The Road to Kanreki - Chapter 3
(Kanreki (還暦) is a traditional Japanese celebration of a person’s 60th birthday, symbolizing a "rebirth" or the completion of a full 60-year zodiac cycle. It signifies a fresh start, longevity, and a return to the original birth calendar. It is commonly celebrated with family, gifts, and the wearing of red garments.
A brilliant post storm sunset just after the big shit show linear rain band deluge on September 8th. Mina went up on the pedestrian bridge between Jingu Higashi Park North and South, where all the danchi people usually gather to watch the Atsuta Matsuri fireworks just before tsuyu (rainy season) in early June.
Thursday, Sept. 24rd
The first day of autumn on the western calendar. The stretch of national holidays the natives refer to as 'Silver Week' wound down yesterday, so it's back to work and school for the plebs. This year it was rare 5 day run of days off - the first 'long' Silver Week in 11 years. Fortunately it stopped raining for a few days, allowing us enough of a respite from the constant barrage of rain and storm activity to safely trek over to Osaka for an overnight to see The Damned play one of only two stops on their brief 50th anniversary tour visit to Japan. A short, but lovely Obon jaunt out to Nagahama aside, this was the late breaking highpoint of a sweltering hot summer during which both Mina and I spent an inordinate amount of time getting worked over with novocaine, drills and pliers over at the local dental clinic.
The Damned were in fine fettle, and top form.
The over-sized Gorilla Hall Mascot out in front of the Osaka venue. I guess the idea is to sit in it's hand for photo. Nice gimmick.
Mina filmed the opening number, but it cut off for some reason, so I found this...filmed just a bit in front of where we were standing. I really dug their choice of opening music...the theme from 1968's You Only Live Twice (the one where 007 comes to Japan) which also happens to be my favourite of all the Bond themes. Anyways, a masterstroke, I figure. What a great show. These guys are pure class. They stand head and shoulders above all of their surviving peers. I don't think there is a better live band anywhere.
A dead centre, second floor shot of the night's festivities that I found on The Damned's home page. If you look right above the head of the chap in the immediate foreground, you can see Mina and I. I'm wearing the red cap just behind the guy with the raised arm, and Mina's just to my right, behind the blond, and in front of the girl with both arms up, clapping.
Rumour has it that this may actually be their final go round in these parts...but that's what we thought two years ago, and here they are again...sadly without Nagoya on their itinerary. With all of the players now hovering around 70, it's reasonable to expect that their globe trotting touring days are probably winding down. We took the white Voxy out for what was most likely its final long road trip. We'll be retiring the 16 year old lass early in the new year, and getting a slightly smaller Suzuki hybrid.
As mentioned, the weather was on our side, and it was nice to be in Osaka, again. I think it's been 10 years since we last visited. Such different energy from here in Deadbeat City. People are more friendly, and the atmosphere is less uptight. We spent the sunny post concert Friday afternoon sightseeing at a famous shrine, and eating Osaka okonomiaki.
The famous high arched foot bridge at Sumiyoshi Taisha, with koi (carp) swimming about in the foreground. Funny, back in my Osaka days, I don't think I ever managed to get over to this part of town. A lovely snap, courtesy of Mina.
We took a chance on this little, kind of shabby looking place near the station. I wanted to get an Osaka specialty for lunch, and okonomiaki fit the bill. We were the only customers in the place at around 1:30 pm. The gamble paid off.
I'm glad we got out of town for a bit; it turned out being such a lovely little detour from our routines back here in Nagoya.
From here on, it's shorter, darker days...and gradually declining temperatures. Today, the sun is out...and the morning weather report promises a clear day, and tolerable 30C...a happy consolation, as everyone seems at bit bummed that the holiday period is over.
It's been raining for most of this month...and at times, it's been nothing short of Biblical. Like something out of one of those old Charlton Heston epics Old Testament epics from the 1950's. The autumn rain front has joined forces with this year's El Nino fueled hyper-typhoon season to disastrous effect.
