Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
Vietnam
Chapter 2
New Home
in Kofu
Chapter 3
Hong Kong
China,
&
Korea
Chapter 4
Yamanashi
Chapter 5
Society
Chapter 6
Hospital
Chapter 7
Nikko
Chapter 8
Holiday
Greetings
Chapter 9
Culture
Chapter 10
Holiday
Trip:
Kansai
&
Kyushu
Chapter 11
Mores
Chapter 12
Hankos
& Brush-
writing
Chapter13
Friends
Chapter 14
Festivities
Chapter 15
Okinawa
&
Nagasaki
Chapter 16
Hong Kong
&
Australia
Chapter 17
Special
People
&
Events
Chapter 18
Coming
to
Japan
Chapter 19
Letter to
Editor
Chapter 20
Teaching
English
Chapter 21 Hamamatsu
Chapter 22
Women's
Relation-
ships
Chapter 23
Reflections
on
Education
Chapter 24
Nephews'
Visit
Chapter 25
Thailand,
Korea
&
Home
Chapter 26
Taking
Stock
Chapter 26
Taking Stock
November 1999
Prior to leaving for our adventure in Asia, we had some idea that it would be life changing. Little did we know how dramatic and, at times overwhelming, the changes would be. Since returning we have reflected, discussed, experienced, and adjusted to the new selves that we have become. Some changes have been simple and obvious. Others go to a deeper level and are more difficult to put into words. In fact, shortly after we arrived home if people asked how we had changed, it was impossible to try to explain. We were sorting it out ourselves and perhaps we still are. It was something we just "felt." Several years later it is still difficult to put into words, but our perspective is a little clearer.
As we wrote in our last letter, we were ready to kiss the ground when we arrived back on US soil. That remains the same. The freedom in this country is something that we will never again take for granted. As one young Japanese friend recently told us, "In the United States you can be a human being." Individuality, for which we place a premium, is devalued in many other places.
As another friend said, "Living in the USA gave me a chance to understand why things that are right for America work in America and things that are right for Japan work in Japan." In this regard, we were able to have a better appreciation of both cultures.
Even though Tom had been to Japan many times and lived there several times before, the impact of returning home was no less dramatic than it was for Marie, who was experiencing her first time of living in another culture. During prior visits Tom viewed his experience through the eyes and ears of a teacher. He was constantly learning and trying to increase his knowledge of the culture so that he could hone his academic skill in teaching about it upon returning home. He became an "expert" in the history and culture but didn't really experience the culture as intensely as he did during this sojourn. Consequently, he lost some of his romanticized notions, and became somewhat disillusioned. In this regard the "honeymoon was over." On the other hand, he experienced the culture more fully, and it became an even more intrinsic part of who he is and what he stands for.
On a day-to-day level, there were some real jolts to our system. When we first arrived at the airport in LA, we attempted to phone relatives to let them know our plane would be late. We had forgotten how to use our phone credit card. This simple behavior which had been routine before leaving the country was now a conundrum. We never did figure it out, and to our embarrassment, we had to call collect. It turns out that this was only the beginning of the "reentry" adjustments we would have to make. Writing checks was a strange experience and we had to talk ourselves through the steps, as we had not done it for more than a year. Since Japan is a cash society, checking accounts don't exist.
There were many other basic adjustments as well as overarching changes. Driving was an experience in itself. The violence and crime in our society took on a whole new dimension for us. Simple communication was no longer simple. Our concepts of work, play and leisure were impacted. We were enriched with new friendships and the deepening of old ones, while gulfs seemed to appear in some relationships. We developed a heightened sensitivity to international perceptions of the USA and the whole world became a more personal place. Overall, we reexamined and became more closely attuned to our own values.
Driving
Neither of us had driven an automobile the entire time we were gone. However, we were passengers in many vehicles and in most countries we visited, the drivers drove on the left side of the road. We didn't realize how our brains were being imprinted until we returned home. One day shortly after coming back, Marie was out driving, very cautiously and carefully making certain to stay on her side of the road, knowing that driving again would take some getting used to. Only when she saw a car coming the other way…in the same lane!…did she realize that she was on the wrong side of the road. There was no mishap, it was a country road, and she quickly corrected the situation, but she was shaken up for awhile. The same mistake was not made again. Tom also found that driving was not second nature and the drive on the expressway between the airport and home was quite hairy!! He also had one accident within a short time of arriving home. It took awhile to feel comfortable behind the wheel again.
