Via Nothing To Do With Arbroath

Zap Mama‘s new album comes out May 26. Get it, and see her live if possible. One of the greatest vocalists I’ve ever heard. But where in the world is DJ Krush these days?

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If you’ve come to Hungary as a traveler or as an expatriate, you could probably chalk up some of your impetus to “wanting to see the world.” Meeting the local peoples, sampling local cuisine – these are the things that we revel in. The jet-set hops from place to place by plane, students take the slow route by train, poets hop freights or hitchhike, and those on a mission might ride in a plastic car.

Keiichi Iwasaki, however, is doing something else entirely. He’s going around the world – by bicycle. Currently 6 years and more than 30,000km into an estimated 10-year trek, this air conditioning repairman left his native Gunma-ken, Japanin 2001 with 160 yen (USD 1.25 / HUF 235) in his pocket and a vague notion to yes, see the world. Since then he’s traveled through more than 25 countries and reached unimaginable highs and lows.

Logical first question starts something like: “What kind of crazy…” He laughs, knowing this one was coming. With an easy smile and a glint in his eye he recounts how “life” in Japan wasn’t exactly inspiring. “Most people are just working and sleeping. If they ever do travel, they go by plane, which is fast and easy, but you can’t see anything. I want to meet people, see the land, and help spread peace.”

Starting off hitching, Keiichi soon realized that he was still waiting around, asking for a ride. Independence became paramount, and a bicycle offered both the freedom he wanted and the low cost that was necessary. And “low-cost” is no understatement – his rickety one-speed mamachari, a Japanese slang term for “granny bike” covered with customized luggage racks, looks like it’s held together with no more than love and a whole lot of packing tape. But this mimics his entire approach to the adventure, which, with some very notable exceptions, has been funded by the charity of others and the money he earns busking. His skill? Magic tricks.

“There are cyclist networks, and hospitality clubs, so I couch-surf,” he explains, while making an old receipt turn into a bank note. “Money is important, but it’s not all” -one red plush toy becomes five in my closed fist- “If you don’t have any, you just work” -a set of chopsticks emerges from his nose- “I never eat at restaurants, and mostly cook for myself on the road” -a folded handkerchief comes alive as a mouse- “If you’re hungry, you can eat anything.”

What about equipment? Keiichi says he carries a small stove but no tent or camping gear, using just a tarp and taking shelter wherever he can find it. Bizarrely, he carries a laptop computer and a camera. “It’s heavy, but so useful,” he explains. He prefers his donated bike, which he has learned to repair himself, to something more efficient, to prove that anything is possible, even on about 2 euros a day.

That attitude fueled his most significant achievement so far. After riding throughout southeast Asia and Nepal, he decided to go from sea level to the top of the world, with no money and no gas. Locking away savings he would need for equipment later on, he started at the southern tip of India, then rode the height of the subcontinent, earning enough through his tricks to make it to Mount Everest base camp. There he joined a 17-person international expedition and spent 10 months training to become one of just three people from the expedition to summit on May 31, 2005. Once the mission was completed, he rowed his way 1,300 km in a boat on the Ganges River, and biked back to Calcutta.

On the road Keiichi has faced many challenges apart from the physical enormity of traveling so far with so little. He’s been robbed multiple times, bitten by dogs, battled loneliness and beset by constant cultural differences and communication problems. By coincidence, he met a childhood friend traveling in Nepal. Convinced it was fate, the two decided to get married. While Keiichi’s parents were supportive (and have been through the entirety of the trip), hers, alas, were not. He has not heard from her since she returned to Japan.

Despite the challenges, he remains firmly positive, even after six years on the road, communicating with friends and family by e-mail and Skype and posting photos and updates on his website. “If I wanted to, I could just get on a plane and be home in a few hours,” he says. “Every day is interesting, and I’ve never wanted to quit. The world is not so big – I’m not on the moon.” As people go, he explains, differences are not so great. “Human emotions are the same everywhere – only culture and language are different. So I’m not afraid.”

There is a long road ahead for Keiichi Iwasaki. After riding through Europe, he’ll cross into Morocco and bike to South Africa. There his dream is another ultimate undertaking: to row across the Atlantic Ocean, a three-month voyage to rival the years he’s already spent at nature’s whims. This he acknowledges, like the Everest climb, will have to be sponsored. Once in the Americas, his final destination will be Alaska, but as of now the route remains undecided.

