A Lesson Learned

June 25, 1983, Saturday

The day of running started at 10:30am after an interview with NHK TV. Four runners from Yamaguchi Prefectural track team ran 6km with me. One of the runners was a very pretty young woman. While I was running with her, I was thinking about how I would like to see her again. I haven't had any excitement since that day in Kumamoto when the nurses placed the suppository up my rear.

It was sunny and hot today, running on a very hilly route through many tunnels that cut right through the some of the mountains. I covered about 42km today to Tokusa station. This is a nice, small town in a valley. High school students greeted me as I finished at the train station. I checked into a traditional Japanese inn and ate a very huge dinner of steak, sashimi, oden and other delicious dishes. I feel like I am a bit dehydrated so I have been drinking a lot of fluids.

I met an older man, Mr. Nakajima, who is also staying in the same inn that is riding his bicycle around Japan. This man looks like he is in his late 60's and is riding not a touring bike, but an old papa-san one-speed clunker that must weigh a ton! He has a basket on the handlebar where he puts his possessions. I asked him how he tackles the hills with that thing, and he just said, "I take my time and go as I please." I began to envy his freedom to start and finish as he wishes. We talked for a while as brothers on a crazy adventure to see the country and to meet interesting people. Now I am considering doing something more sensible like cycling through Japan for my next adventure, if there is one. Meeting people like Mr. Nakajima is what this experience is all about. I know I will never forget his healthy demeanor and carefree attitude that allows him to accomplish what he has done so far. We talked for a while about the attitudes of people on the road.

Today I had many people waving and smiling from their cars as they passed me on the road. This is surely a result of newspaper and TV coverage that I have been receiving recently. It's nice to see this friendly response, but I still wish that I had more freedom to do as I please, like Mr. Nakajima.

By the way, people were not smiling and waving before the TV coverage. In fact, I received many dirty looks along the way. Here was a guy with a dark tan, wearing shorts, tank top, cap, and a backpack, running along the streets. I must have given the impression that I was some kind of a bum. Nothing had changed from the time before and after the media coverage--I was wearing the same kind of clothing, doing the same thing, for the same reason. Why, all of a sudden, do people have to see me in a different light? Does television legitimize what a person is doing? I learned a valuable lesson today--Every person has a story and it doesn't have to be on TV.

Note: This experience has left a deep impression with me and 23 years later, I am still conscious of how people still put so much weight on what is shown on television. I've personally made it a point to change the way I view things. I try to keep an open mind and will not "pigeon-hole" people based on how they look or where they come from. It's not always easy to do, I understand, but when your background is like mine, you are constantly being reminded of how people try to place you in a certain filing system in their brain.