Since I recently returned from a visit to Aomori Prefecture, also known as Tsugaru, I was delighted to find an English translation of a book written by of one of that area’s prominent authors – Yojiro Ishizaka.  I didn’t pick up this book because I was familiar with its writer but because this area is also the hometown of my wife. It may seem a silly way to choose my reading material but I’ve been to Tsugaru often and my love for the place grows with every visit.

Although writers from Tsugaru are quite popular in Japan, only a few have been translated into English.  To give you an idea of how popular Ishizaka is in Japan, there are nearly 80 movies based on his works.

As translator Sawada mentions, most scholars focus on the writings of Osamu Dazai (also from Tsugaru) whose novels give a pessimistic image of Tsugaru, emphasizing the region’s poverty, rough weather, and lack of development.  Another writer from the area, Zenzo Kasai, also portrays Tsugaru in a rather bleak light. However, Ishizakal gives a perspective that’s quite opposite from the portrayals provided by Dazai or Kasai

In Ishizaka’s own words, “I myself do not want to be like Kasai or Dazai, who inflicted pain and sorrow on their families for the sake of their writing.  It is not commendable to ravage private lives for the purpose of drawing a good picture, composing great music, or producing superior literature.”

This is a collection of short stories all set near Ishizaka’s hometown of Hirosaki located in the Northeast of Japan’s main island of Honshu, the area also known as Tsugaru. All the stories are set in a time before the industrial revolution and center around the protagonist  Yuichi Makii, who is introduced in the first story as a sixth grade youth and son of the local doctor.

Yuiichi is excited about the upcoming Neputa Festival, which lasts for one week starting at the beginning of August.  Huge colorful floats parade through the streets while musicians play flutes accompanied by the loud sounds of a taiko drum.  However, the Neputa festival is only a backdrop to the story of Yuiichi’s friendship with the town prostitute Gen on whom Yuiichi has a crush.

Another story features Yuiichi’s first oyama sankei, a Tsugaru tradition of ascending Mount Iwaki, which is called the Mount Fuji of Tsugaru and is considered to be a sacred mountain.  At its base is Iwakiyama Jinja (Mount Iwaki Shrine), a national shrine the locals refer to as Oku Nikko (Nikko in the recesses). Yuichi intends to climb the mountain with a couple of his friends but things don’t go as he has planned. But not wanting to shame himself by going home after his parents had reluctantly consented to his going, he is determined to make the ascent.

Aomori Prefecture is full of interesting places.  There is a place called “Kirisuto no Haka” which translates to “Jesus’s Tomb.” (Yes, there really is such a place and yes, I have been there.)  So I was not surprised to find Yuichi traveling with a missionary and his assistant as they try to spread the word of Christ in Tsugaru.  I can still picture the missionary trying to explain the concept of Hell to the children of the village because most of the adults ignore his sermons—or the missionary getting angry at Yuichi for praying at a Shinto shrine and telling him he is not praying to the true God.

In the final story, a different character, also named Yuichi (but with the last name of Ida) returns to Tsugaru for the first time in ten years.  Although he’s been back on numerous occasions, it was usually only for a day or two and purely for business.  On this latest trip, he decides to stay for an extended period of time, planning to spend his days walking around town, meeting friends, taking naps. But after a week, he becomes bored and decides to visit the hot springs at Dake and spend the night at one of the inns.  While he is wandering around, he notices a woman who reminds him of his first visit to the hot springs.

As the title suggests, these stories are about the everyday life of growing up in Tsugaru: from participating in local festivals, to making a pilgrimage up a sacred mountain; fighting with rival neighborhood kids or trying to get in to a show free at the Yanagi theater.  These stories celebrate the joy of growing up in Tsugaru (Aomori Prefecture).

There is something special about reading stories set in places you have visited yourself.  On my latest excursion to Aomori, I went to the hot springs at Dake.  My first visit to a shrine for the New Year was at Mount Iwaki Shrine, and although the Neputa Festival is celebrated in August, there is a place called Neputa Mura in Hirosaki where you can check out the colorful floats and even try your hand at beating one of the large taiko drums.  With all these places still fresh in my mind, I felt as if I were reading my own diary, except all these stories are set in pre-industrial Japan.~Ernie Hoyt

This is a title for all those kids who were adoptees and may have faced having an identity crisis at one time or another from not knowing their biological parents.  Although I’m not an adoptee, I couldn’t pass up this book with its interesting title.  However, on a personal note, I met a friend of my sister’s who was going on her own around-the-world solo tour; one of her destinations was a small town in Korea.  Like the protagonist of this book, she also was an adoptee from Korea and decided to go in search of her roots.

