Session #23 (NYC)

When I arrived for this month's appointment, Shinji was listening to NPR streaming radio when I arrived—at least it sounded like NPR, with the smooth "mentholated" voice reporting the news; it turned out to be WNYC, reporting on national and local news. As I undressed, donned my fundoshi, and laid down on the table, the broadcast focused on the political situation around the Confederate flag, the actions and debate around it’s removal from capital buildings in several Southern states, and what that means for race relations in this country.

Much like when Shinji and I talked about American jazz after one of my earlier appointments, as I was getting tattooed I began to think about what he would think about this debate, as someone from Japan? The long history of race issues in this country are difficult to contextualize for someone from outside this country—or would it be easier for someone from outside the U.S., with no preconceived ideas or… prejudices?

Historically, the Japanese have had their own screwed-up ideas about race. (The historical treatment of the Burakumin are one example.) It has traditionally been the opinion of the Japanese that, unlike us here in the United States, they don’t deal with racial tension, as their population is uniquely homogenous. This has long been a popularly-held belief, despite time and again being shown to not be the case. How does coming from that history frame an understanding of what we, as a country, are dealing with?

After a while, the talk about the confederate flag went to discussing Obama’s recently-televised eulogy of Reverend Pinckney, slain at the Charleston church shooting. “It seems Obama spends more time addressing his congregation than his constituents,” pondered one of the guests. “Well he was giving a eulogy, in a church….” replied the host. Unless you’re familiar with the sermons of the South, and traditionally Black churches in particular, how would someone know when Obama was code-switching between his black and white audience?

The program then went on to cover Chris Christie’s announcement that he will be campaigning for President. How do you explain Christie? His Blue-collar message of “work hard, and you will succeed” message, coupled with references to how “runaway entitlements” are crippling the country financially; the discussion of him in the “Guiliani” model, and how that may be a hard image to sell outside the Northeastern U.S. How do you give that a context?

After this was an interview with presidential once-hopeful Gary Hart, discussing his new book and lamenting the current state of politics—and lobbying, in particular. “I’m a student of history, but I’m no Arthur Schlesinger,” he said, when discussing the sense of disappointment that he felt Jefferson, Madison, and Adams would have toward our current, corrupt political system. “Well, I’m a student of Japan, but I’m no Donald Richie,” I thought, as I pondered more about what Shinji must think about American politics.

After that was in interview with the director of the new documentary Cartel Land, about vigilante groups from the U.S. going after the drug cartels in Mexico. What would a Japanese person think of all this, coming from a country that doesn’t have a drug problem—because they don’t really have a culture of illegal, recreational drug use? 

In the end, it really wasn’t, or isn’t, about what Shinji thought about all this, but about how hard it is to really make sense of it all with context—but especially without.

And my tattooing sucked today. The ribs were worse than expected. And there was a woman with rage-fueled Tourette's on the bus on the way back, which made the ride home all the more interesting.