by Tracy Slater
“You. Are. Kidding me,” I’d gasped through laughter. This was not my vision of staid, polite Japanese people. And Toru’s aunt and uncle, Michiko-san and Hamatani-san, seemed so proper. “What did his parents say?”
“Hamatani-san just kept shaking head and saying, ‘Too much! Too much!’ But Michiko-san laughed a little. Maybe thought was a little funny.”
“Really? But isn’t that so not Japanese?”
“Well, kind of unusual, but not so much. When getting drunk, these things can happen. Kind of crazy, but kind of not so, for party.”
In Osaka, I’d already noticed a surprising acceptance under very specific circumstances of behavior that in the U.S. would be considered outrageous anytime. Toru and I sometimes saw drunk salarymen in rumpled suits passed out on the sidewalk in broad daylight, pedestrians streaming by unconcerned; or well-dressed people weaving down city blocks late at night, leaning over periodically to retch. The first time we found a businessman asleep on the street next to his own stomach contents, I’d been aghast, but Toru had tried to convince me it was actually “sign of peaceful society”: people feel safe enough to be vulnerable in public without worrying about crime or injury. I’d been both skeptical and amazed.
But I could also understand how—since Japan exerts so much pressure to be contained, controlled, rule bound—when people let loose, they can really let loose. In general, the society seemed to tolerate it, perfectly happy to ignore it as long as the person was drunk or participating in some other sanctioned activity for blowing off steam, as if it were all a necessary byproduct of living with such strict self-regulation. I wondered if this was why Japanese pornography and crime fiction were so violent, or the sex clubs I’d read about so outlandish: some apparently featured women dressed as kilted schoolgirls standing on mock train cars so customers could pretend to molest them. As long as a behavior remained relegated to the sphere of imagination, of fiction—or of the alcohol induced—people by and large remained un-concerned.
“But,” Toru had added, when he’d told me about the naked table dancer at his cousin’s wedding, “not so good to do in front of parents. Better to wait for after party, just with friends.” Well, at least my lack of underwear can’t compete with that, I thought.
Now, as we crowded into the elevator at the wedding venue with Jiro-san and Sachi-san, I felt curious to see them up close. Both were thin and smiled easily, and Jiro-san had short hair that tufted upward like Toru’s, although his facial features were softer. Sachi-san wore a plain pale dress with short sleeves, her straight dark hair reaching her shoulders. She nodded up and down after we met. “Kakko ii, ne!” she said, gesturing toward me. I smiled, then said through my teeth, “What’s that mean, Tof?”
“It means good-looking, or fashionable, or kind of chic,” Toru said, and then they launched into Japanese with lots of laughter and, I assumed, catching up.
Because Toru’s mother had been Catholic and Kei still identified as such, a priest officiated the wedding ceremony. I’d heard that in Japan many white men rent themselves out as “fathers,” fake priests who will perform at Japanese weddings to provide a Western feel. It’s an alternate way to make money that tends to pay more by the hour than teaching English. (One BBC article quotes a fake British priest saying, “People like the dress, the kiss and the image. Japanese Christians make up only 1% of the country, but now about 90% of weddings are in the Christian style.”3)
I was a touch disappointed when Kei’s priest turned out to be Japanese. “Is he a real priest?” I whispered to Toru.
“Ya, real,” Toru whispered back. “Not like fake whitey,” he said, and we snickered. We’d been laughing about this term since we’d noticed one of Osaka’s underground malls was named Whity (but pronounced as if the word included a penultimate e). We’d immediately taken a series of pictures of the sign along with a nearby café called Honeypot, which I found equally hilarious. Toru had stood in front of the signs and pointed, making mock-horrified faces while I cackled like a tween and aimed my camera, confused shoppers turning to stare in confusion at our mirth.
When I thought about it now, though, it made sense Kei would want a real priest for her wedding, since her religious beliefs were real, too. I smiled at the father, and he nodded prayerfully at me.
