Uh, Japan...dude?

So, if you remember, I told you a while back that I was an alleged "Grandma Killer." I'm comfortable with this title now, and have embraced my role as a weekly receptacle for candy, cake, and leftovers from the older women in my Tuesday Night English Class. But it has, however, come to my attention that I am also a "Grandpa Killer", although with this title comes a slightly more unsettling role.

I belong to a gym here called "Water Water" (clever isn't it?). But to call this place a gym is, I believe, slightly inaccurate. Were it left to me, I would call my gym "Flabby Old Man Land." Every time I go, I am encountered by a massive herd of old Japanese men of all shapes and sizes. They all come to do one or two pull-ups, call that a "work-out," and then cram into the gym's little hot-tub to gab and hur-rumpf in a nearly unintelligible dialect know as, "Flabby Old Man Dialect." And many of them are still attempting to make sense of my existence in Japan.

I've had every type of interaction possible with these men. Some of them are just wonderfully nice old dudes, and just wanna practice a little English and find out what I think of Japanese culture and what not; others want to know some of the more superficial stuff like what I can and can't eat, what I think of Japanese girls, what's my blood type; and some of them just want to examine me as though I were a puzzle piece and they are trying to figure out just where to place me in their world of weights, saunas, and hot-tubs. One man asked me if I would marry his daughter. I said no, but thanked him for the offer. But I've found that the common thread in all our interactions is this one, underlying exchange of greetings: The Naked Self-Introduction.

I like the hot-tub because it's warm and it feels good, especially after I work out. Call me strange. But, I don't necessarily agree with the Japanese style of cramming as many naked old farts as possible into a 5 foot by 5 foot pool of hot water and then call it "relaxing." Many a times I'll be soaking in the tub by myself, and then, just like they got out of school for the day, an influx of crusty old men will come in pack that damn tub as though it were a can of sardines. And did I mention that they are all naked as they day they were born? Then, once they spot me and do their double-takes, the question asking begins. Usually, they don't even offer their names as an ice-breaker. The exchange goes something like this:

"Ehhhh?America?
"Yup."
"Ehhhh?Why are you in Japan?"
"I'm teaching English."
"Ehhhh? Where?
"In a high school."
"Ehhhhh? You are dating many of the girl students then, yes?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because that's evil and wrong."
"Can you eat Japanese food?"
"Yes, but it took a lot of practice and discipline."
"Can you speak Japanese?"
"Yes, a little." (although what I really want to say is "What the hell have we been speaking in up until this point, dude?")
"Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you, too." (The last two lines are typically done in English, as that seems to be the extent of most of their vocabularies.)

At this point they typically digress into the aforementioned "Flabby Old Man Dialect" which is usually a long string of words I don't understand, topped off with an occasional self-appreciating giggle. An example:

"GrruuuhhhfriinnjhjkdjjdjkAMERICAmkoeuryuinvlslwuyJAPANjksdhserwjhlsdioJAPANESE GIRLSqouwjgpkjjksdlfdhHA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

OR:

"Grruufffklfiuorpdukddfgjidfiriwwwwwiutyyrrrrrrr KA?"

In Japanese, the asking of a question typically ends in the sound "KA," a sort of verbal question mark. When speaking with Flabby Old Men, hearing the sound "KA" usually fills me with an intense anxiety, as I know that my chances of answering their unintelligible question correctly are not good. So, I usually go with one of two responses:

"Yes, that's very funny. I agree completely."

OR

"Well, yes. Perhaps. I think so. Or not?"

So far, these responses have yet to fail me, as both answers elicit either a hearty handshake or a grandfatherly pat on the shoulder. They then tell me that I am, indeed, "a good boy." I usually make an excuse at this point to get out of the tub, because, well, we're naked, and I don't feel like having any more of a conversation like this, but sometimes the questions and comments come at such a rapid speed that there is little room for me to interject a polite plea to leave, let alone answers to their questions. This being so, I often find myself trapped in my sports gym, unable to escape the space that is found between a Flabby Old Man and a hot tub.

