Perched in the back of a taxi, its seats draped in delicate lace covers ubiquitous in Japan, my grandfather and I ascended the leafy, winding roads that lead to the summit of Nihondaira from his home at the foot of the hill. Nihondaira is a plateau that towers over Shizuoka-shi, the capital city of Shizuoka-ken. On a clear day, Mount Fuji, the Izu Peninsula, the Japanese Southern Alps, and Suruga Bay are all visible from Nihondaira.
At the hill’s peak, wind whipped around us, as Papa tightly clutched his brown fedora. His coarse gray hair had grown long when barbershops shuttered during the pandemic. He has maintained the style, now fashioned into a small, low ponytail. We hurried into the Nihondaira Ropeway station to shelter ourselves from the last days of winter.
Upon moving to Tokyo to immerse myself in Japanese language and culture and be closer to my family, I chanced upon a documentary that left me captivated by the lore of Japan’s Three Great Unifiers: Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and the patient, strategic Tokugawa Ieyasu. Throughout the tumultuous Sengoku period spanning the 15th and 16th centuries, the three men ended nearly a century of warfare. Naturally, they achieved this through further warfare. Ieyasu ultimately succeeded in unifying Japan and became the first shōgun, with his shogunate peacefully ruling Japan for 260 years.
During my visits with Papa, we would often stay seated at the table after dinner and converse rapturously about this time in Japan, the warm aroma of his homemade curry lingering in the air. Outside the wide kitchen window, the silhouette of Mount Fuji grew hazy in the dusk. When I declared, “Ieyasu is my favorite,” the pride in Papa’s smile was palpable through his thick, silvery beard. Despite the chasm of generational and cultural differences between a Japanese man born in 1946 and a woman born and raised in 1990’s California to a Japanese/Argentine mother and an American father, we had found common ground. That night, we planned our trip to nearby Kunōzan Tōshō-gū, a Shintō shrine erected as the original burial site for Ieyasu.
I arrived from Tokyo on Papa’s 75th birthday, March 18. I plied him with cured meats and Spanish olive oil procured from international markets in Tokyo, goods he could not buy in Shimizu-ku, though only an hour south by shinkansen.
Papa and I boarded the ropeway, an aerial lift taking us from Nihondaira to Kunōzan Tōshō-gū. We floated above newly blooming cherry blossoms as the ropeway carried us east toward the coastline of Suruga Bay. Once we arrived, I tried to match Papa’s gradual pace as we climbed steep stone steps to reach the shrine’s roumon, a two story gate, where we each placed our hands atop an outline of Ieyasu’s imposing handprint.
We offered our prayers at the shrine’s crown jewel, the shaden, where Ieyasu’s deified spirit is said to be enshrined. I was awed by the attention to detail given to the structure and the pristine condition in which it had been preserved, with gold and pastel blues gleaming against immaculate black lacquer. We tossed yen into the box at the base of the shrine, bowed twice, and clapped our hands twice to signal our presence to the deity. A final bow followed our moment of silent prayer.
Each monument was atop a towering stairway, and Papa’s breath grew labored as we approached the shaden. Though a robust practitioner of martial arts, he also suffers from emphysema. His breath, a stalled car engine, unable to power its vehicle. He opted not to ascend any further and I climbed the final stairway to the shinbyo alone. The shinbyo, a mausoleum made of stone, faced west per Ieyasu’s instructions.
While Ieyasu’s remains were said to be relocated to Nikkō Tōshō-gū by the third shōgun and Ieyasu’s grandson, Iemitsu, it is also claimed that a portion of his deified spirit remains at Kunōzan. Rather than thinking about the possibility that I was standing in front of an empty vessel, I focused on what I admired most about Ieyasu: his ultimate desire for peace, his loyalty, and his sharp ability to know when to make his move and when to wait. I thought of how Papa exemplifies these traits, in his gentle sturdiness and quiet devotion to our family.
Visiting Ieyasu’s burial site offered me a unique sense of upliftment, a feeling I’ve only occasionally experienced in shrines and chapels, in the presence of a natural wonder, or when listening to a particularly good song. I desired to share this with Papa and encouraged him to make the climb to visit the man we so admire.
Guilt plagued me as his breathing intensified on his ascent, not settling even as we eventually descended the many steps to the base of the shrine. We rested on a wooden bench, admiring the Suruga Bay as it glistened in the fading sunlight. His breath steadied, revealing the shrine’s tranquil silence. My anxieties calmed with his breath as I got up to browse the shrine’s many omamori, amulets dedicated to various gods and often intended to provide specific blessings.
“Do you want amazake,” Papa asked excitedly.
Not wanting our shared experiences to cease, despite knowing I don’t particularly enjoy amazake, I accepted his offer. We sipped the warm, sweet beverage on our bench. Fermentation caused grains of rice to break down into sugars, which bobbed at the surface as we drank. I swallowed slowly, trying to mirror the pleasure Papa found in the milky liquid.
As the next ropeway car neared, he noticed I had not finished my cup. Not a fan of waste, characteristic of those born in the wake of World War II, he swiftly slurped down the drink and remnants of fermented rice.
The final hike back to the ropeway station proved most arduous for Papa. During the five-minute ride, his breathing was once again audibly strained, to the visible concern of the other passengers. What was intended to be a bonding adventure had shaped into a Herculean effort.
Had I pushed him too far?
Though I had grown used to being unable to decode Papa’s reserved emotions, I struggled with what I should do. True to Japanese culture, Papa would not appreciate a fuss being made, but I worried my attempts to remain calm would be perceived as nonchalance.
His wheezing was a bleak reminder that the number of his birthdays left to celebrate was dwindling. Though he has no plans to retire and I consider him sprightly, I was disturbed by the reality that one day it would be his tomb I’d be visiting.
As we retraced our steps through the station atop Nihondaira and made our way back to the familiar lace covered seats of a taxi, his breathing gradually calmed. I continued to juggle countless emotions simultaneously: stirred by the stillness and beauty of Kunōzan, grateful for the glimmers of kinship between us, overwhelmed by the lingering sense of guilt and loss.
I did what seemed most appropriate in Japan, what Papa and Ieyasu might have done. I swallowed these feelings and feigned a calm demeanor as I watched the verdure blur outside my window.