Drummer Joseph Calderaro is one mixed-up kid!  Why is that you ask?  Because he has one serious problem.  Joseph is fourteen and is in the 8^th grade and his social studies teacher has just handed out an assignment to the class – to write an essay about your ancestors.

Since Joseph has an Italian-American family, this wouldn’t seem to be too much of a problem.  But he was adopted.  The only thing he knows about his biological parents is that “they shipped his diapered butt on a plane from Korea and he landed in New Jersey.”  How is an adopted Korean boy going to write about his family or ancestors he’s never met?

At home, for Joseph’s fourteenth birthday, his father has given him a Corno, a goat horn that Italian men wear for good luck.  His father explains that it’s to protect against malocchio, the “Evil Eye”.  However, Joseph shows no excitement and refuses to wear it.  He makes up some excuse for his father but really he feels that the guys in his class would think it’s weird. If they knew what a corno is, it probably meant that they’re Italian and would wonder why some Korean kid would be wearing this around his neck.  Ah, the trials and tribulations of adolescence.

Joseph’s friend Nash has a great idea.  He suggests to Joseph to look up his ancestors on the internet.  Joseph thought that might be easier than asking his parents for help.  His dad is not pleased with Joseph’s reaction to the corno and when he tries to talk with this mother about his adoption, she always breaks down in tears.  His parents had told him about the day he became part of the Calderaro family.  But what they never told him, was his “MBA – Me Before America”.  His mother had only told him, back when he was in the third grade, that his biological mother had named him Duk-kee and Park was added by the adoption agency.

While Joseph is still worried about writing his essay, the only thing his friend Nash discovers is that Pusan had a record rain fall on the day that Joseph was born.  Thinking of ways to expand his report to 1500 words, Joseph decides to head to his local library.  At the same time, he runs an errand for his mother, taking towels from his mother’s business, a hair salon called Shear Impressions, to the Jiffy Wash Laundry.  Joseph is surprised to find out the owners of Jiffy Wash have sold their business and will be moving to Florida.  He gets another surprise when the current owner mentions that the new owners are Korean!

There is also a new student at school who is in Joseph’s band class.  One look at the new boy and Joseph just knows that he is Korean too.  The following day Joseph is once again the “towel boy” for his mother and heads to Jiffy Wash.  As he opens the door there he runs into the new kid.  Joseph introduces himself and says that they’re in the same band class.  New Kid says his name is Yongsu Han.

When Yongsu calls his “Uhmma” and a Korean lady comes into the room, Joseph figures that “Uhmma” must mean Mom.  When Yongsu’s mother greets Joseph with “Ahn nyong has seh yoh?”, not only does it make Joseph feel a little insecure, he suddenly feels totally out of place.  It doesn’t help matters any when he’s asked if his mother is Korean.  Once he explains that he was adopted he feels like Yongsu’s mother sees him in a different light – a fake Korean who doesn’t speak or understand the language.  The only thing Joseph wants is to get the heck out of Jiffy Wash as fast as he can, but it also makes him want to know more about his Korean heritage.

Back home, Joseph looks through a book on Korean history that he borrowed from the library.  Although he becomes familiar with Korean history from the Yi Dynasty up until the Korean War, he can’t figure a way to making the history a part of his heritage.  Then he comes upon a picture of a man wearing a Gold Medal.  The caption says his name was Sohn Kee Chung who represented Japan during the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.

A light bulb goes off in Joseph’s head.  He now knows who and how he is  going to write that essay.  Joseph titles his essay “A Medal for Speed and a Life of Honor: My Grandpa Sohn”.  Little does he know, this little white lie will lead to an even bigger problem.  His teacher announces to the class that his essay was chosen to be entered in a National Essay contest!  What is Joseph going to do now?

But I wouldn’t want to spoil the entire story for those who may have had a similar experience.  I think this would be a great story for anyone who was adopted and suffers from having an identity crisis at one point in their life.  Joseph was lucky enough to become part of a loving family and yet, not knowing his heritage seems to have left a little hole in his life.  Although I am not an adoptee, I am the product of a mixed marriage and was brought up bi-culturally, so I can understand wanting to know my own family’s heritage.  Even if you are not an adoptee, it’s a very heartwarming story and you can’t help but feel for Joseph and his growing pains.

This is a Japanese text only of a graphic novel which has been adapted for the silver screen. It was also chosen as the 2009 Book of the Year by Da Vinci magazine.  The title translates into English as The Dog who Protects Stars, which means wanting something so badly but never being able to satisfy that desire, much like the image of a dog that continues to look longingly at the stars but will never able to grasp them.  (Although this is a manga, the story may be a bit difficult to follow by just looking at the pictures.)

