Sunday Papers: Miguel Arboleda

"The wild really has little inclination for sitting still."

  
--Laughing Knees 

On the turntable:  Muddy Waters, "The Chess Box"

Nakasendo, solo III

The rain out the window sounded heavier than the shower.  The day before, I had planned to set out for a three day walk up the Nakasendo, but I just wasn't feeling it.  So I stayed home instead, kicking myself some when the rain stopped around 7 am and the sun came out. 

This morning saw similar skies, though the rain had let up some.  Arriving at Kyoto station to scenes of chaos, people milling in front of the neon signs announcing that all the limited express trains were delayed.  As I sat awhile on the platform waiting for one to come, I was lucky to overhear a station worker tell an elderly woman that he wasn't sure if they be running at all.  I quickly jumped aboard a local train that had been sitting idle before me, its doors closing just behind my back.

It was raining in Takamiya when I disembarked, yet its intensity abated little by little for the next hour until eventually petering out.  The sun didn't seem to want to take the stage today but that was just as well as it kept the heat down.

On a hill at the edge of town stood an old shrine, below which was a cluster of Jizo.  Beside them was a small Jizo temple, almost an afterthought.  I was definitely heading into the countryside now, the suburban homes falling away gradually like the rain.  Moving past a shrine with its papered barrier rope lowered to prevent access.  I thought it had to do with ritual pollution as the shrine stood across from a large modern cemetery and this was the time when the souls of the dead return.  But every shrine in this area seemed to be closed off, so it must be a local custom.  Soon after,  I passed another grave, that of the renowned beauty Ono no Komachi, standing lonely in a narrow ribbon of green between the expressway and the Shinkansen line.  On the latter, the trains weren't moving, two or three of them lined up nose to tail at a dead standstill.  It was like being in some postapocalyptic film, the vision of these ghost trains.  Something bad must be happening back in Kansai.  (Later I'd hear about the fatal floods down in Uji.)

Moving at a speed far exceeding that of the Shinkansen, I entered Toriimoto-cho, a lovely old posttown retaining its traditional look.  At the opposite end was an old-timey wooden canoe and beautiful vintage Jaguar sitting behind an apartment building.  Just beyond them,  I entered the forest for the first time since leaving Kyoto.  A short but steep climb brought me to a tiny hamlet in a narrow valley overlooking rice fields and Lake Biwa beyond.  It was quiet for a time, until I arrived back at the expressway and its everpresent rhythmic hiss.  I crested a low pass where beneath me, the expressway had entered a tunnel.  The far side was quiet.  A large monkey crossed the road in front of me.  As I stopped to watch it move through the trees, dozens of dragonflies churned the air above the rice paddies.

Where the paddies ended lay the village of Bamba.  People clad in black were gathering in the road, obviously heading to a temple downhill.  One man was carrying a small box of powdered incense which smelled like it was already lit.  For the first time, I felt like I was finally on the Nakasendo, moving through the woods that served as the boundaries of human settlement, and on into these villages that exhibit a vitality unseen in the lifeless suburbs that I'd spent two long days trying to leave behind. 

Where the village ended I found a restaurant that surprised me by being open. Inside, two women were busy packing boxes with masu  that were being delivered to families too busy to cook during the holiday.  I was the only customer of course, which allowed me to chat freely with them as I paired my fish with a beer that is always a miracle on a humid day like this.  I joked how when I explain the food to my tour clients, I inevitably use the English word 'trout' for not only masu, but also iwana, ayu, aji.  As we talked, a dozen larger fish swum in a cement pit at one corner of the kitchen, soon to join the souls of their own ancestors. 

Having satisfactorily carbo-loaded,  I moved along, standing on the shoulders of the beer.  Across from the former chaya is a policebox with information written in both Japanese and Portuguese.  Next to it is a butcher shop, open in defiance of the usual Obon prohibition against meat eating.  I soon came to the next posttown of Samegai, a lovely little village shaded by the trees that over hang the brook that runs through the center of things.  The town quickly became my favorite of all of those in Shiga, with the galleries, cafes, and temples.  The only problem is that fucking expressway running just above.

On the slope heading out of town I come across the only thru hiker I've met on the Nakasendo.  He had set out on July 22nd, and would arrive at his destination of Sanjo Ohashi in a couple more days.  He said that when he'd set out 25 days before, he had intended doing 40 km days, but the heat quickly changed his mind for him.  Now even thirty a day is a challenge.  He was friendly and chatty in a way that reveals the loneliness of solo travel.  I had many things I'd have liked to have asked him, but we both had places to go, and soon set off toward them.

The road brought me past a row of love hotels lining a quiet and shady river. Behind the modesty curtains of each hotel I could see a few cars, their owners currently doing their best to stimulate the economy.  I left them to their business, and moved into the forest along a soggy dirt track bisecting bamboo.  The forest on both sides was being used as a deliberate rubbish dump for the nearby factories, machinery and cars piled up the hillsides in an orderly fashion.  The trail opened out onto farmland, rice fields hugging a crescent curve of hills.

I wrapped around them to the town of Kashiwabara.  A Holy Roller moved past, his black priest's robes flowing behind as he rode his scooter to his next gig.  I meet another priest on the road, a nice young guy who seemed curious what I'm up to.  He tells me that he too lives in Kyoto, dividing his time between there and here.  Gesturing at his clothes, I joking ask if he's working, assuming that the priest job too is part time due to his full head of hair.  I carry on up the road again, behind a boy walking barefoot up the street.  A car pulls up, and a couple yells at him to get his ass home, to which he yells "No Way!' and moves along even more deliberately.

