Lost In Translation

Fashion Shoot

A couple of weeks ago I was in Omtesando before the crowds on a weekend and saw this model being shot for what I assume is a fashion magazine.

Arrested Development

Some friends lent me Season 1 of Arrested Development and I thoroughly enjoyed it. My sister had taped a few episodes and I thought it was interesting, but I didn’t quite get into it fully. But watching it from the start to finish helped me with the pacing, back story, and characteristics of the cast. It is defiantly the best thing Jason Bateman has done (well, I haven’t seen Dodge ball yet…). Perhaps the most outstanding character is Tobias Fuke, played by David Cross-side splittingly funny. But the great thing about this show is that everyone gets his or her laughs. Will Arnett as GOB (George Oscar Bluth II) is also quite funny in his turn as the playboy, ne’er-do-well older brother. Jeffery Tambor is excellent as the incarcerated George Bluth senior and his twin brother Oscar, as is Tony Hale as Buster, the infantile like younger brother who still lives with his mother. But there isn’t a weak link in this cast. The guest star roles have been a hoot as well-Liza Minnelli as the vertigo plagued next door neighbor/best friend of the mother Lucille, Carl Weathers as a skinflint Carl Weathers, Henry Winkler as the family attorney, and so on. I’m looking forward to Season 2.

Word Of The Week: Giri

"Giri" is a cultural construct that is hard to translate/explain. This week's colum "Cultural Conundrums by Kate Elwood" from The Daily Yomiuri, looks at this concept:

Aki seemed quite taken aback and said, "No, no, giri and gimu are completely different."

Hmm...I took out my heavy old Japanese-English dictionary and looked up giri. It said: "1) obligation; 2) duty." I flipped the pages to gimu: "1) duty; 2) obligation."

Hmm...again.

In English, we don't make a lexical distinction based on the temperature of water and we don't pay much conscious attention to whether the drive to do what's expected of us stems from within or without. Basically, giri is something you know you have to do without it being made plain. When it's spelled out, it's gimu, as in gimu kyoiku, compulsory education. Both giri and gimu can express either obligation or duty, although it does seem to be true that in English as well there's a certain possible classification along inner/outer lines: Duty is used in terms of ordinary responsibilities, while obligation often falls more to the realms of personal conscience-- although they're fairly interchangeable in a way that giri and gimu most definitely are not.

A quick Internet check of book titles reveals that obligation is often used in terms of legal "debt obligation," "political obligation," and more recently, regarding our "moral obligation" to animals. A collection of essays by Lionel Trilling is called The Moral Obligation to Be Intelligent.

Duty, on the other hand, is most frequently associated with public service in the army, police force and so on.

Giri is...well, giri. It is "the proper way of things, the morals which guide personal and social conduct, that which must be done in social relationships," as my Japanese dictionary so elegantly and rather vaguely puts it. It would not be used to express a relationship with animals, but it is frequently used to explain a bond between two people that results in one of them doing something that they may not necessarily feel like doing, like the frivolous but nonetheless real obligation felt by female employees in many offices to give chocolate to their boss on Valentine's Day.

Click here to read the rest of the article.

I think it is this concept of "giri" associated with "wa" or group harmony that makes Japan a place where there are fewer conflcits and violence than in other cultures. This issue was also broached in a very different context. I was reading an interivew with a writer being interviewed about a book on sociopaths, when I came across this quote:

Is there the same level of sociopathy in other cultures?

No. In East Asian countries, China and Japan in particular, there is substantially less sociopathic behavior observed. It seems to me that the only explanation for that would deal with overall cultural attitudes. In the East, individual winning is not considered the appropriate goal. The culture is more group-oriented. A sociopath born in such a culture might learn to behave appropriately the way one might learn table manners. They might not have a conscience, but because sociopaths need to fit in, the behavior might be tamped down a bit.

It seems to me concepts like "giri" and "wa" may prevent some sociopaths from going over to their dark side. Anyway, the interview with Martha Stout, author of The Sociopath Next Door, is fascinating. She suggests that 4% of the population is sociopathic-since the only verified people are violent criminals but she says that dosn't include nonviolent people and women-who casue damage in other ways like seducing women and then dropping them for the fun of it or berating/manipulating employees for fun. They are people without consciouses.

Urban Housing

In the picture above, this house in my neighborhood is being demolished so that a new one can be rebuildt on the same site. This a common thing in Japan where people buy plots of land rather than buildings. Sometimes the property changes hands every 10-20 years, sometimes less. This is why so many homes/buisnesses are so cheaply built. Either the land here has changed hands or the owners want to upgrade their home completely.

I have admired the facade of this house in Omotesando for a while.

