Osakatomebaby

After a busy day of catch-up for me, Melbotis came to the rescue with this Kenneth Burns spoof which is coincidentally a Microsoft demo by Al Franken. The world is wierd, but I do not seek to understand. Enjoy.

My dream last night involved several eggmen. Some of the eggmen were good. Some of the eggmen were bad. One of the eggmen was my friend, but he got a little cracked.

My mom's not going to like this, but since it seems to me the penguins are willing participants, and since I don't think there's a legitimate connection between computer violence and real violence (for *normal* people), here's my high score on this game. I disagree with Jim, I think I could get 593 if I could just get a good solid one on the shoulder and just enough spin.

Suddenly fighting compelling urge to kick pigeons...strange...

I was still too sick yesterday to even concentrate on a book for very long. Today I'm much better and have started into Tolstoy's Confessions. I think I am going to devour it.

But yesterday, having slept all day I wasn't good for much so I listened to a recent episode of To the Best of Our Knowledge. The host is a stuffy, pretentious guy, but they try to liven the show up with a little electronica or other semi-hip music, but it's no This American Life (all episodes of which I've already heard, so I had to find something else).

They do have interesting topics and interesting guests though. A lot of academics, but next to the host they sound pretty cool. Academics can be fun too ya know.

The show was about "kid culture" and how "being a kid has never been cooler" which sounds really silly coming out of this droll hyper-NPR voice. Almost a self-parody really. Anyway, it seems some dope somewhere caught on to what marketers have known for years--that people don't want to grow up--and wrote a book about it. Jim Fleming, the host, seems to have a particular aversion to care bears...it's almost creepy. I mean, yeah, they're cheesy and gimmicky but I thought that when I was a kid too.

He's also rather nonplussed by adults watching the cartoon network. Um, why is animation only for kids? I'm living in a whole country where this certainly is not the case. Of course I'm also living in a country that defines what they refer to as "rejuvenilism" (oh what a hideous coinage! god willing it will never make the dictionary). Cutesy images abound on everything from the endless phone charms (which I don't understand) to construction signs to giant frog-shaped trash bins.

Still, why the hard line between "kids'" and "adults'" entertainment? The best "kids'" entertainment is the stuff adults can stand to watch too--like sesame street. I still like the show. And muppets was for adults but kids liked it too. Too bad there aren't more shows that cross those boundaries.

(Okay, I feel a little bad that I was so hard on Fleming, since I do listen to his show sometimes and enjoy it. He's a good interviewer, he just needs to lighten up a little and stop sounding so bleedin' important.) (again pot::kettle)

More than anything, though, the problem I was seeing wasn't that adults may still like t-shirts or underwear with Grover (Cleveland--sorry) on them, but that these folks see this clear delineation between childhood and adulthood that's just much too strict. Kids are usually capable of a lot more maturity and intelligence than they are given credit for.

That's one rather controversial point that Marcel Danesi of the University of Toronto makes later in the show by noting the unnatural idea of "adolescence" in our society (wacky Canadians). According to him once kids are 13 or so they should be treated as legal adults, as they were in the past. He goes on a bit about how they ought to be able to join the military and so on, which is rather extreme. I guess I'd worry less about the kid who decided to do that than the guy at the other end of the gun. There's also the whole education issue he failed to address. It's one area where I suppose I do favor more paternalism. School's good for you, even though I could more or less have done without that agonizing senior year. But I don't see anything wrong with letting teens vote. And don't even get me started about parental consent and birth control issues. Fortunately my own mother trusted me enough to let me decide about such things on my own. You ROCK mom.

The middle segment of the show made about no sense. It's about adults liking kids music. Again, why so baffling? The more baffling question, I think, is why are so many kids programs so stupid? Why did Barney bastardize perfectly good folk songs into sickly sweet humorless earworms? I know what I'm talking about here, my sister was a tot at the time this stuff was big.

The real problem isn't kids not growing up fast enough. It's people thinking childhood is some idyllic time. It's not. It's just more black and white. The younger you are the more you're either in uncontrollable fits of glee or in utter world-shattering despair.

The last guest was brilliant. Maurice Sendak who recently illustrated the book Brundibar which is an adaptation of a Czech opera, and which was performed 55 times by children in Terezin, a Nazi model concentration camp. That's 55 different troupes of children performing for foreign guests to demonstrate how happy they were in camp and that these weren't "bad" places at all. 55 troupes who were then sent on to Auschwitz and the like. And the story is about kids confronting evil. Very creepy. Knowing that I think it would be a lot scarier for the parent reading the story (about kids competing with the tyrannical Brundibar in order to save their dying mother) than the kid hearing just the story.

Sendak also talks about being a Jewish kid in the 1920's and how "everyone knew" what was going on--how friends and relatives were disappearing. How his dad kept records of which villages had been hit. He describes how he grew up in this atmosphere of grief. But he doesn't see it as limited to himself or that time and place. He remembers feeling smaller and weaker than others as a child. I know as a kindergartener I thought 5th graders were pretty scary (my sister on the other hand, said "I've never seen a 5th grader"--it sounded like "I don't think they exist"--she's very matter-of-fact). And he tells the story of a little girl who witnessed 9/11 and softened the story intentionally for her parents. I've seen kids do that too--be very stoic because it's what the adults needed.

I do think kids are a lot tougher than adults. Partly because their capacity for abstract thought isn't totally developed yet, I suppose. But for whatever reason, they're not the fragile, delicate beings we build lots of protective walls around and they certainly don't need to be buried in beanie babies to fend off the shock and horror of adulthood.

No, kids aren't just little adults, but they're not aliens either. Just because they're entranced by crummy entertainment, doesn't mean it's good "kid entertainment". Nor do adults need to be stuffy humbugs who run in fear of stuffed animals.

Care bears: CARE!

Boo.

When I'm looking to kill some time and since my DVD player is kaput (thanks a lot HP--I bought this machine in July and to fix it they want me to send it back to the states which would mean a minimum of two months before I get it back, yeah right) I sometimes go to this website where they've posted films that I guess the studios have released the copyright on. Mostly stuff from the 1930's or so and which, for one reason or another, will never be shown on tv.

It's quite interesting simply because I think there's a lot of history there. Not that they're particularly good movies, but a major reason I can see for letting the copyrights lapse is that a number of the films are patently racist and offensive. No I guess this stuff shouldn't be on TV except maybe as clips in a documentary or something. But the thing that fascinates me about it is that these were considered "mainstream" a mere 70 years ago. In a sense I think they should be preserved, which I guess they are partially online.

