8 rides 28 hours

With a grin on his face my boss looked at me as if he was waiting for the punchline of funny joke I had just told. After pausing for a moment he repositioned himself in his chair and said, “Are you being serious? Do you know how far it is to Tokyo? Surly you plan on flying, right?”

As it turns out my boss and I weren’t seeing eye to eye on my hitchhiking plans. The way I saw it was that by hitchhiking to Tokyo I could save a bit of money, meet some interesting people, and practice Japanese the entire trip. The way my boss saw it was that if I didn’t make it to school on time then it would be the equivalence of not making it to work on time and that was unacceptable.

By promising I would safely make it to Tokyo before class started and by promising to phone him along the way he agreed to let me go. Truth be told, it was impossible to be sure of anything as the progress of my journey relied on the generosity of people I didn’t know and had yet to meet. The unknowingness of it all was a large part of why I was doing it in the first place.

Traveling nonstop from Nagashima to Tokyo I was able to make it in 8 rides and 28 hours. I had originally planned on stopping and sleeping overnight and using 2 days to complete the tip, but as fate would have it I was lucky enough to find the right rides at the right time and make better progress than previously anticipating.

Ride 1 – My friend Rina an English teacher at one of the junior high schools on the island had plans on driving to Fukuoka to visit her sister on the same day I was leaving for Tokyo. Had I started my hitch from Nagashima every single student that passed surly would have stopped and asked why I was standing on the side of the rode. Starting in unknown territory quickly took care of this potential problem. I asked Rina to drop me off at a highway rest stop because this guaranteed that everyone there was already going somewhere – all I had to do was find someone who needed a little company along the way (travel time - 3 hrs 45 min)

Ride 2 - The man had just gotten off work and was his way home. He was only traveling 15 minutes further up the road, but because I had waited for nearly 2 hours at the first rest stop I was desperate for anything. The parking area where I started was small and traffic was sparse. I asked him to please take me to a larger rest stop with more people and thankfully there was one right before his exit. Along the way we stopped for gas. (travel time - 15 min)

Ride 3 – When we pulled up to the next rest stop I was overwhelmed to see lots of traveling people. I walked up to a young looking guy smoking a cigarette asked him if he could give me a lift. His first response was “no,” but after talking with him for a few more minutes he agreed to it. He is a 27 year old farmer and the vegetables he grows are sold all across Japan. When asking why he is a farmer responded, “I like being a farmer because it’s peaceful.” He also loves playing Pachinko and plays it nearly every weekend. He wasn’t all that talkative so most of our time together was spent in silence – I didn’t mind. (travel time – 1 hour)

Ride 4 – If I had judged this man based on appearance alone I probably would not have asked him for a ride. He was missing a few teeth and looked like he hadn’t slept in a month. However, because it was getting dark and my last 2 rides hadn’t really gotten me all that far I decided that it would be best to ask a few truck drivers at this point. I took a deep breath and asked him for a ride. Had he not motioned with his hand for me to come along I wouldn’t have known he had agreed to give me a lift. Actually, for the first 3 hours we were traveling I didn’t understand one word this man said. He was speaking Japanese, I’m sure of that much, but beyond that I was guessing my way through our conversations. By the 4th and 5th hour I started to pick apart his strong Japanese dialect and fumbled my way through conversations on how he’d like to visit New Zealand, his favorite onsens in Japan, and how he thinks nurses and doctors are overworked and underpaid. At one point he bought hamburgers and coffee for us to enjoy together during one of our stops. By the 8th hour I was having trouble staying awake and so was he. Towards the end of our time together he was stopping every 20 minutes to rest. Before napping he would circle the parking lot of the rest stop and point out all the trucks that he knew were heading towards Tokyo. While he napped I would solicit for rides ~ we were quite the team. (travel time – 9 hours)

to be continued. . .

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