🗞️ Peripatetic Chronicles

"It really comes down to whether you find it bothersome," the tinnitus specialist says, not even glancing at my left ear.

You’re right,” I answer — while somewhere inside, another version of me mutters, _that’s not an answer._

I thank the doctor anyway, a purely performative courtesy, and walk out of the exam room. This is a ritual I repeat every few months.

The tinnitus came on suddenly, about three years ago, in my left ear only. My hearing itself is fine. Somewhere deep in the brain behind that ear, a sound began — smooth and continuous, like the turbine of a jet engine. These days I think of it more as fog drifting on the wind, if fog could be heard.

At first, the one-sidedness of it sent me into a kind of panic. But once I was told there was nothing seriously wrong, once I accepted that this was chronic but manageable, something in me eased. I even began to feel, at times, a strange positivity about it — as though my left half had wandered into a deep forest and decided to stay. When I’m focused on something, I don’t hear the ringing at all.

What’s hard are the moments of enforced silence: a still elevator, a long quiet scene in a film. In those moments, I become aware that the only sound in the entire world is the jet engine humming inside my left ear. That awareness tips quickly into annoyance, and sometimes into something closer to dread.

I’ve been going to the ENT clinic for about two years now. Beyond a standard hearing test, each visit consists of little more than a self-assessment questionnaire — essentially, _how bothersome did you find it since last time?_

“Is there a chance this will never go away?”

“Are there any surgical options?”

The doctor doesn’t answer questions like these.

_Is this even treatment?_ The doubt surfaces, but when the specialist says, “It really comes down to whether you find it bothersome,” I want to say, _no — I need you to actually fix this._ Instead I say, “You’re right.” And then, strangely, I feel a little calmer.

Which makes me wonder: is the tinnitus even real?

No one else can know. Not the doctor, not anyone. And honestly, even I’m not entirely sure. What does it mean to _hear_something? Does it mean the eardrum vibrating in response to air pressure? Or does it mean the brain registering that signal? If my hearing is clinically normal and yet something rings — what exactly is happening? I have no idea.

What I know is this: somewhere in my left half, there is a universe that only I can perceive. That much is certain. And maybe the doctor is right — if I stop finding it bothersome, it becomes simply a part of me. Something that belongs only to me.

Oh.

I think I finally understand. The specialist was never trying to silence the ringing. He was trying to change the way I relate to my own body.

It took me a while to see that.

The day after arriving in Phnom Penh, my plans — the whole reason for the trip — fell through. With nothing left to do and having been to this city many times before, I had no interest in hitting the usual tourist spots. Besides, we were in the thick of the rainy season.

The cheap hotel room wasn’t comfortable enough to hole up in all day, and honestly, I was craving some human presence. I thought about reading at one of the nearby cafés, but afternoons are probably when the staff want their real break. The emptiness was so pronounced it made me restless. Come to think of it, there was a market somewhere on the edge of downtown. Maybe I’d head over there, take a walk. I knew not to expect much from the restaurants in the area, and figured I might pick up something for dinner at the market. I could see the afternoon storm coming, but I left without an umbrella. Traveling light just feels better.

The market, about 20 minutes on foot, was teeming with goods and energy. Vegetables, meat, fish, fresh flowers, homemade prepared foods, sweets, dried goods, clothing, household items — everything imaginable crammed into every available space. The produce looked mostly fresh.

Walking through the high-ceilinged space, I was hit by a distinctive smell. As I moved down the aisles, the merchandise changed and so did the sensory assault, shifting in interesting ways. The vendors were a mixed bunch. Young women doing business while small children played at their feet. Elderly vendors whose faces made age itself seem irrelevant. Teenagers staring at their phones with expressions of complete indifference.

The shoppers were just as diverse. What looked like restaurant buyers examining ingredients. Wholesaler types loading up on bulk quantities of the same items. Plenty of families shopping together. Everyone seemed upbeat, the whole market buzzing with life.

Then, without warning, thunder cracked like the earth splitting open. Seconds later, rain came crashing down on the market roof with crushing force. The downpour drowned out the voices of vendors and customers alike.

Still, most people carried on with their business and shopping as if nothing had happened.

New arrivals and passersby ducked into the building for shelter. With no actual doors, I could see the wet heads of those taking cover near the entrance beyond the stalls, and beyond them, the relentless rain.

Before long, the entryway was completely flooded. The makeshift street vendors who’d been doing business just outside the market — probably without permits — had packed up shop. With their spaces underwater and no realistic hope of customers in this deluge, they must have figured they’d earned a break.

The rain wouldn’t let up. A cat that lived in the market wore an expression of resignation as it stretched out on a counter and yawned.

As the downpour dragged on, more people in the market paused their work, gazing out toward the sky beyond the entrance.

After about 30 minutes, the rain was still coming down hard, but a few men started moving with impatience, not even bothering with rain jackets. They roughly covered their loaded cargo with tarps and fired up their motorbikes.

The water had risen high enough to partially submerge the bike tires. The nearby gutters had probably overflowed.

Another 30 minutes or so later, the rain stopped abruptly. It had the sudden quality of running out of fuel.

The market’s semi-frozen operations and visitors slowly stirred back to life, like pressing play on a paused video. People resumed shopping as if normalcy had returned, others headed home with their purchases, new customers arrived. The vendors went back to business without bothering to wipe down their rain-soaked goods from the ceiling leaks.

The street vendors outside had already reopened.

Aside from the still-flooded streets, the market had mostly returned to how it looked before the storm. People were smiling again.

Stepping outside, I saw the post-rain sky beginning to glow with sunset, and could feel the temperature had dropped a few degrees in the breeze. Night would gradually begin from here. I decided against buying anything after all — I’d just grab dinner at a cheap place nearby — and walked toward the main boulevard empty-handed.

My scheduled flight was canceled due to heavy snow. The aircraft never appeared at the gate, and announcements calmly relayed the facts. I managed to rebook for the next day, but the snow kept falling. When I returned to the airport the following day, my rescheduled flight was delayed nearly four hours. This time, after we’d already boarded, the captain announced the flight was canceled.

What struck me was that no one panicked or got angry. Neither the first day nor the second, neither at the departure gate nor inside the cabin — while people looked confused, not a single person made selfish demands. Many must have had their plans derailed, their trips thrown into disarray. Yet everyone seemed to accept the reality: in this blizzard, what else could be done? There was not only reverence for nature but what seemed like a quiet trust in the airline.

That an object weighing hundreds of tons can fly through the void at thirty thousand feet, and that we can access this for anywhere from a few dozen to a few hundred dollars, might be called miraculous. These hollow structures — the latest aircraft are made of carbon fiber and alloys, with fuel, passengers, and cargo packed into hollow wings and fuselages — slice through the air with meticulously calculated design.

The operation of aircraft is nothing less than a quiet resistance against gravity. Against absolute physical laws, humanity fights back with two axes: calculation and trust. The act of “flying like a bird,” which humans have dreamed of since ancient times, was realized barely a hundred years ago. This grand resistance has only just begun.

Modern airlines function as a kind of apparatus for maintaining collective illusion. They translate the abstract promise of safety into flight schedules and sell it as a product. This isn’t simply providing transportation. It’s a contract around the abstraction of safety — minimizing passenger anxiety and guaranteeing arrival at the destination.

