Shikoku, Part V: The Chiiori House

I had already snagged two rides, slept over night at a rather swanky campsite, massaged my body with a long soak in an onsen, and traversed between mountain folds on roads which seemed to find the smallest crease between peaks by the time I found myself hanging out on the side of yet another road, in what was deemed a town. Upon my arrival I had tried to buy a packaged pastry, one of the nondescript kinds they sell at any old convenience store in the country. But when I went to the counter and dug around for money, the lady picked up the snack, examined it, and told me the expiry date had past already. I didn't realize the preservative-filled thing even had an expiry date. That's when I noticed the layer of dust on the clear plastic package. I smiled: I was truly in the countryside of Japan. I had then decided to buy some fruit instead, ate it and chatted with the old lady for a bit who didn't seem interested in much of what I had to say, which I also found curious. Now, I found myself jammed between the grocery house-shop and the road itself. The shoulder of this street was non-existent, and when a car came I had to hold out my thumb to show I was hoping for a ride while simultaneously be sure I didn't get it lopped off by the review mirror.

It was much hotter down here, away from the mountains. In fact, ever since I decided to take the ride and not continue into the back country, the sun had been beating down as if it was trying to make a point spring was here. Judging from this weather, I probably could've continued into the mountains alone, as planned, and been alright. But I had already made the decision not to and was in the middle of seeing out where it was leading me. I looked around, squinting at the light. I had made it deep into Iya Valley, but not yet to what could be considered its heart.

If you look at a map of Shikoku, you'll notice that its biggest land masses are found on the east and the west respectively, with a narrower piece of land in the middle connecting the two. If you move your eyes east and focus on the right land mass, you'll find a big patch of mountains, shared between the two prefectures which make up most of the east side: the eastern of Tokushima Ken and southern of Kochi Ken. If you're looking at a topographical map you can see that all the main roads bend and warp around a pocket of mountains sitting in between the prefectures, leaving a big green, undeveloped patch which is called Mt. Tsurugi Quasi-National Park; cities vanish, train lines end, and nothing is left but the curvy lines which signify various degrees of altitudes (indeed most of my destinations have such characteristics in common). Iya Valley (祖谷渓) is tucked deep in this area and is said to be one of Japan's "three hidden regions." Now, if I may lay a side note down here: no matter where you go in Japan, that area will be known for something: its food, its water, its rice, its wine, or its people or clothes perhaps. And, more often than not, it's scenic view. I've read more signs than I can count saying that "this spot is one of the three most beautiful views in Japan." Or something like "this mountains is called ____-Fuji due to it's resemblance of Mt. Fuji." After traveling through Japan you get the sense that the country has mobilized on a national scale to make absolutely everything cater to tourists; a spot that has natural beauty, which is worthy in itself to go and see even without being told about its resemblance to Fuji, or Kyoto, or what people "consider it" will be littered with such notifications and observations. So reading that Iya Valley was considered to be one of "three hidden regions of Japan" meant nothing to me. Until I started hitchhiking through it. I have to admit, this place deserved such a claim, and I found traversing through the mountainous area to be more difficult than usual (which was a nice challenge) and many of the region had such little access that my eyes fell upon an abundance of untouched nature. Furthermore, Iya has a role in history to stop even the least interested traveler.

If you've studied Japanese history, the family names of Minamoto (aka Genji) and Taira (Heike) stick out like sore thumbs, the queen and king on the chess boards, figures directly shaping national identity and the progress of a nation. Like any good country, civil wars were rampant in Japan, but one only is thought to be the mother of them all: the Genpei War. These two families fought bitterly overly the dominance of the imperial court (dominance of Japan), and battles took place all over the central and western Japan (check out the map above), on land and sea. Although The Minamoto were to prevail in the end, the battle had so many twists and turns a certain victor could not have been guessed until the fateful battle on sea between the island of Kyushu and Honshu (to the west of Shikoku). When the two clans were entrenched in this civil war, The Taira clan retreated deep into Shikoku and into these "hidden regions" of Shokoku, crossing ravines on kazua-bashi or vine bridges, cutting them after traversed making it impossible for their pursuers to follow. The end of this war and ensuing Minamoto victory marked the rise of military (sumarai) power for the first time in Japan where the emperor was made a mere figurehead, and the first time a shogun was ever to wield power on a national level. Furthermore, the colors of the two clans, red (Taira) and white (Minamoto) became the national colors of Japan, seen today on its flag.

