Hitching Rides with Buddha: A Journey Across Japan

by Ferguson, Will

“Hokkaido has good mountains,” said Saburō. “You’ll like it there. Lots of horses. Open ranches. My daughters and my wife and I”—he was surrounded by women; perhaps that was why he was so manly—“we went horseback riding in Hokkaido. The horses were fast and strong.”

  “How about the people? I’ve heard they’re very friendly in Hokkaido.”

  He shook his head. “No. Not friendly at all. You know what they say: cold weather, cold hearts.”

  The highway grew wider and the traffic grew steadier. Soon we came out onto the plains, and a tableland of green spread out before us. And at that moment I realized what it was that made the Japanese landscape so jarring: there were no foothills. Having lived in a mountainous landscape for a hundred generations, where farmland is always at a premium, the Japanese have reclaimed land from the sea and have honed and tilled and flattened every available space until there are almost no transitional areas left. The flat patchwork of rice fields stretches out to sudden walls of mountains, and the two meet at near ninety-degree angles. In Japan, you go from cultivated horizontal to forested vertical without a sense of melding: a land of foreground and background, with little in the middle distance.

  Matsuyama City sprawls out in just such a vast plain. The largest city on Shikoku, the main port and industrial centre, Matsuyama is a gravity well that sucks in trade and traffic in every direction. Saburō dropped me off on the outskirts. He had to get to the airport in time for his mountain-climbing, jet-setting daughter to arrive. I would have liked to have met her, to get another angle on this odd, flower-intoxicated, god-discerning family, but it was not to be.

  I asked Saburō for his address, but he waved my notebook aside. He was the first and only person I met during my travels who refused.

  “If you come through Uwajima again, you know where to find me: at the Nakamura flower shop. Nakamura. Remember that. It means ‘middle village,’ and that’s where you can find us. If you come, we’ll talk. If you don’t come, there is no point keeping contact. I only gave you a ride. You don’t need to write or anything.” He swung the door shut, and a sickly sweet aroma of flowers swirled around him.

  And so, Saburō the pilgrim drove away, leaving me standing beside the road, grateful but slightly baffled.

  That night, I dreamt I was hitching rides with Buddha. We were standing on a highway flooded with flowers. When we held out our hands, pebbles fell from our palms.

  11

  MATSUYAMA CITY began as a castle town and a castle town it remains. The original structure was built in 1603, but it kept getting hit by lightning and it burned down several times over the years. (Once again, the fact that they had built a large wooden structure with a metallic roof atop the highest outcrop of land never seemed to bother anyone.) The turrets and outer walls are authentic, but the main keep was last restored in 1854, making Matsuyama the youngest of Japan’s twelve extant castles. It is also the most attractive. Other castles are grander, others are older, and others are more important, but none are as beautiful or aloof as Matsuyama Castle, dubbed “the Black Crane Fortress.” It manages to be both elegant and ominous, like a suit of samurai armour laid out for a waiting lord.

  In the early twilight, I slid into the city’s nocturnal prowl. A bevy of office girls swept by. “No! She didn’t! Did she? I can’t believe it!” Touts and arm-grabbers outside the sex shops ignored me (being a Westerner, I was no doubt stricken with AIDS), but eyes caught mine as I passed, masks behind masks. I wandered into a bar building, one of the many that have compartmentalized the Japanese experience. The typical bar building is several stories high and divided into separate apartment-like rooms, each containing a single pub—though pub is perhaps too grandiose a word for something the size of a large walk-in closet. As I climbed the stairs, a burlesque of drunks staggered by, yelling and laughing and slurring each other’s names. The plaintive caterwauls of karaoke songs bled from behind doors, disembodied like spectral voices in a house plagued with singing ghosts of limited talent.

  A pink-and-purple sign above one door glowed, in English, PHOENIX SNACK. Another announced, BLUE LOVE SNACK. Another, simply THE SNACK. Many first-time visitors to Japan, and I was one, mistakenly assume that a place advertising “snack” will serve, well, snacks. But the meaning has been adapted just a bit. In Japan, snack doesn’t mean “light repast,” but rather “tiny bar without set prices where the hostess can charge as much as she damn well pleases so if you wander in you might as well paint a bull’s-eye on your forehead, you poor stupid fool you.” The only snacks these places usually serve are plates of peas and dried squid.