The September 8th deluge, as taken by Mina on her way back from work. Her usual 10 minute drive home took almost an hour and a half. Lots of ground floor homes and businesse ate shit.
As I sit here hammering away on my trusty keyboard, word is that yet another massive storm is hurtling this way from somewhere southeast of the Philippines. Where that will land is anyone's guess...but it seems fairly certain it will give Okinawa another proper beating, before likely heading on a northwesterly course toward the Japanese archipelago proper around the middle of next week.
Chiba Prefecture is still inundated from Typhoon 25. It's their third go round with severe flooding this season, with 9 people confirmed dead and a number missing after Monday's landfall. With only one extreme weather event (and fortunately no casualties) under our belts so far this season, we're counting our lucky stars here in Deadbeat City. 'Linear rain bands' are now officially a thing in these parts. They will turn your street into a river in a matter of minutes.
All eyes are now on what goes down next week.
Tuesday, I'll be pedaling my way out to Insecthead's kindergarten to entertain the 5 year olds. So far, it's due to be overcast. Two of my last three sessions over there have been rain drenched miseries. Fingers crossed Tuesday remains 'cloudy'.
Wednesday, I'll be getting my annual 'Ningen Dock' (ningen = human) health check, and the dreaded gastro-scopic endoscope - possibly my least favourite, gag-tastic 15 minutes of the year. Fortunately Mina will be accompanying me, to ensure that all goes smoothly, and there are no preventable 'miscommunications', as I live in something of an 'English Bubble'. Despite recent efforts to up my game by finally learning the two kana character sets, I'm still rather bad at the spoken language. Baby steps.
As far as the latest storm goes, my imminent poking and probing adventure may or may not coincide with incoming typhoon 26's potential approach. If we're super lucky it'll simply veer off into the northeast Pacific, and leave us alone. Needless to say, I will be extremely pleased when Wednesday morning's medical check travails wrap up - hopefully without incident. Of course, still a week out, and the whole nasty business is stressing me out. I hate that gut camera.
For now, my mission is to focus on the here and now. To live in the moment, like a good faux Buddhist, and try to put all of that nastiness out of my mind. Today is sunny and nice. Time to go out and ply the Horikawa running course for the first time in a week, and try to work off those cheap Heinekens I treated myself to out at The Damned last Thursday night. I always feel great after that run...that is until the chronic pain sets in three or four hours later - and providing I don't injure myself out on the go, or get set on by predatory homosexuals en route.
I wonder how many clouds of second hand smoke I'll have to hold my breath through on today's run?
And just like that, old fashioned smokes are back...
It seems that old school cigarettes are making something of a comeback recently. Immediately post COVID, it really looked like smoking over here was on the wane... but every time I go out recently, there seems to be someone loitering around in a corner fouling the air for a good five meters in all directions. Maybe I'm like a magnet for stuff like this. Until recently it's been all vapes, or those ridiculous looking 'smokeless' cigarette holders... but now the old school tailor made filter tips seem to be back with a vengeance. Those nasty, dirty, filthy smokes that were everywhere when I was growing up.
I saw something interesting in the entertainment news awhile ago. Apparently Madonna (an ardent anti-smoker just a decade ago) has taken up what's being termed 'performative smoking' on stage and at public appearances. Of course, it's raised a lot of eyebrows and upset the p.c. tea pot ...but I suppose that was the whole point. Smoking to piss people off at 68? Poor old Madge seems to be grasping for relevance a bit.
A scant twenty years ago, who would have guessed that a pop icon smoking in public could generate such outrage?
I grew up in probably the last era where smoking was still sort of a fashionable and glamorous rebel thing'. A cigarette was like the ultimate accessory. David Bowie always had one, and he was the coolest of the cool back in the day. Then there was Keith Richards, with the ubiquitous smoke hanging out of his mouth. Of course, the list goes on and on.
