Leila's Journey: A weekend in the country

Most of the teachers who work for my company (including me) get Sunday and Monday off, so since it was a national holiday this past Tuesday we had a long weekend. To take advantage of the extra time off, a group of my friends and I decided to go on a camping trip in the Okutama region on the border of Tokyo. A lot of Americans don't realize that Tokyo is not actually a city, but a prefecture, so while part of it is made up of major metropolitan areas, there are also extremely rural, mountainous areas that are still technically part of Tokyo as well. Okutama is located within these beautiful green mountains and it only takes about an hour and a half to two hours to get there from Shinjuku Station. We stayed at a campsite called America Camp Village in a lovely little log cabin with a river running next to it. Truthfully, our weekend can't really be called "camping" because the cabin was fully equipped with a full size refrigerator, stove, microwave, tv, and beds; I think it would be better to just refer to it as "a weekend in the country" (which, by the way, is a Sondheim song that is now stuck in my head). I was extremely thrilled to sleep in a real bed for an entire weekend, since back at my apartment I sleep on a fairly uncomfortable futon that is only about 1.5 to 2 inches thick. I was also happy to have other people cooking for me, though I did contribute to the meals by washing dishes and helping to cut vegetables. On the first evening we played some games and talked for a while, we also went for a little walk to check out the area. At the other end of the camp ground we came across a group of college age Japanese guys playing the Japanese version of break the piñata. One of them held a big stick and wore a bag over his head while the others sat on the side and shouted directions at him so that he could try to break a melon lying on the ground. We stood by and watched their numerous drunken attempts until we finally heard the guys shout "Yatta!" - "Alright!" signifying that one of them had finally pierced the melon. After heading back we headed to bed. There were 6 girls and 3 guys on the trip so the girls slept upstairs in the beds and the guys slept downstairs on futons. This separation resulted in endless girl talk and I felt like I was 12 years old again at a sleepover party, it was a lot of fun.

On our first full day in Okutama a bunch of us decided to try a HUGE assault / obstacle course at our camp site that was built along the side of a mountain. It was an amazing course with rope ladders, zip lines, wooden bridges, and tons of other stuff. Some of these obstacles were practically suspended off the mountain in some areas, if that sounds dangerous to you, it's because it was. We would NEVER have been allowed to do a course like this in America, because within one week someone would be suing the camp due to injury and/or death. Not only were we not wearing any protective gear, but it had also been raining so everything was extremely slippery. Add the slipperiness to the barbed wire conveniently located beneath a number of the obstacles and it was just a lawsuit waiting to happen, good thing this is Japan though, not America, because the course was AWESOME! It took over an hour to complete and was quite the workout, but it certainly gave all of us a sense of accomplishment once we finished! That night we relaxed and watched some movies, for those of you who haven't seen Iron Man, you should check it out. On our last day we visited an onsen down the road from America Camp Village. It had both an indoor tub and an outdoor tub that looked out over trees and mountains. It was really beautiful and fun going with friends, though it still took me a little time to get used to being naked in front of so many people since I had never been to an onsen with more than one friend at a time before this. After the onsen we took the train to Mitake where we had Chinese food for lunch. In case you were wondering, Chinese food in Japan is not quite like Chinese food in America, but there are some similarities. I was fond of the restaurant because they gave us Coca Cola in glass bottles, which in my opinion adds some rustic charm to a place. After lunch we took a bus and then a cable car/train on a really really steep track up Mount Mitake. The view was gorgeous and we arrived in the late afternoon so we got to see the mountains in golden hour, my favorite time of day. I was sad to return to the city, but when we got back we had dinner at a fairly authentic and pleasantly quirky American burger restaurant, so at least that made coming back to the endless buildings and air pollution a little bit easier.

On a bridge in Okutama