  Inside the Phoenix, a small knot of young company men were being served and flattered by a middle-aged hostess. A bartender in a white shirt and bowtie manned his tiny domain, and a group of well-presented young ladies were taking turns on the karaoke machine. A woman in a bank teller’s blazer was belting out an English-infused pop song (“I’m just a woman. Fall in love.”), accompanied by the stiff rhythmic claps and polite smiles of her friends.

  “Sing! Sing!” cried the salarymen once they had spotted me.

  The men, faces beet red and neckties loosened in reckless abandon, insisted that I honour the room with a tune. So I launched into my prize-winning version of “Blue Suede Shoes,” for which I was awarded free beer and octopus. Encouraged, I belted out a rousing rendition of “You Ain’t Nothing But a Hound Dog” followed by a stunning interpretation of “Jail House Rock,” after which they asked for their microphone back.

  12

  TO THE EAST of Matsuyama is Dōgo, the oldest spa in Japan. Dōgo has a three-thousand-year history that begins with a wounded heron nursing itself back to health in its waters (a common legend; the hot springs of Yunotsuru near my home in Minamata makes a similar claim about a wounded crane). People were bathing at Dōgo before the time of Christ, before the birth of Buddha, before the conquests of Genghis Khan. So I decided to add my own sorry carcass to the pool.

  I took the tram to the end of the line in a neighbourhood crowded with inns and private baths. The main bathhouse at Dōgo was a wonderfully jumbled affair, built up on top of itself with a small watchtower peering out, crowned with a greening copper figure of a heron. It was a wet, dank world within. Centuries of steam had penetrated the very walls, and the baths were murky and filled with people soaking in the heat. I eased myself into the alkaline waters and closed my eyes. I almost wished I had been walking across Japan rather than hitching rides; a hot bath is always best when you are weary and full of aches.

  The higher up you go in Dōgo, the more expensive the baths. I stuck to the mid-range, far enough from the plebs to keep my dignity intact, but low enough to keep my pocketbook from being completely emptied. On the top floor, the gold-leafed yōshinden baths are specially reserved for the Imperial Family, should they ever drop by for a dip. A haiku post is available for suddenly inspired bathers. I floated over and added one of my own, but I couldn’t come up with a final line:

  early spring—

  a single road

  I tried to compose an ending, but the heat was making me lightheaded, and when I stood up the room began to swim, my heart fluttered, I staggered into a wall, and the haiku remains incomplete.

  With a thinned-blood, post-bath, anemic waver in my step, I made the long hike out to Ishite-ji, the temple where the stone that was found in the newborn baby’s hand, signalling Emon Saburō’s reincarnation, was on display. The temple was crowded with pilgrims and tourists, often hard to distinguish between, and I was soon in a cranky mood. My shirt was sticking to me in a sweaty embrace as I queued up to get inside, and the warm glory of the bath had now turned into prickly heat and a headache. Straw sandals hung in heaps throughout the temple grounds, many left by weary travellers as far back as the Meiji Era.

  Few people make the trek on foot these days, and the temple was filled with wave after wave of bus pilgrims, what the flowershop owner had described as “instant henro.” It was a surreal sight: the pilgrims, decked out
in spotless white vests, arrived in air-conditioned motor coaches with their pilgrim’s staffs kept by the bus door like umbrellas in a stand.

  I tried to imagine equivalent tours in the West: middle-aged Americans dressing up like cowboys to visit the Alamo, or British tourists donning clunky suits of armour and then taking a bus to the Tower of London. It didn’t make any sense. So why do the Japanese do it?

  Well, you’ll be glad to know that after years of research, often late into the night, I have come up with four possible explanations:

  The Romantic Explanation: The Japanese want to experience the journey to its fullest, to immerse themselves in it—even temporarily. Assuming the wardrobe of a henro is simply a way of attaining a deeper understanding.

