Dear All,
I have been trying to write in my diary since arriving in Japan, but there has been very little time. It`s just after breakfast now, on Sunday, and I am snatching a few moments to send you a postcard. I don`t think I can talk much about all I have done since arriving. I feel a little as if I am seeing my entire life in Japan (some two and a half years here and there over the last decade) flash before my eyes. However, I will tell you about my daytrip to Tokyo yesterday.
A few days ago, we (I shall refrain from mentioning other people`s names) were looking around the local temple when a young lady struck up conversation with us and offered to show us around Tokyo if we were going that way. Eventually we took up the offer, and as a result, we spent Saturday wandering around Tokyo with her as a guide. We arrived at Asakusa station and so our first stop was the Kaminari Mon, or `Thunder Gate` which leads to the Nakamise market and Sensoji temple. Our guide suggested we take a boat along the Sumida River to Hamarikyu gardens, and so our course was set. On the way, however, I noticed, down an alley, a little cafe called Arizona Kitchen, which I happened to know was one of the haunts of Nagai Kafu. I mentioned this and our guide suggested we have lunch there. On the menu was a strange dish of chicken liver, which, it said, Nagai Kafu used to eat when he came here. Since my vegetarianism has already been ruined by daily life in Japan, I only felt a minor sense of regret in ordering this. I suppose it`s silly, but it made me feel a little closer to one of my personal literary deities. On the wall of the cafe were extracts from Kafu`s diary. "January the 24th. Clear skies. Cloudy later. Dinner at Arizona Kitchen." That sort of thing.
We took the boat and arrived eventually at Hamarikyu gardens. Apparently this area was once known for hawk hunting. No hope of that now, I suppose. Our guide pointed out the recent development in the area, the huge office buildings that now surrounded the gardens, and, blocking the wind from the sea, had made the summers in the area that much hotter. One of the buildings was for an advertising company. Scum of the Earth.
From there we went to Tokyo Tower via Zojoji temple. Zojoji had the most impressive displays of mizugo figures that I`ve ever seen. Mizugo are little effigies erected as memorials to aborted children. As abortion is more or less a method of birth control here in Japan, such statues are numerous. I took a great many photos. One of the statuettes, with a yellow raincoat, reminded me of Nakata Hideo`s film Dark Water.
From Tokyo Tower – a tasteless piece of architectural hubris – we looked down on the metropolis that, our guide reminded us, had all sprung up in the sixty years since the war. Tokyo is ever-changing, to quote from Hojoki, like bubbles forming and bursting in a river. I noted with interest a building with a very strange roof. I was informed it belonged to a cult known as `reiha no hikari`. There was something weirdly futuristic about it.
Our final stop was Ginza, where I managed to buy a copy of Tender Pervert by Momus, which I believe is not now available outside Japan, and also Kate Bush`s Aerial, which I have now listened to in its entirety. What`s it like? Perhaps I`ll tell you, if you ask nicely.
All for now,
Your avuncular homunculus,
Quentin.
Hello Q., I envy you (and envy is not my usual emotion), for it is many years since I was in Japan and like all things that change so rapidly it probably is not, in some context, the place I once knew, and I wish I was there right now, seeing what you are seeing. Still, we do plan to go Japan. It’s a question of “When”, not “If”, and so we are looking forward to that day, probably next year. Before we depart I will be talking to you privately about this (I will email you my cellphone number at that time, as I will have some questions/request and I hope you will be able to help answer them). When we were returning to London, from Madrid, back in early August, I started to talk to the Japanese man in the seat next to me. He told me his name is Harunobu　Umeki (ume means plum, ki means tree, he said.) and he is a teacher at a school in Kyoto, where he also teaches English . Our conversation was a long one, covering Japanese history, culture, religous beliefs and so on. We exchanged emails and now we corresepond to each other. He seemed to be a shy, thoughtful person, who was ready to listen to an ‘outsider’ asking some (discreetly done) questions and to give what answers he could. Your own blog about Japan is very informative. Your descriptions and narrative transport me to that country, as I look at what you have written. When I wrote from Madrid, back in October, KayFour described my blogs+photos as an enjoyable “travelogue”. I would like to describe your blog now in that sense, for it is in your usual style but offering something even more remarkable. I have refrained from a ‘profound intellectual reply’, as regards the specific things you mention in your blog. I am either totally ignorant of the intellectual perspective, or I am simply content to read and to absorb what you are reporting.Wonderful blog, dear Q.,Thanks,lokutusSunday. 6 November
Hello Lokutus.Please feel free to e-mail me with questions about Japan. I suppose I should state the obvious and say that my own view of Japan is deeply biased. Anyway, if I get a chance I will write some more about my current visit to Japan.Until then…
I look forward to this, dear Q.
