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Done

Posted on 2025-05-26 09:29 by randy

I made it to Haneda. The above map is all the cycling I did this trip, minus the disastrous first day via Yokohama and Enoshima. The direct cycle from Atsugi to Haneda is definitely a slog – the first part is very mildly hilly but mostly annoying because there are so many roads and urban sprawl to navigate. Once I hit route 4 it was surprisingly green and lovely, I didn’t think to see more trees and forest towwards Tokyo. Even the urban buildings and infrastructure were covered in greenery. That, combined with the fact that there were very little people around, reminded me a lot of the Last of Us. Fortunately I did not get bitten by zombies.

After that the journey turns into a very pleasant riverside cycle all the way up to Kawasaki. The cycle path is smooth and easy to follow, and I quite enjoyed, although it was surprisingly cold today. I never thought I’d be buying a hot drink from the conbini in late May, but I did, and it fixed me right up. Kawasaki was easy to navigate, and before I knew it I was already in Haneda. I’ve not done the cycle to Haneda that often yet, but it is ‘customary’ for me to have a little break at the shrine in front of the airport before ‘finishing’ the journey. It feels like it’s the last moment of ‘Real Japan’ before heading into the international airport area, where there are lots of foreigners and everyone is rude again.

The last time I cycled to Haneda I also had an early morning flight – I cycled to Haneda late in the afternoon and tried to get some sleep in the airport, which was a terrible idea and I felt like crap in the morning, so I got a hotel this time. Yup, that’s lifestyle inflation, right there.

Two things stand out as things I’ve noticed on this trip. The first one is that there are just a lot less conbinis everywhere. I was talking to a friend and she didn’t think so, but I definitely noticed it. The ones I used to go to are all gone, and in all the places I’ve cycled at this time there’s the telltale tiles of former 7-11s and Lawsons everywhere that have now turned into moving companies, dentists and whatnot. Lots of dentists.

The other thing that was impossible to not notice when cycling Japan is the absolute terror and havoc caused by Japanese moms on electric bicycles.How do I know that they’re moms? There’s a very specific electric bicycle type that’s made specifically for carrying little children. It’s lower than a regular bike and has at least one kid seat, usually in the back. These bicycles are truly a menace to society. There are no rules, no laws. They do what they want and they go as fast as they damn well like. Will they pass you on the left or the right? Or will they play chicken with you and expect you to get out of the way? It’s a mad max world out here on the cycle paths of Japan. Moms on bikes have always been chaotic, but the rise of electric bicycles has supercharged the madness. Make your intentions known very early and give a very wide berth. Or, just stay on the road. It’s usually better.

So, what next? Am I done cycling Japan now? Am I going to do another one of these trips? Chances are very high that I’ll be back in Atsugi again for cycling, although I wish there was a better way to do it other than bringing my own bicycle. It’s always such a hassle. You can’t carry bicycles on trains any more (even when bagged) apparently, and the bus company for the bus from Haneda to Atsugi has said to me that they’ll no longer accept bagged bicycles as luggage. They’ve said this to me at least three times now, and some pleading has worked in the past, but it’s not exactly a reliable option going forward. Then there’s the hassle of bagging the bike up, unbagging it, hoping that nothing broke in transit, and then tweaking all the little things like brakes, gears, saddle and handlebars. It’s not too bad, as long as nothing breaks, but that’s always a worry.

A better way would be to just have a nice bike available on arrival, but the electric rental bikes are.. almost great, but often not. They’re not always available, and if they are, I found that there’s a fair chance that the battery won’t be fully charged. As I found out last winter, they are an absolutely pain to use when the battery’s dead, and it’ll drain quickly when someone my size cycles it up a hill.

So I’m not sure yet. I am wondering if perhaps the next time I will bring my own bicycle and cycle somewhere else. I don’t want to commit to “the big trip up North”, but perhaps I can do a casual sneak peek and see if it’s a thing I’m still interested in. We will see. For now though, I’m coming back from this trip feeling ten years younger and very excited about the future. It’s been a classic.

(On a totally unrelated note, I started playing Balatro this trip. It’s a fantastic game, definitely worth checking out even if you’re not into card games.)