I tried to imagine samurai running along this patch of road, past these houses where cars now drove. My foreigner mind enjoyed envisioning these romantic images; I pictured horses, perhaps some peasants and farmers working in the back ground, a Kurusawa backdrop developed in my mind's eye as I soaked in my surroundings. Did The Taira clan pass through this town way back when? Could this town have lasted through all these years?

I then chuckled, for I found myself, yet again, wondering which word to use for this post of houses, for "town" fell short. This place consisted of a patch of shoulder-to-shoulder houses on both sides of the section of the road. It was, in reality, simply a section of mountain road with a few people's homes lining it, opposed to the usual trees or ravines. There was a post office, in the form of a hardware shop of sorts where you could give the old lady behind the counter a parcel and she'd be sure the next delivery truck, which came once a day, got it. Some of the houses sold vegetables, some snacks, some random necessities like batteries, light bulbs, and such. Almost every shop was the first floor of someone's home, and when I stood there, I felt like I was hanging out in someone's front yard, only that it had been paved over as it was the only place for transportation to get by. For, behind the houses which I stood in front of was a canyon, much to deep to build on, and looming above the houses opposite of me and on the other side of the road was a mountain side which turned into a bluff of a cliff; the houses seemingly fell from the sky and stood as is taking up any vacant space. I adjusted my backpack and waited for another car in the breezy silence of the "downtown area".

In Japan, come end of April, the forests turn an awe-inspiring emerald green. As almost all the vegetation is deciduous, the leaves turn color, die, and come back to life in tune with the passing of each season. During the winter, with all other surrounding vegetation dead, the coniferous trees--which don't lose their leaves--glare at you from the landscape, as if they their camouflage has been used up. The rise up, from the base of the mountain, out of place, like patches of fur leftover on a cat after a fight. The bare parts are the now leafless, surrounding trees, looking more like spines of a porcupine. And, although at first looking at a mountain chain in Japan during winter isn't a pleasant site to look at--come Spring, the forests and fields radiate a green kriptonite glow that is a color unto its own . It is so noticeable, especially after a long, cold and desolate winter, the Japanese people have given this period a name, calling it shinryoku（新緑）: "new green". And, although just a tad early, I found myself surrounded by this, on this early morning on some random day (the names of days lose meaning when you've donned your traveling shows). I felt consumed by new, my thoughts on the subtleties of difference in seasons, in landscapes and history stirring my traveling blood.

Some people come to Japan to test out the adage that it is a country where future meets the old, where technology and ancient art collide, the salary man on his cellphone walking past a temple on his way to work, bowing as he passes someone he knows by--the kind of thing that makes me groan, but, like all stereotypes, these images are born in the abyss of truth. This stereotype of the country works on so many levels, so many facets of life, that it is almost pointless to try to talk about it or note it down on a pad of paper, indeed to photograph it. All you're going to get is a photograph that every other person has taken before. The same temple, the same kid dressed in a school uniform playing the most advanced hand-held gaming device; the same geisha stepping in small, bounded spurts, texting someone on her cellphone--images that don't lie, yet don't say anything new either. This fixation the west has with Japan is founded on truth, but it's most tangibly felt not when you take a picture or look in from the outside, but when you make a good friend based on common interests and spend a prolonged amount of time together, or if you work alongside Japanese co-workers, or especially, if you get the chance to work with the guts of the Japanese education system from the inside. Like any country, this clash of tradition and new is one of the many more-deeply felt-than-seen aspects which make Japan the country that it is. My words fail when I try to describe this dichotomy, this guttural difference between the country I live in now and the one I come from. I can't claim to be any sort of expert on this, but this pulling and tugging, this adherence to old but embracing of new, this preserved tradition combined with industrialization affects my daily life on so many levels, and is a foreign feeling to my Canadian, immigrant, roots.

The car nearly skidded to a halt. I was surprised, for it was one of the many company cars which race around the countryside on various errands. Usually the driver of such a company car is too rushed, on too much of a battle against time to even entertain the thought of picking up someone hanging on the side of the road. The car pulled over, and the driver looked at me through the window with a questioning look, begging the question "is that your car? Do you need a jump?"
I looked behind me, and noticed one of the cars which didn't stop to be pick me had stopped and put on its hazard lights. I then looked back at the driver and said "that isn't my car. But I need a ride."

