I cannot recall my first memories of Japanese culture -- it might have been a gold Buddha seen through the window of a Zen center on the streets of foreign town during some forgotten childhood vacation, or a poster for a Kurosawa film on a random street-corner in one of the larger cities near my old hometown -- but the feeling persists in me that from an early age, I felt the allure of Japan and things Japanese.
In my teenage years I found myself increasingly interested in Zen and meditation, and would often spend my Saturdays in Providence where inevitably by the late afternoon I would find myself in the RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) Museum, sitting in front of the Dainichi Nyorai Buddha that was housed there -- a beautiful Japanese wooden statue from the 12th century. It was this image in particular, I think, that led me to read about Japan and Japanese Buddhism — although often through the lens of the 1950's "Beat" movement writers. Nonetheless, by the end of high school years, I was deeply into meditation and Buddhism. Into my college years, although I was majoring in Physics, I spent all my spare time reading books on Zen and Buddhism in general, and even took time off from school to do my first sesshin (接心) during my sophomore year, when a visiting teacher came to my college town.
A few years after I graduated and had abandoned the notion of going to graduate school in Physics, I decided that given my interest in Buddhism, I should pursue a formal study of it in graduate school, and even made an attempt to learn Japanese. Unfortunately, it was the height of the Japanese stock market boom at the time, and when I showed up to take first year Japanese language, the class was over-registered and filled with business majors hoping to cash-in on the Japanese economy, and all I learned that day was こんにちは.
Although my eventual graduate studies led me to study a different tradition of Buddhism — Tibetan — my interest and appreciation of Japanese culture remained and continued to expand to include food, film, sports (I love watching Sumo), and the overall aesthetic of the culture. When I first came to Columbia for graduate school, I had hoped to make another attempt at learning Japanese, but was advised against it given the time commitment of my program. Having graduated with my Ph.D. a few years ago and with a new research project on the horizon involving Japanese language materials, I decided that finally the time had come to learn the language, and so here I am.
At first I found the classes exciting and I was encouraged by the amount of material I was learning every day. After a few weeks however, my struggles with learning Hiragana were leaving me rather discouraged and feeling like I would not survive the rest of the semester. One day, however, as I was in the checkout line of a grocery store, I saw a small children's toy with Hiragana letters written on it, and suddenly I realized that I could read (well, "pronounce") them. Though inconsequential in terms of meaningful content, I was nonetheless encouraged and continued to persevere in my studies. I am happy to say that I have not given up, although Katakana is now filling me with the same sense of foreboding, and I am trying not to even think about Kanji.
