Hideo Furukawa - Slow Boat

I spent all my time making money. Wages in, damages out. Soon I was twenty—a full-fledged adult. Not that I stopped to celebrate my entry into adult society or anything.

Outside of work, my life was a perfect blank.

My early twenties. Filled with a peace I’d never known.

The calm of nearly dropping dead from overwork.

Click . The digital calendar flips, the century ends. From 12-31-1999 to 01-01-2000. A whole lot of zeros. Some feared the date. Like the Rapture was upon us. Others celebrated. Couples dying to have “millennium babies” sought pharmaceutical assistance to get the timing just right. Still others, partying in high-end hotel rooms, uncorked ultra-high-end champagne bottles. Pop, pop, pop . Even more people burrowed into underground bunkers, waiting to see if the computerized world would descend into anarchy. They really thought that, in one apocalyptic moment, bank accounts would vanish, aircraft would drop out of the sky and nuclear missiles would destroy the planet as we know it. Good old Y2K. The Japanese government didn’t help—telling families: “Be sure to stock up on mineral water and emergency food supplies.” Panic. Sheer panic. The world was in jeopardy—double jeopardy—whether it was God or computers was inconsequential.

OK, my Y2K. For me, the collapse of the world’s banks was the big fear. A matter of life and death, if you think about it. So, on the first of January, I got in line to receive my ATM oracle, like everyone else.

I hadn’t bothered checking my balance in years. What’s the point, right?

Then my turn came, and—what the hell—did Y2K do this?

This couldn’t be right.

But it was. I had been too busy working to notice that I had settled my debts… a good eighteen months back. I was in the black. The ATM was showing me a number I never saw coming.

Seven, almost eight, million yen?

That’s how I entered the new millennium.

All right. Time to face the music. I’ll never make it out of Tokyo. Two massive failures have made that abundantly clear. Guess it’s just my fate. But even if it is, I’ll have to fight fate on this one. Fight against my shitty karma. Granted, I’ve been a shitty person. But, as a human being, I’ve got inalienable rights, right?

At least I have plenty of cash for my third escape attempt.

Let’s think this through. Prior experience tells me that any attempt to exit Tokyo ends in violence.

If I can’t get out, I’ll have to bring out in. Enter the Trojan Horse of Tokyo.

My master plan.

I need a fortress—an impenetrable, impregnable lair. My own stronghold right in the heart of the city. A place with the power to keep Tokyo out—an autonomous region , if you will. A place to fill with all the music and smells and flavours that Tokyo can’t handle. Everything Tokyo can’t have. I need a place all my own.

You might call it a business.

I had to do something, right?

To keep on fighting. With everything I had.

Not like I had anything left to lose.

March, 2000 A.D. The Power of Kate opens in Asagaya, Suginami ward.

Magazines called Kate a café. In reality, I was going for a place that defied definition; I had no interest in opening a “café”—or any place you’re supposed to spell with a cute little accent mark. But why should I care? I had misread the world my whole life. So what if the world misread me back?

All that mattered to me was that Kate had the power to fight against Tokyo. Food and drinks were secondary—just a part of my cover. The Power of Kate. Sounds like a Hollywood romcom, doesn’t it?

Where did the name come from?

From life. I needed a name when I submitted the paperwork to the broker. I clearly wrote: “The Power of Hate (temporary).” But some bespectacled pencil-pusher misread my handwriting—and Kate was born. Why was I trying to call my place The Power of Hate? Because I hated the world with every fibre of my being.

Still do.

But OK. The Power of Kate.

A quick rundown on everything that had to happen before opening. Phase I. Get a public health licence (takes one day) and a fire safety certificate (two days). There were free courses for both. Next, apply for a restaurant permit—which takes nearly a month. Put together tons of forms for the tax office. Then burn through loads of cash on equipment. Interior renovations, dishes, recruitment…

My only job was going to be running the place. Not cooking, not serving. So—Phase II.

Cooking: I know a guy. No worries there.

Serving: I track down a few foreign waiters. Easy enough. Phase II is over in no time.

Phase III. Set up thirty or so cockroach traps on the premises. Cleanliness is everything.

Then Kate opens. On the second floor of a renovated home on Nakasugi Avenue. I give the place everything I have—guerrilla warfare against my shitty karma. Not much later, my third girlfriend makes her first appearance in the chronicle of my life.

She came from the east…

But, wait, her brother came first. I met him at a beef-bowl joint. No, not at the counter—behind it. In the kitchen. I’d been working there maybe a couple of months. Night shift. (It was one of those twenty-four-hour places.)

Watching him wrist-deep in the pickles, I had to ask:

“You been at this long? You’ve got the best pickles in the business.”

“Huh?”

I figured he was two or three years older than me. His close-cropped hair made him look a little thuggish.

He stares at me, picks up a loaded dish and hurls it to the floor. SMASH! Pickles and broken ceramic pieces everywhere.

“What kind of fuckin’ question is that?” he says.

“Wh—what?” I just stand there, stunned.

“Listen to me, you little shit…” He’s looking me right in the eye. “I’m not some grunt making fast food by the fucking manual. Got it?”

“Ye—yeah. I got it…”

“Here. Try this, asshole.”

He grabs something out of the kitchen fridge. It looks a lot like foie gras. When did he make this? He’s been feeding this to the staff? Looks amazing. What is it?

“Angler liver—fresh as fuck.”

This ain’t no yellowtail.

Angler liver and daikon.

“How is it?”

“…”

“Well?”

“Well… damn.”

No other words for this. It’s like an ambush of flavour, so good, really good. My taste buds explode. I look at him and say: “ Kaboom!!! ”

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

I take another bite. That’s answer enough.

He starts explaining: “My family’s been making sushi for three generations. My old man taught me Edo-style before I could read… I was a teenage sous-chef… I can make any dish you can name. Get it?”

Pretty sure I got it.

“But…” I say.

“What, you want more?”

“Um, yeah… But…”

“But what?”

“If you’re this good, why are you working at some no-name beef-bowl?”

He just looks away, coolly.

“Nowhere else I can go. I’ve got a record.”

“A criminal record?”

“Shut up and eat.”

That was the beginning of a deeply satisfying partnership.

From then on, nearly every night, I ate what he made for the staff. Soon kaboom wasn’t cutting it. I had to find new adjectives. Like kablam or kablooey . How did he come up with all of his mind-blowing creations?

This has to be what they call “fusion”.

He was a perfect fit for Kate. I had him on the phone maybe two seconds after I decided to open a place. It was obvious, right?

The first few months went fantastically. Kate drew in plenty of customers, and they seemed pretty satisfied. I know I was. Kate had a potent mix of exotic spices, a regionfree menu and nomadic DJs (who were under explicit instructions to sound like anything but Tokyo ). To destroy any lingering trace of the city, I covered every surface with giant ferns. In time, the place started to look like Jurassic Park —minus all the killer dinos. Most critics raved about the excess of oxygen. They loved Kate. Funny. Kate had been misread again—billed as a café ahead of its time.