A brief expression of annoyance fell across the driver's face, like when a young kid realizes he's not part of the joke but, rather, that it was on him. He glanced back at the road, then back at me, and in a kind of huff said to get in. It was more of an order than an invitation. I understood and quickly opened the door, tossed my bag in, and sat down--bowing, thanking, and pardoning for my intrusion the whole time in a manner perfected over the five years of hitching. The driver sped off. I chuckled to myself, and thanked the driver in the other car who had turned on his hazards.

I didn't say anything at first, eying my driver. He wore a customary work suit; not overalls but since the off-green cream color of the pants and jacket matched each other, the combination could be mistaken for one. He had some emblem on the chest pocket of his jacket, a company insignia. The suit had stains here and there, stains that told a story of a harder worker, not simply a dirty one--as it looked like it had been used for quite some time. The man's hair was disheveled and greasy, his fingernails dirty and his hands rough with wrinkles--hands of a laborer. When he spoke, he spoke with a lisp of sorts, making it difficult to understand, but not impossible.

"Wayne-san?"

My brows furrowed and I looked at him questioningly. He wasn't asking me my name, but rather guessing at my destination. The Japanese language is made up of one-word questions, hints, comments and responses--single words that speak volumes and at times puts the power of a single English word to shame. I tried to recall the volunteers names who worked at the Chiiori House. I then tried to remember the intersection I needed to get off at. For, the road which lead me to The Chiiori House was one which lead nowhere except up, and up, into the depths of the Iya Valley mountain range as well as into one of the many hamlets which finds itself trapped between mountains folds and living off of the game and land the area provided. But Wayne? Who's Wayne?


I told the driver I was headed to a place called The Chiiori House. He grunted, more from his gut than from his nose, and said, "yeah, Wayne." After listening to him and trying to filter through some of his heavy lisped words, I gathered Wayne was one of the house's volunteers. It seemed like this Wayne also got around by hitching. I wasn't surprised, but still mused a little nod to give respects to the laid-back nature of the area; a random salary man driving through the area in the middle of work--I recognized the insignia on the side of the car and the driver's jacket and thought it to be that of an electric company--knows the locals by their first name. It was just another sign I had left the big city far behind. The driver then said he knew where the turn off was but couldn't take me up the mountain as he obviously had a schedule to keep. I said not to worry about it, as I figured I'd have to walk anyway. He grunted and said it's a long way. Again, I nodded, and said that's what I figured. He then said it was really steep. I said I would be alright. He then said it was hot. I nodded. We then went through these motions for a bit, where the idea of using one's own legs to cover a long distance was alien, and I thanked him for his concern.

I can't lie. I first heard about The Chiiori House because of my Lonely Planet travel book (something actually proving to be damn useful in my travels--not as a book to follow, but one to lay the general game plan). The book had a bit of an excerpt written about the house in the Shikoku section of it, as well as a web link. I then, before Spring vacation started, checked out the website and brought it up in some conversations with my friends. Some of them had heard about it, too, it seemed and everything they heard was positive. A non profit organization, first started by Alex Kerr (A Japanophile and author of some popular books on the country, such as Dogs and Demons) when he was--like I was doing now--hitchhiking through Japan. Finding a vein of Japan which spoke to him personally, he was moved to begin to search out a spot in the country which he could make his own, and that's when he stumbled upon the tiny hamlet called Tsui, tucked deep in the Iya Valley. Here he found an abandoned, 300 year old thatch-roofed house 萱葺　(kayabuki). He fell in love with it on the spot. The process of buying the house was laborious and anything but cheap, but it won over the locals, created deep bonds of friendship, and started a pretty inspirational story for foreigners who want to create a life over here in Japan. He had to renovate and make the massive house livable again, and through this process, he slowly earned a spot in the small, rural and tightly-knit community while learning about local customs, facets of culture and bridging cultural gaps (click here for an article on the Chiiori House. The official website seems to have been changed as the house itself is going through changes, and perhaps is now unavailable to the public for the time being. Click here to check out the book which has this story as well as many others of Alex Kerr's).

