April, 1995: Springtime is a dramatic season in Japan. The deity in charge of plant management flips the switch that blooms every flower in the country. Most notable are the cherry blossoms, which prompt the Japanese tradition of ohanami. Meaning literally, "Flower Viewing," ohanami involves groups of people spreading picnic tarps beneath the cherry trees, breaking out loads of food, sake and beer, and getting blitzed beneath the blossoms. Usually companies do this together, but the folks in my division weren't as sociable, so this year I was left on my own. My Encounters with the "Y-Guys" Part 2
One drizzly weekend, I decided to view the flowers for myself, so I headed two stations down to Kamakura's Tsuragaoka Hachiman-gu, an enormous shrine complex with beautiful gardens and a museum. The shrine was hosting the Kamakura Festival at that time, and the cherry trees there were gracefully dropping petals of "pink snow" upon the throngs of people who had congregated there to party. I was strolling along the gravel paths and taking the occasional photograph when I happened on a particularly interesting spectacle, and stopped a distance away to watch.
Two American sailors from the nearby Yokosuka Naval Base had joined a Japanese party, and were gulping huge glasses of shochu (the Japanese version of everclear) and whooping loudly. As I watched them and their bemused Japanese hosts, who were dressed in festival garb, I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to find a puzzled-looking woman standing there: another foreigner, obviously a tourist.
"Excuse me," she said in clipped, German-accented English. "Do you know Japanese culture?"
"Yes," I said.
"Can you answer a question for me?" When I nodded, she said, "Why aren't those men wearing any pants?"
I smiled and explained that the men she was referring to were wearing fundoshi; traditional loincloths worn under hapi coats during festivals. As we talked, the men in question noticed us. Before I knew it, the German woman had vanished and the two men had me by the elbows and were escorting me to their site.
"Come on!" they said. "Join the party!" This wasn't the first time I'd experienced this kind of Japanese hospitality, so I was glad to oblige. I took off my shoes and stood on the tarp. One man handed me a big glass of beer, and they all began to chant: "Ikki! Ikki! Ikki!" ("Chug it! Chug it! Chug it!") So I did. They refilled my glass: "Ikki! Ikki! Ikki!" I did. They handed me a third refill. I sat down and accepted a plate of goodies.
They seemed like a nice, fun-loving bunch of guys. I talked to them awhile in both English and Japanese. Like most natives I meet face to face, they seemed shocked I could speak Japanese at all. They were obviously drunk, but not threatening. One guy had his arm around my shoulders and proposed marriage, and we all laughed. We ate and drank and talked about American hobbies until the two sailors, forgotten until this point, began to get obnoxious. Despite the chill, they stripped off their shirts and began posing, showing off their tattoos--flaming skulls and anchors and military insignias (one guy even had the stereotypical "Mom" tattoo). Howling as they did so.
The first time, the Japanese applauded politely, but after the second and third time, the sailors' antics began to get old. The hosts got annoyed that the men were wearing their shoes on the tarp (a no-no), and asked me to tell them to knock it off. Like that would help. Finally, one of the hosts said, "Okay. You wanna see a tattoo? We'll show you a tattoo!"
Then the guy who'd been declaring his love to me all afternoon got up, stepped to the center of the tarp and stripped off his hapi coat. To display a gorgeous full-body tattoo from his neck to his thighs.
Aheh...
There are only two types of people who wear full-body tattoos like that, and I doubt this guy was a tattoo artist. I looked around and only then noticed the punch perms and the loud suits of the people not dressed in festival attire. Judging the rising amount of tension in the air, I decided to thank them for their hospitality, gracefully excuse myself and stagger off in search of slightly less excitement.
All Japan stories (c) Wendy Dinsmore 2004.