SAYAKA MURATA'S 'CONVENIENCE STORE WOMAN'

The idea of someone working in a convenience and finding this is the place where they feel most comfortable is a revelation. Going to Japan for the first time recently a young friend listed the following items as what they would  like to bring home with them to Australia; convenience stores, vending machines and onsen.

The convenience store in Murata's novel is not just a haven for foreigner's looking for snacks, however, it is also a haven for those Japanese who don't fit in. For their former school mates and families it is incomprehensible that this kind of shift work for high school and college students can become a fulfilling job for an adult.

The work itself is menial and low-skilled. Shift workers need only memorise where the products go on the shelves, how to manage the register during rush hour and how to speak to customers. To do these things with any more than basic zeal or diligence is absurd. There are no plaudits to be won by excelling in the job. In fact to excel this kind of jobmis to be marked out as one of the strange ones. And in Japanese society this must be avoided atcall costs.

This bleak commentary on so-called 'normal' society in Japan is not bitter. It is life affirming and the protagonist Keiko has an answer for most of the problems her friends and family present her with. In fact, it is Keiko who proves resourceful when others struggle. Shiraha observes that, "we are all animals..." and that "this is a dysfunctional society. And since it's defective, I'm treated unfairly."

Keiko notices 'water dripping through his fingers' and takes him to a nearby family restaurant. She gets him a jasmine tea but only drinks hot water herself because she 'didn't really feel any need to drink flavored liquid.' Later he is angry at her because he wanted coffee.

Keiko is as distanced from any need for self pity as she is from the basic comforts that the people around her need. Keiko exists in splendid isolation but makes herself essential at work and is happy to play the part of the 'convenience store worker'. When she proposes to Shiraha to solve both their problems. She is sick of being asked when she was going to get bbn married. Shiraha is resentful but moves in with her. Keiko is bbn glad when he has a shower because he stinks.