#65 Exploring Ome, Tokyo, Japan

Transcript

Alright, I'm leaving the restaurant at the bottom of the Airbnb. Uh-oh, I feel a blister on the toe.

Bad signs happen today, but... Alright, I'm leaving the little restaurant that my Airbnb is above.

But this is different. It's still dark out. It's dusky. I've seen this little glow on the horizon, many a time.

As I look down the street, you know, there's like buildings everywhere. But if you look way down the street, you can see the little glow of the sun. So I see that all the time because it gets dark here in Japan in December at like five o'clock.

But today's the opposite, because I woke up at like five thirty in the morning.

And now it's a little after six. So the sun's coming up. I've never seen the sun come up in this... For this whole run, I've been in Japan. I've not been up for the sunrise. And this isn't exactly watching the sunrise from like the gorgeous, like a beautiful mountain of Shrine or something. This is just walking through the city, but whatever, man, I'll fucking take it. So yesterday I went to the steps from the movie Your Name. And I was surprised how much I liked it. I'm like, man, being here is actually really cool. For just a random set of stairs, it's sort of a moving experience. It was sort of like, oh, here we go. Now I'm going across a bridge. That's a better view.

That's a better view of the sun coming up. That's kind of pretty. Looking down, down the river.

It's like the sun has still got a ways to go. It's pretty dark out there. And then in the other direction, it's like normal night time, you know. It sort of looks like bluish night behind me. Or normally night time in Japan is just like frightening. It is so dark.

But yeah, going to those steps, I was like, man, that's actually really nice. And I rewatched that movie last night and it really holds up. It's a really good movie. So it kind of got me thinking that I do feel a little bit trapped in a way. I mean, it's good to be in central Tokyo. Like I got to those Your Name steps very easily. But if I wanted to leave, if I wanted to get to the edges, to the outskirts, to some nature, that's very hard to do. But going to those steps and then watching the movie, it kind of put me in the mindset of, you know what? Just be with the city. Just stick with the city. While you're in the city, then just be in the city. Don't try to fight it. Maybe I'll go back to that neighborhood today. Maybe I'll just soak it in because just walking around for the afternoon was pretty cool.

However, then I woke up at 5.30 in the morning. And I should have tried to go back to sleep because, I mean, I went to bed, I think, a little before midnight. So that's some sleep, but not enough. And then I always have my little routine where all my stuff is in the exact right spot. But somehow my phone that I always use maps with must have fallen out of my pocket where I always put it because I couldn't find it. And it's just such a, such a clear sign that I'm like, oh yeah, I'm pretty fucking tired because I was getting very fucking annoyed. Because all I've got is this one little bunk. Everything is right here. Where's the phone? What the fuck? And I had to like, yeah, just like literally take everything that I own and every blanket and every whatever. And just move each thing one at a time, one at a time, one at a time, until finally I found it under a blanket or something.

All right, heading into Sumiyoshi station. So yeah, I was like, this is such a clear indicator that I am tired and easily annoyed today. And I shouldn't be doing this. I didn't really sleep enough. But fuck it. Fuck all of that. Fuck going back to bed. Fuck all the stain in the city bullshit. I'm fucking out of here. The only question is am I going to my original plan was Ome. I always wanted to go to Ome station. I haven't been there yet. Or I could go to the end of the line in Akigawa.

But I mean, if I do that, that's like the waterfall plan. I don't know. I don't know. I'll just start. It's going to take two hours. So I'll just start heading west and I'll decide as I go. Yeah, fuck it. 5:00 The best laid plans right or no fucking match for an idiot who decides like, I don't need to sleep. Fuck sleeping. Sleeping and go to hell. And it's like, yeah, all I got to do is get on this same train that I took yesterday to get to the, uh, your name steps. Just keep going a little bit further to Shinjuku station. And then just get on one of them. West really trains. And yeah, two hours sounds long. It's not that long. It goes by so fast. And I'm going against traffic. Everybody's coming into Tokyo in the morning. And I'm leaving.

