Ode to an Old Friend

We've been together quite a while, bud.  I remember the first day you came into my life, and I began to learn how it was you saw the world.  You've been with me on so many adventures, and even when other's have come and gone you've stayed at my side.  You've tagged along to parties even though I knew you might be bored.  We went across the pacific together and you showed me how much our relationship meant to you.  We wandered the streets of Tokyo and a dozen other cities.  You came with me into the heart of Osorezan, and stayed close to me in the mists of Mount Fuji--you didn't shy away even when I thought the clouds beating upon you like billowing wet blankets might finally do you in.  We hiked the Great Wall of China and you looked down fearlessly into the valleys; we walked across Tiananmen square and into the Forbidden City.  You remember the faces of my friends so well that with your help I never have to forget a single detail of their features.  Because of you I won't forget how beautiful a sunset looks over the yard in Nova Scotia.  You accompanied me to Korea, and came out and about with me on that very first week, and even as other people's companions started to look faster, smoother and sharper than you, I knew there was no way I would give you up without due respect and a proper farewell.

This is that farewell.  No, not so much a farewell as an I'll see you around.  I'll keep you close by, but the fact is that we've just aged differently and you're getting a bit old for this.  In truth, I don't think you enjoy it as much as before either.  It's all just part of life, my dear friend, and I know it's time to give you a rest.  My new pal isn't anything special yet, just newer.  He has a rechargeable battery instead of eating double As.  He's got more megapixels (not that it really matters).  These things happen with the passage of time, and it's nothing to mourn about.  We're both just moving on.  Thanks for everything, my dedicated buddy, I wouldn't trade the time we had for anything; the memories will last forever.

Korea: 8 Months In

Today marks my eighth month in Korea, so to acknowledge the this event I'm putting some pictures up here.  To say that I've been lazy and forgetful in terms of photos would be a vast understatement.  Not only do I forget to bring my camera (conveniently placed on a shelf by my door) everywhere, I also often tell myself that there won't be any point lugging it along for particular trips on the assumption that there won't be anything overly photo-worthy.  This assumption proves wrong again and again.  How many mountain hikes I've forgotten to take it on as I dash out the door in the morning to meet my ride, and subsequently how many breathtaking vistas I don't have any photo evidence of, I don't even know anymore (but I also forgot water once, so this ineptitude isn't limited to the camera).  Here are some choice shots that I like anyway.

See-sawing near the temple grounds.

Up to Speed

If you’ve been reading any of the posts previous to this one, I’ll inform you here that although they were written during my years in Japan (save for The Haunted Islands), they’ve all been pre-dated to their appropriate times of completion upon uploading to my blog, which was only established recently this year.  As lengthy as some of them were, I consider them to, for the most part, be somewhat shallow representations of my time in the country as they are concerned mostly with periods of travelling rather than with people, my work, everyday life, etc .  Be that as it may, I felt they remained fitting documents to form a sort of foundation for this blog, effectively bring me up to speed to where I am now.

The Haunted Islands

Japan has a long, delightfully shivery history of hauntings and ghost stories.  Many of these ghosts can be encompassed under the umbrella term obake (お化け), but come in all manner of disposition, from the troubled apparitions, the yuurei (幽霊) to the projected spirit called ikiryo (生霊), in which a severely jealous or angry individual's soul is able to leave the body and haunt the object of that persons suffering (this was popularized in the The Tale of Genji).  The world of Japanese ghosts is rather complex, with many different types and tendencies, so I won't elaborate any further on classifications.  Rather I'd like to share a few tales.

I love a good ghost story, and would often ask Japanese if they had any to tell.  Japan has it's own mix of believers and non-believers are far as ghosts go, but I found that with descriptions of truly strange phenomena, most people didn't seem intent on quickly explaining it away with what it could have been.  For example, one of my adult students who's family owns a hotel (and was therefore well experienced in the general inside nature of hotel management) informed me once that sometimes rooms that have some sort of bad history, for example a suicide, later are reported to experience certain, shall we say, disturbances.  To counteract this, a sort of charm consisting of holy Shinto writings (or Buddhist), can be placed somewhere obscure, commonly behind a picture frame.  She told me that if I ever saw a picture frame sticking out a bit from the wall of my hotel room I should look behind it.  I don't know if I'm a firm believer in ghosts, or even a believer at all, but I can safely say I'd either be getting a new room or not sleeping well that night.

There's no shortage of creepy stories passed around .  There's the couple that couldn't find a parking spot for the event at their child's elementary school one winter evening, forcing them to find one further down the road near a children's cemetery.  When they came back from the event there were small hand prints in the snow all over the car, even on the the roof.

More than one school has its teacher who stayed late at the school, and apparently heard children crying, or laughing, or singing, or the sound of doors slamming in the bathrooms or upper floors late at night, but when they went to check there was of course no one there.

There's that patch of coastline where, at a certain time of the year (I seem to recall it was during obon, the week of the dead) you should never visit or go in the water, but one time someone went anyway to take a picture and there were hundreds of hands reaching out of the sea in the photo.

At any rate, a lack of doubt, even if temporary, at the very least makes a good tale even more enjoyable, and chilling, to listen to.  I had a few haunting experiences of my own in Japan which I can't explain.  I can either chalk these up to extreme coincidence (and on one account peculiar animal behavior), but I'm satisfied with leaving them as they are: mysteries.  Einstein once said that "the most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious" and I have to say that in some situations I agree.  Whether you believe in apparitions or not, here are a few of my favorites, paraphrased, all shared with me as first hand accounts: