The Broken Bridge by Suzanne Kamata

Author:Suzanne Kamata
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Japan, expatriate fiction, Tokyo, Outsider, gaijin, foreigners, short stories, Donald Richie, Suzanne Kamata, Alex Kerr
Publisher: Stone Bridge Press

The Bonsai Master

JAMES KIRKUP

Such a dear, sweet old man, Suzuki-san. So good with children. His own grandchildren adore him. He often gives them little treats—a bar of Dynamite Choco or little tubs of ice cream.

He retired long ago from his medium-sized furniture business, at the age of fifty-five, the normal retirement age for most Japanese men. He still lives with his married daughter, whose husband has mysteriously disappeared, leaving her with two children, a boy and a girl. The four of them—Suzuki-san’s wife died three years ago—form a slightly unbalanced “nuclear family”—one in which the husband’s place has been taken by the grandfather, who is now seventy-seven and hale and hearty.

Suzuki-san attributes his good health to his hobby. For the last twenty years, he has been making bonsai—what the Japanese call “dwarfed trees.” Apart from his increasingly cantankerous daughter and the two grandchildren who are spoiled, lazy, and rude, he has no other interest in life. Bonsai fill all his waking hours, and often invade his sleep.

His daughter, Emiko, grumbles about the room even miniature trees take up in a small Japanese house and tiny garden. In fact, nearly the whole of the garden is taken up with home-made wooden stands on which the bonsai are lined according to species—here dwarf pines, there dwarf plum and cherry trees, and more exotic varieties over there, by the little pool where a couple of creamy carp can occasionally be seen in the murky green of the water. There are bonsai in the bathroom—tropical types that enjoy the steamy heat—and even bonsai in the tiny crouch-down toilet. There are more bonsai in the minuscule entrance hall, and there is always a prime example of the art, of course, in the main room’s tokonoma, or alcove, with an appropriate hanging scroll, both regularly changed according to the changing seasons. The neighbors call the place the Bonsai House.

Old Suzuki-san is famous for his artistry, and his exhibits have won many prizes, which are displayed on the kitchen dresser or hang on the walls, citations in dark wooden frames with impressive calligraphy. Emiko sighs and frets over the dust they collect, and which she makes little attempt to remove. Once a week she goes round flapping at them with a duster made of strips of old colored rag attached to a bit of bamboo. She feels she would like to throw them all out with the twice-weekly trash, but a father is a father, and she hasn’t the courage. When he’s gone. . . . Nevertheless, Emiko enjoys the admiration and praise of visitors and neighbors. They come nearly every day to seek the old master’s advice on the raising and training of their bonsai. Emiko finds it tiresome to have to prepare tea and bean jam buns for these people, who always arrive unannounced. But she manages to put a pleasant face on things. The children are indifferent to bonsai—they think they’re weird. Not without reason, Emiko silently agrees. The children’s days are spent at school and at the night school they attend for extra coaching.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.