Arrive Without Travelling.

Back in the 90s, I lived in Tokyo for more than six years. It has now been over twenty‑five years since I last visited, but last week I spent some time there again. It turned into a kind of nostalgia trip, revisiting old neighbourhoods and re‑walking streets I once knew intimately. Not in real life, but using a mouse and keyboard, I tracked down the places where I lived, worked, and simply spent time.

The house I lived in for most of those years has gone, replaced by a skyscraper. The flat I moved into after that is still there, although it took me a while to find it. The neighbourhood is not laid out as I remember it, yet the buildings do not look new enough to have been built in the past fifty years, so I suspect that is memory at work. The flat I lived in after that has also gone, replaced by newer apartments.

The buildings where I worked are all still standing. One of the companies is now out of business, and my former office is used for something else. The other two offices remain, but the company later reduced its footprint, so they are no longer occupied by my ex‑employer.

I also looked up restaurants, places I used to visit with friends. All my favourites seem to have disappeared, although I did find some of the ones I visited less regularly. The same goes for shops. Many are different now, though some areas have retained their feel, while others are barely recognisable.

The pockets of Old Tokyo have gone. Even then they were small pockets, but places that had remained largely unchanged since the 1950s. Dark wooden buildings, tatami floors, sliding paper doors. I lived in one of them for four years and feel privileged to have done so. There were times it felt magical, moments when it seemed I had been transported into the past. Times I will never be able to revisit.

Societies move on. Cities develop, change, and adapt. The old is no longer always practical, and I understand that. I really do. And yet the pull of nostalgia is strong.

If I could visit Old Tokyo, the Tokyo I knew, just for one day, I would be over the moon.

All I Have is a Photograph.

I lived in Japan in the 90s for more than a few years.

A wonderful experience, and a wonderful memory. And yet quite surreal in many ways.

Sometimes I feel as though I slipped sideways into a version of the country that barely exists anymore. Not the neon one in travel blogs, not the tourist one with noh masks, nor the pop culture one with cosplay, rock and roll dancers in Yoyogi kōen, and bosozoku revving through late night intersections.

I experienced all that, of course, but when I think of Japan, I think of the quieter one, the hidden one. The Japan behind the façades and the polite masks, where old timber creaked in the night and even the dust seemed to belong.

I lived as part of a Japanese family in a traditional wooden house. Dark beams, paper sliding doors, tatami floors that whispered gently when you walked across them. It wasn’t musty, exactly, but it had that old Japan smell; a kind of gentle stillness baked into the timber. My father‑in‑law was a woodcarver who sat cross‑legged downstairs and created objects, decorations, and statues for temples. Real temples and shrines. It felt like living inside history, and I felt honoured, as though I was trusted with something sacred.

Next door was a tiny karaoke bar. The sort of place where the mama‑san fussed over the patrons while pouring brandies, where last trains were missed and salarymen sang enka with more emotion than melody. Younger people sang pop songs, trying to sound like their idols. Occasionally someone would take a run at an English song. The bar only had five in total; I know this because I sang only four of them. There was no way I was going to stand on a stage and sing the fifth, Happy Birthday to You.

The whole neighbourhood was like that. A little worn, a little out of time, and full of stories that didn’t need telling because everyone already knew them. It was home. I knew my neighbours and they knew me. I walked those streets and, for a few years, felt like I belonged.

I looked it up on the internet recently. I felt saddened to see that much of it has gone. The house, the bar, most of the block. New high‑rise apartments stand where those memories resided. Memories that now live on only through those of us who belonged.

But beyond the memories, there’s something else that survived because I took it with me.

One night in the karaoke bar, I went to the men’s room. High up on the old-fashioned cistern, far higher than anyone would naturally put anything, I noticed the tiniest corner of something white. I reached up, stretched, and managed to get hold of it.

A small, laminated photograph. Black and white. About four centimetres across.

On the back, a rubber stamp of a figure; some kanji and other characters within. No date. Nothing else.

The image itself was strange. A person in darkness, just the arms and part of the chest visible beneath, a burst of light obliterating their entire shoulders and head. It's as if someone had taken the photo just as their flash went off. Or a self-portrait with an instamatic. No other clues. Just a frozen moment with the context missing.