Overall, we found traffic to be heavier than we remembered. People seemed to drive much faster and more aggressively than before we left. We thought this perception might be the result of faulty memories until we talked with people who reinforced our impressions. People who had been living back home and driving daily told us that they were dismayed with the longer commute times, the increased number of vehicles now on the roads, and generally feeling besieged while driving. We weren't the only ones intimidated by traffic conditions. In addition, stories of "road rage" were rampant in the media and this was quite a jolt to us, coming from a culture where surface civility is rule #1!
Crime
When we turned on the TV or radio on arriving home, voices screamed at us that our car was likely to be stolen. Commercials designed to fill people with fear and alarm, and usually featuring police officers, urged us to buy car theft detection devises. Lists of automobiles most in demand by car thieves were printed in the newspapers. Our one car always topped the lists (and still does) and the other often made the "top ten." Numerous articles were printed about the "chop shops" in the area. These were places where the stolen cars were dismantled and the parts were sold. We discovered that our car was worth a small fortune in "parts" compared to its actual resale, insurance or trade-in value. While our concern was not without reason, and in fact we did have a close call with someone who was attempting to take the car, the fear was disproportionate to the facts. The news media struck fear into our hearts and encouraged something akin to paranoia. Sometimes, when getting up in the night, we would look out the window to make certain the car was still there. It was difficult to determine the line between realistic concern based on fact and overreaction as an outgrowth of trumped up, unwarranted fear.
The alarmism in the news was in direct contrast to Japan where the television we watched in English was carefully edited. While commercials might be tacky or distasteful, they were usually cute and funny. We simply weren't prepared for the onslaught of frenetic American TV, whose goal seemed to be to strike fear into the hearts of all viewers. Besides that, news reporting had taken on the quality of tabloids, becoming more intrusive and sleazy. In addition, scatological humor had become very popular while we were gone. Bathroom humor was widespread in Japan also, but we found it very distasteful and were hoping we would be leaving it behind.
Gun violence. We had read a lot of about it while in Japan and we wrote about it in our letters. However, it only becomes more alarming and appalling to us. This whole idea of supposedly second amendment rights and our historical gun culture is frightening to us. We had come back to a place where it may not be safe to walk the streets at night. We became aware of why people in other parts of the world believe this is the most violent place in the world. We can't express strongly enough how painful this is to us and how sad we feel about that claim to fame. It also makes us feel very sad that our friends in Japan say that the students (or maybe their parents) don't want to come here because they are afraid. In the case of Yamanashi Eiwa, students have many opportunities to go to Canada, and those who do opt to come to the USA, as exchange students, seem to be carefully choosing "safe" suburban or rural schools to attend. That means that they may spend a whole year in one very remote part of the USA without ever having a flavor of the wondrous experiences and places we have to offer them.
This is not to say that the US is a crime-ridden place and Japan is a placid society. As we neared the end of our stay we came to believe that there was much crime that went unreported in Japan and maybe we shouldn't feel quite so safe. At the same time, in the US, crime is sensationalized and the media bombards the public with frightening, dramatic reports, while the crime rate has continued to go down. Thus, the public perception is that our crime rate is increasing when it is actually decreasing. In fact, after a personal encounter, we were concerned enough about disproportionate crime coverage in both countries that we wrote a second letter to the Japan Times just before we left Japan. (Click hyperlink to read.) We do not know if the letter was published, but felt compelled to write it.
Contrasts
One of the most startling impressions of returning to the US is the sheer expanse of the place. Everything looks so big, so open. We were used to living in and traveling about small spaces. Since coming home we have come to realize that some of our Japanese friends might have the mistaken view that we are rich. Even though we are definitely middle class by American standards, we live in relative luxury just in terms of space we occupy compared to our friends in Japan and some of the other places we visited. Compared to the third world countries we visited we have an embarrassment of riches. All this made us much more aware of the excesses in our country.
