The Pricey Sweetness of Japan

I was simply taken aback by the deep sweetness of the Japanese people, and I find it hard to describe, except to say that they are so deeply wed to beautiful forms and to pro-social self-discipline that kindness and beauty are everywhere. And, of course, people pay a very big price for this... Let me describe the memory that most conveys this...

Japanese people fall asleep on the trains almost as a matter of course; they are, like Americans, very tired people, but for different reasons. They sit carefully in a spot, never taking more space than the most compact version of their bodies requires. So they sit with their shopping bags and/or briefcase on their laps, and with their elbows bent at their sides, palms open and upwards on top of their burdens, and then they fall forward bent in the back only. And so they sleep, not taking a quarter inch more than absolutely necessary.

I saw a woman in a remote rural train station take items out of a grocery bag in which something had broken and spilled. She took a wash rag from her purse and proceeded to clean each item and then to throw the broken and offending package away, returning to carefully wipe off the seat of the station bench.

Everywhere you look in Japan there is beauty, beautiful gardens, beautiful architecture, beautiful food, beautiful clothes, beautiful boxes for the beautiful food, beautiful bags for trivial purchases. And no effort is spared in manners or generosity.

They are tired from the effort of it all and they cannot each always live up to the level of required performance. They have a high suicide rate, very high, as high as the level of expectation for beautiful and generous performance. Still, it is their sweetness and generosity that I carry away in my heart, very differently from any other place I visited. I am sad that Japan is so far away because I would love to be there often and long.