Youngs Around the World

After Aaron’s brush with death, we had a quick but intense powwow in our room during which he acknowledged his bad judgment and promised never to scare me like that again; hugs were exchanged and, a few hours later, we were back underwater, cruising around a spectacular coral-covered dive site. Aaron had gotten his original set of equipment back and all was right in the world again.

We dove leisurely over the next few days and spend our free time eating cheese spaetzle at our resort, patronizing the neighboring seaside restaurant patios, reading, and scouring local fish books to identify the subjects of our underwater photos. We bought fresh fruit from a local woman who came by our resort with a round, flat basket on top of her head and, each day, I let her extort me on the fruit prices because she was so sweet. People walked by the resort all day long, peddling beaded jewelry, cell phones, string bracelets, clothing, pool cues and a few other odd items but we only bought from our fruit lady. Sometimes beggars came by too, which is always disheartening in a resort atmosphere. It’s difficult to enjoy your three-dollar latte with dark, desperate eyes piercing your soul. The beggars appeared to be rural folk, filthy and shoeless, not just down on their luck but truly destitute. One woman walked by with a baby suckling her exposed breast; the empty look in her eyes implied a life of such continual struggle and hardship that she had simply resigned herself to it long ago. There certainly seemed to be some small income opportunities for those few Sabang natives lucky enough to get a sliver of the tourist dollars that trickled in. And, of course, we saw plenty of foreign men taking advantage of the young Filipinas for hire.

The rest of our diving in Sabang was easy and enjoyable. Other “muck dives” yielded much-coveted seahorses – both pygmy seahorses, which are about the length of a fingernail and difficult to spot since they blend seamlessly into the coral and also thorny seahorses, which are three-to-four inches long, delicate and fascinating. I have always been intrigued by seahorses: they are one of the world’s few creatures whose males carry their offspring. I have always wanted to see one but they are as difficult to find as they are beautiful. Imagine my elation at seeing more than five on a single dive!

We also saw an impressive variety of nudibranchs. These multi-colored sea slugs are small but easy to spot because of their bright contrast to the muted coral. Nudibranchs are especially interesting because their lungs protrude from their bodies, functioning externally. They photograph beautifully because of their bright colors and slow movement. The tiny size of the nudibranchs makes it difficult to appreciate their intricate details with the naked eye. By now, I don’t even strain to see them anymore; I just wait for Aaron to work his camera magic and view them after the dive. They are by far the prettiest slugs I’ve ever seen, which really doesn’t say much.

As we loaded our bags and ourselves onto the pumpboat for Batangas, the young boys climbed aboard again looking for coins to be tossed. Their youthful exuberance was refreshing and I handed a few pesos to one of the boys but he kept it for himself rather than tossing it into the sea. Smart kid. As the boat motored slowly away from the shore, I felt a twinge of sadness. Sabang is a sleepy little divers’ town with no beach to speak of, which doesn’t stop the natives from wading in on a hot day. There is little to do besides dive, drink beer and wait for the spectacular tropical sunsets. Life is slow and simple. The locals are friendly. The diving in Sabang is excellent for its diverse underwater world of captivating shipwrecks, gorgeous hard and soft corals and treasure chest of fascinating, unusual sea creatures. Seahorses…check!

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Departing early from Manila, we took a bus south to Batangas and then a bangka or pumpboat (a small wooden boat with bamboo outriggers powered by a recycled automotive engine) to Sabang, a tiny town near Puerto Galera on the island of Mindoro. The island was thickly covered with palm trees and the face of Sabang was a cluster of waterside resorts and restaurants curving around the crescent moon-shaped shore. As the bangka approached the shallows, a group of young boys climbed onto the sides of the boat and asked passengers to throw coins into the water so that they could dive for them. We threw a few and watched the boys excitedly scurry after them.

We checked into the Sabang Inn Dive Resort, a Spanish-inspired villa with spacious sea view rooms, and purchased a diving and accommodation package for four nights. Less than two hours later, we were underwater at a dive site just one hundred meters from the oceanfront resort. The site was impressive for its diversity. Aaron found an octopus hiding in a pipe on the sandy ocean floor and we watched as it changed color from a camouflaging shade of gray to dark red. The Philippines is known for its macro diving, or “muck diving” – scavenger hunts through the otherwise unimpressive sandy sea floor looking for tiny, unusual sea creatures. I prefer pretty coral reefs to sandy bottoms but I had to admit that the octopus was amazing. We explored a beautiful wooden wreck covered in multi-colored algae and teeming with schools of small shimmering fish. It was a great first dive and we were excited about the prospects of the next three days.

