Sunday, October 30, 2005

Adventures in Hokkaido

Hello all -

doing a lot of back dated work at the moment, trying to catch up on all that has happened since, oooh, October the 10th and the massive other chunks of time before that.

Hokkaido is the northern most island of the Japanese Archipelago, the darkest, coldest and wildest part of Japan. It is so far away from civilisation that soemtimes the only light at night is the light that comes from the vending machines that have somehow managed to populate even the most remote areas of Japan. It is also a land of lots of bears (Kuma in Japanese) deer and other assorted wildlife (snowboarders and the like). It is also completely covered in Onsen (natural hot springs) some free, some cheap, but everywhere you go you will find them. I dont think anybody actually needs a hot tap in their house. Of course there are the volcanoes that go along with such luxury, one particularly fiesty one that grew out of a farmers field near Toya-Ko of a morning in 1943. It is now a good 400ms high, and belonging to a family of three or so volcanoes. The volcanoes are active enough that the locals dont spend too much time in the bath.

Mainly though, it is just full of really sound (nice) people, who more or less chauffeured us around the whole island, fed us, put us up for the night, gave us astonishing amounts of alcohol and then fed us some more.

We arrived in Otaru, the port of Sapporo - home of all the beers in Japan, and home to Guinness in Japan as well as it happens. We had our first capsule hotel and onsen experience in the same evening - the Safra hotel and spa having its own Onsen(hot spring) and rotenburo (outdoor bath) as well. The capsules were, capsules, about twice to three times the size of the space on a lower bunk -small but not claustraphobic at all. The onsen on the other hand was palatial. it took me ages to try and figure out the protocol, I knew the theory, but when it came to the practicals, you know, which towels, where to go etc....it was quite daunting.... I know it all now but I am not telling anyone else, that I may ruin the entire experience for them. Or at least save them from some embarrassment.

Next morning we got out of Sapporro a bit and stuck out our thumb. We got a lift in a Mini (a previous driver who had given us a lift in a 1967 VW Beatle reckoned that the classic minis are really popular in Japan because of Mr. Bean)
Our driver is a soldier in the Japanese Defence force, something I am learning more and more about as we go around Japan. Our travels are taking place to the backdrop of the elections and a time of fairly significant change in Japan, at least some days that is what it feels like. OUr next lift was from a nurse up to Rumoi, our next destination. She was learning english as she wanted to go to the States. She wanted NY, her husband California. I wonder how they`ll get on. She was great as well. She nearly caused an accident on the road when she stopped to U-turn to come back and pick us up. A lot of our lifts have come from people doing U turns to come back to pick us up....people tend to come back once they have got over the shock.

Hitching is gas in Japan. It is so unexpected for everyone it seems. Some people try to ignore you, almost embarrassed by your presence on the side of the road. It feels that way - that if they acknowledged you that they would be obliged to stop and pick you up- so that they actually swerve around us as they go by. Truckers and others - delivery drivers and the like would wave or laugh, relaxed in the knowledge that they werent allowed pick us up. The funniest was from people who were genuinely stunned. I still want to learn the Japanese for `close your mouth please` and write it in Kanji on a board to hold out as they pass. That`s another thing, we dont use a destination board, you just stick out your thumb. If you hold out a sign with your destination, people may feel that because they arent going all the way there they`re not really of help to the hitcher. So you just stick out your thumb and when they stop, point at the map and say `this way` in Japanese, and then when you`re in the car you say `actually we are going there` and they often say `me too! Let`s stop for Sushi`. Avoiding the hopsitality can be impossible. On our way along the northern coast of Hokkaido, a lady and her friend picked us up, from the auspicious location of the northern most point of japan, and brought us home. After dropping her friend home she brought us back to her place. We waited for her husband, they then fed us, decided that it was too cold to camp, brought us to the local onsen and put us up for the evening in their spareroom. The only embarrassment was when the towels that they gave myself and Solene got mixed up in the dark in the back of the car on the way to the Onsen, so I arrived into the baths with a pink `Hello Kitty` towel concealing my bits. I had the bath to myself.

The longest we waited for a lift in our whole time in Japan may have been about 40 minutes. The average wait is much shorter, 10 to 20 minutes. We usually make our destination in two or three trips. It is quicker than taking a bus in rural areas, and certainly cheaper. The best thing is that you actually get to meet people, not just other back packers in a hostel, other tourists in a hotel. Just Joe Japan going about their daily business.

We have been staying with a lot of foreign teachers, all english teachers, despite mostly being from North America where a lot of people actually speak french I believe. A great bunch, that sometimes have the haunted air of missionaries in the land that time forgot. Some are people who were sick of their jobs and doing laundry, and decided to go and work and do their laundry somewhere else, others are total snowboard addicts,


to be continued.....

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