The story starts off with the discovery of an abandoned car in a vast field of sunflowers.  In it, the police find the body of a man.  They also find another body which they at first think is a child but discover to be a dog.  What the police find strange though is that the body of the man has been dead for a year or and year and a half.  However, the dog has only been dead for about three months.

From here, the actual story begins as told through the point of view from the dog.  As a little puppy, the dog is left in a cardboard box.  If it wasn’t for a young girl who takes him home, he might not have survived.  She feeds him, washes him and asks her mother if she can keep him.  Mother says to ask father, so in the meantime, she lets the dog sleep in a basket where they keep their linen.  Dad first meets the dog by getting bitten when he goes to grab a towel.  But even after this beginning, the dog becomes a part of the family.  The daughter who first brought the puppy home names him Happy, plays with him and feeds him delicious treats from time to time.  Mother provides his meals and discipline when he does something bad, but it’s always Father who takes Happy for a walk.

A year passes.  Everyone becomes a little older.  Happy tells us he has aged about seven years.  Happy notices little changes in the family, but Miku the daughter still plays with him,  Mother still feeds him, and Father still takes him for walks.  A few more years pass and the changes become even more noticeable to Happy.  Miku no longer plays with him, lately it’s Father who feeds him but the one thing that doesn’t change is Father taking him for a walk.  But before, Father would always take Happy for a walk late in the day.  These days, Father takes him for a walk around noon.  Happy also notices that they take a different route but the biggest difference Happy notices is that Father doesn’t talk as much as he used to It will be you, the reader, who realizes that Father has lost his job and is also suffering from some illness as the picture in the background shows Father visiting an employment agency and going to the hospital.

More unfortunate news awaits Father when he returns home.  His wife asks for a divorce.  Now Father has no job, no family, no home.  He’s left with a bit of money after the divorce, but his only companion is Happy.

Father says to Happy, “The hell with it, let’s go South.  That’s where my hometown is. Not that there is anything left there.”  And so they are off on a road trip.  Along the way, they meet a homeless boy who becomes their companion for a short while.  The next thing Father knows, the boy has stolen his wallet.  Although, he says to Happy, he’s not really mad about the boy stealing but that they boy didn’t have the humility to ask for help.

Tragedy strikes on their journey.  Happy falls sick.  Father rushes Happy to the nearest vet and pleads with the veterinarians to keep his friend alive. Father sells whatever remains of his belongings and manages to save Happy.  They continue on their journey but run out of gas and money in a vast field of sunflowers.  Father finally succumbs to a sleep he never wakes up from.  Happy lives on and thinks he sees Miku, Mother and Father at a campground and runs to meet them only to be beaten on the head with a stick.  Happy slowly crawls back to where Father is, says he’s tired too and passes away.

Then the story comes back to where it started.  The finding of a body and a dog in an abandoned car in a field of sunflowers.   There is no identification on the body, the license plate of the car is missing, the vehicle identity number has been scratched off.  Finding out who this John Doe is the job of a case worker.  If the man’s identity cannot be discovered, the body will be cremated and the ashes placed in an urn for the unclaimed.  Okutsu-san, the case worker for this job thought it would be a simple matter until he finds a receipt for goods bought at a store.  According to the law, it’s his duty to investigate the matter and so begins Okutsu-san’s own journey on retracing Father and Happy’s steps.

What it comes down to is this–a story about life and all its obstacles, good and bad; of love and loyalty between pet and owner, making us remember why dogs are considered “man’s best friend”.  Although the lives of Father and Happy end in death, who’s to say if they were happy or not. Father and Happy had each other.  They didn’t need anything else.  Truly, a wonderful story that will make you laugh and weep, and wonder about the homeless boy who stole Father’s wallet.  This is the end of one story; however, Happy has a brother…–Ernie Hoyt

Although our blog is titled “Asia by the Book”, I have decided to go against the grain and review a magazine.  But this isn’t just any magazine.  This is the first English language version of a popular Japanese literary magazine called Monkey Business, created in 2008 and named after a line in a Chuck Berry tune.  The Monkey Business Manifesto states that “Monkey Business is a newly founded journal of new writing from Japan and abroad with a few not-so-new works strategically slipped in.”  It’s my belief that literary magazines deserve as much attention as novels as they are usually full of short stories, novellas, poems, and reviews of upcoming titles.

