When we awoke it was raining, regardless we slowly readied ourselves and set out north where I had expected it to be even colder and rainier but in fact it was warm and just as we crossed the moat and under the gate (and I launched into my history lesson of Japan... I'm such a geek...) the sun pushed the clouds aside and the warmest breeze I have felt since October blew through our hair and warmed the day. The castle was as beautiful as ever regardless of the seasons and mom and I strolled around it and played with the moat fish and a class trip that called English down from the top of the tower before we went exploring within. At the main gate we met up with the class that had been calling to us and they surrounded us in a flurry of Engrish and high fives and were totally adorable! After their teachers pushed them on, we set off for the keep and spent almost an hour exploring the beautiful original castle, flaking out in the sun and watching the world go by from the open windows, and exercising our calf muscles by climbing up a million very big very steep stairs to get to the seventh floor. From up there I looked, as I often do, at the amazement of Japan. Here I was in a 400 year old castle, with the beautiful spring breeze on my face, where it was peaceful and held a quiet of being in its own world, when just beyond that moat and a few hundred feet was a bustling city that I would never know about had I not been looking at it. Japan has these little pockets that belong to another time, not at every castle, or shrine, or temple, but sometimes, and in the most unexpected places, I will have found I have walked into a different world that lies side by side with the modern Japan most people know as crowded. After my moment of awe, mom and I descended through the keep to the moon-viewing pavilion, a part of the castle that was actually just used for watching the autumn moon, and wandered the old streets until we found a coffee shop where we spent the evening keeping warm with hot drinks, soup and pastries!
The next day I had to go back to school and mom went to Mt. Takao, and had what I believe was a wonderful time! When I got home she still wasn't home but she had until sundown before I panicked and sure enough she came flying in the door just after five. I gave her a few moments rest and then she, Kevin and I went out for an awesome dinner at our Otsuki izakaya where we had sushi, of course, yakitori, gyoza, these fried cheese and pork fritter things, the best french fries in the whole world with mayonnaise, umeshu and yuzu sours! And Kevin even let mom press the button!
For Saturday I had high hopes of seeing Fuji san... but it was cloudy again and was attempting to rain a bit. This is supposedly a bit strange as February is usually known for its clear skies, but again we made the best of it. While I wanted to take mom to the shrine on the hill with the pagoda overlooking Fuji, it didn't make too much sense without a Fuji to see, so instead we went to the shrine at the base of the mountain which again in one of those magical places caught in its own little world. It's right off the main highway so I would think the sounds of traffic should mingle with the claps of the prayers and the rings of the bells and chants of the priests but instead a calm fell over the grounds as we passed under the torii and walked the gigantic tree lined path to the shrine. It was a place I wanted to show mom because it is one the shrines where I never not feel at peace. And while it was wearing its winter cloak, it was still beautiful and a few ceremonies were going on so mom got to see a shrine in real use. She bought a prayer board and I explained apologetically to the young shrine priestess that we would take it home because it was so cool and she understood. I was thrilled that mom felt what I did there!
After I had to introduce mom to another one of my new ways of life in Japan: Lawson's chicken sandwiches! They are amazing and legendary and so darn affordable it's a wonder I just don't eat there every day! Also, mom had taken a liking to the bottles drinks that the combini and vending machines sell warm and dubbed them 'Japanese Tim Hortons!' So we shared a couple of those! (Oh and one of the best parts of mom coming was she brought me a pack of 40 sour cream and chocolate timbits!!!)
