Mister Timeless Blyth, page 11
She thought long and hard, said No, Reg, I can’t. You know I can’t.
Why not?
So many reasons. I have my job.
In the bank. How exciting!
She tensed and I changed tack, hammed it up like Ronald Colman, Robert Donat.
Come away with me!
She managed a smile but shook her head.
No.
We are who we are. We live as we live. We do what we do.
That smile, rueful. The shake of that lovely head.
No.
4
LIGHT OF
THE FIREFLIES
I arrived back in Korea a year after I had left, almost to the day. Once again I travelled on the Trans-Siberian Express, from Moscow on to Kurgan, Omsk, Irkutsk, Lake Baikal, Manchuria, Vladivostok. Instead of Tolstoy I read the book I had bought in London, Waley’s translation of the Tao Te Ching. It made me resolve to learn Chinese.
I couldn’t face going back to live in our old home, sans Annie, sans the animals. Akio helped me sell the house and the land to the young family who had been renting it. I found another house I could rent for myself, closer to the University – a compact Japanese-style two-storey building that opened out on a little garden. Akio and Shinki helped me move my belongings, my worldly goods. Mrs Gyeong resumed cooking and cleaning for me.
Meokda.
I settled back into routine, picked up, as far as possible, where I had left off.
A fresh start, said Shinki.
Indeed.
Akio invited me to his home again where Motoko was quietly delighted to see me. I asked if we might continue our haiku lessons and she said that would make her very happy, but who would be the teacher and who would be the pupil?
Little Katsura had grown in the time I was away. At first she was almost shy of me, then I said we had missed many unbirthdays and would have to make up for lost time, and she laughed and clapped her hands.
At school I felt strangely detached to be back, standing in front of a class of boys. Everything as it was, nothing as it was.
One young fellow named Jo made a point of waiting for me after class. Tentatively, a little self-conscious, he bowed to me, said he was very happy to see me.
Thank you Jo-san, I said.
We thought you will not come back.
Would not, I corrected. Or might not.
Would not, he said. Might not.
But here I am.
Yes, he said. And is good.
Jo was Korean, came from a poor family and was very bright. Like Lee. But as a young boy he had been sent to train as a monk. It was one way for a family to manage – the boy would have food and lodging at the temple and be given basic education. In Jo’s case he was later awarded one of the scholarships to the school. (Again, like Lee). But his early Zen training, I thought, showed in his bearing, a certain lightness.
I asked Shinki about sessions at Myoshin-ji, and although he had not been attending regularly himself, he was keen for me to resume my practice and he copied out for me, in his immaculate script, a full schedule of dates and times.
Every Sunday, zazen, sitting meditation at 5 a.m.
Every month, on 3rd, 13th, 23rd and on 8th, 18th, 28th, evening zazen (after dinner) followed by a talk given by Hanayama Roshi
I asked Shinki if there was some esoteric significance to the dates, all ending in 3 or 8. He said No, it was simply a way of dividing the month so there was a gap of five days between sessions. I told him I trusted his arithmetic.
I read it all through, said Yes, count me in.
For which sessions?
All of them.
The early morning air was cold when I set out in the pre-dawn dark, wrapped in my heavy overcoat against the chill. I walked once more through the temple gate, stepped up onto the verandah, remembered vividly the man who had lain there, frozen to death.
Too little care….
Perhaps the problem had been addressed or was simply less severe than in winter. Whatever the truth of it, there were only two figures stretched out on the verandah, against the wall, each huddled under a thin blanket, head pillowed on rolled-up sacking. I checked, made sure both men were breathing, wished them the protection of the compassionate Buddha. I slid open the door and stepped inside.
In a way I could not quite understand, I was overwhelmed with a sense of familiarity. The dark wood of the pillars and beams, the polished floor, were all imbued with the ancient scent of pine incense, ingrained down the centuries. To breathe it in was itself an act of meditation. I took off my shoes, put on a pair of wooden geta, the sandals the monks wore. I stood in line to receive my breakfast, a bowl of watery porridge. I remembered my time in the Scrubs. The lonely prisoner. Here it would be the lonely monk. In his cell.
The old monk who ladled out the gruel recognised me from my previous visits, acknowledged the fact with a nod. I smiled. He looked stern, said zazen would begin at 5 o’clock.
There was that story of a monk coming to Joshu for teaching.
Have you eaten? said Joshu.
Yes, said the monk.
Then wash your bowl, said Joshu.
And that was it, that was the teaching.
The monk became enlightened.
I ate my gruel, washed my bowl and dried it, placed it upside down on a shelf beside the sink.
I made my way into the meditation hall, found a spot and sat on an old black zafu cushion, crossed my legs as best I could, knees creaking. I straightened my back, breathed in, breathed out.
A bell rang.
To begin again.
The first time I attended an evening session, I found myself queuing up beforehand for another meagre repast, dished out by the same stern-faced monk. This time it was a handful of rice and a few boiled vegetables topped with three slices of what I recognised as takuan, pickled daikon radish. Whatever the reason – the colour (bright yellow), the texture (overly crunchy) or the taste (bittersweet), I found this particular pickle unpalatable and would always, if I could, leave it at the side of my plate. On this occasion, however, that reaction would be unpardonable and rejecting the food freely offered would cause offence. I bowed to the monk, braced myself for the ordeal. Then I heard a quiet voice behind me.