Published by A Public Space, also a literary journal, Monkey Business is edited by Ted Goossen, translator of Japanese publications into English, and Motoyuki Shibata, known for his Japanese translations of contemporary authors such as Thomas Pynchon, Steve Millhauser and Paul Auster to name a few.  This issue is a compilation of pieces from the magazine’s first year in publication which are now translated into English, including short stories, essays, poems, manga, interviews and more.  Goosen and Shibata do not limit their pieces to Japanese writers, they also feature a few foreign writers as well.

A highlight of this first issue is an interview with popular author and 2010 nominee for the Nobel prize in literature, Haruki Murakami conducted by novelist Hideo Furukawa in 2008, a winner of the Japan Mystery Writers Association Prize and SF Grand Prize for his novel Arabia.  The interview starts off with the two authors discussing writing and where they get their ideas. It follows with Furukawa asking Murukami why he decided to live abroad, about his time spent in the U.S. and writing The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, his return to Japan and writing his first non-fiction book about the Aum Doomsday Cult and sarin gas subway attack.  They also talk about first- versus third- person narrations.  Any fan of Murakami’s works won’t want to miss out on this interview.

One of my favorite stories from this compilation is Sandy’s Lament – from The Memoirs of the Sramana Wujing by Atsukshi Nakajima.  This was part of a series of stories based on the Chinese novel Journey to the West by Wu Cheng’en which in turn is loosely based on a true story about a monk named Tripataka and his journey to bring back Buddhist scripture from India.  For you trivia buffs and otaku, you may be surprised to know a popular manga series was also based on Journey to the West – Akira Toriyama’s Dragonball!  In the original story, Tripitaka has three companions – Sun Wukong (alias Monkey), Zhu Bajie (alias Pig), and Xia Wujing (alias Sandy).  In the Japanese translation, Sandy would be a kappa, a water spirit.  This short story is narrated by Sandy as he wonders why he and his two companions continue to follow Tripitaka.

The manga in this issue is A Country Doctor by the Brother and Sister Nishioka and based on a story by Franz Kafka.  In keeping with original Japanese style, the manga is read from left to right which means you have to skip ahead a few pages and read the story in descending pages.  There are also poems by Mina Ishikawa, The Sleep Division; Minoru Ozawa, Monkey Haiku; Shion Mizuhara, Monkey Tanka; Masayo Koike, When Monkeys Sing all translated by Ted Goossen, and short stories by Yoko Ogawa, Koji Uno, and Sachiko Kishimoto.

If your only exposure to contemporary Japanese authors has been to Yukio Mishima, Natsume Soseki, Yasunari Kawabata, Shusaku Endo, or Junichiro Tanizaki, then this literary journal will open your eyes to a whole new world.  Be the first of your Japanophile friends to know who the next up- and- coming literary geniuses are and enjoy some new fiction!  The English language version is currently planned as an annual but as more people become familiar with it, perhaps Shibata and Goossen will turn it into a quarterly.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed.–by Ernie Hoyt

I admit my title of choice may seem to be in poor taste because of the current nuclear power plant crisis in Fukushima Prefecture, but I assure you, this book was released long before March 11’s 9.0 magnitude earthquake and the tsunami which caused the nuclear disaster.  First published in 2006, this is a collection of essays that British national May wrote while serving as a visiting professor of philosophy at Tokyo University.  As the professor says in his own words when he was unexpectedly invited to teach, his first thoughts were – “The Sushi!”

First of all, we must acknowledge that Japan’s bastion of education – Tokyo University or Todai as it’s locally known—is one of the most prestigious and also the most difficult to enter of all Japanese educational institutions.  It is considered the training ground of Japan’s bureaucrats, the elite of the elite, a closed system that’s virtually impossible to penetrate, especially for foreigners.  May informs us that he was “…apparently the first British professor of philosophy since 1882.”

Since May becomes a part of this elite for the duration of his stay, I must admit that the ordinary traveler and even long standing expats would not be able to experience some of his adventures which were arranged by some of the Todai elites who befriended him.  We are given a glimpse into private “amusement” parlours (you will have to use your imagine as to what you can expect to see there), exclusive sushi shops, luxurious ryokan (Japanese inns) and  kaiseki dining with its price tag  at about $1000 a feast.

What I found most interesting were May’s dealings with the Tokyo University administrators before he was even allowed to teach.  He was expecting a warm welcome but found himself in bureaucratic hell, “…administrators began by demanding that I sign a declaration promising to be a loyal and honourable servant of the Japanese state.”  This seems rather reasonable, however he was soon burdened with further requests: “I needed health tests to certify that my body fluids were unobjectionable and my body solids in good order, a declaration from my landlady about my accommodation costs, a certificate proving that I had attended primary school, a document registering me as an alien, and a diagram to illustrate the exact route I intended to take when traveling from home to university, and then from home to university again.”  It’s an ominous start to his  life in Tokyo.

