Hokkaido Highway Blues

molesting her tree. Her plum tree. Plums bloom earlier than sakura in the first scrub days of spring and, although the two sometimes overlap, this was definitely not a cherry tree.
    “Well,” said Hisao, turning to the lady of the temple and clearly miffed at having his bubble popped. “Where are the sakura then?” It was as though she were personally at fault for the fact that the Cherry Blossom Front was so late this year.
    She said, “Sometimes the sakura arrive sooner in the higher mountains than they do here.”
    This didn’t make much sense to me, but it was all the encouragement that Koba-chan and Hisao needed. Off we went, farther and farther from their original destination. What had once been a short drive home for them had now turned into a crusade. We were on a mission.
    “Don’t worry,” said Hisao. “We’ll find them.”
    It was a long drive, over an hour. But we sang songs and our conversation ranged over a wide variety of topics: (a) drinking, (b) women, and (c) drinking with women, the latter topic being met with special enthusiasm. The beer kept coming and by the time the sun reached its noontime zenith, I was pickled.
    High above the plains, the landscape became more alpine. Forests hemmed us in. The highway narrowed and we began ascending the mountainside in a series of long zigs and sudden zags, as though following a staircase to the top of the world. My ears popped, then plugged, then popped again. The air became cold and thin.
    “Are you sure there will be sakura way up here?”
    “Of course!” shouted Hisao.
    “Maybe,” said Koba-chan.
    A Shinto shrine overlooked the entire vista. Heady on the thinned atmosphere and invigorated on beer and clean air, we scaled the steps to the main building. Sure enough, there was a cherry tree out front.
    It had a faint hint of blossoms, the tiniest touch of pink. This was insufferably coy for a bunch of he-men like us, so Koba-chan pulled a bud from the branch and pried it open. Inside was a delicate tuft of flower, no bigger than a pea. “Sakura!” they called out in triumph, and we all stood around to marvel at the beauty.
    Flush with victory, Hisao decided—and Koba-chan agreed—that the only thing for us to do now was to go to a hot spring and drink a lot of beer and have a long soak and find some pretty maids to dally with. All for one and one for all!
    “There is a hot spring, farther along this mountain pass. Hot springs are great for hangovers,” said Hisao, forgetting that I wasn’t the one who had been drinking all night.
    “Sounds good to me,“ I said.
    But Koba-chan soured the mood by saying, “Shouldn’t you call Akiko first and ask if it’s okay?” Akiko, I deduced, was Hisao’s girlfriend.
    “Ask?” sputtered Hisao. “Ask? I don’t ask, I tell!” Then, slipping again into his limited store of English, he said, “I am Japanese man! Japanese man is strong!”
    We drove into the riverside village of Kurokawa and pulled over so that Hisao could use the phone.
    “I’m gonna tell her I won’t be back till late,” he said, emphasizing the word tell. “Japanese man! Very strong!“
    The phone call took longer than we expected. From the car, we could see Hisao gesticulating like an Italian mime, and when he hadn’t hung up after ten minutes, we got out to stretch our legs. Koba-chan lit a cigarette and sat on the hood.
    Hisao returned looking sheepish. “I’m sorry,” he said, unable to look me in the eye. “We have to leave you here. I have to go home.”
    What about Japanese man number one? I wanted to ask, but I didn’t. Hisao’s pride had suffered enough, and it was all Koba-chan could do not to start laughing.
    “But—” Hisao said, brightening suddenly “We’ll help you get a ride, won’t we Koba-chan?”
    “Yes, yes,” said Koba-chan. “We’ll help.”
    “Really, you don’t have to.”
    But they took up hitchhiking as enthusiastically as they had cherry blossoms. They “helped” me by trying to flag down traffic. They waved their thumbs in the air and jumped around, laughing, shouting, and leaping up on each other’s backs. They even lunged into oncoming traffic, thumbs out, causing vehicles to swerve.
    “Really, guys,” I said. “You don’t have to help.”
    “Oh, no, we don’t mind, do we Koba-chan?”
    “Actually,” I said, growing nervous as ride after ride disappeared, many gaping with shocked expressions as they passed, “Japanese drivers stop for foreigners, but they