Just a photo or three for Friday

I don't think I ever got around to posting these photos from last year's trip to Japan.

In the old Imperial Palace in Kyoto, a sign in two parts:

Being agile with your feet while dressed like that seems quite a feat!

The Imperial Palace has some impressively long compound walls:

Kemari, by the way, has a short Wikipedia entry which explains:

Kemari (蹴鞠) is an athletic game that was popular in Japan during the Heian (794–1185) and Kamakura period (1185–1333). It resembles a game of keepie uppie or hacky sack. The game was popular in Kyoto, the capital, and the surrounding Kinki (Kansai region), and over time it spread from the aristocracy to the samurai class and chōnin class. Nowadays, kemari is played as a seasonal event mainly at Shinto shrines in the Kansai region, and players play in a costume called kariginu (ja:狩衣), which was worn as everyday clothing by court nobles during the Heian period.[

I had never heard of it before...