To illustrate May’s brush with bureaucratic red tape in more detail, you only need to read his response to one of the endless enquiries he had to endure – “When I replied by pointing out that in Britain there is no certifying authority that exists for the purpose of certifying that something is impossible to certify, they asked me to state this with a certificate, certified by myself.”  Perhaps those bureaucrats have just a little too much time on their hands.

However, not all of May’s essays are about the Japanese elite or their exclusive clubs.  He also writes about what he sees: things that may seem ordinary to the average Japanese but strange to most foreigners.  He observes people sleeping while standing or sitting on the trains for their commute home but having the uncanny ability to wake from their slumber at their stop.  He witnesses a man rubbing up his knees against a young girl and wonders what to do; groping in trains is a major problem in Japan which hardly ever makes the news.  May also attends and describes a Japanese wedding and a Japanese funeral—and as I have also been a participant in both, I can tell you it is nothing like what you would expect in the States. But you will have to read this book to find out just how different it is.

This is a must read for any Japanophile.  It will make you laugh, it will make you cry, it will make you want to visit Japan on your own as well.  Even expats will find this amusing – I should know, as I belong to that particular group.~Ernie Hoyt

As I was walking to work the other day, I couldn’t help but notice the poster for a forthcoming film that would soon be shown at my local theater, a Korean remake of a John Woo classic –A Better Tomorrow.  Sometime in the mid to late 80s, a friend introduced me to the world of Hong Kong cinema.  This was long before John Woo or Chow Yun Fat became popular in the United States, back when the only opportunity to see Hong Kong films was at small independent theaters that would have Hong Kong film festivals from time to time.  This particular film was probably my first exposure to Hong Kong action movies and after one viewing I was hooked.

But this book isn’t just a film review, it is a critical analysis of the New Hong Kong Cinema and its impact on the film industry at home and abroad.   It explains its rise along with the globalization of film, which both occurred over the same period between the mid 80s and late 90s.

Before this movie was released, John Woo was known as a director of romantic comedies while Chow Yun Fat had the lead role in some movies but was known mostly for the TV soap operas he appeared in.   However, with the release of this film, it became one of the highest-grossing the year of its release and shot John Woo and Chow Yun Fat to superstar fame.  This film also sparked a new genre – the action/crime film, or yingxiong pian which translates to a “hero” movie, which the West described as “heroic bloodshed”.

For those of you unfamiliar with the movie, the plot centers around three main characters – Sung Ji-Ho played by Ti Lung, Mark Gor, or Brother Mark, played by Chow Yun Fat, and Kit played by Leslie Cheung (a very popular pop idol at the time).  Sung Ji-Ho is a successful criminal who built his empire upon counterfeiting.  Brother Mark is his loyal partner.  Kit is Ho’s younger brother who is a cadet in the police academy and does not know that his older brother is involved in criminal activities. On a business trip to Taipei, Ho is framed for a crime he didn’t commit. He eludes the police, however, in order to protect his younger brother and Mark, he decides to turn himself in but insists that a rookie member of his gang, Shing, should escape.  The following day Mark makes a trip to Taipei to avenge Ho and kills most of those responsible but is shot and crippled in the leg.

Ho spends the next three years in prison with hardly any contact with Kit or Mark.  Kit, who learns of his brother’s criminal activities, trains even harder with the police force.  When Ho is released and tries to reach out to Kit by telling his younger brother that he has gone straight, Kit shuns him.  However, Mark is overjoyed at being reunited with his friend and suggests taking revenge on Shing, whom they have discovered was the one who betrayed them.  They plan to do this by exposing Shing to the police and to help Kit advance in his career and to prove that Ho has indeed gone straight.

Everything goes as planned but comes at a really high cost.  Mark is killed but before he dies, he chastises Kit for not recognizing the love Ho has for him.  In the end, Kit goes against police regulations and lets his brother kill Shing.  Ho wants to do right by his younger brother so he handcuffs himself to Kit and returns to police custody.

Getting back to the core of the book, Fang describes the different ways in which the film was received by its home audience and its global prominence as well.  In Hong Kong when the film was first released in 1986, it became a record-breaking blockbuster.  The original title in Mandarin is Yingxiong bense or in Cantonese Yinghuhng bunsik which translates to True Colors of Valor or The Essence of Heroes, suggesting that the plot is about chivalry, family ties, loyalty, and honor.  However, with the international English title of A Better Tomorrow, the foreign press suggested that the movie was politically influenced by Hong Kong’s forthcoming return to China.

