All is dark, and people sit on the floor with legs crossed and eyes focused. Booming dancehall music erupts from a stack of speakers. An array of lights flash then we see her. She steps out regaled in a policeman outfit made of a dark, shiny material. Wearing dark glasses with a sneer on her face, she begins the routine. The Jacket flies off with a sweep of her hand, revealing a hard stomach and tanned skin. Then after a few seductive moves, she pulls the pants away, effortlessly tossing them to the side and continuing her routine. The music is pounding, and now the dancer, wearing a glittery top and boy shorts, starts moving her hips and body in ways that tease the imagination. A few feet away onstage, I’m watching this performance. The dancer is Junko, the first Japanese woman to win the Jamaican Dancehall queen competition.

I’m at a Reggae party called “Goodaz Fridays”, which is held monthly at the Hunters club in Hamamatsu. The crowd is thick, filled with cute Japanese reggae girls and gung ho guys who could rival many Jamaicans on the dance floor. A guy wearing a full white outfit moves with the cultural precision of a full-blooded Jamaican. Beside him a set of girls with platinum blonde hair and non-existent shorts go through routine after routine of practiced dancehall moves. I, the Jamaican stand there for a while, spellbound at the display. A few familiar faces are around; girls I’ve met through the Hamamatsu reggae scene. I see a girl in an off-white leopard print dress standing in the corner, she’s a local dancer. I see Ribbon girl as well, who greeted me with a weak smile. A few other dancers were there, all exhibiting a slightly different body language tonight, and they were all in close proximity to Junko.

Junko in person is reasonably tall. She’s thicker than the average Japanese girl, and thus has more presence. Years of doing headstands, dutty wining and complex routines has given her a very sexy musculature. She stands by the bar with a few local DJs, who are shamelessly soaking up the limelight with her. She laughs while downing drink after drink, casually exuding star power. I find her attractive but not beautiful, sexy but not skanky. In 2002, she came to Jamaica and stunned the audiences with her acrobatic display of dancehall finesse. From jumping splits to handstands and the occasional death-defying move, the other participants were powerless to innovate in her presence. I remember seeing her on TV, barely able to speak any English, happy to stand on her head upon request. “I love Jamaica.” She had said back then.

That was seven years ago, and seeing her in person is interesting. For the local reggae groupies in town, Junko must be the epitome of their world; that place which is a hybridization of Jamaica and Japan. She is their queen, the pinnacle of what they want to be. In their desires to learn dances, songs and Jamaican culture, maybe they all want to be little dancehall queens themselves, rising up into the limelight in shiny outfits with sweat-laced foreheads.

“Happy birthday.” I said to Junko in Japanese.

This was one of a few sprinkled moments of conversation I would have with her during the night. The first time I spoke to her, she replied in English.
“Why do you speak like a Japanese?” she said.
I laughed.
“I like Japan.” I replied in Japanese.

The party started to pick up at about three a.m. The music, fast and powerful was a blur of modern tunes interlaced with the screeching voices of amped-up selectors. River, a local reggae artiste was walking around with a camera, snapping the action. I was dancing too, and possibly making my Japanese media debut on a “Goodaz Friday” bashment DVD. Hilarious.

I ran into a friend at the party, and we mingled with the girls for little while in between dancing. One girl, tall and attractive with brown hair was enamored with my friend, who was a dancer. They disappeared to a dark section of the club for a few minutes while her friend ignored me.

I was on the prowl tonight, and as I would learn, things weren’t so easy. Every girl I’d met on the reggae circuit was in attendance, and they were all unusually frigid. Dancing robotically to the music and chatting amongst themselves, the party at times felt strange. Even when what we Jamaicans call “Gyal tunes” started playing, the crowd wasn’t intermingling that much.

