North America Guitar Tour - spin off

To Germany

July 24, 2008

On this day, I entered Germany by train. I couldn't use the Internet at the guesthouse in Chesham, so with my cell phone not working, I absolutely had to get to Cologne by the time I had told them about when I was in Japan. There was a little leeway in the two transfers (London and Brussels) but if I missed either one, it was all over.

I woke up to the sound of my alarm at 5am, took a shower and went downstairs at 6am with my luggage. The owner of the guesthouse was still asleep. As I had been told the night before, I put my key on the shelf at the entrance, bowed and went outside. It was a peaceful morning. I had heard that UK was not as punctual as Japan, but the taxi arrived almost on time and I arrived at the station in about 10 minutes. This time I properly purchased a ticket to central London and passed through the ticket gate, and there were quite a few commuters on the platform. I feel a bit embarrassed to carry my luggage on the train, but this is not the time to be shy. Fortunately, it was still early, so the train wasn't too crowded and my luggage wasn't a nuisance. I arrived at Marylebone station on time, and took a taxi to St. Pancras station, where the Eurostar departs. I could have taken the subway, but Mr. K. advised me that it would be better to take a taxi since it was rush hour. The driver was quite unfriendly, and when I was confused and couldn't count the coins when paying, he grabbed a bunch of coins from my palm and threw them back to me, saying "That's the change" which annoyed me a little, but this is not the time to argue.

St. Pancras station was quite a large station. First, I went to a place that looked like a Midori no Mado (customer service specializing reserved seat in many Japanese train station) in Japan to buy a Eurostar ticket to Brussels. It was a calm space like a hotel front desk. When I told them I wanted a ticket for the Eurostar train leaving at the scheduled time, they said that it was basically unreserved seating, but if it was a green seat, I could reserve a seat. I decided to splurge on this one to celebrate the success of my concert in Chesham. I also wanted to avoid having to stand all the way to Brussels.

The train was built like the old dining cars in Japan, with some seats around a table, and some single seats with a table in front. My seat was like a box seat with two seats facing each other across a table. There was no one next to me or across from me. There was an outlet on the leg of the table, so I plugged in the adapter and started up my MacBook, and it caught the Wi-Fi signal. I immediately checked my email and started browsing the internet, but as soon as the train departed, the signal gradually weakened and eventually cut out. It seems that the service was only available inside the station. However, I received an email from Mr. B, who I was supposed to meet in Cologne, Germany at 3pm that day, saying, "When you arrive in Cologne, follow the pink arrow as a guide," so I was relieved to know that I would be able to meet him as long as I made the right connection. In the photo, he looked like a rather stern-looking man, so I couldn't help but smile when I imagined him writing and placing pink arrows in the aisle.

Looking inside the car from the window, I saw a Jean Reno-like man sitting in a single seat across the aisle from me, who kept looking toward the toilet, and when our eyes met, he made a gesture of smoking. It seemed like he was trying to take a break in the toilet when the crew was not around. After talking for a bit, I learned that he runs a company in the Netherlands and was on his way back from a business trip to the UK. The Netherlands is located northeast from Brussels, so it must have been like a business trip from Tokyo to Hiroshima. When I told him that there are smoking cars on Japanese Shinkansen trains, he said that he had to go to Japan. In the UK, perhaps because of the warnings about fines posted everywhere, or perhaps because of the national character, there were no people smoking in the non-smoking areas, but judging from this person's vibe, it seems that this is not necessarily the case in other countries.

In the end, while talking to the Jean Reno-like Dutchman, the train arrived in Brussels. He had a cigarette in his hand the whole time. Since I had about an hour to spare before my transfer in Brussels, I first went to the ticket counter to reserve a ticket for the train to Cologne. From here, the Eurorail Pass can be used. When I showed the pass to the ticket counter and told them I wanted to go to Cologne, they wrote something on the pass so that I could take the train I had looked up beforehand. After checking the platform number, I left the station and sat down on a bench there. Then, I heard some kind of sound of running water, so I looked over and saw that someone sitting at the opposite end of the bench had wet himself. What a welcome. I can't really talk about a city after only an hour's stay, but at least my first time in Brussels was very real.