The work of mechanics, air traffic controllers, and ground staff on the ground must carry a unique conviction. What they pursue is the perfection of nothing happening. When a plane departs on time, they are the semi-transparent, silent presences who deserve acclaim.

Flight crew play the role of maintaining normalcy at the boundary between ground and sky. In the extreme environment of thirty thousand feet, they balance the tension of being safety personnel while easing passenger anxiety through meticulous service. It’s a refined practice of staging the everyday, generating empathy with passengers.

The ground seen from above the clouds is an abstracted landscape. You can’t see the faces of the people living there. Yet it’s precisely those anonymous people who keep planes flying. From the ground, you can’t see the faces of pilots or passengers either. Yet they cut through the sky and move forward. Aviation is perhaps the purest form of trust established within anonymity.

We entrust ourselves to the sky, believing in someone whose face and name we don’t know. That trust is almost never betrayed. It’s proof of the beauty of systems humans have built.

After two cancellations, I finally reached thirty thousand feet three days behind my original schedule. It didn’t feel like a major delay — more like a slow progression forward. An airplane is a system of trust and transcendence, where, in a corner of the vast system we call a city, we can experience quietly entrusting our fate to forces beyond ourselves.

The British magazine The Economist publishes an annual “Big Mac Index.” It compares the price of a McDonald’s Big Mac across roughly 55 cities worldwide, measuring each country’s economic strength and currency value. The comparison works because Big Macs are sold at nearly identical quality and size everywhere.

For years, I’ve conducted a similar kind of observation during my travels. Except I’m not comparing burger prices. I’m comparing Monday morning newspapers and the faces of commuters.

In most cities around the world, Saturday and Sunday are days off, making Monday the first day back. This assumption, like the Big Mac itself, is more or less universal. So when I find myself in a new city on a Monday, I head out to a busy intersection or train station in the morning. I used to buy English-language papers from kiosks. Now I pull up local news sites on my phone.

Monday editions are packed with articles that accumulated over the weekend. What stands out most are the local stories and help-wanted ads. What industries are hiring? What positions? At what salaries? Manufacturing, tech, finance? Domestic companies or multinationals? When major foreign firms are recruiting, it signals they’re serious about expanding into the country. Match the job titles with the pay, and you get a sense of the standard of living. A surge in entry-level postings suggests a sector in growth mode.

I study these listings, then compare them to what I saw the previous week in a neighboring country. Sometimes I realize how wrong my assumptions were. The classifieds tell you more about a country’s present than any news story.

Then I look up from my screen and across the street. At bus stops and station platforms, people wait for their morning commute. It’s Monday. Here, too, there’s something universal: that “I don’t want to go to work” vibe.

But look closer, and differences emerge. Someone with a fresh expression, soaking up the morning sun. Someone reading during the wait. Someone scrolling impatiently through their phone. Someone talking urgently on a call. The ratio of these types varies wildly from city to city.

In one place, most people stare ahead blankly. In another, people chat and smile. Somewhere else, everyone’s moving frantically. Same Monday morning, completely different scenes.

Through these observations, I try to glimpse something about a society. Of course, I’m only seeing what’s in front of me, and it’s shaped by climate, culture, countless factors. It’s all just personal impression. Still, I think this kind of quiet voyeurism is one of the small pleasures afforded to travelers.

I love that time when I wake up on a Monday morning in an unfamiliar city, open the newspaper, watch the people going by, and gain a slightly broader perspective on the world.

The latest Big Mac Index shows Japan ranking quite low globally. In other words, it’s cheap. Good news for tourists visiting Japan. But at the same time, those tourists are probably watching our Monday mornings too. On station platforms, at intersections, noticing what expressions we wear.

There must be other travelers like me out there. We might be quietly observed too.

A couple I know lives in northern Tohoku, and every few years, I drop in on them. Back when I was based in Tokyo, I’d take the Tohoku Shinkansen or the expressway and head steadily north. Somewhere past Sendai, the air would shift — you could feel it. On the train, the crowd would thin out. By car, the vegetation along the highway would start to look wilder, more unruly. There was no mistaking it: I was heading north.

But after I moved to Sapporo, everything flipped. The trip became a journey south — down through southern Hokkaido, across the Tsugaru Strait. Same destination, opposite direction.

People have told me more than once that it’s just semantics. But whether you’re coming from the south or the north turns out to matter more than you’d think.

When I traveled north to visit them, the place felt unmistakably like “the north.” Beyond it lay borderlands, remote territories, the edge of things. It was easy to imagine harsh winters, lives lived far from the city. But arriving from the north? The whole impression shifts. Suddenly it’s “warmer country,” a point along the way to Tokyo. Compared to Sapporo, it might as well be subtropical.

Same place. Different meaning. Your position and your line of sight define how you see it.

The same thing happens when I fly to Europe from Japan. When heading to Paris or London, regardless of whether it’s a direct flight or a connecting flight, the way the destination feels differs depending on the route from which I arrive. A northern route takes you over frozen tundra before dropping you into the heart of civilization. A southern route threads through tropical humidity before delivering you to cool stone streets. The path you take shifts where the city sits in your mental map.

Japanese has these neat directional terms: *hokujō* for heading north, *nanka* for heading south. English has something similar — the suffix “-bound.” Northbound. Southbound. Simple, but clarifying. It tells you where the perspective is coming from.

Which brings me to a word we hear constantly these days: “inbound.” Inbound means “coming in” — it’s the perspective of the receiver. The tourists arriving in Japan left their own countries, so technically, they’re outbound. No traveler thinks of themselves as inbound.

So imagine a sign that says, “Welcome, inbound travelers.” There’s a weird contradiction baked in. The logic belongs to the host, but the message is aimed at the guest. The viewpoints cross, and the meaning gets tangled. Maybe that’s a minor thing. But the question of where we’re looking from might be closer than we think to the question of who we are. Every perception depends on where the observer stands.

Where to head next. From which direction, with what kind of gaze, to enter that place. By thinking about such things, the meaning of a journey changes decisively. I’m thinking it’s about time to plan the next route to northern Tohoku. It might also be enjoyable to rotate the Google Maps screen and view the destination in a form I’ve never seen before.

The moment the ferry crossing the western end of the Mediterranean pulled away from the wharf on Spain’s southern edge, I felt something slip away. Not the sway of the vessel — something finer than that. As if the quality of gravity itself had shifted. The engine’s vibration traveled up my spine, announcing that I was no longer bound for anywhere on the Eurasian landmass. Algeciras harbor receded, and I entered the space we call the Strait of Gibraltar.

The cabin interior was strangely mundane. Torn vinyl seats, unappetizing espresso sold at the kiosk, and some receipts lying on the floor. I’d expected something sublime for the cross-border, but reality offered only a dull two-hour passage. In the next seat, a young woman soothed her infant. Moroccan, perhaps. For her, this was a homecoming; for me, arrival at somewhere new. We rode the same vessel, yet traveled different journeys. By the window, an old man gazed at the water with unfocused eyes. Perhaps he’d crossed this strait hundreds of times in his life.