So these trains should be pretty empty is the theory. I could really use a coffee too. But wait till I get to Shinjuku station for that. For that freaking nonsense. Okay. Him at the turn style. Wish me luck.

Well, I'm walking through a bunch of old-style houses, really old-style Japanese houses. And there's very strong smell of incense coming from somewhere.

Just to set the scene. But the good news is I got off the train at Ome station, which I've just always had my eye on. And I've never been to. And the good news is as soon as I got off, I'm like, this is pretty beautiful. Just all these mountains and the trees all over the, you know, tree covered mountains. Oh, man, I can already tell this is not going to be my sharpest episode. Yeah, it seems really beautiful out here. Now I'm walking through this nice quiet neighborhood. I passed the incense smell, but I'm going by like an old cemetery.

Because yeah, woke up at 5.30 and was like, fuck yeah, dog, let's do this. Let's go on an adventure. So it's nine, a little after nine a.m. and I'm, I'm there now. I made it cost about $11 for the trip, I think.

But yeah, I think this plan can only be characterized as extremely fucking stupid. What the fuck? This is way too far to go. I'm just like, one way, I don't know what it is. I really think it must be being at this Airbnb that's like little bunks packed in with people. I think I just, I'm not comfortable sleeping there. It's the only explanation that I just keep staying up all the time. And yeah, I was just thinking about that impulse I felt this morning. I wake up at 5.30 and it's just like, hey, hey, you know what we should do? We should just fucking go.

Because then I was thinking, as I was on a train, struggling to stay awake.

It's like, would I have had this impulse if I was in one of those little apartments in Fukuoka or in the little apartment in Akigawa. Like any of the places where I just have my own room, my own little bed, my own little door I can close, I don't think so. I really think it is just that feeling of like how there's people all around here. And soon they're going to wake up. And soon it's going to be the circus of everybody trying to use the showers and blah, blah, blah. I could just get up right now. I could just get up and get the fuck out of here while everyone else is still asleep. What a great idea. I'll run about. I'll steal it. No one will ever know. Oh, my poor brain.

And really, it's not physical. Like, physical-wise, I feel fine. I stood, had to stay in most of the time on the train. Now it's time for a big long walk. None of that's a problem. It's really the brain is the problem with not sleeping.

But yeah, at that Airbnb, I was saying how you can kind of get the feeling. Well, I dug up, did a little research on the place and realized it had been around about five years. And you just get the feeling that, like everybody really put their all into it in the initial setup. And now that it's five years later, you know, it's a little half-ass. Things are just a bit shaky. Things are kind of falling apart. The processes are not going as smoothly as they clearly did at the start. And now that I've been there for a week or whatever, you can really see the turnover, the grind of running a place like that. Because like I show up and I'm at this new place and it's like, I don't know, everything should be just right. Shouldn't it? I can just criticize every little thing that's not quite proper. Because I'm special, because I'm staying at this Airbnb and everything should be just right for me, right? 10:00 But I was just thinking with specifically just the person underneath me.

Oh, here's a machine with nothing in it, a million super shop empty. I'm passing a 7-Eleven, but I'm really not hungry. I do have one little coffee tucked away in my pocket. I got to assume I'm just going to find stuff on my journey. I think I'm fine, but I don't know. I'm not sure how this is going to go. Anyway, just purely based on the person underneath me is obviously the person that I'm keeping closest tabs on. The first person was the nightmare, super snores. One of them was a mega snorer, the other one a normal snorer, and there was two of them in there for some reason. And that was weird, because that was the one where the person on the top bunker crossed for me also snored.

It's like sympathetic snoring or something, because I haven't had anyone snore to any major degree, teeny little snores ever since then. When I first arrived, it was just fucking, it was like a war going on. They were dropping the fucking air raid siren bombs, and it's just like snores, snores, snore, fuck you. You're never going to get to sleep.

