Reflections regarding Tuesday April 29, 2025 in Osaka, Japan
The boys woke up early, excited to spend the day with our new friend and tour guide, Jake. Although we’d only met him a few days before, the boys were so taken by this young professional who treated them like a big brother. As soon as they spotted him at the train station, they dashed right up to him and tackled him with hugs.
Purchasing a ticket for and navigating the subway system in Japan can be a dizzying process, and we were still so new to it. Jake helped us buy our train tickets. From Osaka, we took two trains to reach Nara, where we met up with Elisheva and Rivkah, two lovely French sisters we’d also met at the Jewish Center in Kobe. It felt like a mini-reunion. Everyone was so excited to hang out together. The boys were especially thrilled to be with people who genuinely enjoyed spending time with them and who weren’t their parents.
As we walked from the train station to Nara Park, Jake guided us to the one mochi place that still makes mochi the traditional way. Mochi is a traditional Japanese rice cake made from steamed and pounded short-grain glutinous rice (mochigome). It has a soft, stretchy, and chewy texture. Ours was filled with a sweet red bean paste and dusted in matcha powder. I bought three, thinking I’d have one, at least one of the boys would eat another, and the rest would each taste a bit of the last one. Who was I kidding? Amichai enjoyed half of one mochi before he was full. I ended up eating the rest. Let’s just say I was full for the rest of the day after that.
More than satiated, Jake walked us to a large grassy area where lots of deer were standing around. There, he explained that the deer in Nara Park have been trained to bow their heads before accepting food from a stranger. He gave us a few crackers to feed the deer and then helped supervise the boys as they took turns trying to wait for a deer to bow before feeding them. Of course, these are still wild animals, and the interaction is not guaranteed to be safe. Poor Matanel was butted by a deer with, thankfully, short antlers. He was completely shaken and had no interest in trying again. That is, until Jake held his hand, stepped between him and any deer with antlers, and helped him regain his confidence by finding antlerless deer to feed. I was so proud of Matanel for trying again. He could have easily given up and said never again. Instead, he pushed himself to overcome a very real and immediate fear. The best part was how proud he was afterward.
Eitan loved feeding the deer so much he had no interest in moving on. I promised him we’d come back and do it again at the end of the day.
Next, Jake took us to Tōdai-ji, literally translated as “Eastern Great Temple,” a Buddhist temple complex located in Nara Park. It was one of seven great Buddhist temples in the greater Nara Prefecture. Tōdai-ji houses Daibutsuden, the Great Buddha Hall of Nara. Situated about 200 feet before the temple is a wooden structure housing two Niō guardians. Jake taught us that these two guardians are called Agyō and Ungyō. Agyō stands with his mouth open, while Ungyō stands with his mouth closed. This represents the first and last sounds in Sanskrit. The pairing governs the beginning and end of all things. According to some, this pairing highlights the gods’ omniscience and ability to know the beginning and end of all things.
Only Eitan, Amichai, and I were interested in seeing the Great Buddha. Jake, Elisheva, and Rivkah said they were happy to stay with the twins and wait for us. Leaving Matanel and Shai in very capable hands, we made our way toward Daibutsuden.
Wow! At nearly 50 feet tall and 10.5 feet wide, the copper and bronze Great Buddha is enormous. Made of about 500 tons of copper and bronze and surrounded by a throne of gold lotus petals, the entire structure is completely overwhelming. And yet, it is covered in intricate filigree depicting the Buddhist cosmological belief in three realms of existence. The engravings drew us closer, making us forget its enormity for a moment. Surrounding the Great Buddha were more guardians, each with its own power. There were also miniature models of the city of Nara showing its evolution from the 8th, 12th, and 18th centuries. We weren’t really ready to leave, but I didn’t think it was kind to have the others watch the twins for much longer, so I ushered us out and back to where they were waiting. I was thrilled to hear that Shai and Matanel had a great time with their chaperones while waiting and grateful to Jake for making waiting feel like fun.
After stopping for a short picnic on the lawn, we visited the oldest calligraphy store in Japan. There, we picked up a gift for my brother, who loves Japanese culture, and a tile card with the name Kirby on it in kanji. The calligrapher told us that our name meant “we are very precious, going with the current trend, and beautiful in both mind and body.” We appreciated the first and last translations and wondered what about our year around the world conveyed going with the current trend! Regardless, the card now proudly adorns our home.
We walked through the park to a beautiful lookout where we learned a little about Shintoism, a Japanese indigenous religious belief in supernatural entities called kami. Kami exist in everything, including ancestors, nature, and shrines. Instead of a developed dogma, Shintoism focuses on living in harmony with nature, ritual purity, and making life-affirming choices. Shinto gates, called torii, can be found all over Japan and mark the transition from a mundane space to a sacred one.
We had been going for a long time, and the boys were itching to run around. Elisheva, Rivkah, and I sat by a lake while Jake took the boys to run around. That fifteen-minute break was everything. As we were leaving, Eitan reminded me that I had promised we would feed the deer again. To my dismay, and his great consternation, there were no more crackers for sale at any of the stalls. Eitan melted down so completely that I felt terrible. I don’t usually give in to these kinds of meltdowns, but I know how much he loves animals, so I promised we could come back to Nara with Chaim.
We parted ways with Elisheva and Rivkah and slowly made our way back to the train station with Jake, where we had to say goodbye to him, too. He had made such an incredible impression on the boys that they were so sad to part ways. I almost had to pry them off him because they were hugging him so tightly.
When we arrived home, everyone was excited because we had hot dogs from the Kobe Chabad store for dinner. Unfortunately, there were no buns, so Eitan refused to eat them. Sigh. Sometimes I wonder why I even try to feed that child. Meanwhile, Chaim was still recovering from his all-nighter.
It was a long, amazing, jam-packed day. The cherry on top was hearing that Matanel’s Kindle had finally arrived at the Jewish Center in Kobe.
Exhausted, I fell asleep with my mind swimming with new sights, sounds, tastes, and information. Wondering what on earth I was going to feed Eitan the next day.
