“My inner, incessant elation, which I think I’ve rightly, if repeatedly, called happiness, is threatening, I’m aware, to turn this whole composition into a fool’s soliloquy”

J.D. Salinger “Seymour an Inroduction”

Last night was the first real snow that I have seen in two years and it was so very satisfying watching a substantial snowstorm by Japanese standards from the comfort of my warm little apartment. It made me feel very nostalgic for Wisconsin and my family and friends back home, so I am very happy to join you all tonight in the time bending space of a letter. I can close my eyes and imagine me telling you these stories.

I guess I will finish past stories from my last letter and say that the little Christmas concert that I was asked to play went splendidly and not at all to schedule and it was spontaneous and I felt very alive. To give you the spectrum of the night’s activities, I began at 5 o’clock playing Oh Holy Night seated in a chair and wrapped up at 11 o’clock singing Twist and Shout on top of a table while my two good friends Ben and Ezra danced with old women and the wine flowed very generously from the bottles of old men. It was the beginning of the holiday season here and a good one at that.

I next had the opportunity to go to three of my coworkers houses on separate nights to have little new year’s celebrations. Each one was very different but all revolved around food which is always something that I love and as I travel, realize that most all celebrations everywhere in the world to some extent revolve around food. The first was a gathering of young coworkers at a very small apartment that I had hinted at doing during out lunch break (read: I said “hey we should have a Christmas party at your house” and then it actually happened). Here they have this really ingenious food called Takoyaki with could be the best food party food ever. You essentially take a sort of pancake mix and mix in green onion and then you pour the batter into a skillet with little half circle cutouts in it and put a piece of octopus into each little hole. Then everyone sits around the heated up table called a kotatsu and turns the little batter balls with big toothpicks. Everyone is comfortable and invariably there is someone that is bad at turning them and everyone teases them and it is just a great time and all the while people are pouring each other drinks and chatting. We also played bilingual bananagrams that night.

The next two were at older teachers’ homes and again very different from one another. The first was very participatory and I was told beforehand that I was going to be working very hard that day and to not expect to just be having a party. The hard work consisted of me literally climbing a latter and removing three pieces of paper from a little shrine and later peeing one sweet potato. The rest of the day we walked to the big shrine to buy a new big rope that hang up in front of the little family shrine and cooking and eating delicious food. I will apparently be very lucky for the rest of the year because I ate black beans and some foods that mixed red and white together.

The next party was at a geography teacher’s house with whom I really bonded at our end of the year party when we both discovered we love the Beatles and spent two hours singing together on the karaoke system. His wife is an amazing cook and had prepared a very traditional, very delicious New Year’s meal. It consisted of two bento boxes filled with very ornate little meats, eggs and vegetables, puffer fish, huge sea snails, sashimi, oden, scallops, crab, shrimp and lots of wine and sake. I think I throw around the word feast a lot but this truly was one. With a bit of help from the wine and sake he told me he loved me, which his wife conferred was the truth because every night he comes home from work and mentions me at least once. It was quite the compliment.

The last event I will write about tonight is the very important tradition of first prayer or “hatsumode”. I actually went twice and perhaps the word prayer is a bit of a stretch of imagination considering the description I am about to give. So there are well over 40 million people living in this general area and just about everyone adheres to the same customs. This means that when it is time to go and do first prayer for you, it is the same for all 40 million people around you. I went to Narita san which is a fairly famous and very beautiful temple. First prayer consists of wafting some incense smoke over your head, washing your hands with some purified water and rinsing out your month and climbing a bunch of steps to arrive at the actual temple. Next you, throw a little five yen coin over the many lines of people ahead of you into a big container, clap your hands together with closed eyes while countless people are shoving and jostling you in an attempt to either come or go, wish for something (I think), and then try and get out of that area as fast as you can. I am more of a quiet room, alone sort of prayer person but it was a very nice experience nonetheless and well, everyone has their own way of connecting with the “eternal Ground”, as Aldous Huxley puts it and is a phrase I particularly like.

Other events include being handed over a café to make pizza in for customers, a short visit from my very good friend Lucas Young which included drinking mate which you all know I love and have missed so much, lots of sitting at this little heated table reading and writing, wearing a kimono for the first time and continuing to check in with old and new friends here. I wish all of you a very happy new year and thank you again to everyone that have taken time to physically write me letters and send me things, I have loved so much reading your thoughts on life and your responses will be coming during this next month.

Love on a cold winter’s night,

James