A Beginner in Matsuyama

There is something to be said for going through life as a chronic beginner (as suggested by D.T. Suzuki in Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind). Living in Matsuyama and recognizing only a few Japanese words presents obvious problems, but on the other hand it opens up a lot of doors. Unable to communicate with words, I’ve been forced to explore some previously undiscovered territories, you know, bizarre concepts like politeness, patience, listening with my ears instead of my mouth…strange stuff indeed for me. And my charades skills have become downright astounding.

Not being an expert in anything, I can’t tell you unequivocally that being a beginner is at least as enjoyable but something tells me it is. For example, I went to a lecture by a Japanese zen master visiting from Catskill, New York, of all places. Jan was busy that evening so I had resigned myself to soaking up the atmosphere as opposed to understanding anything except the initial Kom-baa-wa, but a friend from our zen group had, unbeknownst to me, enlisted the aid of a local English teacher to sit next to me and softly translate as the monk spoke. Bottom line: I actually understood a lot of what was said and wound up offering my “services,” such as they are, to this nice guy the English teacher and so I’ll be visiting another school, guitar and sax in hand, soon. Oh, that’s my new career, by the way.

On Monday I went to a junior high school for children with various kinds of disabilities. I “taught” English to three teenagers in wheelchairs, one with hydrocephaly and something else going on that had withered his body, one with what appeared to this beginner as cerebral palsy and another with something in between the other two. These kids who can barely speak Japanese due to their disabilities are learning English, slowly, albeit, but they are.

Sometimes it took them a long time to answer, especially Takeshi the one in the middle chair who had trouble forming words. And when they didn’t know the answer to the questions (e.g., Does your mother like chocolate?”) we’d all laugh, just like they did when I attempted to introduce myself in Japanese. We finished the session with some songs. They know ALL the words to the Carpenter’s “Top of the World “ (so does EVERYBODY else in Japan, by the way) and then a music teacher stopped by to play “Yesterday” on the piano while I played sax. We finished with “When the Saints,” the kids playing tambourines and rattles. I was just exhausted at the end of the hour and now have at least a glimmer of an understanding of what a teacher has to do to keep momentum going in a class.

Then I “taught” a music class for about 20 older kids, all in wheelchairs, some wearing helmets, I guess indicating intractable epilepsy or some other nervous system disorder. I’ll spare you the note-by-note transcription but suffice to say “Country Roads” was a big hit, once again just about everybody especially the teachers (there was about a 2-1 ratio in this school) knowing all the words. At the end, a little guy who had been clutching a plastic guitar throughout the class was wheeled over to me. One of his hands was nonfunctional. He had intelligent eyes and a big smile on his face and the teacher said he wanted to speak with me. I knelt down. It took him a long time to form the words but he said, “I…love…you…guitar. Please. Come….back.” And then he offered me his good hand to shake…. At that moment I learned something else about teaching--why I want to go back to this school next week and why I learned a lot more from these kids than they did from me.

Yesterday, Igaue-san, my musical Svengali who runs the Moonglow Café, one of the places where I play around here, took me and his trio “on the road” to a Reform School on the outskirts of town. The boys at this facility are not hardened criminals. They are kids who made stupid mistakes and got caught (“Ooops, how did I get into stolen car?” or “Wait a minute I thought that was my handbag, I can’t believe it belongs to that hysterical shopper?”). Contrary to what some of you may think, prior to yesterday I had never been in a reform school so I have nothing to compare this too, but frankly, the gym looked like it was filled with a bunch of valedictorians instead of a captive audience. Each boy was wearing a fresh blue blazer, crisp white shirt, red tie, gray slacks and white sneakers perfectly tied. They marched into the room and sat down on command. But they didn’t seem stiff and really got into the show.

And it WAS a show. I never know what is really going to happen when I do something here if only because it’s impossible for people to tell me, even people like Igaue who does have some English. The trio started with a straight classical air. Igaue gave the crowd a short explanation, sat back down at the piano and suddenly the classic piece was swinging and he was improvising. He had been trying to explain what jazz does to a tune.

Then he introduced me (always as “Mr. Ken from New York,” which, though it hasn’t been the case since 1971, sounds a lot better than Mr. Ken from Ithaca. Igaue then asked me to “teach” some English. We had discussed this before and come up with the idea that I should teach these kids how to say “How are you?” and “Good bye” in two ways, one using the classic phrases above and the other in the vernacular used by kids their own age in the States, tu whit, “Wassup” and “Later, Dude.” Five minutes later, 100 Japanese juvenile delinquents dressed like American prep school boys were shouting, “Wassup” at me. I wish my Japanese teacher experienced success anywhere near this quickly… (Heta desu!)

We played a few more tunes and then Igaue, who always has some tricks up his sleeve, motioned the rest of us off the bandstand and demonstrated just that--actually chopsticks up his sleeve which disappeared to the befuddlement of the two reform schoolers who had been summoned to the stage to serve as his assistants. Coins emerged from their ears; he guessed the cards they were thinking about, and in the last trick, a boy pushed a pen through a 1000 yen note in plain sight and, lo and behold, the hole disappeared and the note was unscathed at the end. This trick was preceded by what seemed to be a serious soliloquy by Igaue. Later I asked him what he had said. “I tell them their heart is the 1000 yen and bad judgment is the pen and they must make their hearts strong to prevent bad judgment from piercing their heart….”

The magician returned to his piano seat and we finished the set with some more jazz, “Stand By Me” and finally “When the Saints” (the refrain to which the reform school authorities had printed meticulously in the program) and the whole gym rocked as 100 plus Japanese juvenile delinquents pleaded to “be in that number when the saints come marching in….”

As we ended, the entire audience bowed to us as 4 of boys, each bearing a bouquet, walked slowly to the stage and with great dignity presented each entertainer with flowers. Then the principal motioned to the boys and with one voice they shouted, “LATER, DUDE….” Gee, and I was expecting Sayonara! (By the way, I should point out that it is quite natural here for men to receive flowers after performances or speeches. The Igaue band played a big department store this afternoon and at the end of the concert one of my volleyball teammates ascended the stage and presented me with a dozen pink roses. After the second show, another woman presented me with chocolates. Actually, they were quite good. I could get used to this!)

The next night Igaue invited Jan and me to be special guests on his weekly national radio show “Embrace Jazz,” which is kind of a potpourri of music and talk. There is no room for a piano in the NHK studio allotted to this show since it is slightly smaller than a baby grand from wall to wall, but he does bring a little plastic keyboard powered by a tube through which the player blows. It only has about 16 keys, severely limiting his technique and it cuts out if he plays more than 3 notes at once but somehow we managed to play “Route 66” live, accompanied by the show’s producer Nokata-san who did a very nice scat singing solo. The highlight for me was introducing a Stan Getz tune just like a real DJ. The low point: playing “Route 66” live AFTER the Stan Getz tune. Talk about a tough act to follow. I did NOT get flowers this time.

Jazz is Igaue’s life and not surprisingly he is always improvising. Since the “riff” on American teenage slang seemed to have gone over well at the reform school, he tried it live on the radio. I mean if 100 juvenile delinquents in a Matsuyama reform school think something is funny, the entire Japanese nation should too, right? So we run through the “Wassup” and “Later, Dude” routine on the air live. The next morning at the tennis court, two ladies to whom I have only bowed hello in the past greet me with “Wassup, Ken-san?” amid much tittering. And as I’m leaving, an 85 year old guy and his partner (who had just beaten me and my friend Iwata-san in doubles!) bow and say, “Later, Dude!” I guess it is never too late to be a beginner….

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