An Accident
Sunday, February 28, 1988. We (Lisa and Daniel, who was then six months old) were visiting Karen and her husband Masaki in Arimatsu, a suburban area to the south of Nagoya. Lisa and I came to know Karen, an Australian who had come to Japan some years before we did, while were all teaching at the Nagoya YMCA English School. For Lisa and me, the YMCA school was a waystation while I waited to be formally hired as an English teacher at Fukui University. We lived in Nagoya from September 1985 to March 1986.
From my journal of March 2, 1988:
Leaving Karen’s place in Arimatsu on Sunday afternoon, we had quite a scare. We had some difficulty finding our way out of her neighborhood – a weird jumble of capillary-width streets that once marked the divisions between paddy fields – and found the main street headed for the Nagoya Expressway. I was driving at about 45 kph [about 25 mph]. Sighted a city bus stopped to let off passengers. I distinctly recall thinking that if this were America and if that were a yellow school bus, I would automatically stop and let the children cross. It wasn’t a school bus, but there was a child. She came out from behind the bus, perhaps looking to see if any cars were coming.
I hit her, but she glanced off the side. Right now, I remember the sound of the fender striking her body, the sight of her in the right field of vision, my slamming on the brakes. Lisa and I screamed simultaneously, a primitive cry of alarm such as I’ve never made before. Daniel, strapped into his seat behind, screamed in response. I though I’d killed the girl.
She was down in the middle of the road, and was already starting to get up when Lisa and I reached her. She was bleeding a little from a gash in her right leg, near the knee, but otherwise seemed unhurt. We helped her over to the side of the street. People dashed out of the shops and I told someone to call an ambulance.
She was a plumpish girl who looked somewhat older than her nine years: 久保まり子 [Mariko Kubo]. Lisa parked the car and fetched Dan. The girl’s mother was there: she’d been getting a perm in the beauty parlor. She seemed to resent the disturbance. The girl insisted that she was not in pain, but she was in shock and was putting a brave face on things, no tears. The mother proceeded to lecture the girl on looking both ways before crossing the street. The woman stood there, wearing the big plastic apron the hairdresser had put on her and, with her short, half-frizzed hair and worn face, I detested her. Only later did it occur to me that she did nothing - at least in front of us - to comfort her daughter. No embraces, no tender words, nothing. We sat there in the beauty parlor, the three of us and the girl holding a wadded towel against the cut on her leg, to wait for the ambulance. The mother went back to try to get her perm finished.
Our faces must have been as white as this paper. The hairdresser brought us coffee (we hardly touched it). The ambulance seemed to take a long time to get there. Eventually it came and the girl was taken away. The paramedic told us to stay there and wait for the police. Lisa called Hayawa [who we were to visit later that day] to tell him we'd be delayed. I expected the worst.
The police were, it turned out, quite reasonable. This sort of thing happens all the time with children crossing those car-congested narrow streets. Also, they didn't know how seriously the girl was hurt. The older cop intimated that the U.S. embassy would have to be contacted. I worried about us, but I also began thinking about the girl. Lisa later said she was running through her mind our litany of complaints against “this country.” I remember wishing I could hold the girl and make her feel better. I guess at that moment I loved the injured little bird.
In the course of their 30 minute investigation, the cop could see we were reasonable people, that we broke no laws, and that the accident was not our fault.
Hold on: reading this passage now, 36 years after the event, I see how self-serving it is. “Broke no laws”? I was driving a 3,500 lb. automobile. I certainly did not intend to hit the girl, but as a driver, especially on a congested, narrow thoroughfare, the burden of responsibility was on me and no one else. And who is this “we” I keep mentioning? Lisa was not driving; I was.
Back to my journal:
We went to the hospital, a small clinic right around the corner, to see the girl and her mother. The accident had happened at around 5: 30, and by 6: 30-6: 45, the girl was lying on the couch of the clinic waiting, her leg bandaged and her arm in a sling. She fractured her collarbone, but her injuries were not serious and the mother was on the phone trying to track down the father who, it turned out, was still holed up in the pachinko parlor.
The cops got the rest of the information they needed for their report. It was time for the 打ち合わせ [uchiawase – “meeting”], and I gathered what that meant. I gave the woman ¥20,000, which was about right, and everyone was satisfied. The police were not going to do anything, and we were let go with a 気を付けてください。[ki wo tsuketekudasai, “be careful/take care”].
¥20,000 was worth about $160 at the time, a not inconsiderable sum.
We went to our next engagement, a genial guy for whom I had done some editing work when we were living in Nagoya. I mention “a delightful evening,” but how we could have had a delightful evening after I hit a child with our car is unclear to me now.
After the accident, I received contact from the mother of the girl. She wanted something from me, but it was unclear what. I bought a tinned box of fancy cookies and sent them to her. I seem to recall finding out that the girl healed up fine. I don’t think I heard anything further. The next time I renewed my auto insurance, the premium had gone up substantially as a consequence of the accident.
I’ll never forget that horrible moment of impact and the sight of a young girl down on the pavement next to my car. The accident could have been far worse. I like to think it made me a more careful and cautious driver, but I’m not convinced of that. Driving is not something I enjoy, and I probably have enjoyed it less since that incident in 1988.
