Carp Unplugged
...written on 2001-04-20, @ 9:55 p.m.
Fri April 20, 2001
Yesterday on the train to Tarui, as I was staring out at the countryside rushing past, I felt a magnetic sort of dizziness. It was almost as if I couldn't pull my eyes away from where I was looking and my eyes grew wider as I thought I heard an electric sound emanating from my line of sight. I managed to shake my head free, but I felt that my energy had ebbed. I can only imagine a Japanese witch cackling as she rolled up the little fosforescent bits of my soul that she had captured. It was either that or I stepped on the shorted Sony Mini-Discman wire of the high school student standing next to me.
I got off the train and walked the streets of Tarui, looking for the bridge where I was to make a right turn. Hide said there would be many flags there. Fish flags. Flying Carp flags to be precise. These nylon or silk flags are hung out to celebrate "Boys' Day" which is on May 5th. (Girls' Day is the first week in April)
I came to the river's edge and saw a bridge on my right. Nope, no fish flags there. I then turned my head to look the other way.
The river may have been running below me, but there, stretched out for a quarter of a mile, fifty feet above me were at least one hundred silk and nylon carp flags anchored to rows of wires fettered on both sides of the river in such a way that it appeared as if the entire school of carp was navigating its way through a stiff stream of air up the mountain!
Surprise! A picture! This will give you some idea of what I am talking about. The actual flags (I'm waiting on a picture of them from a friend) were much larger than these and more numerous. They were different colors like red, blue, pink, and black. The wind was whipping through their open mouths making them flutter up, down and around. It was a spectacular sight and would have made a great movie scene.
I wanted to stay there longer and imagine myself a mermaid astride one of those floating carp, but alas, it was getting dark and I had to find my way to the Tarui branch. The directions I had were rather ambiguous, so I had to ask a couple of people along the way.
"Sahcle K (Circle K) wa doko desuka?" I inquired of one man. The Tarui branch was next to Circle K, but I figured a stranger might know more where a convenience store was rather than a private school.
"Kochi", he said, motioning his hand down a side street that I would not have taken according to the directions.
"Domo Arigato Gozaimashita", I said as I smiled. He smiled too and for a few steps we were going in the same direction.
"Doko ni ikimasuka?" Where are you going? he asked me.
I told him. He let out a big "ah" and kept walking. I could tell he was worried about me. He wanted to say more. I bet he even wanted to deliver me to the school doorstep himself, but was too embarrassed or shy to do so. Before he turned off on his own way, he said in Japanese, "Turn left at the light. The juku is there." He laughed self-consciously when he said the word "shingo" (traffic light) because he wasn't sure how much Japanese I knew. I smiled and thanked him again and thought how very nice he was.
As I got closer and closer to the school, it felt like my energy was unraveling, a loose thread of it caught in the train door perhaps, or on a guide wire for a wind bucking carp, or maybe even simmering in an inky cauldron of eye of octopus.