However, I’m not one for analyzing movies in minute detail.  If it entertains me, then the movie has served its purpose.  After watching this film, I found myself becoming biased, feeling as if these yingxiong pian films made Hollywood action movies seem like Disney productions.  If this film excites you as much as it did me, you will find yourself becoming a fan of John Woo’s other Hong Kong action films which also star Chow Yun Fat such as Hard Boiled, The Killer, and Bullet in the Head.

I may have to make a trip to my local DVD rental store to watch these all over again.  And of course I look forward to seeing the Korean remake as well.~Ernie Hoyt

I have a standard New Year’s Resolution that hasn’t changed in the past few years.  My goal is to read at least one hundred books.  This year, I have also added to my resolution to read more books in Japanese.  Before you drop your jaws in awe, I must admit, this includes photography books, children’s books, graphic novels, and literary magazines.  But do you ever find yourself between books and can’t decide what to read next?  It’s at times like this when books full of essays about  books come in handy.

For English publications, there’s always the New York Times Bestseller list but I much prefer Nick Hornby’s column, Stuff I’ve Read,  in the Believer, (http://www.believermag.com/)because it has more eclectic offerings.  His book essays have also been collected into three series of books.

However, not being too familiar with the kinds of title that I might find interesting in Japanese, I discovered this title, Boku no ii hon, kou iu hon, which  translates to My Favorite Books are Books Like These. The essays are arranged into eight sections with chapter titles such as “Books for women are not yet an adult but not a child”, “Books that lit the fire of my wanderlust”, “Literature as a friend”, “Books for people who want to live romantically” and of course a chapter is featured with the main title of the book – “My favorite books are books like these.”

Yataro Matsuura is the editor-in-chief of a magazine called Kurashi no Techo which translates to Notes on Living.  He also owns a book store and is a writer.  He got his start in the book business in 1994 by re-selling foreign magazines.  In 2000, he started a mobile (on wheels) book shop and finally in 2003 opened Cow Books,  which according to the website, “specializes in out-of- print books focusing on the 60s and 70s social movements, progressive politics, Protest, the Beat Generation, and first editions of forgotten modern authors.”

His book is the first volume of a collection of his book essays that he has written for magazines. As I read it, I discovered that Matsuura’s taste in books is similar to my own.  He features a vast array of visual books including photography, art, design and interior decoration, children’s books, cookbooks (which are more than just books with recipes) and a lot of books and zines published by small independent presses.

Since this is a Japanese book, Matsuura also features English titles translated into Japanese.  Some of his favorite authors seem to be Jack Kerouac, Richard Brautigan, and Paul Auster.  Kerouac’s Japanese translation of On the Road was a life- changing book for him.  Shortly after reading it, Matsuura became inspired to travel across the USA as well, even though he had no plans on what he was going to do once he got there.  Reading these essays has perked my interest in reading those authors as well (even if a lot of people say On the Road is overrated).

One of the books Matsuura features and which captured my interest is Chairo no Asa or Brown Morning. (I discovered that the original was a French book titled Matin Brun by Franck Pavloff, with  new art by Vincent Gallo for the Japanese edition.  I may have to look for an English edition of that book.)  I also want to go in search of a Japanese children’s book titled Yakareta Sakana or The Grilled Fish, about a grilled fish lying on a white plate yearning to go back to the sea.

Before reading Matsuura, I was between books and couldn’t decide what to read next; now he’s given me so many more titles to choose from that it makes selecting the next book just as difficult!  Perhaps I should read the second volume of Matsuura’s book of book essays before choosing another title?~by Ernie Hoyt

This book is available only in Japanese.

What’s the first thing that comes to your mind when you’re asked about Japanese cuisine?  The most obvious answer is found in the title above; I imagine most people would say “sushi”.  But Booth hasn’t written a guide book to sushi and the best places to eat it.  Look at the “& Beyond” and know that there is going to be more than sushi involved in Booth’s exploration of Japanese cookery.

The book starts out with a conversation Booth has with a friend at a restaurant in Normandy called Sa.Qua.Na—but to call this a conversation is a bit tame, Booth trades insults with Toshi, a half-Japanese, half-Korean man who is his fellow-student at the Paris Cordon Bleu.  Booth lightly compares the food of Sa.Qua.Na’s chef to that of Japan’s, knowing that the chef had worked in Japan for a few years.  This sets Toshi off, saying, “What you know about Japan food?  You think you know anything about Japan food?  Only in Japan!  You can not taste it here in Europe.  This man is nothing like Japan food.  Where is tradition?  Where is season?  Where is meaning?…”

Booth’s retort was just as impassioned, if not a bit juvenile – “I know enough about it to know how dull it is…What have you got?  Raw fish, noodles, deep-fried vegetables – and you stole all that from that from Thailand, the Chinese, the Portuguese.  Doesn’t matter though, does it?  You just dunk it in soy sauce and it all tastes the same, right?  Ooh, don’t tell me, cod sperm and whale meat.  Mmm, gotta get me some of those.”

