Chapter 39: CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

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CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

At last it was the Sunday after Oshogatsu ended and time for the historical drama on NHK at eight that I usually enjoy watching. And I'm sure I'm going to enjoy it a hell of a lot more on the full stomach I've got now. Thanks to my nearby restaurant having finally reopened, allowing me to eat a good dinner instead of one or two of those stale sandwiches I've been existing on. And the first drama of the new year always starts a whole new yearlong historical drama of weekly episodes that ends on the Sunday before New Year's Eve. I switched on the TV just as it began.

Hey! It's going to be about the Heian Period of what some call the Golden Age of pre-Westernized Japan when the capital of Japan was moved from Nara to Kyoto. And Japan invented it's own form of syllabary writing instead of using only Chinese characters that don't really fit the Japanese language. And the Tale of Gengi written in it to plague Japanese high school students ever since. Much like Shakespeare's Hamlet did to American high schoolers.

Wonderful! That should be a great change from last year's drama that was about the feudalistic Edo period when the capital was still technically Kyoto. But the real power was in Edo -- today's Tokyo. During the Edo period the Emperors were left starving in their decaying palace in a very shriveled up Kyoto. As the drama started . . .

Wow! Look at those incredible kimono they wore back then. Damn, I sure wish I had a color TV like the I had at that Lake Yogo Kokuminshikusha. . . .

Wait a minute!

What the hell am I thinking? Don't I now have a steady income from my college? . . . Hey, that means I can buy one! And by God I will!

"Did you enjoy your Oshogatsu, Dave?" Ruriko asked me as we were eating lunch again on the first day of classes after our winter vacation ended.

"Not very much really. You know Ruriko? I'm actually relieved to be back and teaching classes again."

"Oh? Why not? Didn't you eat osechi?"

"Yeah. But only on New Year's Day. And it wasn't all that good to tell you the truth."

"Did you make it yourself?"

"No way. I bought it at a convenience store."

"Oh, that's why. Then what you ate was pretty stale, I'm sure."

"Yeah, it was. But you know, the people buying them were mostly young men like me. Businessmen, I guessing."

Ruriko nodded. "They probably are on 'career-track' and were transferred for two or three years from their home offices in Tokyo to a branch office in Kyoto or some other city far enough from away their homes that they can't afford to return home for Oshogatsu on their very low salaries. And it's just to test their loyalty to the company, really. I feel so sorry for them. It must be very lonely spending Oshogatsu alone."

"Hmm . . . Now that you mention it, maybe that's why my Oshogatsu was so bad. In America I never had to spend Christmas alone. Always with my family and sometimes relatives. I can imagine spending it alone would be very lonely, too. Oh, and on New Year's Eve I watched Kohaku like you told me to do. But the only singer I really liked was a girl named Momoe Yamaguchi."

"Really? She's my favorite, too! But she's retiring."

"Huh? Why? She's so young. And she certainly has a lot of fans -- mostly young females like you."

"Because she's getting married. Traditionally, when a woman gets married, she has to quit whatever her job is and stay home."

"That seems crazy. I mean, you didn't retire when you got married obviously."

"That's because neither my husband nor I come from traditional families. He wanted me to have a lifelong career. That's one reason I fell in love with him. And I'm really glad I've gotten this job at our college. Fumie is so supportive of career women like me. Every full-timer here is on the career-track, regardless of whether they are male or female. Almost all the other schools and all companies put all females on their noncareer-tracks. She says she'll even give me a full year of maternity leave at seventy percent salary if I get pregnant. So long as I promise to come back and teach here afterwards, that is."

"Sounds like Fumie, all right." I glanced at my watch. "Well it's time for our afternoon classes. But it sure is nice to have someone to talk to again. See you tomorrow, Ruriko."

After clanking glasses at our usual watering hole, "John, even though I know you didn't need me this Wednesday, I really needed to come down here to talk with someone I can also drink with. I mean, it's strange. This is my second New Year's here in Japan. But I don't remember my first New Year's as being anywhere near so bad or lonely.

"That's because I had a New Year's Eve party as well as a bonenkai. And you got so plastered I had to take you to a love hotel and put you and Paul in the same room together. If anything he was more plastered than you were."

"Hmm . . . I have a very vague recollection of something like that happening. I'll bet the Mama-san there was pretty surprised."

"Hah, hah. No way, man. They're really used to businessmen getting so plastered from their 'after work, work,' they can hardly walk. Not to mention trying to ride on a train for God knows how long, let alone trying to wobble all the way back to their house or apartment far away from their train station. The only thing that surprised her at all was that both of you were gaijin."

"Wait a minute . . . Wasn't it too late to catch the train back to Kyoto?"

John shook his head. "Not on New Year's Eve. That's the one time of the year the trains run all night for people making their hatsumode, among other things. But that's why I decided that this Oshogatsu I was only going to have a bonenkai in the afternoon and no New Year's Eve party. Everybody gets too drunk."

"Yeah. But I don't remember trying to watch that damned Kohaku or eating osechi or doing hatsumode, either."

"That's because you'd never heard of them then. It wasn't until Ruriko -- uh, that's the name of the teacher you talk to at lunch, right? -- told you about them. So of course you didn't try to do any of those things."

"Hmm . . . I guess that's why they say 'ignorance is bliss.' I hated Kohaku and the osechi I bought. My hatsumode was pretty nice, though. Well thank God Oshogastsu is over with. Now I can get back to my normal life . . . I hope."