Hikone: Finding Myself in Remote Japan

My plan to Hikone was spontaneous, made after a quick look through Google Maps when I took a rest at a park in Nagoya. I spent only a night and a half day in Nagoya, not because it wasn’t interesting, but I really needed to take a proper rest since I hadn’t fully recovered after hiking in Kawaguchiko. My foot whispered to me to leave the city and spend more time in the countryside.

Hikone is a small city in Shiga prefecture, extended along Lake Biwa — the largest freshwater lake in Japan. I’d read about a sacred island in the middle of the lake called Chikubu, inhabited by the goddess Benzaiten, where Emperor Shomu received divine messages from Amaterasu before constructing the Great Buddha at Todai-Ji Temple in Nara. The island is now devoted to meditation and pilgrimage. I found it interesting how these stories spread around the world—differ on the surface but resemble the same essence: god delivers its message to a chosen one in a secluded place, and the chosen one sanctifies that place for spiritual purposes.

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It took about an hour to reach Hikone from Nagoya by local train. I passed several stations and only transited once at Maibara Station. My Suica card didn’t work, so an officer immediately came to help. He brought the card to the office next to the gate and did something with it before giving it back. The road and the pedestrian area were almost empty. Most of the shops were closed. I didn’t understand what was going on—maybe it was because it was Sunday. My next stopover was about a 15-minute walk from the station, slightly hidden in the middle of a dense neighborhood — dense but so quiet. The front entrance of the guest house was being renovated, so the owner had put a direction board to the back entrance which immediately gave a small zen garden view

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I fell asleep from the late afternoon until 9 o’clock. My room was a typical dorm with fewer beds and a homey atmosphere. The side of the room was transparent glass which gave a relieving outside view. I hadn’t seen anyone in the room so far. My stomach was rumbling so I decided to look for dinner outside. I took a walk on a dark and quiet street. I kept walking and didn’t find any restaurants in the near distance. I walked a bit farther only to find a closed one before ending up at a 7-Eleven and buying a salmon onigiri, choco bread, and grape juice. While waiting for the traffic lights, I heard a sweet tune from a music box playing ‘beauty and the beast’ theme. A cold night, quiet street, soothing music, and a bright moon. This journey never ceases to amaze me

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I returned to the guest house and ate my food in the kitchen. It was facing the room entrance, so I sat while watching outside. The door was a wooden frame with transparent glass so I could see the garden and the owner inside his dim space sitting in front of a laptop. A few moments later someone came out from the female dorm. She was clearly a westerner but she was talking on the phone in fluent Japanese. She greeted me briefly and took a seat next to the kitchen table. After the call ended she greeted me again and asked a typical introduction question. She was German and had been living in Japan for about a year, currently still working with a working holiday visa in Okinawa. We talked much about her days in Japan and her Vietnamese boyfriend who was still struggling with the Japanese language

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I rented a bicycle from Hajime-san, the guest house owner. Right before I left, Lera, the German woman with whom I spoke last night asked about my plan and decided to join me, but there were no more bicycles available so I accompanied her to look for one near Hikone Castle. I asked her if she could help me buy a specific muscle pain relief balm in a drug store. Her Japanese skills helped a lot, and even though I didn’t get the one I was looking for, the drug seller recommended an alternative. We bought lunch at the nearest supermarket. Lera couldn’t help but buy a bunch of foods—she likes to eat, and she also explained some stories of the Japanese foods. I bought a pack of raw sushi and a random flavor of soy milk (Tonyu). We cycled around the Hikone castle and traditional souvenir places on the castle street. The day was getting hotter, so we continued to the south of the city and stopped by at a shady spot on Lake Biwa. Shortly after lunch, I went back to my plan to visit Omihachiman city, about 25 km from Hikone. On the way, Lera decided to go back since she wasn’t sure if she could get back in time to return the bicycle

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The nuance of this city resembles a lot of my hometown; the bridge, the lined hills, the rice paddy fields, quiet street, empty queue on the traffic light, farmers working on the fields, the reflection of the sun on the sea.

