When Cain exited the bus, he took a deep breath. The cool, crisp mountain air felt good in his lungs. He looked around and took notice of the sights and sounds. The wind rustled the leaves of the trees, and birds chirped nearby. Nature is better experienced in the now anyway, he thought, instead of trying to capture it on film. He turned to Umiko, but she spoke first.
“It’s so beautiful here,” she whispered, emitting steam with her breath.
“Amen,” Cain said, getting into the spiritual mood. “Far from the distractions of city life.”
She pointed. “That’s Mount Fuji.”
“Where’s it at?” he asked.
She pointed again. “Over there. You can see people in the distance hiking.”
He snickered. “That was a joke. You normally get my humor.”
She smiled and looked relieved for a second.
“We ain’t hiking, are we?” he asked. “I didn’t bring my hiking boots.”
“Not this trip. This retreat is for intense kendo training and meditation.”
“I’ve never meditated before. Not sure how to,” Cain confessed.
“This whole trip has been prepared to create the perfect environment for meditation. It will help us see things as they are, and not how we wish.”
A large bell that hung in the center of the Zen retreat rang as two monks hit it with a large mallet. The sound echoed throughout the wilderness, and for a moment all the birds quit chirping. It’s as if even the birds respect the importance of this event, Cain thought.
“It begins,” Umiko said as if she was expecting a life-changing event at the retreat. “The monks are scaring away evil spirits with the bell.”
The students took off their shoes and lined up on tatami mats, which would “make kneeling more comfortable during meditation,” Umiko told Cain.
The monks walked down the line of students while holding a large bag. Students were directed to put their cell phones in the bag.
“When do we get our phones back?” Cain asked.
“When we leave,” Umiko answered.
“Hopefully Sato-san won’t need me,” Cain said.
“You have trained Tanaka-san well,” Umiko said. “Your confidence in him is important.”
Cain dropped his phone in the bag, and one of the monks provided him with a white uniform that resembled pajamas. The monks also handed each student a pair of flip-flops.
“Thank you,” Cain said, “but I brought my own. You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to find a size twelve in this country.”
Some of the students laughed at Cain’s joke, especially Hiroko.
“I almost forgot,” Umiko said as she faced Cain. “I brought something to help you. I have jinko incense candles. They will help your meditation.”
Cain took the candles and sniffed them. “They smell like wood.”
“We’ll use them later, during meditation. But they are going to exercise us for a few hours first.”
“For a few hours?” Cain asked, hoping he had misunderstood. “I thought this was a Zen retreat. A place to relax.”
“The monks will make us tired first. It’s easier for the mind to meditate when the body is tired.”
The sensei called the class to attention, then announced rei—the command to bow. He led the group through a series of stretches for about twenty minutes. Then they did jumping jacks, push-ups, sit-ups, and forward rolls similar to somersaults, and they jogged in place to increase their heart rate and breathing.
The sensei said something in Japanese and then looked at Cain. “Ready for kendo now,” he said in English.
“Hai,” Cain replied between labored breaths, and bowed.
The students picked up their shinai, and for the next two hours practiced their kendo footwork, strikes, and thrusts. Cain’s cotton uniform felt heavy from his sweat. When he started to think that the grueling training would never end, the sensei finally yelled, “Matte,” indicating for them to stop.
Thank God, Cain thought. I couldn’t go anymore. He looked over at Umiko and was impressed by her stamina. Well, she’s younger, he reasoned. And she’s been training in kendo much longer than me.
The sensei looked at Cain and spoke in Japanese. Umiko translated. “He said you are very good—that you must have trained in some type of martial art before in order to have kept up with us.”
Cain smiled. “I had a lot of baton training in the Secret Service. Some of the techniques are similar, just with a shorter weapon.”
The sensei continued speaking, and Umiko translated again. “Now we will put the shinai away and work on holding our positions and strengthening our concentration.”
The sensei ordered the students to squat into a kiba dachi stance, which made them look as if they were riding