interview

May 12, Shiseido parlor of the La Floret, Shinjuku. The young female interviewer is 30 minutes late.

"Well, Mr. Murakami, I'd like to ask about the kinds of things you like to eat every day. So let's begin with what you have in the morning."

"First of all, in the morning–"

"Wait, sorry. I forgot to turn up the volume on the recorder. Excuse me, please go ahead."

"First of all, in the morning I eat some vegetab–"

"Interesting. What time do you wake up in the morning?"

"I get up at five. And then–"

"Five o'clock? Five o'clock in the morning?"

"We're talking about mornings right now, aren't we?"

"I suppose we are... But what are you doing, waking up at five in the morning?"

"I'm running! It's not like I'm out stealing panties or anything like that."

"Hahaha.... So, around what time do you go to bed?"

"Nine thirty or ten. Anyway, isn't this interview supposed to be about food? I'm sorry, but I'm keeping people waiting and I don't have a lot of time."

"Right, right.... I apologize."

"I eat breakfast after I'm done jogging, at around six. I have a bowl of rice with plenty of vegetables, a roll of bread with two cups of coffee, and then two eggs, sunny-side up.

"How healthy!"

"It's really just because the vegetables near where I live are so cheap." 

(Cups of coffee are served, clattering against the table.) 

"And then that brings us around to lunch."

"It certainly does."

"What kinds of things do you have for lunch?"

"For lunch I usually– hey, the tape isn't moving!"

"Ah, ah, ah! You're right... Darn. What happened?"

Click, click, click....

"The switch isn't on. See, it's set to 'OFF.'"

"Ahhh! I thought I had turned it on..."

"What should we do? Do you want me to repeat everything?"

"No, it's alright. I'll be able to remember it all. You wake up at five and go jogging, have a bowl of rice with salad on top, a roll, and some ham and eggs."

"Fried eggs."

"Yes yes, fried eggs."

"And two cups of coffee."

"Two cups, coffee."

"Can you remember that?"

"It's fine. I've got an incredible memory!"

<The Article>

Mr. Murakami has an early morning. He wakes up at 5:00 AM, and then goes jogging. "Actually, it's like I'm a panty thief, hahaha!" he laughed with embarrassment. His daily menu consists of a salad with ham and eggs, and of course two cans of beer... 


-m

encore

Miserliness and avarice, frugality and rationalism.

There's people out there who will bring these kinds of bad ideas into your mind as they prompt you to make noise by violently putting their left and right hands together. You can find a lot of them at places like concert halls. They're out there, and in no small numbers. 

As individuals, they don't have much power, but when many of them gather together it all makes for a thunderous noise. Once these malcontents understand what their din is forming, they're all completely filled with confidence by the noises that they're making. They have like-minded people all around them, so many of their bad ideas probably start feeling like good ones.

When things start getting this way, the threats among the noise eventually reach a purposeful crescendo. It's exactly like how a bill collector slams his desk to make you jump .

"Encooorrreee!" 

"Gimme my money's worth!"

"Come off it already!"

These sorts of rude remarks come flying out.

I'm the kind of person who finds this situation terrifying.

But when you're in the middle of an encore the atmosphere gets you feeling really good, so even I tend to join in with the "Gimme my money's worth!" people in clapping.

Just the other day, I went to a friend's concert and for the first time in a while I witnessed what could be called an encore-less performance.

In the midst of an unending applause, one of the band members just jumped up to the front and shouted into the microphone: "We're not performing anymore, so please go home! You can go amuse yourselves!"

The hecklers snapped to their senses, resumed their place as normal members of the audience, and gradually began to leave.

I guess they weren't really troublemakers individually. All of a sudden everybody was just caught up in the bad ideas. 

Anyway, I just think this "quid pro quo" attitude is something that I'd like to see done away with entirely.

In saying that, I'd probably never make a good musician.


-i