Two Old Men on the Bus

I ran to catch the bus with a suitcase, scraping it on the automatic doors as they swung shut on me. The bus driver looked non-plussed.

An old man is sat by the window in the priority seat, looking out. Heavy-set in a khaki utility jacket, with a fake Royal Air Force patch sewn on to the arm. Headphones in, thick optical glasses, hairy jowls and a drooping face, like a walrus.

The bus pulls in.

A new old man boards the bus. He looks like a thumb, the end of a starfish. Wide smile and making conversation with the driver, unsuccessfully. He sits by the walrus, who takes no notice of him. This new old man’s face is round and soft from all the dopey warmth he emits. He wears a flat-cap, which he doffs and places on his lap.

‘Is warm today.’

‘What?’ The jowly old man pulls out his earphones and glances at his neighbour.

‘It’s warm today.’ Gives him a big grin.

‘It’ll rain later on.’

‘The sun is shining.’

‘No, it’s cloudy.’

‘I can see the sun, shining, will get hot!’

‘No, it’s cold. It’ll rain later on.’

‘I can see the sun – ha ha.’

‘The sun’s over there trying to come out from behind them clouds.’

‘It is bright – ha ha… I’m joking. Is a joke.’ The walrus grunts and turns away, annoyed. ‘You have to laugh: life.’

Okinawa

It’s been two weeks of being away and what differences I notice in Kasukabe. The leaves have sprouted on the plum blossom in our garden like healthy locks, luscious and verdant reminding me of Okinawa.

I came back with my friend Genny yesterday on the morning flight. What a “shocker” is how Genny described it post-landing and feeling unwell after a heavy night of drinking and karaoke-singing in a smoke-filled bar in Naha. But the trip itself was everything we wanted and more. Okinawa exceeded our expectations and at every turn something lucky befell us. Let me tell you about some of them.

1.

The first day was not too hot with the sun gleaming all day, it made the horizon a haze and the air was warm to breathe in. We went to Shurijo Castle at the end of the line of the monorail, which skirts across the skyline in the south of the island. Train tickets are like those in Tokyo but smarter because you don’t feed them in to the machine, they’re digital instead, no magnetic strips. On the way to the castle grounds from Shuri Station we found a stone stairway arched with leaves and the red flowers you find so many of in Okinawa. We climbed and I took a photo of Genny looking happy in the sun, she’d come off a flight the day before and this was the first day of our holiday, so hopes were high. The stairs led us to a road that wound around a fortress wall. A sign read Be Aware of Cobras and the hilltop view of Shuri and the sea in the distance opened up before us, it didn’t seem likely that we were in Japan, and as we learnt at Shurijo the islands of Okinawa were part of the Ryukyu Kingdom up until the 19^th century, so we weren’t really in Japan after all. The Rykyu Dynasty was started by envoys who were sent across the East China Sea to meet with the Kings of the Ming Dynasty, hencewhy the Rykyu architecture looks so colourful and Chinese. A lot of red lacquer, gold adornments, and dragons topped off with swirls for their legendary whiskers and bright white fangs. The modern Okinawan houses and places all have Shi-Sha guarding the entranceways. Shi-Sha or Shi-Shi are ferocious lion-dogs with hind legs reared to pounce and jaws agape in a constant roar. We had traditional tea and cakes in the newly opened sasunoma of Shurijo, where we were sat at low tables that had a Japanese-style dug out floor with wooden slats to place our feet on, spreading a cooling sensation that felt nice against our warm soles. I asked the guide who served us tea what the red flowers were called I kept seeing in Okinawa? She replied in a benevolent amused tone that there are many red flowers in Okinawa. The ones I keep seeing are probably hibiscus she told me, but soon there will be bougainvillea and then many more. The colour red saturates the Okinawan scenes and flowers adorn the sides of buildings and the threads of shirts. Standing in a bar that only serves Hoergaarden in Asato, or as the locals call it Sakaemachi, which was an “absolute find” a la Genny, we learnt that the salary men of Okinawa wear floral pattern short-sleeve shirts instead of boring dark suits to work. What? The fabric and the style is resolutely Ryukyu and the men are tanned with darker features and wider eyes, they smile more and speak softly in clipped tongues. The shirts are called kariyushi and the fabrics are lightweight and すずしい some have geometric designs or wave patterns but often I see flowers and bright colours, Aloha.

