walkabout-tobacco.org Blog

Whether it was the anticipation of finishing this journey or just the bright, early morning light filtering through the curtains; but from 4am onwards my sleep was restless and by 6am we were up to meet Dr Kato at Wakkanai train station after his overnight trip from Sapporo. Reiko went to collect him from the station whilst I packed, but she found him on the streets already sightseeing in the town. The only restaurant available at this time for breakfast already had a few people smoking in it, so we opted for some convenience-store snacks and a short drive to the northern tip of Wakkanai, Cape “Noshampoo” to eat them. Then back to Wakkanai station to commence the final swings of my “compass” legs on this Nippon Odyssey.

Staring out at a relaxed pace, under a sun-umbrella cloudy sky at 7:30am, we had allowed ourselves 5 hours to reach Cape Souya, 32km away. After about 5km Dr Kato and I were joined by Dr Shimizu and conversation succeeded in slowing our pace, requiring me to pick it up several times. In an area of unpredictable mobile communication we were fortunate to receive a call from Dr Pink and Dr Pinpin in San Francisco on their way to the World No-Tobacco Conference in Washington. Spurred on by their good wishes we reached Cape Souya at 12:30 on schedule, with a brief stop just before the Cape to include Dr Iwasa’s Himeji Red Cross Hospital flag. Thus, I arrived on the threshold of Cape Souya armed with two anti-smoking flags to be welcomed by a small group of hardcore, enthusiastic supporters and a large banner unfurled in front of the apex of stone pillars that signify Japan’s most northerly point.

Fortunately at the time of my arrival there was a lull in the tour bus activity and the sightseeing people that were there gave way amidst the TV and newspaper reporters who were directing traffic and placing me on the pedestal flanked on either side by huge Japanese and Australian Flags. A roll-call of supporters at the finish included, Dr Kato (Ehime), Dr Shimizu (Hokkaido), Dr Inamoto and his wife (Osaka), Professor Kitada (Hokkaido), Ms Otani (Chiba), Kiku and Kana chan (Tokyo) and Mr T who rode his motor-scooter 1500km from Tokyo. Moreover, of the many who wanted to attend and who supported us along the journey, more than 50 were represented in spirit by there good wishes, flying in the wind, written on the white background of a “Rising Sun”. This will be my personal treasure, as it represents the unification and communication that is possible from all the anti-smoking groups in Japan.

The press’ most burning question was of course, “How do you feel?”

Actually, at that moment I just wanted to use a toilet. More seriously, its hard for me to describe the feelings of the moment, so much is happening around you, well-wishers and questioners and general public unknowledgably gawking at you, its all so surreal that I think you cocoon your thoughts, until there is time for reflection. On a personal level, there is satisfaction on creating a plan to walk across Japan, and executing that plan on schedule, but in terms of Japan, I have to say: I feel sad that over 300 Japanese continue to die everyday from tobacco related sickness and Mr Koizumi and the Japanese Government continue ignor this grave problem. I’m sure if a JAL “Jumbo” crashed every day of the year, something would be done within a week to rectify the problem.

This leaves me to applaud all those individuals and NPO groups who have given unbelievable support to this walk and more importantly, who work tirelessly with limited resources to make Japan a healthier place to live.

There isn’t room here to write all your names, but you know who you are, and you know how much Reiko and I have appreciated your support on our 88 day anti-smoking campaign. You are all, our friends. On this last day, our final thanks must go to our last official homestay host, Dr Shimizu who entertained eight of us at his home, providing a wonderful dinner and a wonderful concluding celebration to this event.

I dont however see this as an end, but a chance for a NEW BEGINNING for all of us.

If any of you believe in the talismanic magic of animals, then it is interesting to note that on the first night of this odyssey under a full moon at Cape Sata I met an Ino shishi (wild boar) which I feel signifies stubbornness. On the last day, also in the full moon cycle, I met a fox which I feel signifies cunning. As anti-smoking groups with limited resources you must rely on stubbornness and cunning to change the tobacco culture in this country.

Many of our supporters have connected with each other, through us, for the first time. Lets build on this communication and unite as one against “Big Tobacco”.

Let your new slogan be: “TOGETHER AGAINST TOBACCO !”

The overnight rain gave way to a cool, cloudy morning and I managed to enjoy the solitude of a long empty beach over the first ten kilometres, before being joined once again by Dr Shimizu who had journeyed across the island by car and bus just to push me along for a few hours. His thoughtfulness extended to making us a delicious picnic lunch, with restaurants being scarce in this neck of the woods and not a convenience store in sight.

We continued on together for an hour after lunch before he caught a local train back to his car and I continued on alone into Wakkanai under an increasingly hot sun, whilst Reiko was already checking in to our hotel.

