Tomorrow I'm flying to Japan (a country of good manners) to walk the Kiso Road with my friend Bill Wilson. It's an eleven-day hike along a section of one of the old highways that connected Edo (Tokyo) and Kyoto. In the tradition of the travelers of old, I will not be carrying a laptop, so this will be my last post until after Thanksgiving.
I leave you with a passage from Ikku Jippensha's Hizakurige, the classic comic novel of two bumbling gentlemen from Edo who walk the more famous Tokaido to Kyoto:
"The proverb says that shame is thrown aside when one travels, and names and addresses are left scrawled on every railing. ... Naturally, one is curious about the people who are traveling the same roads, and those whose faces are linked together at the public inns do not always have their marriages written in the book of Izumo. They are not tied to convention as when they live in the same row of houses, but can open their hearts to each other and talk till they are tired. On the road, also, one has no trouble from bill collectors at the end of the month, nor is there any rice-box on the shoulder for the rats to get at. The Edo man can make acquaintance with the Satsuma sweet-potato, and the flower-like Kyoto woman can scratch her head with the skewer from the dumpling. If you are running away for the sake of the fire of love in your heart, you can go as if you were taking part in a picnic, enjoying all the delights of the road. You can sit down in the shadow of the trees and open your little tub of sake, and you can watch the pilgrims go by ringing their bells. Truly traveling means cleaning the life of care. With your straw sandals and your leggings you can wander wherever you like and enjoy the indescribable pleasures of sea and sky."