We strolled out of the castle grounds and down the hill and passed a lake filled with coy carp in the waters and coy nobori draped above for Boy’s / Children’s Day. Then we found a hipster coffee shop that served us designer coffees ground by a could be male model barista, and we watched two old folks straddle in with moped helmets slung around their arms, a retired tanned Japanese couple who had a sweet attitude to life. Yes. I want to retire here. Genny found a recommendation for an izakaya in a town nearby called Asato and we could walk there in forty minutes so why not? The day was still going strong filled with sunrays that began to slant slightly when the afternoon set in. We took a winding road and sharp steps down through a tropical urban landscape and curved round the foot of a giant Hilton hotel. We ended up in an unfilled dam, the lowest part of town where we found jungle cats hanging out; one had electrocuted hair and golden orbs for eyes. The bank surrounding the dam was spotted with ohaka or mausoleums for the dead, and the ancestor-cult here I’ve heard is more pronounced than in other parts of Japan. The luscious vegetation everywhere gave the air a stillness, like us humans had been and gone and all that was left was untamed peace. Cutting through the empty reservoir we came to a street and then a main road, police sirens turned round a corner and flew down the motorway. Genny the navigator led us to a rundown sho-tengai where the locals visibly hang out. I see a raggedy old white bearded fella with coffee coloured skin leaning on a red plastic chair, ash trays made of empty tin cans, weathered lanterns slowly turning in the dusk. The place she’s found is called Urizun （うりずん）, which I learn in local dialect is the time of year we’ve happened to bumble in on. Urizun is between late April and May, when the heat of the summer simmers before breaking out in to fiery storms in June. The dialect of Okinawa could be called another language, they say ma-san instead of oishii for delicious, they even have a ん˚ which I can’t imagine how it sounds. The girls in the taxi that we shared to the aquarium told me that the Japanese made the Okinawan language fit their alphabet, like when you force a jigsaw puzzle piece in to the wrong shape. It’s like that. And then Toru, who we’ve been drinking Hoergaarden with tells me that the Americans when they took over the islands expected everyone to learn and speak English, much like the Japanese had tried and expected them to speak Japanese. He smiles wryly in to his pint as if to make a quiet point about these colonisers. The Okinawan beer is called Orion and it suits the fatty pork food and the tropical climate, whilst their Awamori nihonshu is flavoursome and has a bit of a kick, but it’s nothing as pungent as it used to be, our taxi driver tells me.

2.

The second day was spent not rushing. It was still the perfect heat with the sun shining and a cool breeze. The plan was to find a beautiful beach and see a whale shark and to achieve this end we needed to catch a special bus. Going via the backstreets of the capital city of Okinawa felt like we were walking through the cobbled streets of a Greek island. Brightly discoloured peeling paint, corridor-like pathways that gave us glimpses in to people’s living rooms, crumbling Shi-Sha born ready on rooftops. That early morning, two cats were heard howling causing an absolute racket outside our flat window but neither of us had done anything. I couldn’t be sure as to what to direct my anger at and Genny thought they were dying. The brightness of the sunlight bouncing off the walls and the shimmering heat stunned us in to a stupor, and I got distracted by a café specialising in chocolate drinks, which turned out to be more like ice-creams. We didn’t get very far finding the bus but that didn’t matter, as we station hopped from one ticket office to the other trying to find that special bus. So many different bus companies, and neither of us could ever keep on our tongues what the bus was called. We did eventually find the correct bus stop, but it turns out you have to book an advanced ticket and we were as advanced as about twenty minutes before the bus was scheduled to arrive. Oh well, we would wait and see – but then an old Okinawan taxi driver found us and offered to take us to Churaumi Aquarium for the same price as the bus. It was the best kind of deal because both sides wanted it to happen. To seal the deal, Genny and I shared the taxi ride with two pretty pleasant young professionals from Chiba Prefecture who were in Okinawa for a holiday. So the four lasses who couldn’t drive and the tanned reliable taxi driver pootled off towards the north of the island where the whale shark lives, a two and half hour journey, but driven in the most comfortable fashion. Japanese taxis are clean and swish, the back door opens for you and it feels like a luxury hotel on wheels. Our taxi driver made a few comments about landmarks we were passing but he didn’t ever chew your ear off. Maya and Chiyaki were our travel companions and they were great, chatting about how smart the Japanese crows were and giving us a top recommendation for a restaurant later that night. I didn’t know this and I am supposing you don’t but if you do then sorry to have to remind you, but the American military personnel who are stationed in Okinawa (there’s been an American air base here since Japan lost in WWII) don’t pay rent and don’t pay tax on goods. Okinawa also used the dollar up until 1972 when they reverted to being Japanese again. What a history. By now the wise taxi driver was my friend, and I asked him did he not feel a little put out by the fact that the American military personnel don’t pay rent? And he told me it’s the way it’s been for so long that no – not really anymore. We actually hadn’t seen any American army people and I asked him why was that? And he told us they’re all busy gearing up for North Korea, which could kick off any minute. Then he asked us if we four had already got out tickets to Churaumi? And none of had because we’re clearly all slackers who don’t book buses and stroll around drinking chocolate ice creams, so the taxi man let us in on how to get discount tickets from the Family Mart, and better still, he’d drive us there on the way. What a friend. When we stopped off at the convenience store I asked him if he ‘wanted anything getting?’ and this friendly dude of a driver said ‘yes please an ice coffee’ and Genny almost lost her shit at how un-Japanese his response was. I was also taken aback at how casual and warm-natured his reply had been to a question that would usually make Japanese strangers break out in to a cold sweat of awakwardness of holding back feelings of what they really wanted. I got him the ice coffee still flummoxed at that response and we bought our discount tickets and headed to the aquarium.

