In keeping with my intention of visiting EVERY Japan-related thing on O’ahu, Hide and I drove a bit out of our way and visited the scale replica of the Byodo-in, located in the Valley of Temples on the windward side of the island. The temple is on the Kahekili highway in the center of a cemetery. As I said before, the temple is a replica of the original Byodoin (the Pheonix Hall to be specific) located in Kyoto prefecture of Japan. The orignal was built in 1053, though large parts have been reconstructed…Japanese building have a pesky habit of being burned down, destroyed by earthquakes or a combination of the two. The orignal was built of wood, the replica of concrete. The replica also have a 900 year old wood Buddha and a 3-ton brass bell cast in Osaka, Japan which you can ring for peace, luck, or just for the joy of making loud noises. The temple is devoted to Pure Land Buddhism…which is the wussy version where you only have to say ‘Namu Amida Butsu’ (I belong to Amida Butsu) once in pure faith to be saved. I really liked visiting here and loved how many huge, overfed koi they had. It was a brief trip though, the Valley of the Temples didn’t have many other hugely interesting things. Below is a picture of the original Byodoin (left) and the replica in Hawaii.

Some other cool Japanese places we visited were:The Izumo Taishakyo Mission in Chinatown (on S. Kukui St.) which is a Shinto shrine. Hide and I recieved our New Year ‘evil-demon-banishment’ from a Shinto preist wielding a wooden stick with sacred Shinto paper (silly description I KNOW) and some sake from miko (the girls who help out a Shinto temples whereing red hakama pants…they are traditionally supposed to be virgins).

We also stopped by the Shirokiya Department Store (in the Ala Moana Mall) numerous times for Japanese manga (Hide was soothing his addiction for MDP Psycho and North Star Ken) and bobba smoothies. This is a great place to get lots of fun Japanese things, from cheap used Japanese books to baked goods. The upper floor has a Japanese food court with pretty authentic tako-yaki (octopus balls…Hide, the whiny Osakan gives it his seal of approval), mochi balls, mochi ice cream, gyoza, bento, etc etc. It is a little expensive though. If you want to get some inexpensive Japanese dishes and other household goods (even geta), then I recommend you go down to the Ward shopping center (it’s very close by) and check out the Wa-Raku import store located within the dollar store. It’s full of fun stuff.

If you need to itch your nerdy side, go to Toys N Joys (3632 Waialae Ave.), a cool local anime and collectible shop. This place has everything for premade cosplay outfits, to plushies, to moe girl figures. I had fun looking at all their cool stuff.

Finally, if you find yourself by the North Shore, Frommer’s and Lonely Planet will tell you to stop by Matsumoto’s in Haleiwa for some shave ice. This little store is very popular among Japanese tourists for shave ice (which is a slightly less crappy version of a snow cone). Those silly Japanese will stand in lines 20 people deep for the stuff. I’d recommend walking ten steps to the left and getting shave ice (exactly the same I SWEAR) from Aoki’s Shave Ice Stand. It also has a Japanese name, so it’s ok to substitute.

Hide and I went a little crazy for lychee bobba smoothies while we were in O’ahu. We had it in Chinatown, in Shirokiya, at a Korean BBQ place, and in Zagu’s (a local bobba stand in the Ala Moana shopping mall). There is a slight chance we had a little too much sugar. I am also eating Japanese mochi balls (a Japanese sweet made of pounded rice).

Tags: byodo-in, hawaii, oahu, Travel