See, in Jamaica, a party escalates gradually to levels that force people to dance. At the crescendo of a good party, many people dance together. So far, at the bigger events I’d been to in Japan, it seemed a lot of people were content to just dance by themselves all night. I saw Ribbon girl walking around alone. As usual she had a drink in her hand. She seemed lost; standing by a speaker at one moment, and in the middle of the dance floor the next. She wasn’t dancing with anyone, just drinking. Later I would see her on a couch, her legs oddly crossed as she stared forward blankly in a drunken daze. Maybe she had problems, I thought. Family, childhood, who knows. Like my life is any different.

At around seven I left the club, giving a chilly goodbye to a few girls I see all the time who decided to ignore me around Junko. I told (the now drunk) Junko all the best. She gave me a half-goodbye, half hand-squeeze and sipped more of her drink. Later, a friend would show me scandalous pictures of Junko dancing with some of the sound guys. I laughed when I saw these pictures, because one thing with a dancehall queen, is that she won’t just dance with anyone.

Morning sun hit me with a slap as I rode home, tired and stained with sweat. I vaguely remembered there was some number I had to call, or some e-mail to send. I forgot about it and fell asleep.

June 14th, 2009

A Daquiri, I say, Is a sweet drink. It usually has strawberries in it, or some kind of fruit. You blend it with vodka, ice and a little sugar. In front of me, nodding and somewhat understanding, is a bartender at Planet Café. I’ve been trying to explain for roughly twelve minutes what a Daquiri is.

I’m here on a Sunday, and I feel bored, even though my day has consisted of watching Terminator: Salvation at noon, passing through a barbeque with some friends and hitting up a video arcade. My city restlessness has a new face.

At the bar are a few people from the reggae parties I’ve seen around. A DJ from the T.P sound system crew, his girl and Gully. I order a gin and tonic after giving up on my Daquiri. As the bartender made my drink, he laughed and asked me to write down the ingredients for the Daquiri. I’m waiting on Ribbon girl, the one I met at the party last night. We chatted on the phone briefly after I went to my Barbeque. When I spoke to her, a twinge of excitement had trickled through me when her number popped up on my phone. At the time I was sitting on the sidewalk, chatting to a friend about nothing in particular.
I took a sip of my drink, when a flurry of activity beside me grabbed my attention. Two gorgeous girls with slim bodies and long brown hair came to the bar coasting on a sea of giggles. I thought one of them was a girl I met the night before, at the reggae party.

“Hug.” I said.

“Nani?” (what?)she replied.

