We scheduled our trip down the Keys so as to avoid the human embarrassments that attend Spring Break. We sought spectacular sunsets, coral reefs, beachside conversation.
We came for the waters. We were misled.
We didn’t know that the Florida colleges let out their students a week early, so that they will be unimpeded in their quest to begin getting happy as soon as they arise from the previous night’s debauchery.
It should be called Happy Shift.
I stood on the bottom coast of Florida, with the Gulf offshore, mangrove and grassy everglades in every other direction, two hours to Miami, but times away from big town currency and gloss. There are no big boxes, chain motels, or fast food franchises in Everglades City. It doesn’t look like Interstate Everyplace, USA. It looks like what it is: a tiny (pop. 513 in 2004), off-the-trail village that lives on fishing and just enough tourism.
On the Gulf edge of south Florida, just a bridge away from Fort Myers, Sanibel Island is a shell-collecting singularity.
The thin island’s southern coast catches a confluence of waves, winds, and currents that drive bazillions of shells onto the beach. Continue reading “Shell Games”
At Tokyo’s Narita Airport, Mr. Mizutani shook my hand, bowed slightly and said, “Kotora-san, you have safe trip home.”
“Why,” I asked Mr. Mizutani, “do you pronounce my name Kotora? My name isn’t COAT-ler. It’s COT-ler. Why don’t you call me Katora?”
Mizutani took a deep breath and smiled broadly. “Kotora good name. Ko mean small. Tora mean tiger. Small tiger. Good name.” His expression became serious. “Katora not such good name. Tora still mean tiger, but ka mean mosquito. Striped mosquito in Asia give people dengue fever. They die. You not be Katora.”
Lynx, bobcat, caracal, alley cat, small tiger…I was smiling as the plane took off.
Near the end of my stay, to thank me for my efforts, six Japanese executives took me to dinner at a very upscale Tokyo restaurant. I had read guidebooks that highlighted cultural differences and how Americans abroad should behave, but nothing had prepared me for this. Continue reading “Japanese Lessons-Part 2”
In the early 70’s, as assistant to the president and product manager for a small, NYSE-listed business machines company, I traveled to Tokyo to teach our Japanese affiliate how to sell our new product, the world’s first high-speed, commercial fax machine. I was 27.
My introductory talk was to 60 men, all of whom leaned forward in their chairs, taking notes of my wise words…and everything else I said, too. Continue reading “Japanese Lessons-Part 1”