Churaumi Aquarium also known as Ocean Expo Park is exactly that. There’s a manatee enclosure, a sea turtle pool and a ‘dolphin show four times a day for free!’ as Minako our Airbnb host told us excitedly. Ah Minako. She was this bouncy petite-framed woman with equally bouncy hair and a gorgeous smile who described the supermarket near our apartment as ‘Ryubo: Safe and Fun – open til 1AM!’ We parted from the girls and entered the underwater world where it was chockablock full of fish and sea creatures. Those guys that look like those white mushroom guys from the Moomins, poking their heads out of the sand in unison and looking like rods on the moon. There “weren’t enough jellyfish” said Genny but it was all forgotten when we went in to the final how to describe it? IMAX fish tank? A whale shark swoops past and above all our silly tiny human heads and swims on gracefully. It looks like a flying building or a spaceship. It looks like a friendly flying whale shark. We both shout W-H-O-A really loudly and watch all the sting rays that look like Star Wars characters with funny faces, and the other big fish that don’t compare in size to the massive whale sharks, there’s two of them. As we leave mesmerised we’re just in time for the 1 O’clock dolphin show, but we’re a bit late so when we arrive at the pool the show’s already started and the auditorium’s crowded with people so we have to watch from the back. And as we play the audience and the dolphins do their singing, dancing and synchronized swimming I am overcome by such an immense feeling of humility - because these dolphins are so good at everything – one can hula hoop and I can’t even hula hoop – that I start crying. I tell Genny that the dolphin show made me cry out of sheer appreciation and she tells me it made her cry too but she felt dumb about telling me. How many others have cried at how amazing dolphins are? After this we see some manatees being fed carrots and cabbages, some ancient suave sea turtles floating their own way, and go on the hunt for our beach. Genny by now is starving but we only find one food shop that serves curry and noodles. We choose curry, which surprisingly doesn’t go too badly with a beach, and I buy a hat that’s been made in Okinawa. And we happen to be right next to a beach. It’s called Emerald Beach and it’s divided in to three very Japanese sections:

Calm Beach (which the signboard spelt Clam Beach, so that’s misrepresentative)

