ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY THOUSAND STEPS

They are not many in a week, in a week on the other side of the world.
I took much more of them in NY, I think.
But they are my steps, the steps in my journey in Japan.
A planned journey that faded and that, suddenly, I conquered again.
I did it. A stamp on my passport.
I’m flying back home and, as usual, I’m asking myself how it was, what happened.
But it’s pointless to ask it until you come back home and the sensations and moods tell you it.
Before going to Japan you need to leave expectations and preconceptions: expectations will be set aside and preconceptions will be debunked.
Japanese people never smile, but they are always smiling.
No, it is not nonsense: it’s true.
It’s their soul smiling, belonging to those who are so discrete to avoid looking at your eyes, but who pay attention to be kind, polite, hospitable, and devoted when working.
They are a people and a country with strong contradictions: they don’t smile but are affable, they are the hardest workers in the world and yet they are pleasure-lovers that eat everything at any time, they do love but they don’t kiss, they hear but they don’t talk, I mean not publicly, they are sober and reserved but they are crazy about absurd kitsch. They are many, so many, but they can respect living spaces also in an overcrowded subway. Japanese hold everybody in considerable respect, such a big respect they don’t even look at others, they ignore others, they simply coexist. But if you need them, they are there.
Today we were looking for an address in a non-tourist area and a couple of ladies decided to help us even before we realized we had a problem: both of them, one with her bicycle and the other by walk, started looking around in the neighbourhood also without understanding or speaking English at all. Then, one of them knocked at a door, I think it was the expert of the area, explained him the problem and he immediately took a map for indicating us the subdivision of the district. So, at the end, not apps, navigators or WiFi, but kindness helped us reaching our destination.
They don’t look at you, but they are there.
They don’t talk to you, but they are there.
They don’t know you, but you’re not alone.
They don’t understand you, but they try to.
Everything is surrounded by good manners and bows, endless thanks and many many excuses for ignoring English; they can’t read it, not even taxi drivers in Tokyo who ask for the address in Japanese.
At every step I took, it was clear to me that I was on the other side of the world, that it was a different world. Oh, if only you could watch them filling in and folding my train pass: it was like they were embroidering with a bobbin lace.
Well, I will keep that pass, since care needs care and care brings care: maybe this is what is not clear to us and it will never be.
Maybe it’s for Buddhism, maybe for their difficult history, but if you ask me how they are, I will say they commit themselves.
Yes, properly: they commit themselves. It’s like they segmented time and, in each segment they commit themselves to what should be done, but with all the concentration and participation required.
It’s time to sleep? They sleep deeply, even in public.