Folklore-loving Japanese finds new home in Ukraine

’s kitchen sitting at a table lain with Japanese cooking items. I expected an evening of sushi-making in the company of globetrotters known for their ceaseless love of Japan. But when I heard Hiroshi announcing in pure Ukrainian that tempura dishes were on the menu instead, I decided it was time to set my stereotypes aside.

Born in Osaka, often dubbed the second city of Japan, Hiroshi Kataoka, now 38, picked Russian philology and history as his major with 30 other students in the metropolis of 17 million. He worked in a restaurant part-time to save money and go to Moscow. When he made his first trip there in 1997, he recalls that police were bugging him every day and “that it was very scary”. Perhaps, they had thought that a Japanese man researching folk stories about the evil eye could add supernatural trouble to the country’s political and economic turbulence.

But so bewildered was he with the Slavic traditions that even the fear of  Russian militia could not stop him from coming back to Russia for a two-month language course.

He first discovered Ukraine in the Museum of Etymology in St. Petersburg. “They put Ukraine in a separate room. When I saw a painting of a man with a cossack mustache wearing an embroidered shirt in the field, I thought it was very different from a traditional Russian image”, he described his first exposure to the country he calls home now.

Having finished his ‘evil eye’ thesis in Osaka, he headed to Kyiv to become perhaps the only Japanese in the world to study Ukrainian folklore. “Ukraine is one of the last countries left in Europe where people in villages still practice ancient rituals and preserve the authentic culture”, he says referring to Christmas, Easter and pagan holidays of harvests, the summer and winter solstices.

He thinks that folk traditions are similar around the world because they all take root in paganism. For example, in western Ukraine, people make ‘didukh’ or a wheat sheaf that represents a family tree. It is believed to possess their ancestors’ spirits during Christmas holidays. According to Hiroshi, a similar custom exists in Japan.

The same goes for a traditional porridge called ‘kutya’ in Ukrainian. Apparently, his family cooks the same cereal out of wheat, raisins, honey and nuts for Christmas.

He then made a shocking toilet-related revelation about Japan. Apparently, women there clean it scrupulously every day because the object is perceived to be the entrance to another world. “If you fall into the toilet somehow, you are supposed to change your name because it means that you have come in and out of another dimension,” explained Hiroshi, sounding like it was a perfectly natural thing to fall into.

While I was struggling with the idea of falling into the loo, my sensei (or teacher in Japanese) also tried to convince me that ancient Ukrainians had a similar belief.

Feeling almost related to Hiroshi after discovering that our cultures were so much alike, I decided to pose a few cliched questions.

 

KP: Do all Slavic people look identical to you as the Asians do to an average Ukrainian?

HK: At the beginning, they did. But after spending five years here, it is not true anymore.

 

KP: Is it true that sushi prepared in Ukraine tastes different from the ones in Japan?

HK: When new Japanese restaurants open up in Kyiv, chefs go out of their way. But with time the quality changes. Sushi is not a staple food in Japan. We eat them only on special occasions.

 

KP: What religion do you belong to?

HK: I am a Buddhist. But in Japan religion is more a philosophy than a cult. For example, on New Year’s Day I will go to a Shintoist temple, to get married – at a Catholic church, and to baptize a newborn – at a Buddhist sanctuary.

 

KP: What difficulties have you had settling in Ukraine?

HK: For a long time, the National Taras Shevchenko University did not want to accept me to study because there is no law that allows foreigners to take up a postgraduate degree in Ukraine. The whole thing turned into a war. The former Minister of Education Stanislav Nikolaenko stood up for me, so they made an exception. But nothing has been done to improve legislation, and it’s very sad.

 

KP: What do you think about Ukrainian women?

HK: They are strong and fragile at the same time. I like how they combine these seemingly irreconcilable features and stay naturally feminine. In Japan, women can’t allow themselves to cry. They carry heavy bags and don’t expect men to help them, so there is no difference between men and women. Feminism is a tragedy in Japan.

 

KP: Would you like to stay in Ukraine?

HK: Yes, I would like to live here forever. This country has a convenient lifestyle with an emphasis on culture and free time. In Japan, we work up to 12 hours a day. There I would not be able to take more than a week’s holiday at a time.

 

When we met for the second time, I picked a Ukrainian restaurant where Hiroshi’s immaculate language skills could shine. He told me that the Ukrainian Union of Writers commissioned him to write a book about Ukrainian traditions in Japanese.

He also impressed me by offering to take my bag – something the Japanese men do not usually do. And then he found a roll of hryvnas under the table that may have fallen out of the pocket of a previous customer. Instead of keeping it, Hiroshi called a waitress and handed over his discovery. That made me think he is a discovery in his own right for Ukraine.

Hiroshi Kataoka can be reached at sahajdachny@gmail.com