#33 More about Japanese religious cults

Transcript

An ambulance went by and it is the kind of funny to see in Chiba. Even though the ambulance is on its way down the street, if the walk sun comes on and you get time to scuttle across, people definitely do. I was just little things like that that make me curious. I was going to say in Canada, people usually just wait for the ambulance to go by, even if it's a ways down the street. But on the other hand, there's not that many pedestrians in Canada, people tend to be waiting because they're in cars. So it's different, different situation.

So anybody who may have missed last episode, so last episode ended on a bit of a strange note because I got roped into one of these weird, religion, modern sex of Buddhism, whole situations. I know the aim are about to add a bit more. I did some research about it. But I just got out of a sushi place for lunch with Norahiko, the guy who runs the Airbnb I met, who also took me to an izakaya the other day. And that guy's just the best. Did I just encounter balance? Yeah. Not only did we go to this super amazing sushi restaurant, that is around the corner from a McDonald's, which is just funny. It's like there's the McDonald's and you just go around the corner and you can have the most amazing sushi ever. I figured since I might not be to another one because I find it so hard to go to these places on my own, I just got the biggest thing. It was like $21 in a head tempura and just a bunch of different sushi. And he wouldn't let me pay for him, but he let me pay for myself. So our friendship has progressed to that point, at least. We're on even ground on paying for stuff. But that place is a good example of a place that I really don't think I would go to on my own, even now that I've been there once and I went through the process because it's not, I mean, I could make it work. It's not so complicated. Just a place where you go in, there's counters, we went further back to where there's tables and you order from the menu and I mean, maybe they have an English menu if you ask for one, but there was certainly no English anywhere, anywhere that I could see. But it was a very small menu. I guess because it was the lunch menu as well, he said. So I guess, yeah, that made it easier. There was only a few different items. So I just got the biggest one. Just give me as much stuff as you can. So I mean, even if you're full like me who can't speak Japanese, you could, I guess, just point to it. But I mean, I certainly would not have the gumption to do that. And then afterward, you know, you just pay for it. It's no big deal. But having somebody who's willing to take you is invaluable, is excellent. And I really hadn't seen them all week. That's what makes them double the perfect Airbnb host. Is he took me to these places on basically the first day and the last day I'm leaving tomorrow? But during the rest of the time when I just was exploring around doing my own thing, he just let me explore around doing my own thing. There's a lot of construction going on in this neighborhood. But yeah, during the week when I was just going to the shale mounds or getting roped into weird ceremonies or just trying to go to the beach in the middle of a windy night for some reason. On those days, he just is like, just do your thing. Do your own thing. Best of both worlds. Greatest Airbnb host ever. He actually has. You can tell this guy really cares about being a good Airbnb host. Like he used to travel all the time. He knows I just speak Spanish to some degree more than I can. And he has a guest book, which I'll have to fill out tomorrow. But he still has, he was showing me when me and Satura were drinking all his whiskey. He brought out his old guest books that dated back to 2016 when he first started the Airbnb. And anybody who had anybody who had a suggestion of how he could improve the Airbnb, as far as I could tell, they were all there. You know, he even has two different Wi-Fi things for the two different rooms. I'm in the communal room and there's a private room. I'm sure we could both work off the same Wi-Fi, but he even has one for each room. And yeah, he still has these books of everybody just saying nice stuff about him. And I'm certainly going to add to the fucking pile. One of those things as I was like drunk, I had to stop flipping through it because it was like making me sort of like, it's like, I'm going to cry about this. This is like so awesome, you know? This guy decided after 5:00 he retired, this is what I'm going to do. And he fucking knocked it out of the park.

