Tetsuo Kobori



My Spot

My Spot, Winter Kitakama Ridge

“Harmonization of Spirit, Mind and Body is what a human being should be” said mountaineer Reinhold Messner.
“Survival is adventure” said Tsuneo Hasegawa.

On the following day of when Hasegawa got lost in UltarⅡ and came to know Messner’s words, I headed to Northern Alps.I directed myself from Kamikochi to Mount Yarigatake, then arrived at Karasawa in the night.
After getting some water from mountain guards, I pitched a tent in scree, then I saw countless stars made up milky ways and shooting stars in the heavens. Wind was blowing harshly, I went in my tent, lighted a lantern, then relief and warmth had me fall asleep instantly.

In the next morning I went to Northern Hodaka, and it was after two days that I arrived at Mount Yarigatake with going through the deadly Daikiretto Ridge in the midst of Typhoon. Overwhelmed by the view of sky and transformation of the beam of clouds, I felt a lump in my throat and just sank down. By that climbing I certainly became a part of nature and was bitten by the bug of experience of space filled with beam, wind and rocks. As my soul, intelligence and body were exposed to bare natural environment, I came to know clearly what survival means, the weakness of body as well as the sensation of inner calmness.

Later, I met a genius mountaineer D, he taught me the stance of examining things deeply, and steep winter Kitakama Ridge route. Loved Kitakama to the end, D is still sleeping somewhere in Kitakama which he loved the most saying “leave me alone”.

This photograph was taken from a spot height when I climbed Kitakama, I took a lot of photographs aiming to capture the space of complete silence caused by tensed white snow, where the beam was varying constantly.

Now I am estranged from winter mountains, but suddenly the memory with mountaineer D and the atmosphere I felt in Kitakama in that winter crowded in on me when I was privileged to write this essay.

The daybreak from ebony to dark blue, my heart was leaping up “Oh, this could be so called space, thank you D”