Another Boaring Night in Kyoto

My dear friend Chris Gifford recently left Japan after five years in Kyoto and Osaka. The adventures that were had were both numerous and incredible, however one stands out.

Chris came to us one day with the wild claim that he had been attacked by a wild pig only minutes from his home at the foot of Daimonji, in Kyoto. Chris is known as a heavy drinker and occasional drug user so his story was quickly dismissed as either hallucination or outright lie.  

Chris' home was located at the foot of a famous mountain (and I use that term loosely) in Kyoto. True, many creatures of the forest can be seen in that area, in fact a visit from a large centipede while tripping out on a YouTube video was not uncommon. He had a Sake jar full of them. But...a wild boar? Within the city limits? Rather unusual to say the least. We figured, Chris, drunken and on a bike hit a large dog. The dog's cries of pain resembled snorting, Chris made his estimation of the incident and the story was born.  

Chris, being a bachelor, hosted many a night of debauch in his run-down mountain hideaway. One night in particular I was rather drunken and refused to spend the night, claiming I was fine to ride my bike down the mountain and safely home. A mistake I would come to regret.
Shortly after leaving the house I found myself on a quiet street lined with small japanese houses and a few scattered vending machines. All of the sudden a dog started barking and growling madly. The sound was enough to scare me, and make me ponder the reality of a dog attack. However, all of the sudden I heard another dog barking, and then another! In fact, the dogs were chained safely in yards and barking at some unseen menace ahead.  

I slowed my coast down the mountain lane. The sharp smell of an unwashed beast hit my face like a slap. It smelled like the monkey house at the Bronx Zoo. At the intersection ahead a large four legged creature stood in the road. "Was this a dog?" I thought, my heart now pounding. Coasting slowly forward the beast came into view, and in the light of an old Coke Machine was clearly a pig. A large, hairy, tusked pig.

He was five feet long if he was an inch. His shiny little hooves glistened in the moist mountain air, his teeth dingy and stinking stabbed at the glow of the vending machine, his eyes dead. I froze, petrified with fear as I envisioned my demise. Falling drunken onto the pavement, a boar's tusk tearing a valley of skin and flesh though my corduroys, and God forbid, tearing my scrotum.

These visions danced in my mind and eyes until I realized I was still coasting toward the beast. I slammed the brakes, sending a screech of rubber against aluminum echoing into the forest. Startled by the sound the pig jumped, stumbled backward and almost fell. Regaining his footing on the wet pavement he bucked and snorted twice in my direction. Now at a full stop i closed my eyes and waited. When I opened them, he was gone. A faint swirl of mist and the sound of hooves dancing into the distance were all that remained. The pig was gone, Chris is gone, and the story is now just a story. One of many.