Why I came to Japan in the first place

This is kind of a response to what my friend Danielle just wrote about, seeing completely new patterns versus creating patterns using old ones. It is about why I originally came to Japan.

When I was a child, I was really very concerned about the environment. I thought a lot about what we could do as a group, as humans, to change our ways. I often cried about the situation. Then my grandparents came to Japan to visit Hiroshima and they brought me back a book on Bonsai. I saw the pictures as something very different from your average topiary or garden tree. Then I found a book on Ikebana (Japanese Flower Arrangement) at a yard sale, and was shocked. The same rhythm could be found there.

It was a movement, a flow; a thought and then a silence and then a change in direction, and again. I saw that the Japanese must appreciate this art form, and since popular art is a reflection of people's hearts, they must think in the same way. I compared it to the noisiness and fullness of Western Art, and thought that if we could possibly learn to not be quite so aggressive and be more thoughtful in our movements, that we could save our world. So that is the original reason why I decided to come to Japan, hoping to learn it so that I could take it back and do something with that knowlege. What I know now is that that Wabi-sabi, Do and Sei, are uncommon in modern Japan, and an equivalence to Western Art is what is popular here now. I can't say that I haven't learned anything about it, but it is much harder to learn than anticipated, and I wonder if it is actually possible. There is, however, an underlying feeling that lingers, but the culture is so complex that it might have been more likely if I had come as a child.

First of all, it is probably not about taking from something or using something, but more about paths, and this is something that I did not understand in my youth. For me, the feeling in Japanese traditional art and life is something like this: it is like a silence that says that there are only a few correct paths that one can take, and that you must decide or be lost in the situation. But no one actually every comes out and says what someone must do, it is something that you have to feel out. Some people tell you, but they are your in-group(family or good friends), and very few. It would be very, very hard to try to teach how to move in this silent, thoughtful way to people who are used to being open and honest and not depending upon a particular path, but who can see that there are more options in the open air. I think that one of the difference in the cultures is that the Japanese think very hard about what the best path to take is, and if not, just stay on the one that they are on. For example, most people have no hobbies or only one, which they do to perfection. Ask them if they are bored. They aren't. In my home country, however, most people have several things that they enjoy doing, and if they aren't then they are bored. Most Japanese people have few friends. This is desirable. They can be silent, simply happy, appreciate the simple things in life, moving nowhere fast, thinking about everything before doing it, perhaps never stepping out of a comfort zone. But when they do decide to move, it is decisive and very strong in its direction. Most of my foreign friends have a lot of friends, and this suits them. Enjoying a variety of different people, working with different ideas, moving forward, somewhere, everywhere, quickly.

The long, slender, silent branch, with a single leaf and two berries, rising out of a small garden of leaves, versus a big bouquet of roses with smaller and bigger other flowers and colors, comes to mind. Many modern Japanese people however, might choose the bouquet over the simple arrangement, if you were to ask them to choose.

A mix of both might be best for our world, if it were possible. A seeking of a path, and then a blossoming into an area, but not too much, and then a change of path, and another blossoming into another area. I think, as in the very beginning at seven years of age, that if we take our time, and stop to think, that we might be able to change.

Dinner with Taeko

Yesterday, Shinpei and I had dinner with my friend Taeko. She is the same age as my mother, and her daughter is married to a Canadian man, and lives in Canada.

We had a delicious dinner with her and her friend. I am so happy to live close to other people now. We have lived here three months and I have met with people numerous times, as well as having all sorts of clases and arts, cultural resources, internet, supermarkets and thrift shops at a bike ride's distance. It is so nice hereeeeee!!!!

The Windblown Seed

A log set to drift...
An insect in a typhoon...
A seed carried to another land...

Sets root
as only it can
and it can only
survive in another land
where its leaves might grow strangely
or its flowers face another hill
against a sun
from another angle

But it sets root
into the earth
determined
by destiny
Set out to live
Punishment
and blessings
Life
as only can be seen
from this angle

Grow
Grow little seed
into that sun
into that mountain
It is the same air
the same sun
and the same Earth
in perspective

