Finding a Butterfly in a Cup －茶碗の中に蝶々を見つけること－

I recently read a very interesting book called “The Book of Tea”.  It was written in 1906 by Japanese writer Kakuzo Okakura, to explain Japanese ideas of the appreciation of beauty and the tea ceremony to a Western audience.  It was originally written in English. 

Okakura notes that Westerners of the time tended to have a very simplistic view of Asian cultures.  He complained that they saw the Japanese as barbarians until they were successful in war with Russia, and felt that success in war was a poor measure of culture. 

Here are a few interesting quotes from the book: 

“Perfection is everywhere if we only choose to recognise it.” 

“[Tea] has not the arrogance of wine, the self- consciousness of coffee, nor the simpering innocence of cocoa.” 

“Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence… It is essentially a worship of the Imperfect, as it is [an] attempt to accomplish something possible in this impossible thing we know as life.” 

“Meanwhile, let us have a sip of tea. The afternoon glow is brightening the bamboos,… the [whistling of the pines in the wind] is heard in our kettle. Let us dream of [fleeting things] and linger in the beautiful foolishness of things.” 

“We classify too much and enjoy too little.” 

“The Taoist and Zen conception of perfection... the dynamic nature of their philosophy laid more stress upon the process through which perfection was sought than upon perfection itself. True beauty could be discovered only by one who mentally completed the incomplete. The [strength] of life and art lay in its possibilities for growth.” 

“Alas! The only flower known to have wings is the butterfly; all others stand helpless before the destroyer.”

Vocabulary:

simpering – trying too much to be liked, such as by smiling in a foolish and self-conscious way

[eg., The simpering waiter tried hard to please the celebrity visitor to the restaurant.]

adoration – deep love or respect

sordid – involving dishonourable or immoral actions or motives

[eg., He was having a sordid love affair.]

fleeting – lasting only a moment; quickly passing away

[eg., A gambler’s success is often fleeting.]

to linger – to stay longer than necessary because of a reluctance to leave

[eg., Let us linger for a moment longer in the sunshine.]

 

Arriving Nowhere in Hakone －箱根で何処にもたどり着かない－

I recently took a short trip to Hakone with my family. 

My son was recovering from the flu, so we kept the itinerary simple.  We took a ropeway and cable car up a volcano, and smelled the sulphur and vapour hanging in the air.  We rested our legs in hot water as the cold wind whistled around us.  We took a boat across a lake.  And we enjoyed a lovely meal at the hotel restaurant, where I ate deer meat and tried some different kinds of wine. 

My son enjoyed all of the vehicles we travelled on.  He liked the “Romance Train” from Tokyo to Hakone, and a special train which climbed the mountain.  He loved the ropeway and cable car.  The thing he really didn’t like was when we arrived anywhere.  As soon as we got out onto the volcano, he wanted to get back in the cable car.  Maybe he is an instinctive Zen priest.  It is not the action that is important, but the process; it is not the destination that matters, but the journey. 

My wife was getting very frustrated in the hotel, trying to contact reception.  She wanted to ask about booking a taxi. 

“I can’t believe it!” she complained, “They’re engaged again!” 

Every time my wife called reception from the phone in our hotel room, the phone line was engaged.  No matter how many times she tried calling, she couldn’t get through. 

Eventually, my wife read the information sheet next to the phone a little more carefully.  For all of this time, she hadn’t been ringing the number for reception.  She had been ringing our own hotel room.  No wonder the line was always engaged.

 

The Claw is our Master －かぎ爪はご主人様です－

“The claw is our master.  The claw chooses who will go and who will stay.” 

“I have been chosen! Farewell, my friends.  I go on to a better place.”

Spoken by alien shaped toys in a claw machine, from the 1995 film, Toy Story

 

There was an interesting story from Hong Kong this week.  Regulators there have promised to introduce tighter regulations on the use of claw machines, after growing customer complaints were received. 

Claw machines are found in video game arcades, or indoor amusement spots for children.  The machine contains a lot of prizes, and players have to pay money to get a chance to manipulate a claw above one of the prizes, and to try to grab it and drop it into a hole. 

But with improved ability to programme the machines, have manufacturers been making things too difficult for customers to win?  The claw can be programmed to deliberately loosen its grip as it approaches the hole, or only to let a customer win a prize after they had spent a lot of money. 

One Hong Konger complained that he had spent more than the equivalent of 50 Pounds in 45 minutes, trying to catch the prize of a waffle maker.  But the claw kept dropping it, and he left with only a few trinkets. 

With everyone shopping on-line nowadays, could shops tap into the demand for people to pick up products with a claw?  I am going to move to Hong Kong and open up a shop selling waffle makers for 50 pounds.  You can’t have it delivered to your door by Amazon.  You have to go to the store and pick it out using a claw machine.  But there will be no nasty programming to make the task impossible, and everyone will be a winner.