It was absolutely embarrassing to see the wastefulness in our culture after being in Japan for awhile. While living in our apartment there we had to carefully conserve water, electricity, gas and other resources. In fact, we were visited twice in our apartment and told that we were using too much water and too much gas and to cut back on our usage. Recycling has gone on for many years. It was quite enlightening to us to become aware of how much water, electricity and other resources we waste in our day-to-day life. This was especially true during the drought of 1999, when we had to be very careful of our water usage. We collected the dripping water from the air conditioner, which we used sparingly, to water plants. We collected the water from washing our hands, during food preparation, and cleaning other objects in a bucket in the kitchen sink to try to keep plants alive. And we recycled the bath water in the same way. During that trying time we became more aware of how wasteful we normally are with all of our resources. Indeed, we are a spoiled nation in that regard.
Our view of materialism also changed. Compared to us, our friends in Japan had only a few clothes that they might wear for years. They shopped carefully, bought quality clothing, and treated them with great care. First of all, there is little room in their living quarters to hold a lot of clothes. Secondly, they don't seem to need to constantly buy more and more and more just for the sake of buying it. It was quite a contrast. While it seemed to us that Japan is also materialistic in some regards, they have much less disposable income. On average, people save 15% of their income to provide for retirement and the average savings account might be in the range of $150,000. In America it seems like advertising agencies create a bottomless pit of desire for things, and many of us confuse the concepts of "want" and "need." This observation hit us "where we live" and it was a long time before we had any desire to go shopping for new clothes. We became even more determined to give our grandchildren gifts of happy memories and ourselves rather than a mass of "stuff."
Communication
While in Japan we met a woman who lives in Florida. Japanese by birth, married to an American for more than 20 years, and bilingual, she reported to us that her English is not getting any better and she is losing her Japanese. We could relate to that. During our year away we did lose some of our English.
Daily interactions with friends and students brought all kinds of questions to mind regarding our own language. Neither of us is naturally inarticulate, but we found ourselves questioning how we pronounced English words, the usage of the words, spelling, and the complexity of the language itself. Part of this phenomenon came from teaching English with people who came from Canada, England, other English-speaking parts of the world and Germany; many who considered themselves experts. Then there were questions of proper usage and compared to common usage. So it was never simple to know what was correct, and in the Japanese culture there could only be one correct way of doing things.
The language that we once used without too much thought became a complex undertaking. For those who aren't aware, in Japanese the "a", "e", "i", "o", and "u" always have the same sounds. That is much simpler than our language. Of course the vowels in English have all sorts of sounds. How does one explain the different pronunciations for dough, bough, and rough? Hmmm. How about the different pronunciations and different meanings for "bow"? (The different pronunciations for "read." The same pronunciation but different meanings for "read" & "red" and "read" & "reed.") These are just elementary examples. Let your mind explore. We continue to become more aware of how confounding our language must be to others! Even teaching the alphabet to small children was not straightforward, as "z" for us is "zed" for others.
Both our English and our attempts at Japanese suffered. Tom's Canadian teaching partner found many opportunities to correct his pronunciation, word usage, and grammar. And when we attempted to use Japanese words we were often corrected and sometimes even laughed at by our friends. That was especially discouraging because we were trying so hard. However, this served to help us become more aware of the importance of being patient with others who struggle with our language.
The effects lingered after returning home. Even now we sometimes find that pronouncing words and using the correct word is more of an effort than it used to be. We may tend to "over pronounce" words. For instance, Marie recently pronounced the "u" in surrealistic as a long "u", as it would be in most languages, only to be corrected by a teen-aged relative. Other examples include words that are Japanese which we pronounce as they would be spoken in Japan. Sake (not saki) is "sa-kay" not "sakey." Koi, an ornamental carp with origins in Japan, has two syllables ko -e (long "e") not one. Tokyo has only two syllables in Japan, not three. Karaoke is nothing like it is pronounced in the US and neither is karate. Then again, Tom is careful to pronounce "Honda" with a long "o" and Japanese "a" when talking about our car to Japanese friends, while using the Americanized version with people here.
Boy is our language complicated! We vote to be more forgiving of everyone!!
Then there was the habit of communicating in simpler terms and shorter sentences for our Japanese friends and students. We tried to speak clearly and fairly simply in order to promote better understanding. In this regard, something of note happened at one of our parties. One of our guests was a young Japanese student. Another of our guests who had been to Japan with exchange students spoke very deliberately and carefully. She was a bit chagrined when she discovered that the young student had lived in the US for years and spoke English as well and fluently as the other guests did. (Guess that says something about assumptions.)
