This week I have been exploring--both intentionally and unintentionally--the notion that "too much is better than too little". An interesting concept to consider here in Japan, which many non-Japan-living folks often consider to be a place that celebrates the beauty of simplicity and minimalism. And to a certain extent, in certain contexts, this is true. Many forms of traditional Japanese art and culture celebrate what isn't there as much as they celebrate what is there. But even here, or perhaps especially here, fine attention to detail takes interesting forms.
For example:
Do It Right, Or Not At All
Ironically enough I seem to be living in a land that follows my father's most favorite saying: "Do a job right, or don't do it at all". He applied this equally to washing dishes, doing homework or fixing a bike. If you're going to do something, stick to it until it is well and truly finished.
The Japanese approach to medical and dental matters certainly are excellent examples of this.
For the past year or so, Patrick has been plagued by a horrific ingrown toenail. In typical teenager fashion, he ignored it, hid it, camouflaged it and generally pretended it didn't exist until about 2 months ago when he finally had to show it to me. Off to the doctor went Bob and Patrick. Now, back in the USA, dealing with this would probably have been the matter of one doctor's appointment, where they would do the trimming, cutting and bandaging, supply us with various medicines, creams and goo, and then send us on our way.
But here in Japan, Patrick has been summoned back to the doctor once a week for two months. Each visit lasts 15 minutes tops. They unwrap his toe, check it out, perhaps provide new goop or creams, and then re-bandage it and send him on his way.
Incredible.
Take also, for example, the newly scraped and cleaned teeth and gums that Bob and I can now show off. Both of us have been summoned back to the dentist several times for them to check up on their handiwork. Each time they clean our teeth and supply us with various oddly shaped toothbrushes.
My teeth have never, ever been so clean.
And this isn't a new thing. 15+ years ago, when I was pregnant with Patrick in Nagoya, I had incredibly frequent doctor's appointments throughout my pregnancy, and was even hospitalized for a week just so they could monitor my blood pressure. When I was pregnant with Aya 2 years later in Walnut Creek, CA and my blood pressure once again rose, Kaiser sent me home with a portable blood pressure machine and had me call in my own readings every morning. And when the happy day finally came for Patrick to be born, the mandatory--MANDATORY--hospital stay was one full week. I was ejected from the hospital in Walnut Creek just two days after Aya was born.
(It should be pointed out that (a) by the seventh day in the hospital I was ready to poke my eyes out with ohashi/chopsticks (b) the length of post-birth hospital stays is, in my mind, a subjective matter, dependent on the health of mother and baby and (c) While the one week hospital stay in Japan was too long, the two day stay in California was just not enough...)
So is more always better? I cannot say. But when I read the news about the incredibly convoluted, disputed, reviled and in the end failing health care system back at home, I can't help but scratch my head over how different it is here. While back at home Bob and I scrimped and planned and fought repeatedly to keep Patrick and Aya's health insurance, and juggled ways to keep our own, here, thousands of miles away from my own country, I find health care worries to be non-existent.
Yeah, I may be a bit over-coddled, but it absolutely beats the alternative.
Faith In Humanity Alert of the Day
Yesterday I was on the train, coming home from yet another dentist appointment. I was perhaps 4 stops away from my destination (Kitaoji Station). It was about 5pm and the train was mildly full.
I was letting my mind wander off with itself as the train pulled into Marutamachi Station. The train wheezed to a stop, then, as trains so often do, it gave a quick ending lurch so that the doors would match up with the platform marks.
As the train had stopped, an elderly woman rose from her seat, hands full of shopping bags. She was standing and making her way to the train doors when that final lurch hit. It sent her crashing to the floor, face first. Her glasses split in two, one shattered lens scratching her badly from cheek to temple.
As the woman knelt on the floor of the train, blood dripping, the whole train car rose as one, everyone digging into their pockets and bags for packets of tissue (companies in Japan give out millions of packets of free tissue with their company logos on them. As a result, everyone always has plenty of tissue).
It was a sign of how much time I had really spent in Japan that I found myself also moving almost with out conscious thought, towards the woman, outstretched hand proffering tissue.
Immediately five or six other people were on their knees, on the floor with her. Several women of various ages were rubbing her back and encouraging her to move slowly. Two somber faced older men were methodically accepting packets of tissue from people around them, and wiping up the blood that had dripped onto the floor.
As far as I could tell, the woman had been alone on the train. But the reactions of the people around the woman were lightning fast and automatic.
Eventually the woman was able to stand up. Two of the three women with her gathered their own belongings as well as hers, while the third woman kept a tissue pressed against the injured woman's face. At the next stop, two of the women led the injured woman off the train, asking her where she needed to go, and discussing getting a taxi, perhaps to her doctor's office or to the hospital.
And after the train doors closed and the train began moving again, the elderly men were still kneeling on the floor, silently wiping up the drops of blood.
It all happened so quietly, so efficiently and quickly, that neither the other passengers on other cars nor the train conductor ever knew it had happened. It was a single train car tableau of care and sympathy.
Now, both here in Japan and back in the US, I have been witness to, and at times the recipient of, incredible acts of random kindness and help such as this. And both here in Japan and back in the US I have been witness to and at times the recipient of apathy and ignorance. Times when I or someone else needed help, and no one would step up. Sometimes it was because the person needing the help was different--different race, different skin, different clothes. Sometimes it was simply because no one stepped outside themselves long enough to stop and care.
And I wonder, in my foolish, idealistic way, how different our world would be if we could step out our front doors each day, confident in the knowledge that if we were to fall, there would always, always be a helping hand there to lift us up and wipe away our blood and tears.....
A good first step towards this? Go out your door and be that helping hand....
Meanwhile, I'm adding another packet of tissue to my purse...just in case.
Well, that's it for now folks.
Until next time...
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