JAPAN: My third sin: Silent Japan, where’s your pulse?

I am much calmer here and sleep less than in the US. I think the
quiet nature of the city is so calming after NY. It takes less
energy to survive as a tourist, so I need less sleep. My food cravings
are dimmer and I am more grounded and my meditation space is clear.

The fact that so many people can live jam packed into these urban areas and be so peaceful is a testament to this culture’s and society’s advancement. Imagine if all major world cities were so pleasant and calm? After living in NY, with people yelling at each other and getting into rare fights on the subway, it’s impressive to see such harmonious existence. However, it seems like in NY people take their aggression out verbally while riding public transit, while the Japanese subway trains are sometimes delayed because of suicides on the train tracks. I don’t know if one is preferable.

Sterile is the word that came to mind about my first impressions of Tokyo. It isn’t engaging me on any level: spiritual, aesthetic, cultural, linguistic, historical, musical or otherwise. I already knew the cuisine back home and am enjoying most of the food I am eating here. Some of the food is a mystery to me, but when I stay with the basics of sushi, saba, eel and miso I am fine.

However, the hyper-modernity, cleanliness and quite nature of the country is deafening and blinding me to the beauty of the country. Fortunate to speak the national language or to at least be able to read the alphabet has made it relatively easy for the majority of all of my international travels. Japan is testing my ability to communicate with few words and hand signals.

My friend Carmen, whom I met in Sarajevo, speaks fluent Japanese. She told me that one of the fun aspects of speaking Japanese is moving between the four (?) levels of formality in the language that depend on the status and relationship of the person to whom she is speaking. For Carmen, the uniqueness and the nuances of Japanese excite her.

As funny as it sounds, for me, Japan’s draw comes in the form of its warm toilet seats, warm towels at restaurants before eating, the keenly decorated meals, hospitality and attention to foreigners needing help, and the crazy fashions.

I think that my loss of communication in Japan prevents me from seeing the inner beauty of the country. Sometimes it feels like what I see are mostly the plastic food replicas displayed outside the restaurants and I am not tasting the real heart and soul of the country. Unlike places like Cuba, where the music, dancing, singing, and lively people generate such a spirit that the beat of the country is easily palpable by someone who doesn’t speak Spanish, Japan seems to have so many layers below its silent and peaceful surface to which I have no access.

In Japan, the devil is not in the details. I suspect more of the beauty of Japan is in the deep details.

Maybe my 3rd Japanese sin is my inability to appreciate more than the silence and peace that I feel in this country. I believe that Japan will forgive my sin in silence and grace. You gave me a huge gift of my own inner sanctity and for that I am profoundly grateful.