thinking, that's all.

it's crunch time at jj--i have a project every night this week..haha. i felt bad about writing, because sarah and ben have been keeping the collective alive. i thought i'd post some old work--i wrote this in 2003, during my first trip to japan. around this time last year, i had just started to listen to really bad jpop again...and a few weeks later, i was told that we were going to japan again--and i was glad, because the jpop had really gotten me in the mood. again, here i am, during finals, listening to bad jpop

(on an interesting side note--i have bought albums by the band capsule every visit i have taken to japan--i happen to arrive there when they put their albums out. i discovered them on some listening station, and last year, in tokyo, i found a new record again. the week i was there was the week that it had come out. i was sad to find out today that they just had a new record come out and i wasn't in japan to buy it.)

my computer has crashed a lot, and for some reason, i always post this on whatever journal site i'm using right away so that i don't lose it--i guess it's the most important personal thing that i've ever written, even though i've probably never admitted that until just now. it's not great, but i don't think that i've been personal enough with the blog, so...here is me. corny, cheesy and unedited--but definitely joshua masayoshi huff.

i noticed that i wrote "my olllddd cd player" on this--it was after my first ipod broke. the funny thing is...i still have that cd player. in college.

anyway, enough. here it is.
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it's winter. ok, to put it truthfully, its that awkward time when the trees have still got some autumn foliage, but there's already been some flurries and the squirrels are already hibernating.

i wander the streets of shidome alone. its 8 am, and the only place that's open is st. germain's. for some reason, all of japan gets up at 11(a bit ironic, no, if its the land of the rising sun? i guess they figure they've still got the world beat by a few hours)...the small coffee shop in the basement of the carietta mall is open, but..i got a mocha there once...i assumed they'd give it to me to go, because i had to get on a bus to hakone. but no. i got it in a mug, and i had no idea how to say "i want to take this out". so i had to toss it. my 1100 yen mocha. but not after it got the chance to burn my taste buds.

the makudonarudo's. it feels weird to say the name of the meal i want, "correctly", in english, and not have them get it. i don't want to say it katakana-y. ever.

there's something oddly romantic about the point in time where its cold enough to snow but the skies refuse to let go of their pure white payloads. everyone is walking a bit more briskly, and everyone's got cold hands that need to be held.

"she came home for christmas" is playing on my olllld cd player. my hair is still a bit wet and it smells like the kelp shampoo and sea moss conditioner that the hotel gives out in its bathrooms. a jacket i refused on bringing keeps me warm, and i silently thank my mum for packing it the night before i left, while i slept. i'm surrounded by signs proclaiming "welcome shidome x-mas '03! with ayu" and get excited.

then it hits me. i'm going home for christmas. and then, i remember, christmas isn't much in japan. it's a day for lovers. everything is, i guess. but i mean, what can a holiday about the birth of christ mean to a nation full of buddhists and shintos? presents and walks together, hand-in-hand, along the boardwalks of odaiba.

you know that feeling that there's this whole world, somewhere else, where no one speaks english? and things are going on, and it doesn't matter one way or another that you're there or not? life moves on and on and on and on. and i don't really like that. not one bit.

its like how they say "if its not news in new york, its not news. period". or like the way the washington post people said that "we just happen to be a local newspaper in the capitol of the free world".

its just a bit funny, if not totally disheartening, to know that half a world away, a whole country's economy is rising and falling and welcoming new celebrity stars and kicking out the old. civil wars are beginning and ending, and really...

it's just strange that so much happens, unbeknownst to us. and as much as i wish i was taking in my life somewhere else, somehow, i've ended up here. and i've always belonged here and i always will.

but, somewhere, someone is thinking the same thing as me and wondering and wondering and wondering. and some songs, like ayumi's "seasons" will give the feeling that there is life, full of minor enka scales, going on outside of his/her station.

you start to wonder, really, what is it all about? and of course its obvious that this is the same lame pretentious teenage thought that everyone has at one point, but there is a reason cliches are cliches. they're real. they're common. they're life

but really. in the end, i'll look up at the night sky and know that you saw the exact same thing that i did, even if we beheld the sight at different hours. at some point, we were captivated and moved and just stunned by the exact same thing.

and even that is quite funny. because, you know, most of those stars burnt out thousands and thousands of years ago, and we're only getting the signals, their warmth, now. it takes something ancient, something archaic, something that's gone... to really hold us all together, to feel the same way...to hold us in the same moment with one another.

when we say things are inevitable, obviously they're things that must be done and, i hate to say it, but they're usually things that we don't want to do. its not a welcoming word in the slightest. like..saying goodbye.

but you know, in the end, fate is real. there's a reason we do come across everyone we've ever met.