I wanted to go to two more places in the region before going south again, and the first is a mountain temple west of Sendai known as Yamadera. The train ride to get there was lovely, I saw tons of fresh water and ice in the mountains, and the tree’s were still very green and full of foliage. Sadly the place was closed because the ice made it too dangerous to climb the temple, but the train ride there and back to Sendai made it worth the trip. Yet there was more to see.
One of the only people I met in my Sendai hostel told me of a fairground filled with cherry blossom blooms, so I took a chance on a late train and headed that way. It was out of the city center for sure. I think I had to pass 12 stops to reach it. I got there just as the sun went down, took pictures, had corn on the cob for 500 yen and ran to the top of the mountain where the old fortress once stood. It was a lovely little spot filled with lovers trying to steal away some kisses in the safety of the night.
The train left Sendai and as I looked behind me, I knew I had just altered the course of my life in two short days. I don’t often get such inspiration, but when I do get it, I feel it completely, and as should you! I’m telling you to live, but not without direction, with your passions leading the way! I tried and failed to get back into my capsule hotel, this is peek season for everyone in Japan now and for the next many days, that’s why I’m going South. So I found another spot, one more expensive but in a nicer part of town.
As soon as I got into my dorm room a young Chinese man named Yuning came up to me with a smile.
“Want to have a beer?”
“I don’t drink.”
“Want to smoke?”
“I don’t smoke.”
“Want chocolate?” This series of questions were all rapid fire and without reflection after which one was asked, as though he were expecting to keep offering me things and be refused. At the last I finally stopped short, regarding the Kinder chocolate I knew so well from childhood back in Germany. It’s not Vegan. I knew, but part of me felt compelled to take the sweet brick. And another something compelled me to go out of the hostel with him and smoke. We asked an old Japanese lady where it was appropriate, and she ushered us under the overpass where a stream flowed. The young man opened a fresh pack of Seven-star mild filter less cigarettes and handed me one.
“It’s been a long time since I smoked one of these.” He smiled and nodded knowingly.
“What do you do?” he asked, blinking at the smoke as much as through it.
“I work on bikes.” I said, taking a drag of the cigarette. It was powerful. I coughed.
“You?”
“I work on the internet.”
“That’s a big job.”
“Biggest.”
“How’s that going?”
“I hate my country.” He said out of the blue. “Hate what they’ve done to our minds. With the internet.” It was my turn to nod knowingly.
“My country is doing the same with our minds.”
“Our country worse. I want to be free.” I nodded.
“How old are you?”
“19”
“38” I said, his eyes popped.
“You look much younger.”
“Fighting the world keeps me young. One day all governments will end, and humanity will be free.” I said. He nodded as though having heard this all before, which shocked me deeply. Usually It takes me a long time, if ever, to get people to see this fact.
“Yes. That is the destiny of all governments.” He said, and I liked that, having never heard it from an Asian person, and from very few people in general. It made me want to have a drink with him, as I know we would have much to say, but the cigarette and chocolate were more than enough. We found our way back to the hostel and went separate ways for a time.
I went to buy my ticket to Okinawa and from there to Taiwan. Once that was done I had dinner with Juning and went to sleep. The next morning I checked out, saying goodbye to the Chinaman, he and I embraced, I could feel him shacking through his t-shirt, I wonder why? Was he nervous around people in general, or was this all so very new and exciting for him? I try and place myself inside my 19 year old self, hugging a foreigner I just met in a foreign land, talking about conspiracies and the impossible yet inevitable world to come once our nations collapse... It’s like being in a movie, only its really happening.
You know how it is in dreams the moment you realize something’s amiss and not quiet right, you instantly step outside of yourself looking down from a different view and the world can never be the same again afterword. Piercing the viel is like that. Your who you thought you were only so long as its possible to maintain your silly illusion, and then it breaks, and the game is up. Only question is, how long can you maintain your own version? When will enough be enough? Time will tell…