Volcanic

 VOLCANIC

   Kyoto than, for the track of the trail.
I found somewhat different from what I had Imagined. The old capital of this nation, appeared to me a modern city nonetheless. Perhaps, it was the rain that came down steadily throughout that grey day, as I wandered the many streets under the shelter of a small transparent umbrella.
Umbrellas which seem to be disposable items here in Japan piling up here and there, left by their owners, forgotten.
   I walked to the golden palace of the Shoguns of yore.
Great the gardens, though now wet and drooping. Great also the palace was, and it's gates. Yet no furniture there wherein, not even a single item, only large empty halls, with golden sliding doors. Painted with stunning images of pine trees and birds, mountains so intricate and beautiful. So simple, yet so perfect. So completely different from what the European royalty were into, with their pompous, self inflating, pretentious Baroque style of architecture. No, I did not go into all the small bars and boutique little restaurants that one may find in the back alleys of Kyoto, that might have added to my experience.
   I did stray into the long market of food and spices and various crafts that stretched for maybe a kilometer through the heart of the old city. That was certainly a highlight. How many different kinds of ware were displayed there I cannot tell. So many things unknown or even imagined by me or any western person for that matter I fathom. So many condiments and fermented foods and goods. So many a rare dish prepared in many an odd way. The variety of the food of these people is so great. What a treasure!
   I feel so impoverished by our hotchpotch of the European amalgamate of pasta and potatoes.
People ask me, 'what do you eat?' Potatoes? Cheese? Hmmm....

The new Woodshed

   Than again the hitchhiking road I took and rode west. Oh good old West. I crossed the Honchu Island to Tottori Prefecture, where another great volcano awaited me. This one named Diasen, or great mountain. At the foot of which I stayed, for a fortnight with the beautiful family of people though not by birth. They live in a wonderful house. Fashioned of large ceder beams only varnished. A huge cavernous space within this wooden frame. Some three stories high within the ceiling. We sat by the fire at night, our legs warmly tucked under the kotetsu, a low and blanketed heated table so common around here and cooked together. Or went out to the Thambo, or rice paddies to work the deep black volcanic soil. Moving the little rice seedling out into the open air,csowing veggies of various kinds. I constructed a woodshed there, with great joy. How much pleasure that gave me to have a project, to design and execute, with success. Creation can give such joy.



   One day, I went out to that big mountain. Well, to one of it's minor peaks really. A mere hill actually. And how strange, on the way there, in the shade of a large house I passed, snow still lingered.
   Snow?... Really?!!... It's May!
I guess this is a ski resort in the winter. But snow? What a wonderful material!
Scooping up a handful of it, it's icy sensation trickling down my hand in the sunshine. Walking through the thousand colored forest, so vibrant.
When I came to the summit, I could not behold the view. It was just too incredible.
So far as one could see, there was myriad mountains in all directions, stretching through the haze.
I do not recall ever seeing such a sight!
It was......spectacular, and incomprehensible. Unless it was perhaps the state of my mind, elated as it was, in that moment.
What a beautiful place. Sitting in the shade of a crooked tree to gather my spirit, gather my thoughts, give direction.

Mount Daisen

   Than I descended and I kept finding there rocks which weren't rocks, of many colors and structures, so intriguing. This was limestone I figured out but not of the regular kind. This was a form of compacted volcanic ash. Light, but strong at the same time. With such cool shapes! It boggled my mind. I had to pick them up, all the time, and feel them, and look a them and draw with them as one could, on the road.
Mandalas formed, through my hands in flames of passion.
Creation, doing itself.

   Oh life! You are so intricate.

What a wonderful world we do live in.

   From Tottori, than, I left those good friends. They were coming and going. Such is the place. Wwoofers, volunteers, a crowd of Israeli girls, strangely. They had become fast friends really quickly. But it was time to go, and so ever west I continued to Kyushu, the next island. Rapidly hitchhiking into the rain. How lucky that my last ride of the day was a very hospitable woman and her two children, who took me in for the night, into their large house, and fed me sushi from one of those sushi conveyor belt restaurant, where you just pick up plates of sushi and sashimi to your liking, and stack the plates and you pay according to the plates that are on your table. So kind, she payed everything, even though she wasn't rich.
And it was delicious of course.
And she gave me breakfast, and it rained all night, but I was safe,
I was safe inside a very homely home, what a gift....
What a Gift....

