Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.328

Moving to a new place reminds me about the time when I first left home. I had always longed to live in Tokyo since childhood, watching modern high-rises or cool apartments in TV dramas. I knew that would never happen to me because I was a firstborn in a family succeeded from generation to generation and was destined to finish my life in the country family house. But music provoked me to throw away everything-my family, friends, college life and, above all, secure life-and to move to Tokyo. As almost all Japanese record companies were in Tokyo and there were many musicians as well, I thought it would be easy to promote my music and find good band members. In actual fact, I only found bad musicians in an unsightly city with too many people, and the record companies picked trashy songs by ignoring mine. Except that I was so happy to have left the place where I was born, things in Tokyo weren't as good as I had expected...

Friday, May 27, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.327

Since I moved in my new apartment, I've occasionally felt a sense of homesick. Only I've seldom felt it for my old apartment. What I miss are shops and restaurants that I often visited, characters and mascots that were standing by the roadside or painted on signboards, and the memories associated with them. In my case, homesick isn't for home to be exact. I've moved for six times in all both domestically and internationally in my life, and the first one was when I left home where I was born and raised, and started to live on my own for the first time in Tokyo. Although it seemed like a perfect occasion to feel homesick, I was too happy to feel any. To date, I've never missed my hometown nor wanted to visit the house. Recently, I've seen many people on TV who live in the shelters after the earthquake eager to return their hometowns instead of moving to new places. For most people, home is such an important place. I wonder if my new place here can become my home...

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.326

My moving day had finally arrived. I got up only with a three-hour sleep. There was little time before moving out. Although a mover would come a few hours later, unpacked things were still littered all over the floor. My hands were trembling with a panic. Just as I managed to pack everything, the moving van pulled up. The problem was a huge amount of trash. We must use the municipal specified bags to throw away trash, but I used them up and had no time to go and buy more. I ended up shipping trash to my new place. While the mover was loading up a truck with my furniture, boxes and the trash, the real estate agent came up to check the apartment. He was examining the place closely to see if there was any damage. As a matter of fact, I had been dreading this moment for months. I was afraid that he was going to charge me an outrageous price for repairs. Since I didn't have enough time to clean up the place, a possible cover-up wouldn't work. When I was braced for a high price, he said that the room cleaning was included in the security deposit I had put down and I would receive the most of it back. I didn't have to clean the place in the first place or pay for the damage. On the contrary, I got money back. After both the agent and the mover left, I said goodbye to the empty apartment I had lived for nine years, locked the door for the last time, and headed for the bus stop. I would never been in this neighborhood again. An end leads to another beginning...

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.325

It was the day before my move. Time for packing everything including basic necessities. I unscrewed the table legs and removed the drapes and the venetian blind from the windows. After packing the stereo, inside the apartment was weirdly quiet and I heard my own voice reverberate. When I had the last dinner at this apartment with my partner on a small folding table and remembered many good things that had happened or come in here, tears suddenly rolled down my face and I couldn't stop crying owing to the beer and a spell of lack of sleep. But I knew I couldn't afford to be sentimental. I had to evacuate this apartment by noon the next day. It seemed undoubtedly impossible to finish packing and cleaning the place by then. A hectic, sleepless night awaited me...

Monday, May 16, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.324

I have only three days to go before I move to my new apartment. I’m already exhausted from packing. Once furniture is moved, the dirty wall or mold appears and the thorough cleaning is also necessary. A mover came today to pick up some pieces of my furniture. To me, they looked like supermen. They carried heavy objects down the stairs so easily. One of them had been even determined to carry down my electric piano by himself until I begged him to do it with his co-worker. Compared to them, I’m nothing. Moving just a few things tires me out and makes my muscles stiff. I don’t know how unstably I’m moving, but I have bruises all over. After I settle in my new place, I’ll exercise and strengthen my body ? that is, when I finish all the packing and cleaning and move out here in time for the deadline…

