Marcel Winatschek

One Year in Japan

For exactly one year now I have been living in Japan. I have a Japanese phone number, a Japanese bank account, a Japanese social security number. As a student at the art faculty of a Japanese university, I have met many local creatives as well as wonderful people from all over the world who, like me, are trying to find their place in this demanding society. When I’m not sitting in lecture halls, studios, and cafeterias having my broken Japanese put to the test, my life plays out by day between cinemas, galleries, and museums, and by night between izakaya, karaoke bars, and supermarkets that stay open twenty-four hours a day, on nearly every corner of the city, bright and humming.

Songs of Rebellion and Loneliness

I recently watched the documentary Our Lies and Truths about the rise and downfall of the Japanese girl group Keyakizaka46. After all, in recent years Techi and her comrades have been the idols I listened to most. Songs like Silent Majority, Ambivalent, and especially 黒い羊 still play on endless loop for me today, and the accompanying music videos are performative masterworks. Yasushi Akimoto, who has been responsible for acts such as AKB48, Onyanko Club, and Iz*One and also created Keyakizaka46, is not for nothing Japan’s most gifted and at the same time most hated producer. Some people say Yasushi Akimoto destroyed the Japanese music industry, and I agree, noted Agency for Cultural Affairs Commissioner Shunichi Tokura in cutting words.

Small Talk Is Hitler

We’re in a hotel lobby at the counter, staring holes into the air. The girl is Irina, buxom. The guy is Erik, important. I’m Marcel and want to go home. But that’s impossible. Business appointments are essential. Instead of telling Irina that tonight around nine I’d like to take her anally in her single room, and stapling my bank details to Erik’s forehead so he can wire me his inheritance, we must perform society’s dance of dances. I hate small talk. I hate the your-life-is-irrelevant-to-me, nice-weather smile with dull looks trained to keep us from yawning and pouncing. I hate most people. So why this? Dogs sniff rears, humans edge closer through gab. Less fun. Imagine the hours we’d save by going straight to the point.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

On a warm summer evening, when the cicadas were diligently chirping away and the moon was slowly pushing itself onto the stage of the sky, a friend and I were on our way home from an exhibition when, not far off, we first heard music and shortly after cheerful laughter. Because we were curious and still had a bit of energy left, we decided to see what was going on there. So we picked our way through the neighborhood’s ever-narrowing streets and walked past streams, houses, and playgrounds until, a short time later, we stood at the edge of a small park where a neighborhood festival was underway. And it took less than a minute before friendly, perhaps slightly tipsy, people invited us to join the little festivity.

Melodies for Rebels

I love Japanese pop music. J-pop, those are the anthems of my small, private, messed-up world. The Japanese music industry doesn’t care whether I listen to the songs or not. Whether I worship the stars or not. Whether I watch the music videos or not. They are not marketed to me through TV ads and radio slots and newsletters. I don’t exist for them. I can piece together their meaning on my own. I know nothing about their scandals, their problems, or their rumors. J-pop is a huge, personal playlist. Just for me and folks who are a little bit different as well. Its emotional range has something ready for every situation in my life. For dancing. For laughing. For crying. And one of the modern greats of this musical wonder world doesn’t even exist anymore: BiSH.

The Samurai’s Grave

We arrived at the foot of Mount Tatsuda, the site of the Hosokawa family temple, Taishoji. Today the grounds belong to Tatsuda Nature Park, green, wide, and quiet. Among bamboo and cedars stand four mausoleums: For Hosokawa Fujitaka, first lord of the Kumamoto domain, his wife, his son Hosokawa Tadaoki, the second lord, and Tadaoki’s wife, Hosokawa Gracia. History you can touch. The teahouse Ko-sho-ken moved me most. Restored from Tadaoki’s drawings, it recalls a man who was a warrior and a tea master. At the entrance sits a hand-washing stone he loved. In Kyoto, Toyotomi Hideyoshi and tea master Sen no Rikyu drew water from it. Later the Hosokawa lords carried a basin on sankin-kotai journeys to Edo to hold tea ceremonies - a traveling vessel.

Freedom Over Convenience

I’ve never been cool. Not in kindergarten, not at school, not at work. While everyone around me adored the newest American hip-hoppers, wore Nike Air Max, and took drugs whose names I’d never heard, I kept to my small nerdy cosmos: Listening to the Chrono Trigger soundtrack on an iPod falling apart, wearing Superstars for fifteen years, and feeling extreme for taking a single drag. For music, series, or films I lived by torrents: Monthly indie-rock playlists via download links, anime via RSS, and movies from a university shared drive. Life felt nice and simple. When Spotify grew I ignored it. Why pay to rent music I don’t own and mostly won’t listen to? I dismissed it with a simple Nope.

Embracing the Escapism

Sometimes I wished I could muster the courage to leave everything behind, lock myself away forever in an apartment, and devote the rest of my life to a single online role-playing game. In the midst of an enchanted fantasy world full of wonders, dreams and secrets I would transform from a peasant boy into a heroic warrior, find unimaginable treasures and fight monsters, and band together with other outcasts bored with real life to form a sworn adventuring party. My days would be governed by quests, rituals, and leveling, by the pulse of raids, and the slow comfort of companionship the real world denied me. My existence would turn into a digital meaningfulness whose end would arrive only when the servers were switched off.

Happiness Between Two Buns

Japan is a country full of treats. Those who want to fill a hungry stomach efficiently and cheaply can find sushi, tempura, and ramen on every corner, in different price ranges, in hidden restaurants or crowded supermarkets. But Japan would not be Japan if it hadn't absorbed other culinary cultures and made them its own. Cities brim not only with steaming noodle shops and futuristic chains where raw fish on rice travels past on conveyor belts, but also offer delights from Spanish and Italian kitchens or, for those who prefer hearty, fatty, generous portions, the American culinary world. You encounter these options everywhere, from tiny stalls and family-run izakayas to high-end restaurants and bustling food halls in the most unexpected neighborhoods.

For the Alliance

My journey begins in the Northshire Valley, enclosed by high mountains, somewhere in the thickly wooded Elwynn Forest. Before me stands not only the abbey of the local brotherhood but also an adventure that will take me into frozen deserts, bubbling volcanoes, and creepy ghost towns. When I meet my friends, masquerading as knights, thieves, and wizards, behind the towering gates of the royal fortress Stormwind, and outfit myself there with keen blades, shining shields, and magical potions, I can hardly rein in my anticipation. The scent of pine and old stone, the flutter of banners, and the clanking of armor all heighten the thrill. One thing is certain: Whatever challenges await in this digital wonderland, we will endure and overcome them together.