Posted in Cycling | Tagged

Rain

Posted on 2025-05-24 14:48 by randy

Well, the weather took a turn for the worst. No cycling today. I’m flying back on Tuesday morning. My original plan for this trip was to send the bike back on Sunday – I’d read online that I could get it delivered to the airport in a day, but then the hotel people told me that it would take a minimum of three days, and that’s only for luggage that is a maximum of 200cm, length + width + height, which my bicycle bag exceeds. So I’m cycling back on Monday. I hope it doesn’t rain..

I had a good quiet day to reflect on why I came here. It’s been almost ten years since my bike and I last came to Japan by ourselves. A lot of bad shit happened since then. Good things too. But, all of it, things that changed me. I’d forgotten how to relax, how to enjoy life. I’d gotten very used to just anticipating the next disaster rather than enjoying the moment. I’m not quite over that yet. But I’m learning.

I’m not trying to hide from that, from the person I’ve become. Months before I decided to come back here, I considered the idea of going back for a trip, and I realized that I didn’t need it. I was getting to where I wanted to be on my own, without a need to come back here. I’d put the idea out of my mind since then, until one day I suddenly felt pretty damn good and thought to myself “I feel like doing a little cycling trip”. So I did. It’s not a pilgrimage, it’s not a quest for nostalgia goggles, it’s just a fun thing the present version of me likes to do. And, as I mentioned before, I can’t think of a better place to cycle than right here in Japan.

A part of my personal journey, perhaps a large part, is about becoming more comfortable with the different versons of myself. Japan is really where I grew up, if you can call post-university life growing up. When I came back to the Netherlands after Japan, I was a completely different person. There was the child-like Dutch version of me, and then there was the twenty-something, adventure-seeking bohemian. That’s who I was when I first went to England, but that gradually morphed into the boring old middle-aged me that I am right now. There was definitely a point in the last ten years where my significant other and I stopped saying the word ‘normaling’ ironically and just got on with the groceries..

But now that I definitely can’t hide from middle age any more, it feels like things have stabilized a little. I haven’t forgotten who I was before, but I’ll acknowledge that I am not the same person I used to be. I also actively don’t want to forget those past personalities, so in a way this trip is perhaps an attempt to make peace with my past self/selves. An attempt at proving to myself that, if I try, I can perhaps almost be one functioning adult. Perhaps.

The weather should clear up tomorrow afternoon. There should be just about enough time for a nice little cycle around the neighborhood before I head back. It’s been a good trip so far. I genuinely feel ten years younger compared to how I felt a month ago. Cycling is good for you.

Unadulterated. Unashamed. Unambiguous. Unapologetic. I’m still 100% pure me.

Posted in Thoughts | Tagged

Miyagase

Posted on 2025-05-23 09:30 by randy

It starts out easy. Smooth sailing. Just enjoy the scenery. Beauty. Then suffering. Hardship, for a long time. But when you’ve reached the top, there is beauty again. And before you know it, it’s time to go back again. The return journey is effortless and thrilling, a rewarding payoff for the hardship you’ve endured. And then, it ends as smoothly and beautifully as it began.

The perfect day of cycling. For me. Others will say “pah, such a short and easy cycle?”, or “there are much more beautiful spots to cycle in Japan”. To those people, I say “fuck you, go away, this is my blog, what are you doing here, jeez”. I’ve been cycling all my life. In the past I often wondered why I often didn’t like the same things other people liked. When I was younger this made me insecure. As I got older that insecurity turned into stubbornness and just being comfortable with myself. I’m leaning more into the things I like, doing the things I want, and it’s been great. There is no place in the world I would rather cycle than right here, around Atsugi.

Today I cycled to Miyagase dam. It’s a route that feels like it’s mine. I “discovered” it a long long time ago, back when I was living here, before smart phones were a thing and I had to navigate the old fashioned way. I had spotted the mountain lake on a map, and made a route for myself with the least possible amount of turns and junctions. I went there by myself first. Then, a couple of weeks later, I sent out an open invite to all of the other foreigners who were working with me in Atsugi, and a large group of us went on a wild whole day cycling trip to the lake, most of them on good old mamacharis. That trip was one of the most memorable trips I’ve ever done in Japan. I hope that the other people who were on that trip feel the same way. I think, for a lot of us, it was one of the last things we did together before real life and real world responsibilities arrived or returned into our lives.

