Peggy Keener: Quirky in the Far, Far … Really Far … East

Published 9:02 am Saturday, December 1, 2018

Today’s column is an excerpt from my memoir, “Potato In A Rice Bowl.”


July, 1962. Glen, our two baby sons and I have just landed in Tokyo after an utterly grueling 24-hour flight across the Pacific Ocean in a four-engine, four-propeller troop plane. Aside from its yucky all over pea-soup-green paint job, the seats of the C-54 (of Berlin Airlift fame), had not been designed for human cargo like us. I’d been folded in half like a Chinese fortune cookie for two days. And to make matters multitudinously worse, I was, as many of us girls did in the 60s, wearing a long-line Warners girdle! Heaven help me!

The plane, unable to hold enough fuel for a Pacific crossing, had made stops in both Hawaii and Midway Island. This afforded us pooped-out passengers a momentary reprieve from the dense, impermeable, smoke-encased cabin where soldiers were encouraged to smoke cigarettes for relaxation and enhanced cordial relations. My mission over the past two days—besides cutting out chunks of air and sucking oxygen from them—had been to watch vigilantly over our two toddlers, and—even more critically—to fulfill my personal self-appointed task of monitoring the propellers through my tiny window to make certain they continued their revolutions. My head was spinning.

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Bubbling excitement, notwithstanding, filled me to overflowing. The thought of making Japan our next home made me tingle inside, even though I felt a nagging, niggling disquietude. After all, as former occupiers, we would be settling in next door to the very folks we Americans occupied. I didn’t feel like anyone’s boss, but it nonetheless remained a fact. And who could blame the Japanese for having misgivings about welcoming us Keeners as their new neighbors? They didn’t know us from beans. Besides, I was thinking that to them we must look like four albinos in a minstrel band.

We staggered onto a military bus which slowly wove through hours of astonishingly tight Tokyo traffic on inconceivably narrow roads, soon arriving at the Gajo-en Hotel. At first glance I could see that by anybody’s count it was a suspect kind of establishment, otherwise known as a Japanese business contracted by the American government for the temporary use of U.S. military personnel. A few Japanese, bravely throwing caution to the wind, stayed there, as well.

As I entered the lobby, my arms were loaded down with suitcases and ten-month-old, thirty-pound Matt. Everywhere were people who all looked cloned with the same black hair, short stature, brown eyes and round faces. It was startling for a girl from the melting pot of Minnesota where no two of my clansmen appeared alike. Peering around me apprehensively, my eyes unexpectedly alighted on something, however, that immediately reassured me that all would be well; that I would not be alone in this strange land—to say nothing of this gamble of a hotel. Above the front desk hung a sign which stated:

“You Are Invited To Take Advantage of the Chambermaid”

As we moved down the hall, we were informed by the Japanese desk clerk that we would be staying at the Gajo-en until we could find a Japanese rental home, however long that would take. He opened the door to our room (aka our new home). Peering inside, I saw that it was as plain an accommodation as a Japanese Jane could be, with just enough room to manuever around the modest, barely adequate furniture. With no embellishments of any kind, it took me only a blink of the eye to notice a note pinned to one of the bed pillows. Setting Matt down on the mattress, I read it.

“No smoking in bed and other dusgusting behaviors.”

Wow, that seemed a bit rude. But only slightly taken aback, I decided to dismiss it as not applying to my family. After all, none of us smoked, including our babies.

Looking around, I was greatly encouraged to see that we had an attached bathroom. This would make things easier. I moved across the room to have a look. To my surprise there was a second sign taped to the mirror over the sink. Again I saw that it was a stern warning. My, but the Japanese sure were big on warnings.

“Is forbidden to steel hotel towerls, pleaes if you are not person to do such is pleaes not to read notice.”

Reflecting on this for only a moment, I moved on, having decided that since I wasn’t such a not person, I would not to read about forbidden towerls not for us no notice persons!

The temperature inside the room was as hot as a strip tease in Hades, the fug of it making me reel. Still, uninspired as the space was, it was our first Asian home-sweet-home and I was prepared to make the most of it, lacklusterness discounted. I had to admit, albeit, that there was some good news about the place. Even though it felt like a steaming Lutheran casserole, I could sense a reassuring Fort Knox kind of security. This was due to yet another comforting sign nailed to the door:

“Note for the swell safegourd of our gorgeous guestses,though we have told already in regards to grime prevention of our hotel through the informed book equipped in your now room, we anew inform the followings—BE CAREFUL!

Never leave open the door full and half.This is to be care of viscous swindlers and not be cheated by their skillfull enticement.”

Boy, I’d have to remember that alright. It was amazing that within only those few minutes the Land of the Far (very far!) East had taught me my first essential lesson — above all, the chief merit of language is clarity.

And with that important insight, I began my nearly thirty years of life in Asia.