But I'm back at his place now. He's off to have further adventures. I'm doing laundry adventures today, which now that I've been in Japan for a bit and just the pure novelty has settled down a little. These laundry days are some of my favorite days. They're nicely calming. Tomorrow I got to travel to Fukuoka. So there is a laundry mat around the corner, but I'm going to go further away to the cool one in the cool neighborhood I found that also allows me to use the detergent that I bought. So that's my goal for today. So yeah, I got more info I learned about the the religious stuff that I encountered yesterday. But I'll yammer about that as I go on my adventure. I just wanted to counterbalance it by saying like, well, this is kind of what they said with when I was looking up stuff about these religious people, it really does make sense that like one regitor guy said literally 999 times out of a thousand. If somebody just stops you at random like the guy who stopped me in the park, it's going to be for some weird religious thing because people just don't do that here. And that's certainly true. I mean people it's a toss up if they'll even acknowledge you at all. So particularly if you're a foreigner, if someone just stops you at random, you can very much assume it is not not just someone who wants to be your friend. There is an ulterior motive. But they also said, you know, that's fine. Just don't expect to just run into people at random and have that work out. You know, just meet people through something, just through someone else that you know or through a group or through a club or literally even if you go to when he's a guy, just start up a conversation with the table next to you. That's even that. It's just a normal person. But if someone stops you on the street, yeah, I mean, I didn't know what I was walking into and I don't regret it ultimately. But it very much literally is always going to be someone trying to get you into their religious thing. So it's good to know. But yeah, I'll talk about that more as I go and Nora Hiko near Chiba Station. I'm sure you can find his Airbnb listing with her too much trouble if you happen to be here. The exact antithesis. You know, weird religious people are going to leave you with a strange taste in your mouth no matter where you are. And it's kind of neat to just the very next day, just bounce right back like, oh yeah, here's a normal, here's a normal Japanese guy taking me to a sushi place and it's just great. It's like, there you go. There you go. That's nice. That feels better.

Hmm, I'm trying to get to this laundromat. I just bumped into a dead end and I was like, I'm not a dead end, but a road turning the wrong way. And then I saw someone emerge from this little path that I had not noticed that's going between some houses on one side with a wall. On the other side, other houses but blocked off with bushes. If I go this way, I'm heading toward the train tracks. Is this a sneaky way? Oh no, it's another dead end. Okay. Presumably the guy who came down that path probably lives in one of these houses, but that's another case where it feels like a video game. It feels like a person spawned here and walked out. Yeah, man, the layouts of Japanese cities are endlessly interesting. That's for sure.

So I took a little breather at the Airbnb before I grabbed my clothes to go to laundry. Just chilled out, caught up on some YouTube videos, figured I should let my gigantic sushi lunch settle a little bit. And then Norahiko, the guy who owns the Airbnb, he stopped in and he gave me a treat. He's like, yeah, it keeps that. There you go. Japanese candy. It's like two pancakes with bean paste in the middle. And at that point, I was full as heck, but now that I started walking around, I just ate it. It's like, what a delightful dude. I can't say it enough times. What a nice fella. All right, I got a loop around backwards, but then I think that'll take me to where I'm trying to get to. But yeah, also tomorrow, you know, I got to check out, I think 10 o'clock is the checkout time, but he's like, hey, don't worry about it. There's nobody else coming in that day. No big hurry. Take your time. Check out whenever you want. And I plan to go more or less on time because I love so much getting to the airport early. My flight's not till like 3.30, but 10:00 you know, time gets eaten up fast at the old airport. Now, I was trying to figure out this airline, peach air, fly peach. They're the same one I used in 2019 when I went to Fukuoka. And I remember it was a little bit of a to-do with the luggage. I did have to do some last minute maneuvering to make my carry-on bag fit the protocol. But I was just looking at the stuff and it's like, I don't think so. I think they've changed stuff. I don't know. I got to research it more when I get home, but I don't think there's any way I can avoid paying to check a bag.

And even then, I think I'm going to have to be, it's going to be a little tricky maybe even to make my bag actually, actually be light enough. I don't know. I don't have a scale around, so I can't say for sure how heavy all my crap is, but whatever I'll sort it out, but yeah, because I think the flights, they were like $55 American each way, which is pretty good deal. So Canadian, that's a bit more.