For us, the practice of simplifying our speech was one that was difficult to break. Our vocabulary became truncated. What had started as volitional on our parts soon became the norm rather than the exception...it was habit. It took more of an effort to speak fluently. When we returned home we both felt that we had lost some of our vocabulary, because we hadn't used those words for such a long time. Sometimes we still have to mentally search for the word we want. We use the dictionary a whole lot more than we ever did before, for spelling, pronunciation and correct usage.
We also became more aware of the myriad difficulties in communicating when hearing of a misunderstanding from both sides of the following story. A young man we know, who has worked as a translator in Japan, considers himself fluent in Japanese and was determined to speak only Japanese with a young Japanese friend who speaks fluent English. Apparently he said something in Japanese that was very insulting to her and now the relationship is fractured. He is confused about what happened and thinks that she overreacted, while she believes that if he had been willing to communicate in English in the first place, the misunderstanding would not have occurred. We have no editorial comments and we would not even try to sort it out. It just underscores for us how confusing communication can be, especially when it is across cultures.
Finally, while in Japan we could converse spontaneously with each other in rapid-fire speech, being fairly certain that we would not be understood as we walked down the street. Upon returning home we had to be much more careful. Besides, we could not tune out all the extraneous noise that it was so easy to do in Japan. All of this took much adjusting.
Work and play
People in Japan work so hard! And their play seems more like work to us. They take play much more seriously than do Americans and their leisure time hardly seems like leisure to us. Nothing appears to be relaxed or spontaneous. It seems that all of our friends were taking a class in something... music, flower arranging, brushwriting, dance, language study, sports. A few of our friends were attending 3 evening classes each week. This self-improvement is fine and worthy, but it was often pursued with an intensity that left us wondering what the purpose was.
The impact of work and the stress it brings in the lives of our friends is more dramatic than we can express. Sometimes it was difficult for us to observe. We recently learned that one very successful businessman, who had been particularly welcoming to us, committed suicide because of the pressures of his work. We have worried about some of our friends who literally seem to be working themselves to death. We know that they don't have the luxury of leisure time that we do. This forced us to examine our own views of work, leisure, and how we want to spend our time.
This, coupled with Tom's retirement and Marie's being "in between" jobs when leaving the US, led us to look at work and play in a whole new way. Prior to our trip, both of us tended to be workaholics. We both loved our work and got a lot of satisfaction from giving something back to society. However, our deeply entrenched puritan work ethic pushed us to give more and more and never feel as if we were giving enough. The idea of not working filled us with guilt. It would mean we were not being productive and, therefore, not doing our share in society. These values were inculcated from early childhood.
We both came home questioning the role of work in our lives. For the first time in our adult lives we did not have to "work" at paying jobs that put great stress in our lives and required long hours away from home. We became aware of choices that we previously did not know existed. We became more attuned to our own values and began attempting to shape our lives as it feels right for us and not as we "ought" by old standards. The result of that awareness remains to be seen. It is an ongoing process.
Changes in relationships
One unforeseen result of our trip was that there would be adjustments in many personal relationships.Some people seemed angry with us for "deserting" them in the first place and they began to punish us in subtle and not so subtle ways. For some it was beyond their understanding why we would want to travel at all, but especially to places that seemed so "foreign". Others could not understand how we could be friendly with people from other countries which in relatively recent times had been our enemies. Some seemed to feel that we had betrayed them simply by changing. Our status as a couple was often viewed differently in our travels than it was at home and even the level of respect we experienced abroad was different. We couldn't have put any of these observations into words at the time. It is only in retrospect that it has become more apparent to us.
Over time we became aware that not only were the above attitudes real, but also that there were some very real changes in us, some tangible, some not. It seems that people had expectations that we would return as the same people who left to go to Japan, when in fact we were "different." It is probably also true that our expectations of ourselves and others may have changed.
The first major indication that we were different came shortly after we returned home and had a picnic. We wanted to greet all the people we had missed through the year. Our intentions were good and we wanted to welcome everyone with open arms. We wanted them to feel comfortable in our home. We had no idea how disoriented we would feel.
