Adventures in Leaving the House: My Shimoda

I work from home. I’ll never complain because there are more advantages to that arrangement than I can even count, but there is one down-side: I don’t get out much. So on those occasions where I do leave the house to visit people or get away for the weekend or pick up a loaf of bread, it opens the door for

  AUTHOR’S NOTE: You may recall that this is the 20thanniversary of my year in Japan. The following (lightly edited) dispatch is from February 1999, a good four months into my stay in Japan.

I’ve been a bit antsy the last few weeks. I hadn’t traveled anywhere since December and my wanderlust was kicking in. My original thought was actually to go to Taiwan: warm, sunny beaches, nice and relaxing. Not too far from Tokyo, and dirt cheap, too. Unfortunately, everyone else in Tokyo must have had the same idea, cuz all of the flights were booked up. Bummer.

I still wanted to travel a bit, nothing too expensive. Definitely somewhere out of the city (quite a feat in this neck of the woods) and preferably somewhat warmer (February is the bitterest month in Japan). After some digging around and asking about, I settled on a two-day trip to Shimoda, a small town on the tip of the Izu Peninsula, which is only a couple hours away from Tokyo.

Shimoda is one of those places those living in the greater Tokyo area go to when they want an escape from the greater Tokyo area: it’s outside of the city, on the ocean and always temperate, it’s famed for its excellent seafood and soothing onsens (natural hot springs), and it even has some historical significance.  Turns out that this is the spot where Commander Matthew Perry of the U.S. Navy landed and “persuaded” the Japanese to open trade relations with America. 

Not this Matthew Perry.

It all sounded great to me, so bright and early last Wednesday morning, I headed out.

I certainly wasn’t disappointed. Shimoda is absolutely beautiful. It has that small coastal town charm that will always appeal to me, and it constantly reminded me of things I liked about other places I’ve visited in the past: Cape Cod, Mystic, Newport, even Venice at times. The town itself is quite small (I was able to walk it from end to end in about 45 minutes) and since it was off-season, very quiet. Heavenly.

Good luck.

Sadly, it rained most of my first day there. I spent the time checking out some of the temples and getting a feel for the area. It was at one of the temples that I had my first encounter with a Japanese toilet. In case you didn’t know, the traditional Japanese toilet (apparently fairly uncommon now if I made it this far without encountering one) is a strange porcelain trough with a bit of a hood at the far end, kind of like a ski binding. To make full use of the appliance, once squats over it and… well, it’s awkward.

Later, I ducked into a toy store and ended up talking to a woman from Mexico. Our conversation was a strange blur of English, Japanese and Spanish, and my high school Spanish was rusty, to say the least. Not that it was any good in high school, either – after three years of high school Spanish, I was really only proficient in saying “Sit down” and “Shut up.” I can’t imagine why.

Me writing in my journal at a coffeeshop in Shimoda

I also had my first onsen experience that first day. The baths are segregated by gender on account of you going in wearing only your birthday suit. First you sit on a stool and wash yourself with some soap and buckets of water. Then, when you’re all clean, you sit yourself into the hot spring. I was expecting it to reek of sulfur, but fortunately, that was not the case. After about fifteen minutes, I started to feel a bit funky from the heat, but one of the guys in the onsen spoke a bit of English and directed me over to the “cool pool,” which was more my speed. He also took me to the outdoor section of the onsen. It was all very cool and very relaxing.

That night, I had the most delicious baked fish for dinner (I don’t know exactly what kind of fish, even though it stared up at me throughout the whole meal), and ended up at a bar called The Green Glass. I had noticed it earlier that afternoon – the “Elvis Presley Blvd” sign jumped out at me.  A cool little bar, it had a ‘50s Americana theme without being over the top about it.  If anything, there was a subdued atmosphere to the place, despite is being fairly busy for an off-season weeknight. Hits from the ‘50s and ‘60s played all night, which was all good with me.  

I spent the rest of the evening there, chatting with the couple who ran the place. As best as I could tell, Miseu and Hiro had been running the place for about two years, and were engaged to be married. They were about my age and really cool. The three of us talked throughout the night about all sorts of things, from traveling to movies to music. By the end of the night, we had exchanged phone numbers, and Misue gave me a free ticket for the ropeway to the top of the mountain – awfully sweet of her. I also met a British guy teaching English in Shimoda, and we talked shop and traveling for a while. All in all, a very cool evening.

The next day, I was blessed with perfect weather. I made use of the free ticket Misue gave me and was treated to the most incredible view. I spent most of the day walking along the road that followed the coast, taking in the ocean air and enjoying every minute of it.

A few of the people I work with thought I was a crack baby for going off by myself. I decided that they don’t know what the hell they’re talking about – that was the best part of the trip. Sure, I was able to do what I wanted when I wanted at the pace I wanted without justifying it to anyone, but that’s only part of it. I’m positive that none of the people I met would’ve never talked to me if I was traveling in a group. I would’ve never met the fascinating museum curator on the train to Shimoda or spent much of the trip learning Japanese phrases from her. Everyone in the onsen would’ve been intimidated by my crew of boisterous foreigners, and I would’ve spent the night sitting at a table in the corner of The Green Glass drinking with my travel companions instead of bellying up to the bar and talking with the people there.  And that’s what really made the trip for me, especially at a time when I often catch myself thinking of home. There are plenty of times where it would be easy to get down on things here, but there’s still so much more to this place to see and experience.