But I think I pretty much have to toss in an extra 25 bucks each way to check a bag. It's just so restrictive about the bags. Your carry-on luggage allowance is like, you know, it's like a purse, a tiny nap sack, maybe. Which I guess if you were just going to Fukuoka briefly, say that's what I was thinking because Noriko is such a such an accommodating dude that briefly crossed my mind, is like, I mean, I'm sure he wouldn't care if I just left my bag here for three weeks and came back and got it afterward. But then I'd have to make it three weeks in Fukuoka with just whatever, you know, I'm already pretty minimal, still living my life out of one bag. To bring only a third of that, I mean, you know, the reason I got this stuff is because I need it on some level. And even if it's stuff I don't directly need, it's like birth certificates and stuff. It's just easier to take all this stuff. Just pay for the stupid airline. But it is funny how fast you kind of change your your idea or I do of what things should cost. It's still a very cheap flight, but Canadian standards, I would love to get a flight this cheap. So I just got to keep thinking of it that way, keep reminding myself, like, this is not an expensive flight. The other option is like the Shinkansen, which I'm sure would be neat, but takes way longer and is like somewhere between three and four hundred dollars, not a nice two hour flight. So just pay to check the bag, yeah, dink. Just stop overthinking it. Everything doesn't have to be the cheapest price all the time.

So yeah, I did some research on the Buddhist guys that I met yesterday. So last episode has the long, rambly tail, where I was like, can fuzzled in the brain. It's like, I don't know what to think about this. But I mean, it was generally a pretty good experience, seemingly a lot better than what a lot of people have. To the point that, you know, I was looking at the stuff they gave me yesterday, which was this pamphlet with a big picture of Mount Fuji on it, which anyone who's familiar with these, I mean, the common term on Reddit is to call them cults, which I guess, I don't know. I don't know what constitutes a cult. But already, you're probably way ahead of me. You know what I'm talking about already. And they gave me this little booklet with the chant that we did, even though I can't read it. And like these prayer beads that are clearly plastic, you know, they probably cost like 30 cents. It's not a big deal. But wow, I was just looking at them and I was like, you know, this was an interesting evening. It was an unusual night. And I have very limited space for just random keepsakes. Basically, I've got like this cool little box that I bought some fancy chocolates from in Akiruno. And I've got a super cub keychain that I got from a Gacha machine in Ikebukura. And I was like, should I add one of these things? You know, these little prayer beads, I mean, there's a street fighter character that wears stuff like that, but doesn't necessarily mean much to me. I mean, I was just looking at it and I'm like, it is just mass produced. You know, they obviously give these out to everyone. It's not anything. And it really doesn't mean anything to me.

But ultimately, I did have a pretty neat evening, and all the parts that weren't about religion were legitimately fun, and these guys, they were not at all. They were just so nice to me. The whole time, all the way through, that I just kind of felt kind of bad that I'm like, I don't know. I guess I'm just going to throw this stuff out, but I don't know. But anyway, the thing that caught me thinking I should look into this a little more of like, what in the heck actually was this?

I'll tell you the name of this group. I had to write it down, of course. This is Ken Shokai, K-E-N-S-H-O-K-A-I. And apparently one of the things they do is they try to recruit people into their particular sect of Buddhism, particularly foreigners. What happened to me was not at all uncommon.

Maybe a foreign guy walking around or a lady or whatever, that's their target. And in hindsight, there were things, even though they really slowed the religious part. I knew something weird was going on. But it was like a couple hours before it became evident that it was religious stuff, and up until that point, we just had like a very natural, normal, pretty fun conversation. When I was a little weird, I was definitely wary and knew something strange was going on. And for some reason, the religion thing didn't cross my mind. But even when it did, as I was describing yesterday, the religious parts were just boring. They were really just boring, just kind of tiresome. It drained me of the will to care. But they still were so polite about it, they weren't pushy about it, they weren't... There's a lot of bad stories about people's interactions with this group, and I didn't have that at all. Everything was fine. Partially, I think that could be because everybody, if you read it on Reddit, it's always a very confrontational meet-up. Where, for me, it just wasn't, because I was kind of in the mode of like, oh, maybe I can just hang out with Japanese people, because I'd hung out with Norahiko and his friends at the Izakaya.

