Now what?

Am back home now. In Australia. It's cold, wet and overcast. The sun sets early. Did I mention it was cold and wet? And overcast?

It's all so weird. Back at Mum and Dad's house. Back in Sydney. It all feels like a dream. I don't think it was, otherwise that was the most expensive dream I've had.

But no, still no mountain top inspiration to pass on to all. Maybe I used all my inspiration up at Mt Aso, the volcano where I built a rock cairn. Or perhaps travelling to the tin-pot little fishing village near Minoshima where perhaps the last Westeners seen there were from WWII, wishing we had at least taken some beer. Or perhaps it was seeing the 300 year old festival floats being taken around Takayama. Or waiting between Takayama and Toyama at a train station on top of the Japan Alps, wondering when the single carriage train would turn up for the second half of the trip. Or perhaps the smell of Beppu, fart capital of the world and soaking in volcanic hot water in a community run onsen, so out of the way you'd never find it. Although, Mastumoto Castle, with it's moon viewing turret was pretty good as well. Seeing the 500 stone Buddhas and cave where A Book of Five Rings was written after Miyamoto Musashi meditated for 90 days, but not before travelling by train for 2 hours, bus fo 30 minutes and then walking past rice paddies on the side of a mountain with views that were undescribale. Or maybe, just maybe it was sitting in a 300 year old zen garden in a place so remote that being a Westerner in itself was a novelty.

Or perhaps there is no mountain top inspiration to be had. Maybe I'm looking for the forest, when I don't even know what trees are. There is no destination. There is no single point, no singularity, no moment generating function spitting out mathematical moments. It just was.

I have a plan, and the plan is to return to Japan, to continue to live a life more full than the slob I was before. But for now I take each day as it comes (though there are a few I'll hide away from and duck under.) But in general things can't go back to normal, because there is no normal. Not for me, not anymore.

It's been fun to do this, but now the time has come to finish what I started. Although I have lots more to say, I need to write it down, scribble it out, clean it up, throw it away and start again. But not before meditating in a cave for 90 days up a mountain side to really, really consider what's important and what isn't.

And after that, then maybe, just maybe I'll stop.

But I don't think so.

Don't Panic

The sky above the port was the color of television, still tuned to a dead channel.

Am back in Chiba. Have only a few hours to go. Not sure what to do. Will probably go and spend last of my cash at Yodobashi on camera film, maybe a tripod and other stuff. Will wander around in a daze thinking about all the things I didn't get to do, and all the things that I did do that were a complete waste of time. And about all the things I have done, that I can't remember that I did. Try and eat some food without being sick (still feeling foul from bad ramen last week, the smell of it makes me what to chuck, but if I find some oshii takoyaki, I can eat that until the cows come home, but I've talked about that before, haven't I ...)

But anyway.

Had my first spak with shop assistants the other day. The Internet Cafe I've been using have this discount points card, so that everytime I spend money I get points, and I can cash them in for a refund when I buy something. In Hiroshima when I first came across this, 2 points got me about 800yen off a book. Exceptional value. At Fukuoka, I earned about 16 points which I was told was worth 5000yen. Well, that was pretty good. So I go and choose a stack of second hand CDs and try to explain that I wanted to use the points to buy the CDs. After much discussion, most of which involved the sales person telling me that 500yen was 1 point. Yes, yes I know that. I want to spend my points. How do I use my poinbts. Why have points? What do you mean, different to Hiroshima. It's the same store? If I took this to Hiroshima, I'd be getting a zillion yen worth of discount. I had to get 60 points to get 1000yen discount? You must be joking? By now, the other sales people had got the CDs ready to package and had added more points to my card thinking I was going to happily buy the CDs. I said, no, I wasn't going to buy the CDs and walked out. I think it was probably the rudest thing I could have done, but I had really, really lost my patience and just could not understand why the same shop had two completely different systems for the same point card in two places.