The next morning, we lingered over breakfast and then pulled on our dive gear for a 10:30 dive. Aaron was immediately distraught because he had been given a different set of equipment than he’d used on the previous day’s dive and it had definitely seen better days. Usually when you do all of your diving with the same shop, you use the same rental equipment for each dive so that it becomes familiar. To some degree, diving gear is all the same, but getting comfortable with a new set up still takes time. I told him not to panic, that this shop just doesn’t operate that way. “It isn’t ideal”, I said, “but it is what it is.” He was still clearly unhappy about the situation but resolved to dive anyway.

Most of the Sabang dive sites are within a five to seven minute boat ride from the shop by motorboat. We climbed into the small dive boat and sped to our drop point. As our group began to slip into our pre-assembled (by the shop staff) gear, Aaron’s first stage had a malfunction. Our dive master Nilo worked on it for about ten minutes, utilizing a dive knife in place of the tool kit that should have been on board, and finally declared the equipment to be sound. Aaron had been giving me the “I told you so” look throughout the repair process. He slipped into his gear, still shaken from the malfunction. I asked him if he felt comfortable enough with his equipment to go down and he said yes.

On the count of three, we all flipped backwards off the sides of the boat, traded “okay” signals at the surface and began our descent to our maximum depth of 25 meters. As we neared the bottom, Aaron signaled me to check his first stage. At first glance, I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary and since you cannot normally communicate beyond hand signals underwater, he could not verbalize his issue. He signaled for me not to worry about it and I assumed that he was fine. Two seconds later, I looked over at Aaron as he was attempting to remove his BCD while hovering a few meters above the ocean bottom in a slight current. Removing your BCD underwater is possible as a last resort to fix a problem but it is certainly not recommended, especially while hovering in 20 meters of water. While the act of hovering, which is controlled by a combination of breathing and the air in your BCD, can seem effortless to an experienced diver, it can prove challenging when you become distracted and/or stressed.

Just as he got his first arm out of the vest, his weight belt came loose and fell to the ocean floor. This was a problem. Without his weight belt, the buoyancy of his wetsuit would propel him toward the surface – a very dangerous scenario at sixty-plus feet. I grabbed his arm to keep him down and he swam down, completely out of his BCD now, to retrieve his weights. With his regulator in his mouth and me holding his BCD, he attempted to reassemble his weight belt while maintaining buoyancy above the coral. As he closed the clasp of his weight belt and reached for his BCD, the clasp came loose again and the weights fell back to the floor. By this time, Nilo had seen our struggle and come over to help. At the same time, another diver in our group eased me back to give Nilo room to work but my wild eyes were glued to my struggling husband. Aaron went for his belt a second time and managed to secure it around his waist. Then, somehow, in the tangled situation, the mouthpiece of his regulator (air source) became dislodged from the regulator itself, causing him to inhale a startling gulp of seawater. When I saw Aaron desperately signal for Nilo’s spare air source, I grabbed my secondary reg and started to kick over but, thankfully, Nilo reacted before I reached them and gave his alternate air source to Aaron. He then helped Aaron back into his BCD and popped his mouthpiece back onto his regulator. Aaron quickly regained his composure but my mind and heart were racing uncontrollably. When I saw my husband under sixty feet of water with no regulator in his mouth, I thought, this is it…this is how quickly my world could implode. One accident or error in judgment, even on the part of my seemingly infallible Rescue Diver, and life as I know it, with all of the associated dreams, simply disappears.

For whatever reason, maybe out of stubbornness or a need to prove his resilience, Aaron chose to continue the dive despite my plea to abort. Naturally, the first thoughts that entered my mind were of the immediate, indisputable discontinuation of my diving career. However, when you are suspended weightlessly in the serenity of the ocean with no sound except that of your own mental rambling, your thoughts become extremely rational and clear. I decided then that, if we are to continue diving, I must also become a Rescue Diver as soon as possible so that I will be properly skilled to rescue my buddy the next time he does something that arrogant and stupid.

