Toga! Toga!

Kawasock it to Me

This weekend I enjoyed hot barbecue and live music with about thirty of my best friends in a remote part of Toyama-ken called "Toga." About an hour outside the city, this magical forest escape in the misty mountains is a prime location for the ultimate backwoods party: and we took advantage to the fullest.

I arrived around two in the afternoon, welcomed coldly by a giant grey cloud drizzling rain over our soon-to-be indoor event. There was Kawasaki, the owner of one of the most unique houses I've ever visited and our host for the evening, fully dressed in poncho and construction hat, erecting the ugliest giant blue tarp roof you've ever seen over his front yard: the barbecue must go on. We hit the onsen in the meantime - a small one on the south side of town with an outside bath facing the green hills. The fog on the mountains had an eeriness about it, but anticipating the events about to unfold in the evening was more than enough to calm my nerves.

At around five pm, people started showing up. We grilled some monster fish for dinner, grooving to the eclectic sounds of Germany's disco supergroup "Dschingis Khan." A tap on the shoulder from a 5'3" sunglasses wearing Japanese bass player sporting a Mohawk and I found myself on stage rocking out to "Furusatou:" the official song of Toga village (written by Kawasaki himself). As our concert continued, we eventually made the smooth transition into "live karaoke" with me on the piano. James' version of George Michael's "Faith" was a performance deserving of sincerest praise.

With the subtle oriental sounds of Chinese synthesizers, the intro to Earth, Wind, and Fire's "Fantasy" sprung us into disco action. One by one people grooved on down into Kawasaki's driveway, the make-shift dance floor, until there was not a bum touching a seat. James', the self-appointed and overwhelmingly popularly supported MC, called an impromptu "ass shaking contest" during Toga dance fever classic "That's the Way I Like It." None of us could match the power of our friend Stephanie's amazing booty skills. It was a very moving moment in the evening.

Inside, the party was just as rocking. Kawasaki, the owner of about 50 different kinds of drums, had started an African style bongo jam with everyone lending a hand. My friend Haruko (from Queens) and I presented a traditional tristate area tribal dance, which won the praise and admiration of all those observing. There wasn't a dry eye in the house. Hilda was hugging... Laura was laughing... Everson was grunting... Ruth was rocking... everyone was in their element.

As the night came to a close, I took a short walk in the woods by myself. The thought couldn't help but pop into my head: I've traveled all over the world and made all kinds of acquaintances. But never have I had such an amazingly eclectic group of friends, each uniquely contributing something of their own to every gathering, each equally the life of the party. It's quite an awesome feeling, stepping back and knowing you're a part of something like this - it makes you regret the forward motion of time.

Star Trek

On a side note, I saw "Star Trek" yesterday. While the amazing special effects and giant spaceships were enough to numb the critical side of my brain for two hours, afterwards, I couldn't help but feel that an injustice had been done to the series. The new movie, which is supposed to tell the story of how the original Enterprise crew came to know each other, involved a villain who arrived from 25 years in the future through a black hole to kill Spock and destroy Vulcan. As a result, in the words of young Spock himself, the destiny of all the members of the Enterprise crew had forever been changed. In other words, none of the things you saw in the original Star Trek series and films ever happened thanks to this movie. Seemed like a cheap way to justify not bothering to stick to the original Gene Roddenberry storyline in the future sequels. I will say though that the American portraying Chekhov effected a flawless Russian accent. Molodets!

There Will Always Be an England

When you grow up with an uncle and a grandfather both named Benny Hill, you can't escape picking up some of that dry wit you so often hear about when discussing British humor (sorry, humour). Teemed with a non-stop "Only Fools and Horses" marathon last night on my computer, the little half-brit in me couldn't help but jump out and say "ello" this morning.

We were studying Easter Island in my second period class and the massive Moai sculptures adorning its breathtaking beaches. After a short documentary, my JTE and I had the following conversation in English:

Teacher: Boy, I'd sure like to visit Easter Island before I die.
John: Well, it'd be a bit of a bugger to try afterwards.

