I am Atsushi Ishihara. I live just north of Tokyo, in Saitama, with my wife and three daughters—in 8th, 7th, and 3rd grade.

Road trips and hot spring tours with the family, gravel cycling, fly fishing in mountain streams, and losing myself in modular synthesis—among other things.

Buckminster Fuller's Critical Path.

Grateful Dead’s Live/Dead

A conversation about the unexpected parallels between ancient Judaism and the earliest forms of Shinto. It opened up more questions than it answered—which is exactly the point.

Shibuya and Shinjuku stations. I know both well — or think I do. But the renovations never stop, and every visit brings something new: a building that wasn't there before, a walkway rerouted, a floor numbered differently depending on which side you enter from. At some point you stop trusting your sense of where ground level actually is. You're not lost, exactly. You just can't tell if you're above the earth or below it. Google Maps helps. Somewhat.

Midway through the off-season, when I start counting the weeks until Kyoto.

An unagi restaurant. Almost without exception, guests thank me afterward—and honestly, I'm just as happy to be there.

Most visitors to Tokyo rush through the major stations — head down, next train in mind, hoping not to get lost. And yes, getting lost is almost guaranteed. But what if that were the point? Branching off in every direction are department stores, sometimes several at once, connected through the same labyrinthine corridors that make these stations so intimidating in the first place. Go below ground and you'll find food halls unlike anything most travelers expect: prepared dishes, regional sweets, fresh pastries — all at prices that would surprise you. In summer, take the elevator to the rooftop and something else appears entirely: a beer garden, full of office workers unwinding after the day. The city rushing below, a cold beer above. The big terminals are worth exploring as a destination in their own right — getting lost included. If you'd rather not do it alone, that's what I'm here for.

A man I met on the street in Delhi — the kind of encounter that happens when you're wandering without a plan. He brought me to meet someone he knew: a travel agent, older, talkative, his office walls covered floor to ceiling with photographs of mountains and lakes. I asked where they were. His hometown, he said. Kashmir.

I knew what was happening in Kashmir at the time. Insurgency, gunfire, the kind of news that makes a place sound abstract and dangerous. He waved it off. "My family will look after you. It's beautiful. You have to go."

Twenty-seven hours by bus — the kind of ride that makes you question every decision you've ever made. The road was rough enough to rattle your bones, and by hour ten I was somewhere between delirious and desperate. Then the bus crossed into the Kashmir Valley, and I saw it. I found myself in tears before I understood why.

When I arrived, a hotel by the lake had been destroyed by a rocket launcher — blackened walls, still standing. Sandbags along the road. Soldiers. I was scared.

Then: a houseboat on the lake. A month and a half. Fishing in the morning, riding horses in the afternoon, reading, playing with the local kids. The kind of stillness you can only find when you've ended up somewhere completely by accident.

That's what unplanned travel used to feel like. You said yes to a stranger, and the stranger turned out to be right. It doesn't always work out that way. But sometimes it does.

Find the best alternative I can think of in the moment. Giving up is not an option.