Hi there! I am back from my Japan travel now!
@chisato I want to thank you for your recommendation about shourinji temple! It was one of the best times in our travel! you'll see why!
I did book an appointment by mail before traveling, and they answered me so nicely explaining everything. I chose to take the challenge of copying sutras in kanji, so they told me to get there early just in case I needed more time. So, once in Kyoto we prepared for going there early in the morning, we followed google maps directions there and arrived at a place closed with a fence. Inside there seem to be a temple, some houses and what looked like a children school. We waited for 30 minutes and no-one arrived. I was getting nervous as we where really 30 minutes late than the hour they told me to arrive. So I decided to enter the fence (which was closed but not locked) and went to what looked as a children school in order to get some help. A girl showed up, with no knowing of English (and I do not speak Japanese!). She called a man, with no knowing of English too, but we managed to tell him that we where searching Shourinji temple because we had a date for calligraphy there. He clearly did not understand everything of it, but he recognized "Shourinji temple" and decided to accompany us to the temple because it was easier that trying to tell us how to get there. So we followed him.
He took us to the temple we could see from the fence, told us to take off our shoes, got a key from his pocket and opened the temple for us. Then he told us we could pray there as much time as we wanted and got out. So we were alone in an empty (and beautiful) private temple. We didn't know what to do! We took advantage of the situation and admire the beautiful temple from the inside. Then we got out in order to get some other help, and found another little temple with a different name and some signs in English, so we went there to ask. There a very nice man told us to go to the temple's office, and accompanied us there. There was a woman there, and I showed her my emails about the calligraphy date. And she explained to us that we where in the wrong place. There was another temple with the same name some streets away! She marked the place for us in our google maps so we could get there.
Finally we got to the Shourinji temple where I had the appointment! The calligraphy started at 14.00, but they had told me to get there at 12.00. It was 13.05 and the temple was closed for service from 13.00 to 14.00! There was some people outside waiting. So we decided to go for a walk around and come back at 13.45. When we came back, the people waiting were still there, and service had not ended yet. But a nice lady who did not speak English came for us (we were the only non-japanese people there, so we were quite easy to identify) and we finally could sit and practice calligraphy. She explained us all the previous ritual, and how to use the brush, and made us some matcha tea with some sweets.
I did the sutra copying in kanji, and my boyfriend did the buddha drawing. We did have enough time for it, and had no problem. We both had a great time, and my boyfriend even got friends with the monk, because he was the only one with the buddha drawing and the monk was a bit surprised and went by his side to chat a bit. The monk even made us some kind of stamp (something that was done at many temples and I think is some kind of certificate of your visit, but I am not really sure) with his own calligraphy and the official temple stamp in red. And he added some snowflakes in silver ink and some rabbits in gold ink!
At the end the experience was fabulous, and we are still laughing at the misunderstanding at the first temple! We had a real Japanese experience that not everyone gets!