KEEP IT NATURAL pt. 4

by Yukito Yoneyama / 米山ゆきと


(I took a day off, just to see if anyone would freak.
I am glad to know people in the US have a great sense of humor.
If I were in Japan, someone may have showed up at my door step with a sword.. jk.)




Memory is a strange thing.
The things I remember from the 3 weeks in San Francisco are all in fragments.
The more I try to remember, the further they seem to float away, just as stars, planets, and galaxies are constantly driving themselves further away from the center of our universe as it seemingly expands to infinity, followed by the attempts of human intelligence trying our best to give meanings to our fragile and finite existence.


I look back in time and try to find the points of connections within my memories, in order to give meanings to my seemingly chaotic life.


The things I remember, or the images that surface to my mind from the 15-year-depth of my memories, are the parking lot of College of Notre Dam at night, lit by the orange-hued street lights with drama-shots standing under them, railroad tracks stretching to the horizon and beyond, window sills of a bus with glares of California sunshine reflecting my youthful and handsome profile ; ), section of freeways, Safeway sign, and so on.
Each of these fragments are intertwined, somehow forming these abstract images.

Most of them involve several other students who were in the program with me.
Toshi, the other dude, is in majority of them, since we became almost like brothers during our orientation. I also developed close friendships with a few others.

I am going to use nicknames, to respect their privacy. I feel like House.
(Toshi, you are an exception, take it as a compliment. Truth be told, I didn't think that far when I started writing..)



Lolita was one of them. She was always dressed in kind of Lolita-like fashion with her short hair dyed blonde. I can't remember what part of Japan she was from, but I think she was from the West (could've been the North), since she had an accent. If you put a gun in her hand, I would have thought she was Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, or Natalie Portman in The Professional (but blonde).
So she was a badass Lolita from the West in the far East.

Then there was Straight-up, who was also from the West in the far East.
The thing I remember about her is that she was straight up and forward (hence the nickname).
If I have been sweating all day from running around trying to see everything in the city, she would tell me,

"You stink, go wash yourself off will ya?!"

Or if Toshi was having hard time trying to decide what to eat at a cafeteria, she would say,

"Hey you wishywashy, wtf, make up your mind already and get outta my way, will ya?!"
(I could've nicknamed her "Willya?")

And she meant no harm. It was one of those methods of communication that left you with a sense of clearance. It reminded me of strong winds blowing dark and heavy clouds out of the sky above, or waves of the ocean crashing into a rocky shore.

Western accent of Japanese have this frank, friendly, and sometimes blunt tone to it, kind of similar to the Southern accent of the US, at least that's my impression.
Between Lolita and straight-up, these two were unstoppable.

Toshi and I were both from the East, him coming from smack middle of Tokyo, and I from Yokohama, which is adjoined to Tokyo. Eastern Japanese, which is considered "standard" Japanese has a bit of neutralized, homogenized, and pasteurized sound to it. (that sounds really boring. And in a way it is) What happens usually is that when the Eastern Japanese hang out with Western Japanese too long, the accent starts to creep in.
I caught Toshi saying things like, "Ya'all, How U doing tonight."
(well, I can't explain it in Japanese, so I blended Southern and New York accents together. I hope you get it.)

I have a friend from Japan whom I grew up together.
Later in life he studied abroad and went to University of Texas.
He ended up developing Japanese-Southern accent, which must sound really funny.
(He would never speak to me in English, but I have seen him posting on Facebook saying "Ya'all".

Whatever it was, Toshi just sounded funny. What made it even funnier is that I think he was asking for their approval for the correct pronunciation.
Toshi was good like that. He was so into things, I mean everything, and he almost innocently wanted to do all of them right.


Just like in the US, people often times take pride in their regions of origin and their accents. Imagine a New Yorker (a Yankee) visiting down South and asking a red neck for a correct way to say "Ya'all" or "Tuesdee", like my photography professor in college used to say. He was from down South somewhere. (I love the Southern Comfort, no, not just the liquor, and Gumbo, mmm... getting hungry here. I'm gonna take a break. Be right back.)


So anyway, because of his good and honest nature, Toshi got along with everyone. And most importantly, he was always happy and positive.
In most cases, it was him being innocently happy and blindly naive, while Lolita and Straight-up was chewing him up without him even knowing.


