10 Shikoku

We wanted to visit Shikoku, the smallest and remotest among the four main islands of Japan, because we have learned form experience that cities in Japan are constructed to be very functional: all concrete and look like they were made with copy and paste, not much surprise and soul food for someone as romantic as me and outdoorsy as Hunor. so wherever we can we look for the remote, the old and rundown and the countryside. However, we stayed longer at Rei's place than we originally planned and a typhoon was coming too, so eventually we didn't have the time and the guts to explore Shikoku, we just shortly passed by. Rei's family gave us a ride from Oita to the port of Saganoseki and from there we took a very short (70min) ferry ride to the tip of Shikoku, Misaki. As seasoned ferry-hitchhikers, we were the first to get off the boat and we were happily waving and smiling by the side of the road by the time the cars started to come. To our surprise, the first car stopped, a friendly young couple with a small kid, and they took us all the way to Matsushima, our destination, where or couchsurfing host was already expecting us. One thing I like about hitchhiking in Japan is that we know the language, so we can talk with the people, learn abut their life, their work, hear their stories. The young father who picked us up happened to work for the Japanese Self Defence Force as a first aid parachuter, which sounded very interesting so I asked him about his work in detail. How did it feel to jump for the first time? Has he got used to the feeling? Does wind make the jump difficult? He was very patient and answered all my questions. After our conversation his wife told him she had never heard so much about his work, so I guess it was good information for all of us. Meanwhile we were passing through a beautiful road winding on the northern coast of Shikoku, small fishing ports, islands in the calm inland sea on our left and mountains on our right. 

They took us all the way to Matsushima station where our host, Annlie was already waiting with her car. Given these circumstances it felt more like a luxury trip than a hitchhiking adventure. It turned out that we were Annlie's first couch surfers, so I felt the responsibility of giving a good impression for her about the system. She is a young medical student, speaks amazing English, and she is full of curiosity and ambition. She was interested in every detail of our trip from planning to the content of our backpacks. It was a good conversation, it made us sort our own thoughts once again concerning the decision of changing our lifestyle and planning our trip. We were proud and happy to show our backpacks, which became a lot lighter and compact after leaving much of our stuff with Rei and sending home a box of things. The eagerness Annlie was showing while listening to our story made me feel responsible for what I do and how I act while on the way. One thing that makes me happy is that I have never felt more authentic, living from my heart then now. I have the chance to experience something I have been dreaming about since childhood. I suppose the happiness and excitement are converted to energy and people around me can feel it. I hope they do, because that is the only thing i can give them for their generosity, for opening their homes, their cars and sharing their time with us. Annlie showed us around Matsushima, we went to the castle and Japan's oldest hot spring, Dogo. We sat down in front of the entrance and just watched people passing by in their yukatas. It was a beautiful sunset with sharp but gentle lights (perfect for Hunor to take pictures).

at Matsushima Castle with Annlie

Hunor taking a foot bath in front of Dogo onsen

the hometown of Matsu Basho, the famous haiku poet is the most poetic city ever: if you write a haiku on the bus you just put it in this box and it might be chosen for publishing 

The next day our destination was Hiroshima, already on the main island of Japan. We wanted to make it up there before the typhoon. Annlie's mom offered to give us a ride to Imabari, the city at the end of the bridge connecting Shikoku with Honshu. I was excited about the next ride, because it goes zig-zagging through small islands connected by bridges in the inland sea. The weather was still hot and it was our longest time to wait for a ride, more than an hour. An old man cutting the grass in a nearby parking lot came to us after about forty minutes, told us not to lose our spirits and handed us two bottles of cold soda with a smile.

Finally a small truck picked us up, and the high seats gave us a perfect view of the inland sea and the islands in the sunshine. 

Three rides later we were in Hiroshima by 7pm. We got a ride with a young university student, who was on his way back from buying his first car, so Hunor took photos of him with his new "baby". Then we met a family of six, who were going to a baseball match of the local team, Carps, and we also learned that this team is very special for the people of Hiroshima. It was founded shortly after the end of the war, as a sign of the locals will to survive even in the impossible conditions of the reconstruction after the atomic bomb. 

The local speciality in Hiroshima is okonomiyaki, which is something between an overfilled crepe and and a Spanish omelette. Veggies, meat and eggs. As we have learned, the big difference between the Hiroshima and Osaka style okonomiyaki is that Hiroshima puts even noodles in the mix. Don't ask me how, but it does work. We met up with my friend from university, Moe, who lives and works in Hiroshima after having graduated, and she invited us to an okonomiyaki dinner. After that we headed to our host's place which was an interesting experience by itself. A young japanese guy with an impossibly big apartment (especially for Japanese standards). He opened it up for counchsurfers, so it didn't feel like a one-to-one home stay thing as usual but more like a hostel. We were seven of us the night we arrived. There was a very active Colombian guy, who proudly introduced himself as someone from Barranquilla, the city of Shakira (well you can imagine that was enough to make me happy), he put on his music and gave a quick latin dance lesson to everyone. We were dancing for hours in the tatami room which was the most surprising ending to a day we started on another island a hundreds of kilometers away.