She even gave me a lunchbox! Such care. 
   On than, to Beppu, in one ride, through the rain, through the beautiful island with it's many green mountains.
It is hard sometimes because I do not speak Japanese, and I feel ashamed of it many a time.
I feel like I'm not doing justice to these people who are showing me such kindness. I would like to share more of my life with them, because it is something that is rewarding to them. As an island people, they are exceptionally curios about the outside world, our customs, our lives.

   So I came to Beppu. Beppu, next to a large shield volcano, is perhaps one of the most Geo-active areas in the world. There are literately thousands of mineral springs, hotsprings and places where steam emerges from the ground. It's a very crazy place! And this being Japan, the Japanese have built a city right over that place. Imagine building a city like right in the middle of Yellowstone park? That's basically what this is. There are so many Onsen, of which to one I went, enjoying the opalesque blue waters, in the rain.



   Is this rain thing getting boring yet? Well, it wasn't over. In any case, that night I stayed in a Ryokan, or Japanese traditional inn. And what a beautiful structure. So homely!
Many Rooms along different corridors. I got lost in that place several times.
Stairs up, down, left, make a turn, another room there, Oh there's a door, take off your shoes, put your shoes on. Sliding doors, double sliding doors, hinging sliding doors, and steam rises up from in between all the houses in that town.
 In the middle of this Ryokan there was a HUGE kettle, all moss and sediment covered in many colors of red and green and yellow and gray, caked in thick layers of minerals, alive,...alive....
A steam kitchen, a row of wooden boxes there were, through which steam from the deep earth flowed. And you could cook there, whatever you wished by placing your food in the lidded box.
The whole kitchen was filled with vapor. Drip, dropping droplets of water everywhere.

The steam Kitchen

I remember, as a child, I used to read this book, about a city that harnessed the power of a dragon.
They made an agreement with the dragon to feed it's fire into a large funnel, to power the lighting of the town.
This is exactly what that place felt like. Harnessing the might of the earth to heat your food, your house, your life.

 Next day, the clouds ever assembled in the sky, I hopped on a train and made it to the town of Aso. Aso in one of the greatest calderas on this globe. A collapsed volcano of great magnitude. A high rim all around us, an impressive cliff of perhaps several hundred meters high. Fertile lands all around, that were at some time a lakes bottom before it was drained. Kind of like the valley of Katmandu. But in this one, in the center of it all, still smoulders mount Aso. A complex massive of various cones, craters, and erupted debris, of hundreds of thousands of years of geological hyperactivity.
So once the rain had stopped, I made an ascent, through the bright green pastures, where cows and large strong horses now graze. That resembles Mongolia so much already. Reflections of the future?
Perhaps....
Lets hope so...

   Coming to the pass, a flat space between various peaks of various ages. This place is clearly a process, still happening. One crater nearby still excreted a thick white plume of sulfuric white smoke, that the wind blew our way, all the lands around it were desolate and gray by it's toxic exhume. Crossroads of travelers it was up there. And one could see far and wide, around the crater, to all sides. I met a man up there who had been walking the world for at least ten years. Walking his way all the way from Libia to right here, Japan. What a hero, to me, as a vagabond.
But is that what I want? I'm telling myself it is not. But what do I know, of fate, of faith?
He says, "I just have walk and see more things, of the world".
Yeah, I feel that too, yet I also feel this great urge in me to manifest, to invest myself in a place, in something. How do I combine those two? That is what I am searching.

Okay.
   So down, down from that mountain winding, winding, in the sunshine, now. Winding down through open roads, and forests, birdsong embalming me. Water everywhere, warm and fresh. As the sun approached the horizon, to an abandoned village I came. I did not plan to stop, for actually my aim was to get to a nearby Onsen or hot spring. Yet when I entered one of the houses that stood there now bereft of it's inhabitants, so much comfort I found. In this small, two room, two story building, With it's slightly mushy tatami mats, I put down my bag and swept the floor. I took out clean and cosy blankets from the wardrobes built into the walls. I made myself a feast on a actual table, with dishes of real china, and even a real Japanese teapot.
What a luxury.
To sleep softly and not have to fear the cold. To be dry and protected by walls. That abandoned house was a special place. And it's Kami, or it's spirit, felt like a good one.
   I guess it had been abandoned because of the earthquake that shook this place some two years back. Destroyed many roads and buildings alike, collapsed bridges, and vast swaths of the mountain side came tumbling down leaving large red scars that can be seen to this day, clearly, everywhere. That mountain is obviously still in motion. It's shape or form not fixed, but evolving, eroding, becoming, feeding the world.