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Overall, I really adore the pedestrian sidewalk here, even in a remote place like this. In contrast, most of the pedestrian sidewalks in Indonesia have never been properly designed. There is a kind of infectious disease that spreads in Indonesia’s pedestrian sidewalks—it looks like a ninja warrior arena which is surrounded by reckless, poor, white elephant installation public facilities. It daunts you even before you begin. It’s not a question anymore how and why it’s happened — lack of supervision, corruption, and perhaps collusion between the rulers and the stakeholders to make people have a high dependency on personal vehicles in order to keep the game up.

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I understand now more than ever my constant longing for nature or old-fashioned places, and most of the time I travel or search for a new place alone. I think that the feeling of loneliness can be a good counterweight for a retrospective. Moreover, I can be more flexible to manage my time without being bound by other people’s interests and fully absorb every time that passes.

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In the end, the scenic panorama I have seen throughout Hikone to Omihachiman becomes two-dimensional historical objects. As Borges once said “I am not sure that I exist, actually”

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I arrived in Omihachiman city almost at 5 PM. The sky was still bright. I stopped by at Lawson and bought a lemon juice before enjoying it in front of the store, when suddenly the Lawson cashier came back to me. He said something in Japanese which probably meant ‘you left your camera’. How careless—I’d put it on a small indent at the cashier. I continued by visiting a residential area called Hachiman-Bori, lined up with old wooden Japanese houses along a canal which leads to Lake Biwa. Walking here, on the footpath alongside the canal, was like time traveling to the Edo period. I could visualize samurai warriors like Miyamoto Musashi or Sasaki Kojiro commuting back and forth, conversing about their Shogun, stopping by at a sake bar and owing a plate of ramen, or just sitting around reminiscing about the wars they had been through.

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Cycling back from Omihachiman to Hikone reminded me of Che Guevara’s monologue once he arrived at Machu Picchu during his journey in South America with a motorcycle, “How is it possible to feel nostalgia for a world I never knew?” I’m not sure the answer to this rhetorical question. The colors of the twilight sky and the sunset, the flock of crows on the electricity pole, a row of rice fields, and the approaching wind.

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My mind goes back to the Wayan Mirna Salihin murder case after watching a film called ‘13 assassins’. The film is about a group of samurai on a secret mission led by Shinzaemon Shimada to prevent Lord Naritsugu — a wicked, barbaric, murderous man from the Akashi clan who was still related to the former Shogun (the supreme ruler of Edo) — from being appointed as a shogun’s senior adviser. After a long battle leaving only Shinzaemon, Shinrokuro (his nephew), and Lord Naritsugu, it ended with Shinzaemon giving one stab in Naritsugu’s left abdomen. Only one stab so he could thoroughly feel the process towards his death, a long painful death experience. Naritsugu who had never been injured or involved in a war then said trembling towards his death:

“Will I die?” “I’m scared, I’m really scared, I don’t want to die” “so death comes to all of us” “of all days in my life, today is the most interesting”

This scene made me think about what punishment really means. I remembered the dissatisfaction of Mirna’s family and people in general on the day when the judge set a 20-year sentence for Jessica Kumala Wongso. They wished Jessica to get a commensurate punishment—in other words, “a soul is paid by a soul,” said Mirna’s sister. I can grasp that disappointment, but Shinzaemon’s single stab taught me something about prolonged suffering. The more painful way to torture someone, physically or psychologically, is by giving them a slow death process while they’re still alive. Considering the 20 years she will spend in jail might rob away her youth and wage a possible psychological battle inside her, it’s more tragic than an instant death.

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Hotel: Guesthouse Muga
Hotel Environment: Tsuboniwa Style (Traditional house with enclosed garden)
Treatment: Green Tea
Others: Closed to Hikone Castle & Lake Biwa
Impression: Time travel to the samurai era