Unlike the first two cycles this trip I came prepared. I remember the little things that make cycling bearable in Japan: nipple plasters, a towel under my hat and around my ears so I don’t get sunburn, and an extra base layer for when the first one’s totally soaked in sweat. Turns out, when you’ve prepped well, cycling can be a lovely experience. Disregard my previous post, cycling is great again.

I’ve been back many times since then because it’s just a beautiful route. Every time I go I’ll remember without fail how incredibly alien everything was to me (I was really just a simple Dutch country bumpkin the first time I came here, I had never seen hills, let alone mountains..), and how incredibly tough the climb was the first time(s) I did it. I remember exactly the places I stopped to gasp for breath, to buy more drinks (the final convenience store before the lake shut down, sadly..), and to just sit and recover for a while. And I just cycle past it. I’ve gotten older, I’ve got all kinds of health issues, but I am definitely better at cycling than when I first came here. So at least I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.

There’s a “secret”‘ tunnel at the far end of Miyagase dam at the end of the lake, which leads to a very nice and quiet lakeside road that goes back along the far side of the lake. There’s a small-ish tunnel at the far end of the dam park that leads to that road. I’ve been there many times throughout the years, and it’s always been rather ambiguous about whether you’re allowed to go there or not. And by ambiguous I mean there’s no obvious barriers, English signs or Japanese signs with big red letters, so in my mind that means “try it and see what happens”.

Since no one shouted at me when I went in the tunnel, I happily continued along the nice and quiet lakeside road, until I got to the end. Contrary to previous years, there was now a big giant gate, which was closed. Next to it sat an old man, guarding the gate, looking the other way. Because why would anyone come from the inside of the gate, right? He really wasn’t paying any attention to the side that I came from, and at that point I could have easily popped my bike up across the guardrail to the side of the road, which opened up into a public car park, but I thought it would be funnier to surprise our gate guard. I gave him a “konnichiwa” and startled the shit out of him, and he asked me where in the hell I came from. I told him “from the dam”, and he seemed quite surprised, but not angry. Then he just opened the gate and waved me through. I guess I wasn’t supposed to have taken that road after all. It’s fun every time though.

The way back was fantastic. All of the uphill suffering on the way in turned into roads that were sloped just right for a decent but not dangerous speed going down. It was actually quite chilly at the lake, especially in the tunnels, but as I descended again the air became noticeably warmer as I got closer to sea level. What a great feeling. I really missed this. Finally a classic cycle day.

Posted in Cycling | Tagged

I did it again

Posted on 2025-05-22 04:33 by randy

Jetlag seems to get worse and worse as I get older. Last night I went to bed around midnight, fell asleep pretty quickly, then woke up at 2am and couldn’t get back to sleep. Ugh. I had planned to cycle to the lake today, which I was pretty excited about at 2am, but by the time it was 6am and I still couldn’t sleep, I just wanted to stay in bed all day. It’s costing me a lot of effort lately to just go out and cycle. Still, I managed. Old man, two hours of sleep, chafed nipples, sunburnt face and ears.

Yesterday I ranted about all the humbuggy things that got worse, today I should give props to something that got better: the cycle route along the riverside is just very nice now. There’s no longer any need to veer off into Hiratsuka to get around some major road or train track. I’m pretty sure the riverside is now the fastest route between the two cities, given the stupid amount of traffic lights on the main road.

I’m still committing noob cycling mistakes. Two days ago I wore a base layer that was way too thick for the weather and I ended up with sweat rash on my arms. Today I wore a thin, non-cycling base layer that tends to be really good for everything else, but unfortunately it just got drenched in sweat and did not dry up at all during the cycle, so I was cold and wet by the time I got back to the hotel. Lesson re-learned: I need to get some better base layers. At least I managed to do laundry after I got back. Now it’s time to catch up on some sleep..

