A drive trip to Mt. Nasu

It was a very fine and crisp day yesterday. I could not resist to drive to a place where I had wanted to go for some time. It is a highland area close to Mt. Nasu. My sister and her husband have spent their honeymoon years over there. The brother in law is a vet doctor and has started his career there.

This is a photo in their honeymoon days.

It was the time when I prepared for the entrance exam for med school that I asked them to let me stay there for a few weeks in a summer. No prep school in the summer and it was tough for me to spend days diligently studying for the exam in muggy Tokyo. They have kindly accepted me there. One night, I was on the side seat of brother in law's car heading from Tokyo to that place.

It was almost half a century ago! Everything has changed. I could recognize some steep slopes or some views over to the plain area below. There were a few amusement parks or zoos in this area in addition to villas constructed since the days when I visited there for the first time.

The streets were paved. Being on a plain week day, there was small amount of traffic there. Even at the restaurant and souvenir shop area, I could find only few people.

This is a view toward the Mt. Nasu, an active volcano, with a skirt spreading to the east, which must has been formed with lava flow ages ago. This highland is the skirt of Mt. Nasu. It used to be developed as diary farms by certain farmers. My borther in law used to work for them in those years. There were still diary farms in this area, which didn't seem to be very active. Most workers seemed to be old people, even though I could see only few of them there. I could not see any cows grazed in the field. I don't know if it was the season when cows were not grazed.

This could be the street where I took walk in late afternoon after studying hard in the daytime. Of course, it was not paved and was rich with weeds thosedays. 

The vast plain area was seen below toward the east. However, I could never recall such a view in the summer I stayed there. It is so impressive that I could never forget it if I had seen that those days. It is more likely I was just stepping ahead looking at own feet. I could not see and enjoy the view, possibly. I was so serious for I could never go on preparing for the exam next year. Our family was not wealthy at all and my younger brother was going to a university in a year or two. I was smiling wryly at myself imagining myself walking looking down at feet those days.

I have made much effort to break the path to be a doctor by myself. I still remember, without my family's supports, it was not possible. What a trouble it was for my sister and her husband to have me staying at their home in honeymoon those days! I could least imagine of that until recently. My parents should be pleased to have me finishing a college but let me go to another university after this preparation period. No complaint at all. But they have really helped me. When I took a night train from Tokyo to go for an exam of a university far away, my father used to come to see me at the platform of Tokyo station. What a sweet father he was! I again learned their supports and helps have made me what I am right now.  

Driving through this area, I was thinking of those things. I was full of gratitude toward them again.

Cluster amaryllis was coming out at  a roadside. It has been too hot and they are coming out late by a couple of weeks.