Naramachi Koshi-no-Ie (Lattice House)

This guide to the Naramachi Koshi-no-Ie in Nara starts with a small monkey doll hanging by the door and traces it back to Koshin-do, a hall built after Gangoji Temple burned in the 1300s, where a blue-faced deity named Shomen Kongo is said to have promised to end an epidemic. It follows the wordplay behind the custom, since saru means both monkey and to leave, and the sleepless Koshin-day vigils families once kept to guard against evil spirits. Look up at the eaves inside the lattice house and along the street outside for the monkeys still hanging there today.