Hey Joe, we're in Heian-kyō

[steepholm]

After a couple of quiet days (spent looking at early translations of Tom Brown's Schooldays, since you ask), today I went to Kyoto to meet my old PhD supervisor and his wife, who happened to be visiting as well. They lived for a year or two in the city (and before that in Kobe) during the 1990s, rather after I'd finished my PhD and more immediately after the 1995 Kobe earthquake. This was their first time back since those days, and they reported that the place really hadn't changed much in essentials.

Anyway, we had a lovely few hours hanging out in Kyoto, walking around the garden at Heian Jingu (where, despite the many headlines about overtourism in Kyoto, there were very few tourists to be seen, Western or otherwise) and then at a soba restaurant.

Afterwards I had tea with Shino Hishida, a doctoral student whom I'd met at the Diana Wynne Jones conference in August, and we ate parfait together.

I don't have any adventures to relate, but check out the pretty pictures!