So yesterday I decided to see what qualified as a documentary in the 30's and watched Africa Speaks which claims to be a document of the first trans-African trek by motor vehicle. A dubious claim but it does contain quite a lot of interesting footage of Africa in the 20's actually. To create continuity the studio shot a number of filler scenes in a studio showing the "explorer" Paul Hoefler and his cameraman ostensibly in Africa filming and commenting on the action which, even in the 30's had to look wired...who's filming the cameraman? Of course the narration is predictably bad. They make fun of Pygmies, including one off-hand comment that was just wired about the king's wives, "They're shy...when the king's around." ?!?!?

But the part that really disturbed me is that at the climax. They visit a Masai tribe and the king offers to have his son help them look for lions to film. Then, according to the film, the boy gets eaten by a lion. It's obvious that this part is re-enacted (assuming it happened at all, which is a stretch), but they do, in the reenactment, actually shoot a lion to death. You can see it curl up and then slowly extend it's limbs as the life goes out of it. And their only comment, perhaps meant in stoic fashion but it doesn't come off as such, "It's going to be hard to tell the old king about Keiga."

In retaliation the tribesmen gather and hunt down a lion, but the fact that they kill the lion and don't rejoice seems to baffle the Americans. They chalk it up to the fact that the men respect the lion. Um, just an idea here but maybe they're a little upset about Keiga? Then the Americans start to get nervous that maybe they're going to get it next. About the only intelligent reaction they had.

I have the diablucous. That's my mom's word for any vague yucky illness. And I've got it. It's days like this when I just want to be at my folks house curled up under a pile of afghans waiting for mum to bring me some chamomile tea with honey or dad or sis to come give me a backrub. Or Drew to walk by and tell a joke to cheer me up.

And every time I get sick I remember one night back in my old co-op days when I had a hideous diablucous and it seemed incomprehensible to step outside to get some medicine at the convenience store across the street. Cristin and Taletha went even though it was the middle of the night, and a cold one. They were my heroes.

Today my boss is my hero just because she didn't make me justify my being sick like tell my temperature or anything. I just called her up, "How are you doing?", "Not well," "Why don't you take the day off?" It was like a dream. I had even looked up the celcius (38.8) since my thermometer is in farenehit (102). I don't think it's discrimination because foreign teachers are at the mercy of the corporation as so many burned-out teachers would have you believe. I'm "drinking the kool-aid" I suppose, but the staff and Japanese teachers often come in when they're not well. Today, I just couldn't.

It's a real problem for the school if teachers get sick because they don't have subs and they have to cancel classes. I haven't worked out the economics of it, but I often wonder if it wouldn't do to have a couple more emergency teachers or at least some part-timers on call. Of course I don't want to walk out the door into the cold, but I also doubt my students want to be trapped in a small room with me infecting everyone. Yet there doesn't seem to be an alternative.

So I slept till 6pm and I'm going back to bed now. I've been drinking orange juice like it's going out of style, and I finally forced myself to eat some Ramen. Still, I'll have to go in tomorrow evening and Saturday. Just no way around it. Hopefully sleeping in till tomorrow afternoon will help.

Funny. One of my students is moving to Chicago for his company for five years and he's quite worried. His English is quite good for someone who hasn't lived abroad, but he'll have a lot to learn. He's a salesguy. Pretty cool overall, but I had to laugh when I heard his biggest concern was that if he gets sick in the States there won't be anyone to take care of him. It's so sweet to think this otherwise quite daring fellow is worried about being taken care of.

I mean, I can understand. You get used to it, but there's always the idea of that chamomile and honey. ~sigh~

I'm inclined to agree with the Socialists even though I haven't seen Lost in Translation yet (due here in May) or a quarter of the films up for Academy of Awards.

"Aside from [a couple of nominees]...the films nominated remain resolute in their commitment to uncovering nothing important about modern life--under conditions of unprecedented social crisis and global volatility."

It seems that changes to the Academy's policies this year benefit studios at the expense of indies. Basically, there's a shorter time period in which judges can make their selections and the Academy published (and then reneged) on the policy that, "to avoid piracy concerns", judges could not view films at home on video or DVD. Meaning indies got squeezed out from competing and as a result fewer will be shown in theaters this year.

Not that I have to give up watching the Oscars. The only time I did, Julia Roberts sobbed like an idiot and I vowed never to waste my time on it again. Nevertheless...

Shame on you Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences! SHAME!

I am an island.

As 25% of my loyal readership just pointed out. No links. I know. This is blogging for it's own sake. I will probably add some links to blogs I read soon, but frankly if my only readers are people who know me, that's fine. I'm not an egomaniac and one of my first navel-gazing tenets was no link-mongering.

My newest reader, another friend, said this of the blog today:

I very much enjoyed what I read, and will definitely come back. You're entirely too sensible though -- if you posted something good and inflammatory, I'd comment on it.

Mind you this is the guy who told me about the longstanding animosity between Michael Moore and Slate. All links to which seem to have disappeared in this election year. Spooky. He and I probably don't have a lot to argue about anyway other than the tastiness of avocados.

Me: Yum!
He: No.

Very well. I have a cold, so I'll make it short. Regarding this weblog:

It is demonstrable that things cannot be otherwise than as they are; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end.

No? Okay, a question:

I would be glad to know which is worst, to be ravished a hundred times by*...pirates, to have one buttock cut off, to run the gauntlet among the Bulgarians, to be whipped and hanged at an auto-da-fe, to be dissected, to be chained to an oar in a galley; and, in short, to experience all the miseries through which every one of us hath passed, or to remain here doing nothing?

Edited for political correctness on account of my younger readers. Not that they read this far down...but they might. No doubt the word "buttock" will catch one small eye.

Thanks Jim! Here's where I've been (in red). Mostly One good drive up the east coast could take care of a lot of the rest, but I'll probably make it to Hawaii or Alaska first.



create your own visited states map
or write about it on the open travel guide

Now what would be really cool is an international map where I could check my progress on my life goal at age 16 which was to have a lover in every country.

I did something besides study today.



Nothing like the original. Oh well.

Why does Blogger spell-check try to replace "y'all" with "Yale"? I cannot possibly be the only person writing in the Southern vernacular.

*High falutin' -- Steamboats developed high, fluted stacks to spew the hot cinders and smoke away from the paying passengers. People rich enough to travel by steamboat were high falutin' folks.

I don't understand why everyone is so thrilled with their camera phones. When I got mine I asked about getting one that could take a decent picture--I could have gotten the free one, but I wanted to be able to use it as an actual camera. Plus I knew that once you get a phone it's a massive pain to change to a new device and keep the same number.

The sales rep showed me two upgrade options, one with a removable memory card I'd have to get a reader for, and another without. The cameras were the same. I figured go with the cheaper one. "I can just email the pictures, right?" "Sure."

Lies. Lies. Lies.

It took some doing to realize that, while I can take a decent picture, and even video clips, there is a limit on the email size so I can't get the damn things out of the phone. If I take a slightly lower quality image, I can email it in four pieces and reassemble it in Photoshop. When I realized this, I thought, "that can't be right".