In my teens, I would bum one here or there when I went out drinking, but never felt inclined to pick up the habit. At one point, I think most of the people I hung out with smoked. I didn't care about it one way or the other. My first girlfriend was a smoker. Truth be told, I never actually dug cigarettes. They were unpleasant, and did nothing for me.
In pop culture terms, it's hard to pin down when smoking officially became 'incorrect'. Sometime during the first decade of the millennium, I remember seeing a side-by-side comparison of an old promo shot of The Beatles - the original photo next to a modern, 'cleaned up' version in which their cigarettes had been 'magically' photoshopped from between their fingers. It kind of creeped me out. The whole idea of going back and editing history. It was a well known photo from their early days... did they think that older fans wouldn't notice?
It struck me as wholly ridiculous.
The Weed Years...and yet another ode to the Kitsilano of yore.
While I wasn't keen on cigarettes, when I was 18, my ne'er do well pal Kurt managed to get me smoking weed during our studio class breaks at art school. Initially it did absolutely nothing for me. I'd join in to humour him, more or less. One evening I remember walking into a Mac's Milk convenience store, and suddenly having the best time, ever...for no particular reason. That was the first time I can remember it kind of clicking.
Gradually, it became 'my thing'. It wasn't foul like tobacco, and seemed to make mundane stuff seem more interesting or amusing. Listening to music, doing art...everything gained this interesting new dimension. While most of my friends had dipped their toes in to that pool back in high school, I'd never bothered - maybe because my small clique weren't really big time stoners.
Alcohol was king in those days.
From my mid-late teens, it was always more about drinking and the accompanying hooliganism, than sitting around getting stoned. In my previous estimation, that weed smoking business was a throw back thing 'for hippies'.
It wasn't a big deal around home. We never had to sneak around with weed, cigarettes or booze - which a lot of kids went to great lengths to conceal from their parents.
I think it made a difference to Mum that I had at least graduated from high school before I started getting stoned. She liked her cigarettes and drink...but for some reason, wouldn't smoke dope. She never really said why. As far as the 'house rules' went, provided we cleaned up our mess, she'd rather we hung out at home than get busted by the cops in some park or back alley.
Mum was no stranger to trouble.
She'd had a long and storied history of juvenile delinquency in the neighbourhood some 20 years prior, and was said to have been on a first name basis with every policewoman in the district by the age of 17. By all accounts, she'd been a holy horror for my grandmother to deal with.
A beatnik girl in the UK, up dancing on a table in the early 60's. This would have been Mum's late teen era, surrounded by beatnik types and 'hoodlums'.
In Grandmother's estimation, Mum had never really grown up. Two failed marriages and three kids later...she was still that same problem child she'd been at 16. I guess we never really change in the eyes of our parents. Of course, her perpetuation of that dynamic never made anything better.
Initially, Gramma would get kind of excited over the pot smoking, but as there were no house wrecker parties or police coming by, she finally just gave up.
We all knew the story about how my step father's younger brother had scored some weed from the hippies over on 4th avenue; then somehow managed to get Gramma in on a smoke down with his brother and Mum. I vaguely remember this visit. It must have been the summer of 1969, when Mum and I were up from California, just prior to her divorcing my father. In any case, after a few tokes, Gramma apparently laughed so hard she peed her drawers, then wanted someone to hold up her legs and push her around the back yard like a wheel barrow.
Good times.
Fast forward twenty years, and I can still see Gramma hunched over, spying on my younger siblings and I smoking a joint in the front basement room where my younger brother was staying between destinations. I guess she'd heard us laughing, and the bass driver from his stereo thumping through the living room floor upstairs. When we saw her face and glasses peering through the window in the darkness, I think we all just smiled and waved, at which point she skedaddled back up the front stairs, and never said another thing about it.
As I recall, she even snuck in there and stole a bag of weed from his stuff during his brief stint over there. He was shocked that she would stoop to doing such a thing.
What on earth would she want with it?!?' I think he tried to confront her, to which she played stupid, claiming to know nothing about it. Very weird.
