Saturday, September 5, 2026 : Old Sweets Shop and Old Memories
© 安岡喜晴 (JoyShine)
Today we were going to go to Saryo Hosen, a Japanese sweets cafe.
On the way, as we were biking along Horikawa Street,
I noticed that an old shop, one that's been there for as long as I can remember, was open.
Narumi-Mochi Honten, on Horikawa Street.
Founded in 1875, the shop had an old wooden sign hanging over the storefront.
This shop was on my way to Sundai, my old prep school.
I passed it almost every day, but all I knew was that it always seemed to be closed.
I was never a morning person, and partway through the year I ended up going mostly to evening classes, so I don't remember it ever being open.
Or rather, even if it was open, maybe I just never noticed.
So we decided to go in.
Today was the first time I had ever been inside.
First we picked out some Japanese sweets in the shop, and then had them in the seating area at the back.
Soft light came in from outside through the reed blinds, and it was a calm, quiet space.
 |
 |
I had mizu warabi with brown sugar syrup poured over it.
It was soft, and it seemed to melt in my mouth.
Seriously delicious.
It turned out to be a famous Japanese sweets shop.
Why didn't I go in sooner?
From now on, I'm going to come here a lot.
After that, we went to a cafe near Sky Seven, the apartment building I used to live in.
I ordered a cappuccino topped with caramel.
Fine lines of caramel sauce were drizzled over the foam, and it looked beautiful.
In the evening, we went to a Taiwanese street-food bar called Yoichi Sanpo.
Looking up from outside, I could see colorful lanterns hanging behind the second-floor windows.
A world away from everyday life, lit up by 100 lanterns.
Yellow, blue, red, green, pink.
When we sat down and looked up, colorful lights spread out above us.
It's lively, a little mysterious, and yet strangely calming.
It's completely different from the quiet, traditional Japanese space at Narumi-Mochi earlier today.
In the afternoon, I stepped for the first time into a Japanese sweets shop that had been there all along,
and now, at night, I'm sitting in a place that feels like a night market in a foreign country.
Kyoto has some very different faces.
Finding them is one of the things I enjoy.