UN
When we arrived to Koya-san we were not expecting what we found. When we got there we realized that the next day (a Monday) was the birthday of Kobo Daishi, the man who introduced Esoteric Buddhism in Japan from China over a thousand years ago. Also, we soon discovered that this was the year that they celebrate exactly 1200 years of Esoteric Buddhism in Japan. We were amazed at how lucky we were to just so happen to be in Koya-san while they were celebrating such an important holiday for them on a very special year. It was fate.
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| Group of monks headed to the main temple where the Kobo Daishi birthday celebration and prayers were to take place. |
There were festivities going on everywhere and they would continue on to the next day. Monks were roaming around the small religious town and were all in very beautiful celebratory clothes. The place felt very lively and happy. There was a lot of people packed in the small town. It seemed as if all the religious Buddhists of Japan were in Koya-san that weekend. I also felt very humbled to have that opportunity to see get a glimpse of this aspect of Japanese culture, as there were very few foreigners there with us.
We ended up deciding to stay the night at a temple with monks and skipped class the next day. We felt that this was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that we could not miss.. and we were right.
The character "un" means luck or fortune but it could also mean to carry or motion. For instance, 運動 (undou) means exercise.
It can be paired with the character "inochi" which is also used in words and pronounced as "mei":
INOCHI
Inochi or mei, can represent things like destiny, life and decree, as in something that has "ordered" for stuff to happen to you throughout your existence.
Together, these characters form the word UNMEI.
UNMEI
Whew, with two characters we knocked out so many different words :)
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