Sagamihara Constitutional

For the first time, I took a walk around Sagamihara yesterday. For those of you unfamiliar with the area, or Japan in general, the usual means of traveling (unless you're an American hooked on automobiles and traffic) involves a quick walk or bike ride to the nearest train station. In the spirit of adventure and having nothing better to do, I decided that I would walk up to Sagamihara station (The next big station up from my usual depature point).

If you are lost in trying to understand what I'm talking about right now, not to worry. I've been playing with google maps all moring and it has resulted in a handy-dandy visual:

View Larger Map
Unfortunately, the visual goes straight to US, so scroll over to Japan and zoom in to the placemarks to get a looksee.

For those of you who don't have my technical savvy ("Look, mom! I can right click!"), here are words to describe the scenic walk I took.

To begin with, I began this walk with the intention of walking up to Sagamiono station and then riding the train down to Soboudai-mae (I do apoligize if this is misspelled.) for an engagement at 6PM. Well, obiviously I needed a watch. In the states, I would just use my telephone, but since I didn't know where my keitai is I picked up one of my brothers' watches instead. Unfortunately, only after walking out of the housing area did I realize the watch didn't work. On the plus side, this is the only bad thing that happened on the whole endeavour, so I did pretty good. I also needed some yen for my train ride back and just in case I needed some spending money. Since I neglected to change any of my dollars, I "borrowed" some money from my brother. To be exact, I took 600 yen in 10yen peices from his stash. For this I feel no guilt.

The first point of interest on my travels was the grafiti on the construction barrier near one of the local parks. I remember as a child seeing an English cuss spray painted on one of the local housing projects on the way to Odakyu Sagamihara station. Isn't it nice how some things don't change?

Except for the nagging feeling that walking around in Japan shouldn't be as unremarkable as walking around in Pittsburgh, the walk was, unremarkable. I was disappointed to see that UniQlo had become a GU, because I knew I'd fit in the clothes from UniQlo, but was surprised to find out that it is a Japanese company. I used to shop there in London and had no idea it wasn't an European phenomenon. Now I can shop at UniQlo in Tokyo, but feel put-out because it used to be so much closer.

Continuing my walk, I decided to just hop on rt. 51 the whole way to Sagamiono station. That way, I was garaunteed not to get lost. The second point of interest (If it was so unremarkable, how come I have more remarks?) was the back gate to the housing area, which looks directly on 51. Because of security (war on terrorism?) I guess the DoD felt it prudent to close this gate down. Two things: first this could have taken ten minutes off my walk and second the terrorists can google map the place. That doesn't seem very secure to me.

Now, having lived in Japan at various points in my life (notably the beginning, middle, and present) I can say that I feel very secure here. I may not have the laguage mastered, but I am comfortable with my knowledge of the local geography (flat in the Kanto plain and bumpy by the mountains), food (everything is good except the pickled eggplant and some goey potato product), and customs (mind your "p"s and "q"s). I know that dancing around the onsen singing "My Ding A Ling" is going to be frowned upon, but I will be asked to leave in the most courteus way possible. I also know that, at least in the past, jay walking is not the thing to do. So when it came time to cross the street at an intersection without the aid of a crosswalk or a walkway, I was a bit stumped. Luckily I noticed two people who were able to help me solve my problem. The first was an older woman about to cross 51 standing on the median between the two lanes of the side street I wanted to cross. The second was the policeman standing behind her apparently just standing around looking at the median. I figured, if he's not going to stop that woman, he's not going to stop me, and I was right. I hope that woman made it safely across.

I could remark upon the differences between the architecture of Sagamihara versus a city in US or juxtapose the traffic laws of Japan with those of US, but I chose instead to let you know that I passes two Starbucks in my walk. One was near Sagamiono station and the other near Machida station. It's like a virus with really bad coffee breath.

When I went in to Sagamiono station and looked at the time, I realized that I still had hours to kill before my engagement. I decided that since I still had sixty 10yen coins jingling around the bottom of my bag I had better buy myself a change purse. My favorite place to shop is the 100 Yen Store in Machida, so out of the station and up the road I wandered. Unfortunately I don't always make what would be called "smart" decisions and left Sagamiono station through the nearest exit rather than one that I knew. This left me wandering around the residential side of the tracks following an unsuspecting Japanese woman for a few minutes.

Once safely back on 51, I continued on my merry way only this time I wasn't sure if 51 would take me to the next station. After crossing over the train tracks hoping they were for the Odakyu line, wandering around Machida, and realizing I was once more on the wrong side of the tracks, I made it to the 100 Yen Store. Alas, I found their change purse collection lacking in both quantity and variety.

On my walk to Machida station, I went along what I can only describe as the ginza street and browsed the various shops for an affordable change purse. Alright, that's not true. I only went into one shop looking for a change purse and that was only because I was so shocked at seeing it there, I felt compeled to enter. There was a Claire's right there on the street. Inside, I could have been at the Newburgh Mall in New York only the music was something I'd never heard before with English lyrics punctuated with cuss words. Weird. Also, the change purses there were 800+ yen. I refuse to pay that much money for something from Claire's. It's just wrong.

The only other stop I made before heading down to Sobudai-mae was for a sporting good store along the ginza. What drew me in to the store was the display of swim suits in the shop window. Inside the store I found a bunch of great items (including a compression sheath for shin splints), too bad when it came to swim suits half of them had padded bras in then and all of them were stretched over their hangers. (For those of you that don't swim, these are bad things because breasts are not hydrodynamic and therefore do not need to be emphasized while swimming and swimsuits are bought in small sizes to fit the body snuggly and stretching on a hanger defeats this purpose.)

In conclusion, as long as the weather is nice a person can walk to Machida in under an hour so why not do so? It'll save you 160Y and you'll get to pass what feels like a dozen 7-11s and Family Marts.

Now that you've wasted at least 10 minutes of your day, thanks for humoring me!