(1)Q's & A's with an American Lady

When I was in thirties, several times a year, I had to be back to Kurashiki from Tokyo to care for Mother in the hospital.      Once in the crowded Shinkansen, I was forced to keep standing right from the start.

Then an American elderly gentleman sitting by the window, gestured toward his seat for me, and he quickly came out to the aisle.

Thanking him, I took his seat, but instantly I was aware of his wife's strong aural rage! Getting their seats after much effort, why did he give his seat away for a strange young woman?  She must have shouted in her mind!

I silently began to read a book, then the wife moved tightly toward me, and I saw her eyes riveted on the mountain outside. It was near Mishima Station.

"That's the famous Mt. Fuji," I said in spite of myself in English.

"Oh, that's it!" opening her eyes wide, she kept staring. stricken with awe.

After that, she seemed to decide to employ me as a free guide, regardless of my reading. She asked me one question after another, about the scenes she found puzzling from the window.

"What are those hanging clothes on the verandas or so many padded mattresses over the handrails? "

"They are being dried under the sun, making use of its light and heat."

Hearing this, she appeared to look down on them. In the USA, she said, every family uses the driers, which they can use on rainy days and at nights, and are very helpful for working ladies.  Besides, isn't it shameful to show our underwear or bedding things before the others?   She talked as if she was blaming for us.

( After coming back to Tokyo, I regretted not having answered back to her, saying that if all the families in the USA stopped using the driers, and dried their wet clothes in the sun, how massive an amount of electricity would be saved not only in the USA but in the whole world!) 

When the train came near to the Shizuoka Plains, she pointed out a faraway thing outside the window, saying, 'What's that?'

It was just the time when the rice harvesting had finished, and those tied sheaves of rice were hanging across the bamboo poles. They were being dried.

'They are rice,'  I answered.

Abruptly,  she stood up,  and called loudly her husband in the aisle, 'Hey, George. You told me a big lie!'  He came quickly toward us.

'You said rice grows in the water, but, look there!  They are in the open air!' 

I was obliged to explain them how to grow rice from the beginning.

Luckily I had been in the farming region for ten years until my high school days after repatriating from North Korea at six.  I had often seen the farmers planting out young rice plants in the water.  And at the end of July,  they would drain the rice field, and after that the ears of rice would be coming out without water.

George was satisfied with it and left us again toward the aisle.  I wondered if he might keep away from his wife. 

She continued her questions on and on, among which I found it most difficult to answer.

"Please tell me how much you have to pay for taxes," she asked.

To tell the truth, I had certainly kept household accounts since I married, but I never added them up, only wrote the price down in my accounts book. I had been so busy with keeping three children and mother-in-law and sister-in-law, and teaching at schools as a part-time teacher that I had no time to work them out.

The American lady was intently waiting for my answer, and I felt drawn into responding as a representative of the housewives of Japan, which was the end of my luck.

I took out a piece of paper, and listed up the kinds of taxes I remembered; income taxes, municipal taxes, lands property taxes, house property taxes, health insurance taxes, a vehicle tax, and besides we had a cottage in Hinohara Village, so I had to add a villagers tax and lands property tax, and moreover there was a tax for my part-time income. I was shocked at so many taxes we had to pay! Luckily, there weren't a general sales tax and a nursing care insurance tax in those days!

For each tax, how much I should have had to pay?  I definitely didn't remember the exact amount of money. I added up the ambiguous, doubtful figures, and after that, I had to convert yen into dollars. I wasn't sure how much a dollar was then. How bothering!

At last, arriving at a certain number, I wrote it down. The lady looked into the figure, and instantly she stood up again toward her husband.  'Hey, George'

He instantly came toward us. She cried, 'Let's immigrate into Japan!　Japan is a Paradise for the taxes!

Ow! How big a mistake!  I felt it in my bones. We are truly paying so much taxes!

I began looking at the figures again, then an announcement came,  'Soon we will reach Kyoto!'

The American husband and wife began hastily preparing their things.

The lady wanted to shake my hand, and leaving her smile, got off the train.     I was left alone in a half-done state. 

The moment I returned home from Kurashiki, I opened my housekeeping book, and began carefully calculating all the taxes, then I found I had shown her only one fifth of them ! How regretful!  Too late!  It can't be undone. 

I suppose she would surely have a home party after going back to her home, reporting the news to her friends about the taxes in Japan,  saying that she would be confident in herself,  because the information source was from a Japanese teacher!

In this case,  I should have told her honestly that I was unable to answer her question about the taxes!

As the proverb says, 'Honesty is the best policy'!