My trip, in five points

1. Aggression (J train) and Zen (A train) on the NY subway
a. New York is a strange place, and nowhere is it stranger than in the subway where bizarre extremes coexist in the dank smelly tunnels. One day I was witness to a screaminng confrontation in front of the ticket booth of the J train East Broadway station. A Chinese guy was screaming "come out! motherf****r!" To which the ticket attendant, wielding a metal pole, would go sQUaWKsqUAWkSquAWk! from inside the booth. Since the thin spectacled hispanic ticket attendant wouldn't leave the booth, they remained at a high-pitched impasse. Even as I passed through the turnstile, I could hear them echoing down to the platform. (come to think of it, I saw many many fights/arguments when I was in NYC)
b. With all my bags, on my way to JFK on the A train, a middle-aged white guy plops down next to me; he immediately begins talking to me about Japan, how he's 48 years old, how his adopted father was a 'teacher' at the University of Tokyo, and about how he was taught to respect peace and his elders. He mutters on and on about how he learned martial arts early on because his father was a monk (is there a direct link between these two matters?), and about how much mental discipline he has. Next he relates how he stopped a thug from harassing a Japanese woman on the subway once. Leaving the train, he tells me to think of him if I visit the 'temple of the cat', raising his left hand in cat-like paw. I suppose he means maneki neko, but I'm not sure exactly what temple he's talking about since most restaurants feature such a cat. There's plenty about his story that sounds dubious, especially since he didn't actually say anything about Japan, or Zen that was not common knowledge ('what is the sound of one hand clapping'), and his weird confusion over the naming of the Japanese isles. Then there's the deeper question of whether one really needs to tell someone about their inner peace. What is there to tell, if your soul is completely tranquil? Is there any more need to assert your ego, or rather, is there not instead just enduring silence?

2. Little Boy at Japan Society
Murakami Takashi has 'curated' (more like assembled) an exhibition at the Japan Society entitled 'Little Boy - the exploding arts of Japan's subculture' (featuring a floating image of a Ikari Shinji on the cover of the exhibition catalogue). I find the production of the exhibition interesting, because its contents are for the most part things that are commonplace elements of daily life in Japan, and not per se art. But when you pull together 60 or so local government mascots and line them all up, it's hard not to consider them a social phenomenon. The same goes for the hello kitty display. And the room-sized Zaku head that greets you when you enter.
Another thing about the exhibition is Murakami's deliberately political take on Japanese subculture, at once as infantile, as dominated by American cultural/political/economic imperialism, as subversive, as a response to capitalism. One section of the exhibition featured a wall-sized reproduction of Article 9 of the Japanese constitution, where Japan (is forced by the Americans??) to renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation. Next to it is a set of Godzilla dolls. . .

3. Mexican food shack
There was this old worn-down shack along Route 1 near my house when I was growing up. Apparently, they sold Mexican food in there, and my father would often, jokingly, say he wanted to eat there. Well, I finally went there, after learning that it's still open after these 20 something years. Inside, the floor is covered by worn orange carpeting. The seating area, nothing but several picnic tables and benches. The food arrives on styrofoam plates, but it wasn't bad at all . . .

4. Skullsplitter. . . in NYC!
Ah, I never thought I'd see this stuff stateside, but this was the thickest, murkiest beer I've ever had. Here is a link to the export label. Notice the placid demeanor of ol' Thorfinn the Mighty, AKA 'skullsplitter'. On the domestic (orkneys) label, Thorfinn is swinging his axe straight at your face, for even daring to open the bottle.

5. Smells of NYC
(my narrating ability is breaking down. this post is getting too long)
Sharp, but at times musty, as opposed to the heaviness of Tokyo air. Blue skies above NYC, bracing winds and clean air. But inside the deep brown buildings,scratched paint, creaking elevators and the dust of ages.