Double Life

I have a girlfriend who falls in ‘like’ with Japan after lived in Tokyo for a few years. She was involved in some art organizations that bring her back to Japan frequently. It’s interesting to know someone can ‘like’ Japan like really 'like'.

The other day we discussed about Japanese literary. Of course she read many Japanese novels to ‘enter’ the Japanese way of thinking. Not for the purpose in the first place of course. It’s about growing interest after one falls in like with something.

Well, she could observe the real Japanese life thru what they expressed in their writing. She observed the rich aspects of Japanese life. The complication. The pressure. The obsession.

I only finished two books by Japanese writers. One was suggested by a good friend, an over-600-page book titled The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami which is about an odd life of a man. So strange that I could not imagine such life exists. But who knows Japanese? Like who knows Indonesian?

And the second book, I read in plane from Bali. Thin book, 118 pages, I bought in the Festival titled Snakes & Earrings by Hitomi Kanehara. It just caught my attention when I saw the cover and browsed the inside. Perfect for 1.5 hours trip.

I had inconvenient time reading the first few pages. I felt like my skin was peeled slowly. Watch this quote:

Apparently, you begin by getting your tongue pierced. You then gradually enlarge the hole by inserting bigger and bigger tongue rings. Then, when the hole has been stretched to a certain size, you tie dental floss or fishing line in tight loops running from the hole down the middle of the tongue. Finally, you cut the remaining part of the tongue that’s still connected using either a scalpel or a razor-blade.

That’s only half of a paragraph, the rest of the book is about the details of enlarging ear hole and whole body tattoo process. Such knowledge is never a waste for me. At least, now I know the psychology of people who are addicted to ‘body modification’, how they come to the idea and how they are attracted to the opposite. And of course, now I know what gauge size means.

Yes, back to what is interesting about the Japanese teenager life. The punk of Harajuku. They certainly lead a life that I never imagined although it’s probably the same way of life in other part of the world where ‘underground world’ exists. I wonder about how their parents accept the reality that their girls or boys pierced their bodies in such scary places. How they live together and consume so much alcohol.

That interests me. Living a double life. I often think about the notion. What appears to be ‘double’ to others may be felt as ‘single’ by the person because the person takes that as part of her/his life.

To be frank, I’m lost. What was I going to share? I was in deep discussion with a good friend the last few hours. It was such a good discussion that I forgot my point :-)