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The Happiest Memory hr665

Hidemi WoodsLeave a comment

What I remember as the happiest memory in my childhood is the day that my parents took my younger sister and me to the confectionery factory for a guided tour when I was about seven or eight years old. Theme parks hadn’t arrived in Japan yet and even a factory tour was rare and unfamiliar back then while it has been popular and factories of many kinds have offered it nowadays. My father happened to find a major Japanese manufacturer offering a free tour at the factory that was a 40-minute drive from home. Since we didn’t go out much together because of my parents’ busy work, a factory tour sounded to me extra special and also to be something unimaginable. As we had made a reservation, the staff waited for and greeted us at the factory where we realized that we were the only group for the tour that day probably because it was a weekday.

A tour guide led just four of us around the huge factory and showed and explained each section in detail through the overwhelmingly big glass above the factory floor. Everywhere in the factory was thoroughly clean and all white. Walking along the long passage above the vast factory floor and looking down the machinery through the glass, I imagined that inside of a space station would be like this. I was amazed at automation. Everything was operated by automated equipment and few humans were around it, which was so futuristic. Cookies and snacks were flowing endlessly on the conveyors and hopping and wiggling as if they were dancing while they were seasoned. They looked to me some cute life-forms of another planet. My mother also looked so happy for this once. She said to me several times in excitement, “Look! That dough came out turning into these here! Look! Those pieces went in over there!” With an additional backdrop of my mother’s good mood, I was sticking to the glass, fascinated by the operation.

At the end of the tour, we were ushered to the large screening room. Many tables were set there and one of them had a big plate of confectionery on it. That was our table. The staff brought tea and told us to have as much confectionery as we liked. The short film that introduced the manufacturer’s history and business was shown on a big screen while I was munching freshly-baked, just-out -of-conveyor cookies and snacks. Since snacks were luxury for me who was raised by stingy grandparents, I had eaten neither so many of them nor the ones that were still warm at my fingertips before. We monopolized the whole thing as a single group and were treated like VIPs. I thought I was dreaming.

When we were leaving, they gave each of us a big bag filled with their confectionery as a souvenir. I was holding the bag to my chest in the back seat of our car as if it had been a treasure while the car was exiting the factory’s parking lot. I missed the place already and looked back to see it one last time from the rear window of the car. I saw the tour guide and a couple of other workers standing and bowing toward our car in front of the building. They waved to me, and I waved them back. We didn’t stop waving to each other until they became sizes of rice and finally disappeared from my sight when the car that my father drove slowly on purpose for me turned out the factory gate.

I had one more memory in which I felt the similar sense of that day. It happened at the theme park where the mouse works as a host. By then, I had already left home and begun to live on my own in Tokyo. It was a weekday in winter and the park was almost empty. When I was strolling about with my partner, the mascot of that mouse appeared with the space costume that matched the particular area’s theme. I greeted him with my partner and took a photograph together. I was chattering with him when my partner pointed at his shoe, saying, “Your shoe is tattered.” The mouse and I looked down with a surprise on it that was partly worn out indeed and he gestured embarrassment. I defended him by telling my partner that he had been traveling through space a lot, which relentless condition made his shoes worn off. Three of us laughed together. We said goodbye to the mouse and left him. I looked back a few steps away and saw him still waving to me. I waved him back. Other guests gathered around him, but he didn’t stop waving to me. I repeatedly looked back several times and saw him waving to me each time even while he was taking photographs with other guests. In the end, I reached the other foot of a bridge which arch hindered the sight of him. Yet, he kept waving to me while jumping so that I could see him. The scene of his big sweeping, waving hands toward me above his bobbing head over the asphalt arch had been burned into my brain.

Every time those two memories pop up in my mind, I feel heartwarming and yearning. I sometimes wonder why I have cherished those incidents in particular. I’m not a social character and not good at being with people. I hated people, especially when I was little. Somewhere in my deep subconsciousness, I assume that people don’t understand me and vice versa because they never treat me the way I think it should be. However, I proved wrong in those two memories. They treated me right with so much kindness, which was different from what I had believed as human behavior. I was betrayed by people in a good way and got connection instead. For a brief moment as it was, I sensed deeply connected to others and that gave me inexplicable happiness. It was totally unexpected, but extremely joyful enough to be the reason for my special, happiest memories.

Living by Myself in Tokyo hr663

Hidemi WoodsLeave a comment

When I left my hometown for Tokyo and started living by myself there in the mid 80’s, quite a few second-run theaters for movies still remained. Those theaters showed two or three films at the price of one new film. The best experience of mine was when I saw ‘Top Gun’, ‘Taps’ and ‘Back to the Future’ as an all-night triple feature program at a second-run theater in a suburb of Tokyo. Those films were already a bit old by then and the show time was the middle of the night, so that the price was incredibly low accordingly. I left my apartment at night, ate out for dinner, got hamburgers to have inside the theater and was immersed into the movie world until dawn. The main attraction for me had been ‘Top Gun’ that turned out to be so-so. Instead, I was deeply moved by ‘Back to the Future’ although I had thought it would be a silly 50’s comedy judging from its trailer. The film became my best one and had held that position for many years to come.

Back then, I had just moved to Tokyo to become a musician in spite of all the opposition from my family and friends. I had been feeling unsettled constantly because of anxiety and loneliness, which stemmed from uncertainty of my future. I had been clueless about whether I would be successful as a musician and how my life would unfold itself. I saw ‘Back to the Future’ in that state of mind and the story and the ending of the film encouraged me immensely.