I got on the train that was parked at the platform I had confirmed about 10 minutes before departure time, and confirmed with a person who seemed to be a crew member that the train was going to Cologne. I couldn't buy a cheap pass because of age restrictions, but it seems my pass was for First Class, and I was shown to a carriage with spacious single seats scattered here and there, like a hotel lobby. It was much more luxurious than the Eurostar I had just taken. Perhaps because I felt relieved that I had boarded the train as scheduled, I began to doze off while looking at the scenery, and when I woke up, I was already in Germany. I opened the Thomas Cook timetable I had bought at Narita, and every time I passed a station I would check the pea-sized letters with a magnifying glass, but German words contain an unusually large number of letters, so I had a hard time getting an image of the name just by looking at it. Moreover, unlike in Japan, the names of station before and after the current station are not written, and the station names themselves are posted so inconspicuously that you can miss them if you're not careful.

I arrived in Cologne safely at the appointed time, and first went down the stairs nearby. However, I couldn't find any pink arrows anywhere. When I went down the stairs and looked around, the only thing I saw was a pink arrow pointing to Burger King, but that would mean I would end up going into Burger King. I looked inside the store, but there was no one I recognized. I went outside to check it out from the outside, and the sight I saw there was so sudden that it was impossible in Japanese common sense. The famous cathedral is right in front of the station. In fact, it would be better to say that the station is in the square in front of the cathedral. For example, it feels like the station is in the grounds of Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine in Kamakura. I was mesmerized for a while by the grandeur of the building towering against the clear blue sky. When I came to my senses and looked toward the station, I saw a much larger entrance than the one I had been out from, closer to the cathedral. In terms of Japanese stations, I came out from the south or north exit, not the central exit. Mr. B must have assumed that I would come from the central exit. When I entered the central exit from outside, I saw him with his back to me and looking around the station. I felt relieved that I had come this far. I quietly approached him and poked his back with my finger. He turned around in surprise and his face changed from anxious to smiling. We had only seen each other in photos (in my case, videos on YouTube), so I was searching for him, thinking that I was the only Asian person with a guitar at that time of day, and by chance there was another person there. He seemed worried because he hadn't come out even after a while after the train arrived. I kept it a secret that I had taken photos of the cathedral and was stunned by the cathedral.

The three of us, including Mr. H, Mr. B's guitar teacher who came with him, left the station and first greeted each other while drinking coffee at an open cafe in the station square. We had exchanged messages on YouTube and spoken on Skype several times, but it was our first time meeting in person, so we were both a little shy. In this respect, I felt that they were a little similar to Japanese people. As I talked about the successful live performance in the UK, we gradually became more comfortable with each other, and Mr. H, who was quiet at first, gradually began to talk. For the time being, we decided to visit the cathedral towering before us, so after putting my luggage in Mr. B's car, which was parked in a nearby parking lot, we went inside the cathedral. Once inside, it was a genuine cathedral, and in the back there was an area separated by a rope, where everyone was sitting on benches and making the sign of the cross enthusiastically. Mr. B and Mr. H occasionally explained, "This is...", but they seemed busy taking photos. It had been more than 10 years since both of them had been to Cologne. The city of Lemgo where they live is closer to Hannover, so I somehow understood why they stubbornly refused my suggestion to go there by train and made Cologne the meeting place.

After touring the cathedral, we set off for Lemgo. According to Mr. B, it was about two hours from Cologne, but it was only assuming that we were driving at 200km/h on the Autobahn non-stop, which has no speed limit. Sometimes there are traffic jams in areas with fewer lanes due to construction, but as soon as we get out of there, we accelerate to 200km/h. Everyone drives fast!. I realized that the reason why Mercedes has such good acceleration is because of this need. I was surprised to see cars quickly passing us as we were driving at 200km/h. Many of the trucks that passed us were also Mercedes.

