A few weeks ago, I had occasion to take part in an awards ceremony being held to make presentations to the winners of various prizes in a national essay contest. Previous to this, my experience of such affairs had been limited to the small graduation ceremony given by my daughters' day care center, a considerably less rigorous event.

This ceremony though, was quite an important one, and the awardees represented a complete cross-section of Japanese society, from very young elementary students up through adults, and also including a group of foreigners. Over the course of the afternoon, during the two-hour rehearsal and then the slightly shorter ceremony itself, I was particularly surprised by the considerable trouble almost all the participants had with some of the formalities involved - most notably the proper bowing techniques.

I watched all of these people, one-by-one, step up onto the stage, and struggle with what to do. The ideal form was apparently for the presenter and the awardee to bow together first, then for the person to step forward, be presented with the certificate, bowing as he received it, then to step back a pace and bow in unison once more before leaving the stage. Almost nobody got it right.

In some cases the presenter would bow quite deeply but the recipient would simply nod his head. This person would then realize his mistake and make a hasty deeper bow. This would be picked up by the presenter, who would bob down again in response, usually just as the other person was 'coming up'. Finally they would come to rest, the presentation would be made, and the 'bobbing ducks' routine would begin again. Just when to start the bow? How far down to go? What to do with your hands? Nobody seemed to have any idea about what to do. And these were the Japanese! It was almost like watching a group of foreigners trying to wrestle with the customs of a strange society.

I very much wanted to do a 'good' job, so as my turn approached, I watched the presenter very carefully and tried to memorize the timing of his bowing movements. But just as I walked towards the stage to receive my award, I realized that the presenter was being replaced by a different person for the foreigner's group! And sure enough, my preparation had been useless, for this person followed a different rhythm, and I too ended up bobbing up and down, trying to catch his movements ... And for the presentation, I made another mistake here too. I took the certificate and said in a loud clear voice "Arigato gozaimasu." (I guess my mother's training was long and hard all those years ago ...) When I got back to my seat, my neighbour gently reminded me that it wasn't customary to say 'thank you' on such occasions. Silent acceptance was preferred. Sigh ... And I had so much wanted to show everybody that a foreigner could do the job just as well as a native Japanese.

But then I realized ... I had done, hadn't I! At least by the general standards shown over the course of the afternoon, I had done neither better nor worse than anybody else. The experience of watching all these people struggle with this seemingly simple procedure made me realize that the 'art' of bowing is obviously another one of those things that is on the decline in contemporary Japanese society. Of course, bowing is still a very important part of life here, and it is difficult to imagine getting through a day without finding yourself bent over inspecting the tips of your own shoes on at least a few occasions. Unless you hibernate at home, that is. One certainly doesn't get much in the way of bowing practice when communicating with one's children! (But now that I realize it, you can't escape from bowing rituals even when alone in your own home ... the telephone is bound to ring, and during the conversation you find yourself in the ridiculous situation of bowing to somebody you can't even see!)

Many westerners who come to Japan either to live, or just on business, have considerable problems with bowing, and I don't just mean the mechanics of 'what to do'. They have real problems with partaking in a ritual that in their minds seems to place them in such a subservient role. It is truly distasteful for them to bow down before somebody. I visited this country on business some years ago, together with the owner of the company for which I then worked, a 'straight-ahead, shake hands, look 'em right in the eye' kind of man. He simply could not bow to our hosts, and I'm sure he felt quite some distaste at my attempts to respond in kind to the Japanese bowing. In his mind, 'real men' stand straight up, and 'weak toadies' bow and scrape.

Those with more experience of Japan, realize that it is actually more common that the senior of the people involved is the one who will be bowing the deepest, and that 'subservience' is just not a factor in the thinking involved. Of course, 'rank' and status is involved, quite deeply, and people with much experience in the art of bowing are capable of making quite extraordinary calculations as to the proper depth and timing of the bow.

But I suppose such sensitivity will soon be something of a lost art. There are not many younger people nowadays who have the inclination to follow such delicate nuances of the custom, and as I found during that ceremony I attended, current standards are very low indeed.

That seems somewhat of a pity to me, because the few people during the ceremony who did perform such duties well, gave every appearance of polished poise and politeness. They were not like robots, mechanically going through a memorized sequence of movements, but rather came across as confident, courteous individuals. I felt envious of their abilities, and secretly decided that next time I find myself in this situation, I'll be ready to handle it. I'll be the perfect model of correct bowing. There's only one problem. When am I going to get another award?

(January 1995)

Posted by Dave Bull at 1:43 PM | Comments (0)

I was asked to give a speech a while ago to a meeting of a 'kokusai koryu' group, and as the theme I was given was simply that vague buzzword 'internationalism', I felt pretty free to let my comments range far and wide. At one point during the talk, I found myself discussing kitchens, both Japanese and western.