I said it again, more Japanesey. “HUG-OO.” I said. She hugged me, and then I realized I’d never met her. I also realized in the same thought she was very drunk. Japanese girls never hug guys they don’t know. Unless of course, you are famous.
“Hi.” She said exasperatedly.
“Hey.” I replied.
She was pretty, with movie actress looks and flawless skin. She wore a stylish outfit that screamed high fashion. Her friend smiled as I talked to her, but chatted to one of the bartenders and left us alone.
“Where you from?” she said.
“Jamaica.” I replied.
“Really?” she said.
She said this with absolute surprise, in the way a child who swore he failed a test  realizes he actually received an A. I told her I was a designer. Incidentally, I was wearing one of my own shirts.
“I want to buy one.” She said, rubbing my chest. “I am a mother!” she exclaimed triumphantly.
“Very cool.” I said. “One child?”
“Yes, I have one. But I am twenty-one!”
She said this with a bright expression. I held her hand and without getting up, beckoned her to twirl. “Very nice.” I said.
She was. If she hadn’t told me she had a kid, it would be impossible to tell.
“You think I am nice?” she asked. Her eyes were filled with desire.
“Yes, you are.” I replied.
A part of me wanted to exploit this situation, but as a rule, I never like drunk women. The only way it works is if I’m equally drunk when I meet them, but at present I was stone cold sober. Having a sexy mother of one on my speed dial would be cool, but alas, Ribbon girl would arrive any minute.
I was right. In the periphery of my vision, I glimpsed her. She was looking very cute, with huge designer glasses. She wore a black and white dress over a pair of tight jeans. I could see the taper of her body through the layers. She had lip gloss on and a purse that resembled a ribbon. The theme continued.
I saw her pause as she said hello to some of the people from last night. Her eyes were on me, but I didn’t move. I’m not the type to play too many headgames, I was just observing.
The hot mom disappeared with a guy onto the the dance floor, and I turned to Ribbon girl. “Hey! You been here long?” I said. She walked over. She gave me a weak hug and stood by the bar. Close up, I could see the glow of the bar lights on her lips. She put her bag down. She seemed a little nervous. I chatted to her about my day and ask her some questions about herself.
“I don’t do much.” She replied. ” I just like to dance.”
Ah, I said in my mind. She’s a party girl.
I’ve messed with party girls before. One word always comes to mind when I think of a party girl.
Dangerous.
Party girls always seem to have nothing to do, are often sexy and probably slept with a few guys you’ve met before if you go out a lot. This generally means it’s a bad idea to think you’re special if she likes you. Sometimes this can change after a few sexual encounters, but not always.
She reached into her bag and pulled out a small camera. The LCD flashed brightly as it came on. With her glasses and jeans, she looked like a shadow of herself the night before.  The image of her leaping on me, her face pressing against my neck and the smell of her shampoo flooded my senses quickly. It faded quickly, like a puff of cigarette smoke.
She showed me pictures of her in Jamaica. “Maji de??”(Really?) I said. Then I remembered somewhere between tequila shot eight or nine she had mentioned living in Jamaica for a month. Through her pictures I was catapulted back home. I saw the bright glowing faces of people with dark skin and short curly hair. She showed me the hot spots; Stone Love’s headquarters for Weddy Wednesdays, Lime Quay beach for Sunday afternoon, Devon house for tasty ice cream, and more. There were pictures with famous Jamaicans, and a few of her Japanese friends going wild at big parties, like Passa Passa.
I playfully joked with her, but she was shy, different. She ordered Chozou, a popular drink (sake mixed with water). I didn’t know why she was nervous. After she put the camera back into her bag, her entire focused drifted to the UNO game the people beside us were playing. I hinted a few times at going to dance, but she kept saying she was watching the game.
That’s an incredibly fascinating game of UNO, I thought to myself. Then I remembered. She was a party girl. I’m new to the scene. Disappearing with her on the dance floor might put her on the bad news bus. While we were looking at the pictures, she mentioned some party on Friday she was going to. She watched the UNO game, and I sat, bored on the stool. I got up and left.
As I exited the bar, before the door close I heard my name. In a movie-scene way, the door slammed in front of her as I glimpsed her looking at me.
“I see you Friday night?” she said.
“Yes.” I replied.
She went inside. I laughed a little, because she had practically chased me out of the bar. Party girls are different, I thought. I left the underground passage leading out of Planet and heading outside, back into the nighttime and towards the bowels of the city.

 

I’m getting used to drunk Japanese girls.

I’m at Captain Jerk, a Japanese-owned Jamaican restaurant and a cute girl named Ai is rubbing my hand. I’m chomping down on a particularly spicy Jerk chicken tortilla. She’s peppering me with questions. All in Japanese.
“Where are you from?”
“You are cool!”
“Why did you learn Japanese?”
“You are Jamaican. REALLY?”
“You are a designer? ”
“Do you drink tequila?”

 
She had a round, attractive face and long brown hair that fell below her shoulder blades. She went outside. Another girl came in. She had the same hairstyle as Ai, but had a slimmer face. She was Naoe. “Are you going to this event?” she said, pointing at a poster on the wall. It was filled with Japanese faces I didn’t recognize, but it was some kind of Reggae event.
“We are performing there next month.” She said.  I ooked on the date, it   said July 27th.
“Wow that’s far away, ” I told her.
“Come!” she squealed. “We are doing African dance!”

