My studio was built in the Taisho Era. Some of the younger visitors have not used these sort of stairs. Narrow, no hand rail, and slippery as hell, fine wood polished by a thousand feet.
I only had one visitor come sliding down, bumping his butt each step and screaming each bump. Made a wonderful noise in my little studio. He got every head in the place to turn in horror. Then, boom, he hit the wall at the bottom and like it was a cartoon or something, the painting above him fell off the wall and he caught it in his lap as he sprawled on the floor. A dozen people all shouted in Japanese, "Are You All Right!" as they will.
He jumped up, holding the painting in one hand and his butt with the other saying, "I'm OK! I'm OK!" Handed me the painting and ran out the door. In America I guess he would be running to get his lawyer. Lucky this is Japan.
Today begins the long weekend, middle of the exhibition. Yanaka should be jumping. nice weather and some kind of local festival, "Yanaka Matsuri!" Lots of visitors. Wonder if any of them will come sliding down my stairs.
No comments:
Post a Comment