The phone has a 20 chapter manual--19 in Japanese and 1 in English. Seeing as how this is a Japanese-speaking country I think that's more than reasonable. And most of what I need to know to operate the thing is there anyway, but not this, so I called up the English support line (also an appreciated convenience).

After explaining my problem emailing pictures I got the long "hmmmmmm" response which means "we are not going to be able to help you". Just to confirm in my most differential voice I asked, "so it's not possible to email the full pictures from this phone?" The operator seemed very relieved to have been saved the embarassment of stating the obvious and agreed that that was the case. Which begs the question, why offer the higher resolution in the first place?

I'm writing this, and I know I'm missing something, but when I think about it I know that I'm not. All the unnecessary bells and whistles on this thing make me certain it's just another feature for it's own sake. Zen engineering? Who knows, probably even if I shelled out the ¥3,000 more for the stupid memory card and bought a reader, I would have had some other gripe. Just means I have to lug around my big old digital camera (which was small when I bought it in 1999) if I want to show y'all what I'm talking about.

This stuff doesn't normally get to me. You gotta roll with the punches when you don't speak the language and aren't a native of the culture, and I promise not to rant more than once a season about my cultural cluelessness since it's there are enough blogs doing that already. But I do think this story is instructive for anyone thinking about which phone to get.

All or nothing. Don't settle for mediocre!

Part 1: HoustonChronicle.com was the first new outlet to break the story of the media frenzy on Moveon.org's recent publicity. According to the publication, news outlets have given Moveon.org significantly more coverage than playing their actual ad would have, had it passed CBS's stringent screeners.

Aside from that absurdity, there was a quote that irked me:

"We see it as a free speech issue," said Eli Pariser, campaign director for Moveon.

Why am I somehow more offended by this now becoming the issue than I was by the rejection? (Besides the fact that it distracts from the message of the ad in question, which I agreed with?)

I think I just answered my own question.

I respect what these folks are working for, but they have a problem staying on topic (pot::kettle). Hello, org. If you really think the ad was the best message, best conveyed out of 1500+, and I liked it, why are you suddenly changing the subject from budget deficit to public ownership of the airwaves gall darn it. Don't get distracted by the media's self-referential nature. Use it for what it's worth. You are just playing into their hands.

This is why liberals are known as "whiny".

He goes on to try and do some unnecessary and unsuccessful damage control:

"We're not against the White House running an ad,"...in reference to an anti-drug message from the White House that will air during the game.

People noting it in blogs and articles isn't you saying it. And they're just pointing out an irony--don't protest so much, lady.

Part II: I used to love Michael Moore. Well, I still like his movies, but I can't stand his grandstanding and egoism (except when I'm in an especially absurdist frame of mind). The first time I ever saw him was at a UT screening of "The Big One". I think he got the best of whoosit at Nike, but I was young and I don't actually remember.

I went to a lot of speeches at that time.

The best was by Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry's in 1994. Jerry spoke first. It was a well-timed, well organized event (with very very good free ice cream). I didn't know who they were either. Frankly, being from Tulsa I hadn't even heard of them. Tulsa was a Hagen Daaz town.

The spiel was basically this: Jerry was the set-up man. The opening act. He warmed up the crowd by telling how, in the early days, they started this business from scratch, played a lot of hippie games and so on. He kept emphasizing that Ben was a total nut and a lot of fun. Then he talked a bit about the cool things they were doing like employing ex-convicts in brownie production. Stuff like that.

Then Ben was up: tie-died Grateful Dead shirt and shorts, big Walt Whitman beard. He harangued the audience of mostly undergrad liberal arts majors for a full...I don't know, hour?...about the national defense budget and how it was all our fault for being liberal arts majors and we ought to go get our butts into business school because if we really cared enough to come here him talk about a successful alternative business then we really ought to go undercover in corporations and take over from the inside. Like I said, I had no idea what I was in for. It was well done. (I graduated in Asian studies anyway).

I also marched with the 300 or so protesters who sat in at the UT School of Law after Jesse Jackson spoke to a crowd of 5,000. I had been notably uncomfortable during the public prayer--I could handle that stuff at Catholic school, even went voluntarily, but in front of the tower it was...weird.

The protest itself was over the Hopwood decision--or no, actually over Graglia. Despite being the biggest protest at UT in the 1990's, it was a joke (well...come to think of it, there may not be any irony here after all). The organizers didn't have any repore with the crowd. Much less charisma. Besides that they were a pretty uptight bunch. When some protesters tried to start a non-sanctioned spontaneous protest chant they got shushed. Meanwhile the leaders were rather pathetically begging everyone to stay because pizza was on the way.

I'd like to apologize to Susan Napier for missing her much more interesting class that day. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

In truth, I wasn't really particularly supporting these folks--I have always had issues with how affirmative action actually works. Instead I was there for totally selfish reasons, I just wanted to see what happened first hand. When I realized it wasn't going anywhere and that my job at the women's co-op was probably more important I left. Well, right after I had a piece of pizza anyway.

Then two years ago there was a big tent liberal rally called Rolling Thunder. Of course I went. It was organized by Jim Hightower and, I don't know, a lot of people and there were all manner of interesting organizations in little booths. They were supposed to be "coming together" to discuss a unified liberal agenda of sorts (based on the idea that conservatives are more organized and liberals too scrappy).

Of course that wasn't what was happening at all, they were all competing for support and $$$ as usual. I did come across some interesting orgs but I didn't end up getting involved with any of them. The best one, I think, was called the Inside Books Project which collects used books to donate to prisons.

The agenda was tight--there was a new speaker every half hour alternated with rock bands on two ends of a rodeo arena. Unions, ex-Enron employees, Molly Ivins. As you might guess, Michael Moore was on the roster. He had just published Stupid White Men and I had my yet-unread copy in my bag right next to Abbie Hoffman's Revolution for the Hell of It...just in case.

Ben Cohen had the last slot. I talked to a lot of people, and asked "Are you staying to hear Ben?". "Who's that?". "One of the founders of Ben and Jerry's, the guy who paid for the big inflatable pie chart of the national budget and giant nuclear weapon." "Oh. No, but I can't wait to hear Michael Moore."

And at 3:00 he was on. He was supposed to talk for half an hour. Everyone crowded into the arena--booths were abandoned. He didn't even say anything for about the first five or ten minutes. Literally. He was standing there giggling like a kid with a fit. When he finally started to speak he didn't say anything either, but a lot of people cheered anyway. He totally ignored the agenda and went on for an hour. Honestly if I could remember anything he said or even the topic I would tell you. And no, I was not on drugs. I think everyone else was.