I cross the border into Gifu, the division here being a small stream.   The road is quiet, moving in and out of hamlets, then taking me into the forest again, through a narrow pass that helped determine the future of Japan.  Sekigahara lies on the far side, the site of the most decisive battle in Japanese history.  As I approach the town the clouds begin to build up like approaching armies, and just as I reach the town center the skies open up and then the deluge.  I stop in the covered front stoop of a bank to put a rain cover on my pack, for the only time of the four day walk.

It stops by the time I reach the tree lined outskirts of town.  These types of trees once ran the length of the Nakasendo, a great blessing on a hot August day such as this.  I don't doubt that walking the trail was much more of an ordeal back in the days before abundantly available vending machines and convenience stores.  But people were much fitter then, their basic level of walking ability much higher.  Plus they had more shade, and weren't forced to walk on all this hard asphalt. 

But despite the ache in my feet, I thoroughly enjoyed this particular section of the Nakasendo. Sadly, over the next two days, that feeling wouldn't return...

On the turntable:  Fishbone, "Truth and Soul"

 

Parting Fires

My son Ken is always close, but he's especially close this time of year, when the spirits of the dead are amongst us.  That first summer after his death, his voice accompanied me nearly constantly,  and I grew to believe that the conversations that we had in my head were actual conversations.  

I'm sitting on this train and the moment I think that I haven't heard his voice lately, immediately there's his "Daddy!" I'm here buddy.

I am here sitting with my pain.  I haven't been sleeping well lately, which isn't due to anxiety as much as that my mind races with the details of all I have to do these days, all this mental juggling.  It suddenly dawns on me that we all do this:  the girl sitting next to me; everyone else on this train.  We all have anxiety, worry, grief.  The causes are different, but the way it feels is the same. 

Too often I judge or dismiss people because I glimpse a single action at a single moment in time.  Static.  But humans are more complex than this, being completely at the mercy of the shifting flow of reality around them.  We are all so vulnerable and fragile.  I should be more accepting of others, bonded as we are in our shared pain.  

And later now, as the souls of our dead are sent off for another year, I chose to forgo a view of the hills ablaze, and instead stay indoors in order to light a stick of incense and share a few more minutes with my dear boy.  

No need to wait an entire year.  As long as I have a heart, you're always welcome my love...

On the turntable:  David Grier,  "Lone Soldier"

The Roads to Somewhere...

In the midst of a third go round with Alan Booth's classic "The Roads to Sata."  I read it for the first time about six months after arriving in Japan, and didn't care for it much.  I was still in my honeymoon period as a newcomer to the country, and found Booth to be a grumpy drunk.  

I read it again a few months before leaving.  This time I found it brilliant.  I'd had the prerequisite experience to relate to most of what he depicts, especially as I too had walked into similar situations  and locales.  More than this, my particular mindset at the time was as one well out of love with Japan.  Booth's cynicism found a staunch supporter in me.

This time I'm once again six-months into a life here, yet have found that I'm quite even tempered about things.  I'm still enamored with that which appeals, yet much more tolerant of that which rankles.  The biggest difference in perspective in my reading this time relates to a different writer altogether.  

Back in the spring, I spent a little time with Mary King, who had just published her own book about walking Japan.  In our conversation, she told me that she found affinity in the fact that both she and Booth were adopted.  She was further delighted when I mentioned that I too am adopted.  We speculated on whether this lack of cultural blood identity feeds a sort of wanderlust, if being of unknown origins makes us natural seekers, yet able to adapt and find home wherever we are.  

On the turntable: 'Til Tuesday, "Voices Carry"
On the nighttable: Sheila Nickerson, "Disappearance:  A Map"

Things go better with...what exactly?

Spent the weekend helping with the translation of a talk by the marketing director of a massive soft drink megaconglomerate.  As I plodded through, I tried to suppress those rising waves of disgust at how arrogant and patronizing this woman was.  No real surprise since we are all seen as a nameless, faceless, pulsing demographic, rather than as individuals with unique needs and desires.  I listened to her speak in this completely different language, amazed at how out of touch with the people those in business (and politics) are.  Spending time with this woman made me want to take a bath for a week. 

But as I got deeper into the work, I grew amazed at the deftness with which she flows with the changing times.  It became obvious how the world has shifted forever.  The consumer has been given a larger voice in how corporations target us with their marketing.  They are all over social media.  (It was mentioned that this particular soft drink company responds to each of their 15000(!) Tweets every day.)  Via our social networks, we can affect policy.  I imagine a similar thing must be brewing in the political world.  

We do have a forum, but only if we choose to be heard.

On the turntable:  Peter Murphy, "Unshattered"
On the nighttable:  Shusaku Endo, "Deep River"

Nakasendo, solo II

As I'm congratulating myself on how quickly I can move in the morning (I'm one of those annoying people who are able to wake up as if by the flick of a switch), I feel a drip down my arm.  Shit, my water reservoir is leaking.  It had acted strangely on that last hike I did with Wes, and now I see a nice little hole in the bite valve.  There are a few moments in the kitchen where I make like a Dutch boy, find the leak, and transfer the water over into a couple of nalgene.  I'm going to need it.  It's going to be hot again today.

On the train I'm feeling a bit self-conscious due to the wet spots on my shirt, that is until I notice that guy hanging off the strap in front of me reeks like a mosquito coil.  His T-shirt looms in front of me, its large font literally screaming, "Don't ask me 4 shit."  Sorry, bro.

I should have asked him about trains.  I'm lucky to find a seat in a busy commuter car.  I tuck into my book, and look up at one point to notice that Lake Biwa is on the wrong side.  Shit again.  I often tell people that I sometimes miss those early days when I was illiterate here, and hopping the wrong train being the impetus for adventure.  Well, this morning I've gone retro. 