If anything, I kind of was like, yeah, let's just go. I kind of like sort of get what's going on here. Let's just go. Let's go to Coco's. Let's just hang out. I think the dude was a little almost taken aback, because this isn't supposed to go this easily. What's going on here?

And then even when it became clear that it was religious, and instantly, it's like a damp towel went over my brain. It's just like, oh, that's what this is. But they'd been so nice and so accommodating, and I just wanted to see what was going to happen. That even that, I didn't put up any fuss at all. No resistance. I was like, yeah, all right, let's go. Talk me through it. Let's do the thing.

So I think initially that I had no idea what was going on, so I had no reason to be defensive. That helped make the situation better. And then even once it became clear, it was this religious thing, I still didn't really know what was going on.

So again, I just went with it.

But I guess where I got lucky is seated through the conversation as I look back, there was all the stuff of, if they are going to try to sort of sign you up, however that, whatever that entails, there's, you know, stuff they want to know. They want to know your address, they want to know your phone number, they want to know your birthday. Maybe they want to take your picture.

In hindsight, a lot of that stuff was seated into the conversation. We got talking about birthdays somehow. This guy's birthday was at the end of January. The phone number thing came up at some point, but I was like, I don't have one. I just use Wi-Fi. I'm adrift at sea most of the time. I got nothing. Job stuff. I used Google Translate because I didn't quite know how to explain it, but I just said it inheritance money. No job, just traveling. Address. I was like, I don't know. I don't know my address. They didn't really know Airbnb, but they understood share house.

So I guess like this is all the stuff when you read other people's accounts. This is all the antagonistic stuff where they're kind of being pressured. These people from this group are trying to pressure them into joining and into giving up all this information. Where because I was just very naive about it, I wasn't at all trying to be protective. I wasn't at all on guard or defensive. I was completely open about everything they asked me. But because I'm an indigent weirdo, I just didn't have anything to give them. It's like, yeah, I don't have an address. I don't have a phone number. I don't have a source of income. I don't have anything that's useful. I don't have anything that you want. It turns out. And it might be as simple as the fact that I'm a traveler. 20:00 It could just be that they only want to try to recruit people who live in Japan, which would make sense. I mean, if I'm leaving, what's the point? But I do wonder if at the same time that it was slowly dawning on me, that this was some weird religious thing going on, I wonder if they felt the other side of that. Like, oh man, this really was too good to be true. We meet this foreign guy who's just willing to go along with everything. And he's not giving us any stick. And he's just going to do whatever we want tonight. But he's fucking useless. He's got nothing. He's just like a ghost person. Do you have a line? No. Like, I just had nothing. Do you have a phone? No.