As the story goes, she finally gave it back to him - albeit a couple of years later (though why she'd nicked it off him in the first place forever remained a mystery).
Our old neighborhood - Kitsilano - had been the epicenter of Canadian West Coast hippiedom back in the late 60's and early 70's.
Dirty hippies having a 'cook out' at a communal house in old Kitsilano...smoking weed, messing up the nice old family houses and pissing off Gramma back in the late 60's/early 70's.
Fresh out of California, my first memories of the house on 7th were of the jalopy hippy buses parked along the opposite boulevard, and the waist high, unkempt lawns in front of the dilapidated communal rooming houses across the street. Of course, Gramma complained about them bitterly. 'Hippy this, hippy that', and how the houses looked like crap and the neighbourhood had gone to hell. She'd go on about back when all of those old three story houses had been lovely and well kept, and could remember the names of the families who'd lived in each one of them.
Three blocks down MacDonald, 4th avenue used to be considered something akin to Vancouver's own Haight-Ashbury.
Right near the intersection, there was Rohan's Rockpile, a record shop that had evolved into a live venue (and where The Who are said to have played an impromptu jam set after a Pacific Colosseum show in the early 70's), The Naam - Vancouver's first hippy 'health food' restaurant, and assorted head shops and 'counter culture' destinations up the road.
Of course, smoking pot was still 'illegal', so there there were also plenty of cops creeping around, trying to nab those awful dope smoking long hairs.
By the 80's, no one really cared. The Naam was still there...but Rohan's was long gone. At 4th and Mac, there was a new 7-11, and Darby's Pub (to which they'd later add an off sales shop). The long hairs were on their way out, and BMW driving yuppies were everywhere.
The world was changing.
Of course there were still pigs prowling around on occasion, and if you did happen to have a bag of weed and get unlucky, they'd mostly just confiscate it and give you a warning. After almost 20 years of chasing their curly little tails, the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) had finally been told to lay off the small time pot heads.*
*(It was finally decided that busting pot smokers was an expensive exercise in futility. Pursuing legal charges in every case that came about would have bankrupted the provincial government and backed up the B.C. legal system for decades to come - leaving no time or resources to deal with real criminals)
It was in no one's best interests to pursue 'the hard line' anymore.
Still, there were some old time hippy-era pot dealers right on 4th (across from where Rohan's used to be) that the VPD seemed to have cultivated a long running grudge against.
Every once in awhile they'd try to mount some kind of big sting operation or bust, but it never really worked out. Somehow the hippies were always at least a half step ahead. They'd been mainstays in that neighbourhood for ages, and the locals always closed ranks around them. It pissed the cops off to no end.
The last time I was over there was almost a year before Mum passed away. I think it was 2008. The 4th avenue hippies had decamped to another address, a bit closer to our family house. Change was definitely in the air, but Mum and Gramma were still there. A year later, Mum would be gone...and Gramma - on the cusp of 100th birthday - shuffled off to an assisted living facility on the south side of town.
From what I understand now (with the possible exception of The Naam), the last vestiges of old 4th are long gone. Exorbitant rents ultimately forced the remaining stragglers and artsy, counter culture types out...and in 2018, marijuana was finally legalized nationwide.
From over here, it seems like kind of a hollow victory.
"The best laid plans of mice and men..."
As far as cigarettes went, I never actually picked up the habit in earnest until I came out to Japan.
I don't think that it had really dawned on me that my trusty 'go-to' would cease to be readily available across the Pacific.
Of course, everyone had heard the story of Paul McCartney getting busted and spending ten days in a Japanese jail for trying to smuggle 220 grams over in his luggage back in 1980. Apparently he'd been worried that he wouldn't be able to find anything over here, so he thought he'd just bring a bit of his own.