I eventually get back to Yasu, where I finished the last walk.  The Nakasendo is right where I've left it.  Obon is coming up soon, and the temples are aflurry with sweeping brooms and splashing water.  There are quite a few dosojin along this stretch, freshly decorated with lovely purple flowers.  On the outskirts of town I come to Sakurabasama burial mounds.  The largest, Kabutoyama, has had a tunnel cut into the side, and at the end is a small chamber lit by an electrical source coming from somewhere.  At the center of the chamber is a large stone sarcophagus, lid pulled slightly aside.  The body is of course no longer here, but perhaps some trace of the spirit remains, so I apologize out loud for disturbing it,  then realize immediately that this could be the first time that this long-dead person has heard my native language.  While thinking this, the entire tomb shakes as the Shinkansen passes nearby.  I'm not the only one doing the disturbing.

I follow the Shinkansen tracks for awhile.  What would take me over two weeks of hard walking will be covered by the train in about 2 hours.  I'll parallel the line for the rest of the day, never more than 500 meters away, as the trains push the air along with an impatient whoosh.

The pushing of things aside is the perfect metaphor for the town of Shinohara.  It is another one of those bedtowns that has no time for that which isn't new and shiny and safe.  Here the Nakasendo signs disappeared quickly.  The few historical points seemed almost an embarrassment, like the hiding away of an elderly relative in some back room.  Just beyond a newly abandoned gas station is a small pond important in the life story of Yoshitsune, one of Japan's greatest heroes.  The area surrounding it is hemmed in by development, and the water of the pond itself is covered by an oily scum from all those trucks passing by a couple of meters away.  The only hint that this had once been a sizable post town are the placards showing the locations of what had been prosperous inns, staked in front of those lego-like instant homes designed by the most unimaginative of Tokyo's cookiecutter housing firms.   Even the more developed post towns have a section that retains somewhat of a look of the old.  Here nothing remains, least of which the dwarf bamboo from which the town of Shinohara took its name.

The next town, Musa, is entirely different.  I backtrack to the old river crossing, from which Hiroshige took his print of the town, and walk through a lovely little area of old buildings.  Near Oiso shrine I take a long rest in front of a house that is for sale.  I live out an entire life while sitting here:  of watching Sora grow up with the shrine and surrounding forest as her playground;  of converting the old sake shop next door into a cafe for shrine visitors, which would take on a hipster vibe with live music at night;  of the envy of friends as we'd walk from my front door and into the surrounding hills to explore the old temples up there;  of growing rice in one of the fields that stretches away seemingly toward Kansas.  A pastoral idyll, an hour from Kyoto.

Throughout the day, the sun plays peek-a-boo in the clouds, but it is hard to ignore the rising humidity.  It worsens as I am forced to march along Route 8 and all that traffic.  In the afternoon, I try to find some brief moments of cool in the shadow of the trucks backed up at every red light. 

Luckily I'm not on roads all day.  I cross the Echikawa down in its dry river bed, despite the signs warning me that water could be released from the dam upstream at any time.  I'm prevented from reaching the far side by about five meters of water, but rather than concede defeat and return back to take the bridge, I push through the reeds until I find a way across.  As I pour cooling water on the red welts and scratches on my legs I ponder why we men will stubbornly push on at great risk rather than prudently retreat to safety. 

Echikawa is a lovely stretch of road beneath the shade of trees.  Many of the homes look abandoned, trees and vines growing madly behind crumpling earthen walls.  A beautiful Taisho building is being sold as a residence despite looking more like a European bank.

The sun is low now so I walk the left side of the road in the shade of the two-story buildings.  My left hip is hollering loudly about something, so I take many rests, leaning against the iron shutters of yet another failed business. My feel feel like taiko bachi, which someone had been beating against the asphalt for the last six hours.  Two young girls bicycle past, one of them wearing a shirt emblazoned with, "Wishing you the Best."  Thanks, sweetie.

The last 7km are hard fought, but lovely Takamiya perks me up.  The grassy verge brings relief for the feet, beneath high zelkova trees that throw welcome shade.  A tap attached to the side of a house  offers cool and delicious water.  The town itself retains its historic look, marred somewhat by traffic a little too heavy for such a narrow street built for pedestrians.  Cars jerk sideways suddenly like crabs in order not to sideswipe one another.  One impatient driver brushes my hand with his mirror as he passes.

Finally the station.  Two elderly station workers sit in their air-conditioned office, watching Sazae-san on TV.   Waiting for my train, I think that I'd pushed it pretty close to my limit today.  And the scenery had hardly been worth it, through the worst of Shiga's suburbs.  The few sections of beauty had been too far between, offering the mind too little to distract it from the pain of going over all that asphalt.  The greater challenge was that it had been 35ºC degrees for most of the day, the humidity like a thumb.  Yet I had been set on my 30 km goal.   I make a vow that I'd set a 25/25 rule:  never going over 25km on a day that is over 25ºC. 

But within a week I was hoping to walk 94km over three days, across the broad Minō plain...

On the turntable:  Paul Simon, "You're the One"
On the nighttable:  Alan Booth, "The Road to Sata"

Sunday Papers: Joseph Campbell

"We must not confuse mythology with ideology.  Myths come from where the heart is, where the experience is, even as the mind may wonder why people believe these things.  The myth does not point to a fact;  the myth points beyond facts to something that informs the fact." 

--An Open Life

On the turntable:  Jerry Harrison, "Casual Gods"

Japan hail

I like how the JR ticket machines have that cute animated woman who pops up and gives you a little wave as you take your ticket, thus 'humanizing' the process.  

On the turntable:  一万 Maniacs, "Our Time in Eden" 

Daughter Father

I come from a long line of strong women.  Pioneers, one and all, in their own way.  So it is that I feel it easier to communicate with women, easy to speak from a place without screens.

