Last week, I went to Kyoto to spend some time with a friend. After having lunch, we enjoyed a bento museum and visited two Zen temples.

I took lots of photos and plan to share them in three separate posts. First, I share my experience at the two Zen temples.

Since it's plum season, we saw it in full bloom.

First temple we visited was Koudaiji. I've already written about the temple, so if you're curious about my previous post, please check out here.

My friend and I sat quietly and admired the beautiful Zen garden. It felt like meditation, and it made us feel very calm.

After enjoying the first temple, we visited Entokuin. I've visited Koudaiji many times, but it was my first time visiting that temple.

There was also a pretty plum tree and its blossoms were in full bloom.

We sat again in front of the garden and enjoyed the moment.

There were two Zen experience programs, but unfortunately, we arrived too late to participate.

Even so, we enjoyed exploring the inside. We especially loved fusuma-e (sliding door paintings). They were absolutely gorgeous. When I were young, I used to think Japanese culture was uncool, but now I really appreciate it.

This fusuma-e in the picture below is one of the highlights in this temple.

There was another fusuma-e of bamboos and bamboo shoots.

There was one more Zen garden. Entokuin was built in 1632, and probably, this garden has never changed since then. While looking at the garden, I thought how many people had sat there to look at it or how many historical people had seen the exact same scene that I was looking at. The last Zen garden made me think a lot, and I couldn't meditate myself.

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