懐かしい、これ

I wrote this about six years ago at a time when I was writing a lot in Japanese. (I'll try to post a translation one of these days.) Enjoy. 

彼女がやって来る。グループレッスンなのに生徒は彼女しかいない。最近、こういうことが多くてときどき心配している。早く仕事を変えた方がいいといつも思っている。５年間そう思っているけど、まだちっとも動こうとしていない。僕はバカなのか怠けものなのかよく分からない。とにかく早く仕事を変えた方がいいと思う。

生徒の人数は特に少なくないけれど、確かに多くない。言うまでもなく多い方はいい方です。人数が多いとき、各クラスはにぎやかで楽しいから早く終わる。多いとき、収入がよくて、何でもする余裕がある。1か月、2か月間を休んでもまだまだ大丈夫です。今は、ながい連休をとるのが難しい。働かないとお金が入らない。

いつも一人の生徒しか出席しないとこういうことを考えている。

「今日もあなただけだよ」

「わい、ラッキー！」

彼女はラッキー。僕はどうやてもやし炒めをおいしくするのかを悩んでいる。

彼女が来たとき僕は氣志団のライブをDVDで見ていた。

「だれですか？」

「氣志団です。知っている？」僕は最近氣志団の大ファンになっちゃった。

「名前はしっているけど。初めて聞いてるけど。先生、どうやって『初めて聞く』をいうの？」

「It's my first time to hear them.」

「そう、そう。ファストタイム」

「It's my first time to hear them.」

「そう、そう。ファストタイム」

僕は紅茶とお菓子を出して、彼女と一緒に座る。僕のレッスンはかなりやすい。その上、紅茶とインポートスナックなどをだしてあげる。教室の雰囲気も抜群。生徒が多くなくてとてもへん。6人が坐れるテーブルに二人が座ってる。デートみたい。

彼女は20代後半で、顔は悪くない、スタイルはすばらしいほど、グラビアモデルだったらビックリしない。そういうレベルの女です。お互いに付き合ってる人がいるから僕は手を出すのを考えていない。実は出したいと思わない。でも、こういうとき、二人きりのとき、手を出したら、どうなるだろうと思ってしまう。でも、したくない。時間もないし、生徒も減ってきてデートをする余裕もないからです。

「What's new?」と聞くと「この前、友達のパーてイーに行った」と彼女が答える。

「You went to your friend's birthday party?」

「はい。」

ホワイトボードがださいからホワイトボードのかわりに真っ白のMacデスクトップを使っている。部屋にぴったりです。真っ白のイタリア製カーテルテーブルと白いデンマーク製のアーンヤコブセン椅子とよく似合う。この部屋のインテリアにお金をかけ過ぎた。４つの椅子が使われていないとき、そのことを痛感する。マックに「I went to my friend's birthday party.」を書くと彼女は「I went to my friend's birthday party」と言う。

「Where did you go?」

「いつ？」

「No, where?」生徒はこれをいつも間違われている。どこでやったかときくといつやったのを答えて来る。いつやったのかを聞くとどこでやったのを言う。生徒さんがわざといたずらをしていると他の説明がない。クラスが終わったら、皆がエレベーターの中「うふふ、先生を悩ませたね～」といってるちがいない。日本語で話す時、５とか４とか６言うと相手はときどき僕が何を言ったのか聞き取れないみたい。電話番後は．．．８０４５ですが、相手は６５？と確認する。８０４５と再び言うとまた相手は６５を聞き間違う。どうやって４と６が紛らわしくなったのか理解できない。つい最近の現象なんです。「When」と「Where」もこの一年間の問題です。耳はもともと良くなかったから、原因は僕かもしれない。これを考えるとやっぱりこの仕事をやめた方がいい。早めに。

