A day in Nara 奈良市
The ancient capital of Nara is just south of Kyoto and is about 40min by train from Osaka from where we decided to do a one day trip to see the biggest bronze Buddha statue in the world. And it was as impressive as I thought it would be!
The Todaiji Temple in the national park of Nara-kōen hosts the world's largest bronze statue of the Buddha, which is known in Japanese as Daibutsu. The statue is located in the Great Buddha Hall (Daibutsu-Den). Todai-ji and the Daibutsu are listed UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The construction of Todai-ji was completed in 752. Its purpose was not only to house the Great Buddha, but also to consolidate the position of the city as the capital and powerful center of Buddhism. Over the centuries, the statue and the hall have been damaged several times in various fires, natural disasters, and civil disturbances, but they always have been restored or even rebuilt when necessary. The current structure was completed in 1709 and is only two-thirds of the original size. The hall remains the largest wooden building in the world.
Being named the Great Buddha is well deserved as the massive statue weighs 500 tonnes and is 14.98 meters tall, with a 5.33 meter long face and 28 meters wide shoulders. The Buddha's hair is made of 960 individual bronze balls!
Visiting the temple and admiring the gigantic bronze Buddha was a great experience, but the surprise of Nara was its deers! There are about 1,200 tame deers so you can imagine that they are everywhere! Because they are considered to be messengers of the gods in the Shinto religion, they roam freely in the park, they wander through the temples, and they stand around as tourists take their pictures and feed them with deer crackers (shika sembei).
Another surprise was the amount of japanese school students visiting Nara, its temples ad the park around. After feeding and picturing the deers, it seems that their favorite activity was to come to us (and all western tourists) with questions to practice their English. They were so cute, but after several minutes of having a whole class of young students surrounding you and realizing that much more are coming, you feel trapped like one of the deers! :)
If you are visiting Japan and happen to be in Kyoto or Osaka, you shouldn't miss visiting Nara which is one of the highlights of Japan!
