Kyoto
In Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan, there is a mix of cutting edge and ancient culture. Our first stop of the day was the Golden Pavilion, a zen Buddhist temple covered in gold leaf, one of the iconic sights of the country.
It’s beautiful, and the grounds are crowded with tourists.
Our next stop was much more serene, at the Daisen-in Zen Buddhist temple with a Zen rock garden and its representation of life. 
We were told of some of the basic tenets of zen, “ichi go ichi ie” meaning literally one moment, one meeting, or treasure every encounter because it will never recur. Or my personal interpretation, do it now when you have the chance!
We met an 85 year old monk, author of many books on zen. He signed a book for me after pointing out a page he seemed to think applied to me. We were also treated to an informal tea ceremony.
After lunch 
(just joking I didn’t eat that) and more trains and subways around this huge city, we visited Nijo-jo castle, the last remaining castle from the Edo period when the shoguns ruled.
Our last stop was the geisha district. Kyoto is the centre of the geisha culture, or ladies who are trained in the arts of entertainment. No I am still not sure what they really do. The maiko (apprentices, for four years) and geiko or geisha (the graduates) are like rock stars. In this district we saw a geiko in the back of a black limousine, being chased by paparazzi. Oh wait, that might have been people from my tour group chasing her. A maiko was spotted inside a building 
and one walked down the street with her handlers, again chased by photo hounds.
I was very lucky to get standing room tickets to a show of the Japanese arts in the geisha district. 
It included a dance by maiko, and life sized puppetry called bunraku.
We left the big city the next morning by bullet train to the mountain resort area of Hakone.