Posted in Cycling | Tagged

Atsugi (or: old man yells at clouds)

Posted on 2025-05-21 14:58 by randy

It’s weird to think that this year it will have been twenty years ago since I first came to Atsugi. It’s equally weird to think that I left this place fifteen years ago. It always feels good to reconnect with my past, although I’ve been back so many times since, and so many things have changed in my life, that the nostalgia goggles have definitely worn off. That said, it’s still my go-to destination whenever I go back to Japan though. I don’t like Tokyo, and Atsugi is familiar for going cycling. It’s a good place. But things have definitely changed over time.

I did a dumb gaijin thing today. I walked into one of the restaurant chains that I used to frequent only to realize that I couldn’t figure out how to use the machine up front to order. They used to have a machine where you inserted cash, picked your food item, and it would dispense a food ticket, which the waitperson would then take from you as you got seated. Turns out that got replaced by tablets at each seat, with the machine upfront just being the (automated) payment machine. I should and would have known that, but my mind was stuck in the past. D’oh.

I walked by my old favorite moping spot today, a lovely place near the riverside in front of a sports field that used to be nice and secluded. I often used to go there in the evening since it was a short walk from where I used to live, thinking about everything that was wrong with my early-twenties love life. Good times. Now they built a giant.. I don’t even know what is, but a giant building that looks like a warehouse, on the opposite side of the river, which is lit so brightly that the moping spot is more of a spotlight spot now. Oh well. Things change.

One thing that’s definitely noticeable is the increased urbanization. Atsugi is still in that little narrow patch of flat, agricultural land between greater Tokyo and where the mountains begin. But every time I go back more of those rice fields disappear and are replaced by malls, warehouses and residential suburbs. It’s understandable, but such a shame. There is definitely some character being lost there.

On the bright side, my new favorite spot is a place I never went when I was living here, and that was because it’s on the opposite side of the river and there wasn’t a bridge nearby to get to it. In the last decade or so they’ve opened up a bridge that goes across a weir, opening up to a lovely cycling path on the other side that provides great views of the river and the mountains. It’s become my new go-to spot every time I’m back here.

That is all for now. Depending on the weather I might cycle to the lake tomorrow, or else I might stay in and do some laundry. We will see. More to come.

Tagged

Oof

Posted on 2025-05-20 14:47 by randy

Disregard everything I wrote about cycling and cycling trips two days ago. Cycling sucks. I suck. Everything sucks. What was supposed to be an epic victory today turned into easily one of my top 5 worst cycling days. The worst part is, I’ve really got no one else to blame but myself.

It all started out pretty well yesterday. Although the immigration at Haneda took forever, the bike arrived fine and nothing was broken. I managed to put it all together yesterday evening at the hotel near Haneda, with the intent of cycling to Atsugi via Kamakura and Enoshima today. At 10pm the jet lag hit and I was out like a light. Sadly I did not wake up early in the morning – I woke up at midnight, and I did not manage to fall asleep again. My jet lag seems to get worse with age, but perhaps it was also the excitement of doing my victory ride – any cycle that takes me back to Atsugi on my own bike is always a highlight for me. I couldn’t stop thinking about it, up the point where it got to 7am and I started micro-obsessing about the routes to take, the sunlight hours to avoid, and so on. At that point the fatigue started to hit, I got a headache and wanted nothing more than to just stay in my hotel room all day.

Two paracetamols later I was on my way. I was dreading the first part the most, because the roads between Haneda and Kamakura are the ones I’m least familiar with, and there’s always tons of traffic. Traffic ended up being less bad than I expected, but I did spend a significant amount of time tweaking my saddle and handlebars since any previous alignment got lost when packing the bike up for travel. I ended up cycling with a crooked steering wheel and a sideways saddle for a while until I got fed up with it, took my luggage off (otherwise I couldn’t reach the bolts) and fixed it. Unfortunately, even though it was supposed to be sunny all day, the sky was massively hazy and there were some insanely wild gusts of wind, even in downtown Yokohama. Definitely not great conditions for cycling, and I got sandblasted many a time as my route took me along the coast later on.