Geisha In The Age of Diversity

Here's an article that discusses the selection of non-Japanese actors to portray Japanese women in Memoirs Of A Geisha. I understand trying to get bankable Asian stars, but it would have been nice to have given a chance to some unknown Japanese actresses:

The geisha, in translation

* In Rob Marshall's "Memoirs of a Geisha," with Chinese stars and a pan-Asian cast, will some essence go missing?

By Bruce Wallace, Times Staff Writer

Every move Komomo makes is rooted in Japanese ritual.

The way her body sinks to kneel, or how she uses just the fingertips of her right hand to slide open the wood-framed Japanese doors. The way she moves like smoke across the room on her dancer's toes.

Inside this cramped okiya, a household where aspiring geishas such as Komomo study the way dance, music and conversation can spin an enchanting mood, every action is a piece of performance art based on Japanese tales whispered down through generations.

"The dances are not just action; they are stories from our history, and you have to know that history to express it," says Koito, a retired geisha who owns the okiya and watches over Komomo with a mentor's possession. "You really have to understand Japanese culture to understand geishas."

Bottling the Japanese essence is the challenge facing American film director Rob Marshall and producer Steven Spielberg as they try to bring Arthur Golden's bestselling 1997 novel, "Memoirs of a Geisha," alive onscreen. Marshall recently finished shooting and has begun editing the estimated $85-million-budget movie, now scheduled for Christmas release.

But long before audiences have even seen a trailer, "Memoirs" has generated an underground controversy over the director's decision to cast non-Japanese actresses in the three leading geisha parts. From the opaque alleys of Kyoto's geisha districts to Internet movie chat rooms and the cast of the movie itself, the decision has created unease over what kind of footprint Hollywood will leave on this iconic element of traditional Japanese culture.

Declaring that "my only criteria was who's the best person for the role," Marshall chose China's Ziyi Zhang ("Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon") to play Sayuri, the fictional Japanese girl snatched from her humble fishing village and taken to a Kyoto okiya where she becomes the most celebrated geisha of the 1930s.

Click here to read the whole article.

St. Patrick's Day Parade 2005

The parade in Omotesando was pretty much the same as last year, but it's always a prelude to going to a pub to drink in the afternoon. Here are some friends dancing a jig at The Dubliner's Cafe in Nishi Azabu-it turned out to be a long night with stops for refueling and ending with karaoke, since Monday was a holiday.

The Best Of The Web Japan 2005

Japanzine has selected the best Japanese-related websites for 2005: Click here to read the feature article.

Party-sugi!

Adding "sugi" to a verb in Japanese means doing something too much. For example "nomisugi" means drink too much. With St. Patrick's Day weekend and my birthday-there have been too many parties. Thursday night I drank several 500 yen pints of Guiness at The Shinjuku Dubliners. Friday I met friends for dinner at The Pink Cow. The nijikai (second aprty) was at my favorite cheap izakaya (Japanese bar) in Omotesando, Nakanishi. The sanjikai (third party) was at, Ever, a new club in Omtesando at the former location of the now defunct club Blue on Koto dori. The picture above of Linda (Tony's friend's friend visiting from Chicago), Me, Tony and Martin at the new club. Sunday is the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Omotesando and I have the feeling that after it there will some more Guiness drank.

DVD Notes: The Assassination Of Richard Nixon

The Assassination of Richard Nixon is a really fascinating film. It’s another star turn by Sean Penn, who plays the real life Sam Bicke who was killed while trying to hijack a plane to fly into the white house and kill Richard Nixon. It is a character driven story about a man obsessed with the truth who is driven to attempt a desperate act. The director has done an excellent job of recreating the 70s. The excellent Namoi Watts and Don Cheadle turn in solid performances as supporting characters. Bicke can’t hold own a job and feels that society is against him as a federal loan for him and his business partner Cheadle is turned down. His estranged wife serves him divorce papers against his will. He loses his office furniture salesman job because he isn’t willing to bend the truth for a sale. He increasingly feels isolated, alienated, and disenfranchised, so much that he feels sympathy for the Black Panther Movement and suggest they should open membership to white people as well when he drops by to make a contribution. He narrates his rational for his desperate act by recording audiotapes that he sends to the composer Leonard Bernstein. Perhaps, there is no overall message that he film maker is trying to convey, but it is a compelling character study anyway, which feels real due to the performances in the film.

Favorite Places: MOS Burger

Sometimes I feel this way. A new branch of MOS Burger opened near my station-it's my favorite fast food chain in Japan. The "M" stands for mountain-the "O"-for ocean-and the "S" for sun-there are several healthy food options-rice burgers, salads, etc...but its not all that healthy, they have regular hamburgers and desserts as well. There are branches in Hawaii as well, but that's the only place outside Japan as far as I know. I particularly like The Spicy MOS Cheeseburger and Spicy Chili Dog, both of which have jalapeno peppers on them.