https://otter.ai/u/ZyNGtar-Ox6EIi9Ifs8sLNr4IzE

Okay, now here’s part two of the TJ bike story. I left the passenger center was recommended to go on the north side of Biwako, the largest lake in Japan. And I went to Amanohashidate that day, which, wow, that’s amazing that came out in the transcription that they said was like the third most beautiful place to see in Japan. I went as I am, it’s okay. I definitely wouldn’t have put it in the top three, but it stands out in the story because they had built it up so much as like, okay, it’s a hill overlooking the city, but then the dragons need to turn your head upside down and dragons tail maybe it’s good for kids, but I was like, Yeah, whatever. Maybe just so frickin tired. ride my bicycle all around.

Had I gone via train, maybe be different, but it was okay. The cool thing about this part of the country is there not many trains and while it was spread out I was again on my own free time do whatever I want. I had a train a train went by. It was only to train cars as I Oh, wow. I’m going to take a picture of that. So I waited until the next train and waited and waited and waited. And a woman was like what you’re doing because she went home and came back or whatever she went by you like “what you’re doing?”, like “waiting for the train.” She’s like, “the next train is not going to be for another 45 minutes.” I said, “Oh, really? hmmm, well, that’s okay. I’ll just wait.” And she’s like, “okay,” and so she went, apparently home,

She came back with some big ass strawberries. Like they were enormous like, like five strawberries had barely fit into a pint container. “Wow, thank you so much!” And I just like eat these strawberries with my hands. I’ll read from the juice everywhere is so so great. And delicious. thanked her never you know, exchange information with all over again. But nice little gift.

Thank you Ms Strawberry! And the train came by after loud I took a picture.

I have no idea where that picture is. Oh, I do know that picture is that’s interesting. That’s a different story. are a hard drive and magic smoke oh gosh that’s so frustrating. So you Yeah. Brain brain come back.

So dry riding my bicycle around to the topic of the coast and came back. Have no idea where I was except new kind of I know that city I just mentioned, and north of Biwako but again, we didn’t. I didn’t have Google phone or no GPS running around tracking me. And I don’t remember really writing much in my map book at that time. Thing and look for that. But I got down to I think Nagoya. Yeah, that’s right. And saw my friend Karen, who I had met on peace boat. And she basically, Karen put me up for a few days. But then, like, turns out she was like putting up with me for about a week and she’s like, “Yo, Rob, you gotta go.” And I was like, “holy shit. I’m sorry. You’re right.” I was just being in there and using the internet at the university a lot. But you know, she she didn’t know she was single and just want to travel in space and so i i left and from Nagoya I saw a city on the map called Toyota.

I think it was intrigued by the car company name and the city name and made my way down to Hakone and up and down some starting to get hilly again. Got to Hakone and there’s the next day was scheduled to eat lunch with now I just summarized like five days, I think in two seconds here.

The next day was scheduled to eat lunch with my friend whose name I forgotten in Odawara, and the map book said it was a straight shot from Hakone to Odawara. So cool. I want to get there quick because I’m tired. And the though the map said the road was straight. The road said the road was curvy. What a mean is the scale on the map couldn’t possibly show how curvy this road was. It just like basically straight but was hella curvy and reality. And I went on the first curve and bike bike TJ bike being overloaded brakes were tired. I was tired. I went off the road and kind of into the the soft mud embankment. And, you know, like, you’re kind of thrown into the soft dirt embankment. And was all “Oh, better be careful.” But apparently I wasn’t careful. And that in that moment, I mean, that was the new the guidance from from God being like, “Hey, man, don’t go down this hill.” But I persevered. I said “alright next time if it happens again. I’ll stop.” However, next time. It wasn’t a soft mud embankment; it was a car and I was on his side of the road. In Japan, traffic circulates on the left. The curves were so curvy and the bike was so overweighted that I went into the right hand side of the road and the car was coming up and I was like oh shit. And yeah, I pulled back toward the left but didn’t quite make it and I hit the very back edge of the car. It pushed me down sideways to the left. And like boom, onto the pavement or asphalt and that was it. I was like “huh, I had a wreck.” I lifted up my bike, put it on the side of the road. My heavy ass bike that I picked up. On the side of the road I sat down said “why does my shoulder hurt?” Putting my right hand on my left shoulder is like, “oh, that’s the wrong shape for my shoulder.” My left clavicle was broken. and I was like “welp…” And I looked up at the trees and looked up at the weather. I said “today is a beautiful day to break my shoulder.” Even though it had been like a couple of weeks, since I left the Vipassana meditation center. I still had the meditation vibe in my in my being and I was still meditating, like up to an hour each morning. And I can’t say that I did meditate that morning. I have no memory of that. But I but I remember telling the story is like because I had done Vipassana. Even though I broke my shoulder, I was aware of the situation around me. Say “huh today’s a nice day to break my shoulder.” Beautiful whether checking the rest of my body is like like nothing else is hurt. There is no pain anywhere else my there is no yours and nose or everything’s all working fine. It’s just my shoulder say okay. And

just so, so grateful for having done the meditative experience that allowed me to have this presence of mind just after experiencing a broken shoulder. The car stopped called 911 I free up the numbers here and 110 Maybe 119 That’s it. 110 is for police 119 is for is for ambulance. Ambulance came police came ambulance took me to the hospital. Police took my bicycle to the police station down in order water and hospital was just up the hill at a clinic. And the doctor was like well, you need surgery but we can’t do it here. We’re not outfit for the kind of surgery that you need. And a woman overheard the situation and me stumbling through the Japanese. She’s like, Do you need help? Yeah, that would be fantastic. She’s speaking in English her her mom was there at the clinic from I think she’d said she got like basically flush from too much heat and not enough water while running around Hakone. So once they got all sorted out, they drove me down to down the hill safely to the train station. And I don’t remember which back maybe I just took my laptop bag or something but I couldn’t have cared on both shoulders. I don’t I don’t I have no idea but I believe I would have kept my laptop. But they took me down to the train station. Made sure I got on the right train the romance car to Shinjuku. We had they took me to lunch at a like Jonathan’s or something I think some family restaurant is telling there or a cafe have no idea so long ago. And she this this bilingual woman and I met for lunch once later like a month. Later or something after had my surgery and everything and just like grateful to her like Yeah, so the angels appeared as I was in a time of time of need help me get onto the train to Shinjuku Station. My friend, Jesse’s roommate, Mike came and met me at the station and took me down to his place which was no no, we went to hospitals in the evening and everyone was like, nope, nope, nope, get out of here. And it was very frustrating, but ended up in the hospital near Sakura-shinmachi.
Yeah, so that was the end of my TJ bike trip. And I’ll talk about the surgery. After that. Short answer is that surgery went well, but just took a few days for the surgery to be scheduled.