Playful Beach

Viewing Beach

Out of these three we picked Playful Beach as our go-to and it was a great part of the beach. Turquoise waters and white sand, hot but not sweltering and a clear blue sky. It was low tide and so as hard as we tried, we couldn’t ever fully submerge ourselves but that’s fine by me because look at the view. Paradise. We smacked on our sun lotion and I went in for a dip and got afraid of the seaweed tangling around my feet as Genny coolly splashed around me. The life guard kept a watchful eye over the children who would be hard pushed to drown in such shallow waters, and we saw one granddad walk in and out of the sea fully clothed and then wring out his money when he got back to shore. All in all a perfect day and it wasn’t even over. We found that elusive special bus to get us home, which took possibly three hours but I slept most of the way. That evening we found that recommended place to eat called A’pparishan （あっぱりしゃん） and had us some Orion beers, the great sweet pork, dishes made with delicious meats, rice and veg. They played Okinawan music over the speakers, in fact I’d heard the traditional music being played everywhere, and I love it because it always sounds like an omatsuri. Apparently Okinawan people break out in to song and dance more, but sadly I have no proof of this stereotype. Somehow we stumbled across some absolute gems of a bar, one that was styled in a Pan-Western theme with cowboys and Vogue fashion shoots, and another in the middle of a park next to some old ruins called Ichi Color. The owner with his smart haircut and strong jaw was originally from Tokyo and really liked Glasgow, though he’s never been, and the other bar staff with her feminine looks and shy smile was training to be a cabin attendant, she said working for ANA would be her dream. There was a jukebox and I made some bad choices but I can’t remember what the songs were because we were so intensely impressed by the blocks of ice they used to make the drinks, like chunks of crystal the size of a fist that twirled and melted into ice water in your glass.

3.

Our last day in Okinawa. It had been my plan all along to visit Himeyuri noTou since I’d been served by a bartender-fashion-designer in Hikifune the week before who was actually Okinawan, who told me I must go there. I wasn’t 100% sure why but he said it had to be done because of Okinawa’s marred past and even though I sort of knew about the Battle of Okinawa in 1945, I was not at all aware about the Himeyuri students. There were two girls schools in Okinawa that were militarised by the Japanese government in the war effort, and as the war went from bad to worse for Japan, and the American ships invaded the islands in 1945, the Himeyuri Corps was dismissed. This meant that these school girls had to survive during full blown battle giving aid to wounded soldiers, doing surgery and running away from bombs and gunfire. Most of them died, and to make matters worse when Japan surrendered and the Himeyuri girls found out about it, the few remaining committed suicide in loyalty to their country. I know war is bad but I had never seen the extent to which brainwashing and loyalty and duty can play into the madness of warfare. Poor brave girls and their tragic story. There were a few survivors of the Himeyuri Corps who are my Obaachan’s age today, speaking to camera in the exhibition and I couldn’t stomach what a lot of them were telling me through the screens. Their ordinary memories are unbelievable horrors. It’s a moving museum and monument and well presented. And Japan does not come off well in the narrative, in fact, no adults do.

To get to Himeyuri no Tou we had to catch a local bus, there was one every hour, it probably didn’t help it was Sunday. If you’re ever thinking of doing Okinawa then Yes Totally Do It but maybe think about renting a car as getting around the island requires it. There was a glass factory and museum down the road from the peace memorial so Genny and I walked down there, we got to see some pretty neat glass-blowing performed for us by some skilled ogiisans. This one guy kept blowing these molten red globules in to pink glasses shaped like pineapples. And he lit some paper on fire for us, I think, to impress our tiny tourist minds. Earlier that day we had walked through Kokusai Dori, which translates to International Street but hey it isn’t as tacky as it sounds, and here we bought some rad Okinawan-esque shirts. When we returned to our apartment we decided to don these loud numbers and go to Naminoue Beach, which is the only beach in Naha to see what we were missing. When we got there it was night and we had some tinnies with us from the convenience store and two onigiri and both our reactions to Naminoue Beach was pretty much the same as the top Trip Advisor review: ‘Wow. Two bridges!!’ You should go to Naminoue just to see it because it’s really funny, there’s a causeway running over the sea right above the beach so the vibe is very unrelaxing, but well worth it. The moon was waxing in to a slice of white and after the beach we climbed up to the shrine and then back down again to find somewhere to eat. We found some crazy cheap deal at one of those very brightly lit izakaya, where we got two dishes and three drinks each for 1000 Yen. What? So we took full advantage of that and I drank more Orions and Awamoris and we had a brainwave to go and find that cool bar again. I had up to this point been saying that I wanted to sing karaoke but Genny had wisely pointed out it would be a mood-kill for the two of us to sit in a lonely booth crooning. I agreed and had shelved the idea until - out of nowhere in the street someone said ‘You can sing karaoke in here. 300 Yen for beer.’ We went in. It was a dark cigarette cloud dive with a bar-top that ran around the central bar and a big screen that hung on the wall, screening lyrics and tacky footage shot in the nineties, every stool was filled by some drunk tourist or local singing their hearts out to bad karaoke. Jackpot. Our flight was at 08:50 the next morning and we hit our futon at 04:30. But most importantly, we made it.