At 6pm we were visited by Professor Kitada who had flown up from Sapporo for tomorrow’s finale, bringing with her a fresh supply of Royce chocolates to get me to the finish line. Seing her off on the bus to Cape Souya where she will stay tonight, we then enjoyed a delicious and cheap seafood dinner in Restaurant Panagarue and finished off the evening in the City’s onsen, “Spa-Dome”, soaking in its hot rotenburo (outdoor spa-bath) looking up to the heavens and seeing my face reflected in the magical, mirror of the moon, almost full. Reminding me of my first night’s adventure at Cape Sata under the watchful gaze of the same man in the moon.

Used this manufactured rest day to take the opportunity to reconnoitre the two main routes north to Wakkanai and organise our accommodation for tomorrow. Travelling via the inland trail on route 40, we passed more farms and many more marsh-mallows, stopping for lunch in Wakkanai and then returning along the costal route which is a continuation of yesterday, travelling through low, lush grassy vegetation and the opportunity for more beach walking.

With the distance approximately the same, I have opted for the costal route, with considerations to scenery and safety and no back tracking to reach our final goal as I will enter Wakkanai from the north having travelled around its small peninsular. The afternoon was once again spent up-dating the homepage galleries and resting up for the last push to the finish.

With little else today to write about, I have a little time to respond to my fellow chocolate loving friend Risa, who besides giving me a kilogram of delicious French chocolate in Tokyo, sent me a lovely e-mail about the “serendipity” of life. I have been pondering her thoughts on and off since then, and come to this conclusion. To me “serendipity” seems to have such a passive meaning, as though things and life just seem to fall into place. However, the serendipity of our meeting would never have occurred if; I hadn’t become a nurse; moved to Japan; married Reiko; met Dr Kato and the other anti-smoking activists etc.,etc. These things took positive action on my part, leading me to where I am now.

If there is serendipity in our lives, I think it is in our failures (often out of our control), which then lead us to seek new directions, new actions and new meetings. So rather than mourn our failures lets use the serendipity of them to forge positive new beginnings and events in our lives.

Finally, if you are religiously following this blog as I know my parents are, then you may want to watch us arrive at Souya Cape at 12:30 midday, Japan time on Sunday July 9th, on the web-cam located there. It can be viewed at the following address:

http://www.ilive.hokkaido.isp.ntt-east.co.jp/camera/asa006.html

Leaving Reiko to sleep longer in the cabin, I set out at 7:30am, on an already warm morning at a relaxed pace, changing from route 232 to 106 and hugging the coastline through national park land to Wakasakanai, all the while getting closer to Mt Rishiri Fuji, a volcanic island, just off the coast, named after its similarity to Mt Fuji, though quite a bit shorter at only 1721m.

Managed to walk a few kilometres along the black sand beach before turning at Wakasakanai, 2km inland to arrive at our pension “Ashita no Joe” where after a hot bath we settled into a relaxed  communal living/dining room with a few of the other guests before taking a short ride to view the sun setting behind Mt Rishiri Fuji then back to the pension for a milk nabe (stew) dinner.

Awoke at 4am to the sound of crows pecking at the rubbish bags we had placed underneath the car. Having cleaned up the mess, it was back to bed for a couple more hours until the mornings heat in the car became unbearable.

Walking from 8:30am, again along the coast, past giant wind towers propelled by a strong morning sea breeze, the scenery continues to be pastoral, with large fields of hay, recently cut, rolled into bails and wrapped in white plastic and left to dot the golden landscape like a crop of giant marsh-mallows. Along with the Holstein cows, who eat these “marsh-mallows” in winter, we are again starting to see wildlife again, in the form of deer, yet another reminder of our time in Kyushu.

Tonight we stayed in a small, spartan, two bed log cabin, on a pleasant grassy hillside on the edge of Enbetsu town and we followed the usual course of onsen, dinner and sleep.

Despite 11 and 1/2 hours of sleep and the included hotel breakfast, I still started the the morning feeling unenvigorated, with my walking rhythm interrupted after only 3km by a roadside interview with a local newspaper reporter.

Following this I rounded a bend and found myself connected once again with my Kyushu friend, the Japan Sea, and with it a fresh breeze to combat the persistent heat and slowly I found my strength returning.

Continuing the sentimental journey back to Kyushu, tonight we returned to camping and sleeping in the support vehicle after a major re-arrangement of our various accumulated goods and chattels.

Said goodbye to our thoughtful homestay host Dr Yanagi who had also called in favours and arranged tonights stay in Rumoi. Starting today’s walk from Fukagawa under a hot sun across the open farming plains I made good speed in the morning. But after lunch the road climbed into a low mountain valley and as the afternoon wore on my pace became slower as the road meandered and the sun became oppressive in the confines of the valley.

