nagasaki blues

Valentine’s Day update!

As of 1:16, packages of candy received: 4.

Dissapointment Level: moderate (yellow).

Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, and all I’ve heard all week is about how I’m going to get so much chocolate, like this much, and how I shouldn’t eat it all at once, and how I should be careful because I’ll be expected to give candy in return on White Day. Well, let me be the first to say that I couldn’t care less. I’m ready for handouts. I feel pretty confident it’s coming, too, since as I write this three girls (not in my class) are standing in front of my desk and giggling like the schoolgirls they are every time I glance upwards. In my book, this spells candy.

For me, Valentine’s Day is generally a pretty apathetic affair punctuated perhaps by the occasional Lifetime special on wife-beating or an anti-romantic meal with other frequently-single people. The last one I remember sticks out vividly in my mind:

There we are, listening to Foreigner on a Waffle House jukebox, when I notice that the guy at the counter next to me is staring at the waitress ringing up checks. Not checking her out, not vacantly gazing. Staring. Needless to say, this captures my imagination, and I’m on the edge of my seat 20 minutes later, when he finally speaks to her. The conversation happens like this:

“You got any kids?”

She didn’t even bother to make eye contact, clicking away at her register, but answered, “Two of ‘em,” in a low Southern drawl.

Silence followed for another few minutes, and he asked, “You gotta man around?” Getting to the point, I would go on to learn, is sometimes appreciated.

“Yeah.”

“You wanna come over sometime?”

Surely, I thought, this man was not serious. He did, after all, ask the prerequisite question about whether or not she was in a relationship, implying that the answer mattered to him in some way. Learning she was attached, he continued right along with his proposition as if this was no concern to either of them, which it apparently, mind-blowingly, was not.

“Sure. I don’t want no wife catching us and trying to come after me, though.”

At the time, I thought: Flawless. This is better than television. This is better than any bar conversation I’ve ever heard or any quiet exchange over coffee. This is better than most books. How many people get to see this kind of exchange up close? It’s like watching humpback whales mate, a sight a handful of people on the Earth have been lucky enough to witness. In six sentences, they had managed to decide that, yes, they would be sleeping together. That’s the magic of Valentine’s day.

Well, I don’t need all of that, but empty calories would be nice. I want to snack on rice balls tomorrow about as much as I want to see the world’s paraplegics challenge the world’s morbidly obese to a naked make-out contest, which just isn’t very much at all.

Hitomi, one of the freshmen, came back to school today. It took an hour to get a smile out of her, a feat I usually accomplish accidentally within seconds of talking to her by saying something she doesn’t understand, tucking a pencil behind my ear (apparently hilarious), or something equally unfunny. My point is, it’s not supposed to take much to make this kid laugh. She’s not wired for the stoic role. But here she is, head in her hands, staring at the floor, her brightly colored eyeglasses switched for a more conservative pair.

I can’t tell you where she’s been, since apparently I’m not supposed to know. I asked, of course. ”It’s complicated” was the answer.

I was talking with Mayumi when she stepped through the door, who looked at me and said, profoundly: “I am shock.”

A few months ago, a student’s house burned to the ground along the shoreline, just up and ignited like a pack of matches, so donation cans were placed in the classrooms and probably a bit of money was raised. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably less than what it costs to build a new house. It’s probably Hitomi, but I don’t know. I’m not trying to be cynical about it; it’s not as if the school can be expected to magically fix something that tragic. It’s the heart of the act that counts, and I’m sure every little bit helped. I’m just saying, we’re charged with the responsibility of helping young people grow into well-developed individuals, but when something of critical importance goes down all I can really do is slip the kid in question some leftover Cambodian money or perhaps some Lilo and Stitch stickers and tell them to “try their best.”

 Seriously, what do you do?

The last time I took some time out to write about how things were going, it was in the margins of a notebook on a northbound train for Tokyo to meet my family in Narita, a bit of a wasteland only worth knowing the name of because it’s home to Japan’s largest international airport.

My father and sister stayed for about five days, and between traveling with them and going to pick them up I spent something like 35 hours on trains. In this time, I accomplished the following feats:

1) Destroying “New Mario Brothers” for the Nintendo DS in a scant three hours.
2) Beginning and finishing Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, which I suggest you do as well.
3) Sampling some of Kyoto’s finest boxed lunches.
4) Sleeping.

