Paintings

Along the narrow slope leading from the Reikyo area of Shibuya towards Maruyama-cho, there used to be a row of small bars. I can't remember the name, though, there was a small bar with just a counter, run by a woman who seemed to be a former student activist, a little older than me in the 1970s. I used to drop by there alone from time to time. There was a guitar on the counter, and one night, as I sipped my whisky soda, I said, ‘Play something for me.’ Without smiling, the person silently picked up the guitar and sang Miyuki Nakajima's ‘Wakare Uta’. While I remember the various setbacks of the All-Campus Joint Struggle Generation, it is very impressed to me, like a scene from an underground B&W film by the Art Theatre Guild.