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5 comments about Guidebook To Japan: What The Other Guidebooks Won't Tell You.

1. I bought this book as soon as it was available. I read it from cover to cover and enjoyed it immensely. It is definitely "not your typical" Japan guidebook. Instead of listing hotels and restaurants it helps with the everyday things people will encounter in Japan and how to laugh at them instead of finding them frustrating. It made me laugh again at things I encountered when traveling in Japan. I loved the book. It's the only travel book I have ever read from cover to cover.



2. I really love this author--she's hilarious. I've been reading her column in The Japan Times for years now. I think this is a perfect traveling companion book. It's got a lot of bits and pieces in it to help you out in certain situations. In part it's a language translation book and in part tells you what's expected of you in certain places. I think it would be a great read before you leave for Japan and a great companion for when you're there. I enjoyed surfing the urls offered at the end of each chapter for more information.



3. I really love this author--she's hilarious. I've been reading her column in The Japan Times for years now. I think this is a perfect traveling companion book. It's got a lot of bits and pieces in it to help you out in certain situations. In part it's a language translation book and in part tells you what's expected of you in certain places. I think it would be a great read before you leave for Japan and a great companion for when you're there. I enjoyed surfing the urls offered at the end of each chapter for more information.



4. Humor, not a travel guide or serious help with language. Eurocentric orientalistic racist cultural imperialistic oversimplification.
   
   Enjoy!



5. If you have a sense of humor and anything more than a passing interest in Japan, then this book is for you. It is a fantastic book. I have been a fan of Amy's for a long time now and this book is just as much fun as her articles. It is not a serious travel guide, though there are a healthy number of good tips in there and the urls are a great resource, but it is just flat out fun to read. Well worth your time and money.

No comments about Things Japanese: Being Notes on Various Subjects Connected with Japan. For the Use of Travellers and Others.

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5 comments about Pictures from the Water Trade: Adventures of a Westerner in Japan.

1. I'm afraid this is a bit of a howler, but after reading this book, which I thought fine, I searched J.D. Morley's name on the web and discovered that he's the one who wrote the Memoirs of a Geisha review in the Sunday NYTimes several years ago that I still remember! It was a real howler. He didn't seem to understand that the translator's note at the beginning of the novel was PART of the novel, and in various ways completely missed the point of the book in a way that few people have. Now that I've read Pix from the Water Trade, I suspect it was a matter of jealousy, which is really kind of sad. So what do I think of this book? Adequate; not bad, really. But the author will probably be remembered best for his ungenerous and in fact rather boneheaded review of a much better book that will survive the ages.



2. As an introduction to Japan this novel is superlative. It reads as a collection of memoirs on the Japanese lifestyle bound by a loose but well-sketched narrative. It covers the life of an English cultural visitor to Japan in the early 1970s, detailing the elements of Japanese culture, attitude and character that particularly affect him during his stay. The narrative parts of it are quite entertaining but it is the insghts that this book provides that make this a valuable text for understanding the Japanese.



3. This is a mildly interesting book that explores aspects of Japanese culture from a Westerner's point of view. The cover of my edition describes it as an "extraordinarily evocative, at times erotic," story. Given that the book is ostensibly about the steamy nightlife of the mizu shoubai, one might expect a rather heady description of what goes on after dark in Japan. Despite the title, the book does not particularly concern itself with the water trade. When it does, it's often just a description of the author sitting in some little bar or other drinking. The book does devote lengthy stretches to things like calligraphy and home furnishings, and I'm sorry to say that I found it rather boring.
   
   It is hard to imagine who the target audience for this book would be. For those with little knowledge of Japan, many of the descriptions lack enough context to make much sense. For persons already acquainted with the culture, the long musings are hardly revealing and some of the author's conclusions are questionable. Ultimately, it feels like the author wrote this as memoir for himself. It should give hope to diarists everywhere that they too can one day be published. There are a few genuinely evocative moments in this book (especially notable was a good description of a funeral at the very end), but not enough to justify the time it takes to read it.



4. Morley's character, Boone, supposedly fluent in Japanese, leads us on a wild romp through his version of fin-de-millennium Japan. His grand tour includes an exposée of the affairs he had with two young women during his brief stay there. Thus the misnomer "water trade," though neither of Boone's girlfriends worked in that occupation.
   
   I got the impression that Boone was a sort of smelly chap. Strange that the book left an olfactory impression rather than a visual one, as its title suggests. Maybe it's because a nice girl in Japan would not, under normal circumstances, speak with a foreigner, much less have an affair with one. For this reason we conclude that the "translation" of Japanese culture that Boone received used a lower-class dictionary as its authority. Boone, like many foreigners in Japan, came from a middle-class environment, which afforded him the luxury of making such a trip in the first place. Was this really the Japan that he wanted to see?
   
   I can't resist mentioning two stories that draw on a native informant, for comparison. In James Clavell's Shogun, we see an upper-class Japanese woman (who speaks fluent Latin, oddly), "translating" her culture to the stranded seafarer whom they call Anjin-san. Little by little Captain Blackthorne is drawn into the culture, never realizing that there is no escape. In the movie Karate Kid (1) Pat Morita's character, Miyagi, "translates" the culture of Japan (transplanted to Southern California) for young Daniel LaRusso (also transplanted there from New Jersey). Sadly, for Miyagi, there is no escape. Both the book and the movie far outclass Pictures from the Water Trade, which depicts, after all is said and done, nothing more than Boone's "escape" to his dream-world Japan.
   
   I would not be surprised if this book, due to its graphic nature, was black-listed in Japan.



5. This book is rightly considered a classic, and his description of Miss Suzuki in the chapter "Slaying Dragons" is, oddly enough, one of the most erotic things I've ever read. It describes a severe and businesslike woman, dressed all in black, in a cold white room. As she works, the room warms and he catches the scent of her skin coming from her hairless forearms. (But he writes it far better than I.)
   
   The author was young when he wrote this book, and it shows, but it's pretty dead accurate of what it's like to be young and full of life in a very foreign land.

1 comments about Tokyo Access.

1. Just prior to the Japanese Bubble Economy, this guide book began to grace the shelves of bookshops here in Tokyo.As a guide book for visitors, the maps were rather too vague for newcomers to the city.At the time, in a review of newly released guidebboks to the city, it did not stack up particularly well in comparison to others, but this guide book, being bilingual, should really be seen as a guide for residents. Although nearly 15 years old, many of the comments are still pertinent, if at times a little opinionated. A good guidebook SHOULD carry some opinion, though. The layout is very stylish, and there is a wonderful emphasis on architecture.Tokyo is not a major tourist destination, so that's probably why it has not been reprinted, but in light of the fact that many people come to live and work in Tokyo for a few years, an updated version of this guide for the 21st Century would be appropriate. I think this is a sorely underrated guide, and although it is not without faults, it should be seen as a guide for residents. You guys at ACCESS, do something about resurrecting this guide!

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