Buraisu-sensei.
I turned and saw young Jo, the boy who had spoken to me at school. He had been brought up at the temple, had lodged here, and he still liked to join in the sessions.
Jo-san.
We sat together at the long low table, offered silent unironic gratitude for the food. I glanced at Jo’s bowl and saw in a moment he had been sent, he was my saviour, my salvation. He was a growing boy for whom the portion of food was minuscule. I would perform an utterly selfless act of kindness by giving him my allocated three slices of the offending takuan.
I was just about to effect the transfer when Jo bowed, said Dozo…
Please…
And deftly with his chopsticks he picked up the pickle from his bowl, transferred it to mine.
There was nothing I could do but thank him and set to, grudgingly crunching the pickle, a double portion.
Arigato gozaimasu.
I told Jo later that I didn’t in fact like the pickle and had been on the point of offering him mine when he pre-empted my move. His eyes widened and he told me he too hated the takuan and had been grateful to get rid of it. I mimicked our polite exchange.
Dozo.
Arigato gozaimasu.
We laughed, bowed, laughed again.
Over the weeks and months that followed, I looked forward to the sessions more and more. It was hard work, no arguing with that, body aching, mind ready to scream at the endless intrusions, distractions. But I was determined to see it through.
My Japanese was adequate for most purposes, but when it came to Hanayama Roshi’s talks there were still times when I struggled to understand (though perhaps that struggle was the whole point and having another obstacle to overcome was a positive advantage). I followed what I could, carried along by the almost incantatory power of the Roshi’s delivery, a kind of measured rhythmic monotone. At times I let it wash over me, then the words would come into focus, ring clear and true.
Awaken the mind without fixing it anywhere.
My first great breakthrough (or so I thought it at the time) came at the end of a morning session. We chanted, as we usually did, the sutra to the Bodhisattva Kannon, said to bring consolation in times of adversity.
Enmei Jikku Kannon Gyo….
I joined in, added my tuneless basso profundo to the collective sound. The chant came to an end, a bell was struck, and I experienced it, my moment of awakening. I was quite simply aware of myself sitting there, nothing more (but also nothing less). It was extraordinary and at the same time nothing special. I just sat there as if I just sat there.
One of the younger monks caught my eye as we left the zendo. Perhaps he saw something in my demeanour, sensed a change.
Oi! he said.
Quicker than thought, I responded. Hai!
In time I heard that Oi! – Hai! so many times I began to wait for it. It became a kind of joke, and as soon as I saw it that way, it was like seeing the light, like getting warm in some remembered childhood game.
It was like launching a ship down a slipway. Release the blocks and the ship moves.
I have a piece of calligraphy by Suzuki, lines from As you like it, laid out like a tanka poem in the master’s brisk script, bold and cursive, black ink on handmade paper.
O wonderful.
wonderful,
and most wonderful wonderful!
and yet again wonderful…
That was the way of it. Wonderful.
I was seriously considering becoming a monk.
If I had gone straight home from school that day instead of taking a detour. If I hadn’t stopped at the department store, parked my bicycle and gone inside. I wasn’t even looking for anything-in-particular. (And isn’t that the way, that we find what we’re looking for when we’re not looking?) I was simply killing time – an odd expression but an apt one. Whatever the non-reason, I was not in any hurry to go home.
I passed through the drapery department – it smelled of camphor from clothing and bales of cloth, a faint mustiness, a hint of incense. Beyond that was kitchenware, bamboo ladles and graters, bowls and chopsticks, sharp-bladed knives in little wooden sheaths. Then there it was, the goal of my non-search – the stationery section. I looked longingly at brushes and ink-stones and handmade paper. I imagined myself composing haiku and illustrating them, working on my calligraphy and brushwork. Then I thought of my previous cack-handed ham-fisted efforts, blotched and botched. Perhaps not!
Instead I bought a few functional lined notepads, a set of pencils and one indulgence, a little hard-covered notebook made from rough-textured paper which opened out like a concertina. I opened and closed it, opened it, closed it. The young woman behind the counter had been looking on, politely amused, watching me make my mind up. Now she bowed and smiled, began wrapping my purchases in soft tissue paper. Then I remembered there was something else I had wanted to buy, but I had forgotten the name of it. A kind of wrapping cloth that folded to make a bag. My students would use it to carry their books or bento boxes.
I tried miming, laying out the invisible cloth, gathering the ends and folding them. She laughed, covering her mouth with her hand.
Hai! she said. Furoshiki desu.
Yes, that was it. Furoshiki! I said, with huge satisfaction.
She ducked down behind the counter, reappeared with the cloth in her hand – simple linen, a subtle deep green. She folded it and was about to wrap that too in paper. I managed to indicate she should instead use the cloth to wrap my other purchases. Again she had to stifle her amusement, but she did as I asked, and I looked on, captivated, as she wrapped what I had bought, placed it on the counter like an offering.