So having screwed up the schedule and leaving the organizers in the lurch he proceeded to his book signing in an adjacent building. The crowd followed. I thought, well I'm here, might as well get the autograph at least. But when I walked out at my leisurely pace I saw a line a good mile long. What the hell? Everyone wanted their dumb autograph and nothing was happening in the tent anymore.

Life is too precious y'all, and I don't stand in lines. So I left, thinking, I'll come back at six to hear Ben, but of course I didn't, I was too irritated. I went and hung out with my hippie architect friend and we drank wine and I was much happier.

Later I tried to read Stupid White Men to see if maybe I was just missing something, and Moore had really given an inspirational, resounding speech which I was just too dense to understand the subtleties of. I gave up after the first chapter. I knew his data was dubious, but he is a funny guy and I don't mind people going a little overboard to make a point. And he obviously moves people into action--at least the action of standing in line to bask in his presence.

What I hadn't realized when I bought the book was that it would read like it was written by a irritated 5th grader and lacking the humor that makes him palatable (and effective). I gave it away as quickly as I could--and not to Inside Books. That would amount to cruel and unusual punishment for some unlucky inmate.

Michael Moore is an embarrassment. I forgave MoveOn for having him as the main presenter because he does have cache. And Margaret Cho was dumb too, but funny. But like I said, it was a in-group thing and it was supposed to be entertainment around a larger cause, which was the issue.

Now I'm not so sure. I really thought this ad (which is, after all, showing on CNN this week) would signify some folks coming together behind a cause, but it looks like just more disorganized and undirected liberal angst. Why do I keep giving people the benefit of the doubt?

Coincidentally in writing this I thought of the fellow who had introduced me to Ben Cohen and found him here. I mentioned him to Jim and found out they had once had a bit of a scrap. Jim won (Jim always wins). Austin is a small world.

*I hereby vow to stop blogging on MoveOn.org. I'll be the first to formally end the free publicity (to my staggering readership, anyway). Besides that, you probably didn't read this post all the way to the end anyway.*

Every time I come to Japan the yen gets stronger. Coincdence? I think not.

Conversely when I last went back to the States the economy crashed. I know there's a flaw in my logic here, but for the life of me...

Martin D. Franks, executive vice president of CBS, is evidently also responsible for superbowl ad selection. An article in the New York Times investigates CBS's rejection of the Anti-Bush MoveOn.org commercial dealing with Bush's budget deficit.

"...we don't want those who have deep pockets to have an undue influence on the debate."

Are we talking about the same 2,000,000 member nonprofit organization? Last I checked CBS had no objection to big corporations running dubious pr ads about how they are working to save the environment or feed developing nations.

Regarding ads they have approved:

"If you can find somebody responsible who is for drug abuse...or...teenagers seeking to smoke, then it would be a credible rebuttal of our policy."

I guarantee if tobacco advertising weren't illegal they wouldn't be taking this stance. As for drug abuse, well duh (rolls eyes) no one thinks that's good, but the ad is coming from the White House, and the illegality of at least some drugs is a major political issue. More than anything, a top TV exec giving the NYT such a transparent and very hokey challenge just shows that the guy either has no respect for print media (NYT in particular) or he's been in TV too long and doesn't know sound bites are a lot more dubious in print.

Asked about last year's drug policy advertisement that linked drug sales to international terrorism, Mr. Franks said, "Is it an absolutely perfect system? Absolutely not. On the other hand, the MoveOn.org ad wasn't even close. I didn't need to rewind that one in the VCR."

Lucky for them this one didn't accidentally slip through. Whew!

My mom's reaction to this blog:

Wow!!! What a lot of writing...

link / posted by Molly @ osakatomebaby : 01:08

Well I haven't gotten the Vintage Murakami I ordered yet, but I had an hour to kill yesterday in Umeda so I hung out in Kinokuniya and checked it out (yeah they had it).

Yes, it's a reprint of existing works. Whatever. Except, that is, for a short story which is the last inclusion. So I stood there and read "Iceman" in the store. There aren't--or I haven't seen--bookstores like B&N or Book People here. But people do seem to stand in the aisles and read quite a bit, so...why not?

"Iceman" was published in the New Yorker recently, if I'm not mistaken. It's worth the price, even if you've read everything else in the book. Why? Murakami is a master of the short, but this is one of his best--at least if you tend to the chilling emotional aspects of Murakami.

I'm currently reading The Dying Animal by Philip Roth and among other things, his professor protagonist bemoans his son being:

...one of those overheated kids for whom whatever he reads has a personal significance that eradicated everything else germane to literature.

Not that I don't see his point, but his character is a hypocritical twit anyway, and...um...well I took this a little personally. I like books that communicate something I can recognize or relate to. I like a little subtlety, and above all good story-telling, all of which is why I'm hating this Roth book. If this is "Literature", it can go take a flying leap. Mind you I have to finish the book. I'm hoping an unsubtle act of vengance is inflicted on the main character at wich point I'll sing its praises and start touting the morality tale.

"Iceman" on the other hand, is good story-telling--a tragedy where the fatal flaw is nothing more than the narrator following her heart. If I see a personal significance, it's in going out on a limb and doing something a bit off without really considering, or in full denial of, the consequences.

Besides how could anyone *not* relate to a Murakami narrator? They feed the cat, always have a beer in the fridge, make excuses to do what they want, have regrets, and are constantly trying to get to the bottom of something that's eluding them. That's how everybody feels, right?

Anyway it gave me the shivers.

Visited Kurama onsen, north of Kyoto Sunday. It was surprisingly convenient to get there, just an hour and a half or so away, and quite reasonable as well for a day trip.

But first we stopped in at Kurama-dera which was well worth it. For one thing, I saw snow for the first time in many years. Not that snow itself is exciting, but it's pretty on the mountains. Hiking to the top of the mountain, you'd occasionally hear a shushing sound as a big patch of snow would slide off. There were quite a few pilgrims wearing plastic bags on their heads to keep dry. I got lucky and didn't get hit, but I probably wouldn't have cared if I did. Especially by the time I got to the top and saw the lovely view. It's so close to the city, yet this is really countryside because of the religious importance of the area and because it's not particularly suitable for building I suppose.

The temple's been around since 770, but the main hall was rebuilt in 1971 after a fire (possibly related to the fire festival video site), but it's quite lovely and there were some beautiful chants emanating from the interior. It used to be a Tendai temple, but has since founded its own sect known as Kurama-Kokyo.

According to the brochure:

"More than six million years ago, Mao-son (the great king of the conquerors of evil and the spirit of the earth) descended upon Mt. Kurama from Venus, with the great mission of the salvation of mankind. Since then, Mao-son's powerful spirit governing the development and the evolution not only of mankind but of all living things on Earth has been emanating from Mt. Kurama..."

Some history too:

There is the interesting story...of the warrior called Ushiwaka-maru (later known as Minamoto Yoshitsune, 1159-1189). When he was a young lad, he took military arts under the "Tengusan" (subjugator of evil) at Kurama, and he went on to become an excellent soldier.