The story goes that due to his celebrity, he somehow managed to avoid a drawn out court drama, and was finally just deported, without any formal conviction. A 'normal' person would not have been so lucky. I recall there being a lot of outrage at the Japanese government while he was in police custody. Had they elected to make an example of him (7 years in prison), I don't think Japan would have ever lived it down.
Late August, 1989.
A few weeks prior to our big departure date, I'd suddenly got word that my estranged step father had quite unexpectedly passed away in Durban, South Africa - his childhood hometown. He'd taken my younger brother over there for a 'trip' a few years earlier, and they'd simply never returned. While he'd been in his father's custody for some time, there had never been any indication that they were planning on permanently blowing the scene. I even remember going out to see them off at the airport. While it had taken us all by surprise, it hit Mum especially hard. The words 'abduction' and 'kidnapping' were bandied about. I think she consulted with some lawyer types, but finally there was nothing that could be done.
A few years passed.
I remember getting the news of step father's passing from my sister, who was working at the 7-11 up the hill on 4th avenue, across from where I used to live. Maybe I'd stopped in to say 'hi!' or something on my way back from Gramma's place or the hippy's. I was probably on my skateboard. Needless to say, it was kind of a big shocker. I think I most likely stopped at the liquor store after that, then went back to the basement suite I was sharing with Jack and Ms. T, and promptly blotted it all out.
Weed and booze can be great for minimizing stuff...at least in the short term.
I'm sure that I pretty much avoided dealing with it at all in the lead up to our big Japan trip. Ms. T and I had both finished our respective post secondary courses, and were aiming to get jobs teaching English. The plan was to hunker down and stay there for at least a year...maybe two.
Looking back, it seems clear that I'd had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself in to. Ms. T was Canadian, and could get a 'Working Holiday Visa', or simply switch her tourist visa to a work permit between consulates in Osaka... but I couldn't, as there were no such arrangement between Japan and the United States at that time. I'd have to enter on a three month tourist visa, then leave Japan for Korea to get a work permit. Of course, I'd first need to secure employment at a school that would agree to sponsor me, and then help to make the necessary arrangements.
Aunt C kept saying that everything over there was great, and 'come on, come on, you don't need to be able to speak Japanese, and anyone can get a job teaching English over here, don't worry about it'. She said that lots of people make the trip over to Korea to change their status, and it wasn't a big deal...just a side trip and another adventure.
She was like this fearless individual. An adventurer. She could do anything.
When I'd start to stress out, I'd just roll up another joint and sort of blot it out. 'Everything would work out fine'. Ah...to be 22 years old again, and so...carefree.
I figured that I'd been to Europe with my American father and siblings a couple of years earlier...so, how hard could it be? I never considered the culture shock, or language barrier thing...or that there wouldn't be any weed around to take the edge off.
It's pretty humbling to walk off a plane and suddenly find yourself reduced to the literacy level of a babbling infant. Of course, there were no smart phones with the ability to read or translate foreign languages. No handsets of any kind. Just pay phones, pantomime and the luck of the draw. Traveling out of one's cultural or linguistic comfort zone was very much a leap of faith.
An 'in to the deep end' and 'sink or swim' kind of thing.
The reality of where we were hit immediately upon arrival. The sensory overload of it all. The withering late summer humidity (we'd dressed for autumn in Vancouver). The almost incomprehensible sprawl of Tokyo Station. The lack of any ability to communicate in Japanese. We'd over packed, and had no idea where we were going. That we somehow managed to bumble through, get the last Shinkansen out and navigate our way to Kyoto that evening was a miracle in itself.
The dual impact of 1989 Japan - the sheer culture shock of it all - combined with the absence of my main coping mechanism (weed), and the simmering, unresolved shit regarding the demise of my step father (and fate of my younger brother)...it was all a bit much. Thank god I had thought to buy those three packages of Player's Lights and stow them in my carry on. Canadian smokes. I think that was probably the first time that I ever 'needed' a cigarette.
I had a nice little melt down. Ms.T and Aunt. C were great. Super supportive.