It seemed like we went through the motions of entertaining, but were feeling somewhat disconnected throughout. At the time we thought we may have been suffering from a long-term case of jet lag, culture shock, or just being tired from all the traveling. Later, some of our friends and family members told us that we shouldn't have had the picnic. We are not certain what they experienced but we know we weren't our normal "old selves." Looking back, we wonder if we wandered around looking like zombies...going through the motions...throughout the day.
Some of Marie's friends expressed a personal betrayal because she did not feel the same compulsion to return to work, for which she had such passion. It felt to Marie that her change in work values were taken personally by some of her colleagues and friends. It is understandable because work had always been an integral part of her identity. Anyone who knew her knew that she tended to be highly motivated and almost obsessive in her work. Suddenly she was saying that maybe this is a time for reflection, meditation and finding her way at this stage of her life. She believed that as other things came into line, work would too, but was having a very difficult time finding the words to express what was going on. Some friends expressed a concern about her to each other and to her. They implied that something was "wrong" with her.
Others appeared to sense a change but neither party could put a name to it and therefore it was a bridge in communication that was difficult to cross. One family member told us that while we hadn't changed deep down, our priorities had changed. We are not certain exactly what that means, but sense that in some way she felt disappointed. Perhaps others did also.
Additionally, there was a certain amount of loneliness that occurred upon returning home. We had been through a dramatic change and could not simply go back into the day-to-day life that we had experienced prior to our trip. We needed to talk with others about it, process it, and find people who understood what we were talking about. We feared that if we talked about our trip too much we would be boring, or others would consider it bragging. However, we could not simply disregard all that we were experiencing, all that we had experienced, and all that had become a part of us. This needed a fine balance and, of course, the people we were often drawn to were those who had had similar experiences or who had experienced Japan with us.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons that we are so eager to share Japan with our family and friends. We know that we especially want our grandchildren to come to know Japan. Not only do we believe that it will open up a whole new world to them and enrich their lives enormously, but it will also help them get to know us better and build a deeper bond. This is a legacy we very much want for them.
During the very first leg of our trip, our young guide from Vietnam and our driver, the North Vietnam Army officer, each commented on what a "great couple" we were and how much we belonged together. They experienced the connection between us. Throughout the year, various people from diverse cultures, and of all ages, mentioned the same thing. In Japan, students and friends alike told us our relationship was remarkable, and seemed fascinated by it. At the time we thought they were just responding to the differences between relationships in general between their culture and ours. Except for a few people who held onto the image of Tom's former marriage and saw it through their cultural values, we were always treated in every sense as a couple who not only had the legitimate right to be together, but actually belonged together. That was pretty affirming.
This changed dramatically when we returned home, and it was a change that we were not prepared for. It became clear to us that even though we were married for several years by that time, there were many people in our lives who could not accept our relationship. Some of it had to do with the normal stages and problems of trying to blend families when there is remarriage. Most of it was unconscious but, nonetheless, existed. A dramatic example is in the church where Tom has been active for almost 30 years. More than 6 years after our marriage was celebrated, most church members still find it impossible to learn Marie's name. Although she has been introduced to the same people time and time again, old church friends tend to greet Tom with warm greetings and act as if Marie is invisible, or greet her without having any idea what her name is. A very interesting phenomenon which perplexes both of us, but which we both now realize is not personal. What a contrast to what we have experienced throughout our travels!
Of course that does not apply to everyone. There are many people in our lives who celebrate our union with us. However, there are enough people from our former lives who discount our relationship in some way they are not rare exceptions. Who would have guessed?!.
Additionally, while traveling and living abroad, people wanted to pick our brains, and seemed to value and respect our input. In some part this was in deference to us because we were their guests. Asian societies in themselves tend to be more gracious, at least on the surface, and politeness is an integral part of the society. Some of that might be superficial. But underneath the artifice we felt a real valuing of us as human beings that we experienced daily by most people we met. On the whole, people enjoyed our company and told us so. All this became the norm. We got used to it. Maybe you could say we became spoiled.
We know the old adage, "No one can be a prophet in his own land." (We think this may be from the Bible?) We didn't expect to be prophets, but it was difficult for us when, upon arriving home, people would raise their voices in anger or "act out" their anger towards us in other ways. It was difficult when people questioned our perceptions of our own lives or areas of expertise. When people were irritated or frustrated with us in ways that we didn't understand, it was a difficult transition for us. In addition, we both had a history of bowing to the wishes and needs of others at the expense of ourselves and we were beginning to question that. After a year of being treated as a valuable human being, it is easier to begin to believe it oneself. As we look back we realize that we had become more assertive in the year we were gone. We weren't as willing to accept disrespect when it was directed at us. It was a change for other people to observe.
