Found in Translation

I’ve wanted to visit Japan for forever.  And I did, over Christmas, as I told you and it was great.  But for Spring Break, we did the Japanese grand tour that I’d really been dreaming of—Tokyo, Kyoto, Hiroshima.  Akihabara, Gion, Mt. Fuji.  Sushi, Ramen, Yakitori.  

Leading up to the trip, I crammed, as I do, studying up on Japanese history and literature and music and culture (that’s what I’m calling my bingeing of Japanese reality tv. “Studying”).  And when we got back, we kind of summed up the trip when we found Lost in Translation on Netflix.  Lost in Translation is a beautiful movie for lots of reasons, and one of my favorites, but it was apt for this because it is set in Tokyo, and the setting is such a presence.  It’s not a movie that could have taken place anywhere else in the world, I think.  And my favorite, favorite part of the movie is kind of in two parts—the bookends of the movie.  Bill Murray is riding in a taxi, at the beginnning of the movie having just arrived in Tokyo, and at the end leaving, and the surreal urban landscape of the largest city of the world, all tall buildings and flashing lights, unspools outside his window while atmospheric music plays.  I arrived and left the city by train (because taxis are crazy expensive), but I was so thrilled that the experience is much the same—the train tracks run parallel to the highway for much of the route, and so the scenery that Bill Murray saw flashed by as well, Tokyo bidding me farewell in a hazy music-video dream experience.

So what I really love most about books and movies is that no matter what the events of the story are, the part that really appeals to people is the TRUTH (all caps necessary) at the heart of a story.  Lost in Translation is the story of an aging movie star and a young woman finding a connection while they're staying at the fanciest hotel in one of the largest cities in the world, blah, blah, blah—those aren't events that most people will ever experience or can connect with in any way.  But the universally powerful truth-bullet at the heart of the story is how isolated humans feel sometimes, and how delicious finding a connection can be in the heart of that.  Visiting Japan was interesting and lively, there were beautiful things to look at and fantastic things to eat. But in the midst of all that fun and newness I did hear the roar of the white noise of loneliness that's amplified somehow when you're surrounded by people.  When you're alone in a space, whether it's a small room or an open place under a wide sky, there are borders to your alone-ness--you occupy your space and sense it, and you know that there people to whom you connect somewhere beyond those borders.  Your loneliness in these places there can certainly be sharp, but it is a thing that can be defined.

There's a sense I have in very large cities of being completely, unendingly alone.  In a place where perhaps I pass a thousand strangers in the space of a minute, it's the feeling almost of being in a box stuffed with cotton, like the inside of a pillow; you're surrounded, but entirely without stimulation, suspended completely in your alone-ness.  You can't reach the borders of your loneliness when you're surrounded by people, and I think that's the feeling the the movie captures so well.  This is the truth that it tells: you're never so alone as you are when you’re not alone at all.  For me, the lights and the sounds and the myriads of people in Japan and, sometimes, in Singapore, join to create a chorus of whispers that block out connection with other people.  That’s why I love those book-ends from the movie, I think—those moments alone in the taxi are so true.  Bill Murray is surrounded by millions and millions of people; he’s left a friend and a chorus of business associates, he has a phone to contact anyone he might want, he’s headed home to his family, and he’s not even alone in the car.  He is nonetheless completely crystalized in loneliness.  It’s terrible and beautiful, and it’s the moment we all avoid yet the moment we all experience.  It’s so true, and it’s the the piece of life that makes the bits of connections we do find meaningful, I think.

I’m not going to leave you to swim in my melancholy, I promise.  I found the stifling isolation of Japan beautiful, but I was also struck by how humans are naturally connection-builders, how we find parallels with others no matter how far from our comfort zones we might be, and I have a story about that for you.

We were fortunate to have the fantastic experience, in Kyoto, of staying in a ryokan, or traditional Japanese inn.  Our ryokan has been welcoming guests since 1818, and it’s my understanding that neither the building nor the traditions have changed much in all that time.  We were greeted at the front door and welcomed into an entranceway that was covered, yet felt like a garden.  The stone floor was shining with water, a sign that we, travel-rumpled and grumpy from a long wait at the taxi stand at the train station, had been eagerly awaited and were welcomed.  Everything at the inn was designed to make us feel entirely comfortable and at home; the tea that was ready when we got to our room, the fresh, open space of the low-ceilinged room, the perfect garden framed by the windows.

Nonetheless, taking part in someone else’s traditions can be stressful for a person who likes to make other people happy.  The ryokan was a quiet place, and I have two children who like to do handstands when the moment takes them, so we went to the closest playground for a bit, to horrify locals we'd never see again with our American loudness.  Serenity can be overrated.  And then we returned to have our traditional Japanese bath, to wrap ourselves in the traditional cotton robes (yukata) provided by the inn, and to prepare for the formal, multi-course dinner served at the low table in our room. 

We were served, the whole time we stayed at the Ryokan, by a lovely woman.  She woke us in the morning and sent us off to our adventures standing at the door and waving, she greeted us when we returned with cool cloths for our grubby faces and cherry-blossom tea and snacks, and she pulled our futon beds out of a closet at night and made them up into the fluffiest, most delightful places I've ever slept in my whole life.  Our attendant was an older lady with tiny soft hands and perfectly smooth hair.  She wore the uniform of the ryokan, a patterned kimono, and every millimeter of it was crisp and neat. When she would bring something to the table she would somehow magically sink to her knees with her feet together like she was supported by hydraulics, put out the zillions of tiny dishes she had carried in on a tray with movements like moths thumping against a window, and rise again to her feet, her kimono still looking as though it were a solid piece of porcelain.