The birth of my daughter last year has effectively challenged my ideas of how I view women.  In thinking of her future, I find myself rubbing against my own misogyny, discovering a chauvinism that I didn't know I had.

I think of those things that she cannot do.  American-born, she'd be able to become president of that country, yet unable to be the Empress of the land that makes up the other half of her cultural identity.

Last autumn, on a visit to the Philmont Ranch, I walked through the small museum dedicated to the history of the place, and the history of the boy scouts in general.  I felt a slight sadness that my daughter will never be able to take part in many of those activities, (My friend dc was appointed the first woman Camp Director of Philmont, so she may have a different opinion.  I hope that she'll chime in if I'm wrong.)  In Japan, my daughter can never join me in my Shugendo training, never stand with me atop the weathered peak of Omine-san. 

I find myself worrying about her safety, in a world of perverts and abusive partners.  I don't think I ever thought this way about my son.  And I worry about her being relegated to her role as a second-class citizen.  Here in Japan, this discrimination is more overt, though I find that women here seem to find that place empowering and are comfortable in that identity.  I personally feel that Japanese women appear to be much freer than their American counterparts, who believe they are free yet are often stuck in the mire of gender politics.  I'm getting muddled here myself, but I'm trying to say that most non-American women, being of older, long established cultures, seem much more grounded in who they are.  Their identity is rooted in culture, not gender.  American women by contrast constantly seem to be seeking something.  My mother would of course rebut that these non-American women are operating from a position of default.  They may appear more free, but they lack the freedom to choose otherwise.  And again, this sexism on my part stems from my own position atop the social ladder as a reasonably young, reasonably secure white male.  My world view is shaped by, though by no means limited to, this position.

But what disturbs me most is my own relationship to a daughter.  In my mind's eye, I have always seen a future spent with a son.  I see us camping, hiking, shooting hoops; the usual tropes of male rites of passage.  Not that I can't share these my daughter, but somehow this doesn't visualize in the same way.  I want to believe that I feel this way because I lost my son at a young age, and will never have a chance to share those things with him.  So I enter into this new relationship with my daughter from a position of lack.  Which isn't at all fair to her.

With every week, she is growing into her own sense of being, and it is to watch the shaping of this personality that allows me to begin to see her own distinctiveness. And what I see stands apart from gender.  My child is simply my child.  

I look forward to watching her moving further into life, eventually taking on the role of teacher and challenging more of her old man's inherent preconceptions.

On the turntable:  Ziggy Marley:  "One Bright Day"

On the nighttable:  Edward Dorn, "Views/Interviews"

Carnival of Sorts

In front of my house there's a high wall with large sakura trees on the other side. The wall surrounds the playground of an elementary school, and looking out over it from my house's second story gives one the illusion of space, open sky stretching away toward the mountains of Kitayama. 

In the evenings, the classrooms long emptied, there always seems to be something going on.  It is fun to guess by the sound coming into my house from across the road and over the wall.  The rhythmic thunk of a basketball.  The quick and harsh clacks of bamboo shinai.  The chatter of the baseball diamond.

Being summer now, the school kids on break, the sounds are different.  At seven a.m. sharp, radio taiso rouses us with its blaring distortion.  Then the brass, and the drums, of the marching band. I find it kind of funny that there are such bands here, despite the obvious lack of high school football.  From upstairs I watch what I can see from between the trees, catching the occasional glimpse of a methodically moving figure in uniform, the brilliance of color wilting in the rising heat.

On the turntable:  Roxy Music, "Live in Concert"

Sunday Papers: Richard Louv

"In the space of a century, the American experience of nature -- culturally influencial around the world -- has gone from direct utilitarianism to romantic attachment to electronic detachment.  Americans have passed through not one frontier, but through three."

--Last Child in the Woods

On the turntable:  Bruce Springsteen, "Wrecking Ball"

Inter-dependant Arising at SamSarasa

Cooling with iced coffee at Sarasa Nishijin, perhaps my favorite Kyoto cafe.  When I lived at Daitokuji in the summer of '03, I used to come here a couple times a week, to have a Guinness (rare in those days) and a chat with the owner Aki-san about Tibetan Buddhism, Krishnamurti, and other things that go so well with an Irish stout. 

Anyway, I haven't seen Aki-san in years (a busy man, with six Sarasa branches to manage), but today the guy in charge was wearing a shirt with the words, "Number 2."  Ignoring the obvious scatological references, I was tempted to ask him, "Who is Number 1?" yet was afraid that he'd laugh in my face for assuming that I was a free man, and at my delusion in thinking that the decision to come in here today was of my own volition.  

On the turntable:  Slim Harpo, "The Excello Singles"

Edward the Scrivener

Reading Seidensticker's book on Kafu Nagai, which is as much about Edo as it is about Kafu himself.  An epitaph of sorts, for what Edo was under the Shogunate.  The book could easily be considered the third book in a trilogy in Sedensticker's writings about Tokyo.  Makes me want to walk around the city and explore.

On the turntable:  Blondie, "The Best of Blondie"

On the nighttable:  Edward Sedensticker, "Kafu the Scribbler"

Transience

Heading east on Imadegawa, I look up at the Higashiyama hills and think, "Okuribi is coming soon.  Daimonji sure can use a shave. "

Later in the day, heading east on Oike, I see that a group of someones have already accomplished the task.  The hill is now bald, with the slight bluish hue of a monk newly shorn, ready to take on his austerities. 