HI Q,I miss you so much 🙂 and I amn happy now to see your post and to hear about your time in Japan.You have seen the good and the ugly.. A blend that will stay in your minds eye.So can you tell me how the Kate B album is pretty please???Thank you so much for posting and with pictures too..a nice surprise.Enjoy your time and be safe.HugsEve
Thank you for your Japan postcard and your blog in general, which is most entertaining. I’m looking forward to more. Hope you don’t mind if I check in on an irregular basis.–m
Hello Eve. Hello Melissa.Sorry to be brief, I think I`m about to be dragged out somewhere.”I’m looking forward to more. Hope you don’t mind if I check in on an irregular basis.”Please feel free to visit irregularly or otherwise. “You have seen the good and the ugly. A blend that will stay in your minds eye.”It`s true, I think I have seen both, though I seem to be rather better at expressing the latter. I hope that I will have time to give a more nuanced view later, though I probably won`t. Ho hum.”So can you tell me how the Kate B album is pretty please???”Well, once again, I really want to give more details later. It`s a two disc album and I particularly like the second disc, which is a concept disc with all the songs running into each other. I find the first disc slightly subdued, though it`s undoubtedly more creative and accomplished than ninety nine point seven three two per cent of what passes for `pop music`. I`m afraid that`s not very descriptive, but I will just have to try and write more later. In the meantime, I rather like this reviewThe URL is below, in case the link doesn`t work:http://www.playlouder.com/review/+aerial-0/
Hi Q,Thank you for the link it is a great one.I am happy you are enjoying your time in Japan, and remember to get plenty of photos :)It’s nice to hear from you even in the rushing of being dragged out 🙂 I am just happy you are posting.Enjoy and thanks for the link again:)Eve
Hello Zenya.We`re flying back to Heathrow very early tomorrow, and, as usual, I am extremely nervous and can`t settle to anything. I think that I`ve packed everything now, but I`m not sure. I don`t know if I can write coherently at the moment. I wanted to say a bit more about the Kate Bush album. Somehow I don`t think I`ll get time for a proper review of it. I have been listening to the second disc more than the first, and I think it`s just about as close to perfect as you can get. The songs work well together as a kind of many-layered concept to do with the passage of time, nature, the seasons and so on. They seem to track the course of a single day from dawn to evening and back to dawn again the next day, but this is a kind of vehicle for other ideas. I doubt I would do those ideas justice if I tried to describe them, but certan motifs are repeated – changing light and birdsong in particular. The last song, describing the second dawn, could be taken as a revelation or joy, or as a kind of panic – lines like “The flowers are melting into the sun” are particularly ambiguous in this respect. I suppose this is a curious quality in this half of the album as a whole. It seems peaceful and soothing in one sense, and yet there are certain qualities to the songs, and certain lines, that remain rather troubling, such as one line about going to bed and turning to dust (I`m afraid I can`t remember it word for word at the moment). The first disc does not seem as perfect to me as the second. There are one or two songs here that I haven`t quite got to grips with, in particular, `How to be Invisible`, which the review I linked to describes as the most accessible song on the album. I like the texture of it, and the lyrics, but I`m not sure about the melody. I suppose this side has more of a miscellaneous feel to it, and to me doesn`t feel quite complete in itself. But it`s still early days. Kate`s albums tend to grow on you rather than being immediately accessible. I suppose I should say that I believe (I don`t even think it`s a matter of opinion so much as fact) Kate Bush to be a much more talented and creative musician, singer and songwriter then ninety-nine per cent of those currently purveying music under the rubrik of `pop`. In fact, I can`t think of anyone I believe to be more talented. I think that part of this `talent` comes from the fact that her music completely lacks what is usually called `attitude`. Attempts to make music `cool` usual result in limited creativity. Kate`s creativity is not limited by such things.Anyway, dinner. Must go.
HI Q,Thank you so much for taking the time to write this review of Kate Bushs music, I hope it helped you to take your mind off traveling and packing?I noticed there was a 7.2 earthquake in Japan and of course my mind went towards you.I hope you weren’t around that area?I am in a travel group maybe you can join and post your photos??? and be available for anyone who wants to travel to Japan?Mato2 has started this group and he is in France.Thanks again for taking the time, you’re a doll.HugsEve