Now to my mind, there's just about no better topic than 'kitchens' to illustrate some of the different ways in which Westerners and Japanese see the world. I described to that audience a bit of the history of kitchens, how in the west they have always been considered the 'heart' of a dwelling, a place where the most important activities take place. Guests are usually quite welcome there. And conversely, at least as it seems to me, how in Japan the part of the building where the cooking is done, seems usually to be just an afterthought, a place to be tucked away out of sight. Even in many supposedly 'modern' house designs here, the kitchen is small, dark and inconveniently located. A place for guests to see? Never!

But it wasn't the kitchen itself that I wanted to write about here today. It was something that comes out of the kitchen ... Something that wafts through the entire house, to greet visitors the moment they step in the door ... Something that shouts out loud, "Welcome to our warm home ..." Yes, the smell, the delicious smell of fresh baking!

When my family first set up housekeeping in our Japanese 'mansion', I had been a bit surprised to find that kitchen appliances were not included with our unit. Where I came from, a house or apartment being bought or rented always contained a full complement of kitchen appliances: a four-burner range, a large refrigerator, usually a dishwasher, and of course, a large oven. Here though, we had to go out and purchase some, but as our finances at the time were extremely limited, we were able to get only a small used fridge, and the simplest type of two-burner 'gas table'. An oven was out of the question, and indeed, as it is not such a common item in Japanese kitchens, we didn't even consider such an item.

So that bouquet of smells ... oatmeal cookies, fresh bread, pizza dough, muffins ... simply disappeared from my life. Being so wrapped up in the process of adjusting to my new life here in Japan, I can't say that I missed such things. I never thought of them. They were simply part of my past life.

A few years ago though, when my then wife left our family and returned alone to Canada, I went out and purchased a microwave oven. (Are you laughing at the idea of a house-husband being so helpless in the kitchen that he needs such an appliance? Don't! I was busy enough trying to earn the money to buy food for my family, let alone find time to cook it ...) Anyway, I made a very good choice of appliance, buying one that combined microwave functions and electric oven functions together in one unit. For the first couple of years as the main cook in our house, I didn't make much use of the oven, but simply thought of this appliance as a convenient way to heat pre-prepared foods that I bought at the local supermarket.

But two things happened to change this. I got a couple of packages of muffin mix from a mail-order food supplier, and I also got a present from my mother in England: a small cookbook that she had used for many years, a cookbook full of recipies for all those baked goods she had made when I was a kid. Flipping through that little book brought back a million memories ... Cookies, tarts, pies, pastries ... Here they all were, just as I remembered them. And as I turned the pages one by one, remembering those delights, was it my imagination ... or did I actually catch a hint of the smells ... the smells of fresh baking? The same smells that used to greet me on those cold Canadian winter days when, coming home from school, I would open the house door and know instantly what was waiting in the kitchen. Maybe today was 'eccles cakes', maybe a 'lemon cheese' pie, perhaps a big, heavy chocolate cake ... (Excuse me for a moment, while I wipe away a tear or two ...)

So, with my new packages of muffin mix, I tried my hand at baking. My first attempts were not so successful, but I have gradually improved, and the muffins I now serve to my guests are actually not so bad ... From there, I have moved on to some of the simpler recipies in the little book, and am quite enjoying these experiments. Don't get the wrong idea. Don't imagine that I am producing delicate creations of flaky pastry ... But my chocolate chip cookies and scones do seem to be quite edible ... At least they disappear quickly enough!

But over and above the pleasure I get from being able to serve people these simple things I have made, is the pleasure I get at serving them something else ... Yes that's right, my house is now frequently filled with that warm baking smell. My two girls are now ten and twelve, and perhaps it's too late for them to develop the same 'warm kitchen' memories that I have. But I guess I shouldn't try to pretend that I'm doing this for them. I'm much more selfish than that! You don't think so? Well, just the other day, when I had muffins in the oven and nearly ready, I went outside and stood on the veranda for a few minutes. It was cold out there ... but when I opened the door and came back in ... !

(January 1995)

Posted by Dave Bull at 1:35 PM | Comments (0)

It's been just about a half-year now since I started this little essay-writing hobby. It grew out of a request from the editor of an English-language weekly newspaper here in Tokyo, who had seen some of the newsletters I had been sending to collectors of my woodblock prints, and who thought that one of the stories from that newsletter would be suitable for her publication. I was pleased by the request, and happy to edit the story to the proper length and style she requested. After it appeared, she suggested that if I wished to contribute more, she would consider them for potential publication. I did, and she started to use them, one every couple of months.