I was beginning to wonder if this was going to be an interesting book after all but my worries were put to rest.  After these two adversaries graduate, Toshi gives Booth a book entitled “Japanese Cooking : A Simple Art” by Shizuo Tsuji.  After reading this, Booth decides to head over to the Land of the Rising Sun to see what all the fuss is about.

His plan is to try a bit of everything there is to eat, from Hokkaido to Okinawa, taking his wife and two young kids with him. Their first stop of course is Tokyo where they rent a small apartment and venture into the culinary heart of Japan in Shinjuku’s famous “Shoben Yokocho.” This translates to “Piss Alley” and it is full of small yakitori shops. Here Booth finds more than just chicken breast on skewers—there’s nankotsu (cartilage), bonjiri (chicken butt), hatsu (chicken hearts).  They go to Ryogoku, Tokyo’s home to sumo wrestlers and also home to an array ofchanko nabe (one- pot stews) shops run and owned by former sumo wrestlers.  Booth interviews Japan’s top chefs and checks out a few restaurants that many Japanese cannot get a reservation to enter. But this isn’t what he really wants. He yearns to make some Japanese dishes for himself and then eat them.

In order to reach this goal, Booth signs up for a couple of cooking classes and also takes a tour of Japan’s two top cooking schools.  The Ecole de Cuisine et Nutrition Hattori, run by Dr Yukio Hattori in the Kanto area which encompasses Tokyo, and the Tsuji Culinary Institute which was founded by the author of “Japanese Cooking” – Shizuo Tsuji— and is currently run by his son in the Kansai area.

But Booth can’t mention sushi without taking a tour of Japan’s busiest fish market – Tsukiji.  He fills us in on the seafood of Hokkaido, the fugu (puffer fish) of Shimonoseki, Kobe beef, wagyu, and how miso is made. He takes a tour of one of Kikkoman’s factories that makes soy sauce, discusses the controversy surrounding MSG, checks out the food- stall culture of Fukuoka in Kyushu, dines on a kaiseki meal in Kyoto and even manages to dine at the extra- exclusive, members- only restaurant called Mibu, “the place that made Joel Robuchon weep and humbled Ferran Adria.”

Anyone who claims to be a “foodie” or a gourmand and sees those two names in the same sentence is definitely going to want to read this book…and will enjoy it.  I know I did!~by Ernie Hoyt

This book is available only in Japanese.

WARNING!  This book may cause extreme hunger if read on an empty stomach!

In my opinion, one of the joys of life is eating dessert!  And because my favorite dessert just happens to be cheesecake, I had to read this book, with its title easily translated into English as “A Cheesecake Journey”.  Yuriko Yamamoto is a graduate of the Kagawa Nutrition University who moves to Paris and continues her studies at the prestigious Ritz Escoffier School and Le Cordon Bleu. There she receives Le Grand Diplome, and continues to hone her skills at Michelin three- star restaurants and hotels.  Having spent many years living in France, Yuriko has the opportunity to travel throughout Europe.  Although she always assumed that cheesecake was an American dessert, as she journeys to different countries, she finds that almost every country has their own style of cheesecake and cheese-filled desserts.

First she takes us to the country where cheesecake originated – Greece.  It may come as a shock to us Americans, but the first mention of cheesecake in history was served to the athletes in the first- ever Olympic games, long before our nation was even considered a country. There elderly Greek women tell Yuriko that if she wants cheesecake in Greece, she should come three weeks before Apokries (Carnival) in which the third week is called “Cheese Week”.  Before leaving Greece, Yamamoto purchases a book and reads that in Crete, they make a cheese similar to the ricotta cheese of Italy and that they also make cheesecake there as well.  Perhaps Crete should be her next destination, she decides.

However, instead she finds herself traveling through the Russian Federation and Central and Eastern Europe.  This is where the heart of the book truly shines as she features full color pictures of the cheesecakes and cheese- related desserts she comes across.

This book reads more like an illustrated guide to the cheesecakes of Europe.  We are introduced to the Polish sernik polski, the Bulgarian banitsa, Russian blinisand paskha, Austrian topfenrouladen, just to name a few—including dishes made with the dessert cheese,mascarpone.  And of course, since Yuriko lived in France, much of her book is filled with recipes from that country.