 
Her small body was bristling with energy. We chatted a little more then she and Ai disappeared. I started a conversation with a DJ who was also a graphic designer. “I made this,” he said,  pointing to a logo on his trucker hat. It looked like the MTV symbol, with different lettering. He told me about a reggae party nearby. I was ready to go because so far, my night was a bust.

 
Earlier, three friends and I had an idea. We would all wear white and call ourselves the white team. We went to a club and quickly my other three friends had girls. I tried chatting to some ladies without success, that’s when I felt like eating jerk chicken, and left.
I was starting to remember more about the party. Gyallis, (the chef at Captain Jerk) had told me about it.

 “You like dagga party?” he had asked me.

“Sure.” I replied with a smile.

Then he had handed me a flyer.

“Many sexy daggering girls will be there.” he had said with a smile.

I stood up to leave, but a group of Japanese men with orange hair tried to get me drunk first. I had only stepped out of the shop for a second.
“Press Obama!” one of them said. He was wearing a blue and red surfer outfit, complete with yellow shorts. I didn’t want to press Obama.
The jerk shop had a tradition. On the window sill, slightly above a display of different beers was a small Obama doll. A red button at the doll’s feet, if pressed, played snippets of his famous speeches. Whoever pressed the button has to buy a tequila shot.
Two of the guys up, the streetlights making their hair look like fire.
“Press, Press, Press.” They kept saying.
I didn’t press the button, but they did, several times. Within minutes I had four shots. Japanese guys can get a little touchy feely when they are drinking, and one of the guys was very forward. He kept trying to hug me, as he laughed and spoke rapidly in Japanese. I could barely understand him. He had a heavy tan, and a funky earring with crosses and little slender silver rods. One of his more sober friends chuckled and pulled him away. The guys were Keiske and Keiske, Shojo and Shinya.

 
I told them ciao and head off with the DJ to the reggae party, which was at a club called G-side. We walked a few blocks away from Captain Jerk to a quiet street. I saw the club. A large sign with a gray-chested gorrila identified it.
I went up three flights of stairs and saw a DJ I met last week Monday. Before I reached the door, a girl was touching my arms and saying “Kakkoi… Kakkoi…” (cool, cool) I  chatted to the people at the door briefly and went inside. I found out the DJ had gotten me in for free.
Inside was small and dark. A small bar connected to a kitchen was directly behind me, and a hallway eight feet wide lead to a set of shadowy stairs up to the dance floor. I said hello to some girls near me and they nearly leapt out of their skin when I told them I was Jamaican. They were both cute; one with sweeping long hair and a sharp set of bangs, the other wearing a stylish straw hat. I can’t remember their names because the girl with the hat bought me six shots of tequila.
Upstairs, a Japanese selector was screaming into a microphone. The music was fast and current dancehall erupted from a pair of huge speakers on a small, slightly elevated stage. There weren’t that many people in the place, but it was mostly girls. I went back downstairs and saw the biggest reggae scenester in Hamamatsu; a guy who called himself Gully. I told him hello. Nearby, I saw a girl by the bar that caught my eye. She had a nice body and a cute outfit. “Your ribbon is cute.” I told her in Japanese. She had a large, sparking silver ribbon in her hair. She smiled shyly and swallowed the rest of her drink. She was very pretty, with a button nose, sensuous lips and permed hair. A hot song started playing through the speakers.
“I love this song!” I exclaimed. “Let’s dance.” I said.
She nodded in that same shy way and went to the dance floor with me. Like most of the girls there she stood quietly, half-stepping to the music. Then the song changed and the girls evolved into full blown Jamaicans.
Her hips took on a life of their own. Everything moved in perfect sync to the reggae beats. I stepped towards her and she bent over. The DJ screamed something, and soon I had her in the air, grinding on a wall nearby.
She wasn’t the only one. Once the music picked up, more of the girls when wild. I danced with all of them. It was an amazing feeling at the party; sexy girls and Jamaican music… in Japan.
A support beam on the dance floor became a temporary seat for me in between the dances. At some point while I was sitting there, a sexually charged song played. It was Bragga’s Dagga Dat. I looked at the girl with the ribbon. She was a few feet away, standing near a wall. I looked at her and nodded. She took a running start and leapt unto me, coiling her legs around my back. I surged with  strength and walk/danced with her everywhere. Occasionally she was suspended only with my hand on the small of her back. This trend continued with other girls in the party.
I was surprised. The Japanese veil of shyness in these girls had disappeared. For a little while, cultural barriers were shattered. Here my culture was king, and my culture demanded that men and women dance together. I horribly exploited this, dancing and grinding until my back ached. I went up and down the dance floor, chit-chatting with people. This was when the girl with the straw hat bought me all those shots. I also realized, I was speaking completely in Japanese.
I came back to the dance floor once, and people were looking up at something. I was under a slightly covered part of the dance floor. I walked over to the support beam and looked up. The girl with the ribbon was on top of one of the large speakers. A DJ, General, was standing behind her in a thin undershirt. He looked at the crowd with lust in his eyes and smirked. Music roared from the black boxes, and he started pounding away, nearly sending her over to certain doom on the cold tiles of the dance floor. I smiled. This was fascinating.
When I left the dance floor this time, someone had opened a door in the hallway. Bright light leaked from outside, illuminating the hallway. Outside shining brightly, was the sun. I didn’t even realize the entire night had passed. I left soon afterwards wiwth a smiley face and girls to call. I strolled home in the quiet of the morning, occasionally getting flashes of the girl with the Ribbon, flying towards me, heels first.