I've made lots of new friends. I taunted Candians about their lack of Cricket for a commonwealth country but were redeemed by participating in a Tim Tam suck. I've educated the English and other citizens of the great nation that once was Great Britian about how to tell a Kiwi from an Australian (ask them to say Fish and Chips, because it comes out as Fush and Chups, but also because they know that it's a test created by Australians to harras them.) I've met with Americans and held my tongue when anything at all about the "War With Terrorism" comes up in conversation. And I've met with Japanese who all think I speak Japanese like a Japanese person. Which is really, really funny to me.

When I got to Narita (near Tokyo) airport, it was packed with World Cup fans. There were so many aircraft at Narita we just got a set of stairs and a bus to take us to the terminal. There were lots of extra English speaking guides to tell people where to go (in the nicest possible way.) Today's Japan Times has front page articles about how all the Japanese are really, really scared of English soccer hooligans, and groups of maurading drunk soccer supporters arriving at and leaving soccer venues. Their main fear, is how these European's are physically larger than the Japanese. Although the police are trained with martial arts, and have bought new Perspex(tm) riot shields (Oooh, scary) I just don't know how it will go. Korea should be fine, they have student riots to keep the police well trained all the time, and they had the Olympics only a few years back. I wonder how the beer vending machines will go here, I can't see them lasting too long against a pack of supporters pissed as newts wanting another drink.

But I don't think I have any great philosophical wisdom to bring down from the mountain. I think that's because I got up at 6am this morning to catch the flight from Fukuoka, and just lost the plot, sub-plot, music score, script editors, cast, crew, sets and audience. Even the airports work differently here. There were separate check-in counters for luggage to seating arrangements. I've no idea why. I'm just glad the subway got me to the airport really quickly, and my bags are being looked after from Fukuoka to Sydney (I hope) and they took the large box of stuff I had as well, even though my ticket says 1 piece of luggage.

But I will miss Japanese Pop music. It's strangely addictive. Everywhere I've been I keep hearing the same songs. Ones that have been latest release, even on TV ads. Shame I can't afford the CDs.

I found this shop in Fukuoka that everything is recycled. They sell Mountain Bikes that had recycled aluminium in their frames, and carboard bookshelves (can't see them surviving too long with my books) and shirts and suits, plus lots of homewares. Although some of the cloth things were recycled, I can't see how a suit can be made from recycled material. Maybe it was organic cotton. The coolest things were these t-shirts that had a design pattern on the front, so when the t-shirt was old and useless, you'd cut the pattern out and make a childs toy with it. They had food as well, which I don't think was recycled. The design aesthetic was very minimalist, very stylish and very brown. I scored some of their catalogues to bring back, which look just like Freedom Furniture catalogues. So it's interesting to see how, if any, Asian design is starting to come through in Australian contemporary design.

So, unless I have a dash of inspiration in the next 60 seconds, this will be my last overseas post. I'll probably do one more from Australia to wrap it all up, and then close this off. Then I'll organise a fabulous publishing contract, rights for the television series with Michael Palin, and get to travel with him for 2 months around Japan re-doing my trip as a special consultant. Then I'll work for a few years as an English teacher in Fukuoka while struggling at night to create my first novel, ingeniously crafted to be the first of three which will be published to critical acclaim with descriptions like "The first science fiction since Orwell's 1984 to be considered literature." and win the holy trinity of science fiction: the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award and the Philip K. Dick Award. The other two books will arrive with appropriate intervals after the first one (in time for Christmas purchases of course, and movie tie-ins.) Then, I'll return to Australia to live a quiet life in semi-retirement somewhere down the south coast of NSW still writing books and dabbiling in new technology research.

So long and thanks for all the fush.

Nothing is true, everything is permitted

Today I've done nothing of note. Now, you may be wondering why am I posting up something if that's the case. Lets just say it's all about the wind down, the final stage, the end of the story. Folks, I'm coming home soon and well, I'm really, really tired.

