One Month Down

It's already been one month since I came to this country on the complete opposite of the world. Time sure flies.
Today my Religions class went to Fushimi Inari Jinja, one of the principle and oldest shrines in Japan dedicated to the god Inari. The strange thing is, people tend to personalize their relationships with this deity, so there are about as many different Inari as there are worshipers, fulling roles from the traditional keeper of rice and wealth to the newer healing of ails and bringing good luck to exam takers. The shrine was really just an amalgamation of little shrines all over the mountain where the grounds stood, and we walked all over. Halfway up almost everyone was panting and dragging their feet. Heheh, lowlanders :)
Amazingly, where we Americans would have developed as much as we could, most of the mountain is untouched. There's just the shrines dotted around the mountain and small paths leading around them. But the torii flanking the paths are anything but small. Towering over us, they were packed as closely as possible, every path having at least half protection from the rest of outside. And each one was dedicated, at about 100,000 to 500,000 U.S. dollars each, by companies or individuals seeking the blessings of Inari. One path had over seven from the same person. Talk about devotion!
Inari shrines all have statues of foxes, because while no one can agree on the form Inari takes, they can all agree that the god's servants are foxes. And Kyoto used to have lots of foxes that lived on temple grounds. They may be scarce nowadays, but now there are cats. Cats! The first cats I see in Japan are on a sacred mountain! Looks they they know good real estate when they see it. And they were all so friendly, too, lying down in the middle of paths and small walls to be petted.
On thing that makes temples over here completely different from western temples is the fact that it's normal for shops to operate on the grounds. There are tea and rest shops all along the mountain trails, and souvenir stands by the temple main. I bought an awesome black kimono and a small fox stuffed animal that I've named Daigoro. Sadly, ATMs are closed on Sundays ('the hell?!). If they weren't, I would have gone back to campus, gotten some more money, and headed right back, because one small restaurant near the station was selling BBQ quail! One of the creatures on my 'list of things I've got to try eating' slipped through my grasp because of banking business hours. Damn it.