All of our own experiences when we returned home gave us a deeper level of empathy for people who have lived in another country for a while. This is especially true for the students who came here for a year and then return to Japan. We hope we will continue to be sensitive to others in similar situations and consider what they might be going through.
Friendships
Not too many months ago we listened to a program on Nation Public Radio about Asian friendships. It contrasted friendships among Asians to those in our culture. One of the things we remember from the show is a report about how friendships in Asia endure over a lifetime. They form early in life from the neighborhood or school and are life-long. This pattern was contrasted to friendships in our culture, which are more transient and tend to be more job-related. Obviously they were talking about overall patterns that don't apply to everyone. However, it fit our experience of Japan very well. The depth of friendship that we witnessed was something to be envied by many people. In this regard the whole idea of friendship took on a whole new meaning for Marie. Tom already had experienced this with enduring relationships with friends in Japan. The depth of the relationships that Marie found in Japan, independent of Tom, astounded her and touched her to the core. In fact, the gift of friendships is probably the greatest gift that we have received from our travels abroad.
Many of our new friendships we wrote about in our letters. These friendships are growing and developing since arriving home, aided in part by the Internet. Old friendships also continue to deepen. We have been enriched with visits from friends from other countries and had a chance to sit and talk for hours; to share and confide. We do feel blessed.
Further, the connections that we have with our friends from other parts of the world seem to come without a lot of strings attached or unspoken expectations. Our international friends seem to accept us simply for who we are and value as on a very basic level. As far as we can tell, unless we are missing a lot in the interactions, we have a spiritual connection that needs few words. Indeed, we have come to understand the saying, "Friends become our chosen family," in a whole new light. Many of our friends have in fact become part of our family.
One particularly moving experience underscores the power of international relationships for us. Fairly early in our stay in Japan we read about a book that had recently been published. It was reviewed in the Japan Times and Marie vowed to get it for Tom as a Christmas present upon arriving home. The book was entitled An American in Japan: 1945-1948: A Civilian View of the Occupation. It was written by Jacob Van Staaveren and chronicles the time he lived in Kofu as a civilian employed by the military to see to it that the Japanese schools in Yamanashi Prefecture put the US mandated reforms into practice in the occupied country after the war.
As Tom began reading the book he became aware that Mr. Van Staaveren's interpreter, about whom he wrote with great respect, was most likely the aunt of a long-time friend, Fumiko Enomoto. We copied pictures from the book and sent them to Fumiko to ascertain whether the interpreter was her aunt, a woman we had met on several occasions. This led to heartfelt phone communication between Mr. Van Staaveren and ourselves. During our conversation with him and further communication with Fumiko we were able to share the information necessary to renew the acquaintance of the two, who knew and respected each other many years ago but had lost track of each other in recent years.
The result of this interaction led to a long-distance reunion between Mr. Van Staaveren and his interpreter, Aiko Enomoto, both of whom were nearing the end of their lives. One upshot was a feature article in a Japanese newspaper about the relationship between the two and a sort of celebrity status for Ms. Enomoto in her hometown. Also, a special award was to be presented to Mr. Van Staaveren for the work he did for Kofu more than fifty years before.
Unfortunately Mr. Van Staaveren died before he was able to receive the award, and therefore it was presented posthumously. We were sorry we were not able to visit him in his home in Oregon before his death, or share more about our different experiences in Kofu...separated by 50 years. But we felt richer for having the communication we did with him and honored to have some part in bringing him and his interpreter back together to renew their acquaintance.
Beauty
Our deepest values have remained constant. Others we reexamined or reassessed. One is the excesses of our culture that we discussed earlier and others are discussed in the section on work and play. Another is the whole concept of beauty.
