It was an early and cloudy Kyoto [京都] morning when I woke up to walk to Heian Jingu [平安神宮], a shrine built in 1895 to celebrate that Kyoto had existed for 1100 years already. It was supposed to be just another trip to a shrine, I did not expect anything special to come from it.

However, as I was snooping around the shrine shop I saw that they had come up with a stamp rally, shrine version – the Kyoto Gosha Meguri ~Shi shin Sou Ou No Miyako~ [京都五社めぐり~四神四神相応の京~] (The tour of four gods of Kyoto). According to legend, Kyoto was anciently guarded by four god-like spirits: the Azure Dragon of the east Seryu, the White Tiger of the west Byakko, the Red Bird of the south, Suzaku and the Black Tortoise of the north Genbu. Heian Jingu stands in the middle “the heart” of Kyoto, and each guardian is supposed to dwell in one shrine in each cardinal point. I bought a small cardboard tablet with the four sacred guardians of Kyoto , with the Heian Jingu stamp in the middle. With that tablet, you had to visit four more temples on the four cardinal points and get their stamps. It is The rally unexpectedly trumped all my Kyoto-visiting plans. I had to absolutely do this! I was so pumped that I did not even take pictures of the tablet until the peregrination was completed.

After leaving Heian Jingu, I walked alongside the Kamo River Kamogawa [鴨川] towards Gion [祇園], stopping to get the second stamp at Yasaka Jinja [八坂神社]. Here is where the “easy” stamps were over. I still had three shrines to get to, and they would not be as easy as a literal walk down the river.

I was to meet D****e at 10.15, as she was coming from Osaka, where she was for a concert. She wanted to tag along to what I was going to do next, basically to… share the pictures with everyone. Last year, my friend B**** had told me about something she had done that she thought I might like, a photo shoot in maiko [舞妓] clothes – maiko being Kyoto geisha-in-training. Following her recommendation, I chose a place called Maiko-Henshin Studio Shiki [舞妓体験・変身スタジオ「四季」], which is where B**** had done hers.

This is something that had been in the back of my mind for the longest time, but I had never got around to doing it because of the price tag. I was a bit put off by paying over 10,000 ¥ for what would in essence be pictures of myself. However, I eventually realised that it is not just the photographs you are paying for, it is the whole three-hour experience. I booked a Studio Shoot plan for 11,900 ¥ (plus tax), which included:

• White make-up cover.
• Renting and getting dressed into a formal kimono.
• A pair of tabi (Japanese socks) that you get to keep.
• Fake eyelashes applied on you.
• Natural wig (half-wig) fitted and fixed.
• Eight studio photographs including a Fushimi Inari Taisha background.
• A book with the best eight pictures.
• CD-R with all the pictures taken.
• Five postcards.
• Ten minutes of free time to take your own pictures outside the studio.
• Possibility of paying to get some extras, including extra pictures.

The shop was easy to walk up to. It was set out as a traditional house with a sliding door, and they offered two kind of services – kimono rental to walk around Kyoto, and Studio transformations along the subsequent pictures – maiko, samurai, and couple or family options.

This was a 98% great experience. 1% fell because I had a coughing fit (I have had issues with my lungs, but they are slowly getting better) and the other 1% due to a communication failure with the studio upon reservation. However, that 2% is negligible and it was all in all great. D****e had a blast in turned, and she decided that she needed to share the pictures with everyone she knew who knew me.

I had made my reservation online a month in advance. I chose a time, which was rescheduled for an hour later. When I asked if I could have a sword for the photo shoot, the answer was to inform my photographer.

When I arrived, the receptionist checked my plan with me. Then they asked about the optional or “less crucial” items – whether I actually wanted the white make-up, fake eyelashes, and type of wig – I have absolutely no idea about wigs. They asked if I wanted any extra photographs (each one for 1000 ¥) on top of the eight included in the shoot. They also checked who came with me so they could call D****e to come in when she was allowed to be with me.

D****e and I had arrived early for my 11:00 appointment, and they called me around 11.15. I was given a little basket, a gown, the keys to a locker, and a pair of tabi [足袋] – Japanese socks, with a separation for the big toe and the small ones. The little basket also contains a brochure to give you instructions of what you are to do in all the steps of the experience. This was helpful, especially when they recommended using the toilet beforehand.

I walked up to the third floor to change into the gown and tabi and put all my belongings into the locker. I took with me the key on an elastic band around my wrist. The little basket was for the instructions, and my mobile phone for pictures during free time later. At this point I was still wearing my glasses, but I had to take them at the next step, and they would also go into the basket.

I walked down to the make-up room on the second floor. At this point I had to take off the glasses (and decided that I wanted to get myself some contact lenses). Here I had the white make-up applied, and I was amused by the process. I had not built any kind of expectation about how they would do it, but I guess I was not expecting a thick brush – much thicker than a normal make-up brush. It was an interesting feeling – the white paste was cool and the brush also felt very different from a regular one. The make-up reached up to my hair line, but the artist left a little bit of unpainted skin for the wig. They also painted much lower down my back than I would have expected – it was explained to me that the neck and the wide collar of the kimono are “sexy”.

Afterwards, they contoured my face a little, added the blush, and airbrushed my lips bright red. Finally, they did my eyelids and eyebrows, also in tones of red. The staff gave me instructions in “fluent” (read: broken) English, but we both tried, and communicated successfully. I was told where to look at each point, or to close my eyes and finally I was offered the fake eyelashes again – I accepted because I was going to be without my glasses anyway. I unfortunately inhaled a bit of powder or something, and had a coughing fit that almost gave my poor make-up artist a heart attack…

After the whole make-up had been applied, it was time to get the wig fitted. I was shown to another room with a big closet full of lockers, and each locker held one wig. They checked three or four against my head until they decided on one to put on me. It was a “half-wig”, which means that they painted the hairline and part of your own hair in order to stick it down. Afterwards, they put some traditional decoration, kanzashi [簪], in the wig.