But then that horrible situation dissolves, and then I got, it seemed like a nice enough guy, but some dude who was always preening himself and peppering his body in the sense of, you know, a lot of time in front of the mirror and such and such, but that's fine, I don't care, do that. It was the wearing strong cologne before you go to bed, part that I was found a little suspect. That was a little weird. But then he disappeared, and then there was somebody who sounded kind of German-ish, but I only heard them say one thing. I just heard them ask like, is it okay if I turn off the light to somebody? That was my non-distinct accent, that's not actually what they sounded like.

And I think that person was only there for one day, because then I got in yesterday, pretty early, because I didn't stay out late. And I just hopped straight up in my little bunk, so again, I'm just hearing people. But then it was like, I think as a girl beneath me, but I think the person on the bunk across from her was with her, and somebody, anyway, they were talking about time zones. Oh, what time is it compared to where you all might? There was, I think it was the couple that were Australian, and I got to say and do respect this about Australians. Brand new place, brand new people, they're just talking to her or whatever. Hey, it's fucking seven hours from here. Yeah, I like to throw it in the casual swearing. I love that. I respect that.

North America is at a very weird middle ground with swearing, where I love swearing, but I still feel like, maybe I shouldn't be swearing all the time. People give me shit about swearing. Dude, I mean, fucking, well, then the other guy was British, and he didn't say any, I don't think he swore in the little stuff that I heard, but you know, I wouldn't put it past him, and it didn't bother him. Just like that about Englanders and especially Australians. I can't, they don't give a fuck, it's nice.

But yeah, oh, seven hours ahead. One more fucked up. It's like, bitch, I'm 12 hours ahead. 13, if you're fucking account for a time change, that's nothing. But instead of opening my little flap and joining in on the commit thing, I just fucking stayed in my little bunk and I watched your name instead.

All right, this is the time I river. I've walked down to, I saw that there's a park near here. With one of those nice little green lines that denotes pedestrianism. But wait a second, maybe this bridge isn't what I was looking for.

No, okay, yeah, this must be it. So, Kemenafuchi Park appears to be where I'm going. I just figured just to start off with, whatever, this seems good enough. Let's see what this is.

And yeah, the Tama is the river that you have to cross to get to Akigawa.

So this is where it starts, or at least earlier, in the river, up north here by Ome.

And there's a hotel over here. Good old hotels are everywhere.

Oh man, yeah, this was, I mean, this is fine. You know, this is a weird plan.

I really should have gone to bed even earlier if I was going to do this. I mean, I can't believe how early I got up, it was silly. But there's like one fisherman on this river. 15:00 Nobody else, just nice and quiet. And no one's around. This is great, this is just what I want.

But yeah, the fact that there's been like four different cycles of people all the way through just that one bunk in just this week or so. It's like, oh yeah, I mean, multiply that by five years. No wonder nobody gives this shit anymore. I wouldn't either. You know, it's very hard to keep giving a crap, I think. Especially when it is just such a sort of faceless process. You're not really meeting people. It doesn't matter. Just like whatever. You just got to keep your hair being be going good enough that you don't get bad reviews. And then that'll do. So when you look at it that way, I'd say they're actually doing a pretty good job. So what if there's a fucking fridge that doesn't work? I wasn't going to use it anyway. Who gives this shit?

