An Unexpected Invitation

Last Friday night, following our big 7.3magnitude earthquake, I walked over to church to pick up the car.  Our pastor, Nomura Sensei, met me at the door and told me something quite unexpected.  Apparently Yo-san (a Chinese woman who is a member of our congregation) had called the church earlier that afternoon and was wondering if I would be interested in playing the djembe (African drum) with her at her concert on Sunday (that would be two days from now).  We would need to get together on Saturday (tomorrow, the day before the performance) to practice.  This was the concert that she was going to perform at the Fukushima City Ongakudou 音楽堂 (public music hall) for which she’d been practicing for the last several months. 

Now, Nomura Sensei’s use of the English language is usually pretty good . . . but having lived in this country for almost a year, I’m all too familiar with frequent miscommunications (based on language and cultural differences) to assume that I’m understanding anyone clearly.  So I asked for Yo-san’s phone number so that Haidee (who speaks Japanese a lot better than I do) could confirm that this was actually the message that she had intended to communicate.

As it turns out, it was!  Yo-san wanted me to play djembe at her concert at the 音楽堂!  So the next morning at 9:30am Yo-san met me at church and drove me to her house so we could practice our song together.  Now, remember:  I don’t speak very much Japanese at all, and Yo-san doesn’t speak any English.  I could ask her about her favorite food, when her birthday is, and if that object (over there) is an apple or not (see Japanese Language blog). . . but I certainly can’t ask questions like, “How fast would you like this music to be?  Is this a good drum beat?  When would you like me to start playing?”  Luckily, Haidee taught me some useful music vocabulary the night before, such as “song” (kyoku), “from the beginning” (saisho kara), and “faster / slower” (haiyai / yukkuri).  Thus equipped, I arrived at Yo-san’s house for our first (and only) rehearsal.

Upon entering her home, I met Yo-san’s friend, Ka-san (何歓).  She is also from China (the same hometown as Yo-san), and has been living in Osaka for over 10 years, teaching music and Chinese language and culture.  Ka-san would be playing the Biwa 琵琶, a pear-shaped fretted lute, at the concert.  Yo-san would be playing the Koso古筝, a Chinese stringed zither.  Most of their songs would be played together, as duets.  They would each play a couple songs alone.  It would be during one of Ka-san’s solo pieces on the Biwa 琵琶, that I would accompany her on my djembe.  Okay, it was becoming a little bit more clear to me.

A picture of 何歓 with her Biwa

the Koso 古筝

Ka-san and I introduced ourselves to each other (I can do that pretty well in Japanese, at least) and then she played through her solo piece for me.  Her solo, a Chinese folk song, sounded amazing!  There’s no sheet music – she had the entire song memorized.  She used her fingernails (and finger picks taped to her fingertips) to pluck, strum or tap the strings to produce many different qualities of sound.  There was even one part where she tapped the sound board with her palms, creating a drum-like effect.  For the next 30 minutes we played through different parts of the song with me improvising what I thought would sound like a good drum accompaniment.  It was a lot of fun!  Ka-san was very kind, patiently trying to explain different directions for me to follow, and, in the end, (probably) just being content with the small percentage of instructions I actually understood.  With words and gestures I asked Yo-san if she had a way to record the music so I could practice alone at home, and she did!  So, less than an hour later, I found myself back at church, recording in hand, with directions to be at the Ongakudou 音楽堂 at 12:45pm to practice once more with Ka-san on stage before the 2:00pm performance.

Sunday morning came quickly.  Yo-san’s husband drove me to the Ongakudou 音楽堂 and, thankfully, came inside with me.  He was able to convince the ushers at the front door that I was indeed one of the performers, even though my name wasn’t in the program and I didn’t look Chinese.  Thankfully I found Ka-san and Yo-san on stage, going over a few last minute notes with the stage manager.  Yo-san gave me an authentic Chinese hat to wear (with my white shirt, black pants), and Ka-san and I were able to run though our song two more times (ahh, a second rehearsal!) before we all had to leave the stage – the doors were about to be opened for the audience.  

The ladies left to change into concert attire, and I stood off in the wings with the stage manager and the Master of Ceremonies, the head of the Japanese/Chinese Cultural Exchange group in Fukushima.  She didn’t speak English either, but was able to come up with two words, “flower” and “student” and then proceeded to explain to me, using Japanese and a stick-person pencil drawing, that I was to bring a single rose with me on stage, and after the song give this flower to a school girl in a blue dress.  I had no idea about the meaning of this flower exchange, but after repeating her instructions back to her in broken Japanese, I assumed (always a risky thing to do) that I was understanding her correctly.

A picture of me playing djembe with Ka-san (note the small rose next to my chair)

At this point some other Japanese ladies found me in the wings and asked if I’d eaten lunch yet.  Apparently there was a lot of extra food in the backstage changing rooms, so I followed them back stage where I found Yo-san and Ka-san, along with the four-person Mongolian music group called “Moriton Mongol” who would also be performing at the concert.  Free food, meeting the performers backstage before the concert, attending a concert for free, in costume, no less. . . . this invitation was getting better and better! 

The "Moriton Mongols"

At 2:00pm the performance began.  I stood in the wings and heard Yo-san and Ka-san play some amazing duets.  Then it was time for me to take the stage.  I grabbed my djembe and reached to take the flower with me on stage.  But the girl in the blue dress said (in Japanese), “No, that’s my flower!”  Whoops, I guess I had misunderstood . . . until Ka-san asked me, “Do you have the flower?” Apparently the girl didn’t know what was going on either.

After the performance I gave the flower to the girl in the blue dress.

To make a long story short:  I went onstage with Ka-san and I think our duet went really well!  After the song I gave the flower to the girl, and audience laughed, and we both left the stage (I learned a couple days later, from some of our English students who had been at the concert, that the Chinese folk song was about a boy giving a flower to a girl.).  At the end of the concert all the performers went out on stage to take a bow, and Yo-san called me out to join them.  Each performer (including myself!) got a large bouquet of flowers.  We then went out into the lobby to greet the audience.  It turns out there were several people in attendance that I knew:  a couple church members, English students from our school, and even few of my Japanese teachers that I see on Friday mornings, “Eric, we didn’t know you were going to be in the concert!”  (“Neither did I!”)

At the end of the afternoon, all the performers and several members of the Japanese/Chinese Cultural Exchange group invited me to join them for a celebration party at a local restaurant.  I sat across the table from Ka-san, who, being from out of town, didn’t know many people at the party either).  We had a nice conversation during which I could practice all of my useful Japanese phrases, and share some stories (as much as my Japanese language ability would allow) about being a foreigner in Japan.  Being from a different country themselves, I think Ka-san and Yo-san both have a special appreciation for what it’s like not knowing a language very well, and being an outsider in Japan.  It was a really great evening of connecting and sharing.

Ka-san 何歓 on the left and Yo-san 吐根青 on the right

After dinner Yo-san gave me a ride back to my apartment.  And so there I was, Sunday night, 48 hours after talking to Nomura Sensei on the doorstep of our church.  I had a large bouquet of flowers to add to our collection in our apartment (our students had given Haidee and me flowers at the Christmas Concert a week earlier), some great pictures of the concert, and shared experience with one of our church members that I will treasure for a long time.  There’s no telling the plans that God has in store for us here in Japan, but I’m growing more certain that there will be many more unexpected blessings like today!

Bouquets that we received at the concerts