4:01:35

I don't know if you've heard (maybe you haven't), but I've been training for a marathon.

It's been a common refrain around these parts since my friend Prairie and I started training back in July. Four days a week we've gotten up (relatively) early, laced our shoes, and gone out for runs.

Training for it had dominated my life. I couldn't go out too late Friday nights because we had our long runs on Saturdays. I wouldn't go out too late Saturday nights because my legs were sore from running 10, 15, or 20 miles earlier. I would eat nearly everything in sight and then some. I hadn't eaten like that since high school when I'd come back from cross country practice, eat two bowls of cereal, and then two hours later eat a full dinner (with seconds).

Last Sunday, all our months of training, all our hard work, early mornings, and hung-over Saturday runs came to fruition. Prairie, Devon and I made our way up to Seoul for the 11^th annual JoongAng Seoul Marathon – which commemorates the marathon held at the Seoul Olympics in 1988. It was by far one of the biggest events I've ever been a part of: over 20,000 people were running in the 10k and full marathon races that weekend (with about half in each).

We arrived in Seoul Saturday night—Halloween for those of you keeping score at home. Before settling into our hotel and grabbing dinner, we went to the Olympic Stadium to find a place to meet after the race the next day. When we finally checked into our hotel, settled in, and set out to find dinner, it was after 10pm which unexpectedly was a problem.

Apparently, restaurants in Korea close promptly at 10. As we had a marathon the next day, we weren't exactly in the mood for drinking heavily, so we looked for a place that might serve us pasta. No dice. Every place was either closed, or closing. We couldn't even find a Korean fast food ramen place to get some noodles! We were hungry, tired, and cold. Then it started pouring.

Exhausted, we settled on the only place open at 10:45 at night: Burger King. Fast food didn't seem like the ideal pre-race food to me, so I got some ramen from the local corner store to supplement my fried chicken-paste sandwich, French fries and coke. We ate back at our hotel, watching a movie until after midnight, when we finally decided to get ready for bed.

Everything I've read about training for a marathon says you should do two things before race day: eat well, and get plenty of rest. I suppose French fries and a fried chicken-paste sandwich count somewhere as "well," but going to bed at 1 when you have to wake up at 6am can't be what they meant by "plenty of rest." I had dreams of myself puking as my legs gave out and I collapsed into chicken paste by the side of the road. Lovely.

Before the race - can you tell I'm really nervous?

The next morning we woke up, trudged out of our hotel, and took the subway to the stadium where the race began and finished. Forty five minutes later, Prairie and I were in the middle of a pack of 20,000 Koreans, and a couple hundred foreigners (mostly East Africans invited to try and win the race), being barked at by a Korean gentleman on a microphone.

The crowd all started stretching in unison. First the left arm, then the right arm. Now we bend left, now bend right. Then a giant massage line formed and someone behind me grabbed my shoulders and necks, and began to maul them with the expertise and dexterity of a master masseuse. In between brief spasms of pain, I could feel my muscles relaxing. I made a mental note to get a real massage after the race was over.

When the massage was over, I turned around to see who had manhandled me so expertly. "Thank you," I said to the man. "You're welcome," he said. "I hope you have a good run."

"Thank you. You too." I replied.

A few minutes later and the gun sounded, fireworks shot up from the starting line, and…nobody moved. I'd forgotten that getting a pack of 10,000+ runners take some time to get moving, so while the clock ticked on, we waited, occasionally moving forward with the current of people.

Almost four minutes later, we passed the starting line, and we were off! My first marathon had begun! My target time was to finish in under four hours, but I figured since it was my first race, I'd take it slow, and be extremely happy with 4:30 all the same.

15 kilometers in - feeling great!

I won't bore you with the details of the run (mostly because, at 42 kilometers and change, there's a lot of details, and more often than not, they involve me running). I will say that thankfully the Burger King and lack of sleep had little apparent effect on me – I felt great for most of the race.

The last 10k were…beautiful. I remember passing the sign that said there were only 10 kilometers in the race after running out and back along a dreary stretch of highway. I glanced at my watch and realized that I was running at a pretty steady pace—10 kilometers every hour or so—and that I had run the last 32k in just over 3 hours. If I kept that pace up, maybe I could finish in under four hours.

That realization was the jolt I needed. I picked up my heavy feet, and pressed on. Somewhere ahead, a band on the side of the road was playing "Superman" by Goldfinger – one of my favorite songs from high school. The rhythm of the guitars and drums carried me through the next two markers.

I'll never forget the feeling that hit me as I passed the 34^th kilometer. I was running uphill, still buoyed by adrenaline from the band a mile back, and it hit me.

A shiver went down my back. Eight kilometers was nothing – shorter than many of the easy runs Prairie and I had done in the summer! For the first time, I realized that I was actually going to finish the marathon.