I speak too soon though. Sure, there's nobody here, but of course the one person who is here in this park is a guy with a leaf blower, because let's just make noise. Why let's just, why not? And let's see, where am I trying to get to from here? Is the question. Now that I'm on the little island or across the river, I wonder if I can walk along the shore. Maybe I'll check that out. Yeah, it looks like I can just stroll along. This park. And then there's going to be a little more traffic, so let's do that while I'm yammering. See, like I was saying, physical tiredness is not really the problem. It's more the mental instability that comes with not sleeping enough. Where I was at the station waiting for the train that goes to Shinjuku, the same one I took last episode to get to the year-name steps. And I remember, I was just like, I don't know, like mind over matter of life. Like, I was still just like annoyed that the day started with me not being able to find my phone. You know, like this is absolutely the stupidest shit. It was a five minute problem, although five minutes is a long time to be in your bunk and there's everything you own is right in front of you and you can't find the one thing. But it had also happened quite a bit earlier. I'd walked all the way to the station. I was just standing there. But it's just like one of those examples of being tired, where I'm just like, like I guess I was just hanging on this weird feeling of entitlement of like the world doesn't, shouldn't put these roadblocks in my way. I didn't deserve to not know where my phone was immediately. Just the absolute stupidest, most spoiled, most weirdly entitled nonsense that could ever happen to a human brain. But I'm like watching this happen in my own brain. And I'm like, God, this is the worst. This is just because I'm tired. I got a little, a little excuse to be cranky when I first woke up and now my brain is just like hanging onto it, even though it makes no goddamn sense. So I'm trying to tell myself like, hey, you just got to have a better attitude here. This is so stupid. Like you're literally just grasping at anything that you can try to feel offended by or annoyed by and hanging onto it. And it's absolutely dumb and we're not going to do that. It's the fuck off.

But mine over a matter is very hard to do. That's one reason I love hiking around and stuff is because once you're out in a physical environment doing stuff, especially like going up a mountain. But even now, so now I'm like, by the river, walk past the fisherman. I'm just walking up the shore.

Gotta be careful on these rocks a little because they're very uneven and I sort of definitely have this is so many things I can go wrong today where I think it's like a muscle in my foot that I pulled a little bit. I don't know. But there's like this nice sheer rock cliff on the other side of the river and it's fucking beautiful. And yeah, like once you're out doing something physical like this going on a hike. That's when it's like hard to maintain those types of feelings. You know, like you really have to instead of working at trying to feel good about your day when you're standing in a subway station at fucking 6 am. That's hard to do where it's the opposite when you're out hiking in nature. That's where you have to like really try hard to not feel good. You know, I'd have to really summon it up right now to really try to be annoyed because you just feel okay. You know, sometimes you feel great. But the baseline is just so much higher. It's like, yeah, I'm just out in the world and it's fucking beautiful out and I can hear water and the scenery is amazing. I mean, I can see the water too. Just saying the sound I think helps, you know, it's like adds to the ambiance. Like this is awesome. And then it's not like super nature. There's an apartment building across the river. There's little houses everywhere. There's another bridge. 20:00 It's that nice mix though. Like this is definitely my favorite type of Japan is just nature adjacent when you're right next to some mountains.

It just feels so good. But yeah, this is a big reason why I do these big fucking epic walks and shit every day is because it just feels better. It just, it just gets so tiresome trying to fight with your own neurotic brain. Where it's one of these things that it's all so obvious, but I feel like I really was late to learning this because I just grew up as general fucking. I don't know, it's the video game guy, just a little nerd guy, whatever, just let him go do his nerd shit. You know, that delineation between, oh, the smart book guy and then the sports people.

And I feel like, I don't know, whatever you want to call it, just the education system or my family in general, anyone that I knew, just nobody did add all a good job of identifying to me or explaining or expressing that the body and mind are so connected. I think I was much more raised with the idea that they are disconnected, you know? It's like the only reason people get into physical sports stuff is because their brains ain't so great. So that's what they do. But if you got the brains, then fuck all that. Just use your brains, son. And it just sucks. It's such a completely lame, limiting ineffectual, ultimately damaged. Damaging way to go about life.

Because it's just such a process, it's such a loop. Your mind's connected to your body, your body's connected to your mind. If you were a brain in a jar, you'd just be a very different creature without the stimulus of the body, without everything being attached and flowing together.

