The eighth day of\u00a0the\u00a0trip started off kinda rough. Our first priority today was to find an ATM and get some cash out. The first place we tired was the post office–up to this point, that had been the only place we had success using our cards for ATM transactions. Unfortunately and very upsettingly, the Japan Post Bank has decided to take an\u00a0EXTREMELY\u00a0long New Year’s holiday. We found out that they will be closed until\u00a0January\u00a04 (and when the JP Bank is closed, they turn off their ATMs across the city … Why? I have NO idea).
\nAhhhhhhhhhhhh! Feeling immediately defeated, we decided to go to they World Currency Exchange Center in Kyoto Station. But the joke’s on us, when we got to the currency exchange, the sign on the door informed up they will be closed too until January 4. We have no cash to our names; only American Visas that work at very limited ATMs in this country and every place that could potentially help us is closed for the next two days. Time for Plan B … But wait, this was a trip where most of the time we didn’t even have a Plan A. Oh well, it’s all apart of the experience.<\/p>\n
We sought\u00a0refuge\u00a0at the International Tourist\u00a0Information\u00a0Center in Kyoto Station. Luckily, they were open. The man at the “English” counter told us to try 7 Bank (ATMs inside 7-11 stores). Alright, anything was worth a try at this point even though our prior times of trying 7 Bank had failed. The man pointed us in the right direction and off we went. We arrived at the 7-11 and\u00a0immediately\u00a0started trying our cards. Fail. Fail. Fail. None of them were working. I tried my BancFirst, Citibank, Sooner OneCard–anything with a magnetic strip, I stuck it in that machine. None of them were working though. We got the bright idea that maybe we were putting the cards in the machine wrong even though we were doing it\u00a0exactly\u00a0like the video depicted… Would you\u00a0believe\u00a0it, we were putting them in wrong! Crazy as it may have seemed, we began to feel a little more\u00a0optimistic.<\/p>\n
With some cash in our pockets, we bought our all day Kyoto bus passes and headed for\u00a0Kinkaku-ji temple in northern Kyoto. The bus ride was an hour and we had to stand the entire time due to the crowded state of the bus, but it was worth it. The temple was beautiful. Admission to see it was \u00a5600, and I can confidently say that was the best money I had ever spent to simply just look at something. Take a look at my panorama below (or the beautiful Wikipedia picture here<\/a>) and you’ll see what I mean.<\/p>\n
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