Koya-san

Early on the morning of Nov. 9 we opened the day at 6 am with zazen meditation in our room finishing with 10 minutes of whispering `AH` as a prelude to our visit to Koya-san, the most sacred mountain in Japan, and center of Japanese Esoteric Buddhism. It was my first time, so I was very excited. It was a quite a long train ride from Kyoto. 3.5 hours. From Kyoto Station we took the JR to Shin Osaka, then the local train to Namba Station, then the Nanakai line to Koya-san station. Then a very steep cable car up the mountain to the beautiful town of Koya-san. We took a bus to the temple where we were staying called Rengejo-in which was a very lovely, and warm place. What a magnificent haven to come to after a long travel. Check in was at 3 pm. We had lunch downtown and immediately got hooked into shopping as there were many lovely buddhist things to buy. We also visited the impressive and massive orange-red, white and yellow Kongobuji which houses a great gold sculpture of Dai Nichi Nyorai, the the cosmic sun buddha, the central figure of Shingon Buddhism. We arrive in Koya-san just at the perfect start of the fall season with all the leaves turing firey reds, yellows, and oranges. One auspicious thing was seeing an image of a heavenly bodhisattva playing shakuhachi, on the side of a great bronze toro (lamp) next to the Kongobuji.

We got back to Rengejoin at 4:30 and checked into our rooms. 5:30 pm was evening service where we meditated in the ceremony hall. Entering the hall, it was very dim, with only candles lighting the space. This low lighting made the many gold items of the hall glow with intense brilliancy. The meditation started with 5 miinutes of chanting by the monks then a deep penetrating silent meditation for 40 minutes.

6:30 was dinner in the main hall. After dinner, we were treated to a lovely surprise lecture in English by the owner of Rengejoin, Michiko Saotome, who is 87 year old. She told us her story of growing up during world war II and being the wife of a buddhist priest. She also gave us lots of interesting historical and philosphical background about Koya-san which we all enjoyed. Her English was near perfect as she studied English in University. After she finished her lecture, were were blessed with another wonderful lecture by the head Shomyo (chanting) priest (whoes name I didn`t get) who explained in detail the basic meditational and ideology of Shingon Buddhism, chanting, and the practice of Ajikan, meditation of the letter `A`, one of the most important meditations in their practice, which is where the famous shakuhachi honkyoku derived its name. It was a great lecture. He invited our shakuhachi group the next morning to join him and the monks to play shakuhachi as they chant! What an auspicious thing!

The ofuro was incredible and I fell asleep to more erotic dreams.

To be continued....

Alcvin
www.bamboo-in.com
ramos@dccnet.com