And it's funny because online, there's all these techniques. Like, here's what you can do to deal with when these people come and harass you. Here's all these methods you can use to stymie them. Where I was being completely cooperative and not trying at all to be adversarial. But I stymied them just through the nature of my dumb life. I just am not useful. And a good example of that is even by the end of the night. Like, we left. Still, I'd say on quite good terms of like, I was like, hey, thank you. You know, I didn't fully mean this. I found the Buddhist part wicked boring. But the experience was still interesting, right? So I thanked them like, hey, thanks for taking me here. Thanks for letting me experience this. This is really great. And they were like, oh, make sure you remember the sacred words and remember the sacred scroll. And I was like, yeah, yeah, I'll remember. I will remember all this. Let's not get bogged down with details of how I'll remember it in what context I'll remember it. But I will remember it. And the one guy with the five kids is like, all right, say hi to your kids for me. You know, Adios. What was that one that you had for me? So, yeah, the whole thing was just fine the whole time. But the one thing I did have when they're going through the like, is there any way we can contact you in any, any freaking way? It was Instagram. And I was like, yeah, that one's pretty harmless. Because you know, at this point, still, it's not like, at this point, once I knew it was religious, I wasn't going to hand them over my info even if I had it. But I'm like, guy, Instagram, that's pretty harmless. You can look at my dumb pictures of random crap. That wouldn't hurt. So the guy dug out his Instagram. He clearly didn't use it much. And I do think this was maybe just a formality. At this point, I think the only reason he even went through the motions was just to keep things feeling normal. Right after the end. Because again, the guy even during the ceremony. Once I was in there and I was stuck in the tractor beam and it's too late to stop, he was still just very nice the whole time. Just really helping me through it. All these stories online of people's bad experiences, I really feel like I got lucky. Because I got the best possible experience with the Kenchokai you could ever have. Because the guy was just really nice. So maybe that's the only reason he even bothered with the Instagram thing. It's just because he just wanted to keep up the pretense to the end of like, let's at least pretend we were actually trying to be friends, you know.

It would be weird to not even ask. But it was just a pretense because as I was looking at these little chotch keys that he gave me trying to decide what to do with them, I fired up the Wi-Fi, you know, catch up on my notifications for the day on my phone.

And I saw the notification from that guy and when I clicked on it, it was user not found. I was like, what does this mean? What is going on? And it's because he blocked me. Like he, I feel like it's so weird because there's all these stories of people just getting endlessly harassed by that group. And there's another one that's very similar and then a bunch of other ones. There's a whole ton of them. And it's like once they get their claws in you, if you give them an inch, they just won't stop. They'll keep messaging you for months so they'll stop by your apartment and do all this crazy shit. Where I had the opposite. Instead of my worry that, oh, I hope I don't get harassed by the Kenchokai. It's like he didn't want me to harass him. Because I did see as he was firing up his Instagram, you know. It was his legit Instagram with pictures of his family and stuff. So he's just like, we got what we need out of this foreigner. I don't need this guy in my life. I don't need him messaging me later. Like I, I legitimately got rejected by the Fuji cult. What the heck? And I mean, I know I'm very lucky. I know this is the best outcome. This is the only good outcome. I wouldn't want to have any lingering connections or like, that I made some terrible mistake and now these people are in my life. 25:00 There's so many ways this could have gone bad. This is the best thing that could happen. They don't even want to talk to me. They're like, just get out of here now. But it felt so weird. It's like, oh, this is like when you first moved to the big city and you're like 19 and you go out clubbing. And you think that the random person who's talking to you, it's like they spent all night with me. We had a great time. We had a great fucking rapport. And then you find out all they wanted to do was make out and touch your butt because then they ghost you. It's exactly that. And it's like, yeah, of course it was. Of course it was. I'm just a random person. They stopped in the park. That's it. We weren't friends. I don't even want to be friends with random people. You know, I've got that string of people on social media that I only met one time. And it is like weird. It's like, I'm never going to meet these people again. But it's like, oh, it's just a kind of social politeness that you keep them on the thing. So it was weird enough feeling that, you know, it's like, I know logically this is the best outcome. But my ego felt a little sting. Of like, geez, I really was just a cog in the machine. I met nothing. Which of course, again, of course, logically, I'm just the guy in the park. I could have been anyone. But I was like, I need to figure out what the heck is going on here. Because this just feels so weird. What a weird feeling. What a strange experience. What in the heck?

Right, I met the tiny little, the tiny little laundromat where there's two of them around the corner from each other. There's literally one person in the other one and it's kind of full. But this other one, the machines are free. None of the dryers are. But then I guess there's the dryers around the corner too. So I'm going to use the machine to see what happens to see if I can get my hands on a dryer after.

But I mean, worst case scenario, I can just take my wet laundry back to my hood to the big laundromat and dry it there if I have to. All right, let me take a little laundry break.

