Sunday, January 4, 2009

Fight - Epilogue

Per request of the cool Japanese people I met last night, I returned
to Harley just before midnight. For some reason, my Japanese was
feeling more than stiff which was making me quite a bit more shy. I
talked a bit with the guy and girl next to me. He was a rock guitarist
and seemed interested in my Werewolf project. His girlfriend was a
literature student at Waseda University, only a year younger than
myself.

I figured the chap who tried to pick a fight with me the other night
wasn't a regular at the bar. Both the bartenders and patrons were
saying bad things about him. I figured he was just another drunkard
stirring up trouble.

I was wrong.

About an hour into the night, he walked right into the bar. I felt
that "oh shit..." feeling rise from my stomach.

Surprisingly, the very first thing he did was approach me and reach
for a handshake. He told me in Japanese, "She [the woman] told me
about what I said last night. Sorry. I don't remember." He then tapped
his head with his forefinger. I replied that everything was fine.

For the next hour, I made sure to avoid him, but at one point, we
ended up sitting at the same table in the barroom. Ironically, once
again, he asked me what country I was from. "America. New York," I
replied, this time tactfully leaving out the whole part about the US
being the best country on Earth.

The fellow's name is Nori. He's probably a few years older than me,
always wears a black hoodie, listens to techno music, and has very
long hair. His face is angular and crow-like, with slanted dark eyes and a dangerous glare, but I think my judgement may be biased from our last encounter.

After all, (at least tonight) he's not such a bad guy. He was goofing
off and joking with the other guys at the bar all night. Before I took
off, we even had a little heart to heart about the problems with
religion and politics in America as well as incidents between Japanese
and Americans at the military bases here.

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