Dear Friends,

Thank you for your interest in our blog. I hope you have had a good first week of November.

It has been nearly 2 weeks since I’ve returned from Japan, but I’m still there mentally.  I feel present yet absent in this routine life. I went to the gym, went out with friends, to transplant support group, yet inside, I still get flashbacks of my trip to Japan. All I want to eat is rice, red bean, and ramen. And chocolate filled marshmallows from Lawson.

There are so many images running through my head, and perhaps many things were mentioned briefly in our prior posts, but I want to use this chance to recall some poignant memories while coming to some conclusions. 

Picture this:

I’m seated in a subway, swaying with a few jerks, and the film crew is scattered around where seats are available. Their view is blocked by the men and women swaying with motions, held in place by their tight grasping of the loops hanging from the ceiling.  I see them a few seats down, their eyes glazed over. Ana is reading her cards.  The loud screeches and dondon-dondon-dondon of the traintracks keep me awake. I’m glancing at all the poster advertisements, trying to read the hiragana and katakana(easier Japanese letters).  I peer out the window, but only see darkness. We are somewhere in the complex underground maze, a commuter city under of the vast city of Tokyo.  For 510 yen (about $6) we are on our way to Yokohama. I trust that Ashley, our bilingual crew member, said we’d be on this train line for 45 minutes, so I relax.

I look around. There are men in suits, eyes closed, arms wrapped tightly around their briefcases. Many of them look like white people I know in America, but they are Japanese. I look at the women. Everyone is wearing makeup. Perfect foundation. Perfect eyeliner and eyeshadow, the perfect shade of lipstick- not too bold.  Everyone is wearing nylons- and unlike mine, no one else has holes or runs in their nylons!  No one seems to show their skin.  Even on warmer days, the ladies have shirts with conservative collars and at least 2/3 sleeve shirts.  The ladies have their hair nicely done. They are in formal clothes- no t-shirts, no sweats, no one seems without jewelry. God forbid, no open toe shoes! Only the school girls wear neither makeup nor nylons, but they, too, look all alike, with their dark blue uniforms. Their backpacks are different, as are the dangling cute zipper pulls and keychains that decorate their packs. The guys are also in dark school uniforms, differing by their wild hairstyle or their unusually colored tennis shoes.  I think, no matter how conformed they have to be, their unique individuality is dying to come out.

The train jerks a little and soon we come out of the dark and see the “suburbs” of Tokyo. My eyes open wider when I see green in the distance, and bushes and trees alongside buildings. I have missed green in Tokyo! There are large buildings with flashing neon lights, and tall apartment buildings with futons hanging over the railing. It is dense, dense, dense. I see karaoke bars, restaurants that look really good, and huge American-style department stores. All the cars are zooming around look like the Mini Cooper. People walk with a purpose on the street, bicyclers dodge cars, taxis line up waiting besides hotels. This suburb is active.

We pass a public park- I haven’t seen any of these in Tokyo! There’s a baseball field and jungle gym, and mothers of toddlers help their kids up to the slide. The field has a uniform sandy color; the playground also consists of a man-made “ground”- it’s not earth, it’s not soil, just ground covering.

We pass a river, with both banks covered in concrete. There are paved paths on both sides. A man stands in the distance fishing. What will he catch? Is this water clean?

Soon the train tracks bring us alongside the backyards of small family homes. I see the hanging onions under the awnings. I see slippers neatly lined up outside entrance to the backyard. I see the particular glazed windows that remind me of my relatives’ home. I notice the trees in the yards.

One of the arguments against organ donation is that it is unnatural. Nature gave us our organs and it’s against nature to take them out and put in someone else” organs.  The Japanese say they are closer to nature than westerners.  I see the trees in these quaint suburban yards. The pine trees are all manicured, bonsai style, with wrinkled wood ending in bursts of green spines. The persimmon trees are shaped into round balls, the chrysanthemums in pots to held to stakes with fine twine.  This is a typical Japanese garden. Everything natural in this yard has been manipulated by human hand. 

I can’t help but wonder why so many things in Japan seem so unnatural to me.  There were some places where we gave speeches where we walked through long bright corridors of pure metallic walls and escalators leading to bright multi-fluorescent lit rooms with white walls. I felt like I was in a space station.

In my own hotel room, each time I would go to the bathroom I’d sit on the toilet and hear a swishing sound. The under-the-seat fan has started. These automatic toilets have ventilation mechanisms to suck out the smelly air — great for CFers! When I’m out in public, I’d enter a woman’s bathroom stall, and automatically the sound of running water will emanate from some mysteriously placed loudspeaker.  You see, the sound of urination– this natural, universal sound– is taboo in Japan. So there is automated cover-up of nature’s calling.

I was so hungry at times, because we were so busy, but eating in the train is prohibited. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, Robin, Ana and I went to an exquisite marketplace and bought the most delightful of foods– and then couldn’t find a place to sit to eat. Eating is a private matter, done only in a restaurant or at home. Never mind that hunger is a natural need.

I am home in America now. I went to my local park and reveled in the crunch-crunch-crunch sound of my boots on the earth.  I am surrounded by trees,  I hear the birds and feel the sun on my face.  Ah, nature. At home, I walk barefoot. I wear a bra once in a while. I haven’t put on makeup for a week. The nylon hose are in my drawer– for a very long time.  I throw my hair into a ponytail.  And no one around me really cares.  Just plain me. Natural me.  It feels liberating.

Of course, America has it’s own concrete jungles- NYC, SF, LA…– and fair share of unnaturalness. Modernity and nature have clashed for centuries.  Mankind has found ways to control nature- that is called culture.  Cystic fibrosis, polycystic kidney disease, Eisenmenger’s Syndrome, hepatitis C… those are all natural diseases that lead to organ failure.  And with culture, now mankind has discovered ways for people with these diseases to keep living.

A Japanese culture found a mold in the mountains and discovered tacrolimus (Prograf), one of two of the best immunosuppresants.  Cyclosporine is also from mold.  Human organs are natural: are dialysis machines, ventilators and heart pumps?  That organs work after taken out of someone dead and function in someone who is dying is natural.  The tubes, the ventilators, the machines may not appear natural, but they are merely tools our culture has created to facilitate nature. 

So I end this post acknowledging that every culture has its inconsistencies, I know.  Japan has been uber-modern in the last few decades in science, medicine, business and technology.  I cannot accept the argument that organ donation is not natural in a country where very little is natural.  Try another one on me, but not this.  Organ donation is another modern innovation that can be embraced to make our lives better, easier, and longer… like escalators, the internet, PET scans.

Thank you for your interest. May you embrace the nature of your eyesight AND modern technology as you read this blog.

Thanks, Isabel

No related posts.