Reminders

Today, after sitting on my butt for a good two... three... quite possibly four hours (and by sitting, I mean laying in bed) I decided that I needed to get out of the house and do some walking, since this whole "walking" thing wasn't something I had done in-

Wait. Waitaminute. I walked on Friday. On Friday I was at my special needs school with the elementary school kids, year six. Every friday, they have ”やまあるき” or "mountain walking." Since the place is pretty much built into the mountains, there's ample space to go walking up there. It had been a while since I had last walked, so I was actually pretty excited to go up.

Little did I know what awaited for me. We did our usual route at first, which took us past the cowshed and chicken coops, past the kiwi groves (how random is that), then down to where the golf course and the information... cabin thing is. Inside they have a mini map of the area, information on wildlife, and, more importantly, restrooms. So we usually walk to there, and then turn around and walk back since I mean, these are elementary school kids we're talking about.

Today though, since I was with the older kids (last time I was with the first years, a boy in a wheelchair and a small but very very very energetic little girl) I got to go in group one. Group one, since it was only ten o'clock (we started around 9:30) when we got to the cabin (must have walked too fast) was going to do the "marusaku course" and I didn't really think much about the name at first.

Turns out that means "the course where you walk up a giant-ass hill." I mean like, this was no small hill. I think we walked around the circumference of the golf course, because when we got back we were pretty much 100m away from the cabin we started at. We kept losing kids along the way as well, since some of them got tired (it was a really really long walk with a good half of it uphill) so they'd refuse to move, so one teacher would kind of hang behind and coax the kid (or wait for the kid to give up). Eventually, we would be rejoined by that kid, and then some other kid would fall behind.... We even got rejoined by this one kid whom we had left at school, only to lose him again when he too, got tired... Major props to the four kids who managed to stay with the group the whole time.

There was also some leftover snow (from Monday) around the grounds when we were walking. That was fun. That also meant it was COLD, no matter what the temperature was. If it was cold enough to keep snow for a while... yeah, cold.

Anyways though, we got back to the school some time around 11ish. A good solid hour and a half of walking, some of that being hills. I was actually kind of tired.

Saturday, I actually walked back to my place with people rather than ride my bike.

So I dunno what I was thinking when I said I haven't walked in a while. It's not like I'm in the States right now. Yeesh.

But anyways, today, in light of having absolutely nothing to do (...like not study Japanese and not work on correcting papers) I decided to take a little walk before video chatting with my parents (with my brother as a surprise guest). I've been meaning to start doing like... routine walks up the giant hill/mountain behind my house, for at least like, 30 minutes or something since it's probably the most outside working out I'll do apart from my daily commute. Plus it's really pretty.

So I started up the giant hill, with the intention of going and seeing the pretty area along the route to the mountain castle... but then I decided to see if the baseball kids were practicing or something (despite it being Sunday, the day when most shops aren't open here, including this adorable cafe I found that is one of my new favorite places in Takahashi).

As I walked up towards the fields, I came across these really cool looking moss covered stairs, and thought "hm, where do these go?" Since it's winter, there is a significant decrease in the chances of encountering one of the dreaded huge black and yellow spiders (or any spider for that matter) and bugs in general. This makes me much much much more inclined to explore places I haven't been to in the mountains, since I actually think it's pretty interesting. Up the stairs I went! I thought I was going to slip and fall, but it was alright, and at the top there was this kind of little grove and something that may or may not have been a path and a bunch of bamboo. I decided to go back down.

It wasn't long though before I reached this little park area that had a little uhhh, not pagoda, but it has one of those roof things, shoot, I swear I know the word, but I just can't... remember it. Terrace? No. It looks like a small hut and it's roundish but more polygonal with straight edges... I want to say bungalow but that's not it either. Anyways. One of those. In this little clearing area with a pond that screamed out "MOSQUITO BREEDING PLACE." So glad it was winter. But there were some stairs there as well, so I figured, why not. I was really curious to find out where those stairs went.

The entire stairway and path to the stairs were completely covered in dead leaves and mulch, as if nobody had been there for a long long while. The first thing I worried about was, "what if there are bugs and slugs and even worse, mukade, hiding underneath these leaves?" So I resolved to look down as little as possible, and made my way up the stairs. About midway, I could see that they led to this kind of clearing looking thing, so despite my misgivings about running into snakes or giant centipedes, I walked up to the clearing.

It turned out that in the clearing area, the path continued up along the edge of the hill/mountain that I could see. Along the path, green knee-high weeds had sprung up, making me slightly wary about finding spiders and spider webs. But so far, nothing.

This continued, with me going another twenty feet before stopping and looking at the path before me and wondering if I should continue down it. By this point, I had traveled pretty far. I could see the baseball field... off in the distance. I wasn't really eager to make my way down the (damp) leaf strewn stairs, and I really wanted to find out where the path went. I mean, it had to go somewhere, right? I thought originally, it went to a clearing or something, but as it turns out, it actually led to a space above the baseball field, another dirt field with this abandoned looking... fountain or something, along with a fenced in set of benches that looked like an observation spot. I was kind of tired from climbing, so I wandered over towards the raised spot where the benches were and as I got closer, I noticed that there was actually more stairs, as well as an actual path with railings and everything.

This piqued my curiosity even more, and I found myself once more wandering down the path until I got to this watchtower thing, and then to a map thing that I had absolutely no idea about. It turns out I thought I was on the wrong end. I thought it was showing that I was at the end, but I guess I was at the beginning of it? There were stairs down, so I figured "why not just follow the stairs? As long as I keep going to the left and downwards... I'll probably end up somewhere closer to my house."

I passed a bunch of paths that looked closed because of I have no idea, and these observation decks... or something. It said that it was the university park or something? The paths looked like they were somewhat maintained (as opposed to the leafy path I had taken earlier) so I figured hey... they must go somewhere! This was an area of Takahashi that I hadn't actually explored though, so every time I looked out, I had absolutely no idea where I was.

Eventually, after going down stairs for what felt like twenty minutes, and passing by this really interesting shrine with a bunch of stone figurines, I found myself in someone's backyard area, where they had a garden. Thankfully, there was a stone path towards an actual kind of road thing, which led to, finally, a familiar place, about 200m from where my house was. My legs were not so happy with me, from having to go up, then down, all those stairs. But they were more than willing to walk me the rest of the way home so that I could sit down and drink some tea.

On my journey though, I realized that I had forgotten how freaking gorgeous it is around my place. If I was in the States, I never ever would have been able to just wander off like that and get lost in the woods for forty minutes before wandering back home again. I live in a pretty awesome place. The woods were really pretty (and even better, I hadn't run into bugs). The shrines were old, and screamed out that kind of rural Japan that just made me shake my head in wonder. I mean, you see them and just go "...damn, I'm totally in Japan aren't I."

I love having those moments, even though I've been here for a year and a half, almost. Takahashi, really, is an amazing place to live, now that I've taken the time to explore it and have found restaurants I actually like. The hours suck, sure, but still. I really do love it here. I guess deciding to leave has really... made me appreciate the things I have here more.