Learning to Bow by Bruce Feiler

Author:Bruce Feiler [Feiler, Bruce]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2012-11-28T13:49:16+00:00

The next morning when we arrived at the base of the mountain a little after ten o’clock, people were visible at every turn. According to a popular saying, every person in Japan is only one hour away from the sea and one hour away from the mountains. Nearly eighty percent of Japan is covered with mountains and virtually uninhabitable. Adding in the country’s already limited land supply, the result is that over one hundred million Japanese live and work in an area smaller than the state of South Carolina. Not surprisingly, a Japanese ski slope on a Saturday morning in February is a product of this equation. Multicolored specks of pink and green seemed to appear out of nowhere and spiral down the mountain on top of one another until they gathered in a heap at the bottom like discarded confetti. Five separate chairlifts scooped skiers toward the summit, pausing at the lodge halfway to the top. To add excitement to this already frenetic scene, loudspeakers strapped to every other tree blared synthetic pop songs from the latest American teen heartthrob: “Electric Youth. Feel the power and the EH-NER-GEE.”

At the top of the range our group divided. Cho, Hara, and Komaba took off down the most treacherous path, carrying a video camera and several blank tapes to record their exploits for posterity. The two women headed down a less difficult course, while Tomo and I—a beginner and a recovering cripple—chose the least rigorous route to the bottom. We agreed to meet at one o’clock for lunch.

Wearing borrowed pants that were too short and rented boots that were too tight, I soon realized that skiing down this mountain would be far more difficult than teaching English on crutches. Tomo and I managed to make it down the hill and up the lifts several times before Cho came skidding up to us at midslope and offered some much-needed instruction.

“How did you get to be so good at this?” I asked.

“I went to college,” he said.

“To go skiing?”

“Not exclusively. We went hiking and bowling as well. Nowadays, my club even goes scuba diving in Okinawa.”

“And you complain that you never get a vacation…”

“Now, I don’t. I went skiing ten times a year in college, but I haven’t been ten times since I graduated. I am supposed to have fourteen vacation days a year, but this is the first one I’ve taken. Being a teacher is like being a mother: we never have a day off.”

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.