Its gold walls reflected in the pond at its feet, the Temple of the Golden Pavilion, Kinkaku-ji, is glorious in any season. It was originally the retirement villa of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, former shogun and patron of the arts.

How Yoshimitsu was able to be shogun is a story from some decades before, a story of betrayal, revolutions, and lots of samurai warriors committing ritual suicide.

Listener Jaime discussing seeing the temple in various seasons, as well as the experience of visiting Kyoto itself. Also, somehow Drew makes it through an entire episode on Kyoto only mentioning geisha once, and that's in the opening song lyrics.  They make up for it with all the good food, including okonomiyagi, "Japanese pancakes".

NB: Drew makes an important announcement at the end of the episode.

Sources:

Dougill, John. Japan’s World Heritage SitesMiller, David. Samurai WarriorsMilner, Rebecca. Lonely Planet Japan

Photograph by Pedro Szekely