12 Hours In Tokyo
Tokyo, Japan 29 Years Old
I only have 12 hours in Tokyo, so I’ll have to move fast.
I pop by the airport bookshop to flip through a Japanese phrasebook and learn six phrases to ease the day: good morning, good afternoon, please, thank you, excuse me, and goodbye.
For 250 yen I’m on the train platform, ready for the 70 kilometer ride to the city.
Since childhood, Japan has always seemed a culture of honor, an island of mystery.
Today is at long lost my chance to explore.
The doors hiss open and I take a seat among the silent Japanese lining the walls, sitting motionless with eyes open, riding the train in peace.
There are nearly fifty people in the car, but the only apparent sound is the predictable “click-clack, click-clack” of the wheels below.
The young Japanese girl sitting beside me, wearing a clean white hat with flowers perched atop it’s brim, turns and asks, “Do you need any help with directions?”
“I’m not sure. I have no destination,” I reply.
“There’s a popular shopping area farther down the line”
I thank her for the suggestion, but know that isn’t my goal.
She asks if I can tell the various Asian cultures apart.
“By looks?” “Yes.” “Usually. I find the Japanese look to be very unique.”
She giggles a little and blushes a little below her eyes.
She takes the complement purely, but does not seem to share my opinion.
“I’d like to become more beautiful,” she says, looking down.
“In what way?”
She motions to her skin, her hair, her face, “More beautiful.”
I thought for a moment.
“Well, do that if you’d like, but that isn’t where beauty is. Skin wrinkles and fades. Hair greys and falls away. The only real beauty is the light in one’s eyes. That and kindness. And you already have both.”
She blushes and giggles again and her cheeks get pinker in the most beautiful way.
Brake-torque pulls our bodies forward as the bullet train slows.
Having enjoyed our true connection, I decide to forgo the flash and bustle of bright city Tokyo for the quiet intimacy of a small town.
I pick up my pack and wish her a happy journey.
The doors hiss open, unveiling a flowery, quiet town, called Katsutadai.
This was so very much the right decision.
The streets and trees glisten silver from a recent rain, The sky glows white-grey from horizon to horizon.
Soft scents of leaves and flowers surf on the empty breeze, air swirls like a cool beach dawn, though we are nearly seven miles from the sea.
The town has just one main street, which has just one street light, and almost no traffic.
The two or three cars on the road move at near walking speed. Colorful, understated signs, all written in sharp, graceful Japanese characters line colorful awnings of neighborhood shops.
I stroll easy down the main street, gazing into open doors of bakeries and bookstores and fruit stands. A handful of quiet townsfolk meander.
I veer right off the main street and within 50 feet find myself already in silent neighborhood: Colorful homes, bicycles parked in front. Small fountains in front yards fringed in bright flower beds. An old mailman out on his route, chatting with a woman who came down to the sidewalk to greet him.
I step into the town grocery store. An interesting style of music caresses the silence, slow and full of feeling like a Native American flute.
I stroll the aisles studying strange products, and cannot read a single label.
I greet the cashier with a smile, “It’s really nice out.”
He looks at me with inquisitive eyes and points to the other cashier in the empty store.
“It’s very nice out.” I say again.
She gives me the same look.
I hadn’t eaten in nearly 24 hours, so I went on a hunt for sushi.
I walk into a cell phone shop, surely I’ll find an english speaker there.
I greet the man behind the desk,
“Konichiwa.”
“Konichiwa,” he replies with a relaxed grin.
Perfect.
“Where can i find the best sushi in town?” I ask.
His reply is a paralyzing blur of consonant and vowel combinations I’ve never heard, but his bright body language shows that it must have been helpful.
After a moment of pause and a minute of broken sign language, I realize I might be the only english speaker in town.
I walk until I find a sidewalk sushi stand, they roll it right there fresh.
I can’t read anything on the menu, so I point to a picture of some colorful rolls.
She offers more vowels and consonants and I look at the old manual cash register, reading “299Y,” and hand her 300 yen.
I pick up the sushi, grab some chopsticks, and drift down the sidewalk.
Only ten steps down the sidewalk I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn around.
The small old lady is reaching out with two hands, head bowed in solemn respect, to give me one yen in change.
One yen is about a penny.
I bow in solemn return and walk on, obeying the magnetic pull of a dense grove of tall evergreens in the distance.
I enter the forest and branch off down a narrow dirt path, which opens in the middle of the forest to a serene graveyard.
Butterflies dance around intricate shrines to revered anscestors, each shrine taller than a man, each carved into a different shade of marble. a stone lantern at its base, and a set of small steps leading up to the main tomb.
And everything ornamented in long, vertical strings of japanese characters, each engraved and then painted white into the marble.
Every tomb laden with fresh flowers, white vases, wood carvings, and stone statues of peaceful monks standing with hands clasped, eyes closed, mouths in eternal expression of equanimity.
Beyond the graveyard, under shady swaying canopy of tall tress above. the magnetic path opens to another forest clearing, this one deep green, quiet, with fallen log benches on the forest floor. I set down my pack and lay on a log and listen to the birds sing their happy post-rain song.
I awake in perfect quiet. I lay still for several minutes, watching waves of wind breathe whimsical leaves under warm grey sky.
I forget where I am. Looking at these leaves, I could be anywhere. It isn’t until a small, older Japanese man shuffles by that I remember, I’m alone on an island on the far side of the world, thousands of miles from anyone I know.
Feeling perfectly renewed, I rise to make a slow return to the train.
I pass a woman carrying a baby in a small pouch on her chest, petting his hair and whispering soft Japanese love.
I pass a man rolling along on an old bicycle, gaze on the road, happily whistling a tune for no one.
I pass a group of four elderly women walking at snail’s pace, speaking one at a time in patient phrases, or not speaking at all.
Each person I pass keeps their eyes focused ahead. We all exist in quiet isolation in the same serene scene.
I take on the same vibe.
After several minutes of this peace, thoughts slow and fade, until there are no thoughts left at all.
With awareness now fully immersed in the depth of the moment, the separation between this being and all else falls away.
Present in the now, I became the peaceful villager.
Soaking in the light. I became the brilliant flower.
Letting myself go, I became the world itself.
The doors hiss open.
Though I’ve only spent one day, I feel a fundamental understanding of this town.
I feel I’ve seen the respectful, quiet light in its eyes.
I’m not sure when i will return to Japan, but I feel there is much more to learn from its peaceful soul.
