Gedo Senki (Tales from Earthsea)

6th August 2006

Supplementary 4 - Tomorrow's Verdict

I have arrived in Portland Oregon in the United States of America.

Portland is the where Ms. LeGuin lives, the author of the original works "Tales from Earthsea" is based on. The purpose of my current trip to the U.S. is to show the film to Ms. LeGuin.

The flight was approximately 9 hours. We arrived in Portland at 8:30 a.m. on the morning of the 5th. This was my first time in America since visiting PIXAR to exhibit the plans for the Ghibli museum[1].

At the airport we met up with Ghibli's sole American representative(?)[2], John Johnson, and headed to the hotel. Today was free day, to let my body have a day to adjust.

I always have trouble with jet-lag when I come to America This was not the case when I went to Europe, but whenever I come to America I invariably become really, really sleepy around mid-day and then can't sleep at night.

In order to wipe out the jet-lag, I have no choice but to stay awake until night-time, but, as if mocking my efforts, I get regularly attacked by strong bursts of sleepiness.

Mr. Suzuki collapses completely after noon. He's like a child sleepwalking.

[Picture of Toshio Suzuki sitting down]

Every time I come to America I think this, but it seems like everything is twice the size of Japan. Roads and car sizes, Hamburgers and Cola, and even people's sizes. By the way comparing Mr. Suzuki to John, their body masses[3] are in the ratio 1:4.

It seems obvious that the mentality of people who are born and raised in a country like this will be different to us.

Somehow I held out and when I finished dinner and went to the hotel it was 9 p.m. I'm going to go to sleep now, but I think I'm probably going to wake up in the middle of the night.

Tomorrow is the screening for Ms. LeGuin and then we are planning to have dinner with them afterwards.

When Hayao Miyazaki went over to England to show "Howl's Moving Castle" to the original author[4], he was incredibly tense. I was travelling with him at the time and this mystified me. "Why is he so tense?" I wondered.

Now that I'm am in the same situation myself, I understand the reason very well. Honestly, I'm terrified of tomorrow coming.

Translator's Notes

[1]: There was actually a Pixar exhibition at the Ghibli Museum some time in the first half of 2005, but this does not seem to be what he is talking about.

[2]: This is the director's question mark, not mine.

[3]: Literally, their "volumes", but this didn't sound natural to me, so I went with "body mass".

[4]: Diana Wynne Jones