The first thirty minutes aboard felt surprisingly long. The sea remained the same gray, and through the porthole I could still make out land. When I rose to use the restroom, I passed men speaking Arabic in the corridor. Then at some point, time suddenly compressed. We must have been nearing the strait’s narrowest passage. Spain to the right and ahead, Morocco to the left and beyond. Only a few dozen kilometers between them. Two continents facing each other at such proximity. A child pressed against the window, pointing at something. What lay in that direction — Africa, Europe, or the currents flowing between?

The quality of light around us seemed to shift. Whether it truly changed, I couldn’t say. Something within me insisted that Spain and Morocco must differ in every way. Yet the color of the sea did not change. Still gray as before. No dramatic visual transformation anywhere.

An announcement came over the speakers. Spanish, then Arabic, then English. Only the Arabic I couldn’t understand at all freed me from the burden of language.

Countless people have crossed this strait before me. Ancient Phoenician merchants, Islamic conquerors, the pursued, the hopeful. And tourists. I was about to join the tail end of that procession.

The Moroccan city of Tangier came into view. At what moment would I actually arrive there? When the ferry docked? When I took my first step on land? When I met someone’s gaze on shore? Or when I sensed the scent and sound of that place?

The ferry slowed. The engine’s pitch changed. People began to stand, reaching for their bags. I did the same. The heavy, dry metallic sound of the gangway being lowered traveled through the vessel as vibration.

I joined the line, inching forward. One step, then another. Which step would cross the boundary — I still couldn’t tell.

I met the eyes of a port official. He looked at me and seemed to register something. To him, I was just one more face from Europe, perhaps the hundredth today. To me, he was the first person I’d locked eyes with in an unfamiliar port. I could register nothing about him. Communication is always asymmetric on the road.

I descended the gangway. My feet met hot concrete. I couldn’t immediately recognize where I was. Beyond the ambiguous boundary called the Strait of Gibraltar, a journey through the African continent was about to begin.

As the eastbound Doto Expressway approached the Minami Furano area, the snowfall intensified. I tightened my grip on the steering wheel slightly, thinking this was only natural for November in the mountains.

Even on the highway, aside from passing zones, it’s just one lane each way, separated from oncoming traffic by nothing more than a low fence or center poles. Large trucks roared past my side window. Some might be hauling freshly harvested oysters in their beds, bound for Sapporo, for Tokyo. I was heading the opposite direction, against the flow, toward the source: Akkeshi.

My destination was Akkeshi’s “Oyster Festival.” If all I wanted was fresh oysters, it would probably be cheaper to buy them in Sapporo once you factored in the highway tolls and gas. Distribution networks have evolved to the point where delivery and shipping are effortless. Yet I found myself drawn to the act of “going to get food” — and so I set out for the production site in Akkeshi.

When I arrived in the Akkeshi area, the mountain weather had cleared as if the storm had been an unpleasant dream. The temperature was in the single digits, but the wind was calm. An event space had been set up in a park on the edge of town, with local fishery operators lining up tents. Akkeshi oysters, clams, and scallops were being sold steamed, charcoal-grilled, or raw.

Most of the visitors seemed to be local families, and the atmosphere felt almost like a spring cherry blossom viewing. Each group had staked out space in the park, grilling ingredients on portable or rented grills they’d brought. Beer cans popped open. Laughter echoed.

As a tourist — or perhaps an intruder — I bought and ate oysters, clams, and scallops that had already been prepared. Steam rose from the charcoal-grilled oysters. The scent of the sea tickled my nose, and when I put one in my mouth, a rich umami spread across my palate. What existed there was a strange sense of unity, as if all humans shared the same taste and happiness.

In the end, I only ate four or five. I could have had more, but quantity wasn’t the point. The taste was unbelievably fresh, delicious. I felt as though all ingredients were naturally connected. Sighing repeatedly with admiration and satisfaction, I recalled something a fisherman at another Hokkaido port once told me.

“People say Hokkaido is all about seafood, but the good stuff? That all goes to Sapporo and Tokyo first. That’s where it sells for more.”

I nodded in agreement, and the fisherman added with a laugh:

“But the really good stuff? We eat that ourselves, here. Just don’t tell anyone.”

On the return trip west from Akkeshi, I encountered snow again. The wipers moved rhythmically, clearing my view. Replaying the memory of the oysters I’d just tasted, I felt certain that beyond time and distance, “the really good stuff” truly existed.

On the way there, I’d entertained needlessly complex thoughts — that tracing the supply chain backward and “going to get food” was somehow an act of approaching a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. Maybe I was just getting bored with driving, half-enclosed in the snowy car. The reality is much simpler. Wherever it may be, you simply go where the good food is. Perhaps that’s what keeps people moving. At least, that’s what I think I’ll keep doing.

Whenever people hear about the nightlife districts scattered across the world, they tend to develop fantasies alongside a vague desire: “I should visit someday.” I’m no exception. It’s a curiosity that borders on instinct, tapping into something fundamental about why we travel in the first place.

But here’s the thing — that allure only works from a distance. Get too close, and the magnetism fades. That’s how it was for me when I lived in Thailand.

Bangkok, the capital, is famous for its thriving nightlife scene. There are countless places where anyone can step into something that feels like an alternate reality. But I quickly found myself put off by the chaotic, overly liberated atmosphere of those spots, and I started avoiding them altogether.

During that time, I had a steady stream of acquaintances visiting from Japan. And every single one of them — like clockwork — followed the same script.

It would start with an upbeat email or phone call: “I’m coming to Bangkok solo on such-and-such date. Let’s grab dinner.”

Oddly enough, these visitors were invariably people with respectable, established careers — folks I’d never actually met up with one-on-one back in Japan. Still, I was touched that they’d come all this way and want to see me. I had no reason to decline, so I always said yes.

When we’d meet up, they’d try to play it cool, keeping their travel excitement carefully contained. We’d have Thai food at a restaurant or share beers at a street-side table while they filled me in on what was happening back home, and I’d give them the rundown on life in Bangkok. Then, inevitably, they’d start getting restless, and the conversation would drift in a more charged direction.

I’d think to myself, “Here it comes,” but I’d deliberately avoid bringing up any concrete plans for later, ordering another round of beer instead. (Looking back, it was almost sadistic.)

Eventually, unable to hold back any longer, they’d burst out with it.

“Look, I’m just going to say it — I want to go out tonight. Can you take me somewhere safe where I can actually enjoy myself?”

There’d be an urgency in their voice, almost desperate.

If I’d hint that I was tired and thinking of heading home early, they’d pick up on it immediately, their faces falling slightly as they dialed it back.

“Oh, of course. No worries at all. I can figure it out on my own. But hey, could you at least point me toward some good spots?”

Then, perhaps feeling awkward about putting me on the spot, they’d launch into justifications. And these, too, followed a predictable pattern.

“I don’t usually do this kind of thing.” “I’m interested in studying Thai culture.” “People need to cut loose sometimes.”

What fascinated me was how each person’s vocabulary, imagination, and way of expressing themselves would shine through in these moments. But the underlying message — the objective of the evening — was always identical. The seductive pull of those places really is that powerful.

And every time, I’d send them off to some appropriate venue (all perfectly legal and within the bounds of social norms), muttering something like “Being a responsible adult is rough,” before heading home.

If I ever found myself visiting some nightlife district in another part of the world and had a friend who lived there, I’d probably blurt out “Take me somewhere wild” the second we met up. It’s just a fleeting escape. A little strategy in how you approach it seems likely to amplify the fun.