Then it was time to choose the kimono. At this point, D****e was called onto the floor to “help me choose”. There were literally hundreds of options, but I actually found the one I really wanted even before she was there. It was black with cherry blossoms on it, and when D****e arrived she said “that one is really you”. The staff grabbed it for me and took it to the next room – and my poor friend was sent away once me.

Before they started getting me dressed, the first thing was padding my front so the kimono fell flat. At this point I was wearing the under-gown, and on top of that they put an undercoat called nagajuban [長襦袢] over it – this is done to protect the kimono. The nagajuban was tied closed with a cord called datejime [伊達締め]. Then they put the actual kimono on me – and boy was it heavy. I had not expected that it would be that heavy. They offered me a choice of three obi [帯], the wide belt, somewhat of a rigid sash that holds the kimono together. They tied it down and placed a pre-made ornate bow on the back – it was a bit of a bummer that they did not do the whole knot on the spot. They finished putting hair accessories into the wig, and I was ready to head off to the studio. They tucked the long sleeves and the lower part of the kimono into a string that they tied around the obi. The big problem came when I had to go down the stairs to the studio on the first floor, without the glasses – yes, I need to get myself some contact lenses.

Down there, I had to wait for maybe 10 – 15 minutes, which felt very long. I am a tremendously visual person, so I felt very vulnerable without my glasses, just catching some shadows in the background. I saw something that I thought was a cat in a little garden, probably for the outside shoots (the garden, not the cat). When the “cat” jumped into a small pond, I realised that it was a duck.

Once I was admitted into the studio, the photographer was a very nice young woman. However, it was now when I learnt that the eight pictures that you get with the package are pre-planned shoots, you do not get to choose anything. The photos are pre-planned and “staged”, so they are the same for everyone, whether it is “your angle” or not. But at this point, the 1,000 ¥ were not that much of a price increase, so I decided to get it anyway. I was not upset, I just thought it was a translation issue from Japanese to English or a miscommunication. My photographer was friendly and explained about the extra photograph. As it was not included in the maiko set, I had to get it in the samurai room. I agreed, because I really wanted that picture with the katana. As she was finishing explaining, D****e was shown in. She helped with the “look at X” instructions. She also helped make the photographer understand the kind of picture I wanted, since she had trouble digesting the idea that I wanted the samurai sword kind photo with the pretty maiko set-up.

The photo shoot has eight pictures, and I don’t think I look particularly well in any of them – but it was fun. For the first seven photographs I was only wearing the tabi, and for the last one I was given a set of okobo [おこぼ] – high platform sandals for you to walk on, named onomatopoeically for the sound they make on the pavement. The photos included in the photo shoot are:

1. Full body, slightly backwards, with a fan and the kimono extended at your feet,
2. Upper body, front, with the fan,
3. Upper body, front, with some kind of ball / jewellery box,
4. Full body, front, with a red paper parasol, and kimono extended,
5. Upper body, front, looking straight at the camera with the parasol,
6. Full body, front, looking “nice”, kimono extended at your feet,
7. Upper body, front, with some kind of bento box,
8. Full body, lower part of the kimono pulled up, with the okobo and a Fushimi Inari Taisha background.

After my official shoot, I was taken to the samurai room for my extra photograph so I could get the picture with the sword. Then, D****e and I were lead outside, the back part of the studio, to play around with the phone and take selfies and stuff. She made sure to take a hundred thousand photos of me during the following 10 minutes. Just for the LOLs, my last couple of pictures were back with the glasses on – which surprisingly did not even flake the white make-up.

Once back inside, the magic seemed to die down, and everything became efficient and a bit cold. My kimono was undone, my wig taken away, and I was given instructions on how to remove the make-up. It did not take too long to do so and go back to my normal, boring self. Then I had to pay and we waited for a little while before I was given my pictures. In total, the whole thing took about two hours and a quarter.

It was a fun experience, probably not a must in Japan. Communication at times was a bit weird, because they work in a sort of “line”, and each person is very specialised on one thing. They are very set on what they do, and don’t always explain in detail because after all “they know,” it is what they always do, even if the customer is lost or not aware of what is going on. Then again, I had a blast and I really liked it, never mind all the inconveniences and issues. Not that I feel I need to repeat it, especially costing this much. However, I might consider something similar thing at a cheaper price, or with a different kind of character.

I walked D****e to her station, waved her away, and headed off towards the third shrine of the stamp rally, which I thought at the time would be the furthest-away shrine, Kamigamo Jinja [上賀茂神社], in the outskirts. There was some kind of art / craft fair there by university students, so it was very lively. Unfortunately too, a lot of it was under renovation, but I explored a little (and wasted a lot of time waiting for and riding the bus). Anyway, I received shrine-stamp number three.

After the stamp success, I headed off back to the hotel to retrieve my luggage and undid my way to the station by subway. I had a while at the station, so I explored the building a little. Designed by Hiroshi Hara, it is one of the most “out of place” buildings in the city. It can be considered “futurist”, with an irregular glass-and-steal façade and illuminated stairs.

Finally, I jumped on a train to backtrack to Himeji [姫路], which is south of Kyoto. I timed the visit to Maiko Henshin so D****e could tag along, even if it meant going back and forth a little – travel was covered by the JR Pass though. Once in Himeji, I found my hotel and then went to walk around the castle. Actually, I should have been having some dinner but apparently I’m castle-distracted. I walked around the park and took a lot of pictures – and spotted some koi carps in the castle moats that were huge.