Don't get me wrong, these two girls were cute and innocent in their own ways.
Lolita was carrying her teddy bear friend with her at all times, and I think she was in the midst of her teenage heartbreak of some sort, I don't remember.
Straight-up was infatuated head over heels with this guy, who was one of the students from other programs. She thought he looked like Ichiro (Yes, the baseball player. He was yet to join MLB, but was already famous and popular in Japan.)
In most days, she seemed to live up in the lala land clouds when talking about Ichiro, like any healthy or unhealthy teenagers do.



We talked about lots of stuff. I mean we talked about life, love, family, friends, school, Japan, US, the world, and whatever else that came to our teenage minds.

And when we hung out, it was always at night outside in a parking lot or a courtyard on campus under the street lights (no drama-shots here). At least my memories tell me so.

Naive was also around sometimes. She was in a semi-serious relationship (how serious can it be when you are 16, 17, but the existence of the whole universe depends on those things when you are in that age group. well, for any age group I suppose.) with this guy who were back in Japan, who was much older, probably around 22 or something. It was one of those cases an innocent young was preyed by a much older and experienced one. At least it seemed to me that way, since she was kind of clueless on the matter.
Regardless, I think Champ-the-Teddy-Bear had a thing for her. He seemed concerned every time she was feeling down after talking to her older boyfriend. I guess he wasn't very nice to her.




So when we all took a trip to Yosemite National Park, many yet-to-spark romance fuses were laid under the park prior to our arrival.
I am not sure, but I think the program buried them the night before we got there..
But it was just such a "Wet Hot International Summer."



On the way to Yosemite National Park, I remember the scenery which I saw out the window.
It seemed desolate. And it was close to what I imagined the surface of Mars to look like.
That part of California did look like desert with patches of bushes scattered across the landscape. Light-hued blue sky looked darker as it retreated away from the horizon, contrasting the color of the sand-colored ground below.
In the far distance, I saw numbers of windmill spinning by themselves, as if they were abandoned by an alien civilization from millenniums ago. It looked all so surreal. I can't remember a thing about what was going on inside the bus.


When we arrived at Yosemite, I was in Awe. I must say, this continent has wonderful diversity of natural landscapes, which never seize to amaze me even to this day.

In Japan, we find beauty in everyday nature around us, which are rarely jaw-dropping, or astonishing.
Rather, our culture found the way to appreciate seemingly ordinary things around us, giving them meanings to enrich our mortal human life.
Don't get me wrong, Japan does have dynamic display of nature. However, as you may be familiar with our traditional arts, such as Bonsai, or Zen garden, it almost work backwards on scale of things.
In my opinion, both perspective is equally appreciative, if you can plug into the given mindset.



So when I saw the Yosemite Dome for the first time, my jaw fell on the bus floor.
Before I could pick it up and put it back in place, we were off the bus.


First, we had to check into our new home where we were going to spend the next 3 days (I think it was three days). They had variety of camp sites, for trailers, tents, and the tentish-cabin looking thing we were going to stay in. It was about 10'x10', covered in water-proofed canvas or vinyl sheet, in the shape of a little cabin in the woods. It housed about 5 or 6 of us.



As we walked across the parking lot where the bus had dropped us off, I saw signs with pictures of bear on them. I could tell that these bears were not the adorable mascots of the park, since the signs had universal warning esthetics to it.


When I walked up closer, it read, "Beware of bears."
I looked around immediately, my hand holding the handle of my sword tight, no, my hands up in peek-a-boo style, since I have never encountered a bear in my life except in a zoo.
It looked peaceful in the park. No one was screaming, nor did I hear gun shots.


We were led by the program advisers into a lodge, which held a main office.
Again, I can only remember the exterior, surrounded by tall trees, lights falling between the swinging leaves of the summer.  I do remember, though, it had a very at home atmosphere inside.



The order of events are all mixed up, as the memories which left lasting impressions fly through my mind with series of images like strobe flash.



One of the events are a walk through the forest of giant redwoods, standing tall while pointing straight up to the deep blue sky. I can recall standing in a tunnel which went through a trunk of one of the giants.
I am pretty sure I made a peace hand sign while being photographed by someone, using my disposal camera. I guess most of my memories are linked to the images of photographs from my collection of disposal cameras.


There was this waterfall to which we had to climb up good numbers of boulders.
I would look up every time I climb up a boulder, and I will be blinded by the sun.
The sun at high noon positioned itself over the top of the waterfall.
Splash of mist from the fall was creating clouds above us, in front of the clouds which were up high in the sky, blown by the wind.
I saw a few rainbows appear and disappear in my peripheral vision.
Something about this climb felt spiritual, as if I was ascending to the garden of the gods.




