📖 Chapter 1 (Episode 1)– A Quiet Morning at Kita-in Temple (Day 1)
The First Stop of a Not-So-Planned Journey
The morning air at Narita carried that crisp chill I’d been imagining for weeks.
Outside the glass walls, everything felt new—
signs I couldn’t read,
voices floating in polite melody,
and the kind of calm order that seemed effortless—almost suspiciously so.
Today my journey would take me from the edges of Tokyo toward the heart of Gunma Prefecture—guided by nothing more than exhaustion, instinct, and a train timetable I barely understood.
The plan—if we’re being generous enough to call it a plan—was simply:
take the train north, get off where it feels right, and hope for the best.
Not the most reliable strategy, but certainly the most me.
A Train Ride with Japan’s Quiet Charm
I feared the long ride would bore me, but Japan has a way of filling silence for you.
There’s the rhythmic hum of the densha ((電車 – train), the soft chime announcing every stop,
and—so I’d heard—the gentle sound of people opening their bento boxes.
So naturally, I waited for that polite pata-pata sound of bento wrappers.
And waited.
And waited.
Not a single rustle.
Not one beautifully wrapped lunch box.
Not even a rogue smell of tamagoyaki drifting in the air.
I began to wonder if the famous “train-bento tradition” had quietly retired, replaced by discreet convenience-store snacks or a sudden national decision to be healthy.
It felt like preparing myself for a charming little local festival only to discover the villagers had all stayed home that year.
Still—Japan has its own ways of keeping you entertained, even when nothing happens.
Maybe modern commuters eat before boarding.
Maybe everyone suddenly went on a diet.
Or maybe, just maybe, I had chosen the one train in Japan where no one was hungry.
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