During the last forty minutes of the dive, I stuck to Aaron like glue, despite his repeated assurances that he was okay. I would spend three seconds looking at coral and the next three watching Aaron, making sure that he was breathing and staying within two kicks of my clutches. He was still visibly frustrated with his equipment setup, but everything seemed to be fully functional. I could not relax and enjoy the dive site because all that I could think about was getting Aaron back safely to the surface. I know that I drive him a little crazy when I go into Mother Hen mode and, in a beautiful underwater paradise, stare worriedly at him while ignoring the spectacular coral and fascinating variety of fish. I love scuba diving – it has become a true passion and a significant funnel of our fun money – but the reality is that when it comes to guarding the safety of my family, that magical underwater paradise disappears outside the figurative walls of my tunnel vision. For me, there are simply no other fish in the sea.

Aaron’s Footnote: What began in my mind as a seemingly simple, even routine underwater maneuver went terribly wrong in a matter of seconds. Reflecting on and reliving the experience, I realize that I really was in grave danger. The simple problem was that my BCD was connected too low on my tank causing me to keep hitting the back of my head on the first stage at the top of the tank. My equipment was problematic and uncomfortable, but functional. I should have endured the dive and fixed the problem later. Overconfident in my abilities and frustrated with my second rate equipment setup, I attempted to remove my BCD and adjust the tank strap myself. This of course set in motion a series of events which could have ended badly. I’m certainly thankful for our first class dive master Nilo and his help in putting Humpty Dumpty back together again. But my wife is an excellent diver and I truly believe that had it just been the two of us on that dive, Tina would have acted quickly to help her foolish husband. Sometimes it takes a close call to remind us that regardless of competence or experience, we’re still fallibly human.

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We are back in the Third World and startlingly so. As we rode into Manila in the dark of night, tacky neon signs illuminated long rows of night clubs, restaurants and hotels. At a stoplight, a young, filthy girl, holding an infant, knocked on my window, begging for money. After two-and-a-half months of living in the Western world (New Zealand, Australia, Japan), I was not mentally prepared for India-caliber poverty and the wretchedness of her appearance gave me a start. I quickly switched to Third World mode.

It was Friday night and the streets of the Malate district were roaring with rampant intoxication and melodies from various outdoor venues. Our hostel, Malate Pensionne, was right in the middle of the action, buffered from the street noise by, of all things, a Starbucks! (Angels singing: “Alleluia!”) After a long day of travel, our tired bodies wanted only to shower and crash but the bright lights and entrancing street music beckoned us outside and, since we had to buy water anyway, we ventured out and succumbed to the alluring Cuban music pouring out of Café Havana. We ordered a couple of San Miguel beers and the melodies of the live band melt away the fatigue.

The next day, we explored the city on foot. The Philippines is a small, impoverished nation masked by pockets of prosperity in the form of high-rises, higher end hotels, and gargantuan shopping malls. The broken streets reek of sewage and auto emissions from the taxis and jeepneys – jeep-style converted open-air buses, ornately decorated with bright lights, colorful decals and religious artifacts. Homeless families sleep on the sidewalks; children snooze the day away on flattened cardboard boxes. We saw a man bathing his two naked sons, who looked to be about eight-years-old, in the muddy rainwater collected in a pothole in the street. Tricycles – man-powered bicycles with small, two-person sidecars attached – roam the streets in search of fares, though more often we see the drivers sleeping in the carts. As we walk along, we are constantly approached by money changers flashing their note cards with the day’s handwritten exchange rates as well as young men selling random goods such as leather belts, fedoras, small electronics and cheap knockoff watches. Families camp out all day along the sidewalks, operating small food carts or selling cigarettes and gum.

