A walk amidst autumn's splendour 2

As Sanae said, "You'd never think we lived in Muroran".

A walk amidst autumn's splendour 1

God decided to make it up to us for the snow he threw down last Tuesday and blessed with one of those glorious autumn days that leave you murmuring words like 'sublime' and 'transcendent'.

Men of the soil

God shook some of his frozen dandruff over us yesterday. He didn't even have the good grace to wait until the start of November, but instead flung winter at us before we had even finished with Autumn.

Now, this mightn't be such a big deal to all of you basking in the warm benevolence of the North Atlantic Drift, buy we live in a part of the world where the time frame for 'winter' extends to the beginning of May. Think I exaggerate? Well then let me remind you, dear readers, of this:

http://gaynor-takahashi.blogspot.com/2010/04/oh-lord-hokkaido.html

The weekend before last Cian and myself took ourselves off to the mountains above Lake Toya to plant some trees, because that is the kind of caring-sharing we-all-live-on-one-planet-with-mother-nature kind of family we are. So, hippies for a day, but rugged, manly, LL Bean attired hippies. (Mammy was busy with her 'school festival', but from how she subsequently described it - "feckin busy" - I don' think it was all that festive.

The event, in a sort of outdoorsy, try not to think of the environmental damage house building actually entails, way was organised by my good friends at Sudo Home, who obviously had forgotten about the events of last spring.

http://gaynor-takahashi.blogspot.com/2010/03/home-loans.html

Or perhaps they presumed (prayed?) I wouldn't come. But the invitation (yes, on recycled paper) had said trees, and importantly, free barbecue afterwards, so Cian and myself jumped in the car, stuck some Neil Young in the cd player, and sang about searching for a heart of gold, cos I'm getting old, man.

In actual fact, it turned out to be a great day, the occasional rain shower notwithstanding. Cian was in his element, wielding shovel, digging soil, planting trees, while I felt all Daddy like as I instructed my son in the ancient Kerry art of digging a good, round hole.

And on the way home, we had ice cream. Perfect.

Tis the Season of Mists and Mellow Fruitfulness

Autumn in Hokkaido brings with it some fine, cool sunny weather and more importantly, fruit. Lots of it. Orchards full of burgeoning ripe apples, prune trees weighed down with full, voluptuous berries, and vineyards resplendent with the many hues of succulent grapes.

It is all a bit vaguely erotic, in a 'fecund Mother Nature and her abundant fertility' sort of way, but thankfully we don't stand for any of that auld hippy shite around here. Nope, pick 'em, eat 'em, and poo 'em out. That's our motto. Well, Cian's anyway.

A couple of weekends ago, on what turned out to be a gloriously sunny Saturday, we jumped in the car and headed off to Sobetsu, home to some of Hokkaido's finest fruit growing farms. We had been there back in June to devour our body weight in strawberries, and after our long, hot summer, we were expecting a bumper harvest. We weren't disappointed.

First we had grapes. Or to be scientific about it, red grapes.

Then prunes. Voluptuous ones only mind you. No sagging berries for us.

Then more grapes, green ones this time.

Next, apples.

By this stage Cian's sugar levels were somewhere up in the stratosphere. But the boy is a professional juice junkie; even now he was only having a mild 'buzz'. So, time then, for some more grapes. Black ones, if you please.

To calm him down we took ourselves off for a walk to look at a waterfall. And then we threw Cian into it.

No we didn't (though the thought did cross our minds). Instead we went off to Lake Toya, where Sanae and Cian went and threw stones at the small lake-side shrine.

Before Daddy and Cian sat down and contemplated the serene beauty of Mother Nature (when she's not being overly fecund), and how fleeting and thus so precious, are days like today.

Well, Daddy did. Cian sat there wondering how he could score some more grapes.

No Surrender.

Last Sunday, I went for a run up the mountains in nearby Noboribetsu, along with 26 fellow fleet-footed souls of questionable sanity. The occasion was the annual 'Forest Kozan Trail Run' though this was my first year to compete. And compete I did. There was honor at stake, national pride, as Ireland's representative at what is now the 'International Forest Kozan Trail Run', I had the expectations of a nation resting on my slim, albeit still toned, shoulders. Plus, I didn't want Cian calling his Daddy 'a wuss'.