What would a post-circumnavigation future look like for such a limitless adventurer? Keiichi plans to begin writing a book while still on the road, and thinks he’ll probably undertake other far-flung challenges, such as seeing the north and south poles and climbing the tallest peak on each continent. For now he’s happy to be living a life that few could even dream of. Asked if he missed anything, he responded in the negative. Smiling, he corrected himself: “Wait, there’s one thing – sushi.”

To learn more about Keiichi Iwasaki’s Around the World Adventure, go to his website (Japanese only): www.geocities.jp/keinoryokouki or see his photo galleries: http://photo.svobodno.com

Ever wanted to know what it’s like to be the main attraction in one of those conveyor-belt sushi joints in Japan? Well this is it:

Both Japanese people and my friends in other countries often comment that “you love Japan”. At this point it’s not possible for me to either refute or comply with this assessment, and perhaps it never will be. Let me just impart the polar opposites of my experience, what I love and what I hate about Japan. Like a giant iceberg that spans the seas, only arising at one home and another, this is only the tip, and the majority of how I feel lies somewhere beneath the surface. If global warming continues as planned, they’ll be visible soon enough. The following diatribe is intended to be both serious and not, as this represents my experience, so please do not be offended. Let me start with what I hate.

I hate ignorance. I would say that I hate racism but honestly I don’t think Japanese people are on the whole racist. I hate the fact that in the second largest economy, in a vastly modern and globalized country I still get stared at for looking different. I hate that the immigration policies are institutionally racist. I hate having to explain that I do not love Bush, and war, and guns. I hate being asked what American culture is, and getting surprised looks when I say I don’t know anymore (if I ever did). I hate group think, where ten people must be consulted before answering the question “how are you?”, students are forced to march like soldiers, girls at the clubs dance in synchronized patterns and most of all that someone older always knows what’s best. I hate the neighborhood P.A. system, waking everyone up at the ass-crack of dawn with news of someone dying and playing a stupid, out of tune and completely not-cute song every night at 6pm. I hate Big Brother.

I hate the Japanese education system that stifles creativity, character development and personal achievement and puts every focus into making human beings into cogs for a machine that no longer works. I hate the fact that my students didn’t learn a damn thing this year and that after a minimum of 6 years English education plus cram school most Japanese people can’t speak English. I hate that there is actually debate about whether English should be used in the English classroom.

I hate that Japanese people are so damn good at everything. I hate salary men, stony faces, boring business suits, aggressive 4-foot-tall grannies, and OLs. I hate the fact that all I needed to get this job was a college degree and that most foreigners here can’t speak a damn word of Japanese besides “beer” and “love hotel” (“beeru” and “rabu hoteru”). I hate that foreigners are pigeon-holed into about 4 types – student, English teacher, gypsy/criminal or banker and are welcomed just so long as they promise to leave. I hate being busy like an ant, scurrying around with ten million other ants doing ten million pointless tasks even when I’m supposed to be “on vacation”, and I hate the fact that “the job” is infinitely more important than the family.

I hate absent fathers who spend 12 hours a day at work and string out their families with useless trinkets and status symbols turning them into consumer junkies while he’s off drinking with girls his daughter’s age and not feeling a damn bit ashamed. I hate the housewives who sit around and take that abuse while spoiling their sons rotten. I hate their sons’ mullets and white moccasins. I hate their daughters’ pigeon toes, helpless demeanor and purposely crooked teeth. I hate underage prostitution, vastly under-reported incidences of rape and domestic abuse, and the use of abortion as birth control. I hate the tall, blue eyed Mormon missionaries in their white shirts who wear bicycle helmets and thrust their beliefs onto a culture far older and more developed than theirs.

I hate Japan’s love of paperwork and resistance to this new invention called a “computer”. I hate shopping and sightseeing and cameras and peace signs. I hate that smoking is the number one cause of death, followed by suicide. I hate the fact that everyone is what they wear. I hate Disney and J-Pop and pachinko. I hate being so far away from the one I love that she left me. I hate being told that I look like Tom Cruise when clearly I look like David Beckham. I hate the lack of any variety in Japanese beer. I hate fermented beans, most Japanese sweets and the fact that meat is in EVERYTHING. I hate that being a vegetarian means I just like vegetables a lot. I hate the lack of foreign food restaurants and the lack of actual non-smoking sections. I hate that they put mayonnaise on everything.