Driving along a narrow mountain road in northern Hokkaido, I spotted a piece of wood half-hidden in the bamboo grass along the shoulder, scrawled with “ROTEN →.” I pulled into a space by the roadside and looked in the direction the arrow pointed. All I could see was an animal trail covered in tall brush and grass, disappearing into dense forest beyond.

“Roten” in Japanese meant outdoor bath – an open-air hot spring, not some commercial facility, but a wild spring hidden in the woods. Without any real basis for thinking so, I decided the wooden sign must have been put up by a helpful local or hot spring enthusiast, and I plunged into the forest.

After about ten minutes of hiking, wary of bug bites and wildlife encounters, I caught the smell of sulfur. Soon I came upon a stream about three feet wide. A narrow log had been laid across it. On the far side was a small oval depression, steam rising from the hot spring water pooled inside. Someone must have discovered the thermal water bubbling up through gaps in the rock, dug out the hollow a bit, and arranged stones around the perimeter. I gingerly dipped my hand in – the temperature was just right. I confirmed no one else was around, stripped down, and literally became one with nature as I sank into the water. After soaking until thoroughly warmed, I made my way back to the car in a state of complete contentment. “Hokkaido just hit different.”

The trouble started half a day later. My hands and feet began to itch. The itching escalated rapidly, and before I knew it, red welts had erupted all over my body. My entire body felt swollen and feverish. This was clearly not normal.

I rushed to a pharmacy in a nearby town, where the pharmacist calmly told me, “Over-the-counter medication won’t cut it – you need to see a doctor.” However, the local clinic only had a physician on certain days. “See a doctor” meant the general hospital in a larger town some distance away.

According to my map app and GPS, the nearest general hospital was nearly sixty miles away, in a town facing the Sea of Okhotsk. My whole body was burning up, and breathing was becoming difficult. I had no choice. Anxious but somehow managing to hold onto my reason, I drove toward the hospital.

By the time I arrived, it was already after hours, and the doctor on call specialized in surgery. He examined my skin, let out a long “Hmm,” and said, “Let’s get you on an IV.”

As I lay in bed receiving the drip, the itching and fever seemed to subside. Perhaps it was the relief from my anxiety, but drowsiness washed over me. “This’ll take a while,” the nurse had said, so I figured it was fine to sleep. As I drifted off, I caught fragments of conversation between the doctor and nurse. Words like “hot spring,” “sulfur,” and “rash” reached my ears. Was my condition not particularly unusual? I thought I also heard something like “that outdoor bath deep in the mountains…” but right after that, I fell into a deep sleep.

A few days later, my symptoms had almost cleared up. A different dermatologist told me, “Sulfur dermatitis – basically hot spring burn. From now on, you might want to avoid highly acidic hot springs with a pH below 4.5.”

It was good to learn that my skin was surprisingly delicate and prone to such reactions. At the same time, I came to viscerally understand that Hokkaido’s nature is far more powerful than I’d imagined, utterly indifferent to human convenience. I suppose this is common knowledge for locals.

I doubt I’ll ever return to that wild hot spring. Still, for some reason, I can’t quite let it go, and I’ve been searching map apps and online for the location of that wooden sign and the spring itself. But somehow, I can’t pin it down. Could it be that the sign and the animal trail never existed in the first place? I find myself feeling like I’m at the end of one of those stories where it all turns out to be a dream.

Back then, I was drifting through Central America without internet or a phone. I’d been visiting countries like filling in blanks on a map, and finally washed up in San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador. The corruption and violence that Hollywood loves to dramatize never quite materialized in my field of vision. What I found instead was a city where comfortable lives unfolded at an unhurried pace.

Latin American food is passionate, delicious — no question. But after weeks of the same rhythms, my stomach had grown tired of the routine. I craved the smell of soy sauce caramelizing in a hot pan, the fragrance of sesame oil, the sharp bite of rice vinegar. It didn’t have to be Japanese — my palate was simply hungry for “Asian flavors.”

Central America has a significant Chinese diaspora, a legacy of the Panama Canal’s construction era when laborers migrated from China. San Salvador seemed to be the exception, though. I rarely spotted anyone of Asian descent on the streets. There were small Chinese takeout joints here and there, but nothing where you’d want to settle in and actually eat.

One morning, as I do in every city, I made my way to the central market — the best place to gauge a city’s food culture, price points, hygiene standards. At the fish stalls, I noticed a middle-aged man staring at me. East Asian features. Our eyes locked for a few seconds. He gave a slight nod, as if confirming something to himself, then bought a large whole fish and disappeared into the crowd.

That afternoon, wandering the side streets near my guesthouse, I spotted a sign hanging in an alley: “中華” (Chinese). So there _was_ a Chinese restaurant here. How had I missed it? The place appeared to open only for dinner — the door was still locked. It looked like the kind of setup where they’d unfold tables in a courtyard. I thought I saw someone moving in the back, but I kept walking.

By evening, when hunger set in, that restaurant was all I could think about. My feet carried me there without conscious decision.

The space was large, with plenty of tables. But there wasn’t a single customer. I took a seat at a table in the center of the courtyard. A man in cook’s whites emerged from the back with a menu. It was the same person from the market that morning.

The menu was hand-written in faded Spanish — completely illegible to me. In English, I ordered “egg and lettuce fried rice” and “hot and sour soup.” He nodded lightly, then smiled and said, “_Pescado_.” Fish, in Spanish.

No, gracias,” I said, shaking my head. Ignoring my protest, he repeated “_pescado frito_” and headed back to the kitchen. Apparently, I’d been voluntarily conscripted into ordering fish.

Fine, whatever. Before I could work up any real resistance, the fried rice and soup arrived, along with a whole red snapper, deep-fried deep-fried without breading or batter. I forgot to question the circumstances or the price — I just ate. The fish was impossibly fresh, delicious. Whether it was some special technique or just the cook’s skill, the seasoning was unmistakably high-quality “Asian food.”

When I’d finished — satisfied, almost stunned — the man emerged from the kitchen again. With no other customers to attend to, he seemed to want to talk. The problem was, we had no common language. My Mandarin pronunciation is terrible, and his Spanish, English, and Japanese (naturally) were all equally shaky.

He pulled a pen from his pocket and started writing on a paper napkin. Chinese characters.

“我係福建佬嚟㗎。以前喺香港、多倫多、紐約做過嘢,揸鑊鏟。之後就過嚟聖薩爾瓦多。呢檔係我個竇。你呢? 你係邊度人呀?” (_I’m from Fujian. Used to work as a cook in Hong Kong, Toronto, New York. Then I came to San Salvador. This place is mine. What about you? Where are you from?_)

I recognized the traditional characters as Cantonese and cobbled together a reply with my limited Chinese.

“先生、国際人! 我、由東京。食事、美味。魚、最高。多謝!” (_Mister, you’re a citizen of the world! I’m from Tokyo. The meal was delicious. The fish was incredible. Thank you!_)

Characters traveled back and forth across the napkin. A silent conversation had taken shape between us. Then he wrote one last line and laughed.