  The Cynical Explanation: Japan is a hollow doll, a land of superficial ritual divorced from any deeper significance; tourists dressing up as though they were pilgrims only illustrates how shallow and divorced from authenticity the Japanese have become.

  The Realistic Explanation: It’s simply a cultural trait. In Japan, uniforms are very important. One assumes a role by the uniform one wears, and at times the line between uniform and costume is a fine one.

  And the Will Ferguson Explanation: Why? Because it’s fun. It’s fun to dress up, and hey, it’s easier to be silly in numbers. Think of The Rocky Horror Picture Show or Halloween. If I wear wooden clogs and short pants to Holland, I look stupid, but if everybody does it, it becomes a tradition. The bus pilgrims are like a travelling Shriners convention. Kōbō Daishi is just an excuse.

  I asked one of the Cup Noodle henro “Why do you dress like that?” And the lady replied, “Because we are pilgrims. This is how pilgrims dress.” In other words, it just is. It was as good an answer as any.

  “Do you think Kōbō Daishi would approve? I mean, the air-conditioned hotels, the four-star restaurants?”

  She laughed. “The Daishi cares about everyone, even us. Even you.”

  “I’m not on a pilgrimage. This is the only temple on the circuit I’ve visited.”

  “Well,” she said. “It’s a start.”

  13

  WHEN IT CAME TIME to escape Matsuyama, I took a streetcar north to the ferry port and was immediately lost in a confusion of timetables and departure schedules. There were actually three separate ferry ports to choose from, and I wasn’t even sure I was in the right place. Perplexed, I sat hunched over a timetable trying to figure out the cheapest, soonest, and most scenic way to cross the Inland Sea to the main island of Honshu.

  When I finally managed to line up the times with the destinations, I realized that the ferry I wanted was leaving now. I had thirty seconds to make it. Grabbing up my baggage, I made a mad dash for the pier. They said it couldn’t be done! And they were right. I watched the ferry roll free of the port and, tooting its horn in a mocking way, turn out to sea.

  Cursing, I waded back into the world of schedules. It was in the middle of this escalating mood of aggravation that a small voice appeared beside me.

  “Excuse me,” it said. “May I practise my English with you?”

  This happens now and then. Usually, I try to be a good sport, but at inopportune moments like this it is difficult. The man, a pinch-nosed professor type, began reeling off a string of questions. They must have a checklist or something.

  “Where are you from? What is your name? Do you have a hobby?”

  “Look,” I said, “I’m a little busy right now. I’m trying to—”

  “How old are you? What is your blood type? Are you married? What is your salary?”

  “My salary?”

  “Yes, I hear that you foreigners make too much money in Japan.”

  “Well,” I said, “in my country it is considered rude to ask someone—especially a stranger—how much money he makes.”

  “Three hundred thousand yen a month? Four hundred thousand? Five hundred thousand?”

  Here I was, folding and refolding my maps, trying to figure out my next move, and this nattering gnat of a man was trying to engage me in a dialogue about my income. He spoke what I call Random English, dictated more by the abrupt firing of synapses than by anything approximating a plan.

  “Foreigners can’t eat pickled plums,” he said. “And you are very racist. In America, you treat the blacks bad just because they aren’t as intelligent as other people.” (How do you respond to something like that?) “And you killed all of the Indians.”

  I sighed. “There are still Indians in North America.”

  “No there isn’t. I saw a show on NHK. You killed them all.”

  At this point I decided to simply ignore him in the hope he would just shut up and go away. Or burst into flames and run screaming from the building. Either would have been fine.

  “In America,” he said, “the workers cannot read and write. This is why you are having problems with productivity.” He smiled sweetly at me, as though offering fatherly advice. “But I like Clint Eastwood. Do you know Clint Eastwood?”

  “Not personally.”

  “I like very much the Macaroni Westerns. Do you like?” And then, in a sudden shift: “Tell me, when writing a letter, do you use P-S or B-S at the end? I understand that one is considered slang and the other is a way of—”

  “It’s P-S.”

