A festive day

On the day of the harvest moon, which fell upon last Sunday this year, our town had two festivals to celebrate good harvests and pray for another bumper year. One was a tug-of-war that is held every six years in Toguchi, the central district of our town. And the other was a "honen-sai" harvest festival in Bise, an area known for its traditional streetscape. 

As a curtain raiser for the "o-tsunahiki" tug-of-war, a "michijune" dancing parade by Toguchi residents marched down the main street, amusing hundreds of spectators with adorable dances by children, elegant folk dances by colorfully-dressed women, and comic performances by men in weird costumes. 

The festival came to a climax with the tug-of-war which was fought between the east and west teams. A few minutes of heated battle ended in the victory of the west team, which locals believe to be a sign of a bountiful catch in the next fishing season. 

As the sun went down, we and many other town people moved north in droves for the honen festival in Bise. A staggering number of people came out to see it, packing a small square in front of an "ashagi" shrine, despite a threat of rain due to an approaching typhoon. All of the more than dozen performances, ranging from "Ryukyu" dances to "bo-jutsu" stick fighting to a "Kumi-odori" musical drama, were entirely by locals, most of whom were non-professionals and had been practicing for weeks for the big day. They were rewarded for their hard work. Shortly after a sudden rain shower which drove the crowd to temporarily take shelter under tents and trees, the moon emerged, a little hesitantly, from behind the dark, thick clouds, lighting up the happy faces of the audience who were enjoying the performances of their children, grandchildren, friends and relatives under the beautiful mantle of autumnal night.

A man who delivers fun

Mr. M is a delivery man, but he's not your typical delivery man. He is more like a comedian or an entertainer pretending to be a delivery man. I suspect that working as a delivery man is merely a disguise for him to get to know people he can entertain. 

A couple days ago, he delivered a package and asked if we had "a few minutes to spare." Of course we did. Looking pleased, he went back to his little van and returned with a mysterious white plastic bag. He took out a sketchbook and two unused pencils from it and sharpened the pencils slowly. Tantalizingly slowly.

As our expectation was reaching its peak, he finally started drawing something, using his both hands simultaneously. The drawing turned out to be of a dragonfly which he saw that morning. He said the dragonfly was a messenger of an approaching autumn and added a "haiku" poem he'd just composed to the drawing. 

A few deliveries back, Mr. M performed an impromptu one-man show in our garden, mimicking chirpings of several different birds. It was such a brilliant performance that it's a real pity the audience was just two of us. 

Mr. M once said he was always trying to find new ways to entertain himself because he was single and had a lot of time to kill. When I heard it, the words "entertain himself" echoed in my mind. And I realized how poorly I've been entertaining myself all my life. I've always relied on such predictable and unimaginative ways as shopping, watching DVDs, or surfing the Net. 

Mr. M may not have what many of us have but it seems to me that he is enjoying his life more. I think it's because he knows how to play by himself. If my husband and I are left alone in a deserted island, we couldn't enjoy the life there, thinking only about how to get out. But I'm pretty sure Mr. M would be totally happy and I admire him for that.

Revisiting my spiritual roots

This is where I was given my name. My mother consulted a priest of this Shinto shrine when choosing a name for me. I think she wanted to make sure I'd have a good name after a tragic loss of her first child. 

This is where my mother brought my sister and me every year to summer and winter festivals and bought me my first balloon when I was three or four. I inadvertently let go of the balloon only minutes later. I cried for it, helplessly watching it disappearing into the dark night sky. 

This is also where I was temporarily employed when I was a college student to sell "omikuji" fortune papers to people who paid "hatsumode" New Year's visits to the shrine. 

And this is where I came first thing in the morning on the day of a high school class reunion for which I flew a thousand mile from Okinawa to my hometown near Tokyo for the first time in three years.

It's better to travel

I was 21 when I traveled alone to a foreign country for the first time in my life. The destination was the Indian subcontinent. 

My Air India flight arrived in New Delhi well after midnight, at like 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning. Back then, I was young and reckless and didn't do any preparation for the two-month journey. I didn't even reserve a hotel room for the first night. I didn't need to, though. As soon as I stepped out of the airport, I was surrounded by dozens of taxi drivers and whisked away by one of them to a hotel of his choice, which would give him a commission. The drive to the hotel was probably the scariest 30 minutes of my life. I was in the pitch-black darkness in a car with a total stranger whom I didn't know if I could trust. I even thought, "What if he is a kidnapper?" It turned out, however, that he was just a hard-working taxi driver as I arrived at a rather decent hotel in a clean, quiet neighborhood of New Delhi.

A week or so into the journey, I met, at the Bombay airport, a middle-aged German woman who was also traveling alone. We were both waiting for a flight to the southern city of Cochin and after some chatting, decided to travel together. I think we were both starting to feel lonely. A few days later, we met an Italian hippie guy and a gentlemanly elderly Englishman who, just like me and the German woman, Elizabeth, met each other in the course of their journeys. I traveled with this strange mix of Europeans for the next several days. Coming from different countries and very different backgrounds, they were all fun people to be with, but I especially remember how Elizabeth was a warm-hearted, motherly person. I still keep the towel she gave me one night when she found out I didn't have anything in my bag except the passport, a spare T-shirt and underwear, a Walkman, and a little money barely enough to get by for the rest of the journey.

After a hilarious time together with them in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, I parted ways with them, first with the Italian guy and the Englishman and a few days later with Elizabeth. I was alone again. After the day Elizabeth left for home, I often found myself singing to "Breakout," a tune in Swing Out Sister's "It's Better to Travel" album. Whenever I felt lonely dining alone, couldn't sleep at night, and got homesick, I played the song, which encouraged me to go on my journey with lyrics like "The time has come to make or break. Move on. Don't hesitate. Break out." The journey to India is and always will be the best and most memorable travel I've had in my life and I owe the once-in-a-lifetime experience to the great musical companion.

Cradle for a new life

How many twigs and leaves were used to weave this little nest? How many times did the weaver have to fly to collect all these materials? And how many days did it take to complete this masterpiece?

How did the nest's creator learn the craft? How did he or she know how to make a cushion at the bottom from dead leaves and bend twigs to give the nest the shape of a basket? 

How did the master weaver feel about the work? How did the work serve its purpose? I hope it did very well.

Utsusemi

Cicadas' songs are blissful music of nature. I wake up every morning in summer to their pleasant choruses, work at the computer listening to their BGM, and cool myself after a little gardening in the shade of a tree which offers a temporary housing for them. Like many other Japanese, I love "semi-shigure (literally meaning cicada shower)" and never get tired of listening to it.

Cicadas' shells, however, make me a little sad. Whenever I find their cast-off shells, I feel like congratulating them on starting a new life after spending many years underground, but at the same time I feel sorry for them, remembering their end is only days away.

"Utsusemi" is a Japanese word for cicadas' shells. The poetic word has another meaning; this world and all the mortals living in it. After all, there isn't any difference between cicadas and me. I, too, am destined to die some day. All I can do in this fleeting life is to sing, like the cicadas in my garden, a song of life as beautifully as possible.