The ceremony proceeded in Japanese, and Tetsunobu-san, sitting on Toru’s other side, held up a picture of Toru’s mother. I heard the priest say her name, “Eiko-san,” and then a string of solemn words. I bowed my head, felt my silly mood condense into something softer, quieter, then sad. Up at the altar, Kei and Funaki-san stood still and expressionless, he in tails, she in a white gown. I glanced at Toru, who sat with his eyes down now, equally expressionless. His father looked up toward the picture he held aloft, Eiko-san’s framed face smiling, but he, too, remained expressionless.
I knew inside they were all rent by grief, and I felt momentarily shocked at how seamlessly they hid it. I knew Kei must have missed her mother achingly, especially at this moment. I knew Tetsunobu-san must have felt a cold space by his side where his wife should have been sitting. I remembered Toru on the afternoon he learned of his mother’s accident, his body trembling in that taxicab in Seoul, and then again on the night he’d returned to Korea after visiting her in the hospital in Osaka, only to learn she had died just after his plane had taken off. I imagined them seeing her in a coma in the hospital before she died, gathered in the gloom by her bed, tubes hooking her to machines. I wondered if they were remembering her that way now, or thinking of other scenes: a mother’s nighttime kiss, cool and soft; an encouraging hand waving on the first day of school; her back at the kitchen sink, arms moving as she peeled the skins from vegetables.
Suddenly, although I had never met Eiko-san, I missed her sharply. I wondered how it would have felt to be related to a woman so different from my own mother. I grieved for her, too: for her missed chance at being here with her children, her husband, at the altar of her daughter’s wedding. Inside, my chest felt wobbly as I thought about her family in their silent, hidden grief. I wondered, considering the stoicism of Kei and Toru and Tetsunobu-san, if doing something as overt as crying here and now, in public at an event meant to be a celebration, would be judged excessively emotional: by the other attendees, by themselves, by Japanese standards in general. Somehow, that made me even sadder for them.
I wanted to grab Toru’s hand but I didn’t, because I didn’t know if he would find it an intrusion, and I didn’t want to shatter his equilibrium if he was, in fact, fighting down tears. I couldn’t see the other attendees because we were in the front row, but the room was silent save for the priest’s monotone intonation.
I felt a sob push against my own throat, and my eyes began to sting, but I pressed down the emotion as hard as I could. I pushed my leg alongside Toru’s knee so he would know, would remember through that quiet pressure that I was beside him, with him. Quickly, I wiped a tiny tear that had leaked onto my lash line. Then Tetsunobu-san lowered the picture, and the priest’s prayers turned to other matters.
After the ceremony, the rest of the guests went one floor up to the dining room, while the two families lined up in a room adjacent to the makeshift chapel. We sat on two long benches facing one another, Kei and Funaki-san standing at the end. Tetsunobu-san, Michiko-san, Hamatani-san, Toru, and I were there to represent Kei’s side.
Now Funaki-san announced each of his relatives, calling their name and, if relevant, their job or professional title. As each person stood and bowed, our side would say, “Hajimemashite. Dozo yoroshiku onegaishimasu,” roughly translating to “Nice to meet you. It is an honor to make your acquaintance.” Then Kei repeated protocol with her side.
When I stood up, I put my hands flat on my thighs and bent low at the waist, as Respected Teacher Fujita at the YWCA had taught us was the polite way to bow. My back was to the wall, so I didn’t worry what was visible through my dress. “Hajimemashite!” I said on my way
down. Then I raised myself up and, embarrassed, forgot the rest. “Dozo . . . gozo . . . ,” I muttered, turning red-faced to Toru. He said something to the line of Funaki-san’s relatives, offering an apologetic dip from his seat, and everyone laughed kindly. I sat down abruptly, feeling both grateful and childlike.
Funaki-san’s grandmother nodded her powdered face, then gave a lipsticked smile, as if pleased I had made the effort but not the least surprised it had proved beyond me. After all, I was a foreigner, and this was Japan, where the language, food, and customs remain inaccessible to outsiders, even in the unlikely event one marries into a native family. I knew I was doing nothing to dispel that myth.
I also knew that in some Japanese families, a foreign relative was considered a mark of shame. I’d heard of the common Japanese practice, especially popular before the mid–twentieth century, of people hiring private investigators to research potential mates’ clans to avoid a scandalous match. A gaijin in the family could definitely be a no-go.