I might have missed the point of having easy English conversations in front of intermediate level Japanese students. My sentiments were confirmed by the overwhelming sound of crickets chirping in the classroom. Tough crowd!

Revelations

After reading a friend's recent blog entry, I understood something profound. She was recounting an essentially banal but somewhat deviating from the norm experience she had recently, noting that it made her think a bit differently about the world she lives in. However, she made the powerful distinction that she had not undergone some sort of life-altering experience, but rather just had a simple realization. I've noticed that my blog entries have a tendency to take a markedly less exciting event and turn it into some great lesson for all humanity:

I ate a sandwich today and realized that a slice of meat in between two pieces of bread was a metaphor for what Prince Siddhartha believed about the nature of reality.

I don't want my readers (whoever you two are) to think I fancy myself some sort of prophet, having apocalypses in between third and fourth period classes and writing them down in my blog over school lunch. My attempts to romanticize the events of my life often find me adding a moral to the story where there may not be any. Please excuse this tendency and consider I'm mostly doing it for a laugh.

Penny Black Attack

One thing I learned this weekend was the value of a good self-defense course. I know anyone who dares to set foot in Toyama's infamous "Penny Black," a mos eisly-esque expat hub where half the guys are seedy Russian car dealers, the rest look like avid members of the local al-Qaeda affiliate, and almost all the girls are working, is taking a big risk at having his face rearranged. And yet, out of boredom last Saturday, I made a pit stop over to Toyama's foreigner dive. Within five minutes and without saying a nasty word to anyone, I got karate chopped in the neck by a drunken Brazilian who was smoking outside.

Just one hit and this throwback to our Cro-Magnon origins was back in the club abusing ever more intently his own liver. You could call it a "so this is why I don't come here" moment. A big part of me wanted to knock this guy's teeth in, but I decided to restrain myself, got on my bike, and headed home. I felt a sadness that a normal, peace-loving guy like me couldn't just drop into a local club and enjoy a little disco dance without Nacho Sanchez giving me a hard time. It was frustrating as well; every guy knows the sense of emptiness, the lack of closure, when we deny ourselves the opportunity to punch someone back. Just walk away, it’s not worth it.

I always try to think “people like that will mess with the wrong guy one day, and then they’ll learn.” As it turned out for Kung-fu Carlos, today was that day. After I left, news of the recent scuffle reached my posse of Brazilian friends inside the club, who were dancing and enjoying themselves as well. Baffled by the nerve of this bag of feminine sanitary chemicals, they grouped up and sorted him out.

Now, I don’t get some kind of devious pleasure out of the image of a drunken toe rag lying bloodied in the street, but better he get his comeuppance now and learn his lesson, rather than finding himself at the mercy of a gang of murderous yakudza later. I guess that’s why it's good to have a reputation as a peacemaker. While I've had my moments of rage since I've been in Japan, people here know I only throw a punch when I feel my safety or the safety of my friends is endangered. Knowing me to be a laid back guy in that respect, my Brazilian friends, who might have otherwise just reasoned with the guy, were ever more infuriated that someone would treat me in such a vile manner. As a result, the haughty philistine got his stone in the head, and the decent, civilized folk of Toyama scored a victory over barbarism.

Clash of the Lanterns

It's 1820, and a bunch of bored Japanese people are sitting around the port town of Fusiki with nothing to do. So one night, probably under the influence of alcohol, they decide to gather the two biggest wooden carts in town, build them up about ten meters high, cover them in paper lanterns, and get the townsfolk to ram them into each other. A national pastime is born.

189 years later, here I am observing a time-honored Japanese tradition: the Kenkayama Festival. With about a thousand beer-breathed, screaming admirers jam packed into one small block of an otherwise dead suburb, I elbow my way onto the railing of a Shinto shrine for a stellar view of the action. The opponents face each other off. One team has traveled from a small town in the west part of the prefecture. The other is from somewhere up north. No one in the crowd really knows or cares who wins, but in the spirit of competition, we and our newly-made Japanese acquaintances begin cheering for Futsumachi, the team whose cart is closest to us (incidentally, one of their guys gave us a free beer, so our allegiance became an iron bond).