Immigrants' Stories

We have been watching The Sound of Music in the JHS 2nd grade class. First, I would like to say that I think this movie is amazing. What a great film. It has a bit of everything very well orchestrated into it. It is funny, sad, happy, elegant, down-to-earth, and very well composed. The directing, acting, and camera work is great. And the plot is really good. I saw this movie when I was about seven, but I was too young to know enough about life to appreciate it.
It constantly reminds me of my father in Mexico when we watch it. He is Austrian, and the movie is about Austrians. It shows us the culture before the second world war. It is a culture that I know he yearns for, a beautiful culture of elegant waltzes, classical music, quiet mountains, and many other things. I am sure, if I were to see a movie about Cuba, the same thing would happen with regard to my mother.
It makes me realize that I have chosen the same path. The path of the immigrant.
The other night I had a dream. I was in the mountains somewhere in California. I had met some people at the store. A young woman, a young man and an older woman. They were laughing and talking in the checkout isle. The man began to sing a short song, an addition to what we were talking about. And then the young checkout woman said to me "Why don't you stay here? It is fun, the people are nice. You would probably be happy here." I began to cry, and I woke up crying. It had been a long time since that happened. I realized how much I still missed being in the US, the way the people so freely greet strangers, and treat people like they are important, even if they don't know them, how easy it is to make real friends. But all of these feelings and this nostalgia are meaningless. The fact is that I am an immigrant. I have married a foreign man and moved to a foreign land. No one understands or cares, why should they? They didn't leave their homeland. I have chosen a lonely path, perhaps. Or perhaps it takes years to build a life, and most people have started from childhood, but I started 5 years ago, as an adult. I am not lonely with my husband; he is a lovely man, and very masculine and very proud. He is always at my side, if I should need someone, he is there for me. So I have the seed of a life here, and slowly, little by little, am meeting people and learning the language to a point of semi-literacy. And I am learning what it means to be Japanese, not in the obvious ways, but the ways that I am sure the Japanese Immigrants miss so much when they have left their home to live abroad. The quiet nature of homelife. What it means to be proud of yourself because you have really tried and prevailed at something, and then to keep going. Patience. The art of focus. And littler things... that I might not notice until I left, to go back to my homeland, and then looking back, realized how they had struck me so deeply. This may also be the plight of the Immigrant. That time and space always move forward, but that your become a part of that moving sphere, and once separated, are lost, in some part, forever. We can never go back. To where we were born, or to the place where we lived for some years.

Immigrants never forget their homeland. They never forget the way that people interacted. They never forget the little things, like how the place looked, the shapes and styles of things, when people smiled, when people connected, the sounds, the smells, the tastes. Those things may fall away with the years, changing, but for the immigrant, and perhaps, for the elderly as well, the nostalgia of a life never goes away. It lives forever in their hearts.

I am planting a garden. There is a Pineapple Guava in it. It is a rare ornamental here. I am also planting all sorts of citrus fruits, which are very popular here. I hope that my garden will flourish. It resembles my hopes.

It gets colder everyday now. At night we use heavy blankets and an electric carpet undeneath our futons. It gets more difficult to air out the futons in the winter, with the rain and cloudy, cold weather. The futons, light mattresses, are very easy to clean. After removing the bedding to be washed, they are taken outside and pounded on for a few minutes to get rid of dust and mites, and then left in the sun for a few hours to air out. It feels so good to sleep in a clean futon! I will never forget what it looks like underneath a traditional western mattress when I've moved them after months...

In the winter, it also becomes more difficult to wash clothes, because we, like most people in Japan, do not have a clothes dryer, instead hang them up in the sun. It is much better for the clothes, and saves on electricity, but is not a very good technique in the winter.

Hmm... I guess while I'm at it, I'll mention some things I like about my Japanese home. This is not a conclusive list; there are a lot of differences, some I like, some I don't like.

The toilet. When you flush, the clean water comes out of a spout on the top as the tank empties, so you can wash your hands after flushing. As you wash, it runs into the tank. I have a bar of soap on the corner, and a clean towel there.

The hot water heater. You push a button on a controller, and the water heater turns on. It takes seconds to get hot water anywhere in the house, and you can select the temperature from the controller. On top of that, it uses kerosene which is really cheap.

Tatami and hard wood floors only. This is pretty standard in Japan. If people want carpets, they buy a carpet to lay down. The tatami is used in the bedroom. It is a grass mat. It stays cool in the summer, just cool in the winter, and is very easy to clean. Liquids don't easily permeate it, and suface dust is easily vaccuumed. Hard wood floors can be found all over the states, but it seems that usually they are so expensive, although I did see some bamboo HdWd floors that are much cheaper, on exhibit at the Green Festival in San Francisco some years ago.

Thinking of houses and the way they are built reminds me of all the houses that I've lived in over the years. They were all great. I can't think of one that I didn't like at all. They all had their own special layout, and the places fit into their surroundings as though they were trees that had grown their, in some odd way. And best of all, they all inspired some experience or another to look back on. Where have you lived? What did you like about that place?