I am currently reading Personal, Portable, Pedestrian - a collection of writings on the mobile phone in Japanese life. A big focus of the book is the keitai (mobile) and youth culture. Adoption of texting started in the 90s with girls sending messages coded in numbers via their pagers. This method of communicating short, mundane messages helped young people stay connected to their friends throughout the day, no matter how shallow the message content may have seemed. (Like, “what are you doing”, “good morning”, etc.) The messages being coded and sent / received with a personal device also helped create a communication space among groups of teenagers - their private sphere away from “the others” (ie. adults, the man).

It is quite remarkable how pagers and then the keitai were adopted and I enjoy reading about studies of the kids in Shibuya and Harajuku. At the same time, my mind was wandering off to experiences of my own youth and the “methods” we used to hide things from adults and maintain connectedness when we felt that our teachers and parents only wanted to drive us apart. (Okay so I’ll admit that when I was younger I had a bit of that “the world is against me” complex…I’ve grown up…a bit). I think that everyone used these things - coded notes, secret languages, signs, etc. I still use some…like the special signal for when the person on the other end of the phone brings something up and it is not exactly an opportune time to talk about it.

I still like to keep that connectedness, but it has been slipping away as I age. I haven’t missed Canadian food so much but I miss being able to send SMS messages to the girls and I miss receiving them even more. I still remember my last hours in Vancouver, sitting behind the airport security gates, sending texts back and forth knowing that those were my last moments for that kind of communication. The texts are saved in my phone which has not been turned on since coming here. That phone is now this artifact of going to Japan memories. I’ll have to save it for a long time.

*sigh* Just kidding. Super pumped for the weekend. Hope I take a lot of pictures : )