Two stories about the parochial

Two incidents in the past week have had me reflecting on the notion of parochiality. 

I have recently come across Japan being described as parochial, a designation that has startling accuracy in certain senses, even while its use is utterly secular. Or is it really secular? What a people identifies with and worships and how and where they do it surely informs the concept of 'the parish'. Ideally, the parish is the first home from home. It's an idea that makes me wistful and doubtless informs some of my admiration for Japan's great spirit of neighbourliness. Over the years I've learned that having a mono-cultural milieu makes neighbourliness much easier even while it tends to drive discrimination of various stripes into dark and impossible to access places. I suppose any group identity is vulnerable to its shadows, the parish no less than others . . .

The first incident concerns a species of parochiality that may well be frequently encountered in the small pockets of 'Anywheresville'. It's something that reminds me of the question of the relevance of certain kinds of knowledge. I remember reading many years ago about some kids in a rurally situated school doing poorly on some British standardised test; the point being that had they been asked about stuff that was relevant to them --sheep and wool, say, or planting or harvesting or husbandry-- they would have aced the questions and those in the 'centre' would have performed predictably poorly. Situatedness in learning promotes community and out of community arises a wealth of opportunity. 

So, I went by the police station recently to pick up my renewed drivers' licence. It was an easy and pleasant encounter if, in retrospect, also curious and slightly baffling. There seemed that day a distinct resemblance in Japanese bureaucracy to Alice's experience down the Rabbit Hole. The officer at the desk said, looking at my carefully filled in paperwork, "Soooo, where were you born?" Naturally, I'd had to write the town and country of origin, and I read it aloud for her as she pointed at it. "Oh, is that in America?" It stands to reason [in Wonderland] that all people who look like me --non Asian and/or non Japanese--must be from America (aka, The Foreign Country).

"No, not America," said I. "It's in Africa." 

"Well, your passport says you're British.  You must have been born in England (* presumably in America.) Please cross out where you said you come from and write England because you cannot come from where you say you come from. For one thing," pointed out the officer patiently, "it doesn't match that maroon passport of yours."

[* Caveat: Liberties taken in mindreading.]

Well, this information was evidently outside the box of the officer's professional and geographical remit and she could not make the sum of my white, African, British parts add up to anything sensible. Why should I mind the gap? I took the path of least resistance--the way of harmony--and why not? Who was I to add (further?) to the confusion of the world? I crossed out my birthplace, replaced it with "England" and we parted on friendly terms. She, having set the worlds to right, and me licenced to the motors.

Then, there was another incident--another mind the gap event, in fact--that made me proud of good human beings, this time acting in concert. Taking a break at work a few days ago I came across this story of a woman falling between the platform and the train in Tokyo rush hour traffic. I would have been gripped by terror were it not for the picture --the ultimate reassurance--of commuters leaning on the train to make space for her extraction. It happened at the time that a rendition by the Salvation Army of Nessun Dorma (none shall sleep) was playing on the radio. A remarkable, and I confess, rather emotional synchronicity, knowing that at that hour of the day in that metropolis people are in, at best, liminal states of consciousness . . . but lo & behold, the clarion call came and it was all hands on deck. 

And, despite the gaps, we all lived, happily ever after.