The carts are as tall as two story buildings, every inch adorned with paper lanterns save for a small five by seven box in the back sporting a confused-looking marionette. Fifty or so folks dressed in traditional Japanese yukattas grab the four-inch thick ropes at the bottom and begin pulling the carts to the opposing corners of the street, all the time chanting ancient battle songs. A single man in the “driver’s seat” rhythmically clicks together two hollow wooden batons.

With a whistle from the officiator, the two carts take off full-speed toward each other. The whole town erupts in screams and chants. People climb over one another; a young girl on her father’s shoulder perks up for a better view. Suddenly, the chaos is muted by a half-second of silence and BAM: the two carts collide, lanterns flying everywhere, shockwaves knocking the cart pushers back. When the smoke clears, a few lanterns have gone out, one or two have fallen to the ground, and everyone appears to be fine. No one in the crowd knows which team has been victorious, but it doesn’t matter. The excitement of the moment has everyone cheering again: let’s have another go.

Into the wee hours of the night, teams of lantern warriors battle it out, ramming each other incessantly until one, for reasons unbeknownst to anyone observing this madness, finally concedes victory to the other. It’s an event which the scores of tipsy Japanese festival frequenters can’t help but feel the epic nature of. We step back for a few minutes to catch our breath when suddenly I feel a consoling pat on the shoulder from the old man standing next to me: our dear Futsumachi was eliminated in the first round.

Short video from the festival: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVfBUP8bo9w

Good-bye, My Dear Uncle...

I lost my Uncle Benny today. The call came in from the states while I was at work. As he was driving to a construction job early yesterday morning, the police found him on the side of the road slumped over his steering wheel. It was a heart attack.

I hadn't spoken to him since Christmas. We'd all but lost touch when I started traveling: that's the sacrifice you make when you spend most of your life thousands of miles from home. I was very close with him during my formidable years. When my father was bogged down with work in South Jersey, Uncle Benny took on the task of raising me for a little while. He coached me through dating girls, taught me how to cope with moving away from my friends, and even helped me with my homework (though in certain subjects, such as Algebra, all he could offer was "X+Y=Benny gets an F). I spent most of seventh and eight grade with UB, as I called him then, listening to Guns and Roses and sneaking up to his room to watch South Park, pretending I understood all the adult jokes. Today, all I can think of is the unfulfilled promise I gave him when I left for Japan, "Let's have a beer together when I get back."

But he would never have blamed me for not making good on my suggestion. Uncle Benny was in every sense of the word an innocent bystander. All the forces that weighed him down, all the crap the world would throw at him - he never invited it. His lifestyle wasn't any better or worse than anyone elses and yet fate often treated him with a contempt that perhaps even the greatest of us could not have withstood. It always frustrated and angered my mother to see Uncle Benny suffer the way he did - losing his children and first wife, battling addiction, going through a divorce - but he would just brush it off with a joke or a simple "don't worry about it, Kath."

And so as though straight from the pen of Arthur Miller, Uncle Benny's quiet death on the side of the road reflected his nature in life. He wouldn't have dragged it out or dramatized it by slowly deteriorating over months or years. He wouldn't have subjected us to hours of hospital visits, though we would have gladly been there everyday by his side. We feel frustrated and bewildered that he was plucked from our lives so abruptly, but it was just his way: to live when he was alive and die without making a fuss.

That was how it always was between this man and those of us who loved him. We wanted to throw our fists in the air whenever bad things happened to him. We felt that fate had indiscriminately singled him out for a life of pain and unfairness, but he didn't see it that way. Uncle Benny knew that a good life was not just smiles and laughter, but a range of different experiences - sadness, relief, pain, hope, fear, elation - and that it is these experiences which make us human. He was a man who for much of his life crawled through the mud and suffered in silence. But that mud, which often dominates our reflections of his life, was merely a lifeless, gray mass in his eyes - a lack of form, against which shone the bright and colorful things that gave him joy; family, friends, music, laughter. By living this way, he brought us so much joy as well.

Thank you, Uncle Benny. Thank you for being real, for being hillarious, and for never disappointing us. May you continue to inspire even after your body has left us.