1. Youshouki no Rinshi Taiken to Kakuri Byoutou Seikatsu
[My Near-Death Experiences as a Child and Life in the Hospital Isolation Ward]

I am in a cradle. It sways gently back and forth. My field of vision, dim. Peeping out at my mother's face. Above her head, a mobile spins fitfully, playing a music box tune.

In the next instant, one year old, two years old, three years old…the memories of those times reappear before me very vividly. Me crawling. Walking on unsteady legs. Trying so hard to say words that I remembered. I couldn't talk very well.

"Ma…ma…"

Her words to me also come back to me like this.

"Tomorrow you have a piano lesson."

"Practice!"

Bright, sunny days. Sweat sliding along the piano keyboard…

Along the axis of time, these events are truly just several seconds long. Between them, a few very long [lit: enormous] memories run around my head with ferocious speed. Every moment of these memories that I lived till then become vivid images and begin to spin like a revolving lantern.

Am I going to die….?

Up until now, I have thought this 15 times.


The first time this revolving lantern happened was when I was seven years old.

Drowning in the Okinawa sea, being swallowed by the waves, painfully, struggling and struggling, my feet unable to touch the bottom, seeing things above my head being pulled along forcefully by the waves. Pulled along by the water. Though I tried to breathe, all that entered my mouth was saltwater.

As I could do nothing but drink the saltwater, all sound suddenly disappeared. A gentle sensation, a warm sensation, and there was a feeling as if I was being completely embraced by something. It doesn't matter what you call it. I was enveloped in a relief that I had not felt until that moment.

It was just after that moment. The revolving lantern began to move. All the memories I had since my birth till then began to one by one flash through my mind.

It was the first time this happened. I felt no fear. I thought that surely I was going to die.

But I didn't die.

Thereafter, whenever I come close to death, the revolving lantern spins. In situations where I may die, such as traffic accident, a fight, it appears suddenly.

It has happened 15 times. That's a little much, perhaps.

I was a mischievous child. I had a tendency to face death.


When I drowned, I was terribly afraid. A part of the reason was, I think, that I was violently afraid of death. But at the same time, I was fascinated by death. I was caught by it. If I didn't try to go close to it, then I wouldn't see it. I wanted to go as close as I could to it because I wanted to examine it. That was the kind of boy that I was.

Because of this, I would intentionally do things that were dangerous. I did things many times that made me wonder if I would die. Of course, I was always scared, but when that moment drew near, I was always calm.

Just a little more. Just a little more and I can maybe see the answer. That was the feeling. At that level, I couldn't die. If I was at that level, I could do it. I wanted to see more and more into the next world. There were times I'd cheer myself up by telling myself that.

For example, I loved bikes and when I was a teenager I would ride often. The city had a lot of curbs, and I think that at that time, I had a strange way of getting up on the curb [lit: attack]. I didn't have any skill, but I felt I could get up to that level. I really loved that feeling.

I was going faster and faster, and when I crossed over one area, there was a second when I saw everything in slow motion. That feeling lasted for a long time and it was as if I saw everything clearly. In that place that I crossed, surely something was there, and I wanted to see it. Because I wanted to savor that, I was reckless.

Until I saw the revolving lantern, I would continue to drive at things with all my might. When I can see the revolving lantern, it is the first time I have a consciousness of death. Then, I am in the place between life and death. Until I felt that, I could not do things to the fullest.

Now, I think, "That was strange." I was a dangerous child.

I sought death and I didn't know the meaning of life. What does it mean to live? Where can I find the value of my life and existence?

Truthfully, questions like that also had the opportunity to be born from my personal experiences when I was seven years old.


After I drowned, I became able to see many things. That day, all boundaries were broken. After my eyes were opened, until now, I became able to see completely things that before I could not see. I couldn't distinguish between people who were living and people who were not.

When I talked to the people who were not living, it must have been bizarre watching me from the outside. My parents were of course surprised.

"Who are you talking to?"

"Uncle."

"Where is Uncle?"

As they said that, they would laugh.

Perhaps they laughed and ignored it. But didn't they ignore it because their hearts were afraid to face me?

This began happening with more and more frequency, and I became thought of as very mentally strange. People talked about me, and I became uncertain of the meaning of my existence. Because I could see both live people and dead people, I didn't understand what life itself meant.

This continued, and when I was ten years old, I suddenly collapsed. I had a violent pain in my stomach and intestines, and I couldn't move.

After I was taken to the hospital, I was told that the cause was unknown. They told me that while that was the case, I probably had some sort of infectious disease.

So I was suddenly isolated. Isolated, in confinement, thrown into a hospital ward that was more a prison. I think that they put me in the pediatric ward because I was so young. Children who were heavily ill, had infectious diseases, or had terminal illnesses were in that ward. Being ten years old, that's what I thought. All of them were in a cage, and were likely to go down the corridor at any time.

Down the corridor, in another sick ward, were children who were probably going to die. I often knew when that would happen.

Talking with those children, I would then feel, "That child is going to die tomorrow."

The next morning, I would hear the nurses' feet go pattering down the hallway. Then I knew that one of my friends had died.

Those were hard days. I couldn't stand it. Just when I made a friend, they would be dead the next day. And that was something only I knew. It was hell.

Being in a place like that, I grew very strange. But because I was not mentally strong, I did not receive a quick release.

Why didn't they release me? Because I wasn't normal? What is the difference between being normal and not normal?

I thought incredibly hard about that. I couldn't escape. I had to do something to get out of there. So I continued to think.

I began to watch my senior doctor. When I imitated him exactly, I was observed to be "normal." This went on for about ten days or so. Suddenly, they told me, "You can go home."

I didn't change at all. But though nothing inside of me changed…

To the adults who said "I told you so," I had only a feeling of deep distrust.

But I didn't want to ever go back to that hospital.

So, from then on, I continued to copy the people who my parents and other adults of that generation said were correct.

All the while, I held on to the thought of "What on earth am I?"

Source:www.midnightrevolution.org/asrundream/trans/book/jihaku/