I ended up deciding to go back to Vancouver to deal with that family stuff a couple of weeks later.
Early the following March. I rejoined Ms.T, who had relocated to the old Moriyama Building, in Tsukamoto, Osaka. While I'd been getting sorted back in Vancouver, she'd found gainful employment teaching English, just as she'd intended. I would attempt to do the same.
Japan, part 2
Osaka was one a hell of a town.
The gaijin crew Ms. T and I fell in with back in the late bubble era - the 'Moriyama Building Collective' - were an intrepid lot, hilarious and very resourceful. I think Aunt. C had connected her to another Canadian woman who lived over there, as all of the advertised English teaching jobs seemed to be in the Osaka area.
The old Moriyama Building was on a busy Showa-era shotengai (shopping street). The location was great - Tsukamoto was one stop out of Umeda (central Osaka) on the local JR. Rents were low.
It had housed a printing press originally, then been converted to small 'apartments'. From what I understood, there were two owners who didn't see eye to eye. One was Ms. Moriyama, who would rent these SRO type rooms out to foreigners for cheap. She'd come by every month to collect. I think I only met her once, as Ms. T was the formal tenant. There were very few Japanese tenants. I only knew of the two funky Japanese girls that shared the place right at the top of the stairs on our floor, and Cathy's boyfriend, Sada. There was also this random Australian guy down the hall with a Japanese girlfriend, but Ms. T said he was a jerk, and my few encounters with him pretty much bore that out.
As far as the building, rumour had it that something super bad had happened there ( maybe a murder) in the semi- distant past, giving the place a dodgy reputation with the locals. The rooms were spartan and a bit shabby. Old Japanese-style squat loos, with no bath or shower. No A/C. The tenants all had to use the local sento (public bath) facilities, of which there were two - one on the main drag about five minutes away, and another a bit further on, near the Yodogawa River. It was essentially a 'gaijin ghetto'. Everyone knew everyone, and gossiped endlessly. We'd hang out together before and after work, go to the baths and local establishments during the week, then out to the clubs in Namba and further afield on weekends.
Alcohol was the social lubricant of choice in Japan. There were vending machines selling beer and highball drinks everywhere. Drinking to excess was unexceptional, and the ability to hold one's drink was considered a measure of character by the natives.
That's not to say that there weren't also myriad 'contraband substances' floating around over here for those so inclined. There most definitely were. The 'Moriyama Building Collective' were an intrepid lot. I'm sure that it was a lot easier to fly under the radar and get away with stuff like that back then.
Now there are eyes and ears everywhere. Cameras tracking our every move, a new Kempetai-like spy agency, and the National Police Agency claiming that it has the right to employ generative A.I. to monitor social media posts for potential 'security threats' and violations of Japanese law. Literally anything that could upset 'public harmony' (whatever that implies) is now fair game.
These days, the foreign resident community sits at very the top of the Japanese government's list of concerns. Public sentiment toward us is at a lower ebb than at any time I can remember. Dirty looks. Bad vibes. A lot of people here tend to easily buy into whatever they see posted online, and hate groups like Sanseito are pros at spreading online misinformation about foreigners.
Of late, a growing majority of the natives - particularly the young people - would rather see us all pack our shit and clear out than give us the time of day. Given all of this, and the native's odd affinity for snitching (which they somehow think is their civic duty), we all have to be extra careful of everything we do or get up to these days. We are being watched.
It wasn't like this back in my formative days over here. We were almost uniformly welcomed.
All these years later, it's strange which memories stick.
A brisk, sunny late March afternoon in 1990, sitting on an old granite abutment along the garbage strewn banks of the Yodogawa River, smoking cigarettes with Cathy and Joanna, the two Canadian women who lived in the building.
Both had been in Japan for awhile at that point, and knew the ropes. Cathy lived on the top floor with her funky Japanese boyfriend Sada. As far as I understood, her older sister had lived there first, but gone back to Canada with her Japanese body builder boyfriend, and married. I think Joanna had come around the same time as Aunt C , though I'm not sure how she found her way to Moriyama Building.
