06 Fireworks, Beer and Beer and Fireworks

What was that lesson we learned again? Not the one about maps in Kyoto. Not that Mondays are long but Wursdays are worse. Not that you can’t meet a ninja, but you can have a ninja encounter. What was it again?

Oh yeah!

Make reservations before the day you need them.

Tokyo is full. There is no more room in Tokyo. There are so many buildings that from space, Tokyo looks like the surface of the moon. There are so many people that when you find your face in someone’s armpit on a train, all you can reasonably say is, “Some of the people from Tokyo are here.”

I shouldn’t raise Tokyo above the other cities we visited. They’re full too. Tokyo is just a more convincing essay on the topic. 127 288 419 people live in Japan. You’ll find some of them pretty much everywhere you go.

Some space in Japan is set aside for gaijin. Those pesky white things, which the natural human reaction to is to stick them between your forefingers, apply pressure and squeeze until they explode, have places too. Unfortunately, Tokyo is considered cool by foreign people in Japan. It’s considered cooler than Osaka, Hiroshima and Kyoto put together. These lazy zits just want to sit in one place, and they choose, resoundingly, to clog Tokyo’s pores.

All these people meant one thing when we arrived. No rooms, no floors. In our travel book, all the rooms and floors that were under ¥7000/night were being fed on by those gaijin bacteria. It seemed as though every crevice of Tokyo’s face was already oozing and swollen.

I went into a travel center and asked for help. They found us a place in two minutes. Things that make you go, “Hmm.” Our travel-book companion was called into question, found guilty and thrown into confinement.

The best part about the place we were about stay was that we could stay for two nights straight. That removed a lot of stress, knowing now that we had a home-for-three-days. We were staying in Tokyo for four. The second best thing was that it was very near Shinjuku, which meant it was very near to everything. That isn’t because Shinjuku has everything, but that Shinjuku Station is the biggest in Tokyo making it easy to get wherever we wanted.

When we got off at the right station we naturally had no idea of where to go next. In my experience, standing with glazed eyes in front of a map almost always gets you further than looking at the map and trying to discern your position from it. Posted in front of the station exit was actually a map to where we wanted to go. We weren’t just staying at any hostel; we were staying at the Olympic Youth Centre.

So we looked at the map, our eyes glazed over and a sparkling lady in purple appeared.

Do you need help?

She asked.

Uhh.

I said.

Where are you going?

Youth hostel.

I devolved twenty thousand years.

It’s simple. You just ~~~ and then ~~~ and once you ~~~ you’ll see it on your ~~~.

Thank you so much.

Alright, so the plan worked. We started walking but were soon lost.

Weren’t you listening?

Chris asked.

I was paying attention to other things!

She was, after all, a sparkling lady in purple.

So we asked a security guard and he redirected us.

I’m in love.

I said to Chris, more or less.

You’re dehydrated.

Chris replied, more or less. Tuesdays are Healthya Water day.

Coming up to the entrance of the hostel we met Atsushi. Atsushi is a big fan of Canadian whisky. He’s from Osaka and was at the Olympic Youth Centre for a weeklong training seminar for some service industry thing. He offered us some whisky, but we had a date. We were to meet our Japanese brother Daiki in an hour.

The story of Daiki’s relatedness goes as follows: I met Daiki’s sister Kaori three years ago in Toronto. Two years ago in Japan I met Daiki through Kaori. Last year Daiki stayed with us when he came to Toronto. This year, however, Daiki’s sister suddenly stopped talking with me. Things that make you go, “Hmm.” Daiki is family now.

We met Daiki at Waseda University, which he attends. He’s studying to become a sports announcer. The sports announcer field is much more competitive in Japan.

We ate at Waseda’s cafeteria along with Daiki’s school friend. I developed another bad headache — didn’t drink enough Healthya Water I suppose. So while I held my head in anguish and made everyone feel down, we met up with another of Daiki’s friends. She was also studying to become an announcer — she bought me headache medicine; Chris bought himself a beer.

We went to the park to do fireworks. In Japan, it’s legal to do fireworks whenever you want. It’s also legal to drink beer and do fireworks. Chris caught on fast.

There was a man singing and playing the guitar by himself in the park. He was rehearsing a song that he was going to be playing for his wife at his wedding the next day.

My headache went away.

Had it been Canada we would have just blown $250 worth of fireworks in about an hour. Since it was Japan though, where fireworks are toys, I don’t think it cost more than $40. Chris took a sip of his beer and lit a flare. We all lit our flares from his and ran around like planes with blown engines.

Daiki started a Roman Candle. It was not properly grounded; the first shot was fine, the second shot was horizontal. Daiki ran up to and kicked the fireball-shooting toy away from us; the next shot went into a tree and the sparks showered down as a jogger ran underneath it.

Now it was time for the grand finale.

Daiki pulled out four measly strings and handed one to each person. The one whose burned the slowest would be the winner. This was not a joke.

It was time to go home. I told Daiki to tell his sister I wanted to talk with her. The truth is, I already knew why she wasn’t talking with me. I had a feeling, an unspeakable thought in the layers of my brain, of why she had marked my messages as spam — I turned out to be right. At this moment in time though, I only had the feeling.

On that day, oh so long ago in Kyoto, Chris and I made Tanabata too. I don’t know what Chris wrote — I think reading other’s Tanabata is pretty spiritless — but I wrote this:

I wish for Kaori to forgive me.

We returned to our home-for-three-days and I needed to shower. This place had another Japanese-style shower. Before, I vowed to be more open to the whole thing, and that was still true. I opened the door — no one was in there. I showered — and no one came in. This luck couldn’t continue forever I knew.

While brushing my teeth, Atsushi peeked around the corner of the communal sink with some Canadian Club whisky, shook it and asked if I wanted some. “So sorry,” I said after spitting into the sink, “but I’ve just brushed my teeth.”

Chris and I had separate rooms right next to each other. We set our air conditioners to ice cold and hibernated. I had to wake up at five to pee.