The Japanese Farmer

I’m not genetically hardwired for Japanese farm life.  But my husband, Tadaaki, is.  Day in and day out, he jumps out of bed before 6 am and doesn’t finish work until after 7.  And he whistles when he cooks dinner, even after a 13-hour workday.  Whistles.

Me, I drag myself out of bed around 8 am (maybe) and finish with dinner prep around 7 or 8pm (maybe).  And I swear a lot and snap at the kids when I cook.  No whistling.  My day consists of multiple visits to Sunny-Side Up!, cooking, writing and maybe going to the field.  No tea breaks are on my schedule, but writing offers the slow solace needed away from others.

Tadaaki grabs his granny glasses and book several times a day for a quick respite, while Baachan oversees serving tea and snacks to the egg workers.  And if Tadaaki is around, he’ll pull up a chair as well, for 10 o’clock and 3 o’clock are written in stone as the time that workers stop and chat around the teapot.  Baachan tries to get me to come, but making conversation is not a break for me.  I look for a quiet place where I can write (like the dressing room floor outside the bath area).

But occasionally, I feel that crushing force of everything around me:  issues at Sunny-Side Up!, keeping up our boys’ bilingual education, publishing my work, cooking new food, keeping the house clean (or at least in some semblance of order) and oh yes, the school garden (not forgetting Tadaaki’s fields).  Sometimes the exhaustion of small business and farm life overwhelm me and I long for my bed—that dark haven with billowing down comforters that engulf me and soothe my overwrought spirit.

Baachan looks at me askance as I pass through the breakfast room from the kitchen carrying a tray of food to my room.  Who is this strange oyome who doesn’t act like a Japanese wife?  Christopher asks, “don’t you want to eat with us?”  It’s not about want, it’s about need.  Sometimes I need to be alone.  And that’s hard to do in a house with paper doors and open ceilings.  The air and the voices waft throughout the house in a seamless way, great for circulation, but not as good for privacy.

I grew up in a family of six and we each had our own room with a lock on the door.  My husband grew up in a family of 3, and an extended family of 10 or more.  He lived with his parents, brothers and grandparents, but his 5 aunts and their children were constant fixtures in the family home.  Privacy is not built in to Japanese life, hence the politeness that is.  Confrontation is the end of a relationship and not the beginning of the next phase (like in America).

The funny thing is that my husband has become more confrontational, and me, less.  I suppose that is what we call compromise.

Japanese farmers though, have a strength of character and ability to work selflessly that way exceeds what I learned growing up in the suburbs of San Francisco.  And maybe that is what draws young Japanese people to the farm, or Westerners to Japan—this desire for a deeper sense of what it means to be unfettered by all the trappings and complications of modern urban life.  And maybe getting one’s hands dirty, and being part of mind-numbing work, quiets the soul.  Maybe that is what people need. 

While I do thrive on the simplicity of our life, for me, farming will always be about playing a role, and not a very good one at that.  I’ll never be a real farmer, because in the end, I don't have that requisite strength of character and in the end, I’ll slack off when I don’t feel like doing the work.  I’m selfish like that.  Well, I ‘m a town girl.  What else is there to say?

Negi no Karashi Miso                                                                         Japanese leeks with Mustard Miso

Cut ½-inch thick negi into 2-inch lengths.  Separate green tops from white bottoms and place bottoms in bamboo steaming basket, set over a pot of boiling water.  Cover and steam for 4 minutes, then add the green tops and steam 4 minutes more.  Remove steaming basket cover and rest the basket over a large bowl to cool (and catch any drips).  Muddle Edmond Fallot mustard, organic miso and organic rice vinegar (1:3:3).  Transfer leeks to a suitably beautiful bowl, fold dressing gently into leeks and serve with salt broiled herring.   Nishin no Shioyaki :  Lay fresh herring on a foil sheet set over a grate.  Place top oven rack in third slot from the top.  Sprinkle the herring with salt and broil for 15 minutes.  Flip carefully and salt the other side.  Broil 10 more minutes.  

Nishin no Shioyaki                                                                                                                                             Salt Broiled Herring

Comments

[Brad Fisher]

When living in Japan back in the 70s, I visited a few farms. I remember being a bit surprised that there actually were farms in Japan. With its dense population, its love for technology and its thousands of years of history, I'd half-expected Japan to have somehow evolved beyond farming. I'd been prepped for California-style agribusiness by 4-H and FFA, and had a whole different idea of how the whole thing should work. So of course I was struck by the small size of Japanese farms and their toy-like farm machinery. And their location! Around the corner from my flat in Kawasaki, between the apartment buildings and factories, there was a rice paddy smaller than my present yard in Pittsburgh. Looking back, of course, I was reacting to human scale and some form of sustainability, although I didn't understand any of that at the time. And I was surprised at the gambaru spirit of the activist farmers, who clashed with Godzilla-armored police at Narita to try to stop the mighty airport. Try, of course, when there was no hope whatsoever.

[Brad Fisher]

And shioyaki is one of my absolute favorite styles of cooking. Nothing better with a draft of Sapporo.

[Brandon]

Mo e pie

[Nancy Singleton Hachisu]

Brad: Sorry for dropping the ball. I agree about shioyaki also about the crazy Japanese zoning (or lack thereof). Near the school, we have car washes next to fields in a higgledy-piggledy fashion. Luckily we live in an old neighborhood now, but still there is the random animal vet & small mysterious shop fronts that operate as late-night secret drinking spots. You will be happy to hear that the farmers in this area were successful in fighting off an incinerator plant a few years ago. Tadaaki was quite active in that fight.

Brandon: Funny.

[Sasa]

I totally hear you. I'm a city girl but I live in a small ruralish area in Austria (pretty far from NZ and Japan, where I'm from) for love, natch, and while I appreciate parts of it, I'm still always going to have those overwhelmed moments where I wish I didn't have to deal with it.

[nancy@gol.com]

Hi Sasa: Sorry for never responding...I have been gone off and on this fall and cannot seem to stay on top of life here in Japan. I'm writing about that now...I did check out one of your uTube cooking videos. It was cute. I admire your verve. Nancy