​It happened. I’ve been afraid of this moment for my entire life.

At dinner, I went to one of the closest restaurant and I picked what on the menu looked like a baked dish with lots of tomato sauce and cheese.

“Westernized Japanese cuisine”, they said. “An insult to what you hold dearest in your heart”, I read now.

When the waitress served me “Spaghetti Naporitan”, my heart skipped a beat. The red thing squeezed all over the place didn’t look like tomato sauce, unlike on the menu.

It was ketchup. It was fucking ketchup!

I wanted to take the hot dish and throw it to the cook, from my table all the way to the kitchen.

Yet, I kept my cool, I said “thanks” and started to eat. I was starving so much that I decided to stoically get on with it.

I felt like Frank Perconte in Band of Brothers, hating it with all my heart but too hungry to turn it away:

In any case, the enormous amount of cheese almost cancelled the ketchup taste, and that saved my stomach.

Horrible, horrible, horrible. I had only one question in my head: why?

I hope I won’t get haunted by this last horrendous meal in my sleep, tonight.

But let’s change the subject now. I feel the need to preserve my mental health.

The day went somewhat smoothly, even though I felt very weak and dizzy in the morning.

It was likely because I didn’t get much sleep last night. I eventually went to bed at around 11 PM, way too late. Freaking Wi-Fi. 

It was so bad that I almost felt like fainting, on my way up the mountain.

Luckily I had some chocolate and plenty of water with me, so I could get some sugar, and therefore energy, into my body.

The weather was annoying today. It was cold im the morning, so I had to go in full “winter mode”, then it got warmer as I started to climb.

This made me sweat (and swear) a lot on my way to the temple. Once I arrived, the weather turned cold again and I was freezing while having lunch: damp, in the shade and constantly “caressed” by the cold wind. Not the ideal situation. Swearing intensifies.

It was important to get the hell out of there as soon as possible. However, when I started to go downhill, the Sun came back and the day became much warmer. Just in time for me to produce an outrageous amount of sweat, once again.

All I want now is to forget about today’s horrors, mistakes and false hopes.

Tomorrow I will take a shortcut to gain some time and get closer to the temple #66, which can be reached after another tough climb.

I do hope that, after the ketchup nightmare, the worst is behind me now. If not, I really don’t know what else to expect.