And yeah, when I finally realized to some point, I mean, I guess I always walked a lot. Because I mean, deep down I knew it was better, you know, I had a better day when I walked home from high school instead of taking the bus or whatever. But yeah, it was like such a nice discovery, but again, it's just what a weird society we're in, that this has to be a discovery, that this is something you ever have a chance not to learn. Then when you go do physical stuff and do exercise and exert yourself physically, your brain just works way better, way better. And all these fucking weird annoying problems in your head just don't develop.

But anyway, all that is to say I was waiting for the train and yeah, it was just in that grump mood of just like, mmm, come on, try not to be grumpy. But again, it's so hard to fight yourself. It's much easier just to get into a better physical situation and then you don't have to fight the grumps. And he more because the grumps just go away.

Case in point, right fucking now, I feel fine. I'm walking around on the shore, on the rocky shore of the Tema River.

But then yeah, it's not just grumpiness, it is just emotional erraticness when you're tired. Because then the train showed up and it looked real busy and as I got damn, maybe 6am's not early enough around these parts. That train is pretty packed, but it wasn't that bad. It looked bad through the windows, but inside there was quite a bit of space. And especially if you can jockey yourself just to the position between two of the doors. That's nice because then if people need to exit on one side or the other, they just flow to one side of you or the other side of you. No one has to jostle past you as people are getting in and leaving the train at each stop. You can just be a calm little ocean of not having to move.

And then the train cleared out quite a bit on the way to Shinjuku. I thought maybe it would like pick up people. But I guess the thing is like Shinjuku is the hub, right, to take you to other places. So these were just people that work within Tokyo, so it's just dropping them off in whatever neighborhood they work in. So it got even less busy. And then at Shinjuku station, I knew I needed the Chuo line toward Ome, of course, or toward Tachikawa. Now I was like, God, they'll be a sign for that. But there kind of wasn't. It just said JR trains in general over here. And I was like, I guess is that a JR train? I don't know. 25:00 Probably, but I took a little step outside of this station just to get my bearings a bit, get away from the crowds. And that was kind of nice, just like, oh yeah, Shinjuku station. Now that I'm outside of it, I recognize this place I've been here before. And while I'd been underground, it became daytime.

The sun was up, just barely, but it was up. And then I went to the JR thing, got on the Chuo line to Tachikawa.

And it was, I was hoping that one would be less busy, because I was like, oh, maybe I could sit down and just take a quick little cat nap on the train. But no dice there, but again, it wasn't like busy, busy. It was fine. But it was, you got to stand up levels of crowdedness. So I just watched a guy play a game of Magic the Gathering on my phone that I'd previously downloaded. Now that I've stopped playing Magic the Gathering online, because it was ruining my life, now I just get my magic fixed by watching people play it. And again, yeah, these, these long rides, they're never quite as long as they seem like they're going to be, because I only really had time to watch the one game.

And I was not only at Tachikawa, I'd actually overshot Tachikawa just lately. And that's where I realized the train that I wanted would either continue to go west or curve up to the north, but this one went down south.

I actually went right by where my next Airbnb is. So I got a little, a little taste of what that hood's going to be like.

Here's another bridge to get off of this park, but I think I don't want to do that. Or I guess I could either way. But no, I think I'm going to stay in this park. I'm going to stay on this side of the river.

So I considered that briefly. It's like maybe I should just take this as a sign. Maybe I should just let this train keep going and just see what happens, because I'm not even quite sure how far it goes. It looks like you could go pretty far into the mountains, but I wasn't sure where the stop was. So as I get in every mind, I'll just get off at the next station, which was Hachioji, and loop back up to my beloved Hajima station.

And yeah, my next Airbnb is basically right between Hachioji and Hajima. So it should be great for all of this type of stuff. It's very near here. I'm not sure how long I'm there for. I think a week. And again, God's so expensive. We're almost a month in South Korea, 400 bucks. The one week in this other place is like 550. It's like, fuck me. But it is like a whole place again. It's like, and it's got, you know, bunks and stuff. It'd be one of those things that would be just perfect if I was sharing it with other people and splitting it with other people. It's just getting a private room by yourself. It's just not a great idea. It's really expensive. But I just wanted something else in this location. So I don't have to take these two hour rides. So I didn't really have a lot of choices.