I paid and she gave me my change, a few coins, and as she did so she cupped her hand, small and soft and warm, beneath my own hand as she put the coins in my open palm.
It was a gesture of indescribable delicacy and refinement, the slightest touch, and it sent an electrical charge right through me. I was stunned, smitten. I even felt myself blush, flustered. I bumbled out some stumbling banality about the weather and the season, translating badly from English instead of thinking in Japanese. I was tongue-tied, quite undone.
I managed to ask her name.
Kijima Tomiko.
Kijima-san.
Tomiko.
The shapes her mouth made, forming the words.
I told her I was Buraisu-san, (pointing to myself) and English, Igirisujin.
Buraisu-san, she said, and my name had never sounded so beautiful.
I went back a few days later to buy another notebook I didn’t need. This time I was more composed and managed to hold a polite conversation. I told her I was a teacher at Keijo University. (She had guessed as much). She had been born in Japan, in Hagi, Yamaguchi, but the family had moved to Korea when she was 10, because of her father’s business. I assumed he allowed her to work at the store to add to the family income, but also perhaps to get-her-out-of-the house, give opportunities for her to socialise. And however unlikely it might have seemed, here she was, meeting a potential suitor, this divorced gaijin, besotted-at-first-sight.
I looked up the meaning of her name. It was in two parts – Tomi meaning wealth, blessings, good fortune, and Ko meaning child. Blessed child, then. Child of Good Fortune.
Tomiko.
Tomiko.
How many notebooks did I buy? They probably had to re-stock from their suppliers, wondering at the sudden increase in turnover.
In my rather old-fashioned, gentlemanly fashion, I was courting her. I liked the word. It had echoes of courtesy, and courtliness. Courting.
I had no idea as to the protocol, the formalities. I simply asked her one day (as she wrapped yet another notebook for me to place in the furoshiki cloth) if she would like to accompany me to a concert at the school, a performance of Bach by some of the young students I had been teaching.
For the first time I saw her look uncertain, and I wondered if I had made some social gaffe. Then I realised she was just making sure she had not misunderstood and that I was indeed asking her out.
In London, in another life, Annie and I had intended to go to a Bach concert that was cancelled, and we’d gone instead to hear Akio speak about teaching opportunities in the East. Another life and half a world away. Now Annie was back there, and I was here with Tomiko, at a concert of Bach. As I listened to the students, haltingly, imperfectly playing the music, I had an overwhelming sense of the randomness of things sometimes resolving itself into a kind of coherence, a pattern endlessly repeated but with infinite variations. A fugue. Yes it was like this, we were infinite, as the music was, and we experienced it here in this drab school hall, in this our only life, in the best of all possible worlds.
I had no idea if Tomiko would appreciate the music. She sat next to me in a wine-coloured kimono, her sheen of black hair caught up and gathered, held in place with a red lacquered clasp. Our arms were touching. I could feel her warmth, smell her perfume, sweetness of jasmine. When the music ended we joined in the applause. I turned to her and saw her eyes were shining.
Tomiko’s father, Kijima-san, was a successful businessman, managed a construction company. He was among those Japanese bringing progress to Korea, dragging it into the modern world, developing its resources, industrialising on a grand scale. He had doubtless, as they say, made a killing. I recalled my conversations with Akio about the nature of this progress and exactly who stood to benefit most from the development. I resolved not to pursue the matter with Kijima-san.
He was in many ways my polar opposite – stolid, materialistic, grounded in that world of work, mechanistic, governed by profit and loss, getting and spending. His wife looked like an older version of Tomiko, in fact not so much older, with that ageless quality I saw in so many Japanese women. But her eyes were tired and she was self-effacing almost to the point of negation, deferentially bowing when she entered or left the room.
I had been invited to the family home so that I could be vetted and assessed, weighed up. The evening was awkward. There was little to talk about. The latest building materials? The knocking down of the old city walls to allow extended urbanisation? Could I counter with the metaphysical poets? My love of Bach? The importance of koan practice in Rinzai Zen?
Then there was my refusal to drink alcohol or eat fish. Kijima-san and his wife seemed genuinely bemused by this tweed-suited gaijin in their midst, confirming their worst fears.
On the other hand, as a Professor at Keijo I was clearly a fellow of some standing and something of a catch for their daughter.
At one point I caught Tomiko’s eye and she flashed the quickest sweetest smile, amused and complicit.
The wedding was a very Japanese affair, conducted at a Shinto shrine. We were a small group – a dozen or so – and we entered in procession through a red torii gate, led by a priest in his white ceremonial robes. He clapped his hands and chanted, invoking the kami, the benevolent deities, particularly the gods of marriage, Izanagi and Izanami, themselves a married couple. All this Tomiko had explained to me in advance. She wore a red kimono and a white silk headdress, equivalent of the bridal veil. I wore a formal suit instead of my usual tweeds, a wing-collared shirt and black bow tie. We exchanged rings and bowed. The priest placed a branch of sakaki, Japanese evergreen with its bright yellow flowers, on a little altar in front of the shrine, and chanted a verse invoking long life and fertility.