Once you’ve had your fill of this book, you may want to treat yourself to a nice big slice of New York- style cheesecake, perhaps with a raspberry or blueberry sauce topping.  As for me, well, there is the “Cheesecake Factory” in my neighborhood that features an all-you-can-eat buffet…of cheesecakes!  I kid you not. There goes my diet.~Ernie Hoyt

If I were to translate the title of this book into English, it would be “The Lonely Noodle Shop [Eguchi]”.  If I were to directly translate the title into English, it would be “The Lonely Chinese Noodle Shop [Eguchi]”.  However, the shop is neither lonely, nor does it feature Chinese noodles.  It’s a small neighborhood ramen shop.  Of course there will be those who would argue that ramen is a Chinese noodle but we will leave that debate for another time.

This book is the culmination of a previously out of print book that featured the ramen shop [Eguchi] which was originally published in 1984 and had the extremely long title of 「近くへ行きたい。秘境としての近所―舞台は“江ぐち”とゆうラーメン屋」which translates to something like “I want to go near (or “I don’t want to go far”), an unexplored region of my neighborhood, the stage is a ramen shop called “Eguchi.”  With a title as long as that, it’s no wonder the book went out of print.

If you live in Japan, you will discover there seems to be an infinite number of ramen shops to choose from.  There may be thousands in Tokyo alone.  Unlike the versions found in the States, a lot of the ramen shops have only a counter space with a maximum capacity for maybe ten people.  Some are located in residential areas, or as the original title suggests, in an unexplored region of a neighborhood.  This is the story of just one of them – a ramen shop called Eguchi,the people who work there, the regular customers, including Kusumi himself and his friends who gather there for drinks and snacks.  And of course it’s about the ramen as well.

So why has this book just been reprinted twenty-six years after its first incarnation?  When Kusumi was 26, he was not yet into his third year as a manga artist working for a magazine called “Garo” in which he also had a regular column.  He wrote about his neighborhood ramen shop in three consecutive issues of Garo, one of his editors really enjoyed the pieces, and suggested he write a book about that particular ramen shop, Eguchi.  So he did, without the consent of the ramen shop or staff, giving them pseudonyms that he came up with–Onigawara (Ogre), Akuma (Satan), and Takuya (because Takuya looked like his younger brother, also named Takuya).  He imagined their lives and their personalities, but what he was most detailed about was the layout of the ramen shop, the ramen itself, as well as the three employees who seemed to work on a rotating basis there.

He also wrote about his friends who would join him for a bowl of ramen or a beer at Eguchi–his college senpai (older classmate) who was two years older than he was, his childhood buddy, his high school classmate,  and an older high school friend. He fills us in on other regulars whom he and his friends give nicknames to, such as “the man with the big hair” or the part-time worker they called Okami-san (Matron), and the man they thought might be the owner Tadanao Eguchi, (they were not sure how to read the kanji of his name and if he was the owner or not), who didn’t work at the shop but always brought the freshly made noodles.  Kusumi writes in detail about the way Onigawara, Akuma, and Takuya prepare their ramen, saying sometimes the flavor could be hit or miss, that one bowl was never quite the same as the next.  The book includes rough sketches of the shop as well as caricatures of all the people involved.

But the book didn’t keep Kusumi from remaining a regular customer there.  With a bit of fear and trepidation, he returned to his favorite neighborhood ramen shop time and time again.  Not once did any of the three staff members  ever mention anything about what he had written.

And now for the reason why the book has been reprinted.  Kusumi, now in his forties and no longer living in the neighborhood, still treated himself to a bowl of ramen at Eguchi whenever his work or time allowed him to visit his old neighborhood.  The final half of the book was compiled from blog pieces that he wrote between the ages of 42 and 51, relating to his favorite place to eat ramen. The biggest news was in the final piece– after having been open for business for twenty-six years, Eguchi was closing its doors for good at the end of January, 2010.  It seems the owner had passed away in his bathtub and there was no one to renew the contract for the shop.

This is as much fun to read as any piece of fiction, (well, admittedly the stories in the beginning of the book behind the main characters who ran the ramen shop were a product of Kusumi’s imagination), filled with the undeniable love Kusumi had for this shop and its ramen, and the people who made it.

After moving to Tokyo, I too had my favorite haunts where I was also welcomed as a regular customer.  Even if I ventured out on my own, I would always find a friend or acquaintance either eating or drinking at one of the places I frequented.  However, unlike Kusumi, I usually became friends with the manager or owner of the establishments I went to.  Americans might have a hard time understanding the intricacies of becoming a regular at a small joint but it does give you a peek into a lesser known part of the Japanese culture.  マスター、付けといて！(Master,put it on my bill!)~by Ernie Hoyt

This book has been published in Japanese text only.