We woke early the next morning at 6 am and prepared for the morning chanting meditation in the meditation hall. We all brought our shakuhachi as we were invited by the head priest to play with them while they chanted. We they started the ceremony and we listened to the progression of their mantric music. Quite melodic and beautiful. After 10 minutes I started to follow their melodic line with shakuhachi. Then everyone else joined in and followed and played as best as they could. Playing with them felt the same as playing with Master Henry at the Temple back home. The time went by very quickly as I was absorbed in concentration of merging with their voices. After the main ceremony, the priest thanked us and invited us to play more in the meditational hall as they prepared the dining hall for our breakfast at 7:20. During that time, more chanting was being done in the smaller adjoining meditation hall. I played Ajikan, the we all played Tamuke together. They they called us to breakfast. The meal was a very nice, vegetarian meal of miso soup, rice, tsukemono (pickled vegetables), nori, and sweet mochi squares. After breakfast we all walked to Okunoin, a vast graveyard of over 500,000 gravestones, with the center being the place where the ashes of Kobo Daishi are enshrined. It is a very beautiful place where the goma (fire ceremony) was taking place. We saw scores of pilgrims with their beautiful walking sticks with colorful covers and little bells attached, dressed in samue-like tops, with the stamps of the holy places they`ve visited. All of the groups went to the very back of the Okunoin grounds in front of Kobo Daishi`s shrine, lit incense, and said the Heart Sutra (Hannya Shingyo). Leading up to the shrine of Kobo Daishi is a row of cast metal figures of different buddhas with water troughs in front of them where workshippers splashed ladels of water on them to aid them in their journey into hell to save the soulds of the less fortunate, hungry ghosts, and demons. Walking back to the center of town, we all played Tamuke on a brige within the cemetary grounds for Kobo Daishi`s soul and all those who died in wars.
We spent the rest of the day shopping for buddhist ceremonial items and gifts for loves ones. We all met back at Rengejoin and checked out then headed back to Kyoto. We arrived back at 7:30 pm, totally wiped out, and wiped clean from our auspicious visit to Koya-san.
To be continued....
Alcvin Ramos
www.bamboo-in.com
ramos@dccnet.com
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