"On the Michi" Part Five

I hear a common practice among writers is to carry a small notebook or pad with them wherever they go, so that in the event something fascinating, wonderful, horrible, or simply recordable takes place, they have a place to capture the event so that it doesn't lose the poignancy of its moment. In this sense, a lot of what will follow in these final segments of "On the Michi" was not written in the way it, theoretically, "happened." In fact, all of this took place over two months ago, but does this lapse in time make the events any less real? Is it not worth writing about simply because I let a few million seconds pass since the conception of the event, story, thing that was said, thought that was thought? I think no.

Unfortunately, as readers and writers, we make the mistake of drawing a duality between the landscape of reality and the mindscape (don't worry: I'm NOT about to go on a wax parade of Cartesian philosophy nor will I bore you with a discussion on metaphysics). When I use the word "mindscape," I am simply referring to the landscape of the mind, onto which an infinite amount of opinions, thoughts, and memories have and are being painted by our living selves. My own mindscape is dabbled and brushed with a myriad of memories, some of which I will finish sharing with you now. Perhaps you might argue that would I have shared what follows with you shortly after it happened, that the story would be more vivid, alive, and entertaining. I urge you, though, not to argue this with me, for it undermines the fact that these things I will share with you are still very alive in my memory, and that's why I wish to write of them now. Also, I've been working out and have become ridiculously strong, so don't mess with me.


I'm confident that a seven-hour train ride through the interior of Hokkaido can rival any other scenic-viewpoint in the world. To imagine it, drudge up an image of a log cabin in the middle of a snowy mountain range, a river with its banks iced over running in front of the cabin's white snow-laced porch. Then, meticulously pile some snowy tiles on top of one-another in typical Japanese style, to design the roof. Now, paint in some nearby willow trees, maybe some evergreens. Dump a truckload of powdery snow on them. Then: conjure up an indecisive sky, one that looks like it is trying to decide whether it wants to snow terribly for hours to come OR open itself up so that the sun above can cast its orangeness across snow-covered rice fields that stretch for miles and miles below the range. That was our portrait for seven hours, following train tracks through valleys, up mountains, and arriving at a town whose name is close to meaning, "I don't know."

Actually, there is more truth to that last sentence than meets the eye. The way to say "I don't know" in Japanese is, "Wakanai." Although the city's name boasts an extra "K" which changes the pronunciation slightly, "I don't know," is typically how we answered the question, "WHY did you go to Wakkanai?" Essentially, we had wanted to go somewhere that was as far from feeling like a big city as possible, as well as stand on the coast's northern-most point, to gaze into the Russian waters.

Time seemed to have forgotten Wakkanai, there are no two ways around it. Or I could even go as far as to say that it was too cold and windy in Wakkanai for something like time to exist, but nevertheless it possessed a very real and lonely beauty to it. That is to say: there was a grace in its desolation, though I'm not sure if I can explain it further, for you can't really judge something too harshly if it doesn't really have anything adding to its affect. We stepped off the train and into snowdrifts ten-feet high. The only other person who was in the Wakkanai station was an old man advertising rooms to a hotel. I imagine that he hadn't seen another person for an hour, let alone two dudes looking for a hotel room. We thanked him, but in the end found a place a little closer to the station, and more accommodating to our dwindling money supply. After checking in and showering, we left the hotel in a nearly futile search to find a restaurant. Ideally, we were looking for a crab restaurant, and, miraculously, found one. We entered the toasty room, soon to discover that this "restaurant" doubled as the cook's home, as there were couches and the normal household clutter on the opposite side of the tables. We ordered crabs on rice, and within minutes found ourselves inhaling soft crabmeat swabbed with butter, and on top of a bed of white rice. The side, a steaming concoction of soupy seafood. It was arguably the best meal I've ever had.