I've been watching a lot of Japanese television in my hotel room as I eat my Kombini meals and drinking vending machine beer. I've walked the streets late at night watching homeless people set up their carbaord boxes at the train station and bored kids lpay their guitar and drums, just for the hell of it. I've heard motorbikes race through the streets, only to be followed by the wail of the police siren, or is that an ambulance? People shop to find meaning, and find meaning in their shopping. Large department stores sit snuggly next to bright, neon lit pachinko parlours. Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples struggle for space. Back alley ramen shops and yatai street vendors vie for my attention. A Buddhist monk, begging for alms stands opposite a temporary national lottery booth. People put money with both, a bet each way. The days are getting hotter, the sun burning the roadway, scorching the hastily placed porn advertisments spruking services up to 30,000yen for 120 minutes. And all the while, people move on.

There are apartment blocks, parking towers, office blocks, hotels, parks, shops, bars and izakayas. McDonalds, Starbucks, Coke Cola, Pepsi, Nike, Toyota, Nestle and Sony. And lots of people. Everywhere.

Everyone has a role, and a place. Office Ladies, the 18-25 young things, often working for less money than their male conterparts are easily identified by their homogeneous unforms. Groups of clones walk about at the illusive lunch time break deciding what to buy at which department store. Middle age salarymen falling asleep over their dinner, not wanting to go home. School kids speeding off from one after school class to another. And all of them doing something with their mobile phones. Sometimes even making a call, but more often playing games or sending email.

In the slow downhill slide to obsesity, and one does not easily notice the gradual change. With Japan, nobody is watching the scales of opulence to determine, when and if Materialism Watchers need to be called in.

This space for rent

More shopping, shop, shop, shopping. With a small break inbetween to do some shopping. And maybe after this, I'll go and do some more shopping. Then quick shop to finish up with before the final shop, before heading home to shop again.

I'm not actually buying anything, just looking. I've been trying to get a copy of the Fight Club, or should I say "Faito Kurabu" poster in Japanese for a friend, and if I find that I can possibly get Blade Runner, and a few others that I really like. Unfortunately though, I've seen lots of posters, but they are all US imports, and so all in English. There's been lots of really, really cool anime stuff from movies like Akira and Ghost in the Shell, some Matrix stuff and Astro Boy. But mostly it's Star Wars. Since Star Wars is the current trend, and has such a huge marketing machine behind it that's what most of the toy shops stock. Hopefully it'll be just a passing fad (in Japan, a passing fad? Never!) and it'll settle down. Perhaps when the two Matrix movies come out next year then we'll have better luck with the quality and quanity of merchandise for that one.

One thing I had to get today was a wedding present for my sister. When I got to the department store and had a look around an assistant asked if I needed any help. His English wasn't too bad. Neither were his shoes. He collects shoes, and he hadn't seen any like mine before (Doc Martin Yellow Stitch, size 9.) Needless to say, his were these spiffy black leather ones, with a buckle strap. Mine have started to look worse for wear after tramping halfway across Japan. I should go back and give him the URL for the Doc Martin website (if I can find it.)

Anyway, once I had actually chosen the item, I had to convince the sales person I wanted to buy it. Once done, he then whisked me over to a row of chairs, commented that I must be tired from shopping and plonks me down. He then gets a new item from the storeroom, lets me check that it's okay and there are no problems. Then he wraps it, and does a very, very good job at that (they love wrapping here) and then I can pay for it. The whole experience was exactly that, and experience. Very different to the tin-pot little shops I have normally been going to.

I've also found a good source for Tim Tams, and Tiny Teddy biscuits. Also another Osamu Tezuka shop (the Astro Boy creator) and some other really, really cool toy/general modern Japanese pop material places.

Now all I need is a job.

Back to Reality

It would seem my time here is running out. My initial investigations seems to indicate that for English teaching, there is a large quantity of work available. Other investigations seem to indicate that Japan, as a nation will probably crumble under it's own weight within the 50 years, much as I believe the US will as well.

I've started to read "The Prodestant Ethic And The Spirit of Capitalism." It's very good, although a hard read. The author asserts that Europe and America were at the forefront of capitalistic enterprise because of the coming together of various social, technological and management practices with a grounding in the religious framework of the time. As a historical document it is astounding to see how it relates to modern globalisation. The reason I chose to read it was to try and understand how Japan could have moved so far forward without this basis.

But anyway.