After a long drive, we left the autobahn and finally entered the town of Lemgo. It is a clean town with a mix of medieval and modern buildings. Mr. B's house, the house where I will be staying during my stay in Lemgo, was a little up a hill from the town. When I arrived, his wife greeted me at the front door. The entire first floor was prepared for me, and my bed was in the middle of the spacious living room. He said that he rarely uses the living room because he eats on the third floor. I was supposed to stay here for two nights, but there were five or six 2-liter (maybe even bigger) plastic bottles lined up on the table for his personal use. After putting my luggage down, I went up to the third floor and found an attic room about one-third the size of the living room I was using. In the center was Mr. B's prized Lakewood guitar leaning against the wall, and on the music stand next to it was the sheet music of "The Boxer," which I had arranged. Mr. H had apparently transcribed it. At this point, I had not yet written the music, so it was strange to see it on the other side of the world. In a Skype conversation, I pointed out that there was a mistake in a video of a Korean boy named Mr. S playing my "All You Need Is Love" arrangement, and I showed to him using Lakewood how it should be played. I was the original in terms of arrangement, and that it was Mr. S who was not. He looked a little unconvinced, but the point is that people tend to assume that what they first hear is correct (this boy has had millions of times more views). I didn't think that S's music was wrong, and I simply accepted that he had interpreted it differently when he transcribed it, so I don't intend to compete with him, but I have to tell him the circumstances.

I was told to get ready and wait outside for dinner. The restaurant was at further up the hill. From the outside, B's house was pretty big. The German flag was hanging on the balcony on the second floor. I was encouraged to get into the Mercedes that had come from Cologne, and his wife got into the Mini Cooper parked next to it. As we started to drive, he told me that his wife had been asking for that car for a long time, and that it was a gift for her birthday last year. However, he said that he wouldn't ride in it himself because the interior was too small. It's true that the Mini Cooper might be a bit cramped for Mr. B, who is a big man. Also, a few days ago, he forgot to put on the handbrake, so the car went down a slope and hit a tree, damaging it, and the car he was currently riding in was a temporal replacement, and he wanted to stop by the place where he had left his broken car before heading to the restaurant. He also showed me the town of Lemgo. It was a very beautiful town even through car window.

The restaurant had tables lined up not only inside the building but also in the garden, and when we arrived, the inside was mostly empty, but about half of the outside was filled. It was already past 8 o'clock, but the sun was still out and it felt like evening. Mr. H and his wife were there too. At first, I was a little nervous because of the fatigue from the long journey and the situation of being surrounded by Germans, but I gradually relaxed as we talked and drank cocktails. After dinner, we went to Mr. H's house and talked about various things while playing the guitar on the balcony. After 10 o'clock, it was completely dark and the temperature dropped sharply. From Japan, where tropical nights have continued day after day, it feels like a summer resort here, but the coldness that makes you shiver makes you feel lonely, as if summer has ended. The gathering ended around 12 o'clock, and Mr. B and I returned to the house, and I went to the living room and he went upstairs. Thus ended my first day in Germany. It was my first time to talk to a German person like this, but I thought that they have a similar temperament to Japanese people, such as being a little timid.

*The people mentioned in the text are written with their initials until their identities can be confirmed.

Chesham • Supporter's Area • Lemgo

Contents

Introduction
Until Departure
Seattle
To California
Day Off
Sunnyvale
To La
LA 2 Days
To Tucson
Albuquerque
To Colorado (beginning of Miracle)
Berthoud
Denver
to Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City 2 days
To Texas
San Antonio
Georgetown
Dallas
Houston 2 Days
Benton
Nashville (CAAS)
Roswell
Tampa 2 Days
Miami
Orland 2 Days
Myrtle Beach
Chapel Hill 3 Days
Kingsport
To Indiana
Indiana State Fingerstyle Guitar Festival
To Staten Island
Manhattan
Phillipsburg
Nazareth (Martin Guitar Factory)
To Massachusetts (end of Miracle)
Methuen
To Montreal
To Buffalo
Meadvill A Day Before
Meadvill Ghost Hotel
Detroit
Chicago
Minneapolice
Spin Off #1
Spin Off #2 "EU Tour IN 2008 / Until Departure
Czech 1
Czech 2
London
Liverpool
Chesham
To Germany
Lemgo
Ingolstadt
Bregenz
To Italy
Florence
The Last Gig
Going Home