Beyond The River Sanzu (radio doc)

My friend and radio producer Eloise Stevens made this radio doc. after interviewing me about Ogiichan's (Japanese grandfather's) funeral aptly titled Beyond The River Sanzu. The piece was aired on ABC Radio PocketDocs on 28 March 2016.

Beyond The River Sanzu - radio doc. prouced by Eloise Stevens

Bench of Bread

I’ve been lacking of late, not paying attention, not really observing or taking anything in. It may be an obstruction caused by love and happiness, those nuisance anti-muses. I am on the top deck of a double-decker bus and a girl with her left arm in a sling has just managed to stand up to get off, but the vehicle impromptuly stopped and with no free hand to steady herself she boob-planted the man sat beside her. Full breast. He seemed pleased but tried desperately to hide it and she seemed amused if slightly pissed off.

The moon has been out a lot lately, I notice: A sliver here, a round face there. There have been minor maintenance problems which must rack up to some amount. The front door Chubb key became a ‘deadlock’ because the tooth of an old key broke away inside it. Deadlock? I had never thought of it as an object but it must mean a key that no longer turns or fits. A redundant key. How many memories are redundant keys I wonder to myself as a I stare at a bench full of bread. They look like fresh loaves to me. Loaves remind me of something and it has to be biblical doesn’t it, or was it a poem I received about bread being poetry, or is it about poverty? And a funny thought every time one sits on a bench you’re fulfilling its purpose, benches like being sat on. If you have a bench in a part of town nobody uses then it’s a shit bench, but if it’s used a lot then it’s being a good bench. But what if some baker uses this bench to lay out his loaves at night so that passers by can look on bewildered until someone hungry comes along and it becomes normal because it seems necessary to them and then also for us. Like art. You don’t need it until someone who wants it sees it and consumes thus carving the way for the rest of us, sheep. Baa.

Bus terminates here. The amount of drivers that have to change over at Camberwell, really, South London is like falling off the map for some. Getting on and off buses getting slips of paper and touching cards on readers. Bleep bleep. I never feel like I turn a key in my life unless it’s the actual key in the lock that broke. I mean I don’t do anything hands on. I now see why the Makers’ Revolution that Portlandia and The Observer covered happened. Everything is touch sensitive when was the last time I worked anything hard? Not even hard, light? God and why do you think there’s bread on this bench? The only answer is someone put it there, is it a social movement and what makes me different from that woman with the shopping bag perusing it whilst waiting for the bus, checking on their condition. And now stuffing one, two, maybe four loaves into her bag. Bread for free. And why am I afraid and uncertain of what? ‘Stress comes from giving a fuck’ I told Chloe. A tax rise of 3% on rolling tobacco. Numbers of nightclub goers continue to fall preferring eating establishments that turn in to clubs later on i.e. The rise of the restaurant-clubs. Yuck. We touch everything and nothing happens and this ineffectuality about my being makes me rise and fall with hopeful longing and hopeless settling. And that bench of bread remains but now with three loaves, still not none.