it’s here, it’s here! the day i’d been waiting for so long for, our (mostly) free day! the day started off bright and early with me, belle, and megan leaving the hotel at around 7 am. once we got to the kiyomizu dera area we arrived at the kimono rental place a bit early, so we just loitered outside until it was 8.

we easily chose our kimonos, belts, and accessories as they started to fit us and do our hair. i chose to do a fun braid that wrapped around the back of my head, since i didn’t want my hair to rest on my neck because i knew there would be a lot of layers for the kimono. once we were all dolled up, we hit the streets and began our day of photos and shopping.

we started by heading up to the beginning steps of the temple and took a bunch of photos of and with each other. we even had other foreigners asking to get photos with us??? but i digress. we meandered through shops, buying things that caught our fancy —i bought some raccoon themed cups, and belle bought a freaking SWORD— and i made sure to stop in a ring making shop, getting one custom made to fit my right index finger. and then they made it in front of me, it was sick.

eventually it got waaaaay too hot to keep the kimonos on, you would not believe the amount of sweat that had accrued on my midsection, we headed to the pokemon center in kyoto. this time i only bought some hand towels that had cute drawings of pikachu and food, and a pair of chopsticks with ghost and dark type pokemon. this was pretty close to nishiki market so we mostly just wandered around there until we had to head back to the hotel so we could have a pizza party with the kcg students. while there i discovered my new favorite snack, karamucho, that are these spicy potato fry chip things? idk, but they’re awesome.

it was a little awkward at first because of the language barrier, but we were able to get past it. kind of. there was lots of google translate involved, and a lot of double checking things with liam, but it was a good time. it was short, yet fun. today was definitely my favorite day so far.