Translator: Dj2203
Editor: Dj2203
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Having been allowed into the town without incident, I passed through the gate and looked towards the main street that stretched straight ahead. This street was probably the town’s main street, or at least a major thoroughfare.
Looking around, the town and its people are vibrant. This town is alive, that was my first impression when I entered the town.
A cart carrying some kind of goods was being pulled, making a noise, people were passing by and people were calling out trying to sell others something, and in the distance there was the sound of things being banged together, as if someone was making or working on something.
In Japan amid the COVID-19 pandemic, people were forced to refrain from going out and had to keep to themselves, living their daily lives like turtles hiding. This town was fundamentally different from the current Japan, which gave the impression of being in the shadows, and was enveloped in an atmosphere of being alive. Self-restraint and endurance… even though this was the best we who lived in Japan could do right now, I felt that it was a stark difference.
The lively atmosphere I felt upon entering this town was somehow nostalgic, but at the same time I felt an indescribable loneliness.
I wonder if we will ever be able to return to living our normal lives again…
….
It must be lunchtime now, as I can hear the spirited voices of people selling food from all around. The sun has risen high in the sky, casting a short shadow in the direction I am heading.
“…So, the entrance to the town we just entered is probably to the south.”
I guessed as I walked down the main street.
As I walked, I saw a small hill on the north side of town. There I saw a large mansion. A large mansion on a high place… hmm… I wonder if the owner is rich.
After entering the town, I walked slowly north for about 15 minutes and came to another main road connecting east and west. On the northwest side of the road, directly ahead on was a particularly large brick building. It stood out from the surrounding buildings, being three stories tall. The other buildings were mostly bare wooden structures, so the difference was stark. It gave off a sense of affluence.
There was a sign on the building, and the letters were strange and hard to understand, but the meaning was clear to me. “Commerce Guild,” that’s what the letters meant.
“A guild… a trade association, so to speak. In the old days in Japan, they would have had stock brokers or guilds… something like that. Well, it’s not something I’d have any connection with.”
If I continued heading north, I would reach the mansion in question, but it was in an unfamiliar location, and there was no way I could get in even if I went there. So I decided to turn left at the intersection where the main street I was on intersected. In other words, I headed west.
Perhaps because of the presence of the commercial guild, there were many retail stores west of the intersection mentioned earlier. And when I say retail stores, I don’t mean small stores like the convenience stores you find in Japan. They had large premises that housed storehouses and living spaces in addition to the stores. These are what you might call large stores. Such large stores lined this street.
With so many stores like this, I began to suspect that this area must be a commercial district. I walked around for a while, but sure enough, everywhere was the same. There were also shops selling clothes, miscellaneous goods, and medicine. Stores lined up in the same row as the guild on this street… they would be like large corporations in Japanese terms. If that’s the case, then these stores must control the economy of this town.
Conversely, the buildings facing north, though facing the street, were lined with stores selling food, books, etc. While that side was not as flashy as the others, this side gave off an impression of being solid and reliable. I walked around looking around, and before I knew it, I had arrived at the western outskirts of town.
What I’ve seen so far has made it clear that this is definitely not modern Japan.
So far I haven’t seen a single car, no one has a cell phone, and everything in the storefronts seems handmade.
The clothes worn by the people walking around town all had the same shape and color, and I suspected that the fabric was probably undyed. I don’t know if it was cotton or linen, but in any case, it seemed that the fabric was simply sewn together and made into clothing.
Perhaps industry in this area is lagging behind compared to Japan. If you think about it that way, it all makes sense.
For example, the money, which apparently had no markings on it, was indicative of the fact that the gatekeeper asked for the fee not in monetary units but in the “type (material) and number” of coins. Normally, they would have asked for the fee in monetary units, like 10 dollars or 10 euros.
However, the reason he didn’t say that and instead said 10 cupronickel coins is because there is no clear unit of currency around here…or perhaps there is no trust in the unit of currency, so the only way to trust its value is to rely on the material of the currency itself.
By the way, when I showed the guards the “Original 500 yen coin = Large Cupronickel Coin” as well as the “Original 100 yen coin,” they said it was definitely a cupronickel coin. In other words, the price ratio between the cupronickel coin and the large cupronickel coin is 1:5, the same as the 100 yen coin and the 500 yen coin.
Additionally, 50 yen coins were called small cupronickel coins, and two of them were worth one cupronickel coin, while 10 yen coins were called bronze coins, and ten of them were also worth one cupronickel coin; however, the bronze coins were not treated as official currency, and were treated like cents (1 dollar = 100 cents), which were a subsidiary currency of the American currency unit, the dollar.
Moreover, these bronze coins were also known as “currency” and were not highly sought after by aristocrats and those with good money. At the very least, they were never used in official transactions between trading guilds, and ordinary citizens normally… or even rarely used them.
Bronze coins were circulated in places like slums, where they were sold by the half of a loaf to people who could not afford to buy a whole loaf, or as payment for a soup containing some kind of meat that was sold at a street stall for a few bronze coins.
Also, it seemed that ordinary shops that were not large usually did not deal with poor people. If poor people entered the store, there was a risk that something would be stolen, and the store’s status and credibility may be called into question just by the fact that poor people were entering the store.
In today’s Japan, it would be like seeing clearly homeless people going in and out of a fresh food store… Discrimination is not good, but I just can’t imagine being able to shop comfortably, and Japanese people are picky about things.
In any case, it seems that there are some dangerous places to enter, such as slums, so you need to be careful.
As an aside, the value of the 1 yen and 5 yen coins remained unchanged. Even the 10 yen coin is said to be the “poor man’s currency,” so perhaps coins with a lower value than that are no longer considered valuable.
However, the bread in my backpack was purchased last night for just a few tens of yen. In this town’s common sense, it’s the kind of product that would be bought with the money of someone who wouldn’t even be allowed into a regular store… But it’s by no means a bad thing! It’s hygienic, nutritious, and delicious.
In Japan, there is a saying that goes, “He who laughs at one yen will cry over one yen.” It means valuing things, money, and people. This may sound like a nice thing to say, but I’m currently in a situation where my part-time job is suspended, so I can’t afford to waste even a single yen…
I see money all the time, yet I have become so aware of it in a new and stronger way in this unfamiliar place…I find it truly strange.
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