The relationship between excessive consumerism, political will, corporate ethical standards and the education system all lead me to believe that Japan is a shallow nation, built upon the sucess of exploting it's people, the environment and sheer determination of post-WWII to rebuild infrastructure. Although I may see Australia as a Utopian paradise (well, we've still got little Johnny, so it's not perfect, but close to it,) Japan still lags behind in lots of areas. Although I don't expect to be able to apply Western ethical standards that are based in a Judeo-Christian background here, it does seem as though Japan is going down the toilet just as much as all the other Asian nations, perhaps more so.

The excess of materialism, brought on by high disposable income and an Asian preference for outward, surface level meaning has driven the consumer market for years. But as the banking system starts to crumble under the weight of bad debts and gross inefficiencies (they are very paper based, overstaffed and large, even at local brances,) corporate companies start to collapse under unpayable debts (even with official interest rates at 0.00%) and unemployment reaches higher levels, people keep living as they only know how: by shopping. The Japanese people have had to put up with a lot of pain post-WWII in subsidising Japanese companies so products can be exported for cheap prices. Electronics here are not any cheaper than Australia, sometimes costing more. Mobile phones cost just as much, and call rates border on the painful, even for local area trunk line calls. But Japan has 120,000,000 people and 1/6 the size of land of Australia with income tax at about 7%. Prices need not be so high, but they are. But correspondingly, salaries are quite high as well now for the middle class, which represent almost everybody within city limits.

So where's it all going to end up. The infrastructure of polical will is, much like Queensland politics in the 70s and 80s, complete rotten. With the ruling party having power for so long, and the only way they understand to stimulate the economy is to build things, it makes for very powerful construction companies. Concrete politics. Everywhere.

The younger generation, from what I can tell, are driven mad by the emphasis for academic achievement. Syntheic idols, usually represented by J-Pop groups, dominate television. The older generations and family units are breaking down because the male works so hard to provide for the wife and kids, he's never home. The kids don't know their father, the wife goes off and gets her own replacement man and so the father ends up at Hostess Clubs or bars, paying for comfort women. Eventually the wife has enough, leaves home with the kids and the man doesn't even know how to cook for himself.

Everything is just plain wrong.

The nation state Nihon-maru, sailing gently along, is about to go over the not-so-mythical edge of the world. And all its crew and passengers are worried about is what's the next trend or style to follow.

Perhaps, as with the US, this needs to happen. They've lived here in relative comfort (albeith in rather small dwellings) for quite some time. (Now, I know that contradicts my previous statement about the exploitation of workers, but in relative terms, they have it pretty good at the moment, Utopia with a rotten core.) Perhaps, as with individuals, some pain and struggle is required for the whole of Japan. But those who are at the forefront of this, the homeless, are the hidden people. Returning to the social and ethical values of previous centuries may not be the answer, neither would be to fully embrace Western models of social and ethical patterns.

So where does this leave Japan? I've got no idea. But I've got some more shopping to do, so I'll ponder this as I decide how best to spend the last of my yen.

Of Things Past and Present

Well, my rail pass has finished, so no more extensive rail trips. The last two I did was going back to near Beppu, to see a valley with 4 groups of 1000 year old stone Buddhas, and a quick trip to Sasebo which turned out to be a complete waste of time.

The trip to Beppu was really good. It was on a really old desiel train called the Yufuin no Mori, which was a tourist trip designed to go to Yufuin and Beppu. I then caught a local train to Usuki, and once there tried to work out how to get to the Buddha statues. There was no tourist information office, and only a few brochures. I found one with a picture on it of where I wanted to go and asked the JR train station bloke when the next bus was, he said 4:30pm. Considering it was 3:15pm, I wasn't too keen on waiting. As I started to calculate the cost of catching a taxi, walking and just plain giving up a Japanese man and his wife walked up to me and asked if I needed help. It's really weird here how that happens. Anyway, the JR man gave me correct, but not helpful information. The JR bus came at 4:30pm, there was a local bus that arrived at 3:45pm to go to the statues, that dropped me off at the front of the place. These busses had no English signs, numbers or anything. I essentially had to wait for 3:45pm and, in my poor Japanese, ask if he wasing going to the place in the picture.