   Now, I am in Fukuoka. Last of my destinations on the Japanese Dragon isles. Camped once again, in a bamboo grove, right on the edge of the city. Sun is shining on my tent, and this afternoon, I am to take a ferry boat across the narrow sea to Busan, in south Korea.
With the grace of the universe, from the Aso caldera. the hitchhiking road sped me here so smoothly.
And every time, you get in a car. The Japanese people have to give you something to eat or drink. And perhaps the most random but delicious item I ever got on a ride yesterday
was a great, juicey tomato. 

   Thank you Japan. You are so different,
you have amazed me so many times with your peculiarity,
your sincerity, your beauty.
Thank you for all your experiences. Arigato

You know that 
Any time that 
you are not bubbling over 
with ecstatic joy, 
you are holding yourself back.

ETUDE

   As our very ferry boat left the cay side, the entire land based crew, of our ferry company that stayed behind, neatly clad in white and black suits, some ten or fifteen people perhaps, waived us an official goodbye. Not that they knew any of us, but that was what was custom, so that's what was done, in Japan.
   Our vessel, a hydrofoil aptly named Beetle, that for the next three hours crept across the narrow Bussan Chanel on it's high legs, to that city of the same name. City and splendid harbor, of steep hillsides, and a million light spread all around the bay. Arched by a magnificent suspension bridge that lit up in different colors as the night advanced. I was taken by surprise by this incredible great difference between the cultures of Japan and this South Korea. A land never visited by me before, and number 70 on the list in this life.

   The sentiment was completely different. Streets and buildings were not buy far as well maintained, and there was a much more casual, loose feeling in the air.
As I strolled into the first streets. Many Russians were there, I had no Idea. Do they come down from Vladivostok? To party here? Maybe...
I could buy real brown bread, and read things in Cyrillic if I felt myself so inclined.
Koreans seem to be much more expressive that their Nihony neighbors. Open, wide faces and large round spectacles I remember, and suddenly all kinds of large European and American cars the likes one only sparsely encounters on the other side. What a difference! Amazing.
I crawled up one of the steep hillsides until I found a quite spot in the long grass in a park, with a view over the bay, and the waters there beyond.
   A peaceful night followed, and likewise the morning issued a beautiful day. I made breakfast on a park bench, as I observed a group of perhaps thirty woman, energetically exercising on a square under some trees to stompy Korean pop music. And every single one of them had a 'Permanentje' in their hair. This was definitely not Japan.
I than returned to the busy town, and made a faint attempt at hitchhiking in a few different places, but quickly found that things were much different here, and hitchhiking is not a part of this culture. It reminded me of hitchhiking in the Iberian peninsula. Where many give you looks of great surprise. Where you can read off their faces that they are wondering what the heck you are doing there.
   'Why don't you take the bus, or train, or drive?'
They do not understand.
   And as they did not understand, they also did not give me a ride. So I ended up taking the train, all the way straight to the capital of Seoul. Soul city, how beautiful is that?
And that was a wise choice, as it did not take long before the rain thickened, and lashed against the darkening windows. And it was a long way, through this beautiful country, of green hills and wide valleys, where agriculture bloomed. It is really beautiful there.
And Seoul, was a different thing.

Seoul, rolling into this city on the train. 
I feel like entering a pinball machine, from the balls perspective. 
It's so complex. So many lights, so many lines. 
So many structures towering up above us. 
Columns of concrete, shrouded in mists, 
their crests, now hidden from sight.


  I found a home in a locals apartment through the internet, and felt myself safe from exterior wetness.
I tasted some of their food. It's spicy, like chilly spicy! And very diverse. It certainly does not feel as healthy as Japanese food, but is is definitely delicious aswell. There are slightly more chubby people in Korea, and also slightly more slightly unhealthy looking people, correlating perhaps to the food. But the food, is really good! Yet of a much rawer kind.
They will serve a soup with large chunks of bone an unmanageble pieces of carnage floating in it. Something unimaginable in civilized Japan,
where everything must be able to be air lifted by some deftly maneuvered chopsticks

   So for the next two days I explored that wondrous city, that I came to like very rapidly. The Koreans so much more open, they cheer and talk in the streets, and they know how to express their emotions, and it can be felt. They love to party. Perhaps it was the area I was staying in but to me the joy of life could be clearly felt in that city.
I was lucky enough run into the magnificent Lotus Lantern festival, that was being held in a central street of the city, near one of the ancient palaces of yore.
   It celebrated the birthday of the Buddha.

