A meizanologist's diary (107)

New Year’s Day: Akemashite omedeto gozaimasu – the Year of the Horse has dawned, so congratulations to all who read this blog. Although, it has to be admitted, it’s far from clear whether it has dawned at all in the Sensei’s hometown this morning. Rain and sleet scatter down from lowering clouds all through breakfast, so that it takes a warm bowl of home-made o-zōni, accompanied by oddments of osechi ryori from a supermarket, all washed down with a fine blend of Swiss-roasted coffee and chicory, before we can steel ourselves to attempt a mountain hatsumōde – the first shrine visit of the year.

For any local meizanologist, the destination has to be Monju, a mountain that musters just one metre of altitude for each day of the year. But height isn’t everything: “It rises as if floating in the surrounding plains, possessing a presence that exceeds its elevation,” says YamaKei, a bit hopefully. 

Even if it doesn't float very far above the plain, Monju has a backstory that extends a fair way into the past. Not only was it opened in the first year of Yōrō (717) by the mountain mystic Taichō – who made the first recorded ascent of Hakusan in the same year – but, some twelve centuries later, the Hyakumeizan author and his friends inscribed their names on its summit shrine. And, as any classical mountain should in this part of the world, it disposes of three distinct summits.  

It's still drizzling when we park the car. Bear bell a-jingling, the Sensei lights out at a blistering pace – presumably to get out from under the dripping cryptomerias – and we take the variation route across Monju’s north flank. This path is slightly less crowded than the normal route. By the time we emerge beside a pavilion dedicated to the Kannon (this being a very ecumenical mountain), the drizzle has turned to wet snow that limns every branch and bough.

Traditionally, a monk from a nearby temple attends the summit shrine on New Year's Day (as I said, few mountains are as ecumenical as this one), handing out “eto” – miniature votive animals – on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. As he usually runs out by the time we get here, we avoid importuning him to prevent embarrassment. 

But, no matter, on the way down, we drop in at a viewpoint just as the sun starts to peek between the clouds. And then a stray ray of light picks out a lifelike “eto” that somebody has scooped out of the snow and left recumbent on a picnic table. So our new year starts with a horse after all, even if it looks a bit like a cow.