Irritation about Life!!

I don’t remember exactly when this flow of work started, though it seems it did late February or early March. Since then, I haven’t had a real day off. Good and bad. The corporate finance to June won’t be too bad as I’m managing to make a small profit, and I hope this continues to the end of this financial year.

Not having had a real day off means I’ve been contained, or detained, in this apartment effectively. The only time I went out to have my time with others was April 14, when I met three guys for dinner, one of whom I hadn’t met more than 10 years. We are like comrades who survived a large translation project, a battle, some 13 years ago. I enjoyed that reunion. After we parted, I went on to CC for some more drink.

Being home almost all the time, except when I go to the supermarket for grocery shopping, is also affecting my daily life. Very often, I stay up until early morning (5:00 am in a few occasions) doing an online word game and watching YouTube and wake up only in the afternoon. Today, I got out of bed relatively early at 10:00 am.

Staying in bed and in that familiar state of “half awake and half asleep,” my thinking almost always goes to mother and my history with her. I think… she didn’t like me very much. Her attitude toward me when I was a small kid seems to me can be understood now with this idea that she was unhappy with me because I enjoyed being with father. Therefore all those stories told to me by her about him, telling me what a terribly violent and unethical person he was, perhaps trying to peel me off from him.

As for reading, after “America’s Boy,” I’ve read “The Story of English (Robert McCrum, Robert MacNeil and William Cran),” “The Fooling of America: The Untold Story of Carlos P. Romulo (Pio Andrade, Jr.),” “The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger),” “Douglas MacArthur: The Philippine Years (Carol Morris Petillo)” and “Corresponding with Carlos: A Biography of Carlos Kleiber (Charles Barber).”

“The Story of English” is its third edition and of course this is the base on which that famous TV series was created. This is a very nice book for one to see many Englishes used in today’s world in perspective but didn’t change my hostility toward so-called Singlish.

I decided to read “The Fooling of America” because the book was cited in “America’s Boy.” This was published by the author himself because no publishing house accepted his work. Surprisingly, I found his handwriting in this second-hand copy to “Dear Dr. Pontius” and comments throughout it. It was rather tedious to finish this book as this is badly written as the author is admitting in his message to the doctor and he is very emotional in many places. I wonder if Romulo was a politician so exceptionally deceptive. Many in almost every country are, and it shouldn’t be surprising at all when we talk about politicians in the Philippines.

“The Catcher in the Rye” is something I should’ve read years ago. But I had been ignoring American literature. As far as I remember, the other novel by an American author was “Sophie’s Choice.”

Carol Morris Petillo attempts to dissect the general’s psychology. A hero enthusiastically welcomed by the folks of my country at least partly because they were unaware of what sort of information control they were placed under, the author depicts him as a Mama boy.

“Corresponding with Carlos” must be a very rare source to look into the personality of this reclusive “old coot” conductor. It was like having a sneak view into private exchanges between Kleiber and the author though letters only about private matters are excluded from the book. It should be interesting when the book is perceived by combining it with the DVDs, “Carlos Kleiber: I am lost to the world” and “Carlos Kleiber: Traces to Nowhere.”

SMS Exchanges with HIM

On my
previous two occasions at CC (February 28 and March 14), I had met Him there. He’s
been jobless around a year and a half.

Then, SMS
exchanges with Him:

Him: 18:40,
March 26: … possible to meet at cc this week?

Me: 20:07,
March 26: Not sure. Any good news? Unwilling to go orchard only to drink at cc,
honestly.

Him: 20:24,
March 26: Thank you. No news yet. Pls try to come and let me know. Regards.

Him: 11:25,
March 28: Good day. Please try to come today. Thanks.

Me: 15:46,
March 28: I don’t think I can. Sorry.

Him: 17:10,
March 28: Thank you. Possible to call me?

Me: 19:15, March 28: Whatever for? I’m not your
boyfriend.

