Kyoto Tour - Todai-Ji and Nara

So when you hear of Nara, what do you think of? That's right!!

Well, Todai-ji temple is attached to Nara park with the famous deer that have not the least amount of fear. You can feed the deer with crackers but unfortunately Nara was in the grips of the Typhoon so even though thw wind was not too bad the entire day was pretty much like this.

Seriously though, we did get to see some of the deer. There are signs up warning everyone that while they are pretty amenable to a pat and some cookies they are not tame deer and have been known to bite.

The breed is Sika deer and the males I saw had their antlers removed (For which I am quite glad) They are fairly large animals and definitely of a sturdier breed than those that live in central park here in Songdo. According to Seth (Master Ball - Animal Whisperer) deer can scream. I didn't seek to test that today though.

It was interesting how these deer were not the least bit afraid of humans. They wandered right up and stuck their noses into our hands looking for treats.

This was also the site of Todai-Ji temple.

Todaiji has a colourful history of fires. In that, it has been burned to the ground at least twice and technically isn't finished because they ran out of money. There are heads of god statues awaiting the cash.

Here you can see where camera issues really got mad.

We were actually allowed to take pictures of this gargantuan buddhist temple but I have no idea as to why it's yes here but no in other places.

Before you ask, yes I was mincing and skipping through the puddles and I still got soaked through. My umbrella has holes too so it was a party all round.

I'm afraid these pictures do not do justice to the sheer scale of the building.  It was built to contain a fifty foot, 500 tonne buddha statue after all.

The temple is dank and dark and lit only by candles (Guys, let's try to avoid another fire, kay.)

The statue is made of bronze and was built in layers after being cast from a specially made clay sculpture. It was partially melted a few times but it was rebuilt each time.

It was definitely a 'wow' spectacle. It was a terrible pity about the rain, we couldn't really dally in the grounds.