Bells & Other Smells (A Dedication to the Swedish Dinner Club)

October 18, 2025

“If you encounter a bear while hiking, stand your ground and don’t make eye contact. If the bear attacks you anyway, fight for your life”

• Verbatim advice from The Lonely Planet Guide to Japan

I will come to the Swedish Dinner Club in a moment.  But first…..

It sounds at first like an approaching ice cream truck. You are out on a hike and you hear in front of you the approach of tinkling bells. It is not an unpleasant sound just discordant here in the woods. If the trails are busier you can hear them in front and back of you like some odd pilgrimage to the Keebler Elf Tree.

Its bells.  Many hikers are wearing bells on their packs and, if there is a group, the resulting tintinnabulation overwhelms the natural sounds of the forest.  What is this all about?  Is this yet another ode to the Kami’s of the forest and a form of Shinto adoration?

No.  Its for the bears.

Every nature area we have encountered has shops featuring bells you can purchase to ward off a marauding Baloo.  It is a regular cottage industry here.  And the bells are in all varieties, from tiny tinkling Christmas style to what you might see on a wayward dairy cow.

I must admit, I did not know Japan had bears.  There are two varieties.  The first is the Asiatic Black Bear or “Moon Bear”.  These animals, while I am sure can be quite fearsome if provoked, are small, as bears go, and endangered.  There are only a few dozen in the wild here.

The more troublesome one is the Ussuri Brown Bear.  It is larger, similar to the Brown Bear in North America, and more numerous.

Well hi! Say, is that a bell?

Like most people, you are aware of certain things you don’t do around bears.  Try to feed or pet them, leave food out, etc.  Common sense things like, “Don’t pull on Superman’s Cape, don’t spit into the wind, don’t pull the mask off the old lone ranger and…..”  Well,  you know the rest.  But bells?

So hearing all of this is we hiked the area around Kamikochi and Chubu Sangaku National park, along with many others feeling more than a little skeptical of this call for chimes.

The pictures I have been showing are from that gorgeous park.

It felt more than a little like a cynical ploy to scare tourists out of their hard earned Yen.  I mean how often do bears attack people here?

Well much to my overblown American chagrin, more than you would expect.

Look here.

It is true if you dig into the case files, many of the attacks occur when people are doing foolish things - “Tugging on Superman’s Cape, etc”.  But still, despite my American arrogance, you can’t dismiss it entirely.

So am I now wearing a bell?  No, but I did look around a little more in the shadows of the trees as we walked along.

Besides, who doesn’t love the idea of a forest that has both bears and monkeys?   We ran into this small group of Japanese macaques by the side of the trail.

After our hike we wanted to visit a Japanese Onsen near by.  Onsens are found all over Japan.  This country is basically one big volcano and there are thousands of hot springs everywhere.  Some pools are Yellowstone hot and you would perish quickly if you tried to get in.  But most are very tolerable and over the centuries have evolved into a culture here.

(Due to the intimate nature of Onsens, I obviously did not take photos inside - so the pictures shown are from Google.  But they are a fair representation)

It sounds lovely.  A hot pool of water over looking nature.  You soak, revive, and contemplate the world.

But there is an issue. There is quite the smell.  These hot pools are volcanic in origin and as such are rich in deep earth minerals like sulphur.  Sulphur has a rich rotten egg smell.  But the geniuses who centuries ago developed quote the answer to the pungent odor.

It is good for you!  The smell equals good health.  A genius marketing ploy.

There is a ritual to entering the onset.  But a key feature is there are no swim suits.  No, this is something you experience in the buff. Just you and 30-40 of your closest Japenese chums.

A few years ago we had a dinner party with some dear friends.  We all had such a good time that we vowed to meet once a month at different homes as a dinner club.  At our first dinner we somehow got onto the discussion of drinking naked in a hot tub.  This is what old people do.  We talk about risqué things but then go to bed early.  We called it “Going Swedish” and the name stuck and the monthly event became “The Swedish Dinner Club”.

Well, my friends, here we are 1/2 way around the world surrounded by people we do not know and we took the plunge!  Like bacchanals of old this aged couple took to the pool wearing nothing but a smile.

Going Swedish!

It felt improper, indecent, and wonderful.

We miss you guys.

The Swedish Dinner Club