Fuji Revisited
At some point in my life, I found myself in my underwear and sharing a bed with a mother and daughter from the Netherlands.
The rain and wind howled and whistled against the thin tin roof, but it was drowned by the sound of my chattering teeth. I drifted into an unsteady sleep, only waking to the sound of my bunkmates shuffling around or the desperate need to pee, which required me to redress in wet socks and shoes and tip toe across the floorboards towards the outdoor latrine. I squatted above the toilet as I thought I would be unable to warm myself again if I touched skin to the metal seat.
A few restless hours of sleep – interrupted by the ring of a bell and movement from fellow hikers. The guide was here to escort us down the slope. The wet socks came back on, along with the wet shoes, the wet pants, the wet shirt, long-sleeve, jacket. Everything was soaked and cold, which paired with the gray fog drifting ominously down the mountain.
The hike up had been grueling, switchbacks and slippery rocks while the rain pelted me in the face and soaked everything I carried. When I started the climb after the sun had set and the headlamp could only reveal a couple feet in front, I had hope for a beaming sunrise when I ascended. That dream dissipated as I rounded the corner of the steep turn and into a mountain hut, where a pack of hikers huddled from the rain, shared the sentiment that it was too dangerous to continue.
There is a saying that goes “一度も登らぬ馬鹿、二度登る馬鹿” translated in English as “He who climbs Mt. Fuji is a wise man; he who climbs twice is a fool.” Where in that statement described the man who hikes Fuji starting at night in hopes of awaking to a beaming sun. It’s clear that is ill-advised, but the forums raved about these experiences and the mountain had the services to accommodate. So, here we were, three men from Germany and the discussed, mother-daughter duo, clambering on the door of the furthest mountain hut at 1 o’clock in the morning in need of shelter.
We first met in the public bathroom around the 6th station. I was desperate for warmth and a dry space to check my phone, riddled with anxiety on the possibility of ascent. They had been chattering in friendly language, sharing stories from their trip, and pondering how much further they should continue. Despite the conditions, I felt dizzy with anticipation of allyship but clamored ahead.
We met for the second time when they passed me at the 7th station, where I was once again quelling the anxiety ripping through my nervous system and taking over my senses. I was too proud to stop – my mission was the sunrise and I felt there was no other option.
The third time we met at the 8th station, I was convinced it was too dangerous. Money was exchanged with the woman seated in the folded door of the hut and we were ushered to a dark sleeping room. Silently, it was agreed there was enough room for only one arrangement: the men share and the women share. A rough tour was given and a hushed whisper that we would be required to leave at 5 o’clock in the morning. I was disoriented and shaken from the events that I allowed myself to be led by these two women. I regret never learning their names – or maybe I did and the last thing the mountain took from me was the knowledge of it.
No one came prepared with a spare change of clothes, so we stripped to our underwear and carefully threaded our wet laundry through the gaps of string and wood that held the mattress nook together. It would never dry in time, but it provided us with the effort that we tried. The night was so long yet I forgot if I found myself reaching for them in the middle of the night, hungry for warmth or protection from the sharp raps against the wall next to me.
I long to remember if we exchanged further words that night, but the memory has been stolen by time. Maybe one day when the wrinkles web around my eyes, a sudden clarity will emerge – the lost conversation. But for now, the three of us lay silent, curled up into balls to retain the warmth from our flaming souls.
The agony of redressing was high but higher were the question marks littering the soft tatami mats as a guide instructed us of the plan of descent. It was brief, broken, and undesirable – the hope of sunrise was waved off as bad timing. For the longest time, which might have equated to approximately 45 min, the group bounded across loose gravel and chittered about our lives outside of Japan. The faces of those German men sparkled like a diamond in a sea of stones and I yearned to befriend their perplexing lives – how had we all gathered here in this moment?
Moments like these humbled me for different reasons than they do now. I smiled with my mouth but my eyes saw a scene that reminded me of how much I lacked: laughter, love, friends, connection, and a spiral of emotions. To whom would I owe the pleasure of sharing my story with and would they emit a gasp when I recounted the moment I stood in the bathroom at the base station and cried for the wallet I left tucked into the bedding at the top? Would they be surprised to know that the buses shut down due to the rising levels of water on the route which left us stranded on the mountain until an indefinite amount of time? Would they be touched when I described the laughter and the sensation of warmth from small heaters that the rangers dragged out for us to dry off?
I don’t remember the ride down, nor grabbing my bag from the Shinkansen station locker, nor how I managed to arrive across the lake at the small private onsen hotel I had booked a month previously with the idea that I would need a hot bath to recover. What I do remember, all these years later, is that I had lived. Not in the dreary way that I saw death looking around the corner, but that I found a moment of clarity in the otherwise unclear existence that I lived in at the time.
These individuals went their separate ways that afternoon, following their own threads and continuing the legacy that we survived. But they live on in my memory, not as faces, but rather shapes that represent what I left behind on the mountain. Maybe one day, I will revisit Fuji as a new woman with new perspectives and dreams.