When I asked her about the themes and topics she wanted to see, her reply surprised me a bit; "Anything you want to write about," she said. Although this was a bit disconcerting at first, to be faced not only with a blank word processor screen, but with no hint at all about what to put on it, I soon got used to the idea, and have been enjoying myself tremendously, creating these little pieces. One reason for this was that during the previous few years, I had 'lost' my hobby, and had buried myself perhaps a bit too deeply in my work. Back when I was a 'salaryman' in Canada, my hobby had been woodblock printmaking, but that had now become my job, and I had done nothing to replace it ... So I was quite ready to spend time on something totally unrelated to printmaking, and indeed, very few of the essays have been in any way related to that topic.

There is another reason why I have taken so well to this writing, although it feels a bit funny to verbalize it now. For a couple of years prior to this, I had been living pretty much alone. Of course, I physically live here with my two daughters, and we get along very well together, with lots of contact and communication, but I undeniably feel a lack of 'intelligent' adult companionship. The printmaking work, being a manual craft, is hardly the sort of thing to overly tax one's mind, and I suppose that this is why I expanded the work to include things like the newsletter - to add an intellectual dimension to the job. But during the day, and into the long quiet evenings, as I sit there at my benches, carving and printing, my mind is pretty much free to roam.

And roam it does. Although I spend a good deal of the time with the stereo system turned on, listening to radio programs or to various types of music, it still insists on wandering away. Sometimes I wish I were back programming computers again, so it would be forced to behave itself and stay 'at home'. Where does it go, you ask? Well, that's the problem, and that's why I'm glad to be involved with this essay hobby, in order to give it something sensible to focus on. Because more and more, I had been finding myself falling into the 'Walter Mitty' habit.

Have you ever read the 'Secret Life of Walter Mitty', that short story by James Thurber? I remember first encountering it back in high school. Walter Mitty is a little nondescript man, who escapes from his humdrum daily life every chance he gets, by retreating into imaginary situations. As he stands outside a shop, for example, waiting for his wife to come out, the scene is transformed in his mind into a hero standing against a wall, facing a firing squad ... Every activity in his mundane life becomes, in his mind, a heroic situation. Every moment that his brain is not actually engaged in overt activity, he slips away into this private world.

Now whether it is influence from Thurber's story, or as I suspect is more likely, that everybody does this sort of thing sometimes, I had been emulating Mr. Mitty during my carving hours somewhat more than I'd care to admit. But since I took up essay writing, I am pleased to report that I now spend a lot less time in front of firing squads, and a lot more time in a rather more productive (and certainly less embarrassing) form of activity - thinking!

As much fun as the essay writing has turned out to be, one thing that has surprised me is that there is a dangerous side to it. Of course, I don't mean physically dangerous, things like eye-strain from the computer screen, or wrist problems from overuse of the keyboard, but rather, dangerous to my relationships with friends and acquaintances. It comes from the fact that my essays are mostly of a 'familiar' type, making their point (where there is a point to be made ... that is!) from an episode or happenstance from my own experience. Or sometimes, from the experiences of those people near to me.

Now I'm sure it didn't bother him overly at first to see the phrase 'my friend Terry ...' in an essay of mine, but my friend Terry must have started to have misgivings after it started to crop up more often. He must have started to think, "This guy isn't interested in me, but only in ideas for his essays. I'd better be careful what I say, of he'll write about it and tell everybody ..." No friendship can long survive such a situation. The problem is perhaps even more marked in the case of female friends, and one budding relationship was nearly destroyed recently, when the lady found out what I was doing with my time. It is obviously a slippery, and very steep slope - this business of using personal friends' experiences as source material for writing. At first, I hadn't been concerned about this at all; I just simply assumed that friends would share my willingness to be 'open' about personal things, in the interests of communication and discussion about human problems, but now that I've become more aware of their feelings on this, I'll watch my step much more carefully. (Do you hear me, S-san? This is the first and last time you will ever appear in one of these pieces ... I promise!)

Will my essays now become less interesting, without this source of input? Perhaps. But I'm not worrying too much about that just yet. My memo listing of topics waiting to be covered has more than a hundred items on it at the moment, and it's still growing faster than I can chew away at it! It's not that I've lived for 43 years, and will now spend the next 43 writing about these experiences, but that the two activities, living and writing, will now proceed together hand-in-hand.

So relax, Terry. Although your name may still appear from time to time in these pages, it will only be there in connection with a 'point of departure', a start to a chain of thinking. The 'private' thoughts that will be exposed will be mine alone. Now let's see ... where did I leave that old overcoat ...?

(January 1995)

Posted by Dave Bull at 1:26 PM | Comments (0)