Irritation Almost Overflowing & Dan Brown's "Lost Symbol"

イライラが危険な状態かもしれない。

きのうの朝、寝言がはっきり聞こえて目が開いた。「なめんなよ、こら！」「こ」は「ご」に近く、「ら」は巻き舌の発音だった。

言った相手は中学校で席が隣りだったこともあるヤマグチくん。こいつは、「君のお母さんから『よろしく頼む』と言われた」とか、英語の授業で理解不足のこの生徒に「この学期（多分、２年生の２学期）は関係代名詞がわからんかったら意味がない」などと言い、きわめてうっとうしい存在だった。

こいつが今だに記憶から消えていないようだ。

イライラの本当の原因はもちろんヤマグチくんではなく、孤独感、疎外感、不安感だと思う。言語を扱う人となってもう何年にもなるが、やればやるほど自分の周囲にある言語環境と、どうしてもそれに関連せざるを得ない在留邦人環境に対する情けない思いが大きくなる。仕事を別にしても言語と無縁の生活を送ることは不可能で、たまたま自分の仕事と深く関係する英語が公用語である当地の、とりわけ華人の、そして多くの在留邦人のいい加減さが情けない。この言語は当地国民の多く、またほぼ全員の在留邦人にとって第２言語だが、それは自分にとっても同じである。

当然、言葉が発せられる場所には人がいる。何とかもっといい文章を作りたいと常に思っているところに、当地国民の「pidginized (dumbed-down, that is...) English」は無用どころか、悪だ。

在留邦人の事情はもちろん異なる。日本人の言語は日本語だし、日本人の他言語についての運用能力欠如は理解できる。ただ、心底から情けないのは、英語を第１言語とする国に何年もいた後、「とりあえず英語国」のこの国でさらに何年も過ごしている人たち。

前回も登場してもらった「彼（Fuck you, man）」が典型だろう。おそらく悔しまぎれに、「（英語はできないけど）ラテン語はわかる」と平気で言う人だ。彼の専門にはラテン語が使われることがある。ただ、それは単語レベルの話であって、文法や構造を持った言語としてではない。また、言語ツリーにおいて英語はラテン語の下部にあって、「ラテン語がわかるのに、何で英語がそんなにヘタなのか」ということになる。さらに、ラテン語の語彙が現代英語でどう使われているのかについてもまったく知識がないのだろう。情けないヤツだ。

結局、孤独感と疎外感は自分で招いているものだろう。だから余計に情けない。そして不安感は、仕事の先行きを心配する気持ちと、母親の状態を見てから感じる自分自身の老い、そして人生最後の数年に現れる記憶と認知の消滅を原因とする不毛感が源なのだろう。

 

I’m finishing “Lost Symbol”
by Dan Brown. This is certainly not the kind of book I usually read. It was a
gift from someone, who is still so nice to me. I had been hesitating to open the
book especially because it was written by a best-selling author. (If it is
still selling ten years from now, I may decide to read it.) I started reading it
because I had no new other book to open. Interesting story. But Dan Brown made
an error, which is almost fatal to Japanese readers. He gave to one of the main
characters, the director of the CIA’s Office of Security, the name “Inoue Sato.”
“Inoue” as a given name. Impossible. Brown may know so much about anything
else, but not Japanese names.

Some reflection on 2013

2013 was a year when I think a lot happened, especially in its second half.

In April, I had a chance to visit Myanmar, which I had been thinking about going to for years because of my father’s stint there as a soldier. There it was almost all about work and sweat under fierce sunlight with the temperature over 40 degrees.  Yet I had a chance to have a brief visit to Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon, burning my soles.

Then in July, I had my first visit to Japan in more than four years. Only to Tokyo for my work, yes. But it was definitely something to me. This trip led to two more visits there, eventually totaling more than five weeks, including three consecutive weeks from mid August to early September.

Early August, I received an email from brother, telling me that he was looking for a nursing home for mother whose dementia had progressed so much making it unable for him to support anymore.

I know I had been trying to avoid contacting my family because it was always bad news about this and that.

I had heard from brother in May by email, about my renewed credit card linked to my bank account in Japan. And it was my first contact with him since 2009, when I received a letter from him. The feeling I had when I read the email from him about mother’s condition was one of resignation. I had not talked to her for two years and at the time she was already strange though her stubbornness was still there with her. No doubt talking to her a few times back then reinforced my hesitation to initiate to contact her.

Soon after she started her life at the nursing home, she got hospitalized contracting pneumonia, potentially fatal at her age.

I decided to see her, and it became reality in October, by which time she was discharged from hospital.

Brother and I arranged to meet at the nearest station from his place, and instead of going to see mother straight away, he invited me to his house. It was more than 10 years since our last meeting. His was an old-fashioned Japanese house, not very tidy I found but not uncomfortable either. There and through our walk to the nursing home, he briefed me about her condition though he had given me some information by email.