Despite their seemingly depressing circumstances, Filipinos possess an enviable love of life. They are friendly, humble, happy people who have made us feel graciously welcome. The population is predominantly Catholic – a result of 16th century Spanish Catholic crusades – and English-speaking, although its ethnic origins are thought to be Malay, Borneon, and Indonesian. The Philippines struggled for centuries to find its political voice and united identity amid a stream of oppressive foreign occupiers including Spain, Japan and the United States. More than a million Filipino lives were lost over the years in the nation’s long struggle for independence and when they finally won their freedom and elected Ferdinand Marcos as president in 1965, the nation’s political and economic woes were far from over. (Lonely Planet Philippines 2006)

A striking contrast in the Philippines today lies in the circumstances of its women. Having already elected two female presidents in the last twenty years and boasting a middle management demographic dominated by women, the nation is well ahead of many Western countries. In contrast, while prostitution is illegal in the Philippines, it is one of the nation’s biggest industries. The Philippines has often been promoted as a sex tourism destination and, even more disturbing, an estimated 20% of the nation’s sex workers are children. (Lonely Planet Philippines 2006) You don’t have to read about sex tourism to realize that it is going on. An unsettling number of unattractive, middle-aged white men can be seen conspicuously walking hand-in-hand with young (often teenage) Filipino girls. The practice is so commonplace that no attempt is made to disguise it. While I am fully aware of my inability to affect these circumstances, I make a point of attempting to make eye contact with as many of the teenage sex patrons as possible. They appear unapologetic but I find solace in knowing that they know that their reprehensible behavior has not gone unnoticed.

On a brighter note, we regrouped in our room after a long day of intense observation and gussied ourselves up for a night out in Malate. I had bought an inexpensive little silk dress in Thailand, thinking that I’d wear it once and mail it home after it had fallen victim to the cramped conditions of my backpack. After donning it in Thailand, I folded it into a large Ziploc bag and carried it like that for over a month in my pack before pulling it out again in Australia. Miraculously, it came out virtually wrinkle-free as if it had been hanging in my closet. I pulled it out several weeks later in Manila with the same fabulous result. I’m shocked at the resilience of this little dress and tickled by the pleasure of having something delicate, pretty and feminine to throw on once in a while as a reprieve from my t-shirts and cargo pants.

With endless venues to choose from, we went back to Café Havana, this time to have dinner and make a night of it. The food was average but the service and ambience were outstanding. A different, but equally entertaining six-piece band belted out a variety of Spanish and popular songs for a disappointingly small Saturday night audience. After dinner, we moved into the adjacent cigar lounge, which impressed us with its selection of Cuban and locally produced cigars. We each chose a Filipino cigar and puffed away (sorry, Momma, but we don’t do it often, I promise) while sipping Grand Marnier and admiring the beautifully decorated cigar room. The walls were painted a soft, tropical shade of red and were covered with framed cigar labels and large black-and-white photos of Che Guevara. After literally smoking ourselves out of the room, we sat for one last San Miguel and then called it a night. We would depart early the next morning for Puerto Galera, where we eagerly anticipated dipping our fins into the Verde Island Passage between the Sibuyan and South China Seas.

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After traipsing across Japan at a feverish pace, we reached Tokyo, our final destination, with a desperate need to relax and reorganize. We had done so much so quickly that I hadn’t had a chance to process it all much less write about it and the experiences were fast becoming faded memories. We had been invited by our expat friends and former Fort Worth neighbors, Seph and Trish Jensen, to stay with them in Tokyo and we were very excited to see them and meet their sweet little baby Kate Hana for the first time. Trish had mentioned in prior emails that Kate sleeps twelve hours every night and is a really good baby during the day. I’m sure that she said it to put our minds at ease because, as a parent, you never know how your childless (I hate that word but we are, in fact) friends will react to your little one. We were not worried in the least, of course. Trish had emailed some pictures of Kate at Easter, in which she looked like a Madame Alexander doll, and on that same day, the Youngs re-entered the insane world of “not not trying”.

So we found our way to the Jensens’ place on the 27th floor of a beautiful high-rise in the trendy Roppongi area of downtown Tokyo. We arrived around 6pm on Sunday night and Seph had just walked in from work so we did the round of hugs and then digested the surrealism of meeting again in Tokyo. Kate was already down for the count so we settled in and caught up over champagne and a home-cooked beef tenderloin dinner. This proved to be the manner in which the Jensens would spoil us rotten with their generous hospitality for the entirety of our Tokyo stay.