So 'Bang!' goes the starter's gun and, as you will see from the following clip, in a turn of speed and a sudden burst of acceleration, within 10 metres of the start I had already opened up a commanding lead on the donkey in 25th and made 24th place my own.

Now, keep an eye on the old guy in the yellow top, number 402.

In every race I have entered in Japan their has always been a 'Death before Dishonor' older Japanese competitor, who takes it personally if the tall, hairy foreigner passes him by. In the Kozan race, he was the man, the Nihonjin who embodied the samurai spirit of old, who would rather run himself into the ground, smear himself in honey and get torn to pieces by ravenous bears rather than let a lanky gaijin beat him. Also, they all run like the Duracell Bunny, constant, clockwork-like steps, pat--pat--pat--pat--pat--pat, that only ever changes when they realize they have been overtaken by yours truly, when they suddenly shift from low to high and go pat-pat-pat-pat-pat-pat as they scurry past me.

Anyway, we come to the 2km marker, and there we are, me and Swifty Suzuki, little and large, dueling it out for the highly coveted 20th spot.

Back up into the mountains, this time for a good, lung-burning 7km constant climb. At the top I'm still behind him, but as we descend, I stretch those gazelle like limbs of mine and lope past him. But not for long, Pat-pat-pat-pat-pat-pat and he, I swear, 'whirrs' past me, damned if the spirit of the absent Emperor isn't willing him along. "Ah-hah sweaty foreigner, eat my dust!"

7km though, is a long down hill and well, my legs relish the stretch. Go by him again. More frenetic pat-pat-pat-pat-pating but it's a warm Autumn day, I've got at least 20 years and 30 centimetres on him and I'll be damned if I'm going to lose to a bald hobbit.

After this we headed back up into the mountains again, for what turned out to be a 'Sweet-Mother-of-Jesus-what-was-I-thinking" final 6km of an absolute bastard of a climb. Embroiled in my own private world of excruciating hamstring pain, I don't know what happened to Mr. 402 but I thought I saw some empty honey jars on the trail as I finally plodded home.

To a surprising 10th finish, which I was quite pleased with. Until Cian called me "a wuss".

Recovery

Cian, it turns out, had a touch of pneumonia which has kept him, and me, out of the nursey and university for the past two weeks. While I'm pretty sure the Nursery has missed their little bit of Irish charm, I figure the university has been a model of indifference. We have been in and out of the hospital over the past 10 days or so, and are now pretty much on first name terms with all the nurses in the pediatrics department. And we'll be back again on Monday when the boy goes for another x-ray and I sit in the doctor's office pretending to understand what he is mumbling on a about. And God, does he mumble. When he speaks it sounds like an extended clearing of the throat, a low, incomprehensible bass-line of barely formed words that has me itching to give me a clip across the ear and yell, "For chrissakes, would you speak clearly, man!" I mean, its bad enough that all this is being explained to me in Japanese, but it is made irredeemably worse coming from a man who learned about elocution from watching Marlon Brando in the Godfather.

Still, I shouldn't complain. The cost of all our visits, consultations, tests, and medicines have yet to break the 10 euro barrier. Let's hear it for socialized medicine, folks! God bless Marx.

In fact, the hardest part of the past two weeks have been not so much the illness per se, but keeping the boy's waking hours occupied and entertaining. He's an active three-soon-to-be-four year old, and the doctor's strictures about limiting physical activity and getting plenty of rest are easier said than done. Particularly when we are enjoying our annual extended spell of fine weather that turns Hokkaido, for the month of September, into a Japanese version of southern California. So thank God for the internet. Initially it was just cartoons and train videos on Youtube, but then we discovered the unlimited joys of online poker and, well, as long as "don't tell Mammy", then its no-hold-'em happiness for Cian 'Texas' Takahashi and his financial backer, 'Studs' Gaynor.