In Vietnam we watched women ride their motorcycles in the street in all kinds of conditions, but with gloves on their hands and their faces protected from the sun and weather to preserve their beauty. The same sort of thing was also viewed in Japan. In that country beauty is an intrinsic value of the culture. However, the more we observed, the more it appeared to us that this overvaluing of beauty leads to a devaluing of the people and especially women. Marie's observation was that when women are young their value is as an ornament alone. When they are aged they might be venerated or even feared. But when they are middle-aged it seems that the only people who value them are their middle-aged friends (or perhaps their children?). This whole idea of reducing women to objects it not exclusive in their culture but appeared more exaggerated there than some other places in the world. It became fairly offensive to Marie.
It also became personal at one point. During one drunken party attended by very good friends, one male friend remarked to Tom, in Marie's presence, "I can't understand why you got married again, because Marie isn't very good looking." It seemed purposeful and particularly mean at the time. This was so shocking to Tom that he was speechless, and it was the most hurtful thing that happened to Marie during the entire time in Japan.
In retrospect, given that this was said by someone who had told us many times how much he envied and admired our relationship, we believe that it was asked out of honest confusion. The whole concept of marriage is so different in Japan, in the first place, that people simply do not see the point in getting married again after a mate dies. In many ways they are really free for the first time in their lives. Why mess it up? But if one does choose to remarry it would have to be for compelling reasons. Therefore we would guess that the real intent of the question was, "If you were absolutely determined to get married again, why not get a young, beautiful "trophy wife"?" Love is not a highly valued factor in the traditional Japanese marriage.
Of course the trophy wife is not unusual in this country, but believe us, the business of devaluing women takes on a whole different dimension in Japan. And the idea of beauty as it relates to woman was difficult for Marie to stomach.
An upshot was that Marie quit wearing make-up almost completely and started to prefer the natural look. She reexamined her own values of the aging process and what beauty is in the first place. Hopefully, growing older a little more gracefully is an attainable goal. Also, she developed a much keener empathy for her close women friends. This included the young beautiful women as well as the middle-aged ones. In her estimation, neither is better off because both are getting the same message from society. That message is that woman's real value is in being an ornament. That is devaluing to both the young and old, and besides, with any amount of luck, the younger women will be older in time!
Experiencing the East
Most overarching of all of our values that we examined was that of the intuitive or feeling approach to looking at life and its meaning, rather than the western cognitive approach. It is very safe to view everything, process everything and value everything through the "head." Our culture has always valued the cognitive over every other aspect of experiencing life. This is the antithesis of the eastern way which emphasizes intuitive understanding and understatement. Our eastern "centers" are what brought us together in the first place, and it is the eastern way that draws us back to Japan and makes us feel so connected there.
Earlier this year we took a trip to Iceland and bumped into a fellow traveler from New York. She was an educator who was an "expert" on Japan and many other cultures. She explained to us exactly what Japanese culture and people are all about! She summed it up in a couple of sentences and it was as cognitive is it could be. It also came across to us as an absolute. In one regard, she wasn't exactly wrong. On the other hand she couldn't have been more wrong. She could articulate values and customs. She just missed the essence. It can't be explained from the intellect, it has to be experienced. We just listened while she lectured us. You cannot know how frustrating this was to us.
The western vs. eastern ways of looking at experience was illustrated when we had visitors in Japan. Some were very cognitive and wanted to understand the culture by learning as much as they could. Some had a need to know and to let people know that they knew! Everything they encountered they wanted to be able to put within the framework of something that was familiar to them. They needed a cognitive niche for storing each new fact. As a result, they displayed little sensitivity to the people or the culture, and were frustrated in their attempt to "understand" it. In their having to know they were unable to learn.
Others were more inclined to absorb the culture by participating in simple rituals at temples and shrines, interacting with people and using simple Japanese expressions of appreciation. They asked questions that showed an intuitive understanding of Japanese culture. We are certain that they came away from Japan with a much better awareness of Japan than did the others.
Zen Buddhism concludes that spiritual truth does not come through the intellect. It only comes out of experiencing enlightenment. So it is with Japanese culture. No amount of study can prepare you for Japan -- you need to open yourself to the experience and let it become a part of you.
International views
Tom has always been much more aware of international perspectives than most people. After all that has been his primary area of study and teaching for many years. However, the time away from home was a major eye-opening experience for Marie. Now, when listening to news reports, it is impossible to receive them in a myopic way. For us, the world no longer revolves around the USA. Consequently, when the presidential impeachment hearings were conducted this past year, we were embarrassed about the impressions that it might be creating overseas. We both thought about the moralistic views of our country as they compare to views of sex and morality in other countries. It seemed that people in countries where there is a more open view of private affairs would view it as a laughingstock while others would find the process offensive. The whole thing seemed embarrassing and stupid.