「あ、すみません。ソリー」

「So, where did you go?」

「プロバンス。ケヤキ通りにある。プロバンス知っている？」

「Do you know Provence? or Have you been to Provence?」これもマックにタイプをする。

読みながら、彼女は「Have you been to Provence?」と聞く。

「No, but I want to go. How is the mood?」

「食べ物ですか？おいしかったです。スープが本当においしかった。」

「Not food. How was the mood? 雰囲気、ムード」

「あ、ソリー。よかったです。It was very nice. でも、あたしはふじわらの方が好き。」

「I like Fujiwara better.」

「先生も？」

「No, no, no. I've never been to Fujiwara. Not, me, you . . .」

「I like Fujiwara better.」

「Really? Why?」

「ケーキが美味しいから」

「The cake's good?」

「そう、グッドケーキ。」

「You like strawberries?」

「うん、大好き！」

「Today's your lucky day」と僕が言って、冷蔵庫からイチゴデニッシュをとってあげる。

「今日もラッキー。先週もラッキーでした。サンキュー、サンキュー。」

二人でそのイチゴデニッシュを食べる。ときどき、僕の仕事はなのかわからなくなる。僕はそもそも何の役割を果たしてると頭をかく。僕はホスト？喫茶のウエーター？ロンリーハートの仮／臨時ボイフレンド？それか悩み相談のカウンセラー？僕は何をやっているかわけわからないけど、きっと／確かに英語の先生じゃない。彼女はここまで過ごした30分の間、殆ど英語使ってない。これは未解決の神秘です。なんで、日本人は英会話のレッスンを受けるけど、日本語ばかり話してる？

僕はまだまだ日本語のレッスンを受けてる。12年間かけて勉強してきたが自分の日本語に自信がないから、今までも週１、２回学校に通ってる。先生に「お元気ですか」と聞かれると「Fine, thanks」と言わずに「ぼちぼちです」とか「あまっし」とか「おい、聞かないでよ」と答える。でも、僕は自分の生徒に「How ya doin'?」とか「How are you?」とか「How's everything?」など聞いたら「元気だよ」とか「まあまあ」とか「今日はとてもブルーです」生徒は言う。生徒さんたちはいつも「なぜあたしの英語が上達しないの？」と零してる。もちろん日本語で。

Hifumi, the Little Diner That Could

   When I first came to Japan I taught at a small privately run English School which only by the grace of God remains in business to this day.

   I taught five to six lessons a day, five days a week, back then and earned about ¥250,000—the minimum wage for that kind of work—minus ¥40,000-plus for rent and utilities.[1] In addition to being my employer, the feckless Mr. “Bakayama” (a nickname I coined for the man meaning “Foolish Mountain”; his real name was Nakayama) was also my landlord, like a two-bit Milton Hersey. As I was F.O.B., fresh-off-the-boat, I didn’t have to pay any income or residence taxes.

   Located in a sleepy corner of Kitakyūshū City, the neighborhood where I worked had a few restaurants and diners that were alright. There was one place that did a pretty good kara’age karii (curry and rice with fried chicken). My two co-workers “Blad” (Bradley) and “Hoka” (Geoffrey) and I would have lunch there after our “teachers meeting” every Wednesday and bitch about Bakayama.

   Lots of good memories. Blad and Hoka would return to the States the following spring and when my contract was up I moved on to Fukuoka.

   I took a job at another small English school called Bell American School. Not a bad operation and a huge improvement over Bakayama’s Little School That Barely Could. Unfortunately, I was the token gaijin (foreigner) at Bell in an office staffed with psychopathic women. (For more on this, go here.)

   I worked six days a week at the new school, but only had two to three classes a day. I also made a bit more, and with all the free time I was able to take on private lessons to supplement my income.[2]

   There were not only more restaurants near my new workplace, but they were much better than those in Kitakyūshū. What’s more, the affluent women I was now teaching were something of gourmands and delighted in taking me to new restaurants.

   I was at Bell for about four years before striking out on my own. Life continued to improve: more money, more freedom, better restaurants. I was now living in Daimyō, an area of Fukuoka City which is said to have more restaurants and bars (and hair salons) per square kilometer than anywhere else in Japan. The money and eats were very, very good.

   Before the Internet became as widely used as it is today, people would call me up to ask what restaurant I recommended, or where such-and-such bar was located. Thanks to smartphones I rarely have to perform this service now. It’s just as well because I seldom go out anymore what with my being the father of a young child (who happens to be in my lap fiddling with the keys as I try to write this).

   Since last spring I have been teaching full-time at a private women’s college.

   The conditions at the college are very good. I teach a mere two to three one-hour classes a day, four days a week, and get paid considerably more for the “work” than I did as part-time instructor with a heavier class load. (Odd, the way that works.) Where I was once a grunt in the Eikaiwa trenches nearly two decades ago I am now a low-ranking commissioned officer of sorts.

   The only drawback of the change in employment, as I have mentioned before, is the fact that the college is located in the heart of a culinary desert. The only eatery that is within a reasonable walking distance is the Hifumi Shokudō (一二三食堂, lit. One, Two, Three Diner), a miserable little place that doesn’t appear to have changed a thing since it opened sometime in the late Shōwa Period (early 80s?).

   Every thing about the place is odd.