There was also a museum we could have done, although I didn't realize it till I got home and actually read the brochure they give you at the temple (which I skim, unceremoniously stuff in my pocket and promptly forget).

There are quite a few sake barrels on display at various shrines around the temple. Which reminded us that it was quite cold and we'd better be getting on to the onsen.

My massage therapist friend back home would be proud of me. I went back and forth from the hot springs to the freezing cold water I imagined was the freshly melted snow. Who knows? He and I used to do that with our hands and buckets of water on a very regimented pattern and at precise temperatures. It's supposed to increase circulation and release tension--him from doing massage and me from working at the computer all day. Well it worked. After that I hit the sauna, which is when I finally stopped feeling the rush of normal life. Or more precisely, I realized that normal life is rushed and there are other ways to be.



Of course there was a great lunch. Duck nabe, sashimi and the best rice I've had, ever, mixed with mountain vegetables. Plus hot sake, you can't go wrong.



Followed by another bath. This is the life. Every time I go to an onsen I wonder why I don't go more often.

Who knew William Gibson reads Murakami? Good for him. I quite enjoyed Neuromancer and would like to get around to reading more of his work sometime. It's on my list anway.

I was introduced to Neuromancer and cyberpunk by a friend who authored a rather successful first novel in the genre (go buy it). His book site needs to be updated, but that's just because he recently moved. Haven't seen a blog from him either. Guess real writers save it for when they'll get paid. Smart. He and his wife are also serious vegans, so I wonder what they think of my recent PETA-bashing. Wonder if I'll ever know...

So, Murakami. Did I mention Murakami? Evidently Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973 have been published in translation and are just impossible to get ahold of*.

I am told HTWS is "available in Japan". Oh dear. If it's not at Kinokuniya I'll have to attempt the trek to the used English book seller in Kobe. Otherwise, I may just have to read one of the million other authors on my shelf. I can obsess but I know there are more things in this world that are dreamt of, etc etc. Anyway, even if I can't get my fix, I've converted at least one person in the last month and that's a high all it's own.

And as far as "getting a fix" of things "available in Japan", I'll hit the big Tower Music (and Video) in Umeda Monday to look for a Wong Kar Wai box set for someone who shall go unnamed.

*Winston Churchill on ending sentences with prepositions: "This is the kind of grammar up with which I will not put!"

I'm going to attempt to go to this onsen tomorrow, north of Kyoto and smack dab in the saddle of the pommel horse--which I assume has something to do with the mountains in that area (which are quite lovely). Not sure quite how to get there. I can get to the town, but after that I am confident that a sufficient amount of hand waving and asking questions like, "which way is north" in Japanese will do the trick.

I'm not sure, but it might have snowed there. hope hope hope.

This brings up another question. How and where did the gymnastic sport of the pommel horse arise? Another question for the universe...

This blog has now officially been around long enough to legitimately have additional content in the archive. In some sad, narcissistic way I miss the stuff that's not on the page anymore.

MoveOn.org's bid for a Super Bowl ad was nixed yesterday by CBS. It's not a shock, considering the controversies (1, 2) around the contest that produced the ad.

(For the record it was a liberal-in-group awards show, not a political debate. So yes there were a lot of entertainers going overboard. It was-gasp-funny, in part because Margaret Cho is so obnoxious and anyway, you can hardly get a sense of a comedy routine from the transcript. The wierdest part is how Michael Moore finally got upstaged).

CBS chalked their response up to a policy against running political issue ads. Fair enough, it's their network and they have to deal with conflicts with other advertisers as well as viewer response so I guess in they can reject it on whatever grounds they like and it's nice that they have a policy to justify it.

Salon.com observes that it's likely MoveOn.org expected the rejection, but knew they'd get some press out of it anyway--exactly what PETA did intentionally on behalf of their unmoving, cheap-shot of an ad. If you ask me, MoveOn.org just played it smart. They probably really wanted to get the Super Bowl slot, but they had a back-up plan.

Unlike the PETA ad, the MoveOn.org ad is classy. Yes it fails to capture their primary issue, opposition to the War in Iraq, but so what? It's not their most effective issue. MoveOn recognized that anti-war rhetoric only preaches to the choir. Instead they went for mainstream appeal. The budget deficit isn't as edgy as opposition to the war or calling Bush being a "big fat liar", or dead soldiers, but the ad is an emotionally compelling story well executed.

I have to disagree that the message is unclear or that the appearance is too polished--contradicting the original aim of the contest which was, in part, to demonstrate grassroots power. For one thing, having an ad on par with a Fortune 500 branding piece does do that. Apart from that, all I can do is quote from verse 17 of the Tao Te Ching (which you might remember is largely a manual on how to maintain and use political power), "When you do not trust the people, you make them untrustworthy." In other words, stop insulting our intelligence.

Ah well, it really is too bad that CBS sees the deficit as too controversial and has decided to run an anti-smoking spot and a commercial from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy instead. At least people won't have to watch that nasty PETA ad.

Back to beating the dead horse again, Errol Morris was nominated for a DGA award this week for outstanding directorial achievement in commercials for 2003--which also lead me to discover he had directed the Ellen Fleiss Apple commercials of Internet renown and some evidently very successful Miller High Life commecials. I was aware he did commercials, but the Ellen one was a trip to discover. For better or worse I have not seen the commercial for which he was nominated, nor did it turn up in a quick search. So.

At the end of a very impressive list of films that ought to be released on DVD (and which I promise to read in it's entirity someday when I might be able to watch some of them) Jim politely adknowledged my suggestion that Morris' debut, Gates of Heaven, was long overdue. Whether you like Roger Ebert or not, he did put it on his top 10 list (which sadly I cannot locate in it's entirity). In his words:

When I put it on my list of the 10 greatest films ever made, I was not joking; this 85-minute film about pet cemeteries has given me more to think about over the past 20 years than most of the other films I've seen.

Well golly, it's good. But having seen Vernon, Florida first I'm partial, even though GoH preceeded it.

(update: just realized Vernon, Florida isn't on DVD either!, what an unforgivable oversight).

The government is enforcing the unnatural proportions of porno manga? God forbid the pictures be "realistic".

The Japan Supreme Court's definition of pornography:

anything "unnecessarily sexually stimulating, (which) damages the normal sexual sense of shame of ordinary people, or is against good sexual moral principles".

Normal? Ordinary? Shame? Good? Well, that makes it clear. But again, I'm reading in translation. ~sigh~

Not that I like the stuff (pr0n). It is irritating to see the occasional train perv reading it out in the open. Someday (not in my lifetime) people will get inundated enough with media that we'll all max out and get over hollow images.

...I can dream can't I?