I remember standing there for a long moment, wondering what it was. Why it was there. Who had put it up so high. Whether it had been hidden or forgotten. Whether it was meant to be found. Whether I should leave it where it was.

For reasons I still don’t understand, I kept it.

A few weird things happened around me in the weeks that followed, and I briefly wondered if I’d pocketed something I shouldn’t have; a charm, a curse, a joke, a ritual object misplaced by accident or design. Or was it something else. Maybe the owner came back for it and wondered where it had gone. Or, in some weird kind of way, was it left there, intended for me.

I’ll never know.

Life moved on, the curse faded, I left Japan, and thirty‑five years passed. I haven’t thought about the photo for a long time. Four or five years, at least. But this morning, out of nowhere, it surfaced in my mind, clear as it ever was. Quietly. As if it had returned to that karaoke bar waiting for me to once more notice its corner, patient and unchanged, just biding its time in the shadows.

I still have it, that small, laminated square. One of the last surviving fragments from a life that now feels dreamlike, slightly unreal, as though I lived it in someone else’s memory, or passed through a room I was never meant to enter.

I do wonder if the photo remembers more than I do. If that captured burst of light held something I was too far outside the culture to understand at the time. If the event it froze now exists only inside that tiny frame, sealed away. If even the players and the photographer have long forgotten the moment it came from, vanishing into the years and leaving the photograph, and me, as the final interpreter of an undeciphered moment no longer anchored to anything or anywhere.

It’s strange, the things that choose not to stay with us. And stranger still, the things that do.

Lost in Translation?

During the 90s, I lived in Tokyo for around six years in total. First for one year, then after a year back in Australia, back for another five.

It was a great experience, a wonderful time to be in Japan. I made a lot of friends, working with teachers from around the world. We worked all day, socialised after work, and mostly got on very well. There were a lot of transients, young people working to make money to fund the next leg of their adventure, but there were also those we considered "lifers".

Those were the days before the internet was a thing, and so sadly I never really managed to keep in contact with many of my friends.

The last school I worked at was the exception. It was a small Berlitz school in Shimo-Kitazawa, and the core staff there hardly changed for the four years I was there. For the most part, we're all still in touch, and some of us have even caught up occasionally.

Last night I was feeling nostalgic, trying to remember names and faces, and wondering what happened to them all. I'm sure I have photos, but unfortunately most of them are currently in storage.

My first teaching job was with Nova in Otsuka, a suburb of Tokyo near Ikebukuro. I worked with Susan, a Canadian, and Heidi and Tim - both Americans. I am still in touch with Heidi, but I do wonder what happened to Tim and Susan. (and yes, I recall their family names).

I don't remember many students there. There was one lady who I think was a reporter, and a trained opera singer. One night I convinced her to sing. She only let one, short note out, but it was intense and I remember the office staff all jumping and looking up. She also managed to get me tickets to the filming of Naruhodo The World, a TV show hosted by Beat Takeshi.

Another student was a huge fan of Mr Big, and gave me one of their CD singles when I left. Another gave me a cassette tape of the Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra. I hope you're still enjoying your music. 

When I returned a year later, I started working at Nova in Ueno. That is where I met the Doctor, a good friend who remains in contact. We even manage to catch up every couple of years and hang out. But I lost touch with all the others there. (Canadians) Doug and Sean. (New Zealander) Mel. (Americans) Rick, Dan, Brett. (English) Sian, Ed, Elizabeth(?). (Australian) Harold. There was a Japanese-American guy whose name (I think) might have been John. And many others. All good people, all fun.

What became of you all?

I moved to another Nova school for a short time. I think it might have been Okachimachi - very close to Ueno. I only remember one teacher there. I think she was Australian, and her name may have been Lisa.

I hope you're well.

After that I moved to Berlitz at Shimo-Kitazawa. As I said, I am still in touch with many of the teachers there, and one student. But during training, and visiting other schools, I got to know many more. There was the lady who spent a year living in a tepee and dealing drugs in a previous life, Larry - a keen photographer, and John, whose sister was a famous comedienne in Australia. Paul from South Africa, Juliet from the US, Chris from Canada, Oliver who loved cycling, and a few others.

Wouldn't it be great to catch up and reminisce?