Light at the end of the tunnel and fish

Feeling quite lucky today, walking along the tow path back to my boat. 

This weekend we sailed from King’s Cross to this part of town, Angel of Islington, a nice part of town. To come out on this side of the canal however we had to drive through a long and treacherous tunnel, underground for what seemed like five hours to me riding on the back fending off the arse of the boat with a pole to stop it from scraping the sodden crumbling walls of the Islington tunnel; built over 200 years ago; lingering with the smell of stale sweat and the feeling of dead men. Crumbling walls, crumbling bones, cobwebs gliding over face and shoulders and my mind flying at the thought of getting stuck. There was light at the end of the tunnel - behind and up ahead - but there seemed little promise of making it through alive. Of course I’m being dramatic. My friends told me they enjoyed the ride afterwards. 

Today, sunny and mundane I stroll along the tow path back to my boat which we parked beside a small chug-a-long of a thing. There’s soulful American folk playing from within, the tinny twang of guitars drift through my cabin windows as I peek out to see a pretty lady with maroon-coloured hair painting her toe nails on deck. Summer has broken out in patches across the city. This part of town has rustic warehouse conversions, busy manic cafes that spill out on to the tow path and bespectacled clientele with vintage briefcases and art-student graces. People look rather beautiful here. There was a man who caught a monster of a fish when we arrived on the scene. I asked what kind of fish is it? He told me a carp. And the passers-by went up to have a look, to take a few photos. The two fishermen took a cool swig of their beers, looked pleased with themselves and let the big fat carp go. He splashed its face a few times with canal water before the carp looked lively enough, then the unfortunate grotesque aquatic creature flicked his tail and dove down in to the depths of the water to dissolve. 

Whilst in Orkney we were walking along a stretch of beach outside my grandparents’ home called Watersound. At the headland there’s a disused pier jutting out and there two kids, one with bright orange hair and the other with spiked white hair were playing. Being bored and shouting at the sea, mainly. When we threw rocks in to the sea the white-haired one copied us and got even bigger rocks until he held a minor-sized boulder and crashed it down in defiance in to the shallows roaring whilst throwing it. Feral kid. The other, who was hanging off the pier out of sight shouted back to his mate, I caught a fish! I caught a FISH! and they both scarpered and screeched through gritted teeth, excitement, anger and amazement.

Fish are exciting, apparently. 

Moving Eastwards Moving On

It was nice to see them both. My two friends from the good past who live in different lands: New York, Berlin, London (that’s including me). Oh sure, we’re jetsetters. It’s where history has flung us all - out - so that today we can sit on a Friday afternoon amidst the Notting Hill yuppies in a pub sipping £5 ale. It’s no big deal. We’ll pretend that this occurrence is normal, nothing special about it, just so happens that we’re all here in the same country in the same public house. Talking drinking, spouting nonsense, finally. Like the not so recent past… what has it been 3 or 4 years since we all lived in the same town house in a part of the world called Jericho? Where the bricks are made of sand; stone has been bleached by the oddly bright sunlight for southern parts of England and the streets are broad or winding; pubs pop in to view when you turn down a lane or continue to walk along the grassy meadows. I remember herds of cows galloping. Today we all shirk responsibility that has to do with growing up, I notice, but we all deeply care. The affected and ineffectual bunch. You hope we’ll make a good impression on the world. I listen and I listen and the thoughts of Annina are great and grandiose and matter. She makes them matter to anyone who listens and I wish I had her sense of striking passion, and I love her and I listen. And then Owen, the master of sciences, looking rather more worldly donning urbanite-upgraded Woody Allen specs and shabbier, longer hair. They’re both a pleasure to look at and to share time with, supping our rusty-coloured pints and dusk falling, dinner is next on the cards.

