Sons of Loki

Happy End (はっぴいえんど, Happii endo) are one of my favourite little Japanese gems, a folk-rock band from the 70s whose song “Kaze wo atsumete” (風を集めて, “Gathering the Winds”) made an appearance in Sophia Coppola’s Lost in Translation (the only Japanese song on the whole soundtrack – but that’s for another day, perhaps). Lead singer Haruomi Hosono would go on to start a little electropop band called Yellow Magic Orchestra, invent techno in 1978, and the rest is history.

“Natsu nan desu” (夏なんです, “Well, it’s summer”) is a sweet, laidback track from their second album, which perfectly captures the essence of lazy summer days. It’s a very Happy End-ish track – old tea houses, empty streets, aimless wandering.
Linguistically, this is an interesting song because of it’s heavy use of Japan’s double-onomatopoeia words, which usually tend to denote things with quite a nebulous context. For example, くるくる kuru-kuru, which means “spin-spin”, or ぎらぎら gira-gira, “glitter-glitter”.

田舎の白い畦道で
On a white country road
埃っぽい風が立ち止る
The dusty breeze stands still.
地べたにペタンとしゃがみこみ
I drop down to the floor with a bump,
奴らがビー玉はじいてる
as some kids play marbles.
ギンギンギラギラの
Shine-shine, glitter-glitter
太陽なんです
Well, it’s the sun
ギンギンギラギラの
Shine-shine, glitter-glitter
夏なんです
Well, it’s the summer

鎮守の森は ふかみどり
The deep green of the shrine grove
舞い降りてきた 静けさが
A solemn silence has fallen.
古い茶屋の 店先に
An old tearoom
誰かさんとぶらさがる
Someone swings from the store front
ホーシーツクツクの
Chirp-chirp
蝉の声です
It’s the voice of the cicadas
ホーシーツクツクの
Chirp-chirp
夏なんです
Well, it’s the summer

日傘くるくる ぼくはたいくつ
Parasol spin-spin, and I’m bored
日傘くるくる ぼくはたいくつ
Parasol spin-spin, and I’m bored
ルルル…

空模様の縫い目を辿って
Chasing stitches in the sky,
石畳を駆け抜けると
And when I cross some paving stones
夏は通り雨と一緒に
A summer shower
連れ立って行ってしまうのです
Comes along with it.
モンモンモコモコの
Worry-worry, fluffy-fluffy
入道雲です
Big summer rainclouds
モンモンモコモコの
Worry-worry, fluffy-fluffy
夏なんです
Well, it’s summer…

日傘くるくる ぼくはたいくつ
Parasol spin-spin, and I’m bored
日傘くるくる ぼくはたいくつ
Parasol spin-spin, and I’m bored
ルルル…

On my second day in Hakone, I woke up in my room in the ryokan at 7:45am and had a cup of green tea and a short soak in the indoor bath before it was time to go. I left my key on the reception desk and thanked the staff before heading out into the the car park, which was frozen with ice, glittering like jewels scattered across the tarmac.

I went to the nearby Lawson, and photocopied my passport. I’d told Rob I’d meet him later that day and fill out the forms for our house next year, so I needed a photocopy to send off. I bought some Pocky and a sandwich, as well as a can of coffee.

I was the only passenger on the bus to Togendai. When I reached the cable car terminal, I asked one of the station staff when the service started. He said 9:15am, so I had some time to kill. I wandered down to the lakeside. It was quiet there, the gentle winds from Ashinoko rippling across the hulls of upturned boats. They looked like the discarded shells of cuttlefish, abandoned on the shore.

Owakudani was much the same as it had been the day before, though the coating of snow and ice was a little thicker, like day-old stubble on the mountain’s face.

I took the funicular back down to Gora and then a train to Hakone-Yumoto station. On the way, I read a few pages of Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood. I read it back in 2008, when I was working at RBS and the breaks gave me time to read every day.

On the train from Hakone back to Shinjuku, I listened to “Kaze wo Atsumete” by Happy End. It seemed to fit the mood. A guy with messy hair tapped away on his notebook, while along the carriage a cute girl did her make-up. The clouds filtered grey midday sunlight down to the plains of Kanto, reflecting off concrete shacks and distant, tree-covered mountains.

On impulse, rather than taking the train all the way to Shinjuku and returning home on the Keio Line, I decided to get off in a place called Shimokitazawa, where I could change to the Keio Inokashira Line and get home via Meidaimae.

I took a walk about the streets of Shimokitazawa, past clothing-packed discount stores and boutiques. The sun was piercing through the clouds, and the place was crowded with shoppers. It was pleasant to walk about, and reminded me of a quieter Shibuya, or even Leeds.

I felt like Watanabe, from Norwegian Wood. I decided I liked his character; quiet and unassuming, unfazed by life whether he was spending weeks in his room doing nothing but studying or being asked out for drinks on a Friday night by Midori. Watanabe was happy in the simple pleasures of life, like bumbling about Tokyo in jazz cafes reading literature, or gardening on the patch behind his house. It seemed like a good way to live.

At a branch of Freshness Burger, I bought a gourmet cheeseburger and onion rings and ate them in the corner. Behind me, a young-looking guy in pink thick-rimmed glasses spoke of American politics in a Californian accent. He sounded like someone out of a Richard Linklater film, talking about Bush and Gore and the Supreme Court and what to do about China. I finished my burger and caught the train to Tobitakyu and home.