Wednesday arrived. Mr Higo and I were the second act in the farewell party. Once Mr Omura had finished his routine, which involved him dressing up in a schoolgirl’s uniform and parading around stage with a vibrating cellphone, we were given our cue to get ready.
Both of us were dressed in dark suits. I had a blue shirt and tie, while Mr Higo wore crimson. Matching oversize handkerchiefs stuck out of our jacket pockets. We looked like a pair of music-hall vaudevillians.
Mr Terada introduced us with a great deal of fanfare, and we bounded out on to the stage. We were greeted with whistles and a loud applause, and from then on everything went swimmingly. We got laughs at the jokes. We got laughs at the hitting-each-other-on-the-head bits. We got laughs at my facial expressions. We got laughs at my ‘Atatamemasen ka’ joke, and we got laughs at all the lines I still didn’t understand.
Mr Higo purchased his pornographic magazine and I proceeded to heat it up for him in the store’s microwave. We moved seamlessly into our bank robbery skit, in which I was the bumbling criminal who demanded a bag of pesos before hamming up the getaway. Mr Higo, acting as my intelligent accomplice, cuffed me around the head and scolded me for my stupidity.
We then performed some impersonations of teachers in the audience and were given a standing ovation as we ran offstage.
It seemed that bringing happiness and goodwill to the people of Kanan Town was my current role in the universe. Not only had I touched the hearts of my students by making them cry and laugh, but I had apparently inspired the town by having sat the Japanese Proficiency Exam. The event, about which I had written in my monthly town magazine article, had generated a lot of interest, and I had received my first-ever piece of fan mail – from a ten-year-old boy whom I had never met – wishing me good luck. In my March article I had, therefore, added a small comment saying that I had received the results of my exam – a pass – and wished to thank all those who had supported me.
It seemed that passing an exam in Japan carried similar social status to becoming an All Black in New Zealand. People called out to me on the street, and complete strangers approached to congratulate me. At the convenience store, a young female shop assistant giggled and told me how happy she was that I had passed my exam. I gave her a benevolent smile for good measure.
However, my emotional rollercoaster of tears and laughter was set to take one last weepy dip.
On graduation day I arrived at school early in my black suit and new Korean wool overcoat. It was a crisp spring morning, and the sun was shrouded in wispy grey cloud. I took my seat in the gymnasium and watched while the students, parents and town dignitaries filed in for the solemn ceremony.
The high-roofed building was freezing, and I shivered uncontrollably through the formal speeches from the town mayor and the principal. The speeches finally drew to an end, and the music teacher took her seat at the piano. It was time for the individual certificate presentations to begin. A sombre piano solo filled the frosty air as the graduating students began to slowly shuffle on to the stage. When Hiro walked up on stage to collect his certificate I bit my tongue and pinched myself. He bowed proudly to Mr Kazama and returned to his seat looking sad. Hiro was now on his way to join his former classmate, Jun Fujita, at the special-needs school in Tondabayashi.
Yurika had also graduated. She would continue on to a normal high school by herself. Teru-Chan had not wanted to attend the graduation ceremony. She had stayed at home.
I never saw Teru-Chan or Yurika again.
At the end of the presentations, all the homeroom teachers were invited to walk up on stage. Not being a homeroom teacher I stayed firmly in my seat, still trying without success to keep warm. Behind me, the self-appointed head English teacher, Mrs Nakazato, leant forward and urgently whispered into my ear that I should follow the other teachers on to the stage. ‘Go on, Mr Hamish. You need to go on stage. You were one of the main teachers too.’
‘Really?’ I asked in surprise. ‘I thought only the homeroom teachers were invited?’
‘No, no,’ she assured me sternly, ‘you must go too. Quickly, they are waiting.’
I glanced at my colleagues on stage. They were all standing rigidly to attention. Nobody seemed to have noticed my absence. ‘Quickly,’ Mrs Nakazato hissed. She clenched my arm in an attempt to spur me on.
