{"id":3206,"date":"2009-02-03T16:16:13","date_gmt":"2009-02-03T16:16:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=3206"},"modified":"2009-02-03T16:43:17","modified_gmt":"2009-02-03T16:43:17","slug":"wit-life-25-laughing-the-blues-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2009\/02\/03\/wit-life-25-laughing-the-blues-away\/","title":{"rendered":"WIT Life #25: Laughing the Blues Away"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\ngoogle_ad_client = \"pub-5763788839922114\";\n\/* JetWit Post Banner 468x60, created 1\/29\/09 *\/\ngoogle_ad_slot = \"4716350290\";\ngoogle_ad_width = 468;\ngoogle_ad_height = 60;\n\/\/ --><\/script><br \/>\n<script src=\"http:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/show_ads.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!--[if gte mso 9]&gt;  Normal 0   false false false         MicrosoftInternetExplorer4  &lt;![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]&gt;   &lt;![endif]--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><em><a href=\"..\/category\/wit-life\/\"><strong>WITLife<\/strong><\/a> is a periodic series written by professional Interpreter\/Translator\/Writer <a href=\"http:\/\/www.stacysmith.webs.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Stacy Smith<\/strong><\/a> (Kumamoto-ken, 2000-03).\u00a0 Recently she\u2019s been watching Fujisankei\u2019s newscast in Japanese and sharing some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations. <\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" src=\"http:\/\/www.piroki.net\/piroki\/stage\/images\/thumb_photo051203.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"184\" height=\"175\" \/>As the saying goes, laughter is the best medicine and the same effect is being seen in Japan.<span> <\/span>These upsetting economic times have brought a boom in <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Rakugo\" target=\"_blank\"><em>rakugo<\/em><\/a>, <em>mandan <\/em>and other forms of entertainment that have people laughing out loud.<span> <\/span>In Tokyo\u2019s Chiyoda-ku, there was a <em>rakugo<\/em> gathering where attendees cited their reasons for coming as \u201cthe need to let it all out, laugh away my troubles.\u201d<span> <\/span>Another man expressed the fear that because of the bad economy, he didn\u2019t know how much longer he would last at his company, and coming to the performance allowed him to temporarily forget about his worries.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">In a small theater in Shinjuku, 45-year old guitar <em>mandan<\/em> <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.piroki.net\/piroki\/english\/index.htm\">Piroki<\/a><\/strong> entertained a crowd in his get-up which included a bow tie and hair in a ponytail.<span> <\/span>While he strummed along, he told a story of<!--more--> realizing he ran out of money and going to the ATM to withdraw 20,000 yen.<span> <\/span>Except after pressing the \u201c2\u201d he forgot to press the character for <em>man<\/em>, and he got only 2 yen and was charged 105 yen for the transaction.<span> <\/span>This had the crowd roaring as he ended the ditty with, \u201cLet\u2019s live lightly.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">His self-deprecating routine includes reminiscing on his student days and the mistakes he made then, and after the show one audience member said that these types of gags helped him feel better about himself.<span> <\/span>According to Piroki, \u201cIn today\u2019s dark world, I put myself down with the hopes of raising the spirits of my audience.<span> <\/span>I want to give them a feeling of superiority, as they have probably lost confidence in other areas of their life.<span> <\/span>I become a buffoon for them and hope that I can help them overcome hard times with my smile.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">52-year old singer\/songwriter Mariko Hata performs with a special group in mind&#8212;housewives.<span> <\/span>Her songs address mundane topics such as curry rice and <em>mabodofu<\/em>, as she seeks lyrics that her audience can relate to.<span> <\/span>In a song called <em>\u201cAnata<\/em>\u201d in reference to her husband, she wonders why he has such short-term memory.<span> <\/span>\u201cThis morning I told you I was making curry for dinner, but when you got home tonight you asked, \u2018Why does it smell like curry?<span> <\/span>That\u2019s what I had for lunch.\u2019\u201d<span> <\/span>This went over big with the all-female audience, with one member saying she just kept nodding along to everything Hata was singing.<span> <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Says Hata, \u201cAs a housewife, there\u2019s no way to avoid everyday pressures.<span> <\/span>You are busy all day washing dishes, cleaning, etc. and when your family comes home they expect you to take care of them.<span> <\/span>All you want to say is, \u2018I\u2019m tired too!\u2019<span> <\/span>I give women an outlet for these kinds of feelings.\u201d<span> <\/span><!--[if gte mso 9]&gt;  Normal 0   false false false         MicrosoftInternetExplorer4  &lt;![endif]--> <span>In addition to this stress, housewives have to be extra careful with money these days which is an additional burden. <span> <\/span><\/span>Several of Hata\u2019s devotees have formed their own \u201chousewives&#8217; chorus,\u201d which offers them a chance to get out of the house and express themselves at practice and concerts.<span> <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">I don\u2019t know if comedy clubs or other sources of laugh-out-loud entertainment here in the States have seen a similar surge in popularity, but in Japan this phenomenon seems to be going strong.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WITLife is a periodic series written by professional Interpreter\/Translator\/Writer Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken, 2000-03).\u00a0 Recently she\u2019s been watching Fujisankei\u2019s newscast in Japanese and sharing some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations. As the saying goes, laughter is the best medicine and the same effect is being seen in Japan. These upsetting [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,30,18,36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articlejournalism","category-japan-trends","category-translatinginterpreting","category-wit-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkZ7m-PI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3206"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3206\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3233,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3206\/revisions\/3233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}