With nothing on our agenda but relaxation and visiting, we slept late almost every morning, lingered over coffee, played with Kate, went to lunch, and basked in the spa-like comforts of the cozy flat in the evenings. You may be wondering how an enclosed area with a six-month-old baby could be described as spa-like. The explanation is simple: Trish wasn’t exaggerating – Kate really is an angel! She smiled and played all day and then went down for the night around 5:30 and we didn’t hear a peep from her until morning. Seph and Trish are very calm and natural parents, which certainly seems to reflect in Kate’s personality. Tokyo was a huge, modern city with skyscrapers galore, flashy neon, a lot of stressed-looking businessmen chain-smoking and running for trains, more vending machines per square mile than anywhere else in the world (more than 400,000 in total), and every type of retail and restaurant offering imaginable (except for Trish’s beloved Target) – but all of this combined was not nearly as interesting as our little bald, blue-eyed hostess. Even Aaron’s baby fever spiked to a new level.

One night, the four of us went out for a night on the town sans baby. We stopped into a traditional Japanese restaurant called Inakaya (Seph’s pick) and were told that we could be accommodated in about an hour. We walked down the street to a small Irish pub for a round of beers and had worked up a healthy appetite by the time we returned to Inakaya for dinner. We were seated along one side of the single enormous table that encompassed the entire dining area. Three very spirited and vocal chefs kneeled in the middle of the table behind a grill and griddle. We ordered some Japanese beer and Seph ordered dinner for all of us – beef, chicken, prawns, mixed sashimi, snapper, assorted mushrooms and vegetables. While we enjoyed our drinks, the various courses began to arrive, served one at a time on long wooden paddles maneuvered by the chefs.

The jumbo prawns were skewered live and placed over hot coals, their little legs wriggling furiously as they fought their fate. This bothered my conscience tremendously but I tried not to think about it, letting the beer and conversation divert my attention. When the prawns were delivered – one large one per person – Aaron dutifully removed the exoskeleton while I looked the other way. When he was finished, the prawn looked just like the ones I used to buy at Costco, only bigger and juicier. It was by far the best damn prawn that I’ve ever tasted in my life! The sashimi medley was also unbelievable. I’ve been eating sushi for more than ten years; I’ve had all kinds of sushi, sashimi and rolls but I must admit that I didn’t know just how good raw fish could taste until this meal.

Somewhere in the midst of skewered meats and luscious fishes, the premium cold sake started flowing, followed by Seph’s recommended Shochu – a Japanese distilled spirit, which was surprisingly smooth and delicious, considering its thirty percent alcohol content. The big table stayed full throughout the evening and an air of giddy indulgence seemed to circulate the room. Inakaya was an inconspicuous, intimate place tucked away on a quiet side street but it was clearly a hidden gem. As we neared the end of our meal around 10:00, people were still piling in. We finished our experience with a round of green tea ice cream and then laughed all the way home.

My persistent hangover precluded me from leaving the flat the next day but everyone else seemed to be functioning semi-normally. I didn’t mind – I needed an “office day” anyway. With our Tokyo visit nearing its end, we had not done much in the way of sightseeing, our laziness exacerbated by the kind of comforts we used to call home – sparkling clean bathroom, big screen T.V., wireless internet, washer/dryer, couches that you can sink into and, most importantly, the most fabulous toilet that my discriminating derriere has ever encountered. Trish, having read some of my earlier potty commentary, mentioned that Japanese toilets have “all the bells and whistles”. I wasn’t exactly sure what she meant until we arrived in Japan.

The Japanese take a lot of pride in their toilets, a characteristic that I find most admirable. You begin by sitting down on a startlingly lovely heated seat. After doing your thing, you select from a range of functions on a small control panel attached to the toilet. Functions such as a deodorizer, three levels of warm, gentle bidet with adjustable water pressure and a dryer maximize the ease and enjoyment of an otherwise unpleasant necessity. Ladies and gentlemen, I was in Heaven! I have never enjoyed the experience of powdering my nose so much in my life! How this utterly brilliant invention has not made it into every home in America, the most luxury-consuming society on Earth, remains a total mystery to me. I wholeheartedly urge everyone reading this (and tell all of your friends) to find a way to import a Japanese toilet and install it in your home as soon as possible. Your life will never be the same again.