Regardless, my notes look something like this:

I must confess to a mystic fascination with public transportation and trains in particular. There’s something vaguely magical about falling asleep near home and waking up somewhere you’ve never been before. It’s like drinking to excess, only without the hangover and far more expensive. I am a-okay with that.

I had plenty of time to think on the train, and I thought a great deal about work. Plenty of people I talk to regularly seem to forget that I actually have a job that requires most of my time, seeing as all the interesting stories are about doing exciting things in exciting places. Fact of the matter is, at the end of the day, I’m just another sub-par teacher trying to keep a day ahead of everything. It’s not all glorious Japanese hilarity. I wake up every morning and put on a coat and tie and get down to gettin’ busy. With this job comes the inevitable frustrations and complications that virtually all jobs have, but with this one there’s a fundamental difference: if I slack off, if I blow off responsibilities and try to wing everything, it’s not me that gets hurt. Not at all, actually, since I’m under contract. But it’s no good for the kids, and I’ve grown rather attached to them. This startling development has caused me some stress.

I have yet to receive a noise complaint from any of my neighbors, for instance. This happened something like once a week back home. Have I lost the ability to rock? It’s a distinct possibility, one that should shake you all to the bone. I was planning on shredding my way to the forefront as rock’s new savior, but if I’m too busy grading English tests then someone else may have to step up, and I’ll be damned if the world needs another U2 album right now. God help us all. (Or Satan. Whichever is in charge of rocking.)

It’s hardly just that, though. My hair is turning grey. My patience is eroding. I have watched the frustrations of this environment eat at it slowly, then more quickly, until all it takes is one miscommunication too many to put me in a murderous mood. It took me a long time to build up the kind of tolerance for unpleasantries that I came here with.

It cost me more than you think to cultivate the kind of emotional distance from everyday life that allowed me to look cosmic misfortune (or personal screw-ups) in the eye and say: “Oh well. Might as well move on.”

But, somewhere around Yokohama, a realization hit me. In a moment of zen-like clarity I realized whose life I have wanted all along: the good-natured and aging Japanese alcoholic.

You heard me. Think about it.

This is a man whose entire drive from the moment he wakes up until the moment he goes to sleep is to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, at all times. He is functional, mind you; he typically holds a respectable job and shows up. However, he sleeps at his desk when he’s tired, vomits in the streets, and blatantly ignores things that irritate him. He’s long since learned that sweating the small stuff is a waste of time and energy, and the only things that aren’t small stuff are baseball, fishing, and the people he loves.

I’m not saying that sleeping on the job and collapsing in gutters on weeknights are appropriate behaviors to copy, but I am suggesting that a certain kind of apathy is a pivotal tool in preserving mental health.

So here’s to thinking less. Since I wrote those lines, I’ve taken three weeks off of school to travel southeast Asia (more to come on that later),  joined a new band, bought a new television (and a new couch from which to enjoy it), and resolved to take more naps.

So far, so good.

And here’s my New Years Resolution: to write more. Much more. Expect frequent updates from here out.

By the time we’d caught the last train of the night we’d already been lost a half dozen times, each time bailed out by locals who saw confused Americans and took action. It was the first trip into the city of Nagasaki itself, and it had been marked by several wrong turns and hours spent wandering the city. Of course, once we’d found ourselves things were easy enough — yakitori and a bar full of Russian hookers (an accident, I swear) made the night a memorable one.

So, despite the countless screw-ups, we’d made it into the city and were well on our way back. I felt a vague sense of liberation. We were free-spirited travelers. 150 percent energized!  I am convinced that if you move quickly enough — and it takes some real intensity, I will admit — you can outrun your mind and  leave it hanging in the dust, momentarily abandoning the melodramatic worries that inhabit the dark corners of the brain. This is therapy, and you should try it.

Then the train stopped. Not in Kazusa, but somewhere around 40 kilometers north of it. In a brutal show of professional insensitivity, the conductor explained that the train stopped here for the night, then proceeded to wish us good luck in finding a hotel.

We had no car, little money, and no chance of finding a hotel this far in the middle of nowhere.

What could we do? We started walking.

No phones and nobody to turn to. Again, we were to rely on the Japanese locals to save our hides, and this time it didn’t feel like such a gamble. A while into the walk, Paul suggested we hitchhike.

Young people, we reasoned, were more likely to pick us up. People in trucks were even more likely. Something about the separation between driver and passenger would be reassuring, right? Right. Did we need a sign? Is the thumbs-up signal international?

