Clean-up & hiking event at Goten-yama
Been spending a considerable amount of time and energy engaging myself in beach cleaning activities since last year.
In July 2020, had the good fortune to meet with some nice folks at a cleaning event at Kamano Beach, about a kilometer from my house.
It was the first such event for me, and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. The second event two months later at another beach saw myself offering to help in the organizing of future events.
Without much of a realization, I became a member of an extraordinary team comprising of four individuals, all with diverse backgrounds.
The leader is a division chief of a major electronic corporation while the sub-leader is a retired senior public servant affiliated to the city office. The third member has a strong background in NGO affairs, and yours truly, a university man.
The last few months had been an amazing experience coordinating with these three wonderful individuals. Our strengths, coming from different backgrounds, seem to fuse perfectly, as we cover up for each other’s weaker areas. We call ourselves the ‘LOVE’ Team, as some years back, Aji Peninsula (where we base our events on) was the location for a hit movie called ‘Crying out for love from the center of the world’ (my translation).
Our latest (5th) engagement was held on 18th July (Sun), at Gotenyama Beach, site of an abandoned holiday home for one of Takamatsu’s diamyos during the samurai era.
About 36 people joined our event, including three international students from KUFSA (Kagawa University Foreign Student Association) and four Japanese students from ICES (Inter-Cultural Exchange Society). There were families with little kids, senior citizens, couples too.
Being the (abandoned) site of a holiday home, the views are simply marvellous.
As in all our beach cleaning events, we separated the participants into four groups: L, O, V, and E. We spent about half an hour or more cleaning up the beach, and rested for a while. All the participants received a packet of ‘shirasu onigiri’ (rice balls filled with little white fish), compliments from our team leader. This little white fish is a delicacy of Aji.
We were ready for Part Two of the event, that is, a hike up the hills overlooking the beautiful ‘Seto Naikai’ (Seto Inland Sea). Our team had prepared ourselves to be ‘tour guides’, taking turns to explain to the participants the islands, the history, the fishing industry, and the forests. I had the honor of speaking on the ‘Ubamegashi’, a type of extremely hard oak tree that grows well along rocky coastal terrain. When my other team-mates were doing the explanation, I played my Shakuhachi as accompanying BGM (back ground music).
We stationed ourselves at a rest area with spectacular views and chewed on our onigiris. We slowly started to descend, and wow, even I was surprised that watermelons were waiting for us at the final assembly area.
Upon reflection, I must say that this had turned out to be a most exhilirating experience that was full of joy, laughter, musings, and oh, so much fun making new friends and chatting with old ones. Many participants almost instantly reported in their SNS pages, and from the look of it, I believe they had enjoyed the event as much as I did.
We are now on track to plan the 6th event…
Photo credits: Tadasuke Yoshioka, Mao Takahashi, Lrong Lim
Kedahan-Malaysian @ Japan 
What a wonderful group and experience. I hope you have many more events in the future.
Good afternoon from Japan… Thank you very much for your kind comments!
Yes, there will probably be more of these events coming my way…