Meeting Friends

There's a tradition in Tokyo that when you want to meet up with someone , you tell them to meet you by the statue of Hachiko in Shibuya. Hachiko and his owner Uyeno Eisaburo moved to Tokyo in 1924. Every day the faithful dog would follow his master to the train station in Shibuya and wait for his return. One day in 1925 Uyeno-san took ill at work and died. Hachiko never left the train station. He continued to await his master's return until 1935 when he too died on the very spot where he last saw Uyeno-san alive. He'd become so famous by then that a bronze statue was erected in his honor. That's me standing next to Hachiko making the national symbol of Japanese kids having their photograph taken.

While in Tokyo I'd planned to meet up with three friends. One American who has been living in Japan for a long time is a Second Lifer named Duzzy Ryder. I'd met Duzzy just a week before while he was in Washington for a conference. We met up on Friday night and visited Shibuya and Shinjuku. I was looking for a new cell phone with a camera, but we found that all the phones here are locked to the company that sells them. We had fun window shopping though the electronics stores. They are like Best Buy on steroids.

On Saturday I met one of my original Japanese pen-pals. She works in Tokyo and loves Italian food, so we met at Tokyo Station and ate at a little bistro across the street. My Japanese really isn't good enough yet to hold a conversation and unfortunately her English is almost as bad. So we didn't have a lot to say to one another, but it was really wonderful to meet her at last and the food was great. I was very glad we got together and hopefully next time I'll be able to hold up my end of the conversation.

On Sunday I abandoned Tokyo altogether and headed to Nagoya by bullet train to meet Nami. Also one of my original pen-pals, Nami and I met when she came to Baltimore to meet with her boyfriend, who is now her husband. I've been telling her I would come to Japan one day and she's been telling me that when I did she would make it a trip to remember. She certainly did that by booking us on a tour to a Japanese onsen resort.

An onsen is a natural hot spring. Japan being a volcanic island is covered with them and the Japanese have used them for centuries not only to bathe in, but for their healing powers. The minerals in the water are supposed to be good for all sorts of ailments, but it is the bathing process itself that has the most profound effect on the Japanese. This ain't no hot tub, it's a bath tub and you don't wear a swimsuit to take a bath.

Before she made me strip naked in front of a couple of dozen anorexic Japanese women, Nami enjoyed her favorite part of the resort, the buffet! This sort of dinning is not common in Japan and when Nami was in Maryland I took her to a Chinese buffet in Catonsville. When I was struggling to finish my third plate, Nami was going back for her seventh. She kept up her world class standing by downing plate after plate of crab legs at the onsen. We were the second table to be seated and the last one to leave. Where she puts it all is beyond me, I gained weight just walking into the room!

Then it was up the side of the mountain in an elevator to the baths. I know some of you (Rocket) are going to be disappointed, but I wasn't allowed to take pictures in the women's bath. Let's just say that I wasn't the only over weight person there. The baths are on the roof of the resort and open to the beautiful mountainous scenery. Sitting there in very hot water watching clouds roll over the peaks like liquid snow was something I'll never forget.

Oh, did I mention I was the only Caucasian within a hundred kilometers of the place? I couldn't have done this without Nami. She and I sat there chattering in English while the other women did the same in Japanese. It all seemed perfectly normal somehow, but I'm sure some of the women would have preferred I not be there. I just ignored the stares and tried not to faint from overheating. The water was really, really hot!

There was a mix up over the time when the bus was coming back to pick us up, so we got a free drink at the bar and Nami got some money back at the end of the trip. She and I finished off the evening with a curry dinner at a nice Indian restaurant in downtown Nagoya. We said goodbye at the station, hoping to hear from one another real soon. Nami heard from me again sooner than she expected.

To be continued...