For the lack of Fuji I decided to pass over Fujiyoshida mostly and head instead to Minobu. Minobu I think has been my best find. While there are more beautiful places, and places with more to do and see, and all that, Minobu is this secret place not in any tour book and with absolutely no information in English. It was an accidental find many months ago when Rhee and I took a wrong turn and found ourselves on this narrow road passing under this magnificent wooden gate at the bottom of a heavily wooded skinny valley dotted with shrines and the cutest little town at the foot of a massive temple! We had to be on our way but returned again the next day and found ourselves rewarded. Then I took Nikki a few months later and she took me a step further when she discovered you could go in to the temple and wander around. The temple grounds had been an adventure of their own, within the winding halls of the temple surrounding altars and secret gardens and places of meditation had been an unworldly experience. There was no other place I'd rather take mom. So passing under the gate, and the shrines, through the cute little town (where later we explored and found curryman's shop close ;_; but a nice lady offered a side of green tea and warmth with my purchase of prayer beads for mom) until I found a place to park. Passing under the biggest Buddhist gate I know of we walked a short poorly rock laid path to the bottom of 287 stairs that we were forced to climb for enlightenment. Well worth it! It was cloudy (as it had been the other two times and I find myself wondering if Minobu has blue skies ever) and wintry but the temple buildings were as glorious as ever AND, the plum blossoms were beginning to bloom so little flecks of brilliant pink would catch my eye every now and then. I feared the temple may be closed, as it was definitely the off season, but in fact on set of doors were open and after removing our shoes we slipped in and I showed the magnificence to mom. Words do not describe, nor do pictures so I will be brief (as I have not often been) there were golden altars that can only be explained as treasure rooms, a place to sit on the velvet carpet and meditate by a garden and a blessing from a young monk. It was as I pictured and dreamed of and it was perfect.
Heading home now, we met up with Sheena and had parfait and coffee at our favourite shop and went for an onsen! Mom's first! She did a brilliant job of it after getting over the whole naked part lol! It was great sitting in the hot spring and talking, until closing time when they turned on the flood lights and suddenly we felt like very naked, very vulnerable fugitives! It was quite funny so we ran the thirty naked cold seconds back inside, warmed up and dried off and drove home in onsen coma with yet another bottle Japanese Timmys!
The timing of mom's trip was going quite well, and she and I had done so much that we did not feel it was going to slow or too fast; but, on Sunday morning it was time to leave Otsuki... she would need to leave the next day (please note I did said she would need not she would go...) So Sunday morning we set off back east but went south to Enoshima instead of to Tokyo. I will digress a small moment and say that when I picked mom up she had this horrible, lazy, cruel, awful suitcase which eventually got named 'Crappy.' So here we are with Crappy in the train stations when, the lazy jerk decided to give up on his handle. If there is anything worse than a ginormous stupid suitcase, it's a ginormous stupid suitcase with no handle when you can't find a locker for him. At last we had made it to Enoshima but the lockers were full ;_;. Quite disappointed, I worked on plan B which was to walk to another train station, almost half a kilometer away, and deposit Crappy there. I was praying and praying for a locker and a silence fell over mom and me at the thought of dragging Crappy about all day, until at last we found it like the holy grail of places to put your abusive luggage! We both admitted we were close to crying and hugged then locked up and rejoiced as we said goodbye to our crappy friend and headed to the beach! Enoshima is a brilliant place, I have been there four times! It is the island shrine with a flirtatious tropical flare where you can eat warm cinnamon donuts and pray and wash money for luck, and watch monkeys perform and gaze over the ocean and walk a million stairs, ring a love bell, drink coffee and eat ramen perches on a cliff, adventure through a sea cave with nothing but a little candle in your grip to guide you and then at last play on the rocks as the surf threatens to take you home with it. Back in summer (what feels a million miles away in light of the recent snowstorm) I had discovered this places where a cement wall was place in a little cut of rock to form a natural swimming pool. Well today, the weather was beautifully stormy and the waves crashed many feet over the wall! But working hard at it I waited until the surf had pulled back and ran across victoriously. Later on dry land again mom and I watched while trying not to laugh as some stupid teenagers in high heels and shrilly voices tried ignorantly to do a similar thing only to be caught by the waves! I don't mean to poke fun but they must have seen what the water was capable of and still the sauntered with a slow sense of entitlement as if the ocean would abide to their wishes. The poor girl nearly got entirely swept in if not for her clutching the rocks for dear life! Sadism aside, it was a brilliant time! Mom and I walked arm and arm against the cold wind blowing back to Crappy and quite happily took him up again now that the day was almost finished. We stopped and had coffee, as we did many wonderful times, and checked into my favourite hostel in Yokohama where mom got her first taste of futons, tatami, and cramped living spaces in Japan!
But the night was yet over, for only ten minutes from the hostel, was Chinatown! Now don't anybody start with the 'how can you tell the difference?' because it is very apparent you are no longer in Japan when you are in China. The neon lights and red lit up lanterns streaming through the streets place you in a different land with flashy temple and brilliant colours and stalls selling cheap trinkets that make me say 'I don't think we are in Tokyo anymore.' But it is a fun experience and after cruising about a bit we settled on this cute little restaurant and drank umeshu, and had course after set course of this fantastic dinner! There was duck, and some other meat, and mango shrimp, soup, this spicy tofu beef dish, dumplings, ginger pork that melted in your mouth, more shrimp with brocoli, some chicken in theer somewhere, long twisted egg rolls, salads, yakisoba, coconut pudding and little lemon muffins for desert. Truly a feast!
