The call went out and they turned up in their hudnreds. The Melbourne Japanese expatriate community turned up on mass to see one of their own stand-up comedians sit down on the cushion in front of the microphone, Tsurubei Kanbei was a household name in his native country for his rakugo skills specialising in the Osaka dialect.
Officials ran up and down the length of the queue reassuring everybody that the doors would be opening soon. When the queue started to move we made it to the corner and then saw that the queue reached around a stairwell before it got back to the doors. We made it to the last stretch and then it was announced that there would not be enough seats for everybody. Luckily we had made it close enough to the door not to be turned away.
Inside the hall the cameraman was in the centre and at the very last moment the seat next to him was given a young man, a latecomer. Amidst the excitement at recognising other people in the crowd the show finally started. The NHK rep congratulated everybody for coming along and said they couldn't believe the turn up and how many people they had had to turn away.
The crowd cheered.
"We didn't know there were so many Japanese people in Melbourne."
The crowd cheered.
To start the show Tsurube explained how he had spent the day, During the day he had complained about the dry wintry conditions so he had been given some paw paw cream for his lips. He had also tried a meat pie, fed some birds in the park and been for a ride on Puffing Billy. In the morning he had taken a walk around the MCG. This had been rather arduous and then he met a young Japanese man who seemed to recogise him. When Tsurubei asked him, "Do you know who I am?" the young man had paused and then replied "Ebisu san?" This amused Tsurube no end so he kept asking the young man who he was and laughing out aloud each time when the young man gave up and said "Ebisu san?" With that he called the latecomer who was sitting beside the cameraman down to the front of the stage. It turned out that this young man was named Takumi. When he got there they shook hands, exchanged another laugh and then the show was ready to start.
The first of the performers sat at the microphone and compalined about Osaka grandmothers. He talked about wanting to eat eat udon and how when he asked for some money for dinner all he was given was some furikake. Some meal that would buy he exclaimed. He then said that he wouldn't tell anyone he was going for tea because all he was likely to receive was a tea bag. The second speaker lamented that he had recently performed rakugo in a much smaller theatre in Saitama where there had only been four people in the audience sitting in single file, one behind the other, facing the stage. He had sat and faced the audience and been the fifth in line. At the microphone he spoke about his trip to a tiny zoo where he was convinced to dress up as a tiger. He practiced moving his feet in imitation of a tiger. He was terrified when a lion was led to the cage only to discover that it was the zoo owner in the lion's suit. Finally Tsurubei came to the microphone to give his rendition of an ageing junior high school teacher with false teeth. He nearly choked on these in his rage at the lazy students in his class especially Akiyoshi kun who refiused to take down the notes for the dictation. To the teachers chagrin, despite giving them hints about what was on the test, they were the worst performing of all his classes. They were in fact so bad they were the worst class that he had ever taught but, despite that, he liked them the best. The audience erupted in enthusiastic applause as he choked oin his false teeth.
After a short interval Tsurubei came back for a more traditional rendtion of rakugo. The kind that the Australian Henry Black had performed in the Meiji Period when he lived in Tokyo and became a well-known rakugo performer. The show was over and it was off home trhough the city. The performance was to be broadcast on NHK so with a bit or luck they could relive the performance, especially that of the junior high school teacher with the false teeth. It was a sobering reminder in a world of excess just how much we enjoy those people and those events that get under our skin.
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