Tasteless In Translation

I see the old man at a distance. He walks slowly down one of the main roads in the town as the boxy cars, many of them white, speed off to work, to school, to the market. He is nondescriptly dressed in trousers, a shirt and a jaunty hat enabling him to fit into any decade ranging from the 60s to present day. He approaches—tiny, cautious, elderly step by tiny, cautious, elderly step as I sit on the curb book in lap, waiting for the bus. Suddenly I become aware that I am no longer waiting at the bus stop alone. Two eyes are blazing a chasm into the side of my face. The old man has stopped walking and is now standing about a foot away from me. He stares for about twenty seconds, squinting curiously before he decides to open his mouth.

His breath reeks of tobacco.

“You’re not Japanese. Where are you going? Waiting for the bus?”

At what age does it become permissible for one to talk to strangers? Is it when you learn to talk? Eighteen? Twenty-one? Forty-six? When you leave the country? Never? All of a sudden I feel rather juvenile and incredibly visible.

It’s a funny thing about being in a different country. Customs and reactions run through a completely different mental editing process.

Deciding that I could most likely take him on, despite my recent violent run-ins with Niihama’s other hoary citizens, and that I could outrun him if he did turn out to be insane, I respond:

“Morning. Yes. Yes, I am waiting for the bus. I’m going to school.”

“Ah. School.” The man proceeds to look at me searchingly again. “You’re not Japanese. Where are you from? You’re going to a high school?”

“America, I’m from America. And yes, I’m going to a high school.”

“Ah, I’ve been to Hawaii.”

“Cool.”

“So how old are you, anyway? You look… nineteen.”

“Great. No, not nineteen. A bit more.”

“But you’re so cute. Look at that smile. So cute.” He points at me and chuckles.

I hem and haw as is appropriate by Japanese standards when receiving a compliment until I arrive at a, “Well. No, but thank you…”

He lets the topic drop and then moves on to telling me about his bad leg and how he lives over in ‘that’ direction above the nearby convenience store but goes to that hospital down the street quite often. Just a five-minute walk. “Please come over and play sometime.”

Play.

The verb in Japanese is “asobu.” In Japanese class we were told to translate it as “to play,” but the more I hear this word, the more I rail against it being translated as such. For an elderly eighty year old man to be telling me to come over to “play” at his house causes my skin to crawl. A lot. Henceforth, I have decided to translate it as “hang out,” which is still not perfect but sounds less insidious.

The man then offers me a cigarette.

“Ah, no thank you. I don’t smoke.”

“No? Really? Okay. How about sake? You drink, right? You should come over and play sometime. Anytime, really. I have alcohol.”

On the other side of the planet, this same situation is occurring. A man is approaching a young girl, asking her if she likes to drink. He offers her a fag. He asks her to come play at his house. Her mother instantly appears out of the blue and drags her away, berating her for her extreme lack of common sense and street smarts.

The bus is hideously late and I must find another way to get to school. I excuse myself politely, thankful at least that at least this senior citizen opted not to hit me; only call me nineteen, offer me various ways to kill my lungs, corrode my liver and invited me over to “play.”

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Published:
10.9.07 / 3pm
Category:
amusing incidents, what i call life, travel, culture, unschoolish