 

Five guys are holding me.

I grit my teeth and struggle as a mild weightlessness hits me. Someone is holding my legs; I’m being escorted out of a club. Angry voices escape the premises and rocket into the night air. Brazilian guys are barking at me in a mosaic of words I can’t understand.

“Mi amiga y amigo.” I say in broken Spanish.
One man, with thick eyebrows furrowed into an angry gaze shouts: “He punched a girl!”
“Really?” I reply.
He was talking about Eric, one of three people I came to the club with. The night didn’t start like this.
Like most Fridays, this one started at 7-11. I grabbed a few beers for the walk to downtown Hamamatsu. By the time I reached Yuraku-gai, I had a nice buzz. I was wearing a light purple shirt and an age-old accessory; the man tie.
Yuraku-gai is crawling with people, and I entertain myself by saying hello to cute girls walking by. I make a pit stop at the video arcade and lose a few games playing with my current Street Fighter character, Guile. I bounce into 7-11 and grab another drink. I run into a friend, Ten. I chat to some cute girls with red hair. Behind them a few girls say, “Konbanwa.” And disappear into a building called Cote d’ Azur. I wince a little. Japanese girls rarely say unprovoked hellos. I should have chatted to them, but they were gone.
A heavy hand lands on my shoulder. It’s Will. He is beaming a bright smile, almost goofy. He’s drunk. That’s when the man-grabbing ensued. I tried to grab will and we tussled. Ten grabbed him from behind, and he was momentarily suspended in the air.
We go to 7-11. “Can you get me a drink?” he says. I say sure. He tells me that my favourite drink (Suntory Strong) is stronger than a regular beer. I look on the label. Sure enough, its 8% when all the beers are 5% alcohol. We buy a few and head to Liquid Kitchen. Somewhere along the way, we lose Ten.
At liquid, we go inside like a hailstorm. A few girls are inside. Two of them are cute foreigners. Will zeroes in on girl number one while I entertain her friend. Her face intrigues me, and I like her lips.
“You’re too hot for me.” She says. “Why do you like my fat?”
She’s a little chubby, but not obese. I poke her stomach and tell her she’s adorable.
Inside Will is doing shots. Marty (the owner of the bar) give me free shots. The ladies aren’t biting. (plus my chick has a boyfriend). After standing around in fuzzy, smily-faced daze, we head out. We both have passes for the Brazilian club, Hunters, and decide to go there.
Back on Yuraku-gai,  I see two familiar faces; redheads in a sea of Jet black Asian hair. “Grab?” I say to Will. He smiles and nods. Will lunges after Stephanie, and whirls her around like a ragdoll. We laugh and make jokes. Everyone is going to hunters.
Will has been wilder than normal. He’s usually the king of cool. For some reason he seemed distracted. In a few weeks he’d be leaving Japan after living there for several years. It must have been messing with his head.
With Stephanie, Me, Will and Eric, we went to Hunters. It was some sort of traditional Brazilian folk music night. As always, I saw the same faces. I danced a little with Stephanie, stepping horribly to the Brazilian music. She was all smiles and rhythm, getting so close I could smell her shampoo. She occasionally gave Will a furtive gaze, and I wondered what it meant. Somewhere in this stream of thought, I see Eric being dragged away by a beefy guy. The guy had him in a headlock. Oddly, he was smiling. Stephanie stretched out a pale hand towards him.
