Diary of The Snowy Country in Japan

Started a new life at the town of mountains

De: Hidemi Woods

Narrado por: Virtual Voice

When I woke up in the morning, it had stopped snowing for the first time in several days and it was a clear day with the blue sky. I decided to go to a city a little far from the town. But it had started snowing heavily again by the time I left. I scurried to the station in the snow and heard the delay of the train announced there. That meant I would miss my connection of the train to the city. Because only a few trains run in this line, having another connection is hard. I gave up going there and had lunch at a local restaurant. This town is situated in the mountains and the weather is treacherous with sudden changes. Once it snows, the train easily delays or stops, which makes it so difficult to plan ahead for going out, as the weather forecast almost always fails and I don’t have a car. Besides, we’ve had fewer fine days and more snowy days lately. My apartment has been closed in snow gradually, becoming more and more like the hotel in ‘The Shining’. Am I going to go mad and begin beating my partner with a keyboard of my computer? Or, is it going to be my partner who pounces on me by raising a remote control over his head? I hope we go through the winter and have the spring thaw peacefully… Every year in January, I visit a temple to pray for good luck in the new year. It’s a common practice for most Japanese people. Since I moved last year, I visited a local temple of my new town for the first time about a month ago. It was a small, uninhabited temple surrounded by three large trees that were over three hundred years old. Before praying, offering money should be put into a wooden box set in front of a temple building. I usually put a one-yen coin that is of least value in Japan into the offering box because I’m cheap. But this time, seven feet of snow buried the site and I couldn’t go in. I had to pray outside the entrance and throw in the offering money. As the temple building was a hundred feet away, my one-yen coin, which is made of tin, couldn’t possibly reach there. Even so, I threw it with all my strength because I felt that the closer the coin landed, the more grace I would get. Since then, I’ve had a pain in the joint of my right elbow for a month. I feel a sharp pain in my right forearm every time I bend my elbow or hold something with my hand. My partner reads this as a sign that says I should stop being stingy and being too careful for small change this year, as my desperate coin throw caused it. It sounds to me more like his request than a sign. I, on the other hand, read this as a punishment to throw money onto the ground. Either way, I’ve got a pain from a temple instead of grace…