  “B-S?” he asked.

  “P-S. P as in pneumonia and s as in psychotic.”

  “Ah,” he said. “I see.”

  I said nothing. I was now actively ignoring him, if such a thing is possible.

  “Perhaps my English is very poor,” he said. “You see, I am under the weather.” He waited for sympathy and, receiving none, continued. “I am a headache,” he said.

  Yes, you certainly are.

  Then, as I was just about to roll up my maps and climb on the next ferry regardless of where it was going, I noticed that Shōdo Island was circled in red several times on my map. Mr. Migita, back when we were plotting my ascent of Japan, had made special, forceful mention of this island. Beside it on the map, I had written a cryptic note: circles. What did this mean? I was suddenly struck by an irresistible urge to find out. The island was at the other end of the Inland Sea entirely. To get to it, I could take a coastal ferry, or I could hitchhike along the north shore of Shikoku and then make a short hop across.

  “—and that was when I decided to study English conversation,” said the little man beside me, winding down some story or other.

  “Tell me,” I said. “Is the northern coast of Shikoku scenic? Is it worth travelling along?”

  “Oh, yes,” he said. “Very beautiful.”

  That settled it. I thanked him for the scintillating conversation and caught a streetcar back into town.

  14

  IT WAS HOT on the road out of Matsuyama. The day was swimming with humidity, fetid and sticky. There was a film of muggy sweat on everything. The palm trees hung limp in the heat like wilted flowers. Even the buildings seemed to perspire. I walked along the highway under a scalding sky that was white with haze, my face as slick with perspiration as a honey-glazed doughnut.

  “Thank God,” I said when a car finally pulled over.

  Yoshiaki Kato was a telephone salesman who had recently gone into business for himself. Because he spent a lot of time on the road, he knew all the best routes. He made endless detours, meandering through countryside up along the Sakura-sanri highway, where the cherry blossoms blanketed the road. “I haven’t had time to attend a single hanami party,” he said, which I found odd until I realized that as a self-employed businessman, he would be outside the company cocoon. It struck me as a sad price to pay.

  We passed through a cloudburst of petals and for one freefall moment it really did feel like I was surfing across Japan on a wave of flowers. “You have come at just the right time,” said Mr. Kato. “The sakura in the Matsuyama area come sooner than elsewhere in Shikoku, and today they are at their peak. There was a special bulletin on the news announcing this.”

  I loved that. A special bulletin
for flowers.

  Mr. Kato, meanwhile, wanted to give credit to some of the lesser-noticed flowers we passed. “Do you see those roadside fields?” he asked. “Do you see the wildflowers? We call them nano-hana. They grow throughout this area. You know, I often stop to gather some for my wife.”

  I was touched by this, and I almost leaned over and gave him an “aw shucks” sort of punch on the shoulder, when he explained: “Those flowers are delicious. My wife fries them in oil. Wonderful.” He smiled and then, seeing a somewhat disturbed look on my face, hastily added “Of course, we put salt on them before we eat them.”

  Of course.

  Mr. Kato was only going as far as Tōya City, but we had already passed it, skirting the southern edge. “I’ll take you through the next town,” he said, and on we drove, captives of momentum.

  Finally, east of Komatsu Town, he pulled into a highway rest centre, one of those vast parking lots anchored by a restaurant. What followed was truly embarrassing. Mr. Kato, suddenly shy in a crowd, tried to arrange a ride for me against my repeated protests. We walked through the parking lot, past row after row of cars, until he found one with Osaka licence plates. (Although I wasn’t going to Osaka, it was in the direction I was headed.) He then approached a surly father and his burly son (Surly and Burly). The man muttered “No” without even looking up from his newspaper, and his son stared at us with thick lids and a bland bovine expression. Making elaborate, bowing apologies, Mr. Kato backed away and then, under his breath, muttered, “Osaka.” He next approached a startled older man coming out from the washroom, but as Mr. Kato explained the situation—“He has come all the way from America looking for a ride”—the old gentleman’s eyes filled with fear and I declined on his behalf.