“一早喺街市見到你,我就知你今晚實會嚟呢度。咪特登買咗嗰條魚囉。” (_When I saw you at the market this morning, I knew you’d come here tonight. So I bought that fish just for you._)

So that was it. Maybe it was more than just a cook’s intuition — something beyond that. Two East Asians, meeting by chance in a foreign land, passing invisible signals to each other across the distance.

When you’re traveling, there are moments when the superficial labels — nationality, language — suddenly feel thin, almost translucent. That night in San Salvador was exactly one of those moments.

Last summer, I returned to Toyotomi in northern Hokkaido after decades away.

Sarobetsu is a wilderness sprawling along the Japan Sea coast near Hokkaido's northern tip. Marshlands and wetlands stretch endlessly, and on clear days, the silhouettes of Rishiri and Rebun islands emerge on the horizon. Route 40 and the JR Soya Line cut through the interior, running north-south. The town of Toyotomi sits along these arteries, just south of Wakkanai, Japan's northernmost city.

This place holds particular significance for me. It was the destination of my first solo journey—Toyotomi and Wakkanai. The details have faded, both in documentation and memory.

One summer day during break, I crossed the Tsugaru Strait by ferry, passed through Hakodate, Sapporo, and Asahikawa, then boarded a local train on the Soya Line. The moment I settled into a box seat for four passengers on the Asahikawa-to-Wakkanai train, three women—college students, it seemed—filled the remaining seats.

They greeted me with easy smiles. "Travel's better with company, right?" one said, offering fruit and snacks they'd brought. I was pleased by this unexpected turn, but the tension of my first solo trip kept me quiet. I listened to their conversation instead.

After a while, one of them turned to me. "Where are you from? And where are you headed?"

I named the city in the Hokuriku region where I lived at the time, then recalled my itinerary. "I'm getting off at Toyotomi Station—four stops before Wakkanai."

"Toyotomi? What's there?" another murmured.

"There's a hot spring, I think."

Ah," they nodded. They were going straight to Cape Soya from Wakkanai. When I mentioned I'd visit the cape after Toyotomi, one smiled. "Maybe we'll run into each other again."

The train pulled into Toyotomi Station. As I stepped off, the three waved from the window. Once the train disappeared toward Wakkanai, the platform filled with the overwhelming sound of wild summer insects.

The rest of the trip exists only in fragments. Taking the bath, traveling to Cape Soya—these memories are barely outlines.

Last year, while traveling through northern Hokkaido, I stopped in Toyotomi again. I couldn't tell if the station or town had changed in the intervening decades. At the Toyotomi hot springs day spa, I lowered myself into water naturally laced with oil. A faint petroleum scent rose. When that smell reached my nostrils, a memory fragment surfaced unexpectedly.

It was the words of the woman who'd asked, "Where are you headed?" She'd continued:

"Oh, sorry for asking so suddenly. You don't have to answer if you don't want to. But 'Where are you from, where are you going?'—that's a question only fellow travelers are allowed to ask each other, isn't it?"

That was it. For decades, I'd believed I'd discovered this phrase myself during my travels. But I was wrong. It was something a stranger had taught me that summer, on my first solo journey. The connection between scent and memory is strange.

So Toyotomi in Sarobetsu has become the place that marks the beginning of my long travels, bound to words passed between travelers.

The driver in the taxi I’d hailed in San Jose was an Asian man, probably in his early forties. Shortly after we pulled away from the curb, his phone rang. The conversation started in English, then quickly switched to a language I didn’t recognize.

When the call ended, he glanced back at me. “Sorry for all the noise in a foreign language. Some friends from back home and I are opening a restaurant. Lots of logistics to work out.”

No problem at all. Was that Vietnamese or Cambodian?

He looked momentarily surprised, then smiled. His roots were Vietnamese, he explained, but the language was a variety of Khmer. His family belonged to a minority group in the Mekong Delta, near the Cambodian border. After the fall of Saigon, they’d spent years in a Thai refugee camp before coming to the States in the early nineties, when he was three.

You’re from Japan?

I told him I was.

He kept talking. He didn’t remember about the journey to America itself, he said. But his earliest memory was Narita Airport.

His parents had told him the story later: they’d flown from Bangkok to San Francisco via Narita. They’d arrived early in the morning with a long layover until the afternoon connection. While waiting in the terminal, they were given lunch — something called “bento,” a Japanese-style fried chicken called “karaage” with white rice. He’d been amazed by how good it tasted. That flavor, and the sight of the Narita terminal, became his first memory.

I watched his profile as he drove, saying nothing.

In the early nineties, I had worked in an airline office at Narita. One of my duties as a junior employee had been handling the early morning flight from Bangkok. Back then, the International Organization for Migration had been running a resettlement program for Indochinese refugees heading to America. Every flight had carried groups of refugee families, dozens of people at a time.

At the time, I had known almost nothing about the Vietnam War or the refugee crisis. For the airline, passengers had been passengers, regardless of who was paying their fares or why. My supervisor’s only instruction had been to make sure none of the refugee passengers wandered off during transit.

Not that it would have been easy for them to leave the terminal, or that they’d have had any reason to. When the Bangkok flight arrived, I would find someone who spoke English and tell them: “Please wait here until your afternoon departure. Water and restrooms are over there.” Then we would leave them alone. As long as everyone boarded the U.S. flight that afternoon, our job was done.

Around noon, box lunches paid for by the international organization would be distributed. A colleague and I would walk around saying “Hai, karaage bento” in Japanese, handing them out. They were ordinary lunches to us, but when we passed them out matter-of-factly, most people would smile quietly. Everyone knew how to use chopsticks. They ate with evident pleasure, finishing every bite.

As I collected the empty trays, I would think about their futures, especially the small children. Many would grow up as Americans. Some might lose their way. Some might succeed and one day return to Vietnam as U.S. citizens. None of them had chosen to become refugees or to make this journey. They’d already endured more than enough. I hoped the rest of their lives would bring them happiness. I hoped that at Narita, at least, they could have a few peaceful hours.

“Everything OK? Am I saying ‘bento’ and ‘karaage’ wrong?”

The driver laughed, turning back to look at me.

No, you’re perfect.

I looked out the window. This man might have been one of those children. But there was no way to know for certain, and no need to ask. The people we meet while traveling sometimes remind us, unexpectedly, of something we’d forgotten. That’s enough.

The taxi arrived at my destination. As I paid the fare, I quietly wished him well with his new venture.

I sometimes visit a university library. Not as a student, alumnus, or faculty member, but as a neighborhood resident granted access through a community program. The spacious room is quiet — a convenient place to concentrate for a while. Outside of exam periods, I can come and go freely.

Most of the reading floor is divided into cube-shaped carrels. Privacy is so complete that you wouldn’t notice if someone sat down next to you. Users work in silence, poring over materials, writing, tapping quietly at keyboards.

There are many older patrons among the visitors. To engage in stereotype-laden profiling: they tend to be thin, bespectacled, with slightly severe expressions. Their hair is somewhat long — the old-school scholar type. They often bring stacks of academic texts. Even from behind, you can sense an intelligent, slightly high-strung aura.