Nooooo… he’s my friend.” She said in a strange voice.
I reached forward, getting a good hold on Eric and that’s when I felt arms behind my neck and bodies around me. I surged with strength to no avail. As the guys clamored around me, I wonder what happened. This is when I heard that Eric punched a girl.
This seemed strange (Eric is gay). No one could figure out why he would do that. I was near the entryway. Behind me, a short bouncer with thick sideburns had my left arm twisted upwards behind me. I didn’t struggle. As I learned more about what happened I just nodded. He let me go.
Later Will told he that he was the person that grabbed me initially, protecting me from a beatdown by guys behind me that I didn’t even see.
With a smile, Will said. “I told them “nooo!” that’s my friend! Then I grabbed you. I got two punches in the face.”
This was interesting.
“They said, “Get the black guy! Get the black guy!” Will said excitedly.
I laughed this. “Really?” I asked.
“Yes. Because you are bigger and taller and you have muscles they thought you would fight. They were ready to beat you up.”
He told me this as we were walking Eric home, somewhere nearby. He was being a diva, not wanting to go home. Eventually, through a lot of cajoling he went inside his apartment, which wasn’t too far from the club. As the three of us walked away, chatting about nothing in particular, we hear a voice behind us. It was Eric.
Will walked up to him and spoke in a calm voice. “Go home. Seriously, if you go back there they will kill you. Go home.”
This seemed to register in his mind, even through his inebriation. He nodded and still smiling, walked back home. We walked some more and Stephanie commented on our bodies. She called us “threesome material”. I wasn’t sure how to take this, and I didn’t say anything. We went back to the club. One bouncer told me that’s the third time Eric has been kicked out of hunters. He was officially banned for life.
I went back inside and danced a little. Stephanie went home alone. “Call me later eh?” she said. I followed Will to KK house where he met up with a friend. It was around five a.m. I hopped on my bike, and went home.

June 7th, 2009

In Skinny jeans and shoes unfit for sand, I’m helping to clean a beach.

I’m an unofficial member of Surfquest, run by a tall manly-man looking guy named Mike, who’s responsible for thirteen miles of beach in Hamamatsu. I’d met him once in the city. He’s a builder. He built his house, skateboards and has plans for a lodge beside his house to sell books, house wayward surfers and have events.
The beach clean is pretty popular. Afterwards we have a barbeque and there is a book sale for those of us fiengning for English novels to read. When I arrived, I saw a couple fellow employees and familiar faces from around town.

We grabbed bags and went through an enclave of trees to the beach. Seeing the ocean for the first time since I’d been in Hamamatsu washed me with a sense of calm. I felt quiet and in touch internally as I walked and talked, happily picking up garbage and sorting into different bags. We had red bags and blue bags. “Red is for unburnable, blue for burnable.” Mike told the group earlier. We were all commissioned straw hats, little dirty gloves and a few plastic bags each. With only two colours of bags, people still asked during the clean which was which. I was putting the non burnables in the red bag, which luckily for me, was correct.