No matter what I do, taxes go up and the government bureaucracy keeps increasing in Yourego! And what's with the fact that I'm 31st out of 47 in terms of largest welfare programs? I cut everything but education! How the heck did my political freedoms get to be merely average?

I'll tell you how, because I dismiss half the issues--yet I get bureaucracy. Feh.

I know where I'm going on the next weekend I can get away. The world needs a few ninjas. It's just past Nara where I used to live. For some inexplicable reason I never ventured there...or out of Nara that often for that matter...probably because Nara's just such a nice laid back place it never occurred to me to leave.

Konishiki got married. Come to think of it, I haven't seen him in much advertising lately. He used to be the staple celeb, but now it seems Daid Beckham is.

Don't know who Konishiki is?

Man mountain Konishiki, 40, is nicknamed the Dump Truck and the Meat Bomb, and is [Sumo's] heaviest-ever wrestler.

At one meal, he is said to have washed down plates of roast chicken, beef, lamb and fish with 120 bottles of beer, two-and-half gallons of tequila and ten shots of whisky.

Man mountain??? I take it that's a play on "mountain man"? I'm not going to get over that one...

I just discovered that he released a new film entitled The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara.

Agonies! There is not a chance I will be able to see it. Morris has an astounding ability to elicit from his subjects while totally obscuring his own interaction with them, so it's both alarming and thrilling to know that he has not edited out his own questioning of McNamara--giving us the opportunity to see him at work.

Yes I guess my bias shines through since I'm more interested in the documentarian than his subject matter which is astoundingly short-sighted of me, especially in this context. But then, I can't see it so I don't want to start speculating about the content and anyway, US Military history is not my strong suit. (I'd appreciate good book recommendations. I have plenty of time to read before I get access to this thing).

I have a twisted amateur obsession with his work for other reasons, and every time I hear the soundtrack from Fast, Cheap & Out of Control used as background music on This American Life (or anything else for that matter) I get a little thrill. Once when I was having a really rotten time, I swore off all fiction. In fact, I couldn't have sat through five minutes of the stuff. I started plowing through the documentary sections at Vulcan and I Love Video. It was that kind of mood. After devouring Morris and his worshippers (is that a metaphor? but it's too weird to delete) and a SXSW film festival later I was ready to face the fictional world again--mainly because no one could live up to his style of ironic documentary filmmaking (he's more of less the father of the genre).

I don't know if I could give up fiction for a world of Errol Morrises, but it would certainly be tempting.

I'm adding League of Melbotis to the very short list of blogs I read. I just haven't settled into a pattern (in anything...ever), I flit and float from flower to flower.

Damn, sounds like the chu-hai is talking again.

Melbotis is in fact partly responsible for the existence of this blog even if he doesn't realize it, because I suddenly found the urge to express myself through his holiday media contest and once I started...

By the way, Melbotis mentioned his concern about beating a dead horse. As an art fan I imagine he would appreciate Errol Morris's thoughts on the subject.

There was another attack on school children in Kansai last week (after two last month), this last one was a stone's throw from me.

Meanwhile I still frequently get the comment that America is dangerous (the movie Bowling for Columbine didn't help). My sneaking suspicion is that it's six of one half a dozen of the other. I'm pretty sure there's plenty of violence in Japan, although the stuff that gets reported in English is pretty much of the weird fringe variety because there's such a huge market for it.

My own experience is quite to the contrary. I've been fortunate not to have been a victim of violent crime in the States, and it's not that I've been particularly conservative.

On the other hand I've been directly involved in and have seen other acts of violence on at least four occasions in Japan. Two were street fights, one was when a kid on drugs decided to beat the crap out of my friend because he was hanging out with a foreigner (and mostly just because he was way whacked out--it took five cops in riot gear to subdue him), and one time I got groped on a quiet street by a kid on a bike. (If this happens to you I'd recommend screaming like a girl if you think there's a chance someone might come, I yelled like a sailor and had a very very frightened walking home).

Disclaimer, of course there are a lot more people in close proximity here. Whereas in Texas, I would see maybe a hundred people in a day, I can easily see ten times that walking though the Osaka/Umeda stations. So the odds of seeing violence are certainly higher. What I theorize though, is that there's also just less reporting of crime.

A few days in and I'm breaking one of my original tenets regarding cultural comparisons, but I hope this is in the interest of finding the truth behind the notion that Japan is so safe. That, and looking into the political myth that foreigners are responsible for a disproportionately high amount of crime. More to come...

The earthquake in Osaka the other day was a lot bigger in Mie and Nara. Glad I wasn't there. I'm not used to these things, I'm jumping every time the walls creak.

Jim mentioned the 1966 UT Tower Shootings today, which always takes me back to my freshman year at UT--no, not 1966, 1994. Newly arrived from Tulsa, I was unfamiliar with many of the strange ways of Texans. Like every freshman I knew the story of the shooting. In fact, I vaguely recall also having heard about it when I toured UT as an undergrad. It's something that the University is still addressing.

So one beautiful autumn day, I'm walking up from the six-pack across the mall in front of the tower, on my way to the smurf in the ugly--I mean, on my way to the student microcomputer facility (that's a goofy name too) in the undergraduate library. Anyhow, I'm walking along, happy as can be to be free and independent and all those other great freshman feelings, and a SHOT rings out. I jumped. Then anther one! At this point I was ready to dive for the bushes. I was literally deciding if I could clear the hedge, when it occurred to me that no one else was reacting. It was like I was the only one hearing it--some ghost of the past.

This is where the psychology comes in. There were clearly two shots...then a third. Then a fourth. Meanwhile everyone is acting normal and I start to feel like I'm losing my mind. But I don't dive for cover. In fact I try to act normal--I don't hear it I tell myself. No one's getting shot, but in my mind the people around me are getting massacred. I imagined the wounded crawling behind the bushes and patches of blood streaked across the pebblerock. But the shots are real, and they don't let up till I get to the library, a little shaken.

At the library I got up my nerve and decided to tell the clerk I heard shots. They didn't seem to have any idea what it was, but then, they weren't overly concerned. There there little freshman.

Later when I was walking with a friend I heard shots again.

"Oh that? They shooting blanks at the grackles."

"The what???"

"Grackles, those nasty birds that land in huge flocks and make a whole block of campus smell like bird poop."

It really is an overwhelming stench, these birds. I never noticed them in Tulsa, but they do a tremendous job of making parts of the UT campus totally inhospitable for days at a time. Needless to say, I was relieved to find out I wasn't in the early phases of schizophrenia. I would have gone right on believing they had come from my own mind...

Download my messy handwriting and write yourself a love letter, or go make your own.

I've got my answer! Lost in Translation is slated to open in Japan in May according to an article in the NY Times. There's also an interesting Aussie film on the festival circuit. I realize watching foreign-made films about Japan is just another way of navel gazing but what does one do otherwise in a small well-lit room in Osaka? I ask you.

