Lost in translation?

After Althea and I got off the ferryboat from Miyajima, she suddenly looked at me and suggested that we climb up to the Peace Pagoda on the mountain behind Hiroshima Station. We had read that we can get an amazing view of all of Hiroshima once we get up there and Althea was really intent on taking a panoramic shot of the view. What we failed to realise was that we were both terribly out of shape, a condition aided by the fact that we've had a daily serving of ice cream since we arrived in Japan a week ago. By the time we realised that the climb was more strenuous than we thought, we were already halfway up the mountain and we were determined to make it to the top. As we got closer to the pagoda, the road got steeper and we were both drenched in sweat but before long, we finally saw a plateau in the road where the trees cleared and we were sure we were finally there.

The light at the end of the tunnel!

As soon as we walked up the steps leading to the pagoda, we were met by an older, extremely tan Japanese man who took one look at our sweaty faces panting for air and smiled and gave us the thumbs up. We came to realise that he was somewhat of a groundskeeper of the pagoda as he immediately started to speak to us in Japanese and gesturing towards the pagoda. We, of course, had no idea what he was saying so we just looked at what he was gesturing and guessed that he was telling us to climb the pagoda to get a better view. The pagoda itself was a circular building with three different levels. We climbed up the first level but weren't tall enough (or strong enough) to hoist ourselves to the second level. The man soon returned and motioned for me to follow him to the back of the pagoda where he showed me a door (all the while speaking Japanese while I just nodded and used one of the 5 or 6 Japanese phrases I knew). He took out a set of keys and opened the door to show us a dark staircase leading into the pagoda itself. He then gestured to the top of the pagoda so I took it to mean that we can go inside and climb up to the top. Althea and I took one look at each other, another look at the dark abyss the staircase lead into and told the guy that we were fine with staying outside. He closed the door and gestured that I could give myself a boost up to the second level by stepping onto the sunken handle of the door.

View of Hiroshima on the Peace Pagoda

Once we got up there, Althea went back to taking pictures while I 'talked' to the man since my camera batteries had died earlier. Now when I say 'talk', I mean he talked animatedly while I tried to interpret what he was saying by his hand motions. Somehow we managed to convey that we were from Canada and I didn't understand Japanese and he in turn said something about America and Hawaii. He didn't seem to mind that I didn't understand and he continued to talk. I think that because he spent so much time alone on the mountain, he was content with just having someone to talk to. He gestured for the two of us to walk over to a golden statue of a buddha and pray.

Peace Pagoda with Golden Buddha
He brought out some incense and a string of beads and started chanting something in Japanese in what I think was a sort of blessing ritual. After we were done we asked him if we could get a picture of him, a question which took him for surprise.

The picture of him that we took actually didn't capture his essence because he was actually smiling and laughing the whole time we talked with him, he was smiling. He gestured to his short ponytail and then pretended to take a sword out of a hilt on his side and then started to make swinging motions with an imaginary sword to which Althea excitedly exclaimed "Samurai!" and he laughed while continuing to swing his pretend sword. We then left him with a handshake and our thanks and made our way back down the mountain which was unsurprisingly a much easier and shorter journey.