When I lived in my hometown with my family, many rules bound me. To begin with, that all-night movie experience was a dream within a dream since my curfew was as early as 9 p.m. Other rules were abundant. Singing while eating was forbidden, a gap between the body and the edge of the table must not exist during the meal, whistling or playing the piano after dark was prohibited, some ways of talking to my grandparents were banned, walking with audible steps inside the house wasn’t allowed, chewing something in the mouth in public was regarded as an act of barbarity, and so on and on. But once I began to live by myself, I was freed from all the family rules and everything was left to my discretion. I ate what I wanted, when I wanted. I woke up when I felt like it, since I didn’t work at an office. I slept until evening at times, and rarely cleaned or did the dishes. The bathroom got moldy. While I appreciated freedom, I realized how slack I really was. My music career didn’t go well either. I had expected I could find my band members easily as Tokyo was the biggest city in Japan where so many aspiring musician gathered from all parts of Japan. The reality was Tokyo simply had too many bad unmotivated musicians. It was extremely hard to find a member whom I desired and my band just kept breaking up. That was far from what I had planned as life in Tokyo. I sometimes got tempted to doubt if my decision to come here was the right one even though I hadn’t had any other choice.

When I finished to see the movies all night and left the theater, it was early morning in the real world. I headed back for my apartment. The train had started running and many commuters were walking hurriedly and gloomily toward the station already. They used the train bound for downtown that was an opposite direction to where I was going. I was waiting on the empty platform for my train while watching them waiting on the nearly overflowing platform. When their train came, they pushed and crammed themselves into the cars. The station workers additionally pushed their backs from outside to squeeze as many passengers as possible in and the train doors barely closed. Minutes after it departed, the platform got filled with commuters quickly again. I stepped in the empty opposite train and yawned in the seat, remembering ‘Back to the Future’. When I decided to live by myself in Tokyo that was a far and unknown big city, I was afraid and trembled for what my life was going to be like. I gave up my right to an inheritance by leaving my family, and a possible steady income by quitting college. I was alone by parting from my family and my friends who disagreed and didn’t support me mentally. I threw away everything which wasn’t easy for me. But as Marty’s father dared, I had dared in my own way and left for Tokyo. I hoped that action of mine changed my future. In a good way, I wished. 

My Travel hr662

Hidemi WoodsLeave a comment

A trip can require an enormous effort. In my case, it starts by making time to plan in a hectic daily life which consumes me with work. Once I manage to find time for planning a trip, a long way to finish it awaits. I search all over the Internet for the best possible deal for a hotel and transportation that suits what I want to do during the trip. I narrow selections, choose the most saving plans, combine them into an itinerary, book everything, adjust my work schedule, and pack. The latest trip I took after that lengthy process was by plane. I could have taken the bullet train since the time that would be  taken to the destination was almost the same because the airport was much further than the train station from my home. But that particular airline carried a limited-time sale so that the fare was lower. My choice was decided on a plane for that reason.

No matter how many times I have flown, I feel nervous each time. Although I know that the chances of a car accident are much higher than a plane crash, that kind of logic doesn’t help me. I see many people drink alcohol before the flight and that shows I am not the only person who is nervous of flying. A long time ago, I took a flight to Dallas. Before landing, the plane was sucked into nasty turbulence. It repeated steep dives several times that gave some passengers screams and vomits. I was in a window seat and seeing the wing in the midst of a thick cloud that told me the plane tilted sharply. I heard something fall and break everywhere. Above all, I was most terrified when I saw the flight attendants panic, who were supposed to get used to and be trained for this situation. The plane finally got out of the thick cloud and I thought I would see out of the window broad highways or the edge of the runway that were common views after the plane descended that much. Instead, what came into my sight were tips of green trees. Because I had never seen trees so closely from the airplane, I was convinced that we were going to crash. I vaguely thought it was least expected that my end was Dallas. Then, the plane stopped descending and flew ahead horizontally. It made turns above trees with a move that was more like a bus’s rather than a plane’s. It seemed to spot the runway by doing so, and we landed safely.

For the latest trip I took, I checked in at the airport and was informed that my flight was delayed for two hours due to machine maintenance. I wasn’t sure if the airplane I was going on board would need further maintenance or a backup plane would fly in from somewhere, but either way, it made me uneasy since it came on top of the existing nervous factor that it was a low cost carrier. After I went through the security check and waited at the gate, the further delay was announced. I finally got on board a few hours behind schedule and the door of the plane was closed. Yet, it remained stationary, and wouldn’t move. The captain announced it was waiting for takeoff permission from the control tower. It sounded absurd because it was a small local airport where the runway was empty and only few flights a day came in and out. Forty minutes passed while many things crossed my mind. Why can’t a takeoff be permitted? Is there any problem? Is that the true reason? Does this plane still have some sort of machine troubles? The cabin was dead silent and tense as other passengers sat quiet and strained for the whole forty minutes. I thought this was the very time when we needed alcohol most. By the time the plane took off and safely finished its 90-minute flight, it was already night and I was exhausted. My elaborate travel itinerary got messed up on the first day though I had made it with full of leeway. The massive delay ate up the time for a meal at the restaurant. The express train I had booked from the airport to the city had long gone.

Flights are always accompanied with troubles. Other than delays, I have had my fair share of troubles regarding baggage, other passengers or attendants. Even so, I don’t hate flying. I don’t know why exactly, but I feel like I become a different person each time I take off and land on the destination. It is as if I jumped into a different dimension where a better version of my life exists. I like that feeling so much that I feel stuck circling at the same spot over and over without any changes when I haven’t flown for a long time. That’s why I need to take a plane to a different place once in a while in order to become a better self even if it’s nervous, risky and troublesome. I might as well stay home just to relax as to travel. It would be peaceful, calm and tranquil for me. But I know I couldn’t enjoy that because staying at the same place without traveling feels like being dead. Travel lets me keep changing so that I stay alive.