One day, I settled into a carrel and began researching with my materials. About a third of the twenty or so carrels were occupied, and I caught glimpses of a few scholar types from behind. Everyone was absorbed in their own work. Then another patron, seemingly a student, slipped quietly into the room and took a seat in the carrel behind me to the left. I’d barely registered the soft sound of a chair being moved when a loud throat-clearing came from the carrel diagonally in front and to the right. Then came a sharp “thud.” The student behind me must have dropped a backpack on the desk.

Immediately, a loud voice erupted from that diagonal carrel. An older man’s cadence. The same person who’d just cleared his throat, perhaps. I couldn’t see him.

You. The person who just entered. What exactly is going through your mind right now? This is a sacred library study room. Making such thoughtless, inconsiderate noise and remaining unfazed is unacceptable.

His voice simmered with suppressed anger. The student who’d just arrived seemed confused, uncertain whether the words were even directed at them. Since the speaker remained invisible, other patrons simply watched the situation unfold. The man’s voice continued.

You dropped something or knocked into something and made that noise. A highly disruptive and unpleasant act. You probably thought you’d never make a loud sound in a library. But it happened. From now on, I want you to make an effort to reduce such mistakes to once in a thousand times — no, once in ten thousand times…

From behind me to the left came a quiet murmur: “I just put my bag down.” It didn’t reach the man’s ears.

…Because this is a library, a sacred space. Everyone who comes here is devoted to scholarship. As fellow seekers of knowledge, I ask that you not forget that.

I couldn’t judge whether his grandiloquent words were justified. Are you not supposed to make a single sound in a library? If so, isn’t it contradictory to call that out with a loud reprimand? There was something off-putting about the way he spoke at length while remaining hidden. Perhaps my confusion stemmed from the fact that I’m not what the man described as “devoted to scholarship” or a “seeker of knowledge.”

When I turned around, the student already had headphones on and was studying. The floor had returned to an atmosphere as if nothing had happened in those few minutes. I tried to refocus on my materials, but concentration eluded me. I was unsettled by the realization that someone demanded such absolute “sanctity” from a library space.

I haven’t been back to that university library since. I don’t know if the day will come when I return. I’d learned that a library’s silence isn’t necessarily a peaceful thing.

Wherever I’ve traveled in the world, Chinese food has been my salvation.

I like Japanese cuisine well enough as a Japanese, but abroad I rarely find myself missing it. When I first started traveling as a student, Japanese restaurants were scarce even in major cities, and when they did exist, they were invariably upscale establishments. The pricing put them out of reach for a young person watching expenses, and that instinct has stayed with me. These days sushi and ramen have proliferated globally, but I almost never seek them out. After all, even in Japan, I don’t eat them every day.

Still, spend a week wandering through butter-and-olive-oil territory and your body starts craving something lighter. The salinity of soy sauce, the umami of seafood broth, freshly steamed rice, the fermented depth of miso. Not the refinement of kaiseki, but I start to crave something more humble — the flavors of what you might call “Asian comfort food.”

That’s when Chinese food becomes your best ally.

Chinese restaurants exist in the most improbable places. Not just upscale dining rooms, but casual spots you can walk into without ceremony. Paris and New York have their Chinatowns, naturally, but you’ll find them on street corners in the unlikeliest countries. Bridgetown, Barbados. Cape Town. Tromsø, Norway. Tegucigalpa, Honduras. I could go on. Once, half-joking, I said, “Watch, there’ll be a 北京飯店 (Beijing Restaurant) around the next corner,” and the moment the words left my mouth, a sign in traditional characters reading 香港餐廳 (Hong Kong Restaurant) came into view.

This ubiquity is the legacy of centuries of Chinese diaspora. A global infrastructure of dried goods and condiments, adapted to local palates, meeting steady demand, establishing permanence.

At these restaurants, I always order the same two things: egg and lettuce fried rice (蛋菜炒飯, _dan cai chao fan_) and hot and sour soup (酸辣湯, _suan la tang_).

The fried rice is exactly what it sounds like — eggs and lettuce, nothing more. A foundational dish of Chinese rice cookery. Hot and sour soup originated in Sichuan: vinegar-sharp, chili oil–laced, both things at once. Both are standards on any menu.

I started ordering this combination on the advice of a travel companion with Hong Kong roots. “The fancy dishes are heavy with oil,” they told me. “Stick to the basics and you won’t go wrong. You can actually taste what you’re eating.”

They were right. Egg and lettuce fried rice, being so spare, reveals everything: the quality of the rice, the fragrance of the oil, the richness of the eggs, the freshness of the lettuce. Hot and sour soup makes plain the balance of acid and heat, the character of the vinegar and spices. Together, these two dishes deliver the satisfaction of an Asian meal while serving as a kind of diagnostic — of local ingredients, of the cook’s skill. The flavor shifts subtly from place to place. The same menu items, but each location leaves its signature. These variations become woven into your travel memory.

Perhaps what makes Chinese food so reliable for travelers is less its adaptability to any ingredient than its straightforward philosophy: feed the person in front of you. When you’re tired and those familiar flavors settle into your system, there’s just relief. And that relief gives you the momentum to keep moving.

Back in Japan, I still default to these two dishes if available when I walk into a Chinese restaurant. The staff sometimes tries to steer me toward mapo tofu or dumplings, but I hold firm. And I imagine I’ll keep meeting new versions of egg and lettuce fried rice and hot and sour soup on unfamiliar street corners, finding refuge in them again and again. Maybe travel, in the end, is just a series of meals that connect us to the world.

I had a few hours to kill between trains at JR Asahikawa Station. There was no rush. My ticket allowed stopovers. Even a brief walk around the station and town would make the journey more worthwhile.

The station building resembled an international airport terminal — glass and natural wood in a contemporary design, its grandeur and functionality stirring something in me. I stepped out through the north exit into the bustle befitting the gateway to northern Hokkaido, streets stretching toward the city center.

I wandered through main drags and back alleys. There were shops and atmospheres unique to Asahikawa, but national chain stores and brand signage dominated, drawing most of the foot traffic. JR terminal stations look the same everywhere these days. It felt a little lonely, though given shifting social conditions and economic efficiency, it made sense. If it enriched the lives of residents and travelers, who was I to complain?

I returned to the station building and crossed through the interior corridor to the south exit. What opened before me: a lush park, a clear river, and the Daisetsuzan mountain range rising in the distance. The Kitasaito Garden and the Chubetsu River. How many major urban stations integrate so seamlessly with nature? It felt as if an enormous station had been gently placed in the wilderness, the contrast with the north exit’s bustle all the more striking.

As I stood there thinking, I noticed a group of teenagers loitering near the south entrance. They had the hair and clothes of youth, skateboards in hand. They were taking turns practicing their runs on the tiled space in front of the station, the sound of wheels hitting the deck and their cheers echoing through the air. Both the station premises and the park prohibited skateboards — even bicycles.

Those waiting their turn were smoking. Clearly underage, and this was a no-smoking area. Elderly people emerging from the station building saw them blocking the way and took wide detours, avoiding trouble.

I usually tolerate youthful recklessness to a degree, but I couldn’t overlook them inconveniencing regular station users, especially the elderly. I considered saying something, but I was just a traveler here. This place might have its own culture, its own thresholds of tolerance. Besides, the kids might escalate things.

While I hesitated, a man in his thirties approached from across the park, carrying a small child — his daughter, perhaps. His expression was stern. He strode up to the teenagers and spoke in a voice that carried.

