Iain Donnachaidh

January 26th, 2009

When I get off work, I want to buy a bunch of mikan. And some wine. And then to sit in the bath, peeling the mikan and letting the bright peels collect on the surface of the water, drinking cheap red wine straight from the bottle. I’ll have some chocolate too, but it will probably get softer than I’d like sitting in the steamy bathroom with me, and diffusing melted chocolate in the water will sully the whole experience.

I’d put on some relaxing music too. I don’t know what at this particular moment, but it would be something chilled out. Something that could just groove in the background without asserting itself too aggressively.

Oranges. And chocolate. And wine. I might fall asleep in the bath and drown.

So here’s what it’s like in Japan. I’m alone most of the time. Even around other people. What I mean is that I have no base identity that is implicitly understood by me and the people I interact with, nor any illusion thereof — beyond just that I am foreign, which itself is just a way of saying that no one knows what to assume about me. Especially since I’m fairly quiet and self-contained and, as Saki observed, not particularly self assertive in the way that Americans are internationally expected to be. I can speak all the Japanese I need to in order to make an ass of myself in basic everyday life (not that I don’t still do it anyway — but I speak plenty more English than that and even in America that’s a struggle). It’s like beingperpetually screamingly mysterious to most everyone you meet, very few of whom don’t take notice of you long enough to come up with a few never-asked questions, some un-voiced conjecture, or to swing a wider path as they walk through the grocery store to avoid coming too close as they pass. Because who knows about you. You are the unknown, and only a fool has expectations about the unknown.

Here is what it’s like in Japan. I have, generally, a lot of time to myself. A whole lot. When I say to myself I mean it both in the way the phrase is traditionally used, the positive way — my job is relatively easy and affords me lots of free time to fill with almost any activity I want (that can be done at a desk without making tons of noise, or just to walk around or smoke and think). I also mean it in a way that is not so celebratory — there isn’t anyone calling me up for spontaneous parties or nights out or coffee or let’s-get-something-to-eats, and reciprocally also no one that I could very reasonably ring to do the same. I have no video games but chess and very simple (free) flash toys on the internet with which to burn big swathes of nothing-thought-and-nothing-done into my time. I’ve been reading voraciously, but I am literally now clean out of unread English-language literature. I write a lot. I write until I’m fatigued of writing. I get second winds. I think about what Marquez said about writing being lonely business, or Orwell’s assertion that you have to be at least partially insane to want to write. I spend large chunks of my evenings on wikipedia or youtube. I talk to a certain woman online when I can, and mope and sulk when I can’t. I drink. With people. Alone. More often alone. I smoke a lot. Not a lot in terms of smokers overall in the world, but a lot more than I really want to.

Here is what it’s like in Japan. I have a very small apartment that I still put off cleaning. I have a minimal set of dishes that I still let crowd the sink. I have nothing but time but I am still constantly surrendering breakfasts and dinners to whatever is quickest and easiest. A little rain or wind and I treat my apartment like a bomb shelter, the outside world a radiation-baked tundra. It’s not that I mind rain that much, it’s just, well, was where I was going to go really that important anyway

This is what it’s like in Japan, and I want it to last for a long long time, just as I want out of it, just as I want to do nothing but play video games and go to clubs and bars and concerts and drink and network, just as I want to go back to school and continue my education, just as I want to retire on a houseboat somewhere and smoke weed every day. I want it to last long enough for me to get what I’m supposed to get out of it, to accomplish what I’m here to accomplish, but just as much I want to run from it, make excuses and pretend I’d be happier if I gave up.

But I’m not giving up. In fact I don’t have as much time as it feels like sometimes. Well, I do. Too much to endure when it needs enduring, and too little to enjoy when it needs enjoying.

Neither of these statements is really true.

This is pretty ridiculous.