2007-07-17 - 4:48 p.m.
The Absurdly Fertile Soils of Hachinohe
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Until two months ago I couldn't understand why so much of this city looks like a delapitated jungle. Sometimes I really like it. That is, the feeling that this city is just barely managing to hold nature at bay and that one iota less of an effort towards this would quickly result in the entire area being taken over by vines and bramble bearing leaves the size of a human head, large snakes in a myriad of exotic colours, all manner of carnivorous insects, and so on. At other times, however, I try to think of how it will be if anyone actually did come to visit me here and realize that I would be embarassed.
(Which isn't to say that anyone considering a visit shouldn't do so. Plenty of more civilized destinations than Hachinohe are only a short train ride away.)
And now that I'm experiencing my first summer here, I'm coming to understand why so much of this city looks the way it does.
Things grow like crazy here.
I've barely been taking care of my garden at all and it is growing as though it has aspirations of taking over the world. I'd thought about trying to grow zucchini, then realized that I couldn't be bothered to try to get the seeds and, in retrospect, I'm grateful for this. If I had zucchinis in my garden growing half as well as the soy beans are, at this point, I would be worrying that I had done something terrible, like introducing Eurasian milfoil to Okanagan lakes.
There's a now closed Pachinko Parlour that I often pass on my way to the station. I can't remember exactly when it closed, probably sometime around March, but it looks as though it's already been empty for years. Various grasses and weeds have pushed through the asphalt parking lot to form an elaborate zig-zag pattern now taller than myself.
One section or another of the highways going in and out of town is perpetually reduced to one lane in order to make room for pick-up trucks and sweaty teams of men brandishing weed-whackers to clear the roadside folliage away before it has a chance to take over the road.
I long ago lost track of my favorite geography student, so I can't be sure of why things in Hachinohe grow the way that they do. Jared Diamond taught me that the ash from relatively recent volcanic activity and being within reach of Mongolian-yellow-sand-carrying winds are both very good for soil fertility, in which case, the entirety of this nation is in luck, but something truly extraordinary must be influencing organic matter in Hachinohe because, I'm telling you, I've never before in my life seen plants growing the way that they do here.
At this point in my highly informal career as an amateur translator of folk tales, I've gleaned all sorts of useful information that explains why this area is as it is. For example, I know that we are safe from tsunamis and floods because Ichitaro kappa, grateful for having his arms returned to him after a sumo competition gone wrong, protects us. I know that Hashikami Mountain is slightly taller than Shirakami Mountain because they once had a contest to see who could grow taller in which Shirakami Mountain cheated, and therefore lost. I know that Lake Towada was formed by the torrential rains which accompanied the final tranformation of a half-human, half-dragon bastard son. Thus far, however, I have no idea of what might explain the conspicuous fertility of Hachinohe soil.
But I'd sure like to...
