Deep thoughts and simmering tofu By Chen Fen, TODAY | Posted: 10 July 2008 1255 hrs
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KYOTO, Japan : His grandfather built a dazzling pavilion covered in gold. But the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa preferred silver to complement Grandpa’s Kinkaku or Golden Pavilion in Kyoto, the old capital of Japan.
Yoshimasa never got around to covering his pavilion with silver. That’s for the better perhaps for his Ginkaku or Silver Pavilion has a quiet beauty that needs no ornamentation.
We had gone to the Ginkaku-ji in eastern Kyoto one sunny autumn morning to follow in the footsteps of the Japanese philosopher, Kitaro Nishida.
The Philosopher’s Walk, a 2km path by a canal starting just outside the Silver Pavilion, is so called because Nishida-san used to take contemplative strolls there.
No doubt he would have visited the Ginkaku Temple too and admired the 2m tall sand cone set in an elegant raked garden by the Pavilion. Some say the cone and the raked sand represent Mount Fuji surrounded by a silver sea. The more plebeian suggest that the mound is merely a convenient depository of material for the temple’s paths.
Would Kitaro Nishida have wrestled with thoughts on these conflicting claims? It was a question that stayed with us as we started our walk down his beloved path by the canal.
Cherry trees line the path making it a favourite spot for walks in the spring. If crowds are not your thing, an autumn morning is a better time for a quiet stroll. Then you can take time to study the quaint old houses along the way and watch the languid carp in the canal, some with scales that glint like gold in the sunlight.
There are other temples to visit too. My favourite is the Eikando that’s famed for its “looking back Amida”, a statue of the Buddha looking back over his left shoulder. The statue, listed as an Important Cultural Asset, is just one of many treasures found in the temple.
Even as you admire the Eikando’s impressive collection of art works, look out for the Suikinkutsu, a big jar set upside down on a pan of water. Gently pour water into the small hole on the bottom of the jar and listen as it drips. You will be rewarded with the sound of low notes that resemble that of the koto, a Japanese harp.
More rewards await you in the temple grounds. It’s not for nothing that the Eikando is known as the Temple of Maple Leaves. The maples were at their glorious best that autumn morning, their colourful foliage mirrored in the still water of a pond spanned by a stone bridge.
Our walk along the Philosopher’s Path ended at the gate of another temple, the Nanzen-ji. We did not go in. It was lunchtime and we were on the lookout for a 350 year-old restaurant famed for its tofu.
Okutan is just across the way from Nanzen-ji. There is no English sign at the door but you know you have found it when you see the line of eager diners next to the cashier near the entrance.
Do not be discouraged by the crowd. Join the queue and you will be seated sooner than you expected because the restaurant is bigger than it looks from the outside.
Follow the waitress up the wooden steps to the second floor tatami room overlooking the garden and order the yudofu set meal that costs 3,150 yen ($40).
Yudofu with its squares of tofu simmering in a delicate broth is suitably austere given its origins as food for Buddhist monks; food that found favour with philosophers too perhaps, as they contemplated the questions that cropped up along life’s way. - TODAY/sh
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