Although the fate of the house has become obscured since I stayed there, at that time it was "run" by a lonely planet photographer and free-lance journalist, Mason Florence, with Alex more on the sidelines it seemed. Although, the project is truly run by the volunteers who care for the house on a daily basis, working with the locals and keeping the visitors coming. It was obviously a complex situation, with many people having attachments to it in one way or the other as well as seeing its future in different lights. At any rate, the house has been acting as a non profit organization for years, with various volunteers coming on stints, keeping it running, integrating the house with local programs and trying to make it stand alone as an independent project as part of the community and not propped up by individual funding.

It was the idea of being able to touch and feel a preserved part of Japanese culture which attracted me. That, and be part of a pocket of multi-culturalism, to witness with my own eyes the latticed relationships of people from different countries working and living together in the same community--for the same community. And my mind tried to conjure up some images of where I was headed and what my stay was going to be like as I hiked up the paved but bumpy mountain road. I walked briskly, my legs fresh from all the sitting-in-cars I had been doing. The sun was fiercely shining now, high in the sky creating a white sheen of a haze, filtering through the countless branches of cedar and pine above as I moved. The higher I climbed, the scarcer houses became, but they were present nonetheless. Many of the houses had metal sheet roofs, hinting at long winters, some painted baby blue, some rusty red. As I continued, dogs who had until then been lazily slumbering in the driveways or yards of their master's homes barked and paced as I walked by. Some farmers stopped to look at me, some men took a break from whatever they were doing in their sheds, or gardens to have a peep, but to be honest, most of them didn't take any notice of me. At one point, I looked down the ravine of the gorge on my left. The road I was walking on wound up the right side of the gorge, perched on the hillside, giving each house a commanding view of the opposite wall of valley below. That's when I noticed a massive boar standing, almost perching like a bird would perch, if it had four legs, on a big rock towards the back of a pen. The pen was more like a cage, the flooring messy with mud, and desolate of any life. The boar stood there, and stared bleakly ahead, like a relic of old, a neighborhood statue. It struck me not only how big the animal was, but how sad and motionless it stood there. I'm not one for zoos, especially ones in Japan made of concrete and metal bars, and this cage was no testament for closing in animals. But, it did give me a sense of where I was; it did stop me and make me look about my surroundings and feel a small surge of that feeling a traveler gets when he is in a different country and brushes against some foreign--a feeling that comes to me in very rare doses now.

After what seemed to be an hour or so, and sweating by this time, I came upon a bearded, red-haired white guy in his twenties chopping wood at a small looking cabin on the left-side of the road, looking over the valley. He stopped, looked at me and said, "you must be Jamie. How was the walk up? Did you make it alright?"

I told him about my luck with the hitchhiking and shook his hand. He had a strong grip, but shook my hand with an adjusted strength which walked the fine line of showing confidence yet courtesy as well. I didn't doubt his ability to chop wood, but felt a gentleness in his smile which was reflected in that grip--a gentleness which reminded me of someone who has learned to operate independently but would rather spend time in the presence of others. He took me inside the small cabin, leaning his axe against the wall and brushing off his hands. That's when I heard a "hello" spoken in a heavy American dialect--not one which conjures up the south, but more of the west, a very Canadian sounding accent at that. The girl spoke to me, without looking up from the computer, he hair black, her skin brown almost like it had been just a tad too dirty for just a tad too long, the sunshine and earth tones of outdoor life seeping into her face. "Just one more sec, I'm almost done here." She sat on the chair in front of the laptop as if she would jump away from it from any minute, her body already leaning in my direction, her head turned just a bit as she typed the last words on the keyboard.

Wayne asked if I wanted some tea. I said yes. Herbal was fine. I sat my bags down and before I knew it we were all joking around about sitcoms, epic fantasy novels I used to read when I was young (and which Wayne had been staying up late to read with his headlamp as of late) and even found ourselves searching up what a kamoshika is on wikipedia as my stories were received with skeptical eyes. I took a liking to the two almost immediately, and although I found out it was their job to be entertainers and basically it was in their job description to get along with anyone, I felt like the next day or two would be genuinely comfortable and relaxing. That's when they took me up to The Chiiori House to show me where I'd be spending the rest of the day, night and however long I chose to stay.

We wound up a stone path, between houses and through yards until we came upon a dog strapped to a long leash which ran along a line which looked like a clothes line; the house's guardian. My first thought wasn't too look at the house and all it's rumored glory. My first thought was more along the lines of "finally, a dog that isn't a poodle, that isn't a chihuahua, that doesn't have a sweater. Finally a real dog."