“She is now wheelchair-bound and needs diapers,” etc.

It was a shock for me to see her in a wheelchair. I remember asking her on the phone a few years ago, “Are you using a stick (to walk)?” She said, “I need no such thing as a stick.”

More shocking was the fact that she didn’t recognize me at all while remembering having a son whose name is the same as mine. Four years since our last time made her a different person. That empty stare. She was talking like a small child.

I had scanned some old photos to show her not really trying to bring memories back to her but to “entertain” her in a sense. It seems it was a good idea.

I was back with her the following day too. We talked about the same set of photos again.   

I was back in Tokyo in late October for the last stretch of my more-than-five-week job. A three-day holiday during this period allowed me to have another visit to see her. I showed her different photos and she recognized a few and told me about them. Still, for her, I was a visiting guest, not her own son.

Returning here after concluding my job in Tokyo, I had several jobless days. Then an avalanche of work started coming down on me. It lasted for a month.

On December 1, I attended a wedding party of someone I’d known for more than a decade and about whom I’ve written here once or twice. After the party was officially over, drinking was still going on and he was drunk, behaving in a disgraceful way. Mimicking a sex act with another idiot, he was saying, “Fuck you, man,” one of the two phrases he had learned while in the US. (The other is “You know…” The man stayed there for seven years.) To me, it sounded “I’m stupid.” Back in September, he said about me, “He starts speaking in English when drunk.” No, I’m not that superficial toward my first and second languages, far more principled. It is this guy who begins speaking in English: “Fuck you, man.” Shame on you.

At the party, I met Him too. I should’ve left there earlier before “Fuck you, man” started. But I stayed on until late. He also did, because I believe He wanted to be with me. I, by then drunk, was with a group of a few people. He was sitting almost with us, looking at me from a short distance without uttering a word. It was scary.

On December 31, I stayed home though almost every year it is a day when I go to CC. One reason of not going there was that I wanted to watch another episode of “The Second Russian Revolution” and another, probably bigger, reason was that I wanted to avoid seeing Him who most likely was there, looking for me.

Very quiet these days, and I spent my time by re-reading two books, “Inventing Japan” and ”Wages of Guilt,” by Ian Buruma and reading two books by Kondo Koichi, and editing “The Story of English” and “The Second Russian Revolution,” which I had finally found on YouTube. I had been looking for these documentaries, both made in the early 1990s, on Amazon.com and other online retailers, believing such excellent TV programs were available in the VDV format.

Last night, I watched the last episode of 2RR, “Coup”. I have yet to start watching TSOE.

Two days ago, I opened again “America’s Boy” by James Hamilton-Paterson, the first book I bought here over 13 years ago.

More Words Mother Said (2)

（「こ～じです」）「あんたがこ～じか！よう来てくれたな」

「（前回も見せた自分を抱いている写真に写っている自分を見て）これが奥さん？」

「（前回も見せた自分を抱いている写真に写っている自分を見て）母親（祖母）…」

「（七五三の写真に写っている自分を見て）これが私？若かったなぁ」

「これがあんた？変わったなぁ」

「（自宅前で撮った兄弟の写真を見て）これ、覚えがある。（兄が着ている上着について）小学校１年生のとき紳士服の店で初めて作って怒られた」（誰に怒られたのか…？）

「（祖母、いとこと兄弟の写真を見て）よう撮れてるなぁ」

「（何枚かの写真を見て）誰が撮ったんやろ？」（答えられず）

「（祖父母金婚式の写真を見て）何やったんやろ？」（「おじいちゃん、おばあちゃんの金婚式」）

「（祖父母金婚式の写真を見て）みんな着物で来る約束やったのに、私だけ着物や」

「あんたが私のいとこ？」（「息子」）

「あんたの名前は…」（「こ～じです」）「覚えられへん」

「（子供も数が）６人」（「３人やがな」）「５人…」

「みな（シンガポールで）どうしてる？」（「誰のこと？」）

「まさみやら」（「シンガポールは自分ひとりだけやがな」）

「ひとりでいたら、病気したとき困るな」

（「また来るわ」）「生きてるうちに来てな」

（100まで生きるて言うてたやないか）「よう覚えてるな」