetarian lunch at at Ikkyu, just outside the monastery gate.

(N.B.: For the less-enlightened, like ourselves, Zen Buddhism is distinguished from other Buddhist schools by its emphasis on direct, experiential awakening over scriptural study. It prioritizes silent meditation and unconventional teaching methods, like koans (riddles), to bypass rational thought.)

The Daitoku-ji monastery itself, founded in 1319, is a large walled temple complex in northern Kyoto. It covers 57 acres, and there are nearly two dozen sub-temples. The monastery is deeply intertwined with the history of the Japanese tea ceremony (chanoyu).

We entered the Zuiho-in subtemple and sat on a floor space surrounding a large tatami mat, while the Abbot demonstrated the Way of Tea, known as Chadō or Sadō (茶道). It is a traditional Japanese cultural art, focused on the ritualized preparation and serving of matcha (powdered green tea), to promote hospitality, mindfulness and tranquility. The ceremony is highly detailed and choreographed, down to the need to rotate the tea bowl 90 degrees clockwise in two steps (to avoid drinking from the “front”), and the requirement to bow and thank the host upon receiving and returning the bowl.

After the tea ceremony, we spent some time in the 20th Century rock, sand and shrub garden designed by Mirei Shigemori:

We left the monastery and proceeded to our hotel, the Ace Hotel Kyoto, opened in mid-2020 in the former Kyoto Central Telephone Office building.

We had a cozy dinner at the Kosa restaurant in our hotel. It’s a striking setting, with huge Japanese lanterns hanging from the ceiling, and a view of a lovely garden.

Dinner consisted of a subtle “Japanese”-style minestrone and a mélange of vegetables (Stef) and duck confit (Stan). The server (whose English was perfect and unaccented) noted that the duck (1) was her favorite dish, and (2) would be removed from the menu (due to seasonal changes) in June. Therefore, I should grab it when we had the chance. (Grabbing it turned out to be a wise choice.) Dessert was chocolate mousse with a dollop of ice cream. Stef has been chocolate-deprived for most of this trip, and the mousse was much appreciated.