I found this book in our local “give a book, take a book” shelf just before we left on vacation for Tokyo. What an excellent coincidence!
John David Morley’s 1985 novel is a semi-autobiographical story of his time in Japan (mostly in Tokyo), as witnessed in its subtitle — The extraordinarily evocative, at times erotic, story of an Englishman’s discovery of Japan (shortened to Adventures of a Westerner in Japan for squeamish American audiences).
“Water trade” refers to the late-night, dark and obscure culture of small bars, where strangers showed their other sides to each other and hostesses. That world — and thus the fit of the title — is not only for bars, but in other places where Japanese people escape from the obligations and confinements of uchi, or family and community.
The book is full of interesting anthropological observations, many of which persist to today. I found myself constantly referring to 50-year old anecdotes as we passed through various conversations, events and places on our vacation here.
The most gripping — and emotionally wrought — story appears in the middle of the book, as Boon (the main character modeled on Morley) and Mariko struggle between passion and uchi in a modern version of forbidden love.
There are other scenes of “at times erotic” that I will leave to you. All of them contrast “Western” habits and mores with those of Japan; none of them show one side to be superior.
Another main theme (besides stumbling among dozens of bars and their various denizens) draws from Boon’s friendships with Japanese, which are possible by his learning of the language as well as their curiosity about outsiders. (I remember how Americans were afraid of “Godzilla Japan” in the 1980s, just as they now fear China.)
These friendships range from hilarious (his roommate decides to marry to escape Boon’s terrible cooking; the roommate, of course, doesn’t cook at all) to challenging (veering between power games and paranoid alliances) to baffling (“we all scooped some of grandpa’s ashes into the urn and went to eat a terrible meal”). You feel as if you are there — sometimes drowning, sometimes swimming — with Boon.
Uchi is (partially) explained by the lack of privacy in Japanese houses with thin walls and shared rooms, which has led the locals to adapt: merging self with group, indirectly (and deniably) asking and answering questions, adopting dual personas within the same day with the same people (rigid in the office; shitfaced drunk right after). The Japanese seem to be good at compartmentalisation.*
Some notes:
- Golfing is expensive, so normal people buy the best gear… for hitting on an indoor driving range.
- The Japanese appreciate Nature for its beauty but also its constant attempts to kill them with fire, floods and earthquakes.
- In spoken and written (calligraphic) language, there is meaning in what is not said and the white spaces where nothing is written. With calligraphy in particular, one must commit. There is no undo so a pause is appropriate.
- Japanese houses are (were) designed for summer’s sticky heat, which means they can be freezing in winter. (They are now full of climate controls, which have many drawbacks.)
- “In Japan the public-private axis is really the insider [uchi]-outsider axis.”
- “Expressions of gratitude often come in the form of apology.”
- “The water trade was a valve. This was where the strain of Japanese society was borne, more or less everything found a reflection or an echo here. For a student of Japanese affairs like Boon study of the water trade was a duty as rewarding as it was congenial. Knowledge acquired in more conventional ways was also necessary, but without the attuned, receptive ear schooled in the forum of the water trade a library of books would have been of limited use to an understanding of the Japanese. The transition from spoken to written Japanese not merely brought a loss in immediacy; it also evinced a change in character. Distaste for the written memorandum, the preference whenever possible for the physical presence of one’s interlocutor, made evident a reliance on the spoken word for which it would be difficult to find parallels in any modern society as sophisticated and complex as Japan’s.“
- Wives and mistresses each played their own role, aware of the other. (I think this sentiment has probably changed. Not unrelated, the birth rate per Japanese woman dropped from 3.65 in 1950 to 1.8 in 1980 to 1.25 in 2020.
I really enjoyed this book. FIVE STARS.
*The book doesn’t spend a lot of time discussing clutter vs Zen calm, but this article does a nice job demolishing the idea that the Japanese live in a spartan environment. Marie Kondo was popular in Japan because they have a clutter problem. Only the very poor and very rich live with empty rooms.