Finishing with our stomachs and faces warm from satisfaction, we graced the Wakkanian night. We vowed to stay true to our nightly mission of exploring wherever we were, and sauntered around the city's massive snowdrifts. Absolute ghost town, it was. Miniature mountains of snow towering up to cover the second story windows of houses, lights left unignited, no footprints in snow on this night. We eventually came to a small temple, and it began to snow even harder. Big fucking flakes the size of silver dollars accumulated around our feet, and the temple was at once ethereal, mythic, threatening, and gorgeous. As an American, when I see temples, I'm often reminded by how little history my country has compared to Japan's, so I often end up feeling alienated by the foreign beauty. But, this particular temple looked so damn mysterious in the blizzardly January night, that even Sunao admitted he felt a little overwhelmed by it. It was an honor to be shunned and taken in by such a haunting sight.

After a few moments of not talking, we resumed our expedition with the new goal of making it down to the wharf. The water was an oily black with occasional gusts of wind rippling across the dark surface. Snow covered ships were parked alongside the pier, vague lights emitting yellow from the decks below, perhaps from Japanese sailors forced to watch the ships over the holidays while their families celebrated the New Year miles and miles away. I walked onto one of the ships decks, on a rickety little drawbridge of a plank. Quietly, so the sailors would not hear me, I edged to the other side of the ship to peer into the black water. Images of multi-armed sea creatures popping up from the icy depths to grab me swam in my head. Suddenly, a door opened, and a man appeared on the deck, demanding to know just what in the hell was I doing. Before I could stutter an answer, Sunao came to bat, and explained that we were from Tokyo, and had never seen a ship before, and also that we were thinking about becoming sailors, and wanted to check out the boat. The man nodded, unsure of what a foreigner and this husky Japanese guy with the gift for gab were doing on his ship's deck on New Year's Day. We left the shipyard, and hustled back to the hotel, where we crashed HARD. Exploring and lying will do that, I guess.

The following morning we went down to the hotel restaurant, and ate an insulting interpretation of what the hotel called an "American breakfast." It was a paper-thin slice of ham, a hard-boiled egg, and a piece of toast. Great. They gave us chopsticks for the egg and ham. Why wouldn't they? At least they had coffee, though. Following the unfullfillment, we decided to go rent a car (with Sunao's credit card), and drive to a point on the coast called Soyou Masaki. Being the northern-most point in Japan AND the coldest, we chose this as our climax, a catharsis to our northern exposure.

Driving through the streets of Wakkanai is a lot like what I imagine driving through the guts of a snow-cone making machine might look like. A whole lot of blur and an occasional glimpse of metal and gears. A little outside the city, though, the coast broke it's concrete beaches, and turned into a vast stretch of black sand and giant rocks, the wind violently raking the shore-water. The landscape at the point itself was even more confusing, as it reminded me of something,like, out of some Anne of Green Gables imagery--you know like golden wheat fields tickled by a gust of wind blah blah blah...THEN raped by freezing temperatures, violent wind, and intimidating snow. But, again, I can't say it wasn't beautiful, albeit in an unsettling way.

When we got out of the car, a man in a parka came running at us, and asked to take his picture in front of the monument (of some Russian guy?) dedicated to the point. He said he had been waiting for four hours for someone to come to take his picture so that he could record his smile at Soyou Masaki. I mean who wouldn't want to go to this place on their vacation, a place that reads -20 degrees Celsius? We sure did. Sunao snapped his picture, he snapped ours, and we about to retreat to the car when Sunao starting freaking out and jumping up and own and pointing into the ocean's horizon.

And there: as a great big wall of ice rising from the sea, was the coast of Russia. Momentarily lit by a spontaneous break-through in the clouds, we were able to see what we had come for. Russia had been successfully delivered, and we took in the two minutes of visibility before finally seeking refuge from the wind and cold in our still running rental car.