All right, laundry in the machine. Half an hour to go. It's the little victories. It's still my favorite, the tiny things that I do successfully. You know, it's funny because I don't quite know why this is. Not to criticize my dear old Ma. She did come up in a bit of an odd household. 11, was it 11 brothers and sisters or 12? So many.

Irish Catholic, no money, tons of kids. It's like Dickensian shit. It's like from a different era. And I'm not quite sure how that informed this personality quirk, but she was just always, not only always doing all the work. Like, oh, I got to wash all the dishes though I got to do all the laundry. But really just like pretending that she had to do it all. Insisting like, oh, no one ever does anything around here. I got to do everything. But the reality was she went out of her way to do everything. I never knew how to do basic things like do laundry till I moved out. You know, and the irony is, I've never bothered to bring this up with her because why bother? But I like it. I like domestic activities. I like chores. I like doing laundry. I like it a lot, in fact. I like keeping a household together. I like it. I mean, yeah, this is the irony. I would have been doing the laundry. My whole fucking childhood. I would have enjoyed it. A nice little downtime to do laundry. And my mom literally never gave me the opportunity. Never. It was just automatically. I always have to do everything. It's like, all right, whatever. In some weird way, you like this. In some weird way, you like being the fucking laundry martyr. So go ahead. Go ahead then. But I know, in her mind, she had no choice but to do everything. Yeah, even just at this Airbnb, the other two folks who are from Columbia, I think I met them the first day and I haven't seen them since. But they used the kitchen area. They did some dishes, and they just let them in the sink. And it's like, yeah, maybe they're going to do these later. But Norahiko has been so ludicrously nice to me, that I don't know who knows different cultures, who knows how people approach things. Maybe they think that's for him to do. Maybe they think it's like, I'll just leave these and let the Airbnb guy do the dishes. So I did all the dishes. It's like, fuck it. I'll do it. I don't care. I like it. As long as it's not a mountain, as long as it hasn't gotten out of control, I like it. I like keeping a house together. 30:00 And that's one of the things I like about traveling. I like just having all my stuff in one little bag, and I like keeping everything organized, and it can never get too crazy. You know? I can only have so many dirty clothes because then I run out of clothes.

Keeping things organized? I don't mind at all. What is the point of that rant? I guess none. I'm doing laundry.

Oh, there's a Tully's brand T in this machine. I am tempted by the Tully's T, but I don't know where there's a washroom around here. And I'm going to be stuck here for a little while doing laundry, so I best not do that. But maybe after this, when I do go find a convenient, maybe I'll take a look for that Tully's T, eh? I mean, I know what it's going to taste like. All the tea kind of tastes the same, but it's, uh, is better good.

It's very sweet, but I like the tea better when it's sweet than I do the coffee. So anyway, what the fuck was I saying? Yeah, so what?

So I was like, I just need to look this up a little more. Like, whatever I inferred or, you know, like, I guess what I was assuming last episode was that this was purely a, a religious thing for them, you know, like it was a thing they do on their side to bring people to the church and do the ceremony. But they tried so little, they didn't pressure me at all, they didn't push at all, they didn't really grill me for information. Only in hindsight did I find, realized they were asking about stuff, but they never tried to get me to sign up for anything. Not only did they not ask me to come back with the Instagram thing, it became clear, they didn't want me to come back. They don't want to see me anymore. And they tried, I wasn't the right goose for them to pluck. And that was it. So I was like, what the heck is this? Let's try to figure it out. So I went on these reddit threads about these different groups. And the way I figured out that this one in particular was, let me check the name again, Ken Shokai, was like, I really didn't think it was because everyone else's experiences were so bad. Just these really pushy, really aggressive borderline crazy Japanese fucking religious people, harassing people at the Nikibukuro station or harassing people at their house. Not taking no for an answer, not shutting the fuck up, literally having to have the door slammed in their face. All these really crazy stories. And people call them the Fuji death cult because they have this one pamphlet with this very prominent image of Mount Fuji on it, and then just a bunch of writing and some old guy who's presumably a religious super guy.