“Hey, you guys. Smoke and get busted or get lung cancer — that’s your business. But clean up the ash and butts. Right now. And the skateboarding. You’re not damaging the floor or the building, are you? And you’re in people’s way, and I won’t tolerate that. Whether it’s a problem isn’t for you to decide — it’s for the people passing through to decide. Go apologize to the stationmaster. Now.”

I held my breath, watching to see what they’d do. Surprisingly, the boys and girls simply said, “Yes, sorry,” bowed their heads, cleaned up the cigarette butts and ash, checked the walls and floor for damage, and asked a nearby shop, “Where’s the stationmaster’s office?” The man, as if nothing had happened, walked away with his child still in his arms.

I felt I’d witnessed something extraordinary, and relief washed over me. The magnificent Daisetsuzan range and one father’s presence at Asahikawa Station — I muttered to myself that there was no other station quite like this, and headed toward the ticket gate to catch my local train.

Toward the end of the twentieth century, I was living in a Tokyo apartment and commuting once a week to Urawa in Saitama Prefecture to teach English conversation. I worked for a dispatch-based language school, assigned to a community center in a residential area about thirty minutes by bus from Urawa Station. The ninety-minute commute each way was far from easy, but the journey to the leafy suburbs offered a small escape from the chaos of the city center.

Each week, about ten elementary school students would gather at the center after school. Following the company-issued curriculum, I tried to convey the joy of speaking a foreign language.

One week after the rainy season began, headquarters contacted me. They told me that an American instructor named Scott would accompany me to the next lesson. The school’s policy was to dispatch contracted native speakers to each class twice a year, giving children a chance to experience authentic English.

It was pouring that morning. I waited for Scott at the Ikebukuro Station ticket gate. In those days before smartphones and the internet, meeting someone at a terminal station relied on intuition and luck.

A few minutes past the appointed time, a short white man in his early forties appeared. His cheap shirt was soaked to the shoulders, water dripping from his trouser cuffs. He carried no umbrella. The exhausted expression, thinning hair, and defeated gait — he radiated the particular emptiness of someone worn down by life.

On the crowded Yamanote and Keihin-Tohoku lines to Urawa, the cars were stifling and the windows fogged over. After brief pleasantries, Scott began venting his grievances.

How unbearable Japan’s rainy season was. How he had never in his life used such a primitive tool as an umbrella. How irrational it was that public transportation lacked air conditioning. How inefficient Tokyo was as a city, and how backward Asia as a whole remained — he spoke in fluent, uninterrupted English.

I listened in silence. I was less interested in his assessment of Tokyo or Japan than in the vocabulary and phrasing natives used when complaining. “I see, I thought, so that’s how you make sarcasm land in American English.”

A long line had formed at the bus stop in front of Urawa Station. The bus was delayed by the heavy rain, but we would still make it on time for the lesson.

When the bus finally arrived, it was packed. Most passengers clutched wet umbrellas or raincoats. Humidity saturated the sealed interior, the windows completely fogged. Even locals accustomed to the bus route were grimacing. The next thirty minutes would be an ordeal for everyone.

Scott was sweating, his eyes bloodshot. Eventually his discomfort reached a breaking point. He leaned toward me and whispered in my ear.

“Do whatever it takes. Find a chance and get out of this country as soon as you can. There are so many better places in the world. This is hell. The worst. Escape now and make something of your life… I’m getting out to America soon myself.”

His face flushed red, he was dead serious.

In that moment, I recalled a scene from a Hollywood film I’d seen a few weeks earlier — the protagonist barely escaping a war-torn capital in a relief helicopter. Is Japan really that terrible to you? I thought, and simultaneously burst out laughing. Scott looked at me with bewilderment.

Decades have passed since then. I’ve traveled the world for study and work. I’ve been stranded for two hours on the Paris metro, nearly passed out on a Bangkok bus with broken air conditioning. I’ve experienced the stench of New York’s summer subway and London’s winter transit paralysis. There are still countless forms of transportation around the world more brutal than that bus from Urawa Station.

Scott, if he’s still alive, must be close to seventy now. I wonder if he ever bought an umbrella. If he were to revisit Japan today, what would surprise him, and what would disappoint him? At least the trains and buses have air conditioning now, and the world’s most accurate weather forecasts can track rain clouds in real time. The country he was so desperate to escape should be a somewhat more comfortable place than it was back then.

It’s been years since I paddled for the first time through the wetlands of eastern Hokkaido, but I’ve never forgotten the sensation of gliding slowly across those marshes. I’d been meaning to get back on the water, to drift down one of Hokkaido’s rivers.

Last year in the summer, I found myself traveling through the northern reaches of the island. I’d heard that the Teshio River and its tributary, the Sarobetsu, offered calm waters ideal for canoeing. At the visitor center in the Sarobetsu wilderness, I made my inquiry. The staff member shook his head. No programs for tourists here. I might have better luck upstream in Nakagawa or Bifuka, where tour companies might operate.

Driving down south along the Teshio River, I checked into a guesthouse in Nakagawa. At the front desk, I asked about canoe experiences. The clerk’s response was curt: try the tourism association. It’s inside the town hall.

The next morning, on my way to the town hall, I passed by a campground. A small stream fed into the Teshio, and several canoes sat moored along the bank. I pulled out my phone and searched. The site described this as the town’s outdoor hub, offering canoe experiences.

Inside the management office, a staff member looked troubled as he explained. The stream-based program was pending a business permit. Not operational yet. The canoes on the shore weren’t available either.

So I ended up at the tourism association window after all. The woman behind the counter seemed slightly flustered, as if walk-in inquiries were rare.

“Can I try canoeing on the Teshio River here in town?”

“I don’t think so.”

“But I heard there’s a canoe port along the river.”

“There is, but there aren’t any programs or tours.”

“Then who uses it?”

“People who canoe down the river on their own.”

We were talking past each other. It became clear that there was no easy setup here for casual tourists.

In Bifuka, the next town over, things were much the same. No one at the gas station or the roadside rest stop seemed particularly knowledgeable. The phrase “canoe mecca” I’d seen online felt increasingly hollow.

Just as I was about to give up, studying the map, I suddenly recalled that this town, too, had a large canoe port on the banks of the Teshio River.

When I arrived, there was a proper launch site and a sign announcing an annual event held here. People did canoe here after all.

Three young men were relaxing by the water. Locals, they explained they’d been shuttling between points on the river — two paddling downstream, while one driving to the next launch, repeating the cycle. When I asked my questions, they exchanged glances.

“I don’t think there are any public tours on the Teshio.”

If there’s anything, it’d be hiring a private guide.”

One of them grinned. “Why not just go down in your own canoe?”

“Wait — don’t you need a license or permit to put in on your own?”

Their faces lit up with laughter.

“Nah, it’s a river. All on you.”

I was startled. Here, the river is infrastructure. No different from riding a bike down the street — no license required.

In the early days of Hokkaido’s settlement, and even before that in the Ainu era, traveling up and down the Teshio River by small boat must have been the best — and indeed the only — means of transportation in this region. I had only ever thought of canoeing as a commercial outdoor sport. But for the people here, it was an essential way to immerse themselves in the great outdoors and to live in harmony with nature.

