STID: Kangaroo Court II

The whole complex has an air of heady, bubble-era optimism long since turned sour. This is a fairground set coming apart at the seams, or that first broken window in the abandoned warehouse. The website I looked at, before we pulled the bikes from the weeds and set off, mentions the whole thing sprung up in the eighties from reclaimed land around the bay. There’s a selection of sketchy rumours about the then mayor having connections to the central government and cashing in on the national frenzy for bubble-economy construction. The next town over, home to a dilapidated concrete-clad fishing port, a single ramen shop, and a stall that sells okra, boasts a bullet-train stop, so there’s a lot to be said for the politics of influence.

“What possible reason would you have for building this? It’s just. I mean, from a business perspective it’s insane. It’s in the middle of nowhere, on the outskirts of some town that no-one outside this region has even heard of, and there’s practically no way of getting here by public transport. It doesn’t make any kind of sense.” I mutter as I boggle at the concrete plinths supporting a chipped fibreglass sun for several minutes until she tells me to shut up and leads me by the hand over a series of stepping stones to the middle of a shallow artificial lake. We are all alone.

“Do you know the word rakkan?” she asks as she traces the characters onto the palm of her hand. The first one means pleasure, or enjoyment, and the second I can’t really make out. I think it has to do with a view of something. “It’s about good feeling, ne. It’s about when you don’t give up. Like, ‘he has very rakkan personality so he thinks only about the best things…” she screws up her face and spins on her stepping stone to face the sun. “This place. When they built everyone had sonna rakkan. They, everyone, had positive feeling for the future and so many place like this was built.” I realise she is talking about optimism.

As we skip from block to block across the lake, I ask her if she knows that Japan pours more concrete each year than America. “Yes, but don’t believe the truth. Come on. Sunburn and kangaroos.” And with that we head for the Ferris wheel.

There’s no one on duty at the ticket booth and the other rides, a rickety looking merry-go round and something akin to a bouncy castle, are deserted. Yet the wheel turns a lackadaisical revolution above.

Finally, we find the attendant, a man who looks to be about seventy, with a faded green uniform and wiry salt and pepper hair. He’s perched on the concrete prefab knucklebones that make up the seawall, and takes slow shallow drags on a cigarette that looks as old as his calloused and wrinkled hands.

“The wheel open?” she asks.

“It’s turning, isn’t it?” he grunts and extinguishes his cigarette on the lid of the portable ashtray that hangs around his neck, then flicks the butt into the ocean.

“未来のことをどうしてそんなに楽観できるんですか”

Previously: Kangaroo Court

Posted in Mwah on Tuesday September 2, 2008.