my American family and the long awaited Japanese hospitality

before you read this, know that the magic and drama of last night, the night that ill be recalling, wont be captured correctly the first time, and so because of that ill probably edit this post a few times, a few more than regularly anyway. i met alex from england on the 6th floor of our hostel. we floated down the elevator shaft together and came out to the lobby speaking of ourselves, and of Osaka and what to do, so I invited him to dinner with my big brother and papa. a place where you can order from an english menu by drawing circles and inserting numbers in bubbles. its there that i gave up. i wouldnt matter if i spoke japanese, the hospitality is better when you`re speaking english and not being understood. but anyhow, that was the low point of the night. a family of mother and three sons, 6, 13, and 15 sat at the table next to us and began to eat. we, me, big brother, papa, and alex, drink sake and beer and eat sashimi and drink miso soup. we talk about things that papa starts to talk about and everyone finishes. we talk about a lot of things while im still a little down about motivation.

the family whose just sat down wants our attention. is not what i thought at first. but they do. we begin talking together! ah.. hold on...

Osaka

I:m sitting at a computer in the sounds-of-a-fountain-drizzling-water-down-little-rock-steps filled lobby of a hostel that my male family and I are staying in. The potato that was too big to eat before dinner sits to the right side of the white cordless mouse in a squished brown paper bag looking like a bums trash. I have become tired of disappointing vendors with japanese that isnt natural and bills that are too big. and men spitting when we cross paths with them. big brother is michael, with thinning blonde hair and jewelery blue eyes, papa is steve with a goatee that people talk about. today was the first day of sun since my big brother and papa have come to japan to visit. it was a beautiful day in nara, but the deer look so much more intense than how i had imagined them. each is missing chunks of coat, with filthy looking lips, and greedy! black eyes... deer look so gentle when they:re scared, i thought, thinking of america. when deer aren:t scared, they:re pushy, they want the crackers. today was a little bit stressful. big brother got sick during our walk. he had to go back to the hostel early. my dad and i walked around more ourselves, and then the sun began to leave and it got cold again, so we came back to check on big brother. the sound of the fountain drizzling over tiny pyramid stone steps, that `you had a bad day` song is all they play in the lobby all day today. we`re going to sushi tonight. im looking forward to meeting a friend of a friend in kyoto in a few days.

Yebisu Garden

Today I went to Yebisu with friends with the plan I put together this morning. The day after Yokohama, staying home on such a beautiful day as it was (days when old Japanese ladies speak to birds, asking cutely, “Oh! What’re you eating?“ and going on to tend their flowers below, all growing out of dirt packed wooden pots placed on old-fashioned-looking table-stands, each slowly shedding its porcelain-white paint) would be a day impossible to fully enjoy. I’ve been writing a song lately with a single string tuned strangely on my guitar, and with that have been kept busy, and happy. But even still, the day was beautiful, and I wanted to try speaking to the birds.

Unfortunately, the birds in Yebisu all ask you, “What’re you eating?” and try to get some. Yebisu Garden is beautiful, like a space station with the architecture of a ballroom outside, it is a space with space, which seems uncommon in Tokyo, and so it didn’t disappoint me to find that pigeons in Japan are the same as pigeons in America, and probably everywhere, although I know that I can’t say that for sure.

the times to celebrate the word human

One night, whose day was full of adventure and being in a place never been before, and seeing the ocean for once in a very long time, and whose day sat on the pier pretending to read a Japanese novel for one hour as the wind slowly pushed the pages around and the sun moved further away and the air turned cold, and then, even after walking all day, walked forward again, to the nearest subway stairs leading down a dark tunnel and disappeared underground, and when a train came down the tracks whistling to a stop, slid inside the train, tired, and sat down next to normal people, one night, for the first time since being here, in a train from Yokohama, I closed my eyes to feel a swaying on my shoulder, the breathing of a person I’ll never know or see again and it was like we were sleeping together. I wondered if that person was doing the same.