May 19 cont...
I knew I had made a late start so I was surprised to see an older Henro all kitted up which meant he was walking to the next Temple also. I asked if I could follow him and was pleasantly surprised when he spoke good English.
His name was Tahara San ( I could remember his name by associating it with Tahora in Taranaki) and was another retired man.
When I commented that I had walked with many ‘older’ people, he said that Japanese only got one paid week off a year, so they had to wait till they were retired to have the time to do the Pilgrimage.
That made sense, especially when I thought back to Taichi San and Makoto San (both 27) they were both inbetween jobs.
Tahara San had a bad knee and kept apologizing for the many stops. I said “First – I asked to follow you so we go at your pace and second, I have an iron deficiency which affects my energy so the pace suits me perfectly”.
He was the wonderful company I always enjoy with a humble intelligent person.
We got to Temple 81 and, because my process is always faster, I was eating lunch by the time Tahara San came to the stamp office.
5 minutes earlier, while I was drying my stamp with one of the the hair dryers that are always at the offices, the older couple who knew no English and who I had followed the day before, arrived.
Even though we couldn’t understand each other, we were still pleased to see each other.
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