I climbed a mountain and learned about Buddhism this weekend.
Mitokusan (Mt. Mitoku if you got your map in the US) is a fairly easy climb--there's some steep parts where you should probably know a thing or two about climbing to get through easily, but it's farily short--and there are a lot of temples on the way. We (about 40 JETs) slept in one of the temples at the base of the mountain the day before (and had a half-hour session of zazen meditation the morning after), and we were inundated with Buddhist culture and perspectives by the monk who was in charge of us. He gave a few explanations in Japanese, which were likely woefully translated given our translator's continual need to have somebody else in the group translate the specialized Buddhist-related terminology (the "main" translator is French originally, so translating from one second language into another had to have been hard on its own)...at one point we traced what I'm pretty sure is a Buddhist Sutra...which was all chinese characters...it took a while. And we had to do it sitting Japanese-style on our legs, so...well. It took me a good five minutes before I started feeling my feet again after a good 25-30 minutes of focused tracing.
Highlight was definitely the evening--as part of the weekend, we do an "international exchange" with the Japanese there...they do some traditional dances and perform for us, and each of the countries represented by the internationals present (we had the US, England, France, South Africa, and the Phillipines, among others) gave their own performances.
For the US, we did Soulja Boy. Not even kidding. We practiced and introduced it as "a traditional American dance," did the dance, and then proceeded to teach the Japanese...there is video of me doing Soulja Boy with probably an 80-year-old Japanese man behind me. When I can send a link, I shall, but for the meantime you'll have to settle for the picture attached. They actually learned super-quickly, very impressive.'
Daisen is over 1,700m tall. This sign came about halfway up.
Two JETs, three exchange students. (The one on the right was the ostensible reason for the climb--homestay families and people associated with her high school hiked up the mountain to "welcome" her. Some welcome, eh?)
The weather was absolutely gorgeous. Clear skies, warm (but not hot) day...my co-teacher (who invited me and Josh, the other JET) said that there are maybe a dozen days this good in a given year.
The mountain trail faces the Sea of Japan, so for much of the way up there's a clear view of the water through the breaks in the trees (not to mention the several lookouts).
Trees thinning--approaching the summit...
...and here it is. There's even a summit shack, complete with a vendor (does he stock by helicopter, or does somebody haul cases up a 1,200m hike?).
The requisite picture with the elevation sign.
The way down had some beautiful sunlight-through-the-clouds effects, which I attempted to capture and embellish with photoshop.
The way down also had some steep declines. It never seems as bad going up...
Back at the bottom. Later, Daisen.
