Thunderbirds are go

Japan. Back from Japan. I think I’m going to be blogging a lot about Japan. While we were away we missed Gerry Anderson’s 80th birthday. And yet, we didn’t at all. We surely lived it out in Tokyo. Was it the jet lag? I felt I was walking about in a futuristic Thunderbirds cityscape, no strings attached. At one moment I was an unfeasibly tall puppet travelling in an unimaginably fast airliner without wings called a bullet train. The next I was failing miserably to insert my frustratingly unbendable western legs beneath a shiny, lacquered table into a position I had not assumed since school assembly before consuming impossibly beautiful dishes of such still-life delicacy and exquisite taste. I knew not whether to come or go and frequently did both simultaneously. Such is the effect of modern Japan on someone who has waited two decades to get there. And now I bring back with me the memories that will make a difference: the incredible service mentality, the even more incredible high heels; the marvellous effectiveness of everything that needs to work efficiently, especially the toilets; the inimitable cherry blossom and blue sky combination, illuminated by an eye-watering brightness. Small people amid tall buildings, working temples and wizzard technology. A baffling and amusing sense of chromatic juxtaposition with the words of the English language. Do you dreams come true? Oh, the pains of being pure at heart. We will exile the monster someday. The Japanese add this type of English brand language to their Kanji on advertising hoardings. But it isn’t any kind of English we would recognise. And that’s why we love it. Attitude makes style.

Mark Griffiths www.idealconsulting.co.uk