Though there was a place up here near Ome that I almost booked, but it was another bunk situation. And coming off the previous bunk that I'm at right now, I just didn't want to do two of those back to back. That's probably the right call. But next time maybe so far, I've only been here half an hour, but Ome is pretty nice. I like it.

Just walking up some wooden steps now up to a nice little bench area with a little sign that says no overnight campbang in this park. No problem. A little, I mean, this little little place with a little fucking roof. Let me just stop here for a moment, drink this coffee that's in my pocket while it's still warm.

But yeah, I figured since I, if I kept going west from Hachioji, I don't know where it goes. I don't know what that whole deal is. And I got to get back, you know. So I'll save that for the next Airbnb, because then it'll be a relatively short journey to get back not all the way across Tokyo type of journey. Today's not the day for that.

So yeah, I got myself headed back up to Hachima. And that's where I'm in like a pretty obscure part of Tokyo at this point. So that was helping the crowd stay down, but it was getting closer and closer to work time. It was like 8 a.m. by then. So that was also building up the crowds. So you could really feel it like it's like two tides fighting against each other. Where there was like a long line of people that looked pretty bad waiting for the train. 30:00 But then once the train got there, it really wasn't that bad. It wasn't that full.

And I started looking at my little Google map and I tried to figure out like, okay, so what am I doing today? Because my original plan was to come up here to Ome, but then I thought I could go to the, it's a Kaishi line, and after the Congo Falls, because I'm going to do that at some point. And I got started so early that you know, I'd be doing that right now, I'd be, I'd be at that station by now, heading out to do that walk. And like, I think I could make it no problem. It would be no problem. And that's definitely on my itinerary, but that's another thing that could easily wait for the next Airbnb.

And just to make it a little, to give myself a little more wiggle room, just knowing that I have a smaller journey back. You know, like this, I don't want this particular adventure to go on too long, not only because I didn't sleep too much, but I also got the huge train ride back. And even though I am again going against most of the commuters, probably won't be too bad, but if I can still kind of get that rolling before 5 o'clock, that wouldn't hurt.

Though I suspect the last leg, once I get down to Shinjuku, those trains are probably going to be busy no matter what. I don't know how to avoid that. That's just inevitable, probably.