Yokohama, and many other cities in Japan, do this thing where they pretend to be cycle-friendly by having a separate area of the sidewalk marked off as a cycle lane. Unfortunately (I’m using this word a lot in this post) that area is a complete wild west, with crazy moms on cyber-electrobikes passing you left and right and causing general chaos wherever they go. What’s worse, there are many major junctions everywhere where the cycle lane just veers off into the street being crossed, and there’s barriers everywhere between the sidewalk and road, so you can’t just hop on the road and cycle straight on. The only ways to get around those is to either go into the crossing street until the next normal zebra’d crossing, or to carry your bicycle up and down an overpass. Both of these options suck, so the best way to deal with these kinds of situations is to just cycle on the road, completely defeating the purpose of those “convenient” sidewalk bike lanes.

By around 10am I had finally sorted out all my alignment issues and left the worst part of Yokohama and it’s wild gusts of wind behind me. My original plan had been to cycle via Kamakura, but at this point it had become very clear to me that I was way more tired than usual. I bonked, had shivers and felt generally miserable, right at the point where the roads started to get hilly. On the short cycles I do on the exercise bike I tend to be not in terrible shape, but I have noticed a bit of a decline after starting the weight loss medication I’m on. This definitely seemed related, because I don’t usually feel this fatigued and empty after a fairly short and flat ride. I foolishly decided to mostly stick with my original route, with a slight modification: taking the national route 1 to Fujisawa and Enoshima, bypassing Kamakura entirely. A slight shortening but still sticking to the spirit of the original plan.

I could have, at that point, decided to go straight to Atsugi, but that would have come with its own navigational challenges, so I figured that, as long as I get to the seaside, it’s smooth sailing from there. Unfortunately (there’s that word again) route 1 has a little bit near Totsuka where the signage indicates that no bicycle are allowed. I could have backtracked a bit and taken a major side road, but instead, I saw a tunnel going underneath route 1 that seemed to be a more direct way forward, so I went with that. That was a big mistake.

I ended up being lost (with a maps app!) for half an hour around these parts. Despite checking the map at literally every corner, the roads were so unintuitive that I ended up doing a full circle back to this horribly steep hill, which I ended up having to push my bike up twice before managing to escape, all the while in the full 30 degree sun while worrying that my sunscreen had drooped off due to the excessive sweating I was doing. Not great. Whoever designed that neighborhood must love mazes. Eventually I managed to make it out of there but those hills definitely drained whatever energy I had left, and I was on reserve power from there on with a good 35km left to go..

And that’s when my nipples started to chafe! Yet another one of those joys of cycling I had forgotten about. Out of energy, nipples chafing, I continued on towards Enoshima, where I received some renewed facial sandblasting from the crazy winds at the seaside. I decided to take a break there and sit out the peak sun hour, though I could barely get any food in me. It just seemed that my body had shut down entirely, waiting for me to finish cycling before doing anything again.

The rest of the way wasn’t too eventful, though it was slow going. I was on familiar territory again, and route 134 has some decent wind shielding and uninterrupted road cycling, at least compared to the more urban areas I had just come from. Despite it being flat all the way to Atsugi I did end up taking a recovery break again mid-way because I could feel myself running out of energy again. This will sound like a duh moment, and I feel stupid even writing it, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to do any serious cycling while on weight loss medication. At least I’ve proven that now.

Despite the haziness and my lack of energy, I did manage to appreciate the moment where the suburbs of Hiratsuka finally end and there’s this brief bit of rice fields and mountain views before reaching Atsugi. I love seeing this every time, it never gets old.

This day is definitely in my top 5 worst cycling days, maybe even the top 3. I’m not sure about the rest of the rankings, but the two worst cycling days are definitely that time I severely underestimated the climb up to the Fuji five lakes, and that time I climbed up towards Mount Aso while also getting a flat tire and getting stopped by police. Oh, and to top it all off, after I reached the hotel and tried to sync my cycling data to Garmin, Garmin conveniently lost the entire day when I had to set up my bike computer with my laptop. Thanks Garmin..

So, while this post might seem like the start of another big adventure, it really isn’t. I’m only in Japan for a week, and it looks like the weather is taking a turn for the worse later this week, so this might have been the most cycling I’ll do this time. Still, suffering makes for a powerful memory. I won’t soon forget this day, and I have good hope that I can pick up the more strenuous cycles again once I’m off the weight loss medication. Here’s to the future.

