This week on myths and legends, there are two stories of pilgrimages.

On the first, we'll meet a forlorn former samurai whose wife has a secret.

On the second, we'll see about doing whatever it takes for kindness.

On the creature of the week, we'll learn how that coat you thought was made up of a thousand

tiny amphibian skins might actually be carcinogenic.

This is myths and legends episode 369,

Pilgrims.

This is a podcast where we tell stories from mythology and folklore.

Some are incredibly popular stories you might think you know,

but with surprising origins.

Others are tales that might be new to you,

but are definitely worth a listen.

We are back in Japanese folklore with two stories of people on pilgrimages, but maybe not in the

way you think.

On the first, we'll see a man, a former samurai grapple with an unforeseen problem. What is she doing with him? So why'd she heard everything? Maybe they didn't think he could, maybe they didn't care? As he felt his way down the street each morning to a different

client's house, Torque his trade as a masseuse, he could feel the silence that

followed like a bubble around him, a lord, doing this sort of work?

He knew his wife was beautiful, yes, in the physical ways, but also in the ways that mattered.

In the past few years, though,

especially after the move to this village on the mountainside,

they had been difficult.

He hadn't been himself,

...