Speaking out of zero experience, I voiced the question: “Will they understand the thumbs-up thing to be asking for a ride? Maybe they’ll think we’re just congratulating them on their driving skills.”

“I’m sure they’ll understand.”

“I don’t know. I heard that sometimes in other countries it’s a different hand motion. I think I read that somewhere. I don’t know.”

“Someone’s pulling over.”

A black pick-up had swirved past us and then pulled over, cigarette smoke wafting from its interior and punctuated by reggae beats. Our potential saviors were two young guys no older than us, one of whom wore sunglasses and bobbed his head below a dangling marijuana-leaf air freshner. ”We’re going to Kuchinotsu,” I explained, “but we don’t speak Japanese well.” The driver nodded gravely, then turned to the passenger. The two exchanged rapid-fire Japanese while Paul and I listened on:

“What are they saying? Do you know?” Paul asked.

“No. Maybe. Well, no. Probably not. Something about how it’s out of the way. One wants to take us a few miles at least.” I interrupted the driver to ask where they were going. Nowhere, he told me.

I turned back to Paul. “He says they’re bored. They’re just cruising around.”

“Makes sense. There isn’t shit-else to do out here.”

So we hopped into the back of the truck, packs tucked under our heads, and proceeded to lazily watch Nagasaki whip past us the truck sped alongside the ocean. I’m sure it doesn’t sound special second-hand. I understand and appreciate that fact. But just try to imagine this with me, okay? Your day has been long. You have just made a major break-through. Part of you — a little part, but a portion nonetheless — is starting to believe that, perhaps, you are unstoppable. The ocean is at your back, close enough to hit with a rock, and the salt air tassles your hair.  In front of you is Unzen, a massive active volcano. Even though you know it’s just a low-hanging cloud, you allow yourself to believe that you can see smoke rising from its summit.

And then, at some point, you realize you’re close to home. You realize that the drivers have taken you all the way there, despite their insistance on driving you only a few short miles before going home themselves.

This is because when you help someone, you gain a little bit of ownership over them. Once you’ve started an act of kindness, the compulsion is to see it through. Those who speak freely of the sorry state of the human soul seem to forget that these things occur on a daily basis. Occasionally, it’s easier to do right than wrong. Paul jumped from the back of the car, dictionary in hand, and said: “Are you hungry? We’ll buy food.” They shook their heads, laughing. “Beer? Let’s get a beer.” Again they declined.

Then they left. We were less than a mile from home. We put one foot in front of the other and went home.

They burn their trash here.

My neighbor is the first to explain this to me, and in Japanese he says, “combustables go here,” pointing to an obnoxious bright red trash bin. It just pops out: “Everything’s combustable at a hot enough temperature,” I tell him, and he shakes his head. He doesn’t understand English.

So, they burn the trash. The smoke rises in thick columns and hangs in the air like jazz notes, dissipating in the early evening and leaving in its wake an acrid smell of melting plastic and burning paper. I suspect that if you live here long enough, if you’re accustomed to this phenomenon, it becomes as inevitable as train whistles and earthquakes: something you simply stop noticing. Anything to have it gone, I suppose. Torch it and move on.

Today is August 9th, and it’s the first time in my life that I’m acutely aware of the fact that this is the anniversary of Nagasaki’s atomic bombing. It seems somehow appropriate to begin here.

Robert Lewis co-piloted the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped Little Boy on Hiroshima, and as he stared from the cockpit at the blooming mushroom cloud that signaled that city’s destruction, he claimed to have tasted atomic fission. It tasted like lead, he later said, and he immediately inscribed the following words in his diary: My God, what have we done?

Humanity, I am sad to report, is not quick in learning the consequences of its actions; three days’ time was hardly enough for us to reflect on the pure scale of the violence we had unleashed with the dropping of a single bomb. Nagasaki was incinerated in turn.

The problem is that nothing ever truly burns away, of course. Einstein knew this. Energy is conserved. This rather basic principle, so grand in its simplicity, is a large part of the reason the bomb actually worked, after all.

On my way home from the grocery store today, I could almost taste it myself. I almost convinced myself I could hear the humming of B-52 engines in the sound of waves crashing against rocks. The water is higher today than it was yesterday, and yesterday was higher than the day before. It’s as if it’s piling up with all that we try to discard, every little thing that every single person pushes out of sight and out of mind. One day, I swear to God, it’s going to overflow. It’s going to break walls and drown multitudes and instill in men some primal fear that we have long forgotten.