In terms of my life I didn’t know how I was feeling. The days still seemed a little fuzzy, and I often wondered what I was doing in Japan, so far from everything and everyone I know. This event helped my mood significantly. I fed everyone around me with questions, made jokes and played racing games with Mike’s dog, Chai. I felt free.

Later, there was a veggie barbeque at Mike’s place. Darkness started to fall, and I was eating loads of curried beans, peppery black beans and chips. There were lots of beers and green tea. Somewhere around this time, I met a girl. I’ll call her Z.

She wore a white a purple skirt that fitted her form perfectly. She was small, but more curvy than the majority of the Japanese women I had met so far. I recognized her immediately. I met her one night I had a DJ stint at a local bar. My buddy had been chatting her up, but I had no idea if he succeeded.
I liked her face. She was cute, with round bright eyes and a button nose. Occassionally her eyes would slant and a spark of sexuality would spread across her face. Then, like nothing, it was gone. I had seen her tipsy, and that look remained in my mind as I saw her the first time. She spoke great English. Her family traveled around. She also had a playful sense of humor.
I pretended to look through books in the book sale room to chat to her. We did small-talk. As I gauged her interest, I started to feel that she was someone worth some kind of effort. I puffed myself up somewhat, demonstrating my interesting life and telling lots of anecdotes, bridging the gap between my raging passions for certain things, with subtle hints about my sexual proclivities and love life.
She’s the kind of girls that foreigners here love–a well traveled Japanese chick who speaks English. The benefit of these women is three fold. One, they are open minded. Two they have probably been ina relationship with a foreigner (which can remove oodles of awkward situations), and three, they themselves have a different perspective on Japan after leaving it. She had been to America, Asia and Europe

.
I fed her story after story, wondering in my mind how I had morphed from my bumbling, sorry self of two days before into a person with what I call “life fire”. Time was dragging on, and I wanted to catch the last bus back to the city. K and a few other people wanted to take a walk on the beach, meaning we’d catch a cab home. I didn’t travel with much money on me that day, but I was down. I was enjoying everything about the evening, especially talking to K. Most women I had met so far were either shy or distant with language, or immediately proclaimed their status as taken.
A full moon was out and it lit our way as we made our way back through the enclave of trees to the beach. I will still chatting to K, and felt my sappy self coming out. I love beautiful moments in life, the kind that are priceless and are extremely simple. Standing with someone you care about on a beach somewhere, or in a mall holding hands waiting for a movie… these things always go straight in my subconscious as things I value. This was no different. The blue moonbeams illuminated the forestry around us, giving the dark leaves a touch of watered down indigo. Me, four other people and a cute girl were going for a moon-lit walk in Japan. It was a drop of heaven.

We when exited the forest, my jaw dropped. The sky above me was brightly lit; wrapped by a belt of puffy clouds beneath the shining moon in a semi-circular arch. Breathtaking, I thought. Now I was holding K’s hand, feeling her soft skin against my palms, smiling fiendishly. We stopped at the seashore, near the tall shadows of tetrapods, where a few Japanese guys were lighting fireworks. There we stood the six of us; Mike’s tall silhouette about fifteen feet away with a friend. Behind me, another couple held hands and quietly took in the vista. Me, I was standing with my arms outstretched and my eyes closed, feeling warm ocean breeze caress my body like a thousand hands.
“This is what living is all about.” I said to myself. “This is life.”
I was lost in thought, and completely overwhelmed by the beauty of the ocean and the moon. I stood there for a while, until I felt a hand touch me. It was K. “Don’t get left behind.” She said with a smile.
I was happy to see the moonlit beach. I was happy to spend time around people with good energy. I was happy to meet K. As usual, the work week loomed ahead like a burly taskmaster with a whip of chains, but at least for a moment, I could say I smiled for no other reason, than to smile.