In contrast, after my very hot-bath I was red-faced and very sweaty.  My hair is too short to do anything graceful, and even on those few occasions I might be able to get to the floor without falling in a flumpf, my knees crackle as loud as firecrackers the whole way.  I've always been all elbows, and to be surrounded by tiny breakable dishes was a special kind of torture.  I was aware it was a fantastic experience, but I was also aware I was out of place, a splotch of ink on a sea of white linen.

Whenever she entered the room, she knocked on the wood of the sliding wood-framed paper doors and released a little stream of Japanese that didn't stop until she left again.  Look, I cram for visiting countries, but I learned about four Japanese words.  I have mostly no idea what she said, except that arigato goziemasu or whatever correct variant of "thank you very much" was in there a lot.  At first I worried that I didn't understand what she was trying to tell me, but I'd say "Hai!" whenever she looked at me expectantly, and I smiled a lot, as we Americans do, and I pointed at things when she gave me a list to choose from.  It worked, somehow, and the pleasant burbling of her river of language became part of the soothing environment of the inn.

The food, like everything else, was very, very good, but very different from what we were used to.

The first night we had dish after dish of exquisite seafood and veggies and went to bed stuffed and happy, feeling that though we were a little uncomfortably full, we'd done a good job of behaving as we were supposed to, eating enough to not offend or be dishonorable or anything.  The second night we opted for the more casual shabu shabu dinner--you have a big pot of boiling broth on a burner at the table, and everyone (or just the mom, you know how it is) cooks veggies and meat in it, and you dip everything in good sauces, and eat wee pickled veggies on the side, and like any time you cook at the table, it felt very celebratory and fun.  Our attendant, as always, brought everything in on a tray and set it down, and at first I think I looked at her--expectantly or a little panicked, I don't know.  She dumped (but gracefully, of course) a bunch of veggies in the pot, and then took the long chopsticks from the serving platter and used them to swirl the veggies in the steaming broth.  "Shabu shabu" she sing-whispered, revealing that the name of the meal is the sound the components make while having a happy cooking swim.

We shabu-shabu-ed (I promise, I'm never going to be able to swirl a piece of meat in a pot of broth again without whispering "shabushabu, shabushabu."  Not ever.), and I managed to eat enough to bring honor to my family, but not so much as to be completely miserable, and I was feeling like victory as an ink-splotch was at hand.  And then our attendant returned to collect our dishes, and she knelt, gracefully and effortlessly, bathing us with the patter of her Japanese niceties, to which I happily smiled and nodded.  "Rice?" she asked, and I'm sure I went pale.  I had forgotten that a Japanese meal is not a meal without rice.  I definitely did not have any more room under my rumpled yukata for a bowl of starchy goodness.

"No thank you?" I ventured, and as expected, she looked horrified.

"Rice!"

I know, I thought, feeling the weight of the coming dishonor bearing down on me.  But how?  And I patted my belly, hoping she could see the effect of all of that shabu shabu-ing.  And then she offered me a jewel.

"Skoshie?" she said, with a lot of other stuff I couldn't understand, but made the universal sign with her thumb and forefinger of just a wee teeny bit.

If you know me, you know I love words just a little bit.  Even if you don't know me, you might have noticed.  I'm a big nerd and I have a passion for words.  I collect lovely little nice-sounding words and big amazing words like some people collect rocks or jewelry or handbags.  If I'm feeling nervous or upset, I build myself sturdy barriers of nice thick ten-dollar words, you know, those beauties with four or more syllables that will keep all but the hardiest souls well away from my tender feelings.  And I have a special love for the gems of the word world, those delicious words from all languages that perfectly express some specific aspect of the human condition.  I keep them in my mental jewel box and take them out and appreciate their perfection whenever I get a chance.  Like saudade, which I'm sure many people have seen now as the focus of internet articles, a Portuguese word which doesn't really translate to other languages but references a pleasurable feeling of missing and longing for something you once had.  These little jewel words from other languages seem to describe something perfectly foreign, but completely universal.  The meaning of some words connects right to the root of what it means to be human, and it doesn't matter what language they're technically in, as they are the words we all know best.

And when our lovely attendant offered me a skoshie of rice, I knew just what she meant.  Skoshe has entered English, the magpie of languages, and I knew it.  I might have just a skoshe of wine with lunch, or joke that the hundred degree weather has me sweating just a skoshe.  But the English expression comes from the Japanese word, which is more properly written in English, sukoshi, meaning just a little bit.  Just the amount you'd fit in between your thumb and forefinger in the worldwide hand-language.  I happily said, "Hai!" to just a skoshie of rice, and she did bring me just a few chopsticks-full of rice in the bottom of a tiny, exquisite bowl, along with a third of a bowl of miso soup and a few pickles.  It was the perfect amount, and I still had room to eat the really awesome slice of melon she brought after that and a few sips of tea.  More than that, alone in a sea of people, I had an anchor, a connection, to a new place.