Posted in Cycling | Tagged

Freedom

Posted on 2025-05-18 17:30 by randy

It’s 2025 and I have never been this free in my life. Freedom has been on my mind a lot throughout my life. When I was younger I used to think freedom was a universal good thing, but after the last few years (the last decade, really) I’ve come to see that reality is, as usual, a bit more nuanced. Ultimate freedom, for all the good that it would do, would also mean that you are not tied to anything. I miss being tied to my parents, my home country, and to the life I used to lead back in Japan. I still strongly enjoy the freedoms that I have, but now that I’m older, I also appreciate my ties, my bonds, a lot more.

In the past I’ve not been the best at acknowleding the ties that I have (had). As the saying goes, you only know what you have, when it’s gone. The sense of gone-ness has featured a lot in my life lately, and I’m still learning where to place that. People die. I’ve lost connection with the people and places that used to matter to me. My health is not getting any better. Getting old fucking sucks. Such is life. During the shit times, those negatives are all I can see.

But recently something happened that made me see my life in a whole new, much more positive, light: I started on weight loss medication. I’ve not been on it for that long yet, and I’ve had some miserable moments during the first two months I was on it, but two weeks ago I experienced something of an epiphany. For the first time in literally ten years, I didn’t have to worry about any stomach issues. I didn’t have to worry about what I ate, or how it would make me feel afterwards. It felt fantastic.

And with that came flooding back my excitement for life. I suddenly realized that, all the things that I do for fun, I didn’t really do for fun any more. I just did them because they were “things I did”. Sure, I derived some level of satisfcation from it, but it suddenly felt insigificant compared to how I felt at that moment. I realized that I could do things again and enjoy them as much as I used to. I realized that, no, it’s not just all downhill from here as I get older. Some things can get better. Some things will get better.

It reminded me of one time, when I was in my mid-twenties, sitting on a hard airport floor in Switzerland somewhere, because my flight was delayed for several hours. It sounds miserable, but at the time I felt absolutely fantastic. I was at the top of my physical game and my freedom game at the time, and I would’ve felt great anywhere. That is the feeling of excitement, of being comfortable with myself, that I have found again. It’s not always there (yet), I definitely still have plenty of moments where I’m my old numb self again. But the spark is there. Thanks to this feeling I have a reminder of what it feels like to enjoy life again. I am motivated.

The same week during which I had my epiphany, I booked a week off, bought a plane ticket to Japan, and packed up my bicycle for travel. I’m going cycling in Japan on my own bike, for the first time in ten years. It won’t be a mega serious cyling trip since I’ve only got one week and I intend to stay in Kanagawa, but it feels like the start of something new. Over the past ten years I’ve thought a lot about finally “finishing” cycling in Japan, by doing the last quarter of the coastline between Tokyo and the northernmost point of Hokkaido. And all those years I had been silently dreading that trip, because it’s the least hospitable cycling one could do in Japan, and I knew it would be a serious challenge for me given my physical state. So I swore it off. After my parents died, I asked myself how much I actually valued that trip versus the hardship it would give me, and I realized that it just wouldn’t do anything for me. It wouldn’t mean anything. And I stand by that. But now, with my newfound excitement and, hopefully, future physical fitness, I can also see a world where a trip like that is not a massive hardship for me, and I can definitely see myself deriving excitement and satisfcation from an epic cycling trip like that. Even if I never end up doing it, I have regained the freedom to do it if I feel like it. And that feels fantastic.

I’m writing this from an airport lounge at Heathrow. Life has been kind to me in that way. No more cold floor tiles in Swiss airports. I’ve got some sunny days ahead of me, no fixed schedule, no worries on my mind, and a newfound physical fitness. If you asked me even two years ago that I’d be where I am now, I could not have imagined it. But here I am. New adventure, here I come.

Posted in Cycling , Thoughts | Tagged

Man

Posted on 2025-03-09 22:47 by randy

Man is destined to never know true meaning, because if man could know true meaning, man would not be man.