I stood up dumbly and wandered up on to the stage. I had no idea what the homeroom teachers were doing, but assumed that we were all going to give the departing students a standing ovation as they filed out of the gymnasium.
A murmur went up from the audience and I noticed a few people frowning and pointing at me. I glanced around. Mr Omura was standing next to me. He had a confused look on his face.
I looked back at Mrs Nakazato. She smiled and gave me an enthusiastic thumbs-up. I continued to stand rigidly to attention until I suddenly realised to my horror that the homeroom teachers were being presented with bouquets of flowers. I did a quick headcount and realised there was one bouquet too few. I was not supposed to be on the stage at all. I turned bright red and shuffled back to my seat, seething with rage and humiliation.
Akko was waiting for me at my apartment when I arrived home. She listened quietly as I ranted and raved and provided a detailed description of my humiliation at the graduation ceremony. Eventually I ran out of steam and sat still, sipping the jasmine tea she had made.
‘You poor thing,’ she soothed comfortingly. ‘No one gave you any flowers.’ She chuckled, and I swatted her playfully with a cushion.
‘Shall we go out for dinner?’ she suggested. ‘I feel like sushi. Let’s go to the rotating sushi restaurant. Go on, your tummy would like that.’
Akko leant forward and patted my stomach. ‘How is my dear Poohsan today?’ Over the past few weeks, she had noticed that I had been developing a slight paunch, and had decided to nickname it the Japanese equivalent of Pooh Bear. I had been loathe to agree with her, but she was right. Since my pitiful performance in the South Osaka half-marathon, my exercise and eating habits had fallen off the wagon spectacularly, and I had slipped back to my regime of two chocolate bars a day and as little physical activity as possible.
Akko and I spent a happy evening at the restaurant and my anger about the graduation ceremony dissipated. After dinner we strolled through the backstreets of Jinaimachi, enjoying the tranquillity and the warm spring evening. Back at my apartment we sat up late into the night discussing how we would spend the coming spring vacation. Akko planned to take as much time off work as possible.
The break was a truly happy and romantic three weeks. Akko and I spent nearly every day together. We picnicked in the hills of Kanan Town, eating sandwiches and cream cakes beneath glorious cherry blossom trees. At night we climbed to the viewing platforms on top of tall buildings, enjoying the twinkling panorama.
We went to movies, dined at restaurants, shopped, ate ice-creams in the park, and snuggled indoors watching videos when it rained. We spent hours crooning cheesy love ballads in our own karaoke booth.
We went to an amusement park in north Osaka. The Japanese-sized seats and restraining bars on the roller-coasters were several sizes too small for me: not only could I not breathe properly, but my testicles were mashed at every hair-raising dip and curl. After three rides I felt physically ill, but continued to accompany Akko as she gleefully bounced from one roller-coaster to the next. By the end of the day we had managed to ride every damn roller-coaster, pirate ship and giant teacup in the park, and I had narrowly avoided throwing up a dozen times.
The final week of the vacation was spent at a much more relaxed pace. We hung out in my apartment, watching videos and cooking meals. I was usually put on cooking detail, while Akko would venture out to the doughnut store next to the train station to buy dessert.
The three weeks had flashed by in a lovesick blur. Suddenly the world stopped standing still. It was Sunday night, and I was mentally preparing for my return to work. Akko had cooked dinner and selected the evening’s viewing, a romantic
drama. We held hands and watched the story of a young man who met a young woman, fell in love with her, and then watched as she died tragically from cancer.
Neither of us spoke as the credits started to roll. I moved forward to stop the video player. Akko was crying. ‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘It’s just a silly movie.’
Akko stood and left the room. I found her weeping in the kitchen. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, trying to hide her face. ‘I’m just so sad.’
