Weaving Beautiful Asia: Skiing

On January 21-22 we went on a weekend ski trip. It was arranged by a company called Why Not!? Japan, which sponsors events to promote cultural exchange between native Japanese and the international community in our area. We caught a bus at midnight on Friday night in Kyoto, and right away we knew we were going to have a good time. Everyone on the bus was extremely nice and we quickly made many friends, especially with a young British couple sitting in the seats directly behind us. Everyone was drinking, chatting and getting excited for the weekend ahead. Our only complaint would be the frequent stops that made what should have been a 4 1/2 hour ride take 6 1/2 hours, we are now very familiar with Japanese truck stops.

Upon arriving to the snow capped mountain town of Hida our exhaustion faded away and we were ready to 'shred the gnar'. We checked into our lodge, a traditional ryokan (Japanese inn), got our gear and took the slow chairlift to the top of the bunny hill. It took about 10 seconds to reach the base again, this place was not exactly Colorado, but we were still excited and having a great time. It was unseasonably warm so the snow wasn't in very good condition, towards the base slush would be a better word, but hey we were skiing, making friends and loving life.

After a day on the foggy slopes we went to experience our first dip in an onsen, the traditional public bath. We went to our respective sides and joined hordes of naked Japanese people in the cozy hot waters. After spending all night on a bus followed by a full day of skiing, I was exhausted and dehydrated beyond belief. The hot water probably didn't help with the dehydration. We went back to our room, pulled the futons and buckwheat pillows out of the closet and had bit of a lie down before the night's group festivities, a banquet followed by an all you can drink party. I woke up completely disoriented and delirious, with one of my notorious high altitude headaches. At this point I decided to go for supper, skip the party and come straight back to bed to rest up for another day of snow sports.

Of course that doesn't happen. After gorging myself on a delicious feast of all sorts of yummy Japanese foods and refilling my 5 ounce water cup more times than I can count, I was rejuvenated and ready to have fun with our merry group of 120 people from all corners of the globe. We ended up staying in the hall long after the official party stops and the free beer stops flowing. We decided to call it a night and start up the slope towards our lodging with Simon and Libby, the British couple who sat behind us on the bus who we ended up hanging out with pretty much all weekend. We made it to the door and all decided we were having too much fun to stop so early, turn around and went straight back down the hill to where dinner and the party were. There was a beer vending machine there and the plan was to hang out in one of our rooms and have one more. We arrived and the vending machine area has turned into a makeshift speakeasy, with its mechanical bartenders. We stayed much longer than we planned, meeting even more new friends. We had somehow managed to not meet any other Americans up to this point but it turned out that the first guy we talked to was from Denver and attended CU. After an hour or two we finally retire to our futons.

At 7:00 we are served breakfast at the ryokan; miso soup, white rice, meatballs, a mini omelette and a potato patty. Everything you need for a balanced breakfast. I'm not feeling the best after last night's festivities, but quickly learn that snowboarding is the best remedy, although the slow lifts certainly are not. Libby takes the day off due to a bad knee from the day before and we ride to the peak with Simon to explore the back side. There is lots of fresh snow and it's much nicer than the previous day. The visibility is also much improved. We got lots of good runs in and packed it in around noon for a much needed water and advil break. As soon as my head hit the futon I realized that I was done for the day. We relaxed until check out time and had some ramen before the long journey home on what feels like the Japanese equivalent of I-70.