Explore a New Kind of Zen Experience
Are you still working out your itinerary? Visit my favorite spot in Fukuyama: Shinshoji-Zen Museum and Gardens. Here, you can enjoy strolling around the neatly swept Japanese gardens, visiting various types of old Japanese buildings, and learning about daily Zen practices.
Of course, you can experience meditation practice and copy sutras at the Zen temple, but you can also have a new meditation experience in collaboration with contemporary art inside this astonishingly shaped building: the Gokando.
At the Gokando, udon is available for lunchtime. This is what unsui (training monks) have on shikunichi (days that end with the numbers 4 or 9) at the training halls of the Rinzai sect. Usually, an unsui is absolutely not allowed to make a sound during a meal, but one is allowed to eat udon very noisily on a shikunichi.
Admission fee: adults ¥1,500 yen/children ¥1,000
Opening hours: 9:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.
How to access: https://szmg.jp/en/access/
Born in Yokohama, and spent most of my school days in Tokyo.
Exchange student experience in the USA (in high school) and Thailand (after graduating from university).
Speak English, Thai and Japanese (of course).
Living in a tranquil island of the Shimanami Kaido.
”I would love to show you around this beautiful area of Setouchi! ”