I gave her a hug, and she melted into my arms. ‘I’ve had such a happy time with you,’ she whispered between tears. ‘I’ve had such a happy time visiting your apartment and doing fun things with you.’ She started crying again. ‘But soon all of this will end, because you can’t stay here any more.’
I listened quietly, and held her close. Tears rolled slowly down my cheeks. I was running out of time in Japan. I was running out of time with Akko.
I slept poorly that night, and was strung-out when I arrived at work the next morning. It was the first day of the new school year, and there had been a fair number of changes. Mr Kazama, the owl-like principal, had retired. In his place sat Mr Nagano, a toady little man who wasted no time informing me that he didn’t like The Lord Of The Rings movies because they were too imaginative. I disliked him immediately.
There were ten more new faces dotted around the staffroom. The closest to the internet terminal was a middle-aged woman dressed in Gucci and sporting a flash haircut – the new office secretary. Poor nerdy Mr Yoshimura had been booted off to count beans somewhere else.
Two seats along was the new woodwork teacher, the school’s fourth in three years. Mr Doi had not returned from his counselling; he had apparently gone into retirement. Shaven-haired Mr Yagi had been relocated and I had not a chance to say goodbye to him. The new teacher was an odd-looking person. His little chin and big moony glasses gave him the hybrid appearance of Elton John out of Brains from Thunderbirds.
My own seating arrangement was unchanged. I was still at the far end of the room, in the cold dank corner next to the door where I was able to act as a draught-stop for my colleagues.
That in itself was not a problem, but what I had not anticipated was that my new neighbour would be Mr Kobayashi, the school enforcer. I could look forward to spending my last four months sitting next to the scariest person in Japan. Gone were the days of turning up forty minutes late, eating chocolate and then sleeping until four …
There had been a few other changes, but by far the saddest was the departure of my good friend Mr Higo, the man who had lost long-distance running races with me, who had introduced me to karaoke, who had daringly impersonated fellow teachers, and with whom I had performed stand-up comedy.
In its infinite wisdom, the Osaka government had decided that Mr Higo had been at Kanan Junior High School long enough. He had been transferred to a school in the rough part of town, where kids sported fluorescent hair and threw chairs through windows.
His desk sat empty. A replacement English teacher would arrive the following day.
22
Lost and found
It was May. Only two months remained of my life in Osaka. I had marked the occasion by contracting a virulent head cold, and would have gladly spent my spare time sleeping at my desk and recovering, had it not been for Mr Kobayashi’s alarmingly intimate presence. Instead I brewed pot after pot of strong coffee and sought solace at the staff internet terminal. Life continued its predictable routine. I finished work every day at 4.15 and packed up my gear. I wheeled my bicycle out of the bike sheds, and stopped to chat with the large groups of students who milled about at the school gates. I teased the girls for having crushes on various male students, and shared stories of my latest outings with Akko. I joked with the naughty boys, and received advice as to the latest and coolest Japanese rap stars.
I would then mount my bicycle and ride past the town tennis courts, waving to the boys’ tennis team. I would pass the town hall and try not to wobble off my bike as I waved enthusiastically to Magnum and Mr Smiles, who would be enjoying their afternoon cigarette on the Board of Education balcony.
I would meander down the familiar track through the rice fields, and call out goodbye to the gaggle of students reading porn magazines. I would yell hello to the two pensioner rice farmers tending their crops, and they would put down their tools to wave and stare as I rode past.
My rice-paddy path would eventually rejoin the busy main road, and I would sail down Terada Hill with the wind in my hair. Without fail, I would pass a group of elementary-school students in bright yellow hats coming the other way. As the children sweated and panted their way uphill, they would call out to me and practise their breezy rendition of ‘Hello, aloha, nihao.’
At the base of the hill I would have two options. If in need of groceries, I would continue down the main road to the supermarket, competing fiercely with concrete mixers and heavy-duty construction vehicles. At the supermarket, I would receive smiles and polite bows from old people whom I had never seen before in my life, and would chat briefly with former students who were now working as checkout girls.
