Tim Anderson - Tune in Tokio

” and their ears ring. The feminine one breaks into tears, and the man draws his sword, chops his companion’s head off, and slices himself open.

At least once a week I go with my coworkers in Ginza, Kenji and Midori, to a café where we sit for an hour and have what is called a “language exchange.” Theoretically, this involves two or more people meeting, often through the classifieds, and going to a café to converse in the languages each wishes to improve-usually Japanese and English. Half the time they speak English, then after a while they’ll switch to Japanese. Alternatively, and more commonly, a “language exchange” involves a Western male and a Japanese female meeting and speaking a few words here and there in whatever language is easiest before bagging the whole thing and leaving the café to go get it on somewhere.

White Guy: Hi, it’s nice to meet you.

Japanese Girl: Hello, it’s very nice meet you, too.

WG: Oh, darn it all, I seem to have forgotten my pen.

JG: Oh, it OK. I have pen you can to borrow.

WG: Oh, OK. Oh, darn it all, I seem to have forgotten my notebook.

JG: I have a paper you if you want use.

WG: Oh, great, thanks. Oh, shit. I seem to have forgotten my Japanese book.

JG: Oh.

WG: I must have left it in my bedroom. Shall we just…

JG: OK.

But Kenji, Midori, and I are honest-to-God language exchangers. There is no sexual tension between us that I’m aware of, though I suppose I should never say never. Kenji, always dressed in the requisite gray suit, is twenty-eight and handsome, if a little uptight. He is an accountant at Lane and spends most of his days looking at numbers, so he looks at our meetings as a nice change of pace. It is my goal not only to have him speaking better English as a result of our weekly exchanges, but to loosen up, to relax, and to talk about his innermost feelings, his dreams, his favorite numbers, and movies. And if he wants to reach over and plant a big, wet kiss on my soft, willing lips at some point by way of a thank you, well that’s just fine.

Midori might get a kick out of this. She is a receptionist at Lane. The most bored-looking receptionist I’ve ever seen. It’s why I’ve taken to her so quickly. Every day she sits at the main desk listlessly waiting for the phone to ring or a student to walk in while she doodles on a big notepad. When the phone does ring, she answers in the professional, friendly, buoyant lilt so typical of Japanese receptionists. Once she’s transferred the call or answered the caller’s question, she replaces the receiver and goes back to her doodling. Her desk has no computer. Behind her on the wall is the giant and shiny Lane logo, veritably announcing her as company spokeswoman. Her sole function is to serve as greeter, over the telephone and face to face when people walk into the school. Saying “good morning” and “good day” and “good evening” to people all day in a pleasant and welcoming tone as they file in can really take it out of a person.

Mornings are very slow, and it is these times when she appears to be counting the cracks in the wall while contemplating grad school or joining the circus.

One morning I sat down next to her. She looked like she could use a little excitement, and I thought perhaps I could help her look for some.

“Midori-san, how do you say, ‘I’m so dang bored’ in Japanese?”

She laughed and asked, “What means dang ?” From those first words grew our language exchange idea. Midori recruited Kenji after hearing that he was interested in taking English classes but couldn’t really afford them, even with his Lane discount.

So we started meeting after work once a week. Since their English is far better than my Japanese, we have pretty decent conversations in English for a while on a wide range of subjects (travel, music, world events, their insecurity about their English skills) before moving on to Japanese, where the conversation tends to gasp and sputter over more basic and yawn-worthy subjects like favorite foods, least favorite foods, favorite seasons, least favorite seasons, favorite sports, least favorite sports, and my insecurity about my Japanese skills (more than justified).

Tonight we meet as usual in front of the Sony building at Sukiyabashi Crossing and then walk toward our regular café, Doutor. Doutor is a Japanese coffee chain that serves the most unremarkable, tiniest cup of coffee I’ve ever regretted buying. A typical Doutor store is full of dozing salarymen who always somehow manage to smoke a pack of cigarettes during their naps. But the Doutor in the center of Ginza is housed at the bottom of a swanky, ten-story cylindrical building (with the obligatory giant television screen on top), and it has the much fancier name of Le Café Doutor. Oui- oui , uh- huh . So that’s where we go.

The sun is setting on Ginza. Some folks are getting off work and heading with their colleagues and bosses to an izakaya or karaoke box for some heavy drinking and awkward flirting, and the evening shopping traffic is peaking. On the street, the distinct and theatrical sound of classical music wafts through the air, and looking up ahead, we see that a small group of people have gathered in a semicircle around a gentleman with his head down as he sways to the Mozart erupting around him.

As we approach, we can see that the man everyone is watching with such fascination is actually operating a two-foot marionette dressed in a tuxedo and playing a violin, with dramatic wisps of gray hair sprouting from his head and making him look like a two-foot Strauss. We stop and watch for a few minutes, enjoying the bizarre sophistication of standing on an opulent shopping street and being serenaded on the violin by a puppet.

We continue on and huddle into le café, order some coffees, and sit down by a window, where we can enjoy our illuminating conversation while still being able to see people narrowly avoid slamming their Matsuya or Mitsukoshi shopping bags into each other outside.

We ease into the English part of the chat, with Kenji asking me what I think about our bucho, or Japanese boss, at the school. I reply that he seems really nice and always wears cool ties. Midori says she hates having to go drinking with him and all the other Japanese staff because he always drinks too much and starts hugging everyone. And sweating.

We talk about a variety of things for the next forty-five minutes: the popularity of the Seattle Mariners’ Japanese outfielder Ichiro, the Japanese love of comics, scuba diving. We’ve just switched over to Japanese and started talking about hot tea when I see her walk into the café.

She wears a pink silk kimono embossed with cherry blossoms, and she walks in traditional Japanese wooden sandals that look about as accommodating and comfortable as slabs of concrete. She walks up to the counter with the clipped, restricted stride typical of women wrapped in kimono. The skin of her face is a shock of white next to her pitch-black hair and eyebrows. Her lips are painted crimson in the middle, while the sides of both lips remain light pink, eventually fading into the powder white of her cheeks. She looks to be about sixty.

She is the personification of Japanese grace and dignity: a vision of beauty, of an aging sensuality, of an over-the-top willingness to be physically uncomfortable that is so unique to Japan. I struggle trying to watch her while also keeping up with our Japanese conversation as it veers towards the topic of coffee and then to a hard-to-follow (for me) debate about the merits of hot drinks over cold drinks during winter and summer.

At the counter, the lady smiles brightly with her whole face, nodding and bowing slightly as she gives her order to the employee. I watch as she takes out her small pink money purse with her gloved hands, produces some coins, and offers them gingerly to the cashier.