Cosmopolitan (03/99)

What traveling gives me....

Suddenly, I feel like I am good at doing the narration. I have been interested in doing narration for a long time and I told my management office that I wanted to get the assignment to be a narrator. However, I never thought that my first assignment for 99 would be the narrator.

The show was "Kando Express-Shinohara Katsuyuki Sahara Sabaku Kanrui Geta Kiko".(Inspiring Express- Katsuyuki Shinohara the Sahara Desert Emotional Journey wearing Japanese Sandals.) This was aired in early January on Fuji TV. The story was that Kuma-san, who is the iron artist Mr. Katsuyuki Shinohara, went to build an object in the middle of the desert that will be the sign for the oasis.

The VTR of the document was only an hour and half but it took four hours to complete the narration. I was working in the small booth watching the screen and adding the narration alone. It was as if I was a lone member of a high school radio club or something. For some reasons, I felt really comfortable! It was lot easier to breath in this small booth, which looked like a broadcasting room in a junior high school, than being in some TV studio where a bunch of show biz people hang around.

Adding narration is similar to adding a spice at the end of the cooking to enhance the dish. My narration is "the spice" for this documentary. As the story progressed and Kuma-san was facing to all kinds of accidents in the Sahara's hot wind. I felt like I was jumping out of this small studio and doing the narration in the hot desert while hiding in the shimmer of the hot air so that Kuma san would not know. Since I don't talk much on TV, this project might balance the amount of talks I do on TV.

Speaking of traveling, this New Year again, I took my family to "the wonderful family trip". ( I am one of those a lion at home and a mouse abroad. Therefore, I ignored my parents' suggestion of going to Hawaii.) Following the Asian Fever, I went to see the birds in an Indonesian ravine with my parents. In this small village, there was no such a thing as "time". I spent my time not going to shopping or not doing marine sports...just doing nothing. I stretched my bare foot on the stone mosaic floor in the cafe from where I could see the beautiful ravine. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes listening to the birds chirping. I was in haven.

Doing a narration for the travel documentary is more or less of having a quasi-experience of traveling...but it is just a "imaginary trip". On the other hand, letting my whole body and soul to experience the birds chirping and the air of ravine is "the trip of real experience". These totally opposed kinds of trips are equally attractive to me. Simply, these are "an escape from everyday life". However, traveling always gives me the opportunity to bring myself back, and discovering an unexpected self through encountering some surprising experience. I may be drugging out my suitcase because of my desire to see many sides of myself.

I like traveling. At least once a year, I visit an unknown place, feeling the air and sky of that country, touching the souls of the people there and imagining how I would have lived if I were born in that country. That's a nice thing to do. I wonder which country I will find myself on the next trip. Choosing the next destination itself does have some meanings, too. Don't you think?

Goro this month (a little talk with Goro):

After the meeting with the editors, Mr. Inagaki left in hurry. Under the chair he was sitting, there is a paper bag. Is this a present for Cosmo? We almost smiled. Then, we remembered him saying " I bought a roller-cleaner at Tokyu Hands". Ah, he has a hobby of cleaning his place using a roller-cleaner. Speaking of hobby, this was the second time in his essay to talk about the trip abroad with his parents. Staying at a resort was Mr. Inagaki's choice for this trip. "My parents were not really into the idea of staying at the resort.", he said. The way he said shows his gentle concern to his family.