The Peak and the Pit of Winter

The Peak and the Pit of Winter BROOKE DALGLEISH

Growing up, my family had this tradition of saying what our peak and pit of the day were. We loved being outside exploring, so we would usually do this after spending a day together in the car driving around to see what we could see. Maybe it was to a place that we have already been to, or maybe it was to a new little diner that recently opened up 45 minutes away from us. It wasn’t essentially about the ultimate destination but more about what we would see or talk about along the way. Throughout the drive, we would find interesting places to stop at which sometimes would become some of our favorite memories. At the end of the day, we would ask each other what was the peak and the pit of the day. I think my parents started this to get us kids to reflect on what made us happy and what

kind of things annoyed us so we could better understand ourselves and each other. Peak means the top highlight of the day, while the pit is the opposite. It’s something that I have continued to this day on all my adventures and sometimes on a daily basis. Whether it’s an internal reflection or something I force upon my friends, I think it’s a cheesy yet healthy practice. Luckily, I have found great travel buddies here in Japan that humor me and participate on all our outings. Shout out to Kim and Catherine!

46 In January, the three of us went to Morioka, to the Iwate Art Museum to see the temporary Ghibli exhibit. As we all know, winter hasn’t been too terrible this year so we wanted to take advantage of the drivable weather. The exhibit was our main destination that day and we didn’t

plan for anything else. It was a lot of fun and so worth the two-hour drive to the “city”. The three of us live in Kazuno and Kosaka, so it was nice to get out of the inaka and into a city-like atmosphere. After we finished the exhibition, we started to get hungry and Catherine had heard of this pizza place a little bit outside the city. At first, I think we all wished it was a little closer but the drive wasn’t all that bad and Mt. Iwate was in all its glory that day so we had a pretty good view for the entire drive. When we got to Shizukuishi Soul Kitchen Pizza, we were pleasantly surprised to find that this pizza shop was nothing that we expected and for a moment, we felt like we were back home in the states. It was small and placed in a random neighborhood on a not so busy street. It had this cool hipster vibe with 90’s music playing and decently sized pizza that wasn’t overly priced. We were stoked and I’m pretty sure it still is the best pizza we all have had since moving to Japan. The employees were so nice and I think Kim made their day when she told them it was the best we have had in Japan. We were on cloud nine and felt like it was the best ending to an already fun day. So we thought! THE AKITAN However, we didn’t know that the adventure wasn’t quite over. Since this was a new area, we used Google Sensei to get us back on the road we knew how to take home… and we all know how that can go. Google took us through roads we didn’t even know if cars were meant to go on, especially since there were no other cars in sight. We drove through one-way alleys, then through vastly open country roads, and then eventually onto a highway road in a dark forest. Right when we thought Google was trying to kill us, we were blinded by these beautiful lights. I was driving and for some reason, I just

decided then and there to pull in and check it out. It turned out to be the Koiwai Farm Illumination Festival. We had all heard of Koiwai Farm but all of us had never been to it and had no idea where it was located. Little did we know it was a dairy farm in the middle of these dark woods. We decided to buy an admission ticket and go investigate even though it was freezing outside. We had so much fun checking out the different light displays, taking selfies galore, and then we got the crazy idea to buy ice cream… in the middle of winter. It was worth it and I don’t regret it at all. Honestly, it was one of my favorite memories to date and I think it was because it was so unexpected and the cherry on top of an already fantastic day.

49 Going into the day, I thought for sure that seeing the Nekobus from Totoro would be my peak, but then it turned into eating pizza and drinking ginger ale from a nostalgic glass bottle. Overall, I think it was eating ice cream while looking at pretty lights that took the win. It for sure added on extra time to our already long drive home but to me, if spending extra time in the car singing Disney songs with my girls is the pit of the day, I’ll take it. To be honest, there were a lot of peaks this day and they outnumbered the pits. In my opinion, being an ALT in Japan also has more peaks than pits. Of course, it all depends on perspective and we all know the motto, “every experience is different” is annoying but so true. I think for the most part we can agree that life here in Akita has some major peaks. You just have to find them!