From that point on, I pushed it to try and finish in under four hours. The kilometer markers passed by like road signs to Disneyland: 34km…35km. Each new marker gave me a new boost of energy. I was passing people left and right, people were cheering, eating, drinking on the side of the street. Eight kilometers left…seven left…

Then I panicked. What if I was wrong? What if a marathon was 47km, not 42? There I was kicking into my high gear, and I still had another hour left to run? I'd be exhausted. I wouldn't be able to finish. I'd be devastated. I was never that good with the metric system. I started trying to do the calculations in my head. Five kilometers is about 3 miles. A marathon is 26 miles that makes…how many kilometers?

Suddenly there were six left…a woman on the side of the road offered me a coke…no thanks I said, I'm almost done. I passed an ancient runner as he took a cup of rice wine from a buddy's hand. Not for me.

Five kilometers. Where my running career began. I had run this distance a million times in Cross country in high school. I'd run it in the swampy Connecticut summers, in the Parisian autumn rain, in frigid winter snow, and slick spring mud. Once, I ran it with a full-blown case of pneumonia. Now, there were a mere five thousand meters between me and the finish line. If I could finish in under 25 minutes, I could beat my goal.

Kilometers 38, 39, and 40 melted away like ice in a hot summer drink. Down the road, past Olympic statues, past cheering spectators, past Olympic park and around a bend: One Kilometer left – there's the stadium!

I'm sure I was moving pretty slowly, but I felt like I sprinted through the gate and up the hill. I saw Devon standing off to one side cheering me on, and felt a final surge of energy kick in. Through the gate, into Olympic Stadium and onto the track: less than 400 meters separated me from the finish.

Finishing: Can you tell I'm feeling great!

I was a bit torn – I was about to finish my first marathon in the Olympic Stadium. Do I savor these last few moments? It had been a great race, I was feeling incredible, and part of me didn't want it to end. But I had always been taught to finish a race with a kick – a full out sprint for the last 200m to push you past anyone in front of you.

In the end, the training won out: I finished with a kick (hard to believe I had anything extra in the tank), savoring every step I took around the track, and crossed the finish line with my hands held high. I looked at my watch:

4:01:35

Prairie finishing strong

Prairie finished half an hour after me, setting a new personal best by 45 minutes. Needless to say, we were both ecstatic about our times. I was so close to beating my goal I could taste it, and Prairie had crushed her previous time. Both of us left the stadium with our legs hurting so bad we could barely walk down stairs, but jubilant at what we had just accomplished.

Mother Nature Hates Me

Our second day in Tokyo began early. We had booked a bus tour to see Mt. Fuji, and the four of us were really excited to go. The tour included a bus up the mountain, a pleasure cruise on a lake at the base of the mountain, and a cable-car ride up an adjacent mountain for photo opportunities.

So at 8:30 we woke up, trudged out of our hotel and stumbled onto the subway, forgetting that it was still Friday, and still rush hour.

I don't know what kind of rush hour subway experiences you've had in the past, but I doubt they've involved being crammed into a subway car with 21,000 silent Japanese businessmen. Seriously – cans of sardines have made more noise and had more room than we did that morning. Leather hand straps dangled uselessly and silently from chrome bars, which was just as well since my arms were pinned to the suits on either side of me holding me up.

Now you might think that disembarking from such a crowded train car would be a challenge—far from it. Since we were getting off at a major transfer point, all you had to do was hold on firmly to your bag, and let the current sweep you out of the train and onto the platform like a deflating balloon. I don't even think anyone actually walked off the train—we were all just expelled from the difference in relative pressures or something.

We emerged from the subway, managed to board the bus that would take us to Mt. Fuji, and immediately hit a problem. Apparently Tokyo's super-futuristic silent highways still don't have an built-in accident prevention system, and in the morning rush, someone had an accident and blocked two lanes. Not to fear, our lovely tour guide assured us that our driver Mr. Akahira* was the best driver in all of Tokyo (that's a lot of drivers, mind you), and was taking us on a shortcut around the accident.

*(not his real name)

As our tour bus exited the city of Tokyo, our tour guide Mrs. Hiroko** regaled us with stories and legends of yore and yonder, teaching us a bit about Japanese culture all the while. For example, we learned that the Japanese believe that spirits inhabit everything around us: the rocks, rivers, trees, and fields. Particularly holy are the mountains, which due to their proximity to the gods, are much taller than regular lands (though I may have that backwards).

**(Actually her name)

Mt. Fuji, in particular is the domain of two goddesses: the beautiful flower princess (whose name escapes me at the moment and I won't even bother to try and fake) who controls the summit, and her ugly sister the rock princess, who controls the base of the mountain. Legend has it that the god of…farming was it??...saw the beautiful flower princess one day and decided to marry her. Her father, the king agreed on the condition that he marry the ugly daughter also. The god of farming agreed, but married only the flower princess anyways.