I’d asked Toru if he thought Funaki-san’s parents were wary of my becoming, technically, related to them. “Could be,” he’d said. “But probably not. We’re not such high family.” Nowadays, he explained, mostly only very wealthy or politically important people researched potential matches. “I have aunt who married Bhutan doctor,” he’d said, so I would not be the first foreigner in the family anyway, although I would be the first non-Asian. “Besides,” he’d added, “my uncle was student leader in communist movement at Tokyo University, in 1970s.” At least, according to the old guard, Toru had assured me, that was even worse than being a gaijin.
But all throughout Kei’s wedding, I thought I sensed a weird energy coming from Funaki-san’s mother. She was unfailingly polite but so reserved that I wasn’t sure whether she was just immaculately contained or inclined to coldness. She wore a red and gold kimono, and when we met, she smiled tightly and bowed very slightly, like a wooden statue tipping down one notch. She spoke a little English, and I tried to congratulate her, comment on the beauty of her kimono, yet still she only smiled and inclined her head.
Maybe she’s shy? Uncomfortable speaking English? Or I’m imagining things? I couldn’t tell if her reserve meant anything or not. Was it one more sign I didn’t know how to read, or not a sign at all?
“I think Funaki-san’s mother doesn’t like me,” I whispered to Toru as we made our way to the dining room. We were placed at a small table with his father, the picture of Eiko-san next to our plates. Funaki-san’s family was at their own table across the room. As is customary at Japanese weddings, Kei’s and Funaki-san’s bosses were at tables, too, rising to make some of the first toasts.
“She probably just shy,” Toru said. Later, when we went to have family pictures taken, we all gathered in one long line, Kei and Funaki-san in the center. The photographer put me and Toru on one end, then went to his tripod and surveyed the group. He gave an order to his assistant, who approached the line and made some adjustments: a torso turned here, an arm or foot adjusted there. Then she came toward me. She moved me left a bit until a small gap separated me from Toru and the family chain.
“See, I told you she doesn’t like me!” I said to him after the photo shoot. “I bet she told the photographer to move me aside so she could cut the gaijin out of the family photo!” I was more curious than upset, though. On one hand, these were technically my extended family-to-be. On the other, they were people I couldn’t have a conversation with. I wasn’t even sure whether they cared I was a foreigner, and I didn’t have the language or cultural skills to read between the lines and find out. Like my strange detachment from Japanese gender norms that in America would disturb me, once again I thought, This isn’t my country or my culture. My remove kept me feeling both isolated and protected from what happened here. Moreover, Toru didn’t seem upset, which I figured was the best sign.
Now, he laughed at my accusation. “They just were adjusting line, making space even,” he said, grabbing my hand. “Although maybe . . . maybe she will decide to cutting gaijin out of family photo!” he teased.
Then another thought seized me. “Oh, God,” I said. “What if the photographer could tell I wasn’t wearing any underwear! Could see through my dress. In front!” I grabbed Toru’s wrist, my tone somewhere between a shriek and a whisper. “Maybe that’s why he needed his assistant to separate me, so he could crop my . . . my crotch out of the photo later!” I spent the rest of the day with my hands crossed below my waist like Adam and Eve in Eden, maneuvering Toru to stand in front of me whenever I could.
• • •
FOUR MONTHS LATER, we were on a sidewalk in Osaka, layered in heavy coats and hats. It was December 2006, and a wet winter wind stung our faces as we peered at the door of the U.S. Consulate. Toru and I needed to retrieve a form claiming I was of sound mind and acting under free will, certifying that when we filed our Japanese marriage papers a few hours later, even though I couldn’t read them, I’d understand their meaning.
In the cold, Toru and I looked at each other for a moment. Our hands were clasped, but neither one of us spoke.
We’d been preparing for this day for months, although I’d gone home to Boston in the interim after Kei’s wedding. I’d found another subletter to rent my apartment for part of the semester, but he only needed it for two months, and I planned to be in Osaka for four. I was beginning to feel more frazzled by both the financial and practical burdens of the Boston studio, in part because my rental agreement forbade me from subletting.
