never is.
With determined ignorance, I studied several road signs. My knowledge of the kanji alphabet is limited at the best of times, and all I could make out were sporadic bursts of words, none of which added up to anything that made any sense:
ATTENTION! —----- EAST ------ WILL BE ---------- PLEASE ------- SOUTH --------- ------ IS ------------ ONLY. THANK YOU.
“Ah,“ I said aloud. “East will be please south is only!”
Odder still, this ganglia of an intersection existed far from any town, deep in a forested valley, without a single gas station or house in sight. Obviously a government project. Curiouser and curiouser. The asphalt was new, the lines were freshly painted. The roads appeared out of nowhere, merged capriciously, and then disappeared around corners. It was maddening.
I wasn’t anywhere near the sea, so I couldn’t even use that as a rough guide. I assumed I wanted to go north, but that was just because I always hold maps so that my destination is at the top and north is always “up.” I couldn’t find a single road sign that read north, but eventually it dawned on me that if I found a road going south and then went the opposite direction, I would in fact be going north. (It takes me a while to catch on to such things.) Three different roads headed in a vague sort of “not-south” direction. I chose one at random and began walking.
I had just turned a corner into the woods when I heard the sound of a vehicle behind me. Desperate for advice, I ran back to Hell’s Intersection, my backpack hallumphing on my shoulders like a Bedouin astride a camel, and I arrived just in time to see a truck fly by on a parallel road. I waved my thumb weakly in the air, much like a man on a desert island watching an airplane disappear over the horizon. It was no use. The moment had passed. Out of breath and disheartened, I let my backpack slip onto the ground.
Time passed. The sun inched its way up the sky. Waves of heat and humidity began to emanate from the asphalt. A bee appeared and tormented me for awhile, but eventually it, too, got bored and flitted off, presumably in search of shade. I began to ooze sweat. I felt a trickle down my back, then another. Time stopped. Not a single car appeared. I began to make lists of places I’d rather be, starting with the Black Hole of Calcutta and then eventually ticking off the inventory in descending grades until I got to a Japanese high-school English class. Anywhere but here.
I was sitting on my backpack, contemplating my shoelaces, when I heard a vehicle. Scrambling to my feet, I thrust my thumb out wildly in all directions, unsure from which road the car would appear. The noise grew louder and louder, like the pitch of a mosquito, and suddenly a sleek blue car whipped past me on the east-west axis. “Wait!” I cried.
At the last possible moment, the driver saw me. He slammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop. He then backed up, spun his vehicle around, and roared up beside me. He was wearing a mask.
I had always feared this: hitchhiking alone in a strange land and having a masked man pull up. Fortunately, this being Japan and not, say, Mexico, he wasn’t a bandito with a handkerchief over his face. He was simply a man who happened to be wearing a white surgical mask. This is what people in Japan wear when they have a cold, to avoid giving it to others. Or when they fear catching a cold from others. Or when they may be coming down with a cold and are afraid both of giving it to others and making it worse. Why this man was wearing a mask while alone inside his own car with the windows up, I couldn’t say.
“I’m so sorry,” was how he greeted me.
I found this reassuring. Bandits rarely apologize before they rob you.
“Please get in,” he said. “I am so sorry.”
He didn’t remove his mask as we spoke, and it gave me the uncomfortable feeling that I had interrupted a surgeon on his way to some emergency operation. I imagined little Timmy lying
With determined ignorance, I studied several road signs. My knowledge of the kanji alphabet is limited at the best of times, and all I could make out were sporadic bursts of words, none of which added up to anything that made any sense:
ATTENTION! —----- EAST ------ WILL BE ---------- PLEASE ------- SOUTH --------- ------ IS ------------ ONLY. THANK YOU.
“Ah,“ I said aloud. “East will be please south is only!”
Odder still, this ganglia of an intersection existed far from any town, deep in a forested valley, without a single gas station or house in sight. Obviously a government project. Curiouser and curiouser. The asphalt was new, the lines were freshly painted. The roads appeared out of nowhere, merged capriciously, and then disappeared around corners. It was maddening.
I wasn’t anywhere near the sea, so I couldn’t even use that as a rough guide. I assumed I wanted to go north, but that was just because I always hold maps so that my destination is at the top and north is always “up.” I couldn’t find a single road sign that read north, but eventually it dawned on me that if I found a road going south and then went the opposite direction, I would in fact be going north. (It takes me a while to catch on to such things.) Three different roads headed in a vague sort of “not-south” direction. I chose one at random and began walking.
I had just turned a corner into the woods when I heard the sound of a vehicle behind me. Desperate for advice, I ran back to Hell’s Intersection, my backpack hallumphing on my shoulders like a Bedouin astride a camel, and I arrived just in time to see a truck fly by on a parallel road. I waved my thumb weakly in the air, much like a man on a desert island watching an airplane disappear over the horizon. It was no use. The moment had passed. Out of breath and disheartened, I let my backpack slip onto the ground.
Time passed. The sun inched its way up the sky. Waves of heat and humidity began to emanate from the asphalt. A bee appeared and tormented me for awhile, but eventually it, too, got bored and flitted off, presumably in search of shade. I began to ooze sweat. I felt a trickle down my back, then another. Time stopped. Not a single car appeared. I began to make lists of places I’d rather be, starting with the Black Hole of Calcutta and then eventually ticking off the inventory in descending grades until I got to a Japanese high-school English class. Anywhere but here.
I was sitting on my backpack, contemplating my shoelaces, when I heard a vehicle. Scrambling to my feet, I thrust my thumb out wildly in all directions, unsure from which road the car would appear. The noise grew louder and louder, like the pitch of a mosquito, and suddenly a sleek blue car whipped past me on the east-west axis. “Wait!” I cried.
At the last possible moment, the driver saw me. He slammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop. He then backed up, spun his vehicle around, and roared up beside me. He was wearing a mask.
I had always feared this: hitchhiking alone in a strange land and having a masked man pull up. Fortunately, this being Japan and not, say, Mexico, he wasn’t a bandito with a handkerchief over his face. He was simply a man who happened to be wearing a white surgical mask. This is what people in Japan wear when they have a cold, to avoid giving it to others. Or when they fear catching a cold from others. Or when they may be coming down with a cold and are afraid both of giving it to others and making it worse. Why this man was wearing a mask while alone inside his own car with the windows up, I couldn’t say.
“I’m so sorry,” was how he greeted me.
I found this reassuring. Bandits rarely apologize before they rob you.
“Please get in,” he said. “I am so sorry.”
He didn’t remove his mask as we spoke, and it gave me the uncomfortable feeling that I had interrupted a surgeon on his way to some emergency operation. I imagined little Timmy lying
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