[MMM]

I am not trying to attack you, I am just saying something about the story sounds funny and why. Please don't take my comments personally. You have to admit, you are telling a ghost story, essentially, so you have to understand people are going to be suspicious and doubtful. Don't be offended. That being said, I will respond to your response.

Originally Posted by tangomike

lol dude really? do you really want me to describe what the ryokan master lady looked like, what color her clothes were, and how should I know how many and where they were.

I did not ask you to describe the innkeeper's clothes. I am just trying to paint a realistic picture, and in my experience, the local ryokan is not the hangout for the local townpeople. Were there three people? Thirty people? And you were the one talking to them. Were they in your room? In the lobby? Standing outside? I am having a hard time seeing your story in my head.

Originally Posted by tangomike

DO you remember the number of people that walk into your place of employment last week? What color tie your boss worr last Monday? I'm a decent writer this is like a summary, so sounding like a story is exactly what i wanted it to sound like.

If you intended to make it sound like a "story" than I think you did a good job. So you can understand why at least I think it sounds just like that: a story.

Originally Posted by tangomike

if you want an in depth book about everything i'm not willing to put in every little description on how many left turns I took by a tree (and a through description of the tree) or the name of an obscure Jinja in a town i've never
even been to before?

I didn't ask for a turn by turn map of your path, but I don't think it is unrealistic to ask what the monk at the jinja said to you when you told him you talked to a monk in the forest. That seems like an important part of the story.

Originally Posted by tangomike

I dont know the people in the parking lot were probably going to go thru the forest on the official trail. i'm assuming theres always a ranger or two at the starting point of the trail. they were not a search party, just people there. The ranger probably got worried cus people were running out of a dense and random part of the woods. nobody except our parents back in America knew were there....and we didnt have cell phones in the forest so they couldnt have known.

So the monk didn't point you out to the path out, but through a dense part of the forest?

Originally Posted by tangomike

hah yeah im not going to lie. I'm afraid of ghost and the macabre, I lost a lot of man points to my girl that day..... I get into fist fights with people sometimes and dont take sh*t from anyone but I've always been afraid of ghosts and stuff like that.

So your girl thinks less of you for being afraid in the woods that day, but she was the one crying uncontrollably the whole time?

Originally Posted by tangomike

i dont get your race mixing question. Yes i am mixed ethnicities, i never said our parents had any problems with us together. It was the Japanese who ASSUMED that just by looking at us. As i wrote, i had to explain the situation a few times.

I don't want to get deep into this, but you keep talking like all Japanese assume you are a native Japanese, even after talking to you and you telling them you are from America, and I would say that sounds quite different from my experience. What I mean is, why would a Japanese assume there is a problem between two Americans dating each other?

Originally Posted by tangomike

the convo in the ryokan was with a teenager who worked there in the kitchen. she came out with us for a drink after she got off and was askin about what brought us to kawaguchiko. we just said we wanted to see the so called natural beauty of mt fuji and the surroundin area...she was worried about us because I guess she saw me looking really really depressed with my face in my hands at the inn. I had lost a considerable amount of cash somwhere between Kanamachi where my grandma lives and Kawaguichiko and noticed that when I got there. Thats why I entertained the idea of taking money from the wallet we found in the forest, as i would normally never touch something that belonged to dead person. Again as i said, if u wanted me to include every freakin detail like that this could be pages and pages long.

I guess if you want it to sound like a story, then that's fine. If you want it to sound convincing, then these details help.

Originally Posted by tangomike

Also there are always exits from anywhere theres an entrance LOL. all you need to do is point in a direction and eventually you wil emerge from a forest.

yeah i do give you the monk part though, he wasn't very teinei and he used informal speech. But then again, he lives in a suicide forest so hes probably not a normal person by any means. its not like all Christian pastors speak like, 'come here children of God, for thine has blessed us with is divine light blah blah blah". ive seen Pastors go to work on motor cycles or shred waves at the beach....so i dont seee why Buddhist monks would be an exception.

Because in his eyes, you would both be foreigners.

Originally Posted by tangomike

please ask me anything, id be happy to answer in depth if you want but like I said for the sake of clarity and story telling I cut it down. Honestly i dont think anybody on a forum wants to scroll through pages and pages of anything. I dont, I get really bored with it and most of the time dont even attempt to read really long and tedious pages of posts.

1) When did this happen?

2) Where are the pictures of you or your girlfriend in Kawaguchiko?