There almost constant reports about all kinds of wars in the world, in daily news. But I had the weirdest experience of territorial war inside a movie theater, in Japan.
While high living expenses is usually mentioned in many country's media, Japan is always considered one of the cleanest, safest and most peaceful countries in the world, by people of many countries. Also, people are generally very polite to each other, apologizing sincerely when there is any accidental contact in the street, or a train.
However, there are also occasional news of violent incident, in restaurant, in the platforms of train station, or inside trains. And even rarer, once in a year or two, there are random man slaughter with knife, by some ill-minded persons.
Yet still, it is considered a trouble free living environment, no matter how big a city is, and where-ever one goes in Japan. Therefore, it was an unexpected shock for me to had a nightmare experience by similarly ill-minded person, inside a movie theater.
It started after the light went dark, and I started to adjust myself for the close to 2 hour Hollywood fantasy.
When I tried to relocated my elbow to a more comfortable position, I realized to my dismay that the man beside me had his elbow residing comfortably on the arm rest, and partially extruding to my side.
This happened to me once in my economic seat during a flight. But my neighbor did not maintain the intrusion too long, after I tried to ignore it patiently for some time. "Again?" is what came to my mind instantly. Then, "hope this will change soon" is my next thought.
After a few minutes, and a few casual contact of my elbow against his, things did not change at all. This is something unusual because most of Japanese will get the sign and retreat sensibly. But not this man, even after I purposely stared at him, and down at his elbow.
Now, the movie is not of my main focus. Determined to send strong signal, I added some force in the contact, trying to push his elbow back. To my even greater surprise, the extruding elbow seems to have been welded to the armrest, and do not budge a millimeter. Yes, need to use unit of this small, since it is a very small space anyway.
Obviously this fellow has realized the start of a turf war too, and is determined to secure his intrusion by all means.
While mindlessly following the scenario of the movie, I engaged myself in a strategy of patience match. Since the intruder has settled down and won't go in short time, I placed my elbow in a comfortable way and at same time keeping contact with the intruder. There is actually by no means comfortable because it's summer time, and both side are wearing T shirts!
Maintaining the contact is not easy, actually soon getting disgusting, but I still tried to resume the contact from time to time. After some time, my hope of wearing him down is getting thinner and thinner. Especially after I realized that the intruding elbow actually remains their without any tiny bit of move! No matter how much force I applied, it is still as a stone wall.
Now things start to get a bit amusing, after I noticed that this fellow actually uses his other hand to drink, or scratch his head and face from time to time. It is becoming clear that he is focusing on keeping his elbow nailed on the arm rest, with constant reinforcement of force. There is no hope of aiming at the instance of any move/retreat of the elbow, to take back my precious space.
Finally, I gave up of fighting and decide to enjoy the reset of the movie more. But it does not mean total surrender or escape. My last strategy is to place a stack of pamphlet, which I collected in a tourist information center, between his elbow and mine. This is both a clear statement of anger and territory defense, plus a little bit of counterattack, although pathetically weak.
This lasted until the end of the movie. Incredibly, the intruding elbow never moved a millimeter through the whole movie! From a quick side look, I could see a face of coldness, and some similarity of some wanted Japanese Red Army member. This makes me making the final decision: fled out of the theater right after the story ended, with the fear that this guy might start doing something even crazier once the light is on.
I still maintain my statement of Japan being clean, and Japanese people being polite, friendly. At the same time, we cannot forget about the existence of exceptions. If one looks carefully, cigarette butts, empty cans or pet bottles can be found here and there, usually in the back streets of cities, or hidden corners. There are also reports of man probing young woman in crowded trains, stealing under wears from woman's apartments. These are not condemned or punished as much as more malicious crimes, which also do happen in Japan from time to time. But it does reflect the dark side of human being in general.
No matter how gentle, normal one looks, there are always dark side in everybody. The key is how much one knows oneself, and how much one can or is willing to control oneself. Also, the environment can change the direction of development.
This is no overall perfection, as long as human being is concerned. Just hope we can all strive to really love our self more, respect others more, and expect less, so that the world is more peaceful.
