And Then There Was One

Those cloud behind me near the ground? Sulfurous steam spewing from the active volcano that is Asahidake.

It’s March 16th (I’m talking to you from the future, biches) and I am the last one from our group that traveled from the U.S. to Japan about a month ago. I can’t believe it’s been three weeks already! It feels like time flew by, I don’t know if I’m ready to go back to the states. Although, I do still have another three days here, so I don’t have to come to terms with it quite yet.

At first I was getting nervous about being the last one to go- I’m in a foreign country, with a giant snowboard bag and I hardly know how to speak the language (it’s getting better but my vocab is still at the point where the three year olds know way more words than I do. However, I’ve probably learned the most from the three-year olds so I guess I should be thanking them. They assume I know everything because I’m a big adult. Who’s winning here? Everyone).

Now, I’m excited. The main staff of Niseko Negula (the pension where our group was based from over the last two weeks) are headed to another resort on Hokkaido; Kiroro, for a few days of snowboard vacation time and they’re graciously stringing me along for the outing. I love the people here already and enjoy helping out around the place with chores. Interacting and working with everyone after the guests have all left is priceless to me. I got to paint one of the three-year old’s nails this morning (her name is Kokoro and it means, “heart”) after eating a home-made breakfast in the common room. That’s something I’m going to remember for the rest of my life. Anywhere that there is snow you can snowboard and have fun. What you can’t find just anywhere are people of a completely different culture that welcome you into their family and home. Hanging out and bonding with everyone here is something I can never duplicate. It means so much to me that I’m getting to do this right now.

I’m already thinking about how I can come back to Japan some day…

Alright, next on the agenda- load up the cars and drive to Kiroro! Wataru also mentioned we’re stopping somewhere along the way for seafood lunch and a tour of a WHISKEY FACTORY WITH FREE TASTINGS. I had to ask him how to say, “I really like whiskey!” in japanese because I was so excited when he told me that. Whiskey daisuki des! Afterwards we’ll head on to some hotel(I don’t have my international driver’s license so I won’t be driving; that will be good) near the resort and get some snowboarding in over the next two days.

Everything’s working out and I’m so excited that I get this extra time to explore Hokkaido. Things don’t always turn out the way you think they will, but if you go with the weird flow of things it’s bound to work out fantastically in a way you never could have planned for.

I’ll be posting another entry or so on japansnoboarding.com to round out the story, but for the most part I’m going back to writing mainly on Gofer. I reposted my highlight entries from Japan Snowboarding to this blog so you can get a feel for how my life has been going since I started posting on that site.

I hope you enjoy this adventure’s story, and I can’t wait to share what happens next! (I think it’ll be pretty good.) Here’s to these awesome guys who made this trip to Hokkaido possible-

Colby just loves those Totos.

Tyler’s so ethnic.

Andy and Dubs show you that if you have two hands, you usually need to two drinks.

Hope you all had safe flights and I’ll see you again when I get back to the states!

Matane~

Home Away From Home- Niseko Negula

Reblog from my posting on japansnowboarding.com March 10th

photos by Jeremy Dubs

When we dropped in to Niseko Negula we had no idea that we were not only going to be staying at a great pension (a pension is a cross between a nice hostel and a bed and breakfast) location but that we were about to become a part of Negula’s fantastic community itself too. Wataru (the owner) initially impressed us by being a warm and welcoming person and then surprised us by being a great musician with extremely musically-gifted friends as well.

Wataru Miyazaki, the owner of Niseko Negula

Twice now we’ve had nights that have ended in full-blown group music jams; where staff and guests alike are dancing, playing music and laughing together. Both times they’ve happened directly following a meal Colby prepared in the kitchen for everyone, all-in-all being a real community event.

The Negula living room is always full of excitement. The atmosphere is electric and its great to meet people of various cultures in such a great atmosphere.

We were each sitting around in the Negula common room, finishing the last bits of delicious yakisoba, mashed potatoes, cabbage salad or fried chicken (depending on which meal night it was) and then Yui (or Masato, or Yasue) sat down in front of a mic with an instrument and simply started jamming out.

The first night Yui and his wife Maico played a beautiful set that included renditions of a few Beatles songs, some tunes sung in japanese and a mongolian song that as far as has been explained to us is meant to mean anything from Happy Birthday to wishing someone good health in general. Once the music started up, everyone who could grab an instrument and play coherently did so.

Masato-San and Band

The second night, Masato and Keita grabbed guitars and began playing that same Mongolian good-health song. I think they played it about four different times; I’m not too confident Masato knows any other songs on guitar (which was actually a great thing, because none of us knew the song at first but by the end of their session we’d all learned the words and were singing along. I was loving it). From there, Yuki (a visiting/traveling musician) grabbed his violin, blew us all away with his talents on that stringed instrument and the rest, they say, is history.

The Negula Jam Band – Maico, Wataru, Macun, Iku

I don’t know how long we played for each night, but it was nothing short of at least an hour, though you had no idea what kind of time was passing. We were a group of American, Australian, Cambodian, Japanese and more, having the best time we possibly could. Everywhere you looked there were ecstatic ear-to-ear grins. People couldn’t help but clap or sing along when they caught the tune. Being in a foreign country where communication is limited to fragments of either english or japanese, it’s amazing the type of connection you can feel with others when you’re laughing and creating music together.

Yui Akimichi – Resident chef and musician at Negula

 

I think it’s safe to say these nights of gathering for delicious food creating spectacular music together have added more depth to our experience out here in Niseko, Japan. We’re approximately 5,000 miles from the closest place any one of us might call home, but with things like this being a part of our trip, that distance hasn’t been too much of a problem for us being able to relax and feel right at home out here.

Its a Negula Party Night. Kampai!

 

Matane~

Until Next Time!