This light read was most enjoyable, but if you are looking for a plot, there is done. It isn’t even like Seinfeld,**spoiler alert** For Those Who Love
This light read was most enjoyable, but if you are looking for a plot, there is done. It isn’t even like Seinfeld, but the idea is there.
The woman telling the story has no name, that is, to say, she is not given a name, but she is the main character. Then near the end of the book her mother calls her “Hitomi.” I will use it now because I need a name, and I dislike the word, “protagonist.” It just sounds dry. I will never speak of it again.
Hitomi works behind the counter at the thrift store. Next is the young man, Takeo, who along with its boss, Mr. Nakano, leave the shop to find items to buy and sell. More characters show up later. Maybe even I will come into the store and buy something.
Nothing happens in the lives of these people that doesn’t happen in the lives of many of us, which is nothing. I know, I exaggerate. But don’t most of us go to work daily, and visit with those at work, if we are allowed? Don’t we all then go home and read a book, visit with our family or not? Don’t many of us chase after the love of our life even if they are not interested? Now, you have the book.
Hitomi decides that she is in love with Takep. How she decides this I do not know, but maybe it is because he is the only young man she sees daily. Her world is small. How she gets him in bed I do not know, because Takao isn’t interested in women or sex, nor is he interested in men and sex. Hitomi never gives up, and at the end of the book, well, like I said, she never gives up.
Mr. Nakano is married. I know this because he has a mistress, and I don’t think that you can have a mistress unless you are married. I used to know these things, but I am getting old, and so now I only think that I know. He leaves the shop almost every afternoon to go to the bank. His mistress is that bank, the author says. She walks into the store one day and puts a manuscript on the counter. Hitomi picks it up later when she is gone, and she reads it. Erotica. A man is tracing his finger all over a woman’s body in order to excite her. This what they call “foreplay.” I am sure about this word. Hitomi decides to Xerox it and puts her copy in her bag. Takeo should read it, I think.
I came into the shop that same day, and I looked around. I found some Japanese bowls that I wanted. Cat food bowls, I thought. They would look good on the floor. I walked up to the counter, but no one was there. I waited. Then I saw the manuscript and began reading. When I was a kid I read everything in sight, even the milk carton. I never lost the habit. I began reading. “Trash,” I thought. “Are they selling trash here now? I am too old for this.” I put the manuscript down. Then Takeo walked over to me and asked if I needed help. “Yes, I do. I wish to buy these bowls. But Here,” I said, as I handed him the manuscript, “Something tells me that you would like this, that you need to read it.” I can be so insulting. That too, comes with old age. No, it doesn’t. I would never sazy that. Hitomi came from out of the backroom just then, and I purchased my bowls and left.
Days go by, and the seasons change. It rains, it freezes, it snows, and then the sun comes out. Everyone’s life changes but in some ways, stays the same. And my Japanese cat bowls look good on the floor, but now we have a skunk coming into the house to share food with the cats, but I will write about that in my review of Raccoons....more
An elderly Japanese woman sees a “help wanted” sign at a café that specializes in making sweet bean paste filled pancakes, but the maA Wonderful Story
An elderly Japanese woman sees a “help wanted” sign at a café that specializes in making sweet bean paste filled pancakes, but the man running the café believes her to be too old, and furthermore, her fingers are gnarled, which could repulse the customers. He refuses her request, but she doesn’t give up. Then he finally gives in to her, and she makes the most delicious homemade sweet bean paste, and he is sold on her as are the customers. He had been using canned sweet bean paste, which is probably all I had ever tasted, but what I had were delicious dumplings. Business increases until his own boss learns that this woman is working there, a woman with leprosy.
As this bittersweet but warmhearted story unfolds, I am not able to put it down, just as I once was not able to put down, “The Samurai’s Garden,” but nothing can compare with the latter book, one about a woman with leprosy, too.
As I read aoubt the history and symptoms of leprosy, I was glad to hear that it had been cured. We even had it in the U.S. but recently it has returned due to people from other countries immigrating here. Still, they can be cured, just that they are disfigured for the disease.
I recalled a scene, an experience that I had when walking down Mission Street in San Francisco in the early 1960s: A woman, dressed in what I believe was a black cape, came walking towards me. She had gathered her cape around her face, hiding it from public ey, but as she passed by, I could see that she had no nose, and her right eyeball seemed to be hanging out of its socket. I wondered then why her face was so disfigured and why the doctors had not helped her. How could an eyeball hang out and not cause infection? I never thought of leprosy until now, because I knew nothing about it. What else could it have been? Needless to say, it had shocked me, but I don’t think that the shock was expressed on my face.
And now that I have read this book, I am looking for another by a Japanese writer, but I think that nothing can compare with those I have read, yet, I have not looked. Tim Reilly, a friend of mine on GR, has recommended “The Nakano Thrift Shop, so I will soon read it, and I will be checking out his list of other Japanese books to see what else I can find. I am just not interested in Geishas or warriors; I just want to read about the life’s of commoners....more
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