But even just the name Fuji death cult, because then also if you google that, you'll probably come up with those guys who did the seren gas attacks in the mid-90s in the subway.

And it's not them, it's not nearly that severe. But the things that were common are fear of China, you know, because saying yesterday, the right winginess was getting more and more apparent as they talked. So that's a common theme. Is the fear of Chinese invasion, but again I even felt like the guy I talked to, he was the reasonable side of it where he was just talking about the encroachment of China attacking Taiwan and then attacking Okinawa. And you know, you'll lose an inch, you'll lose an inch and suddenly you're invaded by China. Which I mean, it's certainly not a crazy thing to keep an eye on China. I think that's safe to say. I think that's quite an erratic government they got going on over there. But the other thing was miraculous cancer recovery stories. In the case of the guy I talked to, he said he had super bad stomach cancer, supposed to die 20 years ago, didn't die, and then somehow it attributed the miracle in a way that I could not follow to the original Buddha of his religious beliefs. But there's like another lady who claimed she had like half of her face covered in a cancerous tumor and that went away like very unreal unbelievable stories. Oh, and along those lines, the other side, the crazy end of like the China attacks are like every single Chinese person in Japan is a sleeper agent. And once they give the order, boom, they're all going to turn and take over the government, take over the country. So again, I got the sensible version. Of all these stories. Oh, and even the basic setup is always the same. 35:00 It's always a group of two people. They always have backup and they do very often ask, hey, hop in the car. Let me drive you somewhere. Let me take you for food. It's all common stuff. But I got, again, I got the guy who his particular views on things were a lot more moderate, even though they were along the same lines. And the two hours we spent getting into it were legitimately fun. I told all these weird dick jokes and stuff and like legitimately a fun guy to hang out with seemed like a good cool guy, which I guess made it sting all the more that he didn't want to be my Instagram friend, which again, I know it's better than he doesn't. It's much better than he doesn't. But I feel like a scorned high school girl or something like I can't believe he went on that date with me just to make out with me. Oh, could imagine such a thing. It feels, it feels very much like that. It's very stupid to feel that way. Well, that's where it was so nice too that Norahiko first thing this morning was like, hey buddy, what are you up to today? Let's go get sushi. You know, have a nice normal experience with the Japanese guy who actually does want to be your friend just like to right away write the things that once went wrong. God bless you, Norahiko, you're a good man.