An hour further on, I've dropped the car with Miki down at Shichijo, and I'm walking upriver home.  Another hot day, so I cool myself with a scone and iced coffee at efish cafe.  Sitting beside the window with Ivan Morris' translation of Sarashina Nikki.  (To my mind, history exists in shadow, and the reading of it creates a cooling effect.)  I look down from time to time at the water moving steady and low.  Yet on one occasion I look up, to see smoke rising gently from the mountain, rising from the dried locks of the previous year. 

On the turntable:  Traffic,  "Welcome to the Canteen"

On the nighttable:  Lady Sarashina, "As I Crossed the Bridge of Dreams"

Sunday Paper: Anonymous

"Talk does not cook the rice."

--Old Zen Saying

On the turntable:  Muddy Waters, "Folk Singer"

Nakasendo Waypoints #36

Even Nagano's mountains

Hold 34 degrees. 

Twenty km over hot roads.

On the turntable:  Morrissey, "Viva Hate" 

Nakasendo Waypoints #35

Above the frenzied white water,

And a riot of birdsong, 

Kamoshika lopes on by.

On the turntable:  Utopia,  "Adventures in Utopia"

Nakasendo Waypoints #34

Wisps of cloud

Hang between branches. 

Cobwebs in rain.

On the turntable:  REM, "Reckoning"

 

Sunday papers: Dion Workman

"To refuse a gift is to proclaim that we do not want to be in relationship with the giver."

 --Shikigami

On the turntable:  World Party, "Dumbing Up"

Taking the High Road

Ikoma's shape is easy to admire from afar.  It rises out on the plain that separates Osaka from Nara.  The low rise of hills rolls south, pointing toward the higher peaks of Katsuragi and Nijo.  Like those latter peaks, Ikoma too was a spiritual center from long ago.  With the trains came the tourists, and later still the maidens of the red-light districts in the towns below.  

We saw more of the former I suppose, a testament to the hiking boom of the last few years.  The mountain's trails weren't necessarily crowded, and brought to mind the numbers seen more often on a weekend day of a few years back.  The numbers are far greater today, Wes assured me.

We'd started our walk from the northern edge of hills intending to walk along the ridge for the better part of the day.  Trains are never fun on an early weekday morning, but at least we weren't heading to an overchilled office.  Cool biz was very much in effect, the legions of men descending the stairs in their white shirts looking like the quick moving water spilling over falls and over black rocks.  In their midst, a group of boys in their school uniforms seemed headed to the back nine. We left them in the bus queue of other students as our own bus pulled away.  

Like many walks down that way, ours started on a busy road.  After about ten minutes we found the first of the parks.  This particular trail, the Ikoma Nature Trail  (生駒縦走)  serves to intersect the many parks up on the ridges of Ikoma.  Most of the parks remained unseen, but the trail took us through the heart of this first one, past the parking lots, vending machines, and toilets that were the habitat of some weird, stick-like insects.  The trail then stayed in the forest, around a few ponds and across a dam.  We descended through a riot of mosquitos, to the farm of a poultry lover, his pens filled with edible birds of various sizes.  We met a highway here, and crossing it, found a quartet of men setting a trap.  When we asked them what they were after, one old-timer mischievously said in English, "Rascal."  I followed with my own joke, asking if they made good eating, which caused all four of the men to turn and look at me simultanously in a chorus of "eeeeh!"   There was another trap not far away, and closer inspection revealed the two 'araiguma' they'd said they'd caught.  Translated directly as "red-bear," we were surprised to find ourselves looking at a pair of American style raccoons.   We wondered if they'd once been somebody's pets, for they seemed unafraid and almost affectionate, as they pressed noses and paws through the cage toward us.  But the gestures of the old man cured us of this notion, as his curled fingers made like the gnashing of fangs.

Wes and continued on through the growing heat, to a soundtrack of baseball players warming-up somewhere beyond the trees.  Along the way was "Ueda Constructions" (sic), whose company logo was painted in a style more often seen on a '60s bungalow of some So.Cal beach town.  The trail finally brought us away from civilization, past a husband-wife farmer team resting in the shade near a surprisingly waterless lotus paddy.  We skirted a golf course through a tunnel of bear-grass, which opened again at a massive stone marked as the god of the Dragon King.  Previously trips to Ikoma have revealed multiple variations of reptilian gods, including those white serpents up on Shigisan.  But despite the hundreds of frogs jumping absolutely everywhere, we didn't see a single snake all day. 

We were climbing some now, so stopped for elevenses at a picnic table in the shade.  We were joined briefly by a cheerful couple who'd just returned from a visit to the States, with obligatory Vegas trip and Grand Canyon helicopter tour.  They stayed close by as we made our way higher, but left us to continue to the top of Ikoma itself.  We kept to the ridge trail, which led us through a park rife with Hibiscus in full bloom.  After dropping down a very warm hillside, we ascended again slightly to a temple that serves as the perfect lunch spot.  Under the shade of rafters, we dined, the scent of green chile in Wes's burrito serving as the madeline to my Proust, prompting me to launch into a long monologue about where I come from.  Wes in turn spun his own like tale.  It was a peaceful place.  I could have happily sat there all day, but the noise of a power weeder started up, prompting us on.

We arrived at a hilltop park just below Ikoma's peak proper.  A dozen or so people were here in post lunch repose, including one guy completely zonked out despite the hot sun.  Wes and I sat atop a rock overlooking Osaka and deciphered landmarks. It was a bit hazy down there in the true heat, but the views were pretty good.  We stopped briefly in a resthouse to buy a cold drink from a surly guy in a bad uniform.  I thought that I'd left him behind, but seemed to be carrying him still, as the encounter prompted a new theory that similar jobs in the States are (generally speaking) usually held by people with a love for the outdoors.  In Japan, many seem to be mere bureaucrats.  Wes told me a few stories about troubles he's had with mountain hut staff up the Alps, a couple in times of bad and dangerous weather.  These instances, and my own, reaffirm another theory I have about attitudes and behaviors following age lines.  The youngest and greenest staff seem paralyzed by rules and aren't able to go beyond them.  The middle-aged are worse, in their mid-level positions and jaded attitudes.  They're more able to think for themselves, yet often chose not to be of assistance in extreme circumstances.  It is old-timers that are the most flexible, humanity reasserting itself over time.   