If, however, I had planned ahead for the evening meal and stocked my pantry, I could forego the supermarket, leave the busy main road and pedal down a quiet secluded backstreet. I loved this backstreet trail, which I had stumbled across while working on the town pamphlet project two years earlier.
The trail began as a thin path through the rice paddies, forking away from the main road at the base of Terada Hill. It followed a bubbling brook through a small settlement of elegant homes built in traditional Japanese style before weaving past bushy vegetable patches, straw-stuffed scarecrows, ornate stone walls, beautifully manicured bonsai gardens and my personal favourite, a run-down old house whose front room doubled as a pokey little stall for savoury octopus balls.
The trail finally rejoined the main road to Tondabayashi at the Ishikawa River bridge. Here, I would cross the polluted river, leaving behind the peaceful countryside town where I worked and entering the concrete city of Tondabayashi, where I lived. After battling the traffic jam caused by lunatic drivers and endless roadworks, I would ride the last leg of my journey through my 600-year-old neighbourhood of temples and old wooden warehouses.
At least that’s what I had planned for the afternoon of May 16. I suddenly remembered, however, that my pantry supplies were running low, and grudgingly decided to skip my secluded backstreet ride in favour of the busy main road that would take me past the supermarket.
As always, I had barely entered the supermarket before I was spotted by smiling pensioners, who thanked me for teaching the town’s young folk and recommended that I try the latest crop of melons, which were apparently very juicy. I smiled, and bowed politely. I didn’t want to admit that I was not particularly fond of overpriced Japanese fruit.
I completed my shopping and left the supermarket with four heavy bags of groceries. Unfortunately I was riding my mountain bike, which did not come equipped with a trusty shopping basket. I balanced the grocery bags precariously on the ends of my handlebars, crossed the busy road, and was just getting up to speed when someone called out ‘Excuse me!’ loudly in Japanese.
I carefully looked around, not wanting to overbalance and get clocked by a concrete mixer. A smiling man was leaning on a bicycle on the other side of the street. He called out again and asked me to stop. Figuring I must have dropped some of my groceries, I pulled over. The man rode blithely through the hurtling traffic and came to a stop directly in front of me, crashing into a lamppost.
I guessed that he must be a relative of one of my students, or perhaps a reader of my town magazine articles. His bike was now completely blocking my path. He twiddled his fingers and looked off into space. It suddenly occurred to me that he might be bonkers.
‘What’s your name?’ he asked. I told him. He stared off into space and repeated the question. I changed my name to ‘Hey’. He grinned.
I asked him what his name was, and received
an incomprehensible stuttering machine-gun response.
Introductions now out of the way, it was time for me to answer a few questions.
‘How do you say “cat” in English? How do you say “oranges” in English? How do you say “traffic light” in English? How do you say “lamppost” in English?’ He stammered on, clicking his fingers and doing a good impersonation of Robert De Niro in Awakenings, while I answered as best I could.
Eventually, though, we struck some problems when he resorted to asking me to translate every single shop name that he could see.
‘How do you say that shop?’
‘Honda.’
‘How do you say that shop?’
‘Mitsubishi.’
I started to realise that if I were to translate every imaginable noun my new friend could conjure up, I wouldn’t be getting home any time soon. I had groceries to put in the fridge and dinner to prepare. I moved my bike off the footpath to indicate that I was eager to leave.
Seeing this, he rolled his bike forward to block my way, and started a new line of questions.
‘How do you say my mother Keiko’s name in English?’
‘Keiko.’
‘How do you say my father Toshio’s name in English?’
‘Toshio.’
I was starting to lose my New Zealand patience and could feel myself becoming a bit more American.
‘Now then,’ I said firmly, ‘I have to go.’
I paused. I did not want this lunatic following me home. ‘I have to go now – to the library.’
Under the Osakan Sun Page 32