Like They Do: Japanese Way of Life

 

An artist sketching the Shibuya crossing. Image by the author 

“Everyone may be ordinary, but they are not normal”, Haruki Murakimi

 

If you ask one word which can be ascribed to Japanese way of life, then it is not Ikigai. It is not Omiyari either. For me it is 'Rhythm'. 

Rhythm, according to Cambridge dictionary is "a strong pattern of sounds, words, or musical notes that is used in music, poetry, and dancing"

 Rhythm in more crude form is a pattern. If two objects or people while in an action, follow the same pattern then we say that both are in rhythm to each other.

So far, I have visited five major cities of Japan and everywhere I found an unseen river of rhythm flowing below the alleys of human lives. Be it the busiest pedestrian crossing of the world-Shibuya, be it the ever-bustling Dotombori market of Osaka or be it the somber and pristine locales of Kyoto. Everyplace, there is an unsaid pattern which connects each Japanese soul with the other. The pattern is so pervasive and so deeply entrenched here that a foreigner of any origin gets swayed by it and becomes a part of the rhythm. It is like an invisible thread which binds every person here - Gaijin or no-Gaijin, and like a bunch of kites that fly together, every person here feels the wind and then glide together. 

 I mostly observe it while boarding or deboarding a train. There is no chaos in stations, how large the crowd may be but never there is an iota of chaos. There is harmony in people to people interaction and that creates a rhythm. The hefty sound of foot steps as people move in and move out, the incessant chime of undertone voices, the sound of rubbing of clothes, the tapping beep of Passmo and Suica in the backdrop, and then a cascading gait of human beings crisscrossing each other are nothing but a rhythm which so far I have observed here only. People act and move in sync with the other as if the first and the last one to move out of the train somehow had an unsaid conversation. It is strange to see that everyone is in a hurry and yet no one is in a hurry. All there is a rhythmic movement, a pattern guided by well accepted and followed rules. Rules which no one tells yet everyone understands and adheres to. The atmosphere even in between the crowd has a semblance with what the people think or do. There is no loud noise, no phone ringing, no over the board chatter. No one talks to each other yet the discomfort of one person is rightly addressed by the other. (A little smile on every face, though, would not harm.) Respect to other feelings, if you have heard this before, then you can experience it here.

 

I believe the software of human being is same across the world, the hardware is no doubt different. We all have similar emotions - anger, jealousness, happiness, sadness, hatred, love, joy, tears, smile. Our moods sway as the day sweeps by depending on the way we experience it. We have our own troubles, and we all have our own triumphs. The software performs well within the system and every emotion which makes us ‘human’ are necessary for our existence. Had it been the other way then it would have never been within us. All we need to do is to give them space and not let them come out of us over other. A boiling water is so far of no harm till it is within the realms of a container. If it spills out, then it might harm. I mention these because it is hard to deny that the people in Japan have the same software as everyone on earth has. Yet, you will never observe those emotional software malfunctioning or an outburst over other person lives.  There are turbulences of soul, but they mostly remain within self. You can observe the calm in their faces. Devoid of any public display of emotion, everyone here is so composed and well attuned to the common fabric that it looks splendid and scary at the same time. Whether it is normal or not is hard to discern. It is also hard to decipher what is going within a person life here. In public all keep to themselves, and all are reasonably quiet. To move on daily with such an equanimity is remarkable.

 

Sometimes, I think the way of life here can never be described in words. To try to name it and ascribe a particular adjective to it will diminish its worth. Like a beautiful statue it can be better left as it is, even a touch could put a dark spot on it. 

 

These are my observations, and it might be limited by my experiences but so far this is how I feel about Japanese way of life and I wish I don't have to alter it. I wish the rhythm lasts here forever and its echo reverberate across the world.