Monday marked the beginning of the end. We traveled now to Tokyo and came full circle to Shibuya, where we gratefully unloaded Crappy quite easily, and took to the busy streets! We crossed districts to Harajuku, my favourite stop, did a bit of shopping, had a delicious lunch of a shared honey mustard fried chicken sandwich with coffee and went to Meiji shrine. This shrine is special not because it inspires me in the way the one in Fuji does but because it is beautiful in such a simple way. There was something else to it that day that I couldn't put a finger on until we were within the shrine walls and I was point out the enormous trees where prayers were hung. Then I saw and realized it! The entire park was green! Green in the way it can only truly be in summer! It was brilliant! Not a winter tree in sight! I don't know how it is possible, and it probably amounts to some scientific species of tree planted there but I will chalk it up to magic of course! Regardless it was pretty and a little pocket of peace in the middle of the Tokyo skyscape. And many months ago, I had seen a little charm shaped like a shrine, I thought about it often and bought it for myself on this visit! After we went on this ten kilometer pilgrimage to the Harley Davidson shop for mom and bought Dave, the one who made this trip possible, a shirt before heading back to Shibuya station. A bit more shopping and a coffee atop Starbucks overlooking the busiest intersection in the world and we were collecting Crappy and heading sadly to the airport.
Here the story takes a turn. Instead of my wide array of adjectives for awesome, there will be many times when I want to scream and curse and cry but in the end we got through it... So, everything was well, perhaps we left it a little late, but in all honesty we should have gotten to the airport with time to spare, had I not... taken the wrong train. As it would happen, the train station we went too was a new one for me and I did not realize there was a secret track. So out of horrible coincidence, one train left at something like 4: 17 for Narita and the one we wanted was on a train track a little ways away that was bound for Narita airport at 4:16. Is my confusion understandable? I of course was searching for the train at 4:16 but my new phone has been a couple minutes off before and when I saw the 4:17 train first it only made sense to take that one. I realized my mistake too late. I tried in every way to fix it but in the end failed... One wrong train, A few wrong turns, a horrible crappy suitcase being dragged by us as fast as we could go, many shouts in Japanese that the plane was leaving now and we had to hurry, an amazingly sweet guy who tried his best to get us to the ticket counter on time and ran with the cart carrying Crappy beside mom and I who were already worn out before at last getting to the ticket counter only to find that it was impossible for mom to get on the flight... it was devastating. It was because of me that we had missed the flight and the next one wasn't for twenty-four hours... and Otsuki was at least three hours and many yen away... Fighting, I tried everything but they just kept saying it was impossible until atlas numb, mom and I slumped in the airport and watched her flight on the screen, board, have its last call and eventually close its gate all in an hour, which would have been more than enough time to make it after mom offered to leave her check-in baggage behind. Sad beyond words, it took all my energy to form a plan, clean out my accounts, purchase us a fantastically fast train ticket home, drop Crappy at the luggage hotel and head back to Otsuki drinking the umeshu mom had intended to take home as omiyage on the fanciest train I ever bought a ticket for myself! In hysterical giggles we managed to find light of the situation and had a pretty good trip home and crawled into bed late at night hoping for better luck the next day. As it would be the plane was almost entirely booked and mom would have to fly stand by, but I learned an interesting lesson... throw a bit of money at a problem and it gets solved. It was with a heart heavy with sadness that I said goodbye to mom the next morning and gave her careful instruction on getting back on her own... but I managed to buy her the last seat on the plane and it all turned out in the end. It's funny now, and will be simply hysterical later in the future when I have recovered financially from my mistake but right now as I close this, all I can think about it how much I miss mom.
But, I have not much time to be sad and lonely for very soon, my next visitor doth approach! Nikki comes for Spring break at the end of March. And then when I suffer from the fallout of that it will be sakura season and then wisteria season and then the rice fields will be planted and Japan will be even more beautiful again and then just as the heat becomes unbearable and I am craving my friends and family, I will take a vacation to Canada! Tanoshimi!
love the pictures sarah!
ReplyDelete~kristie