Around a decade before mobile phones became a thing, Joanna actually had an old fashioned rotary dial set up at her place (a luxury not everyone could afford), and she'd kindly let me come over to call English schools that were advertising for help in the back of the Kansai Time-Out before she had to go out and her teach privates. Failing this act of kindness, I'd have to go find a pay phone somewhere quiet enough...and need to have either have a phone card, or pocket full of ¥10 coins to keep it going.
After a few unsuccessful calls, I managed to score an interview at an English school out in Mukonoso, Amagasaki... two thirds of the way between Osaka and Kobe - and a 45 minute commute by train if I went by way of Umeda Station. Cathy and Joanna were full of advice and pointers about what to expect, and how to navigate the interview. I think they even figured out which trains I needed to take, and made sure that I got on the right ones so I wouldn't mess up and be late.
Long story short (and thanks in large part to their fussing) I got the job...around two weeks after landing.
Aunt C had been right.
I'm sure there was some drinking to celebrate my imminent employment. We'd often convene up at Cathy and Sada's place during the week, or hit a local ezikaya after the sento.
I suppose it was alright for a first English teaching job. I was making ¥2000 an hour, plus transportation. Not great in the English teaching field back then - but more than I'd ever made doing anything in Canada. They told me that they would sponsor my visa, and make the arrangements to send me off to Korea to get it done. I'd work there until my three months ran out, at which point they'd give me the paperwork and off I'd go. Unfortunately it didn't really work out like that...and for some reason, said 'paperwork' didn't materialize in time. They made some sort of excuse, and told me to just turn around and come back to Japan. My return ticket was already booked, so with little choice, I went to Korea anyways, and managed to get back in to Japan a couple of days later...by the skin of my teeth. The guy at Immigration was giving me the hairy eyeball, wondering why I was coming back so soon, before grudgingly giving me another three month stamp (he said that I wouldn't get another).
If this were to happen today, I'd just be turned around and sent packing.
After I got back, the school promised that they'd have everything in order three months henceforth, at which point they'd book me to go back to Pusan again. I didn't really trust them.
Of course, with all the action and stress, the smoking habit stuck. Nothing takes the edge off an awkward moment like a cigarette.
After some trial and error, I found that I liked Mild Seven Lights...'salaryman cigarettes', according to the natives. While smoking was definitely on the way out back in Canada (at $5.00 a pack), here it was still an acceptable, affordable vice.
Part of socializing. Drink and smoke. Smoke and drink. Very civilized.
At work, smoking became part of my break time routine. When there was gap time between classes, I'd pop out to the Lawson's up the street, grab a ¥100 'genki drink' - an Ornamin C - and have a smoke. No break was complete without a Mild Seven and an Ornamin C. It became I ritual I was quite fond of.
I smoked a lot of those Mild Sevens, to be sure.
When I was back in Canada for a two year spell, I found a makeshift 'Japanese Conbini' on Robson Street, that sold a smattering of sundry Japanese convenience store fare. They had magazines, comics, soft drinks, snacks...Mild Seven Lights, for $8.00 a pack, and Ornamin C for $3.00. A steep price for nostalgia - $11.00 CAD (vs. ¥300 back in Japan). I remember treating myself a few times...though I couldn't make a habit of it.
Two years passed. Ms. T and I went our separate ways, and in the summer of 1991, I met Mme Lord Vader, who was out from Japan on a working holiday visa.
I went back for three months to meet and greet my future in-laws in 1992, before finally settling in Nagoya with Vader in 1994.
Two more decades passed.
Oceans of water under a half dozen washed out bridges. Countless cigarettes smoked.