Today, because Mammy was around, we had to fold and leave the online felt table, so we went for a train ride. Cian likes his train rides. I think chugging along the rails, sitting in the open boxcar, eeking out a tune on his harmonica reminds him of the Lone Star State, his spiritual home.

Health

Unfortunately, the little man has been laid low for the past week with a bit of nasty chest cough. I suspect bronchitis but then again I'm just a lowly English teacher (and getting lower), so what do I know. Nor does he seem to be able to shake it. I took him to see the doctor last Monday where he received a week's worth of medication, but to date to little avail. Mind you, I can't really fault the Japanese medical system as my experience, or rather my proxy experience via Sanae and Cian*, has been one of unfailing excellence. And cheap too. Cian's visit to the doctor cost is subsidized by 90%, yes, you read that correctly, 90%, so for the consultation I shelled out the princely sum of 180 yen (which is about 1.60 euros). Similarly, for his medicine - a week's worth of cough suppressent and foul tasting fever powder - I spent another 340 yen, just a few cents over 3 euro.
Then on Friday last I had my annual health check here in the university. Said health check is compulsory and thorough too: bloods, urine, x-ray, eye, ear, electro-cardiagram, and a doctor's once over. I was pronounced 'alive' and fit to continue teaching low-level students low-level English. I am, however, going blind. 'Age' said the ophthalmologist and at close on 41, who am I to disagree. Glasses beckon, as do dentures, a wig, incontinence nappies and great, furious tufts of wild ear-hair.
Anyway, said health check was also free and despite being told you are fast becoming McGoo-san, it was good to get it done.

*Outside of required health checks, the only time I have ever been officially admitted into hospital in my 12 years herein Japan, happened shortly before Cian was born. I was biking to the university one morning, free wheeling down a hitherto fun and fast hill when a Nissan X-Trail suddenly pulled out in front me. I hit the front side of the jeep, catapulted myself into the windscreen, bounced off the bonnet and skidded down the road a few metres. Luckily there was no oncoming traffic so I kind of staggered over to the side of the road and sat down. My ankle hurt and that, as far as I could figure out, was the extent of my injuries. The driver, I think, was more stunned by the fact that he had hit a foreigner, a big one at that too, that by the actual accident. Anyway, he makes the requisite emergency phone call and in a couple of minutes, there's a police car, an ambulance, and two, yes, two fire engines, one of them with specialist cutting equipment. Not wanting to have wasted their trip, I offer to go lie under my bike on the road and they could practice cutting me out from under it. The ambulance men want me to lie down on the stretcher. No, no, it's fine, I tell them, I'm not that bad, I can sit on the seat here. No, they insist, you have been in a car accident, you must lie down on the stretcher, it's the rule. To keep them happy (the fireman were already beginning to look pissed off at the lack of anything to do), I lie down on the stretcher. More than a bit embarrassed, we set off, sirens a-wailing, through the streets of Muroran, and two minutes later end up at the local hospital. Into the ER. There's another patient in there before me, an old man, a very old man, unconscious, wheezing a deeply troubled breath, hooked up to a series of beeping monitors with the intervals between beeps growing longer all the time, surrounded by a team of doctors.
And then they see me.
"Woah, what's this, a foreigner, yes! We get to practice medicine on a foreigner; we get this right and there will be an article in Lancet - "Cross Cultural Car Crashes" or some such. Quick, before he gets off the stretcher. No, don't mind the old guy, he's on his way out, wheel him downstairs and leave him parked in front of the motuary. He's headed that way anyway. But don't forget to bring back the monitors. We'll need them to impress the foreigner".
So I get an X-Ray and a CT-scan but unfortunately, despite their dearest wishes, the doctors can find no bones broken, no internal or external bleeding, and nothing wore than a badly bruised ankle and some scrapes and scratches. And so after two hours or so, they reluctantly let me go, but not before they make me promise them that I'll come to this hospital should I ever get in a 'proper' accident.
And that has been my only time in the consummate care of the Japanese medical profession.