So we skimmed the Tokyo chapter of our guide book in search of any last-minute tourist stops. Aaron decided that he wanted to see the Tsukiji (pronounced “skid’ jee”) Fish Market, the largest fish market in the world, and specifically its famed tuna auction. After a little (okay, a lot) moaning and groaning about having to wake up at 5am, I managed to rise to the occasion and we scooted out the door before our first cup of coffee – always a risky move. A few trains later, we finally found Tsukiji and made our way to the back warehouse where the tuna auction was just finishing its final round for the day. Hundreds of giant tuna were laid out in rows across the entire floor of the warehouse. Men in coveralls and tall rubber fishing boots walked between rows, inspecting the fish and looking busy and important for the tourists who watched excitedly from the viewing area.

The auction round seemed very informal. Sample slices from each fish on the auction block were placed on top of a stack of cardboard boxes with a number written in permanent marker on each stack. The auctioneer stood on a small raised platform in a circle of bidders and launched the bidding process with his rhythmic auction chant. We watched as the last round concluded and then ventured into the main area of the market, packed tightly with stall after stall selling every type of raw fish imaginable. In the alleyways between the rows of stalls, men driving motorized flatbed carts frantically navigated through the crowd. We had to stay alert in order to avoid becoming road kill for the carts speeding through the market with reckless abandon as the carts seemed to have the right of way in all circumstances. We wandered up and down several rows of stalls and then headed out of the market. The raw fish odors were nauseating on an empty stomach and a dizzying display of fish corpses seemed to dominate the view in every direction. I’d had enough.

As we were leaving, we came upon a small five-stool sushi bar on the sidewalk and Aaron decided that, to complete his tuna auction experience, he should eat some tuna sashimi for breakfast. In my state of fish fume nausea, I couldn’t think of anything more revolting to put into my mouth but I sat down with him and sipped some hot miso soup while he ate. It was the most I could stomach before 8am.

Back at the flat, Seph and Trish were busy getting ready to depart on a three-week trip back to the “United States of Awesomeness”, as Trish now calls it, later that afternoon. Miss Kate was not a happy camper, which suggested that Trish’s earlier worry that she might start teething right before their eleven-hour flight might become an unfortunate reality. We managed to calm the little fusser down and, among the four of us, delivered the Jensens’ family-size luggage load down to the airport bus pickup. We said hurried goodbyes and then they were gone in a flash.

Our flight wasn’t until the following evening so we headed back to the flat. At Seph and Trish’s suggestion, we ordered Pizza Hut and vegged in front of the television. Aaron even managed to sit still through an entire movie (Juno), although I’m sure that he was multi-tasking in some way, probably with the laptop or a magazine in his lap. I don’t question it anymore as long as his little side projects don’t disrupt the movie. It was a wonderfully quiet, relaxing evening and we felt a pang of nostalgia for our big, comfortable former house in Texas. I was a great house and we still puzzle over how easy it was to let it go. At this point, we feel so comfortable in the simplest accommodation that we hardly think of our former lifestyle until we get a taste of it again.

The next day, we took a late morning train to the Shibuya area and stopped into a Starbucks which looked over the Shibuya Crossing – a famous intersection where pedestrians in all directions get a simultaneous green light and flood into the street before disappearing toward their respective destinations. It is an impressive sight, especially from the second floor vantage point of the Starbucks. I must say that I am continually impressed by Starbucks ability to occupy the most prime real estate locations in the most patronized areas. They are well-positioned around the world. You don’t usually have to seek out a Starbucks; if there is one, it tends to magically appear like a lighthouse in the storm. God bless Starbucks and McDonalds too! While I remain generally a fan of “the underdog”, I literally light up when I discover one or the other global oasis in a new city because I know that I have found a home base. I may not even stop in but I take comfort in knowing it’s there.

Tokyo was a perfect end to our two-week sprint through Japan. We were both surprised to find Japan among our favorite destinations thus far. We proudly crammed about a month’s worth of experiences into our short visit and have no regrets for there is so much to see. Despite the language barrier, we found the Japanese people to be warm, welcoming and eager to approach us with an offer of help if we appeared lost, which was fairly often. We loved the mix of old and new: beautiful Japanese gardens and historic buildings hidden within modern cities with modern amenities; chic designer fashion mixed with women, young and old, in traditional kimono. In Asia’s most Westernized country, there is a kaleidoscope of rich culture that we’ve only begun to explore. Whether we were staking out geisha, visiting centuries-old castles, hiking through the mountains or sampling the local cuisine, we were continually thrilled and fascinated by everything that is Japan.