And then so many students. Many of these I remember. Kumiko, who was embarrassed when she gave me giri-chocolate. The TV director, who gave me ringside seats to the Sumo and went to America to study film-making. The husband and wife dentist team, the two lovely ladies who took me out for lunch when they heard I was leaving. So many whose first names I forget. Many of these I remember their family names, but I'm leaving those off this page.

Ah what a time it was. And if you remember me from Tokyo days, whether through language schools or elsewhere, please get in touch. It would be wonderful to hear from you.

Be A God.

"If you want to succeed at writing, you make it happen."

We're sitting in a restaurant on the banks of the Bosphorus. We're in Turkey, in Europe. Across the river, less than a kilometre away is still Turkey, but it's in Asia. There is a gap in the land opposite, the entrance to the Black Sea. Ships emerge and enter at regular intervals. I sip my beer again, as Erdal continues.

"You're a writer. I'm a writer. We're gods. You're writing, and you need a town." He mimics typing. "You create one. You need a person. You create one. You don't like someone." More typing. "You kill them."

We pause. I'm thinking. Erdal is drinking his raki.

"You want to be a successful writer? Be a god. Make it happen."

I first met Erdal Güven in Japan twenty years ago when he was the Asian Bureau Chief for The Hurriyet. We soon became good friends. I have fond memories of evenings spent in his company in the streets of Tokyo. Since then he has become a respected author, both fiction and non-fiction, in his homeland.  We lost touch for a few years, but reconnected. And now I'm in Istanbul, we're catching up.

"You want it? You write it. It's all up to you."

My wife nods sagely. I'm still deep in thought.

"But it's not that easy," I counter.

"It is that easy, and that difficult," he says. "After all, it's only words."

Eight Miles High.

While there are some of us who don’t even like the thought of getting on a plane for long hauls, I’m someone who really enjoys those flights. Maybe I just don’t get on planes often enough, but I take great delight in checking-in, boarding and then being seated. I know the thought of reaching my destination excites me, but so does the flight. And then I really start to relax once the announcements start. I have a relative who flies a lot on business, and I’m sure he would disagree with me.

Simply going to an airport is exciting enough. I’m always happy to go even just to drop someone off or pick someone up.  They are exciting places – the hustle and bustle, the international-ness (it’s a word now, OK?) of it all, people excited about going, excited about meeting those who have been away – just the whole atmosphere.

But to be the one who is actually getting on the flight is just awesome.

I love reading the in-flight magazine (Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine should sign a deal to get that publication on flights), the choice of channels and films, the computer games, the drinks and even the food. Then there’s the rumble of the engines, the increase in force as the machine hurtles down the runway, and the wonder that something so heavy can actually fly. I spend quite a lot of time just looking at clouds and geographical features from the windows. Maybe I’m still a kid at heart but it all amazes me.

My most memorable flying experiences, in no particular order:

1.  Bumping into Ray Charles at Tokyo Airport, and chatting to him for a few minutes. (and even, stupidly, asking him for an autograph.  I did get a picture.)

2.  Having the nosecone ripped off the plane and go through an engine on ascent out of Detroit, then spending two hours in a shuddering machine as we circled dumping fuel before an emergency landing.

3.  Not the steward who spilled coffee on me as he was about to pour me a cup as the plane bumped, but the steward directly behind him who immediately positioned his jug over my shirt and asked, “Would you like milk on that, sir?”  He made me laugh.

4.  The first time I flew to the UK in 1985 (after not being back since leaving at 8 months old) and just looking out the window and being wowed with a sense of homecoming.

5.  Boarding a flight where there were six burly detectives around a handcuffed guy they were extraditing.  He obviously didn’t want to go and started yelling and headbutting the seats in front of him until they took him off for everybody’s safety.

6.  Playing with those little polarising windows as I took a lear jet across the state on my way to work security for Charles and Diana. (and yes, she spoke to me)

7.  Arriving home in Australia after living in Japan for six years.  Sure, I’d been back a couple of times for a week here and there, but this was coming home and the flight was fantastic.

And so this afternoon I’ll be boarding a flight and heading off into the wild grey yonder.  You’ll tell me that I’ll be spending 24 hours in a small armchair, with little legroom, average meals films I normally wouldn't want to watch, And I’d respond just as Maxwell Smart would.  

“…and loving it”

See you from the other side of the world.