A fish shop owner and his wife stopped to give me some cold drinks and words of encouragement, despite him being a smoker, which helped push me on into Rumoi, where Dr Tanaka at the request of Dr Yanagi had organised our stay at a much too nice Ryokan (Japanese style hotel). Given my level of fatigue today, I must apologize to Dr Tanaka for the fact that the included 16 course dinner was somewhat wasted on me as I sleepily wolfed it down and retired to bed at 8pm.

Returning to Bibai with Dr Shimizu and joined by Mr Toyama, the three of us walked the 25km to Takikawa, stopping for lunch at my homestay after which I continued on alone for an hour before being joined by Dr Tohdoh and his wife and three of their staff members for the final walk into Fukagawa. This led to a “first”. My first walk with a harem of four attractive young ladies which certainly had motorists heads turning.

Another “first” had been two days before when Dr Kitada asked me what I thought about when I was walking. A question which surprisingly had not been asked on the entire walk until now. The answer to which is quite complex.

My thoughts run the whole gammut from light to dark, always varied according to my mood and always scattered. I think about life and death, tobacco issues of course, and more bizarre questions, for example, do ants feel fatigue when carrying heavy burdens? Over 2700km I have certainly built up quite an affinity for ants. Probably because I spend much of my walking day trying to avoid stepping on them.

This walk has indeed given me a new perspective on the world around me, seen at a slower pace. I have gained a new mindfulness of the nature that is easily overlooked in the disconnectedness of today’s world of rapid transit.

Anyway, as yesterday we finished the day slowly soaking away fatigue in Takikawa’s Onsen and again dinner in the restaurant with the Tohdohs and staff.

A delayed start to the morning to say goodbye to Dr Kitada and Dr Ukae who saw us off from our dormitory stay at the Sapporo Social Insurance General Hospital, had me starting at 9:40. I started off by walking but after two days rest this felt uncomfortable, so I ran to the next corner to loosen up. When I got to the corner I decided to continue to the next traffic light. When I reached there I decided to keep going to the end of town and when I got there I decided to keep running to the next town. When I got tired I rested. When I got thirsty I bought a drink. Then after running a half-marathon (21km) I decided it was enough and I walked for the rest of the day.

The landscape is certainly becoming more and more natural and this morning I followed a river similar in size to the “Murray” in South Australia, all the while heading north towards the mountains hanging on the horizon, some looking like lazy Holstein cows, covered in pockets of slowly thawing winter snow.

With 6km to go I was joined by Dr Shimizu, a dentist who has been instigational in planning our Hokkaido walk. Finishing in Bibai we travelled 20km ahead to Takikawa and the home of Dr Yanagi (dentist) and our homestay for tonight. We also met his daughter Hiromi and her husband Dr Masanari Tohdoh also both dentists and enjoyed a bath and dinner at the local onsen.

You may be wondering why dentists are so anti-smoking. Well, its because of the high percentage ( something like 60%) of mouth disease that is caused by smoking, from simple bad breath to oral cancers.

The morning started in relaxed style with our first event, an 11am newspaper interview followed by lunch in the Hospital cafeteria with Dr Hata and Dr Kitada, then a brief speech a the annual Hokkaido Nurses Federation branch leaders meeting. From the Federation building another “no-smoking taxi” ride to the Sapporo City Office and a meeting with Mayor Ueda, a pleasant, casually dressed man who entered the meeting room wearing a short sleeve shirt minus a tie. I mention this because it is the reason I took an instant liking to the man who wasn’t about to put on airs and graces, even for the two TV crews covering the meeting. I also liked his staff members, Mr Yamamoto and Dr Ukei who would later, also speak at tonight’s symposium. After a brief walk for the cameras and handing out anti-smoking leaflets in Sapporo’s Odori Park and resting up at the presentation center, we made the short walk to the Hokkaido Prefectural Office for a meeting with members of the Public Health Section. Then another short walk to the Hokkaido Medical Association and a meeting with the Vice-President Dr Akakura who humbled me with a special medallion presentation for my services to preventive medicine. The medallion is particularly precious because it is one of only four originals which were made to support a memorial plaque containing the words of Dr Yamazaki who in 1975 opened an interactive preventive medicine museum, in the hope that people who knew more about their bodies would take more care of their bodies.

By now 6pm was approaching and we moved back to the University’s Presentation Center to deliver our one hour keynote speech; about our walk and our thoughts on the state of passive smoking in Japan compared to the rest of the world. Following our speech and others by Dr Ukei on the City’s efforts to reduce passive smoking, and a speech by Mr Kuroki, a lawyer who has been an anti-smoking advocate for some 30 years, the key event members along with Dr Kitada enjoyed a late, private, Japanese dinner at a nearby hotel.