Friday, May 13, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.323

About two months have passed since the 9.0-magnitude earthquake in Japan. Finally, aftershocks have dwindled. Those atrocious scheduled blackouts have stopped being carried out so far. Food shortages were resolved. Nevertheless, life is totally different from the one before the earthquake. Radiation has been leaked from the crippled nuclear power plants everyday and I can’t go outside as much as I like. At nighttime, stores and restaurants hold their signboard lights off and the streets have become dim. I don’t understand why they turn the lights off since the electricity consumption is low at night and electricity can’t be stored up for later use. As there’s no rational reason for that, I suspect they’re just promoting their gestures of trying to save on electricity. Their baseless savings of electricity make the whole town stale and depressed. In Japan, people have consecutive holidays from the end of April to the first week of May, which is usually the lively, noisy and annoying time of year for me. But this year, the holidays were gone quietly. When I decided to move to the countryside, my biggest concern was if I adapt to living in a small town with sparse shops. But after the earthquake, ironically, the city I currently live in is as dark as the small town I’m moving to, and because my going out is limited due to radiation, the shopping experience here is nothing less than in a small town…

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.322

I removed all the magnets from the fridge to pack for my new apartment. Moving those magnets is tricky because they must be separated from my wristwatches by at least 3 feet. It’s the rule for the wristwatch’s well-being that I was taught by an old watchmaker. His shop was run by him and his wife and I used to visit it very often when I lived downtown Tokyo. My friend once gave me a wristwatch as a gift and she wore the one of the same design. The back of hers was taped up unsightly and she warned me that once I had its cover taken off for a battery change, it wouldn’t be closed again because the watch had a peculiar shape. When the battery was dead, I brought the watch to the old watchmaker’s shop. Although I had thought he would tape up the cover, he grappled with the cover for as long as 10 minutes with sweating and closed it beautifully. Since then, the shop has become my favorite. Some watches didn’t start ticking even with a fresh battery and in that case, he took time and mustered various old tools from his tattered box and his unique skills to fix them perfectly. I liked to see him working on watches. I can’t count how many times he saved my watches in bad condition. Years later, I moved to the suburbs and became unable to visit his shop. When the battery change was needed for the peculiar-shaped watch, which had been the old watchmaker’s specialty for me, I brought it to a clock store chain in a nearby shopping mall. I thought they would tape up the cover this time around, but they closed it with a special gadget right away. I wonder if my favorite watchmaker has already retired while I religiously obey his law to separate magnets from watches…

Friday, May 6, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.321

When I was little and took a bath with my mother, she said in the bathtub, ‘Never marry someone with whom you fall in love.’ In her theory, marriage for love is a ticket to unhappiness because love burns out quickly. She insisted that I should have an arranged marriage as she did. She and my father would find a man for me and do all the necessary background checks so that I’d be better off. She also once said to me in the bathtub, ‘I married your father because he was wealthy. Do you think I would choose such an ugly man like him if he didn’t have money?’ When I grew up, I learned that she had been seeing someone before she met my father at an arranged meeting, but she chose my father because he was richer and had better lineage. I think she dealt with the devil and sold herself at that moment. Since then, she has been unhappy and that made her a being filled with vanity and malice. When it comes to decision making, I always imagine what my mother would do and do the exact opposite. Since I adapted this rule, my life has been easier and better…

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.320

I received an unusually nice postcard from my mother, which said she was worried about me because aftershocks of the Japan’s earthquake had still continued to come almost every day in this area. She had also called me right after the earthquake and when the phone service was restored, she asked me if I was all right. Both gestures of hers were so unlike her usual attitude toward me. When she called, she asked me what my apartment was like and where it was located, too. I’ve lived here for nine years and have told her about my apartment many times over the years. I don’t know if she’s not listening to what I’m saying or she simply doesn’t care about me, but either way, she doesn’t remember things around me at all. Considering that many people in Japan have felt helpless and faint-hearted since the earthquake, her true concern might be just for her future as an old woman, not for me. I found a wrap with a markdown of 75% that had left unsold for winter and bought it as a Mother’s Day gift to send to my mother. When it arrives, I’m sure she will glance at it, tuck it away in her drawers, and forget about it quickly. I know this much because a few years before, she has told me not to come home again, and yet, she has acted as if nothing had happened between us…