Quittin' Time
It's been over 11 years since I finally quit. It was a gradual thing. Back in late August, 2013, when I endeavoured to lose the unfortunate weight I'd gained during my prolonged 'Fat Elvis' period, I started getting up at the crack of dawn every morning and walking for an hour. After awhile, the walking ramped up to slow jogging...then moderate running. Smoking made it harder, so I decided that the habit had to go. Over the course of a couple of years, I tapered it down to literally nothing.
I went cold turkey on a lot of things around that time. Cut back on the drinking, too.
It also helped that I'd also stopped working with the bands I'd been involved with for so long. My social life went from an active, going concern, to a low, dull roar... and then just kind of died.
That made it much easier to finally make my lifestyle changes stick.
Sure, I miss camaraderie of it all. The excitement of all the music scene stuff, the writing and performing. Seeing my work released on major label cd's, and taken out on the road. Pretty heady stuff. I guess it all just ran it's course, as most things eventually do. Greed and pride are ugly things...and being the only gaijin in the mix, I was at a disadvantage. I should have paid a bit closer attention to protecting my own interests, instead of trusting that other people would act in good faith...and partied a bit less. I probably would have greatly benefitted from some legal advice, too.
Sadly, things are often not always as they seem on surface over here.
Of course, Mina played a pivotal role in helping to get me through this rough patch, and making a successful transition to 'civilian life'. Her love, patience and support have meant everything.
Out on the other side, I'm actually doing alright. With the exception of the skin cancer business and some other chronic issues (sleep apnea, asthma, etc.) my annual health checks have been coming in way better than they used to. I'll still have the occasional drink....but not anywhere near the level I used to.
To this day, I can't stand second hand smoke anywhere near me.
In the decade or so since I gave it up, I've noticed smokers over here gradually becoming more marginalized. Most bars and eating establishments now forbid customers from lighting up on the premises, and the number of dedicated public smoking areas has dwindled. I'm not sure what the current situation is at the clubs out here, as it's been years since I've set foot in one. I imagine they've had to fall in line with the times.
As far as the resurgent old school cigarette trend goes, fingers crossed that it's a short lived thing.
Having pretty much forsaken all of my old vices, and taken up a late stage regimen of running or torture cycling three to four times a week, I can definitely do without the older retired guys - fag in mouth - casually riding their mamachari bikes up the Horikawa promenade (or around the local park) like slow motion steam locomotives. The trail of toxic disgust they leave hanging in their wake makes me gag and wheeze.
In very short order, I resent it.
I'm guessing that if it were foreigners loitering around public spaces and blowing crap secondhand smoke everywhere, there would be a public outcry, and inevitably, calls to ban tobacco outright. There are already 'machi-no-hito' video survey complaints circulating online about foreign tourists in Kyoto littering and smoking 'wherever they like', and flicking their filthy cigarette butts everywhere. Out of the 7 or 8 people asked, only one of the native interviewees commented that it seemed disproportionate to blame foreigners, when plenty of Japanese routinely do exactly the same thing.
It's refreshing to hear someone telling it like it is. It seems like 7 out of 10 natives just parrot whatever sensational garbage they read online. They are 'Grabbers of the Lowest Hanging Fruit'...and sadly, they represent the majority, these days.
It seems that an awful lot of the natives have 'broomstick up the arse' syndrome when the conversation turns to anything gaijin related. While it's always been like this to some degree, recently it's getting to be a bit much.
It's almost enough to drive a person back to drink...or cigarettes. Almost.
'Zetsubo', as the natives say.
'Hopeless'.
Alas, that's where I'll leave it for now. From here, it's in to the shorter and cooler days, a brief but gorgeous cavalcade of autumn colours, and then winter proper...at which point - barring any unforeseen disasters - I will return with more random musings from past and present, on the very cusp of my 60th year.
Until then, you'd do well to remember that, "No matter where you go, there you are. There, and no where else"
Mina snapped this late afternoon shot on the banks of Lake Biwako, at Nagahama Castle Park, August 12th, 2026. Obon. The day got of to a bumpy start, courtesy of sister-in-law dearest, but it turned out being the loveliest afternoon of the summer.
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