Shigakogen (1 of 2)

I just arrived back in Kyoto after a three week winter break in Shigakogen, which sits in the northeastern corner of Nagano prefecture. I'll try to make the recapitulation short. Before I had any concrete plans for the break, I knew I wanted to spend it skiing somewhere. This, I soon realized, would be an enormously expensive vacation if I simply spent my time skiing, and an enormously lonely vacation if I did it alone. So, I asked around to see if anyone wanted to join me, and thankfully I found that my friend Alan had similar plans. Thus, we began formulating ideas about how to go about skiing in the most cost-effective manner.

It turned out that Alan's ex-hostmother from Tokyo often spends time in Shigakogen, and she kindly offered to write us a recommendation for a position at the Swiss Inn, the hotel that she frequents. It was this connection that got things moving, and ultimately we were offered jobs that included a place to stay, meals, and free ski tickets.

Alan left a few days before I did, as I had a Christmas party to attend. By a 9-hr overnight bus, I arrived at the Swiss Inn of Shigakogen on Christmas Eve morning and had the day to take in the hotel and the immediate surroundings. At first glance, things didn't seem overly unbearable. We were given a relatively large room to stay in, although it was thoroughly soaked in years of cigarette smoke (thank you Febreze), and our employers were very friendly. From his two-day work experience, Alan helped me get accustomed to the environment.

However, over the course of 5 days, the real work environment was revealed to us. I don't want to harp on it too much, but just to give you an idea of what the life was like I'll add some detail. With the exception of Christmas Eve and Christmas day when Christmas music was piped through the entire hotel including our room (which we weren't able to turn down or off), Swiss jodelling music would permeate every nook and cranny of our day. Afterall, it is the Swiss Inn, but you'd be amazed at what one can get used to. The staff would smoke throughout the day, around the prepared food, and even while preparing food. And when you've worked for hours without a break, while the majority of the staff are sitting around smoking and talking, it gets on one's nerves. But it wasn't the discrepancy of work. Perhaps it was the work hours which started at a meager 9.5 hours and by the 4th day had reached 13 hours, and would have most likely increased had we not taken emergency actions.

On my third day there, after the morning's 6 hours of work, Alan and I decided to take advantage of the free ski tickets (which turned out to only be valid for 2 lifts). By this time, I had almost already reached my breaking point from the work, so I had begun to think about alternate options. Ski rescue, avalanche rescue, and the related emergency mountain-related procedures came to mind. Thus, I decided to take this opportunity out of Swiss Inn to visit the Shigakogen ski patrol office to enquire about possible classes. I knocked on the patrol office and was confronted by two patrol officers, and through my broken Japanese, I related my aforementioned interests. They looked startled and confused and pointed me into the administrative office. This time to a higher official, I once again tried to explain my interest in these classes, only to hear that there were no such courses offered in the entire area. I was crestfallen. But, to my surprise, right there and then I was offered a job on the ski patrol, without a single question about my skiing ability. I didn't really know if I should accept it or not since I didn't want to abandon Alan, and at that time I still had a feeling of obligation toward the Swiss Inn. But as things went from bad to horrible at the hotel, I finally decided to take the job. And by that point, the previously hesitant Alan had also been convinced of the impossibility to continue the work at the Swiss Inn. Our last day at the hotel, I brought Alan to see the patrol and they also offered him a job, as a liftman. With everything in place for a clean departure, we packed our bags and walked out the door of the Swiss Inn into the sun-blanketed field of white snow leading to the dorm of our next employer...

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