Snow is Cold

There is a lesson to be learned in putting faith in the word of the weather man. I awoke to find snow had dusted everything in white, and it was still coming down. If it was snowing now, I thought it might worsen during the day, so I set out for cape Soya anyway. And it was rather dull. Aside from the novelty, there is little to see or do, and there is not much to see either. Apparently on clear days you can see the Russian island of Sakhalin, but not in a blizzard. Ok, slight exaggeration, but couldn’t see much.

Whilst I was loitering in front of a monument thing, an old man came up and asked where I was from. We chatted for a short while, during which time he managed to slip in that his wife had died. I noticed the tour bus that I assumed he had come with was leaving, so I pointed this out to him, and off he went. I messed about trying to find some breakfast (to no avail), took some more pictures and went to the bus shelter to wait for the next (and first) bus home, and the same man was inside, so I felt a little bad about having packed him off when he didn’t need to go. In fact we were almost certainly on the same bus going there, but in my early morning haze I hadn’t taken any notice whatsoever.

We talked some more on the bus going home. He was from Fukuoka, his two daughters were both living in Canada, and he was travelling to some places in Japan alone. His next stop was Otaru.
“Have you been there before?”, I asked.
“Oh, yes, several years ago, before my wife died.”, he replied.
I couldn’t help but feel sad about this. For him to have mentioned it twice within twenty minutes of meeting me, I suppose she must be on his mind a lot. And I could empathise.

I was wary that I was sitting in a “priority seat” reserved for the elderly, the infirm and the pregnant, and when more geriatrics started boarding the bus I thought I’d better move, but I’m not sure how well I communicated that fact to the man. We didn’t speak again for the rest of the journey. When we got off the bus he made some indecipherable noise, and half gestured with his hand to follow him. Needing the toilet anyway, I followed into the bus terminal, wondering if I’d offended him somehow. But when I came back from the bathroom, he thrust ¥3000 into my hand, and insisted that I take it. I was completely thrown by this, and attempted to politely refuse, insisting that I couldn’t take his money, but he was adamant that I did.
“Buy yourself lunch or something. I want to help you.”, he said.
I thanked him as politely as I could, and wandered out into the street, flummoxed.

I thought about why he’d done that for a good while, but couldn’t come up with a good answer. I felt bad for not having taken his address or anything, and as chance would have it I ran into him again as he was leaving the hot springs in town. I asked him if he could write his address for me, but he said, “oh no. That’s alright.” and waved me off as he walked away. I guess it was just the kindness of a stranger. He did give me his name though. It was Tony Honda. I wonder if I heard him right.

I had time to kill until I could check into my hotel, so I went to the hot springs, where I was mistaken for a Russian by a father of two. I shot them a wary glance, but couldn’t be bothered to correct them. I comforted myself with a choco-vanilla ice cream in the café.

The afternoon cleared up quite nicely, but it was still fricking cold. I was beginning to wonder if there was much point staying on in Hokkaido, as it is clearly the wrong “season” to be travelling here. All the tourist information pamphlets assure the reader that Hokkaido is beautiful in all four seasons. Yet April seems to be a nondescript stop-gap. A tourist hinterland.

Later, at dinner, I talked with the restaurant owner. I asked about foreign visitors to Wakkanai, and he said, “A lot of Russians came a few years ago, but in the past couple of years, there haven’t been many at all.”
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing, do you think?”
He smiled wryly, “A good thing. The Russians are not good people!”
I laughed and told him I’d been mistaken for a Russian at the onsen, but he said I didn’t look Russian at all. And gave me some squid sashimi with fresh horseradish picked from the slopes of the local mountain, and a large glass of sake, gratis. Nice. I also asked him how he thought the East coast would be at this time of year. He laughed, and said, “cold.” Bah.

Shortly after, I found a wallet in the toilets. There was over ¥40,000 (£200) inside. Being the honourable citizen that I am, I gave it over to the restaurant owner, who sought out the forgetful customer. The customer, clearly drunk, came over and praised me for being, “ii gaikokujin” (a good foreign person). The owner agreed. The customer was insistent on giving me a ¥1000 reward, which again I tried to refuse, and again failed.

The next morning, I left Wakkanai as I’d arrived – under glorious sunshine. And with a slightly bitter taste in my mouth.