The Times sums up feedback (quite a bit from blogs in fact) on the slew...okay, on the four major Japan-related English-language films to come out recently.

Best Quote (regarding Kill Bill):

"[Tarantino] wants to describe not real Japan and its culture, but the people and culture in films such as yakuza and B-action movies. However, general Japanese audiences are not interested in what Mr. Tarantino finds interesting."

I couldn't agree more.

I admit I went to see Last Samurai. I get into the battle scenes, that's about it. Everyone I've talked to loved it. Everyone but the wonderful tour guide in Himeji who was deeply interested in Samurai spirit and aesthetics. But she hadn't seen it because she said Tom Cruise is trying to hard for an Oscar and she finds it depressing. So she went to see Matrix: Revolutions instead. Eh?

I've got to say I enjoyed TLS, because I went spontaneously and expected nothing more than a big, soulless blockbuster. The funny thing about seeing a film like that is that I do laugh out loud at all the bad jokes--and a lot of them were those intentional cultural blunders, but of course I was the only one laughing. This happens to me a lot. I laughed my ass off watching Frida while everyone else in the theater was stone silent. What to do? Of course nothing compares to seeing Something About Mary and not even snickering while the rest of the theater was in stitches...that is until Brett Farve walks in, at which point I lost it and I was the only one. Talk about "lost in translation".

That's a roundabout way of saying I'm dying to see Lost in Translation, but I'll probably have to sneak out of the theater before I get lynched. Or it could go over well. (I'm not the only one who likes navel gazing).

Unlike Last Samurai I have some expectations for this one that could be dashed on the rocks. Mainly I'm counting on Bill Murray to do the eminently fabulous job he does in everything (although I won't be seeing "Garfield"). Let me rephrase that, to do an eminently wonderful job of desperation humor. The sadder but wiser guy for me baby. The "lip them" scene which I've seen online is just lame, so he's starting from a negative count but I'm sure he can do it. Can't comment on Coppola because I haven't seen Virgin Suicides even though you'd think that would be right up my alley.

Complicite, a UK-based theater--ahem--theatre (sorry) company will bring their adaptation of the Haruki Murakami short-story collection, The Elephant Vanishes, to Tokyo. Damn! Just yesterday I told someone I didn't think I'd be going to Tokyo this year and now I'm going to have to work that into my schedule.

Well, no, it doesn't, as Jim noted. But it's floor does. My dead cat and I used to stroll across it daily (dead now that is). After Liberty Lunch closed, the floor was deconstructed and donated to the Habitat Re-store where my future roommate worked. He was (and still is) in the process of building a house over on the East side, so he scooped up the floor for a pittance and stored it in a shed for several years while he went about building the house, living in it the whole time--yes folks he lived for several years without such amenities as plumbing, electricity or windows. Even a roof or walls initially of course.

He'd been an acquaintance in college, but one day in a weird mood I decided I was rather sick of things like walls myself, and we went out for coffee to talk about how one might go about living without walls while maintaining privacy, security and a modicum of comfort (I still think it would be possible). Long story short we were roommates for a year. He finished my room, put a door on the bathroom and hooked up a few lights. No furniture, no kitchen then. It was good. The next thing he did was to put in the Liberty Lunch floor.


Liberty Lunch floor
Okay, it may not be Liberty Lunch, but if Mr. & Mrs. Kirk Watson would like to visit it, I bet he'd be thrilled to have them. There's a pretty weird mix of people over there most of the time anyway--in the spirit of the mythical "Austin".

The mythical "Austin" is a lot of things. Live music's just part of it. There's also the bohemian fringe, the overeducated carpenters and massage therapists, the drifters, the immigrants, the super-hip, the hippies, the employed and unemployed techies, the students and the politicians--all killing margaritas or Shiners or Live Oak Ales or overcaffenating or getting high or meditating or writing letters to the editor or dressing in drag and running for mayor or chilling by town lake or checking out the bats or hitting the second-hand stores or planting wildflowers or watching indie films or making indie films or swimming or saving salamanders or hiking and biking or a million other things.

People worry about it disappearing and they think they need symbols of Austin's past glory to keep it alive, but they don't. In a way those symbols even perpetuate the myth that Austin is losing it's soul. Sure, I've always been fond of the graffiti in question, my dad likes it too--I also acknowledge it was hip advertising by Sound Exchange. And there's plenty of stuff I miss. It's sad to see the symbols of your city change, but then I'm from Tulsa and that's a city that has a lot more ghosts than Austin.

link / posted by Molly @ osakatomebaby : 22:43

I've been live a week and I'm already getting bashed by a Harvard Law student. Yay for me. He seems a bit concerned about whether Jim Dedman and I are sitting around debating his merits at length on IM. Comparing blogs, I have to ask, who is more fixated?

If you know, you too can be a member of the Himeji weird pet club! Okay, they're no oolong (who I just discovered passed away on this very day a year ago--r.i.p. little rabbit), but they do have hats. The look like prairie dogs, maybe the kind that caused the monkeypox scare in the midwest earlier this year? You'd think growing up in Oklahoma I'd know what a prairie dog looks like. (update: GIS seems to confirm my guess.)

Right now the weird pet club only has a couple of members, the guy who owned the varmits in question and a rather tough-looking biker with an eight-year-old girl in tow who had their pet skunk with them on the grounds of Himeji castle. Sounds like a scene out of Kikujiro (which is a pretty little film with a touch of mischief and a good way to kill a lazy afternoon). Don't forget the bandannas!

I didn't see too much of Himeji. It's not too big and they don't boast a lot of specialties you can't get in Osaka. It's pretty much all about the castle, and why shouldn't it be? It's the best preserved and most impressive castle in Japan.

A quick run down on the history:

• Built mid-1300's as a fortress.


• Toyotomi Hideyoshi takes Himeji peacefully under Oda Nobunaga. He builds out the castle including a three-story tower.


• Hideyoshi does a lot of other stuff, some good some bad, and fails to successfully establish his heir.
• After some more wars Tokugawa Ieyasu thoughtfully takes over and things settle down for a long time.

• Part of "things settling down" entails getting the grandkids properly hitched as soon as possible, including Princess Sen who is married to Hideyori--Hideyoshi's child heir.
• Ieyesu later attacks Hideyori's forces at Osaka castle, forcing him to commit seppuku at the age of 23...so it goes.
• Whereupon Princess Sen is free to get remarried to another lucky suitor: Honda Tadatoki of Himeji.


• The castle gets rebuilt and expanded (not that it had ever actually been attacked or destroyed) including building "Princess Sen's" garden.


• Everyone starts making lots of green tea and acting courtly and pretty much stopped killing each other.


• They all live happily ever after except Princess Sen's son who dies as a child, Tadatoki who dies of tuberculosis, and Princess Sen who is relinquished to a nunnery. Okay, nobody lives happily ever after.