When the king heard this, he was as you can imagine, pretty annoyed. In fact, he banished the flower princess to the top of Mount Fuji and decreed that neither the god of farming nor any of his future descendants would be allowed to see her ever again.***

***Complete fabrication

Looking back, I suppose it would have been nice if Mrs. Hiroto had just told us this quaint legend upfront instead of an hour into our tour. The four of us could have asked for our money back, and everyone else on the bus would have had a nice trip. Because what my parents neglected to tell me while growing up (and what it took a trip to Mt. Fuji to figure out) was that I was some great-great-great distant grand-nephew to the farming god that so royally pissed off the flower princess' father.

Now, I don't know this for sure (though come to think of it, I have had something of a way with plants my whole life…), but it's the only logical explanation I have after what happened that day at Mt. Fuji. Never before in my life have I been so thoroughly toyed with, so maniacally manipulated, and so utterly abused by the forces of Nature.

If you haven't already heard, we didn't get to see Mt. Fuji. It rained, it was cold, it was windy, and there was fog everywhere. The entire way to the 5^th station (the highest the bus could take us), our tour guide kept saying "She is a shy mountain," as a way of explaining the fog shrouding the summit. She evidently didn't know that she had an ancestor of the Fishing god in her midst.

She's up there somewhere...

We spent maybe 30 minutes on the mountain herself huddled together to protect ourselves from the driving wind and rain. In between gusts of wind and torrents of rain, we dashed to a small temple dedicated to the Rock goddess. It was a modest affair—just a simple shrine watched over by a monk hawking religious knickknacks. We snapped a few pictures of where the summit allegedly was. I dropped a hundred yen into a little box and a fortune dropped out. I asked the man behind the counter what it meant, and he gave me the thumbs up. I took that as a sign that the weather was turning and the sun would come out.

Up the hill to the Temple

Waiting for Bad luck to blow away

Shortly after, we hurried out of the rain back onto the bus and departed for lunch. We enjoyed our meal in a hotel restaurant, and admired the greenery out back in the sunlight that was beginning to peek through the clouds. Finishing lunch, we reboarded the bus, feeling optimistic about our chances for the pleasure boat cruise. We shouldn't have.

Almost as soon as we departed for the lake, the fog rolled back. We spent the next hour or so either shrouded in mist or driving through rain as the clouds rolled over the dark green mountains next to the highway.

We arrived at the boat terminal, and ambled into the building. Across the lake, a pirate ship drifted to shore (we assumed it was another cruise ship, not a ship bent on wanton rampage and pillage) as the lush green mountains plunged into the water behind it. Fifteen minutes later, it was time to get on the boat, and the rain picked up again. At least the boat was covered, and we'd stay dry.

This is as far as we ever saw across the lake

The engines growled to life, the lines were cast and the boat disembarked. Before it had turned around to set sail across the lake, the fog rolled in, thick as whipped cream. We were on the top deck of the boat, and we couldn't even see the water below us. Hiroko told us that somewhere through the fog, the shy mountain was once again hiding her face.

Seriously Foggy

Fifteen minutes later, the boat docked, the fog cleared, and the rain started up again. We shuffled back onto the bus, where Ms. Hiroko told us that unfortunately, due to the wind, the cable cars up the mountain next to Mt. Fuji were closed, but luckily, we'd be going to a wonderful art museum instead! (She always did know how to put a positive spin on things).

The art museum was alright, I guess. There was a kaleidoscope museum attached, which was amusing for about half an hour (admittedly, it was kind of cool taking pictures as the giant kaleidoscopes twirled). But by this point, the four of us were cold, wet, tired, hungry, and cranky. We hadn't paid to see the insides of a giant kaleidoscope, we'd paid to see Mt. Fuji from seven different angles, and hadn't caught a single glimpse of her.

Imprisoned by the Fog

An hour later, we trudged back through the rain and onto the bus. Ms. Hiroko tried to cheer us up by noting how the kind people at the museum had turned the escalator on in the other direction so we wouldn't have to walk all the way down the hill in the rain.

Later that night, in an Irish pub in Ginza, the four of us sat around, nursing pints of real beer, mulling over the day that had passed. We had only just managed to dry ourselves off and warm ourselves up, and were feeling pretty down at how the day had turned out.

"Well, look at it this way" I said, doing my best to channel Ms. Hiroko's unflappable optimism. "The day could not have gotten any worse. It really was quite impressive—we didn't see a single thing we were supposed to."

"I guess," my companions sighed, not really feeling what was so impressive about that.

"It's not like the day was lacking of things to see either. Look, this tour was a bust, no arguing that. But it was such a completely, utterly, devastatingly busted tour, that you can't help but feel impressed. For that many things to go that wrong – somebody really didn't want us to see that mountain today."