   For one, the servings at Hifumi are huge, the kind of servings growing boys fortify themselves with. Trouble is, there isn’t a boy to be seen anywhere near the diner. Come to think of it, in the dozen times I have been to Hifumi, I have yet to see any other customers. Makes you wonder how they have been able to stay in business all this time.

   What's more, most of the time when I pop into Hifumi, I find the place abandoned. Sometimes I can hear the distant sound of a television coming from another room. (Hifumi, like so many of these diners from olden days, is on the first floor of proprietor's home.) I often have to manufacture some racket—move the table about so that it grates against the concrete floor, or throw the sliding door open with a crash—before the goblins working in the Hifumi kitchen stir to life.

   The only item on the menu that I can safely recommend is the “Service Set” (☆☆☆) which includes two chicken cutlets, salad, rice, and soup for the low, low price of ¥450 ($4.50). With such rock-bottom prices, it’s no wonder Hifumi can’t afford to remodel.

   Part of me wants to advise them on how they might bring in some of the four-thousand-odd girls attending the local school, but then Hifumi has managed to survive the two Lost Decades since the end of the Shôwa Period. Perhaps, they know what their doing.

   The Hifumi Fried Rice. ☆

   The Hifumi Omuraisu. Looks as if it's been stabbed. ☆☆

   The Hifumi Chicken Rice ☆☆

---

[1] The exchange rate at the time was about ¥130 to the dollar, so I made roughly $1,900 a month.

[2] With my salary and moonlighting, I was earning about ¥350,000 per month. The yen would rise as high as ¥80 to the dollar in a year’s time, meaning in dollar terms I was making over four grand a month. I was working half as much, yet making double.

Sign o' the Times

   The other evening the doorbell rang. When I went to go see who it was, I found a balding salesman with an awful set of teeth. He had come to my door before several months earlier trying to hawk a membership to a chain of restaurants and probably assumed that I didn’t remember him from all the other salesmen that come a-knocking at my door. Or, perhaps he just didn’t remember me.

  That happens a lot--my remembering people but not being remembered in return, so much so, it used to get me down.

   I long suspected that the reason I was being forgotten was that I was failing to leave an impression strong enough on the people I met. Obviously, what I needed to do was to assert myself more. I needed to be a go-getter, a hustler with a powerful handshake and a ready smile! That is, at least, what my father used to grumble to me about when I was growing up. A niggling doubt has remained with me ever since. (Let's call it my legacy.)

   But, then, my wife offered up an alternative theory: “The reason people don’t remember you is because they’re not very bright. They simply haven’t got as good a memory as you do.”

   She said to me this after I had finally gotten ‘round to meeting a new friend of hers named Laura.

   The two of them had met a few months earlier at a local park where they had brought their children to play. Before long, they were meeting for coffee and having lunch together. One day, my wife showed me a picture of Laura and all the things she had mentioned about the woman came together.

   “I know her,” I said. “We met about ten years ago and chatted briefly. We were never friends, but we knew many of the same people. She might even know me.”

   “She said she didn’t.”

   “Did you show her a picture of me?”

   “Yes, and she said she still didn’t know me.”

   Granted, as the sexy, vivacious and outgoing Filipina that she was, Laura was going to leave more of an impression on people than a brooding and quiet undiscovered author like me ever would. Still, there really weren’t that many foreigners living in Fukuoka at the time. Even if we hadn’t met and chatted all those years ago, she could have at least remembered my face. Not the most handsome one, I suppose, but certainly not a monstrosity.

   So, be it.

   It goes without saying that I felt much better after my wife paid me that compliment and I can stand a little taller now when I meet someone for the second time who says, not as a question, but as a statement of presumed fact: “We haven’t met, have we?”

   So, the salesman at the door says he’s sorry to disturb me, but do you have time?

   I tell him I don’t.

   He continues speaking all the same. What has he got to lose?

   To my surprise, he does not have anything to sell me today. He is, instead, willing to pay good money for old jewelry.

   “Have you got any gold or platinum lying, say, in the back of a drawer or in your closet?”

   “’Fraid not,” I say, closing the door.

   Gold. Now, if you want to see something (choose the adjective most appropriate to your emotional and financial circumstance: amazing, shocking, exciting, disgusting, frightening, etc.), go check the meteoric rise in the price of the spot gold over the past five to ten years. Up and up and up she goes, when she’ll drop nobody knows. Those in the business of selling gold will have you believe that the price will continue to climb indefinitely. Maybe they’re right. Personally, I believe that so long as the economic situation remains unpredictable, investors will continue to purchase gold in lieu of other investments as a store of value, meaning the price will probably rise further. Some argue the price will rise as high as $2,300 per ounce this year. (It hovered around $1,800 earlier this month.) That said, buying gold as an “investment” doesn’t make much sense. As the Economist wrote in 2010, “it pays neither a dividend, like a share, nor a coupon, like a bond, nor a rent, like property.”

