“That was the world’s most beautiful moss covered forest,” said my friend, who had a real passion for moss. He had spent years searching for such a forest. He told me how he was comforted by the moss. Beautiful moss, so resplendent that it stood out amidst a beautiful forest. Inside a moss-covered forest, the air is purified and tainted rainwater made pristine. My friend found emotional healing inside such forests. He spoke passionately to me about how incredibly beautiful the moss in that forest was.

He understood the importance of moss to life.

Dying trees, ravaged by acid rain, are enveloped by moss; the moss seems to cradle the tree, as if gently consoling them, and tries to protect them, as if they are something of great importance for future forms of life.

Moss first appeared on earth back when the environment was best suited to life. This was apparently 400 million years ago. The earth’s environment was created over the ages, but now humans are destroying it as an incredibly rapid pace. Seeing how moss was quietly cleaning up after man, my friend said that moss seemed like a god.

It has now been more than 20 years since my friend died of cancer. I decided I wanted to search for the forest. Back then, I had only casually listened to my friend as he talked about this forest, but even after 20 years, his words came back to me.

I went to look for that forest. I am not sure if the forest I found was the place my friend had called “the world’s most beautiful moss-covered forest”.

I believe I correctly recalled the words he had spoken to me.

“The world’s most beautiful moss-covered forest” lies under the spot where the large full moon passes over the Yatsugatake Mountains. Those words may have just been my friend’s fantasy.

Even so, I found a moss-covered forest that closely resembled the place he described to me.