Day 3 - 5/15/18. Hollyhock Festival, The Big Talk, Dinner @ Kyoto Station

Day 3: Tuesday - A National Festival, an Olive Oil Talk, and an evening at Kyoto Station, what could be better?

May 15 is a Masuri (Festival Day) in Kyoto, one which celebrates the past with a procession that starts at the Imperial Gardens just outside the Palace. Yesterday, we saw the setup in the garden just outside the gates of the palace - several thousand chairs set up on both sides of the procession route (100 groupings of chairs, 5 rows of 5 chairs - that's about 2,500 but who's counting). We were told it was for the Aoi Matsuri (葵祭), one of Kyoto's three most famous festivals (along with the Gion Matsuri and Jidai Matsuri) and takes place every May 15. We decided we couldn't miss this.

See "Mister Donut" as a backdrop to the 8th century dress

Instead of being outside in the sun in the reserved seats in the Gardens (price = $25 each), we opted to walk east on Imadegawa Steet to intersect the procession at the NE corner of the park (price = free). The 500 marchers of all ages (plus horses and bulls), were decked out in Heian period costumes (circa 800 AD), and most humans have Hollyhock (Aoi) leaves pinned to their costumes, typically on their hats. We learned that the Hollyhock is a flower that symbolizes hope and protection from natural disasters, and one function of this event is to ask for a blessing of protection for the country in the coming year from such things as earthquakes, tsunami, or typhoons. The day was sunny and clear, and we enjoyed the contrast of the colorful ancient costumes against the modern backdrop of Mr. Donut shops, Pachinko parlors, buses and electrical lines. Here are a few of our favorite photos from the event thanks to Rich:

Noble women of the court shaded by their attendants

8 attendants carry the princess on her palanquin

Even the little ones in beautiful kimonos are made up with white face makeup and blackened teeth that was considered in vogue in 800 AD. See Hollyhock branches they are carrying.

Hands were considered very seductive and were usually kept hidden beneath the great sleeves of the kimono

A elderly monk with a drum beating a marching rhythm

A younger court musician with a beautifully adorned larger drum

Proud Nobleman astride his noble beast - Pachinko Parlor in background


This wisteria laden cart was pulled by a bull, not the two adorable children you see out front.


Main entrance to Kyotanabe Campus

Then down to the Kyotanabe campus of Doshisha (a train, another train, a bus and a walk to arrive 2 hours after we left the house) for my talk. The name Kyotanabe literally translates to "kyoto rice fields" and the campus is definitely out there in the countryside and very beautiful and with a very different vibe than the downtown campus. I suddenly realized how large (40,000 students) this private University actually was - in the city, you can pretend you are on an intimate campus with a tenth the number of students. We arrived with olive oil samples for tasting (one Italian, one South African and one Japanese/Italian blend purchased the day before in our tour of the downtown, "Shijo" area), my computer, and two apples. We found the science building "Shishikan", and were undaunted by the locked door - we snuck in behind a group of students. Finally, we got to meet my scientific host, Yutaka Hitomi, a very gracious bio inorganic chemist who works on non-heme iron proteins and is interested in redox processes in cells (hence the antioxidants in the olive oil were of particular interest to him.) I received my ID card and my email account in honor of being a visiting faculty member and he showed me my "office." Finally, I was able to give my talk: "Sharing the Chemical Story of Olive Oil: Sensory Analysis and Health Benefits." I had expected an audience of 10-15 people, and so had asked Yutaka to make tasting sheets for that many. I was a bit flustered when every seat in the 30+ person room filled up and my host had to run out and make more copies. To think I had wondered if anyone would come. I was told to speak slowly as the English of the audience was a bit limited and in fact I only got through half of the talk and went straight to the guided tasting - which elicited giggles as I demonstrated the slurping necessary to taste the oil - and the predictable coughing that followed a strong oil from Japan. It was great fun and we certainly gave them a non-traditional chemistry seminar experience. The nearly unanimous vote from the crowd was the (to me) rather tasteless South Australian Oil.

Dogwoods in Bloom

Science Building

Tired but satisfied, we made out way back home, stopping on the way at Kyoto station to grab some dinner. Levi toured us around the astonishingly sophisticated architecture of this busy train station/hotel/event space complete with stage and sound system/shopping arcade/restaurant complex of 11 stories. We were enthralled.