Posted in Thoughts | Tagged

A new year

Posted on 2025-01-05 07:09 by randy

Before I went on this winter’s Japan trip I told myself that the new year wouldn’t properly begin until after I had cycled Atsugi. I somehow also decided to pile on all my mental issues to be solved on this particular day, when I am in a good mindset to think about all that’s happened in the past year. I turned 40, lost both my parents, had some health scares and hit an important financial milestone. What a year..

Where has all the time gone? All these events certainly made me reflect on my life a lot. It’s been suggested to me that I lack ikigai. I don’t think I’ve ever had a clear purpose in all of my life (except once, briefly, a long time ago). The events of this year spurred a certain unrealistic sense of urgency in me, in that I somehow expected myself to find my ikigai on this trip. “Sure, let’s just get that pesky little problem out of the way so we can start the next year clean”. That kind of attitude. Obviously I was stupid about that, and I did not manage to find meaning in life in one day.

While I have no answers yet for any of the major issues I am facing, I think I’ve gotten better at pinpointing the issues. Ikigai is certainly a big thing for me, but it’s also an issue that’s waaaay at the upper end of the hierarchy of needs. It’s not something that’s on fire, and I can take my time on finding the right answer. I’m learning not to conflate my quest for ikigai with more practical issues like the “where-should-we-live” problem. It’s about time we found something nicer for our little family, and perhaps 2025 will be a good year to find our dream house. A third thing that gets conflated into this problem mix for me is how I tend to feel like a completely different person when I’m in the Netherlands, Japan or the UK. Integrating those parts of myself better is another thing I’d like to improve on next year.

So my mental image of cycling Atsugi wasn’t as glorious as it was last year. I was horribly underdressed from the cold, freezing my ass off, and the electric bike’s battery ran out before the slightly steeper bit, so I was pretty miserable when I came across the scene from the photo above. It’s one of my favorite roads in Atsugi, the one that leads to the mountains and lake Miyagase. There I found this old man painting the scene, and, looking at him, all my cold and misery just faded away and I felt happy. It was strange. My grandfather was a painter. Perhaps it’s something I can also find purpose in in the future.

I wish you all well. There will be more to come, and it will be better. Don’t be in a hurry.

Posted in Thoughts | Tagged , ,

For better and worse

Posted on 2024-12-31 10:38 by randy

Another year has passed. Another year in which I haven’t written much, and now there is too much to write. It’s not often that a year has ended so different from me than it started. This was one of those years, for better and worse.

I’m in Onomichi right now. I want to write “right back where it all started”, but it’s not quite that. It is a place that I have vivid memories of, though. Not in the least because it’s the start of one of the best cycling routes in all of Japan. This marks the third time I’ve been here, and it’s the first time I’ve been here in winter. The first time was at a very turbulent stage of my life, in my younger, “wilder” years. I write “wilder” because I was never really all that wild, but I was definitely a very different person then than I am now.

Despite the Shimanami Kaidou being an absolutely gorgeous cycling route and easily one of the best in Japan if not all of the world, the second time I came here, I could not appreciate it, and I couldn’t figure out why. I had begun to build up my life in the UK and had taken a short week off to cycle Shikoku. And for some reason I just couldn’t appreciate it the beauty of it at all. It registered clearly to me that what I was seeing was beautiful, but I was devoid of the positive feelings that I remembered from when I went here the first time, and I felt terrible for it. Morose. Dead inside. Being unable to appreciate that beauty bothered me for many years after that.

The third time I went here – now – is the year in which both of my parents passed away. This fact still hasn’t fully registered with me. Some people I know experience grief as a massive but brief peak and then it goes away. For me, the initial impact of such a major event barely seems to register, or at least that’s what it appears like to those around me. But then it takes a long, long, loooong time for me to come to terms with it. I’m still a ways away from that.

Cycling the Shinamami Kaidou. Three times. The first time in my youth, too naive to know about the troubles in life. The second time, with all the weight of the world starting to creep up on me. The third time, after it’s all over, for better and worse. The road was beautiful this time. I enjoyed it very much.

Happy new year everyone. New things will keep happening.

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