Our own weather was getting extreme, with the heat rising dramatically as we paralleled the ridgetop skyline road.  We rested in the shade of a lookout, where I cleverly dumped out about a quarter of my remaining water.  The lookout had a set of unsupported stairs that extended diagonally out over the parking lot like a diving board.  I ignored the tingling in the perineum to enjoy the view of Osaka emerging from the haze.  I raised my camera and all lined up for a pic: the city, the bridges of Awaji, the mountains beyond Rokko.   A couple drove up at some point, on an obvious early date, and laughed at the padlocks clasped onto a pair of metal rings placed here by other couples in a significant affirmation of a relationship far further down the line.

We followed the ridgeline, the heat slowing us some.  A few large mushrooms rose from the forest,  their presence alone making me wonder if we'd earlier ingested their party-friendly brethren.  Seven-foot high toadstools, hollowed out, for some unknown purpose?  Yep, the heat was getting to us.  

Past the Jizo of Jūsan-toge, familiar from an earlier hike.  One of the main reason's I'd wanted to do this ridge hike was to see the layout of numerous side trails that ran up from every train station.  We followed one familiar path, over a valley awash with wild hydrangea.  Past a couple picnicking on a bridge.  Past the cult headquarters with it's cool logo. Past another mushroom that is the radar station, then finally to the funicular station and its welcoming cold drinks.

The cablecar was nearly empty, so we sat at the front, looking straight down the tracks, waiting for the ride to begin.  I surely hoped there'd be no rolling blackouts as we made our way down.  Then a series of trains, each growing in length the nearer to Osaka.  The trains grew crowded as we spilled over into rush hour.  Our final ride, seated across from a grumpy old git who kept shouting "Silence please!" despite our conversation being in quiet tones.  Far quieter than him anyway.   He seemed to be placed here as some sort of challenge to the day's theorizing. Challenging Wes believing Osakans are among the friendliest people in Japan.  Challenging me believing old men are more humane.  

But the old man has ridden on now, as have I.  Kyoto bound, emerging from underground just beside the gaudy glitter of Osaka castle.  Far more subtle are the familiar shape of Ikoma rising behind.  Brown and green, moving toward blue as the light goes.

On the turntable:  Husker Du, "Candy Apple Gray"

On the nighttable:  Tim O'Brian, "July, July"

(untitled)

Fourteen syllables

Are good enough

On such a hot day.

On the turntable:  REM, "And I Feel Fine"

Sunday Papers: Herman Hesse

"Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be their own judges obey the laws. Others sense their own laws within them; things are forbidden to them that every honorable man will do any day in the year and other things are allowed to them that are generally despised. Each person must stand on his own feet." 

  – Demian

  

On the turntable:  John Lennon, Live in New York City"

Nakasendo Waypoints #33

Two Grannies

Stop for a chat

In the rice field.

On the turntable:  UB40, "The Best of..."

On the nighttable:  Daniel Wallace, "Big Fish"

Nakasendo Waypoints #32

Proud Norikura

Doesn't care

That it's summer.

On the turntable:  Bryan Sutton, "Bluegrass Guitar" 

Nakasendo Waypoints #31

Fresh-faced Summer,

Called onto stage 

To the pulse of cicadas.

Toots and the Maytals, "Time Tough" 
 

Nakasendo Waypoints #30

Hot springs Benzaiten

Rides white marble clouds 

Beneath the grey of monsoon

On the turntable:  Grand Funk Railroad, "Grand Funk Hits"

Sunday Papers: The Courier

"Shelley, the writer of some infidel poetry, has been drowned: now he knows whether there is a God or no." 

 --Percy Bysshe Shelley obituary in the Courier, a leading Tory newspaper in London, 1822

On the turntable:  Tori Amos,  "A Piano"

On the nighttable: Joseph Campbell, "Creative Mythology"

Nakasendo Waypoint #29

Dance of seven veils.

Seven ranges 

Draped in cloud.

On the turntable: Willie and the Poor Boys

On the nighttable:  Banana Yoshimoto, "Amrita"

 

Nakasendo, solo

And as soon as I looked into the deity's eyes, the shrieking began...

I found myself awake on the nighttime side of five, so I roused myself out of bed, jumped on the bicycle and rode down river.  Our Walk Japan Nakasendō tours ostensibly begin in Kyoto, but aside from an obligatory stop at Sanjo Bridge--the western terminus--we take a train east, through all the built up concrete bed towns of Shiga.  The real walk begins where the mountains start in Gifu.  I found myself curious with what we roar past, and decided to walk those sections of the Nakasendō not on the tour.  I know that it won't be pleasant, over unforgiving asphalt and through ugly scenery, but curiosity oft trumps common sense.  This first twenty-some kilometers was not only the Nakasendō but also that road's more renowned sibling, the Tōkaidō.  I'd follow them both until they part ways in Kusatsu.