Every time we hear reports of another shooting we are afraid that it only underscores the collective international perception of the US as a violent place. We wonder what people in the United States would think if Japan had the same gun laws as ours (and the impact those laws would have on their society, which has its own strong undercurrents of violence and rage). Each time there is another shooting Tom cringes and Marie can be heard saying, in impotent frustration, "I hate guns!"
Now when we hear news stories from other parts of the world, they don't seem so far away. If we hear about student riots in Korea, we remember the lingering smell of tear gas near our hotel in Seoul. When we hear about the dire economic conditions in Vietnam, Thailand, Korea or Japan we know that our friends are impacted. As Hong Kong was reverting to Chinese rule we wondered what has become of the guide with whom Marie formed a relationship. A young friend was active in the campaign against the recent vote in Australia to determine if the country would stay in the British Commonwealth. The shape of communism in Vietnam effects people for whom we care a great deal. Demonstrations in Tiananmen Square to commemorate the anniversary of the massacre there are of more than passing interest to us because we have strong memories of a lively, outspoken guide we encountered in China. Our international experiences and connections mean that building collapses in Korea, fires, floods, earthquakes and other disasters in distant places no longer seem remote for us.
Conclusion
This summer, while visiting a music festival, we were drawn to a Japanese garden and small temple in the heart of a small city an hour's drive from our home. We sat quietly, taking in the serenity and beauty. As we sat there, we noticed a young man who looked like a hippie out of the 60's. The meditative atmosphere obviously moved him, also. Simultaneously, we both felt compelled to talk with him. The brief interaction of strangers in an American city being drawn to one another through experiencing a foreign culture, was meaningful to us and, we believe, to him.
Life is now made up of many such moments.
The world becomes smaller all the time.
For us that translates into spending time with a young Thai man who served us on our cruise, talking to him about his home, sharing our memories and listening to his homesickness. It made us more sensitive to the young couple from Poland we met in Disney World. They left dire economic conditions to come to the USA where they could at least get jobs. Even though the wife has a college degree, she feels fortunate to work as a hat check person in a casino. We were warmed by a conversation, while aboard a cruise ship launch, with two sisters who emigrated from Romania to Chicago a few years ago. They approached us because they wanted to share their personal story with us, even though they struggled with their English.
Our new perspective makes it possible to better appreciate the Israeli- born, Canadian citizen, who owns a hotel/restaurant in Puntarenas, Costa Rica, and lives part of each year in Mexico. When first meeting him, we asked him where home was. He responded that he didn't know how to answer the question.
On a more personal level, the time since coming home has presented us with a greater opportunity to get in touch with our spiritual selves, to affirm our identities as Americans, as well as the overarching identity as citizens of the world.
Since returning home, we have thought a lot about the stages of life discussed in Hinduism: student, householder, forest dweller and wanderer. As students we learn about life from our parents, teachers, peers and our experiences. This prepares us to be householders -- to get a job, raise our children and provide for our family. After fulfilling our duties as a householder, it is time to detach ourselves from the duties of this life and to retire to a quiet place to open ourselves to spiritual fulfillment -- to experience the Real meaning of existence. This is the forest dweller stage. After "awakening" we realize that attachment to any material thing is meaningless and that the only enduring values are spiritual. Thus, in the end, we come to understand that those elements that seem to divide people -- wealth, nation, language, religion -- are inconsequential when compared to the universal human condition we all share.
We are not ready to don saffron colored robes, but we know our values have been irrevocably altered. We realize that our sense of being transcends family and nation and that the world is our home.
In that regard, we have come closer to experiencing the essence of a favorite quote. "If your soul is not a stranger to you, the whole world is your home." (Kabir)
We are delighted that our four-year-old granddaughter has a fascination for all things Japanese and, one day, we hope to take her to Japan. It was a wonderful experience to take her to Ellis Island where she could come into contact with people from many cultures, as well as learn more about the deepest values of our own culture. Perhaps the circle began to be completed when she initiated a conversation with an English family, while visiting Disney World.
