Koden

 

In Japan, if you attend a funeral, in most cases, you need to bring koden, condolence money. They will give you back a present.

One day I attended a funeral. They gave me back a nice present. The bag that covered the present was especially good. In most cases, this bag is made of paper or plastic, but the bag was made of cloth. The color was chic. I liked it. I couldn’t throw it away.

Another day, I was invited to a birthday party of a friend of mine. I bought a present. I needed a bag to cover the present. I came up with an idea. I had the nice, chic cloth bag. As long as I didn’t say that it was from a funeral, I thought it would be a very nice bag to cover the present with.

I gave the present to my friend with the nice bag. My friend liked my present, but he also found a small pocket inside the bag. In the pocket, there was a packet of salt. That was concrete evidence that the bag was from a funeral.

In old Japanese tradition, after attending a funeral, you have to purify yourself with salt. They had given me salt. At that time, I couldn’t find the small pocket and the salt.

I told the truth. All my friends in the party laughed about that. I was humiliated.

 

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Picture by Uni Hirano

The Doctor Who Spoke in the Kansai Dialect

 

 A few years ago, I was in the hospital. I was hovering between life and death due to an illness. Before I recovered full consciousness, I experienced many things; I can’t tell if they were real or dreams.

 One of the experiences was that I was treated by a doctor who spoke the Kansai dialect. I was in the ICU. A team of doctors treated me. I remember clearly that there was a doctor who spoke the Kansai dialect on the team.

 While I was unconscious, they put a feeding tube in my nose. After I woke up, I started eating. But at first, I couldn’t eat much. I left most of my meal on my plate. My condition got better day by day. One day, finally, I finished my entire meal. I reported to the doctor. The doctor praised me in very strong Kansai dialect. That was the last time I saw him.

 After I was discharged, I went to the hospital once a month. One of the team doctors tested me. One day, I asked him about the doctor who spoke in the Kansai dialect. I wanted to say hello to him because I remembered he was especially nice to me. But the doctor couldn’t understand whom I was talking about. He said there was no doctor on the team who spoke in the Kansai dialect.

 I was surprised. The doctor did not exist? He was a dream? He might be a ghost.

 I had been in Kansai for six years. It might be possible to think that an excellent Kansai doctor’s ghost came to the crisis of my life and saved me.

 Dear friends in Kansai! Please help me if I am ever again in crisis in the future!

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Picture by tama

Junk mail

 

 I used to receive a lot of junk mail. It was really annoying.

 My cell phone rang every ten minutes. Most of the messages were junk emails. I thought about changing my email address. But I was not sure that I could let all my acquaintances know. If I forgot to tell someone, it would be rude.

 The most annoying thing about junk mail was that it stopped coming during the holidays. I assumed they had stopped sending me junk mail, but I was wrong. They started again on weekdays. People who send junk mails are probably scumbags. These scumbags rested and enjoyed the holidays? They assumed this was a real job? Ridiculous!

 As a result, I changed my email address. As I had feared, I forgot to tell a person whom I really care for. She scolded me, “Did you change your email account without telling me?”

 Junk mail is my enemy.

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Deny with Eyes

 

I heard this story from my mother. It was before she had Alzheimer’s disease. One day she went Komaki City, which is located near our hometown. She took a taxi.

Then the taxi driver said to her, “Excuse me, but aren’t you the daughter of Vice Principal Kawai?”

He was right. My grandfather worked as a vice principal at a high school in Komaki. It was a few decades ago. Why could he remember my grandfather?

During World War II, the driver was a high school student in Komaki. He thought about taking part in the kamikaze special attack, which was a Japanese suicide mission. A pilot brought tons of gunpowder in a plane and threw himself toward an enemy. It is ridiculous, but some Japanese pilots believed they were heroes at that time.

The driver talked about his idea to Vice Principal Kawai. My grandfather couldn’t say anything because he had his position. He couldn’t say anything against the government. So he denied the student’s idea with his eyes.

As a result, the student refused to take part in the mission. He became a taxi driver after the war. I believe that taking passengers by taxi and living is better than taking gunpowder and death.

Vice Principal Kawai died during the war because of an illness. So I have never met him.

Still, I am proud of you, Grandpa!

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Picture by Shintako

Male Nurses

 

 

I used to work as a teacher at a nursing school. My students worked as nurse’s aides. They were studying to be nurses.

I know you might assume that teachers are always angry, but all the teachers I knew hated scolding their students. If we could educate without scolding, it would be better. If there is a teacher who loves to scold his or her students, he or she has made a bad choice in his or her career. By the way, most nurses are female, but there are some male nurses. My class had about five male associate nurses every year.

One day the principal decided that she needed to scold all the five male associate nurses. They had thrown their cigarette butts on the street. Most of the students lived in the dormitory. The school set security cameras around the dormitory. The camera recorded the five male associate nurses smoking and throwing their cigarette butts on the street. The principal couldn’t put up with their behavior.

When you need to scold someone, you need to change your mode to scolding. It requires a huge amount of energy. The principal summoned the five male associate nurses to her office.

She began her scolding with the Japanese stock phrase “I believe you know why you have been summoned here today.”

One of the five male associate nurses answered, “You need power workers?”

This answer almost made her crack up. She needed to retain her scolding mode. She tried very hard not to laugh. She successfully continued scolding the associate nurses.

Dear friends, stop littering!

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Picture by Matsurinui

“Appearing on TV” Scam

 

 

My wife and I lived with my mother, who had Alzheimer’s disease. Once, a Japanese state-run broadcasting station covered us. Our caregiving was broadcast several times on TV. The director informed us about the date when it would be on air beforehand.

One day the director informed us about the on-air date. I told my mother’s friends, other caregivers, and our relatives in Kyusyu. We were in front of the TV at the time. We waited for the program to come on the air, but it didn’t start. Another program was on air. I called the director.

He was surprised and spoke. “It is on air in Tokyo.”

We lived in Chubu. We understood. At that time, it was on air in some areas, but it was not on air in other areas. Of all the areas, Kyusyu and Chubu were not the on-air areas. The director didn’t know that.

I experienced the “appearing on TV” scam. I felt humiliated.

I have many friends who were stage actors. Sometimes they act for TV, but sometimes their appearances could be cut from being aired. When you do something in front of a TV camera, it doesn’t mean you will surely appear on air. Even if you are on air, it doesn’t mean the program will surely air in your area.

If I have a chance to appear on TV next time, I will not tell anybody. I want to secretly appear on TV.

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The Economy and Taxi

 

An article on a newspaper said that “if you want to know whether the economy shape is good or poor, you should not ask . . . economists. You should ask barbers, laundry shop keepers, and taxi drivers.” I rarely take a taxi, but if I have a chance, I want to ask the question to a taxi driver.

One day I had a chance to take a taxi in my hometown. I could finally ask the taxi driver the question.

“How is the economy? Good or poor?”

The driver laughed and spoke. “I know the meaning of the question. But if you want to know that, you should ask a driver who drives downtown. You should not ask a driver who drives in a local town like this one.”

What? I thought. I don’t take a taxi downtown. There are many subway and bus stations here and there. Then I understood. If the economy is in good shape, there are many rich people who take taxies downtown. They are too lazy or busy to walk to even the nearest station. They call taxis so often. That is a sign of a good economy.

For the same reason, my barber and my laundry shop keeper can’t give me a clue about the economy. We are all local citizens. We should not accept a newspaper’s information without question.

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Picture by Hosino Su