36. A PEACEFUL DOMESTIC LIFE HAD SETTLED IN

A peaceful domestic life had settled in among the hostel dwellers who had decided to spend the winter in Kerikeri.

Elle went on lighting and fueling the wood stove with logs that the Japanese boys split up. She even had a customised stick that she used as poker where she had carved in French, English and Chinese: 'this is my stick'. This way she found it again every night and didn't have to go and get a new one in the underwood each time she collected kindle wood.

- "Buddhism is rather contemplative, isn't it?" said Elle one night, "does it correspond to a national trait?"
- "But Japan is not really buddhist. It is rather zen... that's different..." Kenji answered.
- "Personally I don't like the way poverty is praised. It doesn't suit me at all! Can you see yourself as a begging monk?"
- "Not in the least..." he replied laughing and holding his cigarette between his teeth.
- "Me neither! It's easy really to be a banker's son, to give up everything and go begging, isn't it?"
- "Yes, that's easy," Kenji said with force, "What's harder is to start from nothing and become a banker's son! In my case that's what I'm trying to do... By the way I'm leaving my part-time job at the organic farm to go and work full time at the dairy. I heard they need labor."
- "Does it pay well?"
- "By the hour, not really, but you work all day non stop and seven days a week, full board paid. If I can hold out long enough, that will give me net savings... I'll be able to go on with my travelling."

Elle knew that Kenji was from Hiroshima. He had no uncle, no aunt of any kind, his parents being survivors of the atomic bombing in 1945. She could feel his critical eyes on everything, including Japan, but also his fierce passion to defend his country. He didn't like those who judged without knowing.

- "Where will you go?" Elle went on.
- "I'll take a look at the South Island, I think, as a tourist, just to visit... not to pick apples!" he said mocking.

After Kenji's departure from the hostel, Massa left to go and live at the Lodge, on the other side of town. He had found a good job working as a team with Wataru, a friend of his. The circle of hostel's regulars became much smaller. Scottie had started learning Japanese in exchange of some consulting in English. She asked Shiho one Saturday morning, after the usual greetings:

- "Aren't you working this morning?"
- "Yes," Shiho replied.
- "Alright, but at what time then?"
- "I don't work this morning", Shiho said embarassed.
- "Are you working or aren't you?"
- "Yes, I don't work..." Shiho stressed.
- "How can you say: 'yes, I don't work'? In English it just doesn't mean anything. You've got to say one or the other!"

And Elle felt she had to add:

- "You can say 'yes, I work' or else 'no, I don't work'!"

The embarrassed Japanese girls looked at each other. Shiho finally said as if to apologize:

- "In Japanese you can't say 'no'."

Scottie and Elle looked at each other. Shiho went on:

- "If you say to me 'you are not working this morning', I say yes meaning that 'yes, you are right, I am not working this morning'."

The Scottish and French women couldn't get over it. They were slowly becoming acquainted with the Japanese soul. The main thing was not to agree on facts, but to approve people, to avoid coming up against them and to take into account the other speaker's feelings.