But who knows, I'm certainly no train expert, so I'm never really quite sure what's going to happen. So the other plans were Okutama, if you continue on from here, and go quite a bit further. It's the technically fire this Dewey station on the Tokyo subway system. Lake Okutama is out there, and I watched some YouTube stuff about it, and it seems like there's probably not really anything much there. But I presume there's like hiking trails and stuff. It's going to take some definite exploration, so I think that's yet another thing, better save for when I have a newer Airbnb. Or looked up by the way that train station from your name. And it's funny that it stuck in my mind so much, and apparently a lot of people's, because it's such a small scene. It's such a tiny, it's like 10 seconds at that movie. But basically the town in your name that the girl is from, it's a fictional town. And it's a lot closer in your name, because like at one point she takes a day trip into Tokyo, and she can just get into Tokyo and then get back in a day. It's no big problem. And similarly when he goes out there. But the real place is there's one place that's like a big lake town that's out by Nagano, I think. But then the main town that most of the scenery is based on besides the lake is north from there, I believe. Anyway, it's about a five hour drive, and you can get there on transit, but it's like nine hours. Which I was thinking like that's actually very doable, but not if you're coming back. Not as a round trip. Nine hours on subways and stuff like, hey you at whatever, you know? Especially if you did it in two legs, but even if you did it in one day. I don't know, that's a bit of an adventure, but you'd have to have an Airbnb on that end waiting for you or a hotel or something. Like that's like as you journey across Japan, that'd be totally doable. But in my circumstances, not at all doable. So I'm not going to make that plan, not going to make that trip. And I mean, I probably never will. Anyways, just a train station. But you never know if you just need a random target for no good reason, just an excuse to go somewhere. On my next trip to Japan, who the fuck knows? But yeah, what I decided, what sparked joy in me as I was scrolling around on Google Maps. That's like, so from Ome, because this was an idea I had a long time ago. Can I walk from Ome to Akigawa? Because they're not necessarily that far from each other. It's just that there's a dang mountain in the way, which I'm looking at right now. And it's like, it's not that scary looking of a mountain. It doesn't look, I mean, it looks pretty surmountable. The question is just, is there a path? You know, I don't want to just bushwack across it. It's way too big for that. And you got to assume I mean Japan's full hiking trails and stuff. There's got to be something. And I think as I was zooming in closer, I think I did find one that should work. But what really got me is, as I was scrolling down, I'm like, okay, so here's Ome. And then here's the little surrounding town, which I'm in right now, which I presume is Ome. And then there's the mountains. I've got to, you know, maybe take a little detour a bit to get to what looks like a hiking path. There's definitely roads through the mountain. But if I have to walk along the edge of a mountain road, that's not exactly what I'm looking to do. If horse came to horse, I guess I could, but that's, I would rather not do that. But then as I'm scrolling down, it's like, there's the fucking A on mall near Akigawa Station. 35:00 The mall that I love so much, the mall that I spent way too much time in when I had an Airbnb near there. And that's the little thing that sparked in me. I was like, now that's a fun idea. I get to go to Ome, the station I've been meaning to go to for ages. I get to try to navigate my way across these mountains, these beautiful last mountains. Because I went a little bit the other way. Like I have walked north from that mall a little bit. But I didn't have a proper smartphone at the time, so I didn't have maps and stuff. And I just didn't really know where I was. I just got to the edges of some mountains and took a picture of how beautiful it was and went back. So I'm like, what if I can navigate over these mountains now? And then as a reward, I get to go to that mall that I like. I'm like, fuck yeah. Like that's everything. I like the travel part of it. I like the woods and outdoorsness part of it. And I like the mall part of it. That's got everything. And then from there, I easily know how to, I mean, it's not that tough to get back. Anyway, but I definitely know how to get back from that station. I've done it a bunch of times. But even though this is like very far west, it's, there's only a few major spots. You start at Shinjuku. You got to make sure you're on the right line at Tajikawa. Then at Hajima again, you got to just pick you going to Ome or you're going to, it's Akashi. Or various other places. You know, there's a bunch of other places. But as far as mountainous regions, you know, those are the main ones. So I mean, it's kind of like you're only really going four stops. Just four stops with dozens of little stops in between. But it really just didn't, I don't know.

I mean, I guess it took, I thought it was going to take two hours. It took when I got detoured. It took more like three.

From six to nine to get here. But it really doesn't feel like it.

Like again, I mean, I watched fucking Safron all of a MTG goldfish play one fucking game of magic. And I started listening to a podcast. And then here we are. You know, it's just not that bad. Wouldn't want to do it every day.

Ah, man. And yeah, I think just also coming from going up the mountains every day or two in Fukuoka. And then straight into the city. Very exciting at first. Like, whoa, I'm right in the middle of Tokyo. Cool. All the stuff so close. But I was definitely ready to come soak in some mountains again. I just love that feeling. You're just looking around at everywhere. It's like a 360 panorama here. There's fucking mountains everywhere. There's fucking nuts.

Fucking awesome. My favorite, favoriteist type of Japanese landscape.

The small city or town or whatever the fuck you call this. Next to the mountains.

So that's the plan. From Ome to Akigawa station. With a mountain and a mall in the middle. I don't know if it's going to work. I don't know what the deal is with this mountain. Mountain, hopefully, it's just hay. Here's a nice hiking trail. Go fill your boots because let's see. Let's test my Google map food. It's almost 10 o'clock. It should really get going. As the crow flies, it's only a 10 kilometer walk between Ome and Akigawa station.

