Beyond the Border

The world is full of borders. Knowing what lies beyond one is also a way of knowing this side anew.

The other day, a friend came to visit from Tokyo.

As we caught up, the conversation naturally turned to life in the city.

The city is convenient and fast. What you want arrives right away; there's plenty of work, learning and stimulation. But convenience quickly becomes the norm. Packages arrive the same day, trains come every few minutes. Somewhere along the way, we stop thinking about the people working behind it.

Life keeps running without relying on anyone. So you don't even know the names of people living in your own building. You lock the auto-lock and a double lock, and tell delivery workers through a monitor to leave packages at the door. Even meeting a neighbor in the elevator, you don't say hello. When days like that continue, even caring people forget to reach out first.

"Lately I've stopped wearing my contacts. Seeing things a bit blurry is just right."

That one line stuck in my ear. Maybe because it overlapped somehow with who I was when I lived in Hong Kong. That city, too, was convenient and fast. Before moving from there to Higashikawa, I crossed several lines myself.

The world is full of borders.

Lines drawn on maps, dividing countries and regions. Lines made by nature, dividing brown bears from human life. Lines we draw ourselves before we know it, telling us something is beyond us.

Most of the time we don't notice most of them, leaving lines drawn wherever suits us, living on the familiar side.

So once in a while, we go all the way beyond the border.

Spend different time in a different place, with a different community. Put yourself for a while in a world that blows away your knowledge and values.

Step outside the groomed slopes and a world you didn't yet know spreads out. The softness of new snow you sink into up to your waist. Silence so deep you hear only your own breath. Dormant senses wake one by one.

At the town's izakaya, the master naturally strikes up a conversation from across the counter. Before you know it, you're talking with the person beside you too.

Spend a winter in this town, and when you arrive at the office in the morning, someone has already come in, fed the stove with firewood and warmed the room. Wrapped in kindness like that, you remember what you'd almost forgotten: that the city's convenience, too, was supported by someone's hands and their pride in their work.

Knowing the other side is also knowing this side anew.

Of course, not every line should be crossed. There are things the people of a place have carefully protected, and there are lines within ourselves that keep us from thinking we understand after living somewhere only a little while.

What matters is knowing that a line is there.

What lines are around you?

This winter, ensembles will go up close to a few lines.

To cross them, to protect them, or simply to stand there.

Let's go beyond the border together.

ensembles Magazine, Editor-in-Chief, Daiki Naruo