*

‘See you at 11AM at Royal Oak tube station’. And right on time Annina, the girl I call the sphinx, strides up the Underground stairs with a bagel wrapped in white paper in her hand ready to be part of the crew. Today is the “big boat move” that Mer has been planning for the last fortnight. Since we’ve now moored all over the western regions of the canal, seeing off Harlesden, Kensal, Little Venice and Paddington we have to move on eastwards, and to do so we must first take the top and sides down from the boat and drive it through the low Maida Vale tunnel. There’s no telling that we’re all excited but first Mer, the captain of the crew, gives us a solid debrief about not getting our limbs trapped swinging out the side of the boat and thus getting them ripped off. You see, important orders from the captain. A small fairground has been set up beside our mooring spot for a children’s day, so as we push off the banks and start to set sail innocuous bits of bunting wave us off. Bye bye West.

The tunnel is low and dark and dank and drippy. When we enter it, the 5 strong crew all go silent for a while, one pokes their head out over the roof to go under again, I crouch in the shadows with a large stick to fend off the sides incase the arse of the boat gets too close to the walls, and the sphinx kneels-on looking straight and forwards. When the entrance recedes and becomes like the pupil of an eye only letting the essential light in to reach us, the passage looks longer and more indeterminable. I got the impression of pirates and caves and Hades and the air tasted stale and sweet, as if the old cold stones sweated. Looking forwards, at first the exit was a small semicircle of brightness and as we slowly approached it light began to filter down, like ink on blotting paper and soon and slowly we were drenched in white light, as the nose of the boat broke the seal from the underworld to the real we all clapped or whooped and Mer told us to calm down.

The new world we had discovered was green and Arcadian. Great willows bowed low and grand as if welcoming hot summer heat and a tweed-jacket wearing frog, huge greco-roman buildings (surely, not houses) with white colonnades stood firm and ruled atop the banks. Then out of nowhere a huge avery filled with cranes, storks, exotic birds and a few wayfaring pigeons appeared and you see all of winged-colourful nature flying and hawking above your head and you forget about the city and imagine a crusade. Epic scales guys, that’s where boat tripping’s at.

After cruising past a floating red pagoda weighed down by frilly lanterns, the scenery changes again to one of grunge and iron. You see more young ones in peaked caps sitting on the canal side with their Red Stripes and a foray of unsurpassable tramps shouting fucks and twats at the passerby. It’s Camden Lock and there are too many tourists. Having never done a lock before I have to learn, but it mostly involves people jumping on and off the boat and running around over precarious bridges, which are actually the lock gates. Depending on what gate is open or closed, the water level rises or falls within the lock. The aim of the game is to get the boat from one side of the lock to the other. And the pressure is on when the sun’s beating down and children and parents of all nationalities are swinging their heads from side to side, licking ice creams or taking selfies right next to you as you sweat. Lock gates are hard and then heaving them open requires a whole other sort of strength, pushing with my legs for leverage, my whole body sprung out at almost 90 degrees shoving against an iron bar, ridiculous posturing from me I suppose.

The crew made it happen though, Annina and Aidan were the hero couple opening and closing locks as if there was no tomorrow, Mer shouting at us to jump on board or off, the others keeping steady hold of ropes so the boat wouldn’t kilter off to the side or end up mashed by the lock gates. There are a total of 3 locks between Camden and where we wanted to be, as such there was a lot of work to be getting on with. As we were inside the final lock, people took tea breaks and I dished out some chocolate bars and we filled up the water tank. 200 litres of water the tank holds, I wonder how many showers I can get out of that beauty? The sun was past the zenith but still in full swing, English July is surprisingly warm and it was certainly louts-with-shirts-off weather. 

The vista that opened up before us was sweet and impressive. King’s Cross, a skyline filled with cranes and brickwork. Two white swans with their 7 cygnet babies filed past our boat, in streamlined ordered parade; they looked regal and seemed to know it by law. The geese honked and the coots scurried and parted out of their way, whilst our boat headed eastwards to find a mooring a space nearby. 

*

After the long sun-drenched day my muscles ached and I had an unquenchable thirst. The sphinx lay languid on my cabin bed and I played with my newly acquired boustrophedon disk around my neck, it was brought to me from Crete and I’m very fond of it. We talked about nothing and everything and ate biscuits over tin plates and when the sun finally decided to leave the sky alone, we strapped on our shoes and went in search for pizza.

Photo courtesy of Annina Lehmann