Embarrassed by my own assumptions, I felt my desire to get on the water intensify. Now I’m seriously considering buying a small canoe — just so I can paddle down that river myself.

Physics was my worst subject, but I liked the teacher.

On the final exam, I couldn’t even make sense of the questions. In the answer box, I scribbled something irrelevant: “Maybe electrons repel each other the same way children leave home or lovers break up — some kind of force like that.” When I got my test back, there was a note in red pen: “Your idea can be considered almost entirely correct.” He gave me 20 points.

The teacher wasn’t popular with students. He had this physics-nerd vibe, and his explanations tended toward the abstract and philosophical. Looking back, I think he must have specialized in theoretical physics.

I couldn’t follow the lessons, but I was fascinated by what went on in his head — what he thought about every day, why he spoke in such peculiar terms. For me, at least, class was kind of enjoyable.

One day he introduced the Big Bang theory — the idea that the universe began when space itself started expanding uniformly from an extremely hot, dense state. That day, he seemed more animated than usual.

He wandered into general relativity, quantum mechanics, the significance of theoretical physics. The lecture strayed far from the textbook, and most students tuned out. I only understood half of it, but I learned about something called a “theoretical model that explains and predicts observational evidence.” I remember thinking: so this is how smart people make sense of the world.

Then one of the top students raised his hand. His tone made it clear he wanted the teacher to get back on track.

If the universe was born in the Big Bang, what was there before the Big Bang?

The teacher looked up calmly and said, “The question ‘What was there before the Big Bang?’ transcends the framework of our universe — space, time, existence. It’s logically incoherent.”

The student who asked, and the rest of the class, looked completely lost.

So, you mean there was nothing?

The student pressed on. The teacher continued.

“‘Something’ and ‘nothing’ are concepts that belong to this universe. According to the Big Bang theory, space and time themselves began with the Big Bang. ‘Existence’ and ‘non-existence’ only have meaning once you have space and time. Without space, ‘where’ has no meaning. Without time, ‘when’ has no meaning. So the very ideas of ‘existence’ and ‘nothingness’ only make sense within the framework of the post-Big Bang universe. ‘Before the Big Bang’ can’t be expressed using the language and logic that emerged after the Big Bang. In other words, it’s not that there was nothing — it’s that the question ‘Was there something or nothing?’ itself has no meaning. The framework of the question doesn’t hold.”

The classroom went quiet. No one argued. No one seemed to understand, either.

Decades later, the phrase “the framework of the question doesn’t hold” still echoes quietly inside me. I retained almost nothing from physics, but I did receive something from that teacher — a way of seeing the world.

In recent years, new hypotheses have emerged that attempt to explore what came before the Big Bang: inflation theory, loop quantum gravity. If that teacher were talking about them today, I wonder what words he’d choose. I imagine he’d speak in that same calm, incomprehensible way — somewhere just beyond our reach.

In October, morning temperatures dropped into the single digits. Nearly three years have passed since I moved to this northern city, and I’m about to face my third winter here.

Soon, days when the temperature never rises above freezing won’t surprise me anymore. Even when relentless snow blankets everything, I won’t panic. This is how it’s always been here. You can’t fight nature, and I’ve started thinking this way without even realizing it. Wherever you live, if you accept the environment and adapt to it, there’s no reason to feel uncomfortable.

Two years ago, I decided to move here after a sudden realization: this place has nearly everything I’d been vaguely seeking in my travels. Nature and space, functional urban infrastructure, safety, clean air, drinkable tap water, abundant local ingredients and cuisine, and tolerant people. These sound like obvious things when you list them, but finding them all in one place is surprisingly rare.

When I first arrived, I must have been seeing everything through rose-colored glasses. Everything I encountered in daily life seemed ideal.

Walking down the wide, straight streets, my field of vision extends far into the distance, and I feel a sense of physical and mental liberation. The Sea of Japan climate shifts like mountain weather, changing its mood several times a day, but when the sun breaks through, it reveals the high, blue sky characteristic of these latitudes. At the supermarket, most of the vegetables on the shelves are locally grown. In the seafood section, fish and shellfish caught that morning lie on ice. Step outside the city limits and you’re in the forest. Drive for an hour and you can stand in primeval woods or wetlands where human presence feels almost nonexistent. The distance between urban and natural is remarkably close.

After a while, I began to see things more realistically, but the feeling that what I’d sought in years of travel was always within reach hasn’t changed. That feeling directly translates into daily contentment.

As for the tolerance of the people here, I can’t say for certain — I have almost no local friends or acquaintances. Still, I feel the residents allow me to “live here as a traveler.” Many seem to treat permanent residents, short-term visitors, and passersby with equal regard. Nearly everyone living here wasn’t here a few generations ago. And the Indigenous peoples are said to have had mobile lifestyles as well. Perhaps everyone carries the lineage of movers and travelers — though this, too, might be an idealized view.

I’ve also noticed that many people here organize their year around winter. The long, snowy cold is the default season, while warm spring, beautiful summer, and crystalline autumn are exceptions to that baseline. Once, I heard a local radio host call winter’s arrival “the season coming home.” Hearing that phrase, I felt I glimpsed the contours of how this city experiences time.

On the verge of my third winter, I may finally be starting to understand that sensibility. It makes me happy.

The first snow typically arrives in late October. The city has already prepared. More cars have booked appointments for winter tire changes, hardware stores stock snow removal supplies, and some people have brought their balcony plants indoors. The entire city quietly awaits the season’s return. I’m finally becoming part of it.

Most people don’t move all that often in their lifetimes. I was reminded of this the other day when the topic of moving came up among friends my age.

Most of them had only relocated a handful of times across more than half a century. The person with the most moves had been through it maybe five times — when their parents built a house, for school, after graduation, marriage, and upgrading for a growing family. One person had never left their childhood home.

By contrast, I’ve moved over twenty-five times. Do the math, and that’s roughly once every two years.

The first move was a midnight escape after my parents’ business collapsed. Later, my parents told me not to come back, and I crashed at a friend’s place for a long stretch. College in Tokyo, a rural university in the States, subletting in the heart of New York. Back in Japan, I bounced between rental apartments close to work. Marriage, then divorce — each required a move. I found work in Southeast Asia and lived there for a few years.

Bought a condo, sold it, moved again. Most recently, I became determined to live in a regional city in Japan, so I decided to move there, despite not having any local ties or knowing a single person.

I’ve lost count of the exact number. Let’s call it at least twenty-five.

Is it that I can’t settle down? A lack of staying power? I’m not entirely sure, but I’ve always thought of this lightness on my feet as one of my better qualities. I’ve never disliked it.

My friends shake their heads and ask, “All those moves — what’s the point?”

I tell them it keeps me unburdened, unattached to things. Every city feels like I’m traveling through. They smile and tilt their heads, bemused. One of them said, “Like duckweed. Kind of nice, actually.”

Duckweed. A plant with no roots in the soil. I liked the comparison.

Even without anchoring into the ground, even when the wind carries it away, it absorbs water in unfamiliar places, spreads its leaves, photosynthesizes, and lives — for now, at least. If conditions are right, it sprouts something new. That’s exactly how I live.

I’ve been in this city for nearly two and a half years now. Where will I move next, and why? I don’t know. Duckweed probably doesn’t know what tomorrow holds, either.