• The Tokugawa shogunate transfers control of the castle about eight more times over the course of the next 200+ years so nobody gets too comfortable and decides to start any more wars till...


• Commodore Perry lands and throws the country into upheaval and Tom Cruise eventually makes a movie no less historically accurate than this commentary.

By the way here are some nice folks from Himeji heading off to fight against the pro-foreigner contingent.


Himeji castle has a lot of lovely secrets in the design which I would recommend incorporating into your own home should you fear invaders:

• A labarynthine path to the single entrance. Ideally it will go down most of the way so invaders will think they are going the wrong way.


• Six "water gates" manned by guards who test the water for poison (don't waste funds on health insurance when life insurance will do)


• Lots of iris -- it's difficult to run uphill across iris


• Aesthetically pleasing gun and arrow holes




• Appropriately named "rock and water holes" for dumping rocks and boiling water on unwanted guests


• Make it look like you have a five story house when it's actually seven so invaders will misjudge your location. Psyche!


• "Stairs" that are more like ladders -- this is also good for building up your leg muscles so you can kick invaders back down said stairs. And don't forget to take your shoes off at the door, it's easier to run up and down barefoot.
• Use prehistoric stone coffins to build walls. This will remind you of inescapable death and make your warriors fearless. Discard any archeological evidence contained.

If you have all this it's virtually guaranteed no one will ever attack your home and you'll never need any of it. This is what we warlords like to call, "deterrence".

A word to the wise--even if you have a fabulous free tour guide (and we did), trust your own judgment when they tell the gardens are worth it even though it's the middle of winter....



Oh, okay, I did see the last red maple, a bunch of koi and *a flower*.

I really shouldn't have been videoing this girl's bum, but I was waiting for her to fall down at any moment--she was so wobbly. Plus she had the most incredible get-up: high heels based on the popular timberland hiking boots with the ubiquitous fishnet stockings. She was teetering down the road on her way to Yasaka shrine as was I...not to mention several hundred thousand other folks.

The crowd was amazing, despite the fact that most had probably had a little sake to ring in the new year. Of course New Years is not the party scene it is back home, it's more of a family affair. But with so many people cramming in, I couldn't help but have a few flashbacks the last time I was in such a massive crowd--the Halloween parade in Greenwich Village 2002. It got quite scary when we foolishly allowed ourselves to get pulled into the current of spectators seeking a better view. The crowd quickly went from too close for comfort to downright ugly. Despite hanging on for dear life (and in hopes of not getting knocked down and trampled) I couldn't even see my companions faces. Ultimately I had to let go and be forcibly extricated. It was like being physically reborn--people shouting "just let go, come out! it's okay, don't be afraid".

Back to 2004--people waiting to go to the shrine were different than any other crowd I've seen. Granted it's a somewhat religious event, though a lot of people are just there as tourists--Japanese and otherwise. Even when midnight rolled around there was just a quick cheer and everyone went back to waiting more or less quietly to move forward.

Afterward we strolled down a path I've beaten many times before and always enjoy on the way to see Kiyomizu-dera. After Ginkakuji and Kinkakuji, this is probably the most famous temple in Kyoto and for good reason. Check out the view...

(Speaking of quakes, we had a nice one today...)

A good year and a half after After the Quake was published, Haruki Murakami's publishers have managed to put together what looks like it might be a frankenstein of a book entitled Vintage Murakami (not that kind). Murakami has been popular in Japan since the early 80's, and as popular as the Beatles are in Japan, I imagine if I took a survey about the title "Norweigan Wood", 7 out of 10 people here would think of the novel first.

Another comment I'd probably get is that Murakami is very popular with foreigners, meaning English-speakers, which is true. Particularly in the last six or seven years he's developed a ravenous following, myself included, who will devour anything and everything published by, about, or even in proximity to him. When I'd read everything I could get my hands on, I even went on to read a book by Ryu Murakami (no relation). But no, there's only one Murakami as far as I'm concerned.

Murakami is incredibly prolific, though not only in fiction. He's written mountains of travel articles and done a great deal of translation. He recently released a translation of The Catcher in the Rye which should do a lot for that book in Japan. I imagine if they read it, it will resonate with young people here even more than it does in the States these days.

Most of his fiction has been translated into English already, and since he's been doing other things, the publishers must have had to scramble to come up with something. The only comment I came across describes the contents as:

...the opening chapter of Norwegian Wood, "Lieutenant Mamiya's Long Story: Parts 1 and 2," "Shitzuko Akashi" from "Underground," "Barn Burning," "Honeypie," and finally "Iceman," the only selection yet to appear in English in book form.

I'm not quite sure what to make of this since "Barn Burning" appeared in The Elephant Vanishes, the opening chapter of Norweigan Wood is by definition already in a book (his best-known book), and Lieutenant Mamiya's long story sounds like Murakami's version of the Nomonhon incident which was cenral in The Wind Up Bird Chronicle (written during his tenure as visiting professor and author at Princeton and my pick for his best work to date). I don't have my copy of Undergroud with me to see if Shitzuko Akashi's story is included, but at any rate it would be the one case of non-fiction and a strange inclusion--if it didn't make the cut for Underground why not and why is it here?

But did any of this deter me from purchasing a copy the second it was published? No siree bob. Why I didn't pre-order it is beyond comprehension, because I'll have to wait an entire month while it's back-ordered and then shipped. You'd think I would be able to get it here in Japan before that, but the publisher is in the states. I doubt it'll get to Kinokuniya in Umeda before Amazon gets its next shipment, so I'll just suck it up and wait. I hope I'm wrong and there's a vast treasure-trove of previously unpublished short stories, but I don't have high hopes.

Incidentally there are two Murakami novels in Japanese that he hasn't allowed to be translated yet--his first two, which I gather he considers somewhat inferior. Alas! I suppose if Maugham had had the option he would have retracted Liza of Lambeth in favor of Of Human Bondage (best. novel. ever.). I'll just have to study my Japanese till I can actually read them for myself. Meanwhile, I'll take what I can get.

I've never read a blog's first post, nevertheless...

Blogger is evidently a subsidiary (product name?) of a company named "Pyra" which is, coincidentally, also the name of my dead cat (and I might add the best cat ever to have lived). Needless to say, it is strange reading the terms and conditions set forth by my dead cat to create this blog. However this blog is not about cats, dead or otherwise.

Generally I live in the real world, but I don't mind the idea of mass communication if that's what this is, so let's just set forth why we're all here...

What you can expect:

references to japan

comments on literature

pseudo-philosophy

banter

unfounded assertions about life, the universe and...

incoherent political nonsense

gallows humor

What you won't find here:

cultural comparisons

consistency

link mongering

syntax

truth in advertising

Right then. You've been warned.