So I found myself heading up Sanjo just after 6 a.m.   The usually busy road was quiet, and I left it before long, along a diagonal road heading beneath the hills that lower themselves eventually into Misasagi.  Occasionally there'd be a set of steps leading up to some temple, and I'd climb up and have a look.  Historically, this must have been a flourishing center of Buddhist practice, today watched over by the massive Agon-shu temple atop the mountain itself.  It was along this stretch that I saw the cave, just the other side of the parking lot.  It is very unusual in Japan to see a roadside shrine without direct access, but these people meant business, with their double set of chains and a third strand of barbed wire.  There was a elderly man before the shrine altar, finishing up his prayers.  I asked him if I too could pray there, and he said sure, and gestured me in.  A small waterfall fell across the entrance to the cave, where esoteric austerities are performed.  Further back was a large stone turtle and riding his back was one of the most beautiful statues of Fudo-myo, with eyes of a brilliant emerald green.  And as soon as I looked into the deity's eyes, the shrieking began.  Startled, I turned to see a woman in the street, screaming at me, asking what I was doing there.  I told her about the old man, who at that moment was riding away on his motorcycle.  The woman's husband now came outside, and started yelling at the old man's back.  I repeatedly  apologized, but they said that I wasn't doing any harm, that the old guy was trouble.  He'd been repeatedly told not to enter the shrine, but he did.  Apparently a lawyer had already been contacted, and the matter was heading to court.  Things calmed down now, and I started to ask about this mysterious place, but the couple stayed focused on the old man.  At one point the woman went into the house, returning with a pencil and paper.  She then asked me if I'd give my name and address.  I started to walk backwards, hands up, saying wait a minute, I just wanted to say a quick prayer.  The woman said that was fine, but that she'd want the police to get a report on the incident.  I quickly turned and headed down hill, saying sorry but no, over my shoulder, leaving behind this protective deitess, shrieking for me to come back.

I hurried for the next twenty minutes, worried that she'd call the cops who would come question me.   There was no way I could blend, what other foreigner was out walking at this hour?  After a few more zigzags, I began to relax.  I was walking in the opposite direction of a parade of commuters heading toward Yamashina station.   I liked the fact that at this early hour, I'd already walked halfway to Otsu.  

Along with a walk that would be hard on both the feet and the eyes, I was expecting a frustrating day of seeking out signs, of repeatedly doubling back to find the trail.  I was very surprised to see that the path was quite well marked, for the Tōkaidō of course.  I've walked many of this country's old roads which always entails a lot of guess work, for the lack of signage and poor maps in guide books.  I had no real problems all day.  On the far side of Yamashina, I walked into a snarl of highways and railways.  The road was narrow,  morning auto commuters creating a bottleneck at the intersection of the Nara Kaido.  I topped Osaka pass, stopping for a snack at a small shrine, and noting the sparkling clean toilets built onto the site of the old barrier station.  On the descent, I walked beneath an overpass used solely by walkers of the Tōkai Shizen Hodō.  I knew that at the southern end was the start of a very grueling ascent, one of the hardest on the whole Kansai section of the trail.  (In fact, throughout the day, I'd pass a half dozen more places where the day's walk intersected with walks done previously by Miki and I.  Where a modern GPS will show you a map of the region as it looks now, in my head I hold maps of where these arteries once led in the past.)

The road into Ōtsu is marked with shrines.  A few blocks shy of Lake Biwa, the road doglegs sharply to the east.  In the past, I've ragged Ōtsu for its poor marking of trails, of ignoring its past.  But this section is very well loved and cared for.  Maps and signs are plentiful, as are the multiple placards demarkating history.  These will accompanied me for the rest of the morning.  (The most important marks the space where future Czar Nicholas II was stabbed by a Japanese policeman who was part of his security team in 1891.  The Nicholas survived the attack, meeting a worse fate at the hands of the Bolsheviks 27 years later.)  

The monotony of the suburban scenery was beginning to wear on me, so much so that I recall little to reproduce in writing.  Over the line into Kusatsu and the signs began to disappear, though someone made a valiant attempt in their handwritten signs.   The town center was quaint and faux traditional, atop which the two great trunk roads left one another.  The Nakasendō stood alone now, taking me through a brick tunnel and through a shopping arcade before boring me with more uninspired suburbs.  It was a long muggy afternoon, the only relief being a few large wooded shrines.  Moriyama was attempting to capture some of the flavor of the old road, with a museum and a handful of galleries.  I stopped for an iced coffee in a small cafe built inside a renovated storehouse.  I was soon joined by a woman from the historical center next door.  We talked a little about the road, then I continued on, in the rain now lightly falling.  

Outside Yasu I realized that I'd had enough for the day.  It had been 35 kilometers over hard surface and my feet were beginning to complain.  Far better to jump the next train back home, pop into that Nepalese place around the corner for a take-out curry, and accompany it with a craft beer and an old film.  Then wait until the guide book upstairs begins to weave its next spell on me, and spur me on to the road once more.  

On the turntable: Beastie Boys, "The Mix-up"

On the nighttable: Richard Tames, "A Traveller's (sic) History of Japan"

Takuhatsu

A group of monks going about the their begging rounds startle my daughter from her breakfast.  Her eyes are upon my face, but here ears are pointed completely outside, taking in the 'Hoooooooo!" as it rolls up the street.  

The monks' chant takes me back 12 years to my own begging rounds while I was staying at Hosenji up in Kameoka.  As a country temple, it is pretty self-sufficient in terms of things like rice and veggies and herbs, but the monks needed to beg once a week in order to buy tofu.  Being July, it was a hot torturous afternoon, the conical sedge hats doing little to cool a body wrapped in multiple black robes.  On the way back to the temple, we stopped at the supermarket so that the head monk could buy the tofu.  When he returned, no amount of detachment could've prevented the smiles from crossing our faces when we saw that he'd also bought us all ice cream cones.

On the turntable:  Tim O"Brien, "Traveler'

Sunday Papers: Mark Twain

"Eschew surplusage."

