But the coloured lights fooled you. The lights were wonderful. There ought to be a monument to the man who invented neon lights. Fifteen stories high, solid marble. There’s a boy who really made something out of nothing.
- Philip Marlowe, The Little Sister (1949) by Raymond Chandler.
Summer 2007. Aomori, Japan. I stand on the plains of northern Honshū. The lights are out, the houses and farms all asleep.
Underfoot, the slow crunch of stones on the sun-baked path, tingles my ears and slippered feet. We wander into a small orchard. The leaves on the apple trees rustle against our skin. I hold her closer. City boy, city boy, where have you gone?
Little doll I can’t forget.Bring happiness and everything.
Imagine life without the Spice Girls. You’re enjoying it, aren’t you?
Welcome to the world of the Japanese idol, for the large part still blissfully untouched by the ersatz feminism and sublime marketing strategy that was Girl Power.
Whatever you think of the 90’s girl group phenomenon, it produced alumni with strong enough personalities and the independence to graduate to a wide variety of roles, away from their teen sensation roots and rapacious managers. For example: rich, famous footballer’s wife; rich, has-been rocker’s wife; rich, former-cutting-edge-comedian-turned-children’s-entertainer’s paternity suit.
Two years without a meat pie can do funny things to a man.
He begins to have dreams and visions. He fantasises. He forgets when he thinks he remembers. And then, as the juices flow in his mouth once more… then, the pie is legend.
Seikō