Thankfully, he was.

The place was really good. Someone, obviously with a lot more time then I could possible imagine decided that they'd take this cliff face, and with a chisel remove all the bits of rock that didn't seem to match their idea of the image of Buddha. And not content with doing it once, slices out a whole host of retainers, other Buddhas and bits and pieces. Four times, in different places around the mountain. Although I'm getting a little Buddha'd out now, I felt that I was lucky to see them. Although being a major tourist attraction, lots of other people got to seem them too.

I made my way back to Beppu to meet my friend there. She'd recently heard that her ex-husband, had got ingaged to his new girlfriend in the US. So her life had not taken a good turn. I don't think she got to use the word reconciliation. We had a few beers and talked about it. She's got some work now, which is good. Some of which was in a Japanese style bar, the sort of place that scares me. I always wondered how those places make money. They fit about 8 people, and there may be several hundred of them in a small area, so competition is fairly feirce.

After getting the bill, I now know how they survive.

They carge like a wounded bull. Two bottles of beer and some snack food cost me the equivalent of AU$40. What I was paying for was the company of the women behind the bar, which I really, really didn't understand, didn't need and didn't want. These are the places middle-aged men go to be comforted, sing some Karaoke and drown their sorrows.

As I said, they scare me.

I missed the train I wanted to get back to Fukuoka, and so I waited for the last one I could catch. Which meant I ended up, half way home at midnight. Most trains stop at midnight. I managed to get the last train back, which for JR was supprising running 20 minutes late. At 1:30am I managed to crawl back to my hotel. So much for trying to get the 8:15am the next morning.

So, yesterday I went to Sasebo. Enough said.

Had some beers with my English friend again, so I seem to keep bumping into her at the oddest places. I'm pretty sure with only a few days to go, and with her going to Shimonoseki (where the International Whaling Commission have been having a fun time the past week,) it's not likely we'll see each other. I've made lots of friends on this trip. Met lots of people, and had lots of fun. Although the final chapter hasn't been written, (and my never get written,) I would like to think I won't come home the same person. As I've talked with a lot of other backpackers, after this much travel one can't return home and be normal. There whole world is out there, waiting to be seen. Waiting to be changed, waiting for something to happen. I have been reading the Japan Times quite a bit. I don't have much hope for Japan anymore. A dystopian future awaits it. Money Politics, or Concrete Politics as I end to think of it domiantes the whole country. The Japanese people, who as a people, are lovely, kind, considerate and open have had to suffer to take Japan so far forward into the furture ahead of everyone else that it can't continue.

When I got back to Fukuoka at 1:30am, I saw the homeless people at the train station. There were somewhere between 50 and 100 people, with their carboard boxes for homes, or sheets of newspaper sleeping in the warmth of the building. I don't know yet where these people go during the day, how they eat, how they survive. Or evenwho they are.

I want to find out though.

So now, all I have left is shopping, shopping and more shopping, and maybe look for work. Actually, I think some reflective analysis of the state of Japanese culture in the later part of the 20th Century might be in order. Or I might just go to Starbucks and have a coffee.

Fish

Tomorrow, I'm sure to find myself turned into a giant banana.

Yesterday I caught the train down to Kumamoto, which has castle number 4 in the list of great castles of Japan. I didn't actually go to the castle, because (a) if I return to live here, it'll be a day trip, and (b) I had already seen the three other great castles, and since I only saw two of the three great gardens, and one of the three great views I thought I'd be consistent and not complete the set.

