Page 113 - WDT Winter 2018 japan

bear the brunt of the warnings, and the deer’s bad manners. that is part of the fun of Todai-ji. It’s a sort of “San Diego Zoo
meets the Great Buddha,” with live animal meetups.
This nuttiness only got nuttier when we arrived at the temple
grounds. To enter we passed under the massive Nandaimon The “Great Buddha Hall” is billed as the largest wooden build-
Gate, a 70-feet-tall wooden tower with two guardian statues ing on the planet, and given its size – 16 stories high, 190 feet
on either side. The guardians proved powerless against the long, and 165 feet wide – who can argue? It is large enough to
fauna, as we wound our way through a throng of visitors, deer house the giant Buddha, and four other statues besides.
and vendors, some of whom were selling crackers to feed the
animals. Of course, this only reinforced bad deer behavior, but

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