Pungmul Dance performance

And all days thousands op people crowded into this wide avenue where lots of stalls were put up of many Buddhist or cultural organizations, and there was music. and displays of dancing, and martial arts. Stuff I had never even knew existed, unlike anything I had ever seen before.
   There was band of drummers, with large hourglass shaped drums that made a magnificent folkloric displays. They had a kind of whips attached to little hats strapped around their heads and below their chins, and they swirled these whips around rhythmically, while drumming and dancing in circular paterns, in the most spectacular oriental, I would say Asian like costumes, of bright colors and ribbons and middle eastern style pants. It was so beautiful! And had so much joy in it.
   I had no idea about this country.
They play their drums from two sides at the same time. Quickly moving their sticks from one side to the other. Everything was so colorful. And than in the night, countless lanterns, were paraded around the city center. Large ones in the shape of elephants, tigers and dragons. Heart shapes, cute blue owl lanterns, large groups of men and women, children parading, everybody so ecstatic, so gorgeously dressed. and these bands, that remind me of samba bands by rhythm, but with a totally different feeling to them, so exotic. Wow!

You can vieuw this link for an example of this Pungmul Dancing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIo67z1tE5M

   All this revolved around the great Jogyesha Temple. A place that moved me very, very deeply.
As I advance on it for the first time, not knowing. The perfect circle within which three more circles caught my eye. On that building that has been there since the dawn of the last millennia.
these three balls doubtlessly representing the triple gems of the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha.



   The spirit of Enlightenment, the teaching of how to attain Enlightenment, and those united in the quest for that Enlightenment.
I took off my shoes, and advanced. Looked in though one of the great windows, where the shutters were folded back, and nothing now separated me from those three enormous Buddhas, golden Buddhas, serenely looking down upon those gathered there in front of them. A sacred crowd, some studying scripture, some prostrating, yet others sitting in silence, eyes closed or beholding these three magnificent ones with revered eyes.
The floor so old and fashioned of large blocks of curved wood. There one could take a pillow, and so did I, and placed myself along the wall, and sat, in pure bliss.
In the presence of these statues of great inspiration. They were absolutely perfect.
I do not recall ever being so impressed, so taken, by reverence. There was nothing else I needed to do, nowhere else I needed to go.
This was it. This was the place. This is where I had been going. This was where I had always been going, and this is all that I need. I dissolved, in the moment, in presence.

Jogyesha

In my own presence, in their presence. In the presence of this place, this timeless place, where everything is good.

   Three Great golden Buddha statues. One accepting, it's mudra or hand gesture suggesting that all that comes in is good and has come from the earth, and is one with that.
 One holding up it's right palm, and in the left, carrying a golden apple, the fruit of effort.
 The third statue, just holding up it's right palm again, and its left hand in it's lap. Everything is perfect, everything is as it has to be, everything is good and it may rest.
And thank you.

   Thus I interpreted their postures. That is how they spoke to me, and it was so beautiful.
I did not want to leave that place. I made a promise to return.
Once, after an endless moment, I got up to go to the bathroom. I am happy that I went outside.
As, for the next hour or so, I was startled  by all these people.
I just wandered up some street, and many princesses, damsels, lords and princes I passed by.

   Large hooped dresses stitched with pearls and fashioned from satin and silk, all be it fake.
Men wearing long overcoats, also richly decorated, high hats.
This is a kind of medieval, dress up, cosplay fashion thing going on here that I had no idea about, and it hit me by complete surprise. And I had to smile.
This whole area of the city is geared to that kind of lifestyle, which I'm guessing might be called Etude, or....I don't know.

   So many cool little vintage shops, the milk bar, that 50ties dig with a sky-blue caravan on it's rooftop, in one place people were eating right off the main street in what looked much like a garage, on tacky camping furniture, while next door there was like a shop that was completely pink on the inside, and they're selling pearl necklaces and silver shoes and brooches. So much fun.
A book cafe, that was kind of half garden, half library, half squat, half vintage shop and half lunch place. That place is Rad! We don't have anything like that in Holland that I know of, as boutique as that, I was really pleasantly surprised to find that here in the middle of Asia.
And all this right near the old palace, with it's many tiered pagodas, and it's grand avenues, and the fastest internet in the world.
And the Buddha....