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During a train ride to Nara, we had sat with a middle-aged American couple who were part of a larger tour group. As we engaged in a friendly exchange of Japan travel stories, they recommended a trip to the Nakasendo Highway – an old post road linking Kyoto with Tokyo along which many historic post towns had been restored to their original two hundred year old appearance. Eager for a taste of rural Japan, we made some quick alterations to our itinerary to fit it in.

The journey from Kyoto to the old post town of Tsumago, in the midst of the Kiso Valley, required four trains and a bus ride but was surprisingly painless nonetheless. The alpine mountains were a refreshing change of scenery. The bus dropped us off a stone’s throw away from Hanaya Ryokan – the traditional Japanese wooden home-turned-guesthouse where we would spend the night. The owner greeted us inside as we removed our shoes in the foyer and placed them on a shelf. I slipped into a pair of the slippers provided but the largest ones were too small for Aaron’s American size elevens so he slid around in his socks on the polished wood floors. We were shown to our room on the second floor – it was modest-sized with tatami mats on the floor and a low table in the center of the room with two square cushions. Tea service for two was ready and waiting and we were instructed to take tea and settle in. Dinner would be served at six o’clock.

After our tea, we went out to check out the town. The main trading area of Tsumago was a scenic twenty-minute walk from the ryokan, along a winding gravel path. The traditional wooden buildings had been beautifully restored and converted into small cafes, guesthouses and specialty shops. The afternoon was sunny and warm, which positively impacted Aaron’s shopping stamina as I flitted from one shop to another. In place of lunch, we sampled the offerings at a few of the snack shops, including chestnut softserve ice cream, sticky buns filled with sweet red bean paste, and matcha (powdered green tea) served with a delightful chestnut cookie. With a sack full of treasures in hand, we walked back to the ryokan. The owner suggested that we take a bath to relax before dinner. We slipped into the yukatas (lightweight Japanese robes) that were hanging in the closet of our room and ventured downstairs into our respective bathrooms. The women’s bathroom had a regular shower as well as a deep wooden Japanese bathtub. I lifted one of the wooden planks covering the tub to get a faceful of steam from the hot water. I showered first and then attempted to step into the bath but the water was so unbearably hot that I only made it up to one knee before giving up. Aaron’s bathroom had a much larger tub and he claimed to have had a relaxing dip. Perhaps the Japanese think that, because women have a naturally higher pain tolerance than men, they find scalding bathwater relaxing. More likely, I just needed to add a bit of cold water from the tap.

Our yukatas also came with a heaver waist-length overcoat, which we wore down to the dining room at six o’clock sharp. A long inner wall of the dining room was made entirely of sliding screens which opened in several places to reveal four low tables each with an elegant array of authentic Japanese dishes. We took our seats, wide-eyed and giddy, at our table-for-two. There was a Japanese couple, also in their robes, at the table on one side of us, a Spanish couple on the other side and a table of six Italians at the far end, none of whom seemed to have gotten the robe memo. Their loss – dinner in your pjs is the bomb!

Among the many individual dishes were salmon sashimi, cold soba (buckwheat) noodles, shabu-shabu (thin slices of raw beef and vegetables cooked tableside in a pot of light broth over charcoals), a delicious sticky rice ball on a stick doused in a rich satay sauce, and, of course, miso soup. We ordered a carafe of hot sake and savored our elaborate meal. During the meal, we noticed that the Japanese couple had been served their salmon Izakaya-style – the head and tail of the fish placed on opposite ends of the platter with the body skinned and cut into bite-size pieces between its extremities. Aaron was disappointed that we didn’t get the truly authentic experience but I must admit my relief at the discovery. I have been a sushi-lover for years but, for whatever reason, I have a mental block about eating something while its lifeless eyes stare back at me. That’s just creepy! We concluded the meal with a steaming pot of green tea, thanked our hosts and retired to our room.

We slid the table against the wall and pulled the bedding out of the closet. We laid the Japanese futons, side-by-side, and topped them with the fluffy featherbeds. We spread the soft cotton sheets and warm blankets and crawled into one of the most Heavenly beds that I have ever experienced. Even the pillows were sublime. Had it been logistically plausible, I would have lobbied to splurge on one more night in the ryokan, just to sleep in the bed again. We slept like angels and woke early the next morning.