I guessed my landlords knew and didn’t care as long as I paid my rent on time every month and fixed anything that broke, but I couldn’t be sure. “We love you,” they always told me when we talked. They were both male flight attendants, now based on the West Coast. “Never leave us. Never.” They’d been crestfallen when they heard I was marrying a man from Japan, then delighted by my plan to keep living in Boston half the year. Once, when I got stuck in the apartment because the aging lock had broken from the inside, they responded as if I’d called with news of a three-alarm blaze. “I have a mani/pedi appointment in forty-five minutes,” I’d told Stu, “so if you can get the locksmith here in thirty, that would be great.”
“Oh, girlfriend, no, not a mani/pedi,” he’d said, his voice hushed. “We’ll have you out of there as soon as possible.” Ten minutes later, a locksmith was dismantling my door.
Wow, they must have had really bad luck with tenants in the past, I thought, having been unaware that simply paying your rent on time made you a hot commodity. Still, I tried to keep the subletters secret in case my landlords balked—or kept my last month’s rent and security deposit after kicking me out.
In the weeks in Boston before I returned to Japan to get married, my chest felt tight and my skin a little wrong, like what should be a seamless layer threatened to gap or slip. I tried not to wonder what those feelings meant. I’d lie awake and listen to the sound of late-fall traffic on the South End streets outside my apartment, the drunken laughter spilling from the bar across the road, boys with high voices shouting into the night. In addition to all the work of finding and vetting subletters, the task of preparing to leave home for four months was itself overwhelming: packing my personal belongings while still leaving the apartment adequately furnished; finding a place to store my car; drumming up new freelance work; preparing to reenter a world of opposing rules, rhythms, and customs; scrambling for the best price on the twenty-four-hour trip in economy-seat hell it would take to get there. I imagined myself floating in dark, empty space at the end of a flimsy rope, like the cartoon figure from the beginning of Lost in Space, a TV show we watched when we were young.
Jodi and I had a name for this: the Reentry Phase. We both suffered from depression and angst in the first weeks of our transitions to and from Japan. Even the things we most looked forward to in each country felt remote or insubstantial: for Jodi, the food in Osaka or her garden in Florida; for me, the warmt
h of Toru’s body or the utter sense of home I found in Boston. No thought or comfort could completely dispel the fog of anxiety that came on either end of our bicontinental stays. The shifts always felt tectonic: too huge, too unsettling, and just plain wrong.
We both took heart that the other experienced the same internal roiling, though. Neither one of us knew anyone else trying to live one life on two continents, so we assumed these emotions just came with the territory, like jet lag on a body: the mind’s inability to deal gracefully with planet-sized moves. We promised each other we would never make any life decisions during the Reentry Phase. We would acknowledge but not act on any emotion within the two weeks buffering either end of our Japan-U.S. transfers.
Once I get back to Osaka, get settled, feel Toru next to me, and make it through my first two weeks there, I’ll be better, I’d tried to comfort myself. The borders of my life would shift back into line. The unusual arrangement Toru and I had made, to have me living in both countries, would start to feel manageable again, normalized. If maintaining my Boston life while I was in Osaka became too much, I’d deal with that problem then. I didn’t like not having a firm plan, a perfect blueprint for how to cope with this contingency. But I was learning that in real, messy life, sometimes you can’t fully smooth down the future before it arrives.
Things did recalibrate eventually: the axis of my world tipped upright again, not sideways at an angle that left me feeling I might slip off reality’s edge. In Osaka, I got back into my rhythm of going to one of my morning cafés and working on freelance assignments from our tiny weekly mansion in the afternoons, then cooking a few nights a week at Tetsunobu-san’s apartment. On the weekends, Toru and I walked around the city or went out to dinner, and the soft pressure of his hand holding mine always stilled me, as if his palm could summon gravity to coalesce once more around my feet.
During the weekdays, I sank back into my minor expat bubble, like a little glass globe keeping the real Osaka both in sight and out of reach. My orb contained the few restaurants I could go to on my own, the train stops I knew, the stores whose aisles I could navigate solo. I became accustomed once more to the background murmur of a language I could barely follow, printed signs whose messages withheld meaning.