quicktoez
03-18-2007, 04:06
I have had much personal life challenges. My best friend 38 passed away, the woman I loved left me and my career began to greatly conflict with my personal values.
My now x-wife was born and raised in Japan and was from great wealth. When I said I wanted to climb Mt. Fuji, at night and alone just so I could see the sun rise you could just imagine the reaction and as I hiked that night I surprised many I encountered but for me this was spiritual and it is a casual kind of Mecca for Japanese Buddhists. It took me over two days round trip with the train travel and it was one of the hardest hikes I have done.
The point is my wife and my family really tried to stop me form doing this especial alone but my father-in-law who spoke no English the day I left gave me his hiking pole and told me in English. “I hike 3 time but to old now” I found out latter that 6 generations of his family hiked Fuji with this pole and they told me later that now 7 generations had hikes Fuji.
This man who has lived on the same land for 500 years and his family farmed it since their Samurai clan was defeated and fled Kyoto, owns massive land (is worth millions) and the section of town he lives in is signified buy his family name took more meaning from my personal quest (I had no idea this was significant to him until he gave me the stick) and my interest in this centuries old Japanese tradition than all his wealth and importance.
I formed a bond with this man because this shared my inner self. We formed a bond that will last a lifetime and even though after 7 years his daughter left me for another he told me I will always be family. I will one day return to Japan and take grandson to the top of Fuji.
We both cried the day I got back from Fuji and retuned the staff and if you know about the Japanese they don’t show emotion.
I think my hike on the AT will never have the meaning that climbing Fuji did, but when I decided to climb Fuji I didn’t think it had much meaning either. I took this mans daughter to a land he really didn’t like or trust and in the end I lost her because I found myself in a land I didn’t understand by climbing a mountain and being open to new experiences. She embraced the West and I the East and we grew apart.
I was married Shinto and am still Buddhist, I was accepted unconditionally into this religion far more than a protestant would be buy a Catholic wedding (just an example). My in-laws were always nice but the day I returned from Fuji was the day I became family.
The bond was because I was driven to climb the mountain and wanted the spiritual experience, no one ever suggested the climb I just wanted to do it one day and that’s what made it real. I am in person turmoil these days, I hope to find myself on the trail and few would understand.
I think you do and though you would though you would appreciate this piece of my life. The mountains mean a lot to people like us but what we find in them is never what we look for. So I go to find myself and this is what the people around me don’t understand.
My now x-wife was born and raised in Japan and was from great wealth. When I said I wanted to climb Mt. Fuji, at night and alone just so I could see the sun rise you could just imagine the reaction and as I hiked that night I surprised many I encountered but for me this was spiritual and it is a casual kind of Mecca for Japanese Buddhists. It took me over two days round trip with the train travel and it was one of the hardest hikes I have done.
The point is my wife and my family really tried to stop me form doing this especial alone but my father-in-law who spoke no English the day I left gave me his hiking pole and told me in English. “I hike 3 time but to old now” I found out latter that 6 generations of his family hiked Fuji with this pole and they told me later that now 7 generations had hikes Fuji.
This man who has lived on the same land for 500 years and his family farmed it since their Samurai clan was defeated and fled Kyoto, owns massive land (is worth millions) and the section of town he lives in is signified buy his family name took more meaning from my personal quest (I had no idea this was significant to him until he gave me the stick) and my interest in this centuries old Japanese tradition than all his wealth and importance.
I formed a bond with this man because this shared my inner self. We formed a bond that will last a lifetime and even though after 7 years his daughter left me for another he told me I will always be family. I will one day return to Japan and take grandson to the top of Fuji.
We both cried the day I got back from Fuji and retuned the staff and if you know about the Japanese they don’t show emotion.
I think my hike on the AT will never have the meaning that climbing Fuji did, but when I decided to climb Fuji I didn’t think it had much meaning either. I took this mans daughter to a land he really didn’t like or trust and in the end I lost her because I found myself in a land I didn’t understand by climbing a mountain and being open to new experiences. She embraced the West and I the East and we grew apart.
I was married Shinto and am still Buddhist, I was accepted unconditionally into this religion far more than a protestant would be buy a Catholic wedding (just an example). My in-laws were always nice but the day I returned from Fuji was the day I became family.
The bond was because I was driven to climb the mountain and wanted the spiritual experience, no one ever suggested the climb I just wanted to do it one day and that’s what made it real. I am in person turmoil these days, I hope to find myself on the trail and few would understand.
I think you do and though you would though you would appreciate this piece of my life. The mountains mean a lot to people like us but what we find in them is never what we look for. So I go to find myself and this is what the people around me don’t understand.