Breakfast was served in the dining room promptly at 7:30. The traditional Japanese breakfast included a bowl of sticky rice, a cold, spongy, block-shaped egg cake soaked in a sweet vinegary syrup, and a small, whole fish braised in a thick brown sauce. After the previous night’s dinner, I was not especially hungry but I gave everything a try…except for the fish, of course. It laid on a square white plate, lonely except for a rosemary garnish, its little dead eye staring at me as I ate. I’ve always been a carnivore. While I understand that all animals, including humans, have a place in the food chain, I often fight a sense of guilt over killing a living thing so that I can eat it. I attempt to trick the guilt by only eating meat or fish in a form that does not resemble the living animal. It has worked well enough thus far to keep me carnivorous but I am continually put off by bones, legs, heads or tails on my plate with a few odd exceptions. I don’t mind, though. My discriminating palate has proven to be one of the many idiosyncrasies that make me the weird little person that I am.

Aaron ate the whole fish, head first, both to shock me and to prove that he could keep it down. He’s a braver soul than I. I just stared in disbelief as he bit the head off, then the body, then the tail and swallowed each piece quickly before his mind could communicate to his gag reflex what he was eating. Of all the foreigners at breakfast, Aaron was the only one who ate the fish head, a fact that he took great pride in announcing. After breakfast, we packed our bags and stored them at the ryokan while we walked the old post road to the neighboring town of Magome. The twisting, gravel road wound through thick alpine forest. It was another beautiful spring day and we marveled at the abundance of cherry blossoms, roses and daffodils in brilliant bloom. The 7.8 kilometer hike is almost entirely uphill from Tsumago (elevation 420m) to Magome Pass (elevation 801m) before descending the final stretch into the town of Magome (elevation 600m). About fifteen minutes into the walk, Aaron remembered a sign that we had seen in the Tsumago tourist office, warning that bears have occasionally been spotted along the hiking trail. The sign said that the bears can be dangerous if startled and recommended renting a bell from the office to “announce” your presence on the path so as to deter the bears. Of course, we had forgotten all about the bear bells so we sang loud, off-key marching songs along the way instead. If there were any bears in the area that day, my hideous singing voice undoubtedly sent them running with their paws over their ears.

We reached Magome in about 90 minutes, traversing a mountain pass along the way – it was quite a workout. Magome was a pretty town with a steep cobblestone street running through the middle. The shops were much like the ones in Tsumago so we checked out a few and then sat down on a streetside bench with a couple of chestnut softserve cones and watched the crowds walk by. Most of the tourists in the Kiso Valley were Asian and middle-aged. The ryokans are relatively pricey (but well worth it!) , which deters the younger backpackers. The old post town experience is a more spa-like and cultural experience. The ryokan ambience is quiet and peaceful. The Kiso Valley is a cultural treasure where families live and work in lovely historic communities with breathtaking mountain views. They plant spring flowers and cultivate small gardens behind their beautiful wooden homes. While the restored buildings in the old post towns now have modern amenities such as electricity, running water and motor cars in the drive, the overwhelming feeling while walking the streets is one of stepping back in time.

As the generations of humanity have advanced further into the age of technology, efficiency and mass production, I often mourn the loss of personal artistry in modern products. While I certainly appreciate contemporary comforts, particularly those relating to la toilette, I have always had an affinity for old things. I used to hear people, mostly of my grandparents’ generation, say things like “They just don’t make ‘em like they used to”, usually referring to the inferior quality or durability of modern products but I think the expression also applies to artistry. The beautiful intricacies of historic buildings and finery throughout the world are often lost on the modern versions. I wonder what future generations will make of our skyscrapers and master-planned, cookie-cutter suburban communities.

I truly enjoyed our walk through the past and I am thankful that someone thought that these quaint post towns were worthy of preservation. The little old towns were an enlightening and refreshing contrast to the bustling metropolises that we have so far experienced in Japan. We took a bus from Magome back to Tsumago to collect our bags and continue our journey. We smiled amusedly as the little old Japanese grandfather from the ryokan drove us through town in his Lexus at breakneck speeds and nearly skidded into the train station parking lot.

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