Kitty Chan. Doraemon. Anime cartoons. Manga comics. Constr- uction signs with comic book characters telling you to watch out for falling rocks; cars with eyes and mouths drawn on them notifying you of steep grades and water hazards. Japan loves cute and cute loves Japan. Hell, more than once my head has been turned by cute women wearing cute fashion in this country. But the dogs, the dogs are something else. Growing up in rural Canada, a Husky, a German Shepherd, a Rotweiler or Dobberman Pincher. A retriever, a Black or Golden Lab--these are dogs. Here, dogs are cats gown awry. Rodents in knitted sweaters with colored, little booties. Dogs are accessorized fuzzy balls of fashion and it's one aspect of this country's culture which I have to admit I can't meet half-way on. So, to cut a long rant short, The Chiiori House and its owners, indeed all of Shikoku, scored points with me as I my eyes fell upon this dog (it wasn't even that big). It was a mutt, but looked like it perhaps had a bit of Pit Bull in it. After my moment's flash of canine appreciation, I noticed the house.

It loomed before me, hedged in by grass and roofed in thatch. It didn't take my breath away like some ancient, mist-encircled castle of old perhaps would, but rather hit me with an upper cut of nostalgia. The house took me back and far away from Japan to the fuzzy, unfocused memories of when I was a toddler playing at my grandma's farm back in the Kootenays. Neon signs, public works projects, concrete telephone poles and condensed-milk cities vanished when standing in the presence of this house. It radiated a softness, a calm of sorts, like it was simply part of the landscape, witnessing the coming and going of things, like an old man who feeds the pigeons from his well-used park bench. The sun shone, even glimmered, adding a orange hue to all the earth tones of the scene before me while warming the back of my arms and top of my head. The browns and new-born greens of the surrounding trees painted the canopy for the house, that along with the clothes hanging on the clothesline and the chickens pecking, fluttering and Egyptian-dancing in the front of the house. The dog eyed me curiously but wagged its tail furiously at the volunteer who spoke to it in text-book pet, baby-talk. I took a deep breath of mountain air, and put my pack on the ground to take a closer look.

The house was big, and open. Nearly it's entire front wall, facing the deep ravine, was made of sliding, wooden and glass doors. Light entered and exited the house freely, on par with its visitors. The entire ceiling and rafters above were stained a pitch black from the irori--sunken hearth found in traditional homes used for cooking. The house exhaled earth and grassy scents. I was told to make myself at home (something I already felt) and that we'd be eating together later that night around the irori.


The rest of the day was spent taking the dog for walks, reading outside of the house, and well, simply putting the breaks on all the momentum I had built up and was encircling me since my first initial step out of my front door of my house hundreds of km away. To reach a place where you want to simple "stop" is a big thing for a hitchhiker, a traveler. When you have only an alloted amount of time and you're hitchhiking, you need to give yourself up to the swing and movement of things--never in a rush but never permanent. But here, as my backpack was now somewhere inside, with only a novel on me and relaxing under the sun on a bench, I found myself immobilized, stopped, on pause. I thought about staying here for more than the one planned night.

There are a few places in Japan, besides the tops of mountains, where you can really feel like you've got away from the bee-hive drone of it all. Japan, in a country with nearly four times the population of Canada and nearly thirty times smaller, I've learned how to dance with the ebb and flow of the presence of others, yet also to immensely appreciate the untouched, vast space found in Canada. At the very deepest place inside of me, in the pit of my stomach, like some crystallized pea, resides an innate yearning to find a patch of land to call my home, a patch developed in sync with its surroundings, where the presence of man and its feats is not shunned but used in tune with whatever mother nature provides. I found this feeling which runs through my veins as deep as bone marrow responding to The Chiiori House.

I've always said to my friends that, if I ever moved home, the first thing I'd do is run through a grassy, Canadian park in bare feet. It's funny, for to most of you who read that, such a sentence will be construed as very streamlined "hippie". But if you've ever lived in Japan, you'll know what I mean. Although I was doing no running in parks at this moment, I did find myself with mys flip-flops off and barefoot, feeling the exact experience I would long for if I was running through grass back home. But, I wasn't home, I was on the doorstep The Chiiori House, on the roof of Iya Valley, and in the backyard of Shikoku, Japan.