My Bag History | Hajime Yoshino (Dean of the Faculty of Nursing and Medical Care)
2005.05.24
It's been almost two weeks since the so-called Golden Week ended.
It's here, it's here. Finally, a request for the Dean's Diary.
This year's Golden Week, like most years, was half-lost to an international conference. It can't be helped that there are many international conferences around this time, as it's the best season in almost every country in the Northern Hemisphere, including Japan.
But this year's Golden Week was great. Why? Because there was no request for the Dean's Diary. The pressure of writing an article with a looming deadline never changes, no matter how many years go by.
Now, on to the main topic: bags. To be honest, I'm actually a bag lover. I have a ton of them.
First, let's go through them chronologically.
In elementary school, it was the randoseru school bag. In junior high, a white canvas shoulder bag (I write "kaban" in hiragana because it wasn't leather, just to be clear). From high school, a black handbag (I think it was the same for all boys up to this point). In university, since I was in the rowing club, my standard was a Boston bag filled with sports gear.
After graduating and becoming a doctor, I commuted to school and work by car for a long time and didn't have a regular bag. Eventually, due to worsening traffic conditions and stricter penalties for drunk driving, I had no choice but to commute by train, and so I started carrying a regular bag.
It started in my late 30s with a thin, document-case-style bag—an Italian-made, wine-colored, glossy, and stylish one (or so I was convinced). This was followed by a classic, academic-style thick black briefcase, an attaché case, and the top-loading type often used by pilots. I went through several of each. In time, with the advent of the laptop computer and my own aging process, the situation changed completely. In other words, for someone in their 60s to carry a heavy PC without difficulty, a handbag is impossible; it has to be a backpack or a shoulder bag. I currently use both. While the former is more comfortable, it has its disadvantages: it's a bit difficult to get things out of, it can be a nuisance to others on a crowded train, and it's tough on my "forty-year-old shoulders" (frozen shoulder).
Another thing that has changed in the world of bags and PCs is what you could call the "congress bag" distributed at academic conferences. Many of today's congress bags are slightly larger, can be used as both a handbag and a shoulder bag, and come with padding to protect a PC. When I receive one, I think it seems useful and decide to take good care of it, and in fact, I use it extensively at the conference venue. But strangely, once the conference is over, I almost never use it again. I believe the reasons are that while it's good for carrying a PC, it's a bit too thin for carrying other documents, and depending on the conference, the name is clearly printed on the bag, which can be embarrassing. However, being a bag lover, I can't bring myself to throw these bags away. So, our storage closet is overflowing with them. My family knows I love bags, but even so, they can't stand it and occasionally, helpfully, throw them out for me—discreetly, of course.
My family (currently my wife and youngest daughter) are also, as it turns out, bag lovers. They diligently collect and enjoy so-called designer brand items. What makes them different from me is that they also diligently throw them away without a second thought. Occasionally, if I'm lucky enough to come across them as they're about to throw one away, I'll rummage through them for something usable, and they let me reuse it, on the condition that I only use it at work.
I'm someone who loses a lot of things, but I have never lost a bag, no matter how drunk I get. When I'm drunk, I make it a habit to head home shouting my beloved "Kaban, kaban!" (Bag, bag!). I just love the sound of "kaban, kaban."
Perhaps everyone is a bag lover. I wonder if Japanese people are especially fond of them.
P.S.: Shortly after my previous diary entry, " New SFC Faculty Club (4/14) ," was published, I received a polite letter from the "madam" I wrote about in that entry. She is a Keio University alumni, and the waitress there is apparently an SFC student. Rereading my diary, I breathed a sigh of relief!
The End
(Date Published: 2005/05/24)