Instead when I got the local handbook, opened it and saw the picture of the 500 stone Buddha statues, I thought, I'm going there. Now Kumamoto is about 2 hours by train from Fukuoka. And I had missed the early one. Actually, I wanted to catch the 8:15am train, but slept in. Once there, I caught a tram to the bus terminal. And I had missed the bus I wanted (was checking email, naughty me), so I took the sight seeing bus around the castle as I had an hour to wait for the next one. Some junior school kids got onto the bus and asked me some questions in Japanese and English, like what my name was. For 7 year olds, they were suprisingly well enunciated in their English and Japanese. They took the obligatory photos, and I jumped off at the first chance I had. The local bus took 1/2 hour to get to the bus stop, which I'm pretty sure it missed when I pressed the buzzer. After about 10 minutes walking (and some directional help from a hairdresser), I got to the base of the mountain. Another 10 minutes along a fairly small, steap road, and I got to the rice paddies most of the way up. I asked a crusty old woman, who may not have seen a Westerner since WWII, by pointing at the picture and doing my best Japanese, "Which way is it?" Eventually I got there. Of course, several other people were there (thankfully no tour groups with flag waving tour guides.) I did however take the correct route from the directions I got from the hair dresser, because the map that she gave me for tourists was really, really bad (but I think she knew that and was trying to tell me.)

The place was great. These statues were about 400 years old, and marked the place where a great Samurai mediatated in a cave for 90 days and wrote a book called "A Book of Five Rings," about war and all that. It was, as usual for a Buddhist temple, quite peaceful. It is said you can find your own face within one of the 500 statues. Unfortunately quite a few had lost their heads, which considering how I felt the day before seemed quite apt. I did find some grumpy looking ones, and a few lazy ones so perhaps there was the idea of me within some of them.

When the bus dropped me off, I took note of when the last one to return was, so I headed back down the hill to the bus stop. After some more helpful directions I found the place. I was almost worried that I'd have to hitch back, because there was one last bus back to Kumamoto. Thankfully it arrived, but the trip back was quite scary, at some points the road narrows so only one direction of traffic is possible at a time. Considering how narrow the roads were to start with, there wasn't much room left for it to get any narrower.

Today I finished reading The Complete Short Stories of Franz Kafka. He was a German Jew who wrote from about 1904 until his death in about 1924. He was a surrealist writer. One of his stories, a well known one (apparently) is where the main character wakes up to find he has turned into a giant beetle. When I asked my friend (who had influenced me in buying the book) how I was meant to read it, she said that the work was mostly autobiographical.

Franz Kafka turned into a giant beetle.

This morning, I wanted to catch the 8:15am train again. I left the hotel at 9:45am. It was raining, and I was carrying a banana. I used it as an umbrella. The subway was late, which never happens, so it mustn't have been a train ... maybe it was a whale. I got to the JR station late, and so I missed the whale I had planned to catch. Knowing I was so late that trains had decided, as a collective whole to be whales. Eventually I caught the whale to Nagasaki, because I wanted to go to the Peace Museum, and it wasn't too far away (well, 2 hours away.)

The Peace Park and Museum were pretty good. I ate my lunch in the park, trying to avoid the herds of school children, who seemed to turn into giraffes when I wasn't looking. Lunch consisted of a sandwich, a sushi triangle and a banana.

The museum was better than the Hiroshima one I think. It had a better, more somber atmosphere. Some of the videos and commentary was really moving, and very telling. But again, as with Hiroshima the attrocities commited by Japanese were pretty much covered up.

As usual, I just missed the whale I wanted to catch getting back to Fukuoka, so I sat around for an hour just wasting time. I really should have been doing Nagaski for all I could, but I really, really couldn't be bothered. (Actually, the real reason was that I was feeling really disgusting. I had planned to go to this hot sand onsen about 4 hours south of Fukuoka by whale, and so I didn't have a shower in the morning knowing I'd be going for a swim in the beach (perhaps some train watching), having a shower at least twice and all that. As such, I didn't make it and so I was hot and stinky all day.)

Oddly though, when I was sitting in the Peace Park after the museum, wondering if I'd go up to the Rope Way (which didn't seem to be operating, and no, the thing hadn't turned into a large yellow canary, it was red) a group of four girls and a bloke turn up ask ask if it was okay to take a photo. I thought they wanted me to take a photo of them, but no, the four sit two either side of me and the bloke takes the photo. Before I could work out what was happening, they'd run off for more photos elsewhere. Maybe I stank too much.

Maybe I shouldn't have eaten the banana.