All of us students were constantly astonished by the grand scale of the park. It was just so beautiful in every aspect. The fresh scent of air filled with breaths of trees, the unseen species of birds and other animals who showed themselves without the gestures of fear.

Coming from the urban environment of a big city, I wasn't used to this kind of friendly encounter. Animals in Yokohama, or nearby Tokyo were always on the run. I could tell that they did not trust us humans. They were soldiers of survival, who had cynical and sometimes jaded expressions on their face filled with distrust and fear (At least that was my impression).
At Yosemite, they were proud and joyous residents of the landscape, who claimed their place on this planet with dignity (they just looked happy, and I get it. good for them).


When we hiked through one of the trails, one of us suggested to carve our names on one of the trees near by, just as any teenagers would do (such and such were here, year xxxx. we see them everywhere nature and human presence intersect).

I think it was my idea, of course, go leader! But I will leave a room to blame it on someone else.
I say "blame" because as we began to carve names on the tree trunk with a pocket knife one of us carried, another hiker approached from the other end of the trail and yelled, "Hey!! you can't do that! this park is a preserve!" or something of that nature.
None of us were yet to be fluent in English, so it caught us completely off-guard.
If it happened today, I would probably say,

"Hey, mind your own business, buttocks! And make sure you bring your own beer to the party!"(?)

No, I would respect the beautiful preserve as it is. If everyone who visits Yosemite carved her/his name on a tree nearby, the whole park would look like a rack of mini license plates key chain with every possible names written of it, which we can find at any gift shop.
That won't be good.

So, like a good and polite teenager from Japan, I pulled out a sword and charged at this good-natured stranger who probably really loved the park and just wanted to protect it best he can, so that the children of his children can someday enjoy this wonderful place.

No, no sword, instead, we said to the dude,

"sorry, we did not know." in broken pronunciation.

I certainly grew respect for this stranger ranger of the forest as time went on.
He was being a prick for yelling at us, but it probably was not the first time for him to see things of this nature. Regardless, I believe that we all have to act responsible when we spend time in nature.
So I take full blame and responsibility for my carving action.



Later in life, I spent a year in Oahu, Hawai'i (this is the authentic spelling of the word).
The situation at one of the national preserve, Hanauma Bay is an alarming example.
The bay seemed to me the one of the most beautiful tropical sites, once reserved for Hawai'ian Royalty.
Despite its diverse variety of marine life, emerald green water, and seemingly beautiful white coral, the reality was grim.
The white color of coral reef was actually the sign of death of the reef. The cause was sunscreens which most visitors put on before entering the water. At one point, it welcomed over 3 million tourists per year.
The rest goes without saying. This is just a tip of the iceberg.
I must question the careless introduction and promotion of tourism directed to these fragile ecosystems, driven by profit-oriented corporations.




Anyways, let's get back to the Yosemite paradise..
During the stay at the park, we spent most of the daytime hiking, playing in creeks,
bathing in the summer sunshine and the fresh forest air.
There is nothing like spending time in the wilderness, even though the nature at the park was well maintained by the help of human hands.

I remember us playing in one of the creeks.
It was a wide section of the creek we found during one of the hikes.
I was standing on a shore, looking at a large boulder sitting in the middle of the creek.
Toshi, Lolita, Straight-up, Champ, Naive, Drama-shots, and maybe a few others were either sitting on top of the boulder or bathing in the creek around it.


I went to the shore to get a good picture of them, probably for both Drama-shots and myself.
They looked like fairies or some mythological beings from classic paintings at the Met.
It was one of the most peaceful sceneries I had ever seen..


I took a moment to breath in the sweet air, and joined them.



The daytime adventures at Yosemite left another lasting impression on me.
As I write this, I can't wait to dig out the photographs from these wonderful days,
which are buried somewhere back home in Japan.
I am not sure when I can get back home, but these memories gives me inspiration
every time they surface to my mind.

The night time at Yosemite is another story...





to be continued...






Thank you for reading.
I'm glad you came back.
But don't get too comfortable, I might feed you to the bears at Yosemite..
So keep your shotgun loaded for the next one.
No, I hate guns with passion,
So keep your beer ice cold cause it's really hot and humid out here in NY.
Seriously. 



love,


y


ps. I used many "sword" reference, but neither people in Japan nor I carry a sword today.

peace