 

Vocabulary:

a trinket – a small ornament or item of jewellery that is of little value

[eg., the souvenir stall sold trinkets such as miniature models of Tokyo Tower.]

 

Strange Convenience －不思議な便利さ－

Strange things are happening in convenience stores in Nerima. 

One of my students recently told me that she keeps a “convenience store notebook”.  For the last six years, since 2018, she has been taking a memo of her experiences in visiting various convenience stores around Nerima.  She marks the attitude of the staff towards her with a circle for good and a cross for unacceptable.  She also marks their toilet facilities with an A, B, or C. 

I told her that she could perhaps sell this information to the different companies.  I am sure that Lawson and Family Mart would be interested to know which staff members failed to live up to standard. 

A different student of mine told me that she recently went on a “Lawson crawl”.  This was after I had taught her the expression “pub crawl”.  In a pub crawl, someone visits many different pubs one after the other in the same night of drinking.  My student told me that she had visited as many branches of Lawson as she could find in the same evening. 

Apparently, my student’s friend had recommended a special offer available in some limited branches of Lawson.  They were selling frozen tarts, and also a lemon flavored alcoholic drink with a slice of real lemon. 

When my student eventually found a store selling these products she shouted out loud, “Yatta!” [“I’ve done it!] 

I think she had been sampling the lemon flavored alcohol even without the real lemon several times before she found exactly what she wanted. 

What is it about convenience stores that seems to encourage strange behaviour?

 

A Magical Christmas －魔術的なクリスマス－

My son is now eight years old, and is looking forward to Christmas.  But he is getting quite inquisitive about how the process of present giving works.  Here is a conversation my wife and I had with him recently. 

My son:  Is Santa Claus real? 

My wife:  I think so. 

My son: Where does he live? 

My wife: I think it is in Finland. 

My son: Is he a human?

 

My wife: No

Me [simultaneously]: Yes

 

Me: Well, we don’t really know what he is. 

My son: What do scientists believe he is? 

[Pause] 

My wife: I think he is a kind of magic person, a bit like a god. 

My son: Or maybe it’s more than one person. 

Me: Yes.  It could be like a secret organisation of people, who help Santa to put presents in houses all over the world.

 

My son [skeptically]: And he always comes in through the chimney?

Me: He also uses windows… Um…  By the way, if you had one magic power, like invisibility or the power to fly, what magic power would you like? 

Wishing you all a magical Christmas.

 

Vocabulary:

simultaneously – of two or more events, happening at the same time

[e.g., The two football matches are being played simultaneously.  So we will let you know what is happening in both matches.]

skeptically – with an attitude of doubt

[e.g., Investors have reacted skeptically to the company’s claims that they will be able to double their profits next year.]

 

Ordeals —試練－

My son is struggling to learn how to swim, and sometimes tries to avoid his swimming classes by feigning illness. 

So I tried to inspire him to stick at it by telling about an ordeal practiced by boys and young men in the Amazon rain forest.  There is a tribe that makes gloves full of bullet ants, which the boys and young men have to wear for ten minutes or so in order to pass the ordeal.  The ants will sting them thousands of times during the ten minute period.  Each sting feels like being shot, which is why the insects are known as bullet ants. 

I meant the lesson to be that if these boys could withstand this ordeal, then my son could also put up with his uncomfortable swimming lessons. 

I asked him what ordeal he would introduce at his school for the children that he didn’t like.  Here were some ideas he had. 

The scorpion in the bed ordeal.  In order to become a man, you have to spend one night in bed with a scorpion. 

The counting ordeal.  You have to count to one million, without missing any numbers. 

The chili sauce ordeal.  You have to drink a glass of chili sauce.

 

Very Small Gods －とても小さな神様－

“Gods like to see an atheist around.  [It] gives them something to aim at.” 

“The trouble with being a god is that you’ve got noone to pray to.”

From “Small Gods” by Terry Pratchett

 

It is said that in Japan, the customer is god.  But are there limits to what customers can expect, even in Japan? 

One of my students complained to me recently about the standard of service that her new mobile phone provider was offering. 

“I bought a new mobile phone, and I don’t know how to use it very well,” she said.  “So I went to that phone provider’s shop and asked them to teach me how to use it.  But they said that they charged money for giving lessons in how to use their phone.  Can you believe it?” 

I wasn’t so sure that my student was entitled to complain.  After all, the labour cost of having a staff member available to teach customers how to use the phone has to be paid from somewhere. 

If my student’s logic is correct, then a customer can buy a car from Toyota and then demand that Toyota teaches their new customer how to drive.  Or I could buy some eggs from my local supermarket and then demand that the staff teach me how to make an omelette.  You could buy a book from a book shop and then demand that the staff teach you how to read. 

If the customer is god, he or she is a very small god, whose temples have all fallen down and whose last worshipper has died.