Japan is a symphony. One of a unique kind of restraint that bursts with life, but never overflows, its moments and corners edited selects. 

It is an orchestra you don’t belong to, so you’re cast as the audience. You’re a pretty put-together, very type-A type of person, but when wandering through Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka, it is apparent that your sophistication level has been measured on the wrong scale, in the wrong theater entirely. 

In the first act, at the Aoyama Flower Market Tea House in Tokyo, everything about your presence feels too loud, though you make sure to never speak above a whisper, and be polite. Elaborate flowers, orchids, and lilies trace the ceiling in hues of orange and pink, a sunset indoors. Lush leaves on vines curve in, welcoming guests to dine upright in the garden of tables and chairs. Servers handed you a cup of tea, with both hands. Breakfast is too jarring of a word to describe the pristine plate of rice, vegetables, and meat that glistened in a rosy oily sheen. You look around and wonder if this place is a bubble, or if the bubble already burst and made everything, well, clean.

Outside the tea house, the tempo increases and the subtle signs of a city resurface. There are women dressed in long pleated silk skirts, practically floating to their destinations. It’s empty somehow, this city of 14 million, less lonely and more open than a city typically feels. The train is the best way to get around, but it’s a jarringly quiet place. It doesn’t make sense that a public place would be this quiet, but then again why shouldn’t it be? Following the composer’s guide, you sit quietly, light the only sound, noiselessly pouring in through the windows, breaking openness into the space, calming your mind and recharging your body. 

You make it to the Shibuya Crossing and the music crescendos, the pace requiring warmth to build in your legs. From this perspective, you become intimate with the musicians, each of their own sounds waving to your eardrums, but you’re curious about the echos higher up, so you find a tall spot to look out at the scenery below. The composer guides musicians from one destination to another, grouping instruments in a way that makes sense, controlled chaos. 

In the neighborhoods of Shinjuku, you see the culture, you taste the gyoza, and the cadence has confirmed that you’ve found your favorite parts of the city. At night, swarms of businessmen in identical suits board the train with you, but it’s very late and they’re very tired, the audience applauds.

During intermission, you take time to laugh, talk, and have fun with your friend who’s come with you to the show. You wonder if she likes the music, but you know for certain that you’ve both started to place your hands more intentionally, moving with more grace.

In the second act, the composer shows you refinement, ritual, and beauty in the surroundings of Kyoto. Golden and red temples are placed in gardens where not a single leaf is out of place. Walking around these holy places the atmosphere is ancestral, grounded. The conjunction of nature in this part of the country brings a sense of harmony to everyday life, to your new pace in this temporary home. Notes of matcha flavor your palette; the warm lattes, matcha soft serve, matcha candies, a circular matcha cake that you take home, and too many pieces of matcha french toast at your hotel breakfast. Then, the melody changes and you’re in Osaka. 

You assumed that the chorus of nature would carry on, and they do, but the composer surprises you with their last notes. At this point, you’ve accepted your status as an audience member, honored to observe such beauty from afar. But just when you think you’ve gone unnoticed, the guy making sushi behind the conveyor belt in a busy restaurant looks you right in the eye, breaking the fourth wall, and starts to giggle. No longer flying under the radar, you place a precise smile on your face, nod at him, and take your seat.

Eventually, the show is over. You must adjust to the normal volume of your busy city back home. You seek the quietness in the music you once heard. You try to make your home just as refined. Staring down at your Muji pen, you remind yourself how important it will be to write intentionally at the next overture.