Sometimes I think of my mother’s childhood here in Japan. How must it have been for my grandfather, John, and grandmother, Esi, to pick up and move from Germany to such a different country and then to inadvertently start a whole new saga of their lives there. They lived in Central Honshu, in Chigasaki and Kaurizawa for most of the time. They moved here in 1934 and did not leave until 1948. My mother was born in Tokyo on March 11th. Her two older siblings would have even more of their youths absorbed in this country. Her younger sibling would have an enormous part of her family’s legacy to fill into her own imagination without the help of her own memory. And then to move to America: what culture shock. If it were me doing the same emigration, I think I would miss the relaxedness of the people, the peacefulness of daily life that people here exude. I would also miss the consistently healthy food and the fish. Not to forget that during the forties food was much harder to come by. Moving to America would be the start of healthy, plentiful amounts of food for those toddlers.
Here I am in a different part of Japan, certainly more like the part of Japan where my family lived than urban Japan. I get to experience some of the things that those children and their parents had to say goodbye to in 1948. I don’t even know if my grandparents ever came back. I do know that my father’s parents came to Japan in the 70s and had a pretty awful time, probably because they were not in the country because the core of their hard time stemmed from their taxi driver getting them into a car accident in which the driver died. That would ruin most vacations. But my grandfather will tell you many stories of the good things that happened as well, although all were affected by that one event.
It is strange to walk around this village. I seem to be the only one walking, for one. I did walk by a schoolgirl or two coming back from school today. But it is so spacious and so empty. There are forests where no one walks and they are covered in complex undergrowth. There are gravestones set up on hillsides where I never see people. And the beetles make this high-pitched noise like a engine doing maximum revolutions. Today I saw a mini green frog jumping around by a small canal.
The peacefulness of the land still remains absorbed by the people who live here. They are patient, trusting, cheerful people. They almost always saw hello when I walk by them in the school or in the village.
Like I felt in England, I feel very safe here – as if no one would ever want to hurt me. They would have no reason to, and they would have no handguns either. The people here are so peaceful you might mistake their calm for lackadaisical ignorance. But I don’t think that anyone is unaware of the 60th anniversary (the 60th is particularly important in Japanese culture) of the atrocities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I think that most people are completely aware of these events but they are willing and mentally able to overcome their anger and frustration. It is perhaps part of the Buddhist/Shintoist traditions. But to forget would be ignorant and unhelpful. One must remember, live one’s present life, and look ahead all at the same time. Forget those who tell you to only think of the present—they are misguided. The present has no meaning without the past and future. They cradle the present and give it a home. There are specific times, of course, when mindlessness in terms of time is a very good thing. Now I am starting to sound too much like another relative of mine so I will curb my rants just a little.
Perhaps the executive branch of the American government should learn a lesson from Japan. But I won’t go to much into this. For one, it saddens me what is going on. I am already ashamed enough both of how my government has been acting on the international stage as well as many of my fellow citizens’ lack of international awareness. I should call my country Americaville because the whole thing acts as one little, colloquial American village does to its more distant surroundings: ignores them and pays attention only when it has to or when it may have something to gain. Unfortunately it does not know what’s best for it and thus remains even more stuck in its own close-sightedness.
There is a passage in a book I am reading that I liked, it goes like this:
“There are many things we can’t know. There are many things we can only see, they’re beautiful and we have to be satisfied with that. When you come to see me in India, you’ll be in a big ship for days and days, lots and lots of little fish jump out of the water ahead of the ship, they have glassy wings and they can fly. And sometimes there are birds that have come a long long way from strange islands; they are very tired, they sit down on the deck and they’re very much surprised to see so many strange people riding around on the ocean. They would like to understand us too, and ask us where we come from and what our names our, but they can’t, so we just look into each other’s eyes and nod our heads, and when the bird has had a good rest, he shakes himself and flies off across the ocean.”
The passage seems to say that some ignorance is natural, healthy, and even positive if it is combined with an awareness of its own boundaries and a deeper recognition of its origins. Maybe my country’s lack of cultural depth and long traditions has prevented this kind of recognition and has thus produced a mixture of arrogance, ignorance, and insularity. The connection may be weak between passage and point, but I’ll let it be. It’s not like I am sending this to a publishing house or something!
The passage is also relevant to my stay here in Japan. In some ways I am like the bird on the ship. Although I have many more tools for understanding the ship I have landed on then those little birds.
The passage continues with the child asking:
“Doesn’t anyone know what those birds are called?”
“Oh yes. But we only know the names that people have given them. We don’t know what they call each other.”
The dude recognizes the limits of his own ability to understand and to see. He is aware that there are boundaries and that his way of seeing the world is only one of many. He may have even added that perhaps the birds don’t call each other anything. But no one is perfect. Plus, they probably do call each other something like “tweat, tweet,” but I am not sure how they would spell it.
I wish that all Americans could be more like the dude above. I think that it is a difficult awareness to achieve because it does take a certain amount of calm and time to reflect on such things. Perhaps they should be taught in schools? But until then I will try to be like the dude above.
It’s fun to be the dude above; the world is larger and you can reach out to the universe a bit more. But sometimes it’s hard to be the dude above when no one else around you is like the dude above. But luckily I have had many friends in my life like the dude above. Yoni, Danner, Michael and Mike, Gabe, Heartie, Morgan, Nick, my brothers, my parents, Tye, and a whole lot more, like my cousins and Amanda. Dannee ain’t too bad either (what a Spanish speaking jetsetter she has become). Kids from Maui that I know are pretty good at it for the most part. Samuel, halloa! What would you say; is the shire visible? Where are Thishi and Aras, and all the Cambridge folk, Marina? And the Pomona folk? It hasn’t been too long since we have left that little village but it feels like ages ago for me. Aaron grew up in a beautiful place where humans weren’t the only visible species. And Henry, where have you trailed off to honu? I hope you are using your turtle flippers well. Lisa, Alison, Andrea, Chris, Cara, thanks for seeing me off from NYC. And Heartie and co., thanks for being great hosts in that great city that is alive like a giant animal. VAN! Stay cool. Don’t let the big world sweep you away; be the sweeper amigo. Haha. I can publicly humiliate people on this blog—I just realized. Now that some people are actually reading this… Maggie, enjoy Boston as I know you are. Summer, I know you are out there smiling in the sun. Grewal. Slavs. Britta. Dave. etc. you know who you wonderful people are and thanks to all the people who helped to make you be so wonderful, for they are surely wonderful too.
Hello to Clifton, Colorado, if you can hear me. And to Berkeley, Putney, and Eugene, of course. It doesn’t really feel like I am that far away. Maybe that’s what technology does. But if it weren’t for computers I would be writing letters, so…
To my brothers, Anthony Equord and Nicholas Edward: how bout a visit, eh? I will put you up and feed you. Look for cheap flights. It will never be this easy again to visit a remote part of Japan unless you do JET. Take a loan.
When you reflect and write like this for a good long time it reminds you that life has an end, that mortality puts a whole new spin on the enterprise that is life. I learn to not care too much about being cheesy or unfashionable; it is alright to mispel a word or to make a fool of myself (although I may regret it tomorrow). And furthermore, if people are not willing to let you be ridiculous, then it is their problem and they can go elsewhere or reform their outlook. Haha! Of course, then I start to sound arrogant, but then again all you have to do is remember that I am the one making a fool of myself. I love to make a fool!
To end these seemingly endless rants will be Puck and his reflections about the dream that is life:
If we shadows have offended, think but this and all is mended:
That we are but shadows here while these visions did appear…
No comments:
Post a Comment