Minakami

We left Naruto early on the morning of December 23rd. Five hours through Greater Tokyo (through five prefectures, actually) and into the mountains, we finally arrived in Minakami. The town is known as a hot springs town (and therefore a touristy spot), so I was a little confused that it appeared so desolate and kind of run down. After a few minutes of watching all who had been our fellow passengers on the train through the mountains climb into the appointed buses, we finally found ours. Then it was the designated 15 minutes until we reached the stop for Asanebou. Asanebou is the pension (guest house) that Mieko, one of Hylton's adult English conversation students, helped us book earlier on in December. We knew we wanted to go to a mountain onsen (from here on out just remember that onsen means hot springs) for Christmas, but as most of the websites with information and booking are solely in Japanese, we had some real difficulties until Mieko offered to step in. We stopped by her office one day, and she and her husband presented us with a bunch of printed out information, and then led us to the computer to figure things out further. They ended up calling for us and everything, and I was really blown away by how much time they were taking out of their schedule to help us.

Once off the bus, we kind of looked around, and then saw the Asanebou sign a little ways up the hill. As we ascended the hill I happened to look to my left -AND GET THIS- saw monkeys!!! Real, cute, furry monkeys! They were scared of us, and quickly scrambled up into the leafless trees, but oh they were so cute. We found out later from the pension owners that they are generally considered pests, who dig up flower bulbs and steal persimmons. However I didn't let that dampen my esteem for them.

Once at the pension we were greeted by Tokushima san (Mrs.), who was visibly relieved that we could speak some Japanese. Because we had had Japanese people call in for us and make the reservation, she probably figured she was dealing with another set of no-speaky whities. Then we were led to our room, which was open for the first day since the remodeling was completed. It smelled a little of fresh paint, but other than that was nice and quaint, with our own heated toliet seat and everything.

Next we were shown the indoor baths, which are supplied with real hot springs water. Then we were pointed to the way to the rotemburo, the outdoor bath, which I had been looking forward to ever since I found out there were such things. I forced Hylton to/we wasted no time, and soon found out the joys of outdoor hot spring bathing. The bath was small, and under a roof without walls. It was attached to a little hut for changing out of your clothes, which sometimes was heated and sometimes wasn't. You were supposed to hang a sign on the door when occupied, so that the bath was private. You were also supposed to wash up completely by the faucet between the bath and the changing hut before entering the bath. This turned out to be really neat and really difficult, as it doesn't take much imagination to see how petrifyingly cold dumping buckets of water over yourself in snowing weather would feel. But I really love water, and I loved loved being out there in the rotemburo.

On our second day in Minakmai it snowed, and sitting outdoors in hot, no-chemicals water watching the light snow cover the surrounding rocks was truly beautiful. We even saw a big snowy monkey skitter past us once.

The other delight besides onsen was the excellent food that the Tokushimas prepared (breakfast and dinner were included with the price of our stay). The first night we ate in the dining room with five other couples, one of which stuck around far after the plates had been cleared away, talking with us and Mr. and Mrs. Tokushima. Unfortunately this couple left the next day, but we did manage to have a nice talk with them. Of course, when I say "we" I really mean Hylton, as I spent all my energy trying to follow the conversation, letalone add anything to it. I have differing opinions on this kind of situation, but it was a nice evening, and the food was really really good.

On our second day we ate breakfast with all the other couples, who all ended up leaving that day. We spent the day mostly lazying around, in the rotemburo or reading in our room. We took another walk around the bit of the "city" we were in, which was mostly just a main street in the sense of a road passing through somewhere, not in the sense of a Main Street. From our room window we had a clear view of the mountains and the ski slopes, from which wafted a constant ethereal sound. Upon closer inspection we found that this sound was really just bad J-pop presumably played for the skiers. When heard from a short distance, however, it made you feel like you were in some fantasy video game.

For some inbetween breakfast-and-dinner food we went on a snowy walk to an udon place we had heard about the day previous. I was just in the market for some cheap filler noodles, but the place ended up being a little classier. They seemed kind of snooty (foreigners! ick!), but I think Hylton really did a number on them when he delivered a real zinger. He, in an attempt to give reason for only ordering a cup of coffee, was trying to say おなかがあまりすかない or "I'm not really hungry." Instead he ended up saying おなかがあまりすわない or, something most closely translatable as "I'm not really sucking my stomach." I don't think this looks as good in print. At least you get the idea.

At this same place I thought I was ordering かけ soba, which is basically "regular soba noodles." Instead I ordered (I think?) がき soba, which ended up being big hunks of wheat stuff in water. By the end I was in no doubt that I had gotten my carbohydrates for the day.

The Tokushimas, who incidentally have children the same age as Hylton and I

Hylton and I blowing out the candles on the strawberry shortcake

On our second night at Asanebou we were the only guests, so it wasn't difficult to spend most of the evening after dinner with the Tokushimas in their dining room, getting extra freebies like strawberry shortcake and mikan (mandarin oranges) from Kyushu. Again, I spent the majority of my time listening, but it was an interesting way to spend an evening. I got a little uptight when Hylton inevitably veered into talking politics, but they took it with stride, and Tokushima Mr. who had at first struck me as kind of gruff and brusque ended up proving his worldliness. Either that or they were just really polite, but as city folk-come-mountain folk they struck me as the latter.

The jokes from the days previous of us helping out in the yard actually became reality as Hylton, Tokushima san (Mr.) and I trudged out to the garden after breakfast on Christmas morning. [And sidenote, though Christmas does seem to be celebrated in Japan at least in the some parents give their kids a gift way, I never heard Christmas mentioned on the actual day.] We spent two hours bending hand shovels and freezing through our multi-layered gardening gloves. At the end of the morning, the three of us had planted some 500 bulbs under the earth and snow. We were rewarded with a free lunch and, hospitality of hospitalities, a car ride to our next destination: Takaragawa River onsen.

Rereading all of this, it really was such a nice little escape. It is easy to see why the Japanese, who are notoriously hard workers, hold onsen-going so dear.

More to come.