Presumably, I got a lot more bullshit ahead of me than that. It's not going to go that easily.

Be a 10k. And not even a round trip. Just, you know, one way. That's very approachable. That seems like no problem at all. However, it'll be a lot easier if I fucking get moving. So I'm going to do that.

Holy fuck, dude. This neighborhood is so beautiful. It's all, like, again, the older-style houses. And a bit of farm-type stuff going on here. Not a bunch. There's one guy sitting kind of on a little bridge behind me talking on his phone. Other than that, there's also nobody fucking here. Man, I mean, talk about museums and shit. I feel like I'm in a museum right now. Like, I'm in a museum of, like, I just a Japanese village. What the? It's, like, weird. Where the hell is everybody? I mean, what day is it even today? Thursday? Thursday at 10 a.m. Yeah, and I mean, I guess it's just... There's obviously not much in the way of jobs to do around here. So I guess everybody just went to work. Or they're just hanging out in their houses.

Yeah, it's dang beautiful anyway. And I've, uh, I'm wearing my bigger coats today. My two big jackets. It's a little bit windy because you have this morning. It was pretty cold, obviously, before the sun came up. It was, like, five degrees. The weather said it was going to get warmer, like, 12 or 13. And it is definitely getting warmer. But it's also a little chill in the wind.

So just to be on the safe side, I'm all bundled up.

And even that, it's like an idling engine. I guess one of those trucks must be on, but nobody's in it. Japanese zombie apocalypse, man. How come we don't have that? It's always fucking America with your zombies. I want to see zombies in Russia. I want to see zombies in Japan. I also take zombies in France. I don't care. There's so much... So many opportunities for zombie stories. Oh, here we go. There's some traffic coming up behind me. Good then. The world didn't end. There are some people.

Yeah, I just got to figure out where to go with this fork. So I saw a thing on the map.

Mount Nagabuchi Trail, N-A-G-A-B-U-C-H-I. Looks like if I follow this road past an auto-body shop, the road part ends, but the little trail signs do not end. And they appear to go all the way to the other side.

To Hinode. Oh, and in fact, the Aeon Mall is in Hinode.

See, I guess somewhere in there is the Phantom Marker. I'm in Hinode now. And it becomes Akiruno. But surprisingly, not before the mall. Somewhere between the mall. And the railway line. Hinode is the area between Akiruno and Ome, which mainly seems to be a mountain.

Ooh, the wind. But so anyway, yeah, this mountain trail. This is what I'm pinning my hopes and dreams on. Because beyond that, there is a lot of, I mean, it's very hard to tell with mountainous regions what's actually going on.

But on my little pre-downloaded map, it's quite a sea of nothingness. So if not this, I think I'll just stay in Ome. I don't think I'll try to forge my own path. But this looks pretty promising. And man, I just ran into a weird example of, you may remember way back when I was in Seng and Jaya. Oh, speaking of, I saw a street sign in your name when I rewatched it last night. A sign saying like, Seng and Jaya this way. And I was like, Seng and Jaya, I know what that is now. I've been there. It's neat to add in the little bits. Man, there's also, there's this overpass that I walked over three times yesterday. And I did have this vague feeling, like this overpass does feel familiar. But I didn't know if it was your name thing. Because it's just an overpass, you know. Those are all pretty common. But yeah, it turns out it is that was in fact the one right by the Christmas market I was at. And geez, it's like the third fucking star of that fucking movie. There's so many scenes that take place on that overpass. So that's kind of neat too. But it obviously doesn't have the same effect because I just walked across it and I was like, hmm, this may be kind of maybe the place as opposed to the stairs where the stairs are like, oh, fuck, those are the stairs. Yeah, that's definitely the stairs.

But back when I was in Sankinjaya, I was rambling about the sort of phenomenon that happens sometimes in Japanese drink machines where the price is almost the same for two sizes of drinks. You know, there's the big one and the small one. But the small one is about the same price as the big one.