I hate the legal system that has a 99% conviction rate and would put a foreign kid in jail for months for stealing hair wax. I hate being told that my Japanese is flippin’ amazing and that my chopstick skills are even better. I hate that even people who know I’ve spent two years here are amazed at my flippin’ spectacular chopstick skills. I hate disposable chopsticks. I hate that people are surprised I can eat sushi, tofu, white rice, and pickled plums. I hate the fact that Japanese climbers put bolts into all their routes. I hate Japanese new age cults, new age music, and new age art. I hate the lack of house insulation, international ATMs and the complete non-usage of credit cards. I hate that transportation is so expensive. I hate the power lines stretched across every mountain range in sight and the concrete walls damming up the middle of nowhere. I hate Japanese TV. And finally, I hate Engrish and the adaptation of other cultures based entirely on their face value or television image.

Breathe. What I love:

I love Japanese TV commercials, especially the ones that have absolutely nothing to do with what they’re selling. I also love Japanese game shows. I love the Japanese ingenuity that has made it possible to live in such an earthquake-prone country. I LOVE the shinkansen. I love that it’s so safe many people carry around hundreds, even thousands of dollars in cash. I love the energy saving initiatives the government has taken to curb carbon dioxide emissions and the country’s willingness to adopt “cool biz”. I love Okinawan folk music, Butoh, killer-cute bears, Miyazaki films and Beat Takeshi. I love that in Japanese climbing gyms the routes are set for people an average of 20 cm shorter than me.

I love it when people flip out because I’m a man, living alone, that actually cooks. I love it even more when they eat my awesome food and recognize. I love using beautiful (reusable) chopsticks and eating every last grain of rice. I love being able to speak Japanese, make jokes in Japanese and even sometimes dream in Japanese. I love that the police do not abuse their powers, are basically not allowed to shoot their guns, and always ride around with their lights flashing (making it easy to avoid speed traps).

I love Japanese food, from vegan Buddhist to octopus balls to green tea corn flakes. I love green tea ice cream. I love that thinking about food in a political way blows peoples’ minds. I love funky Japanese vegetables, tofu and fruits. I love that Japanese draft beer always has the perfect amount of head on it. I love that I was recently told I don’t look like a foreigner anymore. I love that the one I love, for however short a period, saw and shared my life here. I love the video games, purikura and karaoke. I love how stylish everyone dresses.

I love picture-taking smiles, cell phone cameras and convenience stores. I love the cell phones. I love that there is religious freedom and a secular government. I love Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. I love the simplicity of adolescent life and the fact that children play every day. I love that inviting someone to do something translates into “shall we go play?” I love that the majority of Japanese people are healthy and live long lives. I love shamelessly flashy, sexy, young adults and innocent, geeky, computer nerds. I love that it’s ok to have crooked teeth, slurp your noodles, shoot off fireworks and drink alcohol on the street. I love Kyoto. I love seeing stupidly-in-love couples.

I love being busy, active and productive and I love that in this land of high technology I’m still WAY better at computers than most Japanese. I love public transportation, signs written in English and that every sidewalk in the country has guide bumps for blind people. I love that being a minority has taught me about pigeon-holing foreigners and other forms of discrimination that occur in the US and all countries. I love being in a foreign country. I love that I can get a well paying job in a foreign country without being able to speak the language. I love that everyone is required to learn a foreign language for at least 6 years.

I love the Asian glow, businessmen passed out in the gutter with their cell phones still up to their ear, and no ID checks, bag searches, or pat-downs at clubs. I love community gardening. I love that the constitution forbids aggressive action by the military, that guns are virtually outlawed, and that Japan gives away a lot of money in foreign aid. I love the Kyoto Protocol. I love Japanese skateboarders and kids break dancing in front of department store windows at 3am. I love Japanese tattoos, tricked-out Japanese cars, trucks, motorcycles and scooters and I love Japanese gadgets. I love that for such a small country there are countless local specialties in food, language, culture and sights. And most of all, I love that on an individual basis I have been shown a profound amount of interest, kindness, warmth and friendship.