Midnight at the Temple on New Year's Eve - Joya no Kane (Patreon)

🐯🎉Happy New Year! 明けましておめでとうございます〜！🎉🐯

Joya no Kane / 除夜の鐘 is the Buddhist tradition of ringing the temple bell 108 times at midnight on New Year's Eve. It's symbolically ringing out our 108 earthly temptations or sins. 

It was super cold, but we made it and got some nice audio. You can hear the crackly fire in the old metal drum, all the people chatting excitedly, and the bell ringing in the background as everyone takes turns climbing into the bell tower and ringing it. 

Here are a couple short video clips I took of the temple and atmosphere. You can see the head abbott/roshi as he greets everyone. Apologies for quality, just held my camera up so...

https://youtu.be/-b7aovxy_tQ 

Here's another, a little longer. 

https://youtu.be/dA06m9Dl9dw 

I'll get a post about Kyoto up with photos and sounds this coming week. 

These lovelies were hanging out in the rocky side of the mountain.