Chanting for a Viennese Coffee

I really wanted to stay at the reception for the conference on Saturday night, but I had made another engagement that I couldn’t get out of, and was really looking forward to as well.

I had probably mentioned something about an International Poetry Festival going on at a café near my house. Colleen knows a guy from Okinawa (and when I met him, the first thing that came to my head was “He doesn’t look like Japanese” and Colleen conferred, Okinawans are different) and was hosting a poetry festival and was looking for people that speak other languages. Colleen had mentioned me to him and I emailed, interested. One way or another, I ended up chanting in Ancient Greek Andromache’s speech to Hector from Book 6 of Homer’s “The Iliad.” I was last; each of us had to explain what the poem meant in either English or Japanese. I knew that I had to do that but at the last minute, decided to do my explanation of the passage in Japanese. With a little bit of help from Jesse (another kid on the Monbusho) I was able to pull it off pretty nicely, for last minute. Maybe that’s a good sign.

I did it because this was something that I would not have done normally at home; Colleen had mentioned that the café culture in Kyoto is really good and she wanted to “get in on it” and to some extent, so did I. The café where the poetry festival was held at was amazing – I felt like I was at an old café in Europe. It was very homey and the building it was in actually had a turret-style room and on the outside was red ivy. I definitely plan to go there again – maybe next weekend when I have to study for my midterm and try to tackle an article from Nippon VOGUE. It’s closer to me than is Sanjo Starbucks or Ogawa, and a lot homier. It has a great atmosphere.

There was an artist there sketching each of the speakers. Afterwards, I asked if I could see the drawing he made of me out of curiosity, and I ended up bringing it home with me.

It’s tacked onto my wall in my apartment now and when I move home in 2008, I plan to frame it (as my Kate Spade ads from Nippon VOGUE; I like the design of the advertisements, and I am a Kate Spade junkie. To each her own fix).