   Contrary to what I told the gold buyer, I do own gold. Quite a bit of it, actually, in bullion and coin. I started purchasing gold regularly about five years ago when prices were half what they are today. My reason for doing so was not as an investment--although it has been mildly entertaining to watch the price shoot up over the years--but rather as insurance.

   I am not so much a pessimist as I am wary. It is not inconceivable that Japan’s economy collapse one day under the weight of public debt and the yen loses much of its value, or that China decides to gain, by military force, access to the frozen methane or other natural gasses under the waters lying in Japan’s exclusive economic zone, or that a desperate North Korea lobs several Taepo Dong missiles at the country, or that Japan is incapacitated by another cataclysmic natural disaster. And, I don’t want to be stranded, unable to return to the States or wherever it is I would flee to, when that days comes. Hence the gold.

   Better safe than sorry, as the saying goes.

   In Lebanon, it is not unusual for families of means to keep a horde of cash in a variety of currencies (as well as AK47s and ammunition) in case civil war breaks out again--always a possibility--or Israel with its itchy trigger finger--decides to bomb. (Few people in the west are unaware of the frequency of Israeli air strikes against, and incursions into, the country.) Seeing how my relatives there prepared for such possibilities impressed me the last time I visited and I started thinking more seriously about my own family’s security.

   Another sign of the times came via a fax--yes, a fax--that arrived the very same evening. (The only reason I have a fax machine is because people still insist on sending documents that way.) It was sent by the Recruit company, a classified, publishing, and human resource giant here in Japan. Recruit publishes a number of magazines, one of which is Keiko to Manabu. Literally meaning “Lessons and Learning”, the title of the magazine is a homonym of a woman’s name, Keiko, and a Man’s name, Manabu, lending it, I suppose, a friendly ring. The magazine is published regionally and features ads for all kinds of schools. If you want to learn, for example, how to put on a kimono (what the Japanese call kitsuke) you just thumb through the magazine to that section and look at the schools listed there and call one up.

   I used to advertise in Keiko to Manabu. The first time I placed an ad in the magazine was about ten years ago. At the time, the only schools advertising in it were the major nation-wide Eikaiwa chains, such as Aeon, Geos, and Nova. Considering the cost of an ad, I could understand why. The cheapest ad, a dinky 1/8-page rectangle, cost about 70-80,000 yen per month.

   But, my business at the time was suffering and I needed to do something different to get new students as the method I had been using was no longer effective. (Too many people were imitating me.) So, biting the bullet, I took out a series of ads with the magazine and crossed my fingers.

   To my delight, the ad was a huge success so I continued using K&T for the next several years. Eventually, I managed to get the price down to 50,000 yen a month, which was still kind of expensive for a small operation like mine, but I could generally recoup the cost through new enrollment within a few months.

   But then five years or so ago, the effectiveness of the ad started to peter out. One of the problems was the Nova bankruptcy, which put a damper on the entire English-learning market, another was the number of other small school owners who were once again following my modest lead. And so, I pulled my ads. (Incidentally, I have since eschewed print media entirely, sticking to the Internet where I seem to once again have the edge over my competition.)

   In the years that I stopped advertising in K&T and a number of other magazines, I have watched with interest how the price of advertising in print media has come down, down, down. They can’t give the space away anymore. And that is what some of them do. One saleswoman called to say they had a space that had to be filled by tonight. How much, I asked. Ten thousand yen. “Ten thousand yen?" I said. "Deal!” I got three students out of that, two of whom studied for over three years, meaning a ten-thousand yen gamble on the advertising roulette table paid out over 25:1. Not bad.

   Yesterday evening’s fax from Keiko to Manabu made a tempting offer and for the first time in years I seriously considered once again placing an ad in the magazine. One month’s advertising fee only cost five thousand yen. Five thousand yen! (I spend that much money on a bottle of rum.) In addition, they were throwing in advertising space on their online site for free. Such space used to go for about twenty-thousand a month.

   In the end, I crumpled up the paper and tossed it into the garbage. Obviously, at prices that low the magazine no longer had the pull it once had. I might gain a student or two, yes, but I would probably gain five salesmen who would hound me into placing further ads in their magazine. No thanks.

   Let me tell you, as much as I like watching the TV series Mad Men, advertising is not a business I would like to be in today.