Got back from Japan last week.

Somewhere in a mosaic of tepanyaki, a duck billed bullet train on Tokyo station, lecture theatres with black curtains and backstage bento boxes, I delivered two big seminars to around 800 people.

We were taxied about by our wonderful hosts, Mr and Mrs Fujii who must surely be two of the most friendly people in Japan, met the very nice Dr Tanaka and Dr Takeida and met with the wonderfully naughty Rinko Nikki who worked with me like a Sumo tag-team partner much to the audience’s delight.

Mr Fujii, Chris and Mr Sagawa (oh, and me) went to a special event by a wonderful singer and dancer, Tai-chan, who is well established in musical theatre and did wonderful performances for us at her rehearsal room with her tutors present. Tai-chan is, of course, gorgeous, and I then taught her to sing Beyond The When from the TV series Things You Taught Me (also on my first album Nobody Nowhere) and she picked it up instantly although she speaks no English. I then asked her to teach me a song in Japanese. Her tutor instructed her to begin to sing, and as she had in English, so too, did I sing instantly in Japanese (although I had no idea what I was singing). It was fun and an honour to sing with her. The fact we’re both diagnosed with Autism and have quite marked receptive processing problems (far more in her case, though she’s 20 years my junior) only reminded me how much one needs no interpretive processing to be a master rote learner with mimicry skills. In fact, lacking interpretive processing allowed us to instantly sing in each other’s language where others would likely have struggled. I hope more people will realise that many of the arts and some sports, a severe receptive processing disorder can sometimes be no obstacle.

Mr and Mrs Fujii then took us to an awesome hotel, Ga Jo En, in Tokyo which has the most wonderful bounce tatami mats underfoot with the rising scent of straw. The walls were lickable black and burgundy laquer (I resisted but felt them with my hungry hands), full of mother of pearl designs till I was in a sensory heaven and geisha images twisted, turned and hid among the rainbows in long flowing gowns etched into the laquer. Even the ceilings and walls of the toilets were like gallery exhibitions.

As a visiting artist, our hosts managed to gain an invitation to the special ceremonial rooms and I was so honoured to be able to get right near to wall murals of Japanese pines and golden full moons, blossom and birds, their bodies twisting and turning and my body mapped them as did my hands.

Outside a gold and black carp sang silently with an open mouth of an opera singer from a stage of water around our feet.

We ate in a room of sliding doors, paper windows and a table with no legs but our own legs into a hole in the floor. Each morsel plays hard to get in a Japanese meal so you eat everything as though it is an honour not an obligation. That the food is odd to foreigners is no surprise but here odd becomes the norm, if one allows it- and odd is relative.

In our own hotel the carpet pile did a dance as I moved, following us like shadows on the floor creating ever new carpets with each turn.

The taxis were adorned with white lace like doilies and cottage windows.

Mrs Fujii was taking gift wrapping classes and her wrapping was visually edible (the Peter Rabbit plates were very cool too, great tapping sound and so shiny with the familiar form of Mr PRs mother).

A homeless lady grimaces outside a train station from her concrete seat capturing me like a sister, older, a world away.

Young women dye their hair a light orange and stride in a well known fashion street like supermodels waiting to be discovered. One comes past me at the station and I’m scared a moment. It was Japanese Barbie in tall vinyl boots lost in some other world as if the world was a stage and maybe it was but I was busy wondering how the machine ate my train ticket and then she was gone.
We were on the plane so soon, taking home the contents of Japanese dreams to come.

Bamboo blinds sat in a corner at home, broken but usable. I get yearning for gold and burgundy paint. Japan, like all cultures, can be a place within us.
🙂 Donna Williams

http://www.donnawilliams.net/