But yeah, all these things there were enough similarities that is like, I think this is the same thing. It's just that my experience was actually kind of fun and not that bad and everyone else was terrible. And then the clincher though is they're like, yeah, we call them the Fuji death cult because they always hand out this one pamphlet and there was a link to it. And it's like the moment of suspense, click on it, click on it, don't, there it is. It's the exact same one he gave me. And it's like, damn, all right, well, that is what was happening. That is what these people were. They were members of the Ken Shokai Buddhist cult. You know, I even feel weird calling it a cult because everyone else's descriptions sounded like a cult. Sounded like you're just dealing with people you don't want in your life. And in my case, it was just, I don't know, just a religious guy trying to spread his religion. It really didn't seem that bad. But ultimately, yeah, it's quite a weird. I do think it's quite weird. I think I mean, all in all, I've just had most of my talk about luck on this trip has been about the weather. Can't believe how nice the weather is. I feel so lucky. I just got a message from my Airbnb guy, Fukuoka, that it's 20 fucking degrees there. It's like, holy fuck, amazing. But also, even going to the Izakaya, where it was me, two Japanese people with a little bit of English. And then the Japanese guy who grew up in America with perfect English, Norahiko mentioned that he's like, you know, I think that's quite a rare setup, you know, to have someone there who could interpret English so easily between us all. And I was like, yeah, I think you're right. I think I got very lucky there. It was very, very nice. Or even seeing Fuji. I have not seen Fuji again while I've been in Inchiba. And just this morning, Norahiko said that too. He's like, I think you got lucky. I think that's a rare thing as well. And with the Kenchokai Fuji Death Cult, I got like lucky and very strange ways where I was initially lucky that I was so absolutely ignorant about what was going on. So I just approached it with good will, with openness, which made it fun initially. Because if I knew then what I know now, I never would have talked to the guy. Like, no, thank you. I just presume you're crazy. And this is stupid and get the fuck out of here. And that would have been the end of it. And in the future, I think that is how it's going to go. I'm certainly not going to do this friggin' world again. But then when it became clear, I was in the clutches of the creepy cult. Even then, just I just like luck sacked my way through it that I just didn't care about signing me up. They're like, we're not going to harass this guy. This guy's useless. Traveling idiot with no job and no phone. Doesn't know his own goddamn address. Whatever. Just get out of here, you get out of here, you first come in, sit through a long lengthy fucking chant. Let me get a certificate, you know. I still want to score the brownie points. I still want everyone to see that I brought you. And, well, that's the thing is that I think it's both things. I think he did just want to do it, you know, to get a little return on his investment. And to get, like, apparently, you do have quotas, you know. Maybe he's like, I got to bring in so many people this month. Doesn't matter if I don't land them all. Just, you know, if everybody sees I brought in this guy and I get the certificate, that's still something. But once everything was in flow and then after it was all done, he did not need to be nice anymore. There's no need to. And he was just real nice and genuine feeling the whole time. So I do think on top of just wanting 40:00 his brownie points, I do think he thinks he was like helping me, you know, that he's like helping helping teach me the magic word, helping introduce me to the magic scroll, helping to scrub my soul or whatever the hell they do. You know, on some level, I think he did think he was helping. He wasn't, it wasn't just, it wasn't just a cynical, religious thing. It was also, you know, I don't believe in any of this shit, but it's like, it's still, it's nicer to think. I don't want to just think that this guy just sucked, because I just don't think he did. I think he's just religious, you know? It doesn't make him a bad person. It just makes him fucking nuts. Which he said that about himself. He's like, I'm crazy. It's like, yeah, you are though. You really are. You don't want to, it turns out it wasn't a joke. But I just can't really hold it against the guy. I don't dislike him. So really the nicest way that he could end the whole thing off is just block me on Instagram and that's the end of it. Even that, you know, he was nice to the bitter end. But I don't know, that may have been a particularly rambly as the last episode was too, because I just still don't know how to feel about the whole thing. It's just weird. It was just a weird experience. That's really the best I can say about it. But I do think for anyone else in these situations, I don't think you should test your luck probably. I think you should probably just keep on walking. You should not not go down this route, because I think I just got lucky that it went so well for me. Because these other stories just look them up, man. Look up the Reddit stories about people being accosted by Buddhist cults. And, man, some of these cases, it's like, Jesus, these people just won't take no for an answer. Sounds terrible. Sounds the worst. And then again, there's the occasional rare story of, yes, I'm hot chick, you know, inviting me out for drinks, and we made out. And then I found out she was one of the church members. And it's like, yeah, well, okay, that's not the worst story I've ever heard of my life. But even still, approach it your own fucking, it's your own peril. I'm going to go check out my laundry. All right, laundry all done. Sun's down, final night in Chiba. You know, I definitely would say, I'll stick to my guns that Chiba is prettier at night, because even walking down this street, I was like, is this, is this the gorgeous boutique street I was on the other day when I found these laundromats and marked them on my map? It sure didn't seem like it, but there were the laundromats, but now that the sun's down and I'm heading back, it's like, yeah, here we go. Yeah, this is it, all right. It just looks way, way better at night. And I'd say that kind of fits to, I was going to say downtown, but I think maybe it's the reverse. I think downtown in Japan means the old part of town. So I don't know what the fancy pants part is called. Is that uptown? Is it something else? I don't know. But down by Chiba station with the monorail and the canals, it's pretty good in the daytime, but also better at night. Just freaking beautiful at night.