28 November 2005

Omiyage

I decided to conduct an interesting study: save all the omiyage I receive, instead of eating them.

This is no small task, as I could already fill a closet in my well-designed + ample storage-space apartment. But just think how rewarding it would be, to size-up your enormous stash of desserts at the end of the year, and say to yourself, "Damn, I could have eaten all that." Then instead of eating them, you examine the little packages to relive the time and event, as if the frosted cakes were actually dusty photos, documenting all the good and bad things that happened to people you care about.

In the past two days I've received about 7 omiyage, some western and some very Japanese. They all came from people I know fairly well, and they were all given for meaningful reasons: a thank-you for helping a student pass her English exam, a symbol because someone's mother-in-law passed away, a token of friendship after visiting a family in another town, a gift to keep me warm during the winter...etc. etc. In other words, people don't just throw gifts around in Japan because it's tradition and they can't remember why they started in the first place. There's always a reason behind it. For the average American this is still overwhelming, because I want to pay it all back. I want to do nice things for all these people. But I don't know when they learned to keep up!

It may sound strange, to say that getting a pear tart or getting a blanket from someone is enough to change your mindset. But the circumstances are so broad, yet so intricate...that you just get confused and begin to realize you are changing somehow, without really knowing where you're going. Relationships have so many dimensions, and cultures have so many ways of expressing them.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

What? You are stacking your dessert in the closet? Come on, haven't I taught you anything?

Lauren said...

Omg Chris I love you.