 --Twain on literary offenses

On the turntable: "Christian Death, Dark Noise 2000"

And this is for when you feel...Lucky

In the morning I take my coffee and doughnuts and sit out on the grassy lawn of the Jimpukaku.  James is with me again.  I remember that he had told me that he used to eat his Sunday breakfasts there, having the whole place to himself and therefore contriving himself one of the genteel.  I pass a happy morning here with my book and the sunshine.

Later, I take advantage of the good weather and take a bus out to Uradome seashore, recently dubbed a 'Geo-Park.'  The bus ride ushers in the return of the ghost of that old affair again, in the form of a row of love hotels.  We stayed in one of these on the night when her cat died.  Hoping to create some eternal connection with her pet, she proposed we dissolve some of the recently cremated bones in Coca Cola and drink it.  Which we then proceeded to do.  (Ah, the lengths we go to win love.)  And today I smile when I see that the hotel bears the name, Santa Fe.

Just off the bus,  I find the Chugoku Shizen Hodō, which leads me up a steep trail toward a small shrine up top.  Below it is a grassy patch of grass just big enough for a tent.  A path leads in one direction toward the eateries of this sleepy town, and in the other direction is a set of stairs heading down toward a small cove.  I sit in this future campsite, looking out at the sun glisten off the waters.   Ken is close again, watching with me this body of water that was once his summer playground.  I'm starting that backward slide into darkness again, but the beauty of the scenery helps me recover, and I soon make my way up the trail.

It is a glorious day and I'm happy.  The trail runs over a series of small hills, each offering as a reward a gorgeous swimming spot with perfectly clear water.  This is truly one of the most beautiful places in an archipelago filled with beautiful places.  After a while I eventually arrive at a small fishing port, then round a bend to a long stretch of beach.  I realize at once that I've been here before, and am joined immediately by the ghost of another lost love.  My son's mother and I came here once, and climbed on these rocks above the sea, back in the early days, completely unaware then of what lay before us, of a marriage eventually made, then later still, lost due to the inability to survive the density of grief.  I remember taking pictures here, photos that have a faded 1960's quality in my mind.  Above the rocks there's a shrine that I don't remember, and I climb the steps in order to pray.  There's a middle-aged women there in prayer, her hair long and unkept, her clothes disheveled.  She is long in prayer, her lips moving to syllables that only she can make out.  I wander around the back of the shrine waiting for her to finish, but when I return a few minutes later, she is still at it.  I don't want to intrude, and head back down.   I take off my shoes and walk out onto the cool sand.  I sit and look out at the water again.  At some point the praying woman comes past, walking with steady purpose toward the water.  She stands there at the edge, looking out for a very long time.  And I too watch, watching her.  She too seems haunted.  I wonder who she has lost out there.

I turn my back to her and the sea.  I think about hitching and make a half-hearted attempt.  Along the way, I pass a Kumano Shrine and a small Shingon temple, reminders of the more recent past.  These serve as confirmations that I would prefer to be alone and not in conversation with a stranger.  So it goes that I walk a few kilometers to the train and settle in for the short ride back to town.  After a few minutes an American walks up and asks me if I know the area.   He sits down and begins to talk, a conversation that lasts until the trains pulls into the terminus.  It's the typical lonely guy on the road thing, a role I recognize quickly because ofttimes, the role is mine.   We keep up the conversation to the door of a pub where I had planned to have a quiet dinner.  It would be impolite to break away with out any real excuse, so I invite him to join me.  But I'd truly prefer to dine with my ghosts.

Another day and I'm walking the Sand Dunes.  They are far more touristed than I remember.  The Japanese have a word I love, aware, for which I personally define as a feeling similar to the loneliness of a beach town out of season.  There is this same pathos here today, despite it being the week of the summer solstice.  I've been to these dunes many times before, swimming with friends in the seas beneath them.  Today I walk inland, in search of the location where they filmed "Woman in the Dunes" nearly fifty years ago.  This will be a sequel of sorts to a trip I took 20 years ago to Nipomo Dunes in California, in the hopes of finding the film set of Cecil B. DeMille's "Ten Commandments." 

So I wander the dunes, moving out toward whatever feature draws me at that particular moment.  It is nice to hike barefoot, past the occasional detritus of previous times:  old pop-top tabs, ancient pens.  As one afraid of snakes, I have a tendency to look down as I hike, and soon I become mesmerized by the patterns of the wind in the sand.  The sound carries out here, voices penetrating from far off.  Closer in, I'm constantly accompanied by birdsong, but from where?  It seems to be coming from up there, in that empty sky.

I fail to find any trace of the film set, but the scenery itself is cinematic.  Sand blows across the face of the dunes.  A couple walks along the tops of the dunes in a long take.  A model airplane bobs and weaves.  At the far end of the dunes, the sound of the wind in the pines is like the sound of waves.  The sea itself is strangely silent.  And as I walk back in the direction I came, my footprints disappear in the wind.  

The bus is pointed toward Kyoto.  We travel the new highway, which takes us below a fake castle that stands atop a low, steep hill.  While in my lost years, I'd longed to burn it down, representing as it does the town whose negligence caused my son to lose his life.  I'm glad I didn't.  I found the trail on which he died in a hiking guide book, and I recently noticed that the current edition no longer has that trail in it.  That negation is enough. 

The darkness of a tunnel, then another, and then more, washes over me, and it is here that I leave Tottori behind.  The depth of feeling I still carry for the place surprises me.  But it shouldn't.  After a certain period of time, a return somewhere causes you to dwell not on the history of the place itself as much as to dwell on your own history in that place, on your own relationship with it.

On the turntable:  World Party, "Goodbye Jumbo"

On the nighttable:  前川うかさ、”大東京　ビンボー生活マニュアル"