On Japan

I was going to write this on Sunday, March 13 but given my internet troubles I never had the chance.  I had many more ideas that since have fled, but I'll do my best.  Here goes.

There are so many words to describe the crisis in Japan:  overwhelming, astounding, tragic, heartbreaking just to name a few.  The pictures of the waters coming in, of the faces of people, of devastation ... I can't imagine it.  The whole ordeal sounds like some bad dream.  Part of me hopes to wake up and find that it's some sort of nightmare.  I am an ocean away, but I'm living it every night on the news, in the day on the radio at work, and in my own heart.

See, I love Japan, Japanese culture and history.  I have since I was a little guy who had a Japanese friend back in elementary school.  I remember going over to their house and trying seaweed for the first time and being hooked on everything Japanese from then on.  This is not to say I am an expert or an "Otaku" as another term in the popular culture is applied to extreme lovers of all things Japan.

I always wanted to go to Japan myself.  I was planning to in May, but of course that plan was canceled.  I honestly don't know if I will ever get to go.  I can only hope.  The Japanese people are a fine, tenacious bunch, and I can only hope that things will work out for the best, especially with the nuclear situation at the Fukushima plant.  That whole situation raises a different set of concerns that don't need to be mentioned here.

My current project, one book that seems to have blossomed into three, is a result of my love of all things Japan.

The story itself is a simple premise.  A young man goes to Japan to teach English.  He falls in love with his translator and ends up in a more interesting situation than he originally imagined when another outside party falls in love with him.  This may seem like simple love story, but when the outside party is a mischevious Japanese spirit things change dramatically.  At the moment I am struggling with some very terrible writer's block in the second part of my story (the second "book").  I seem to get that a lot recently what with working back to back shifts constantly, I have no time to really rest and get my brain back.

This story is one I almost took myself.  Before I started my current job, I toyed with the idea of going to Japan for a while to teach, learn the culture and get first hand experience in this mysterious land which I have so longed to go.  Now, considering what I hear about foreign workers fleeing Japan, I am somewhat glad I didn't go.  I also wonder about the future of my story as much as I do about Japan's.  I pray for the people there and that whatever god or gods watch over them that they deliver them from this disaster to a brighter horizon.