I was an Illegal Prince Charming by Magnus
A madcap adventure should include fleeing into the dark night of a foreign land in a Prince Charming costume, gold wooden sword knocking your knees and all that.
In my slacker days one of my best triumphs was in 88 when I traveled to Japan to teach English and to mooch off my kid brother. Japan was a whole different perception set. Rice wine and open sewer odor mixed with an ever-present cheesy pop soundtrack. Prim housewives in high heels pedaling bicycles with cargo baskets full of enormous radishes. “The Crow Army”, their black para-military unis and caps modeled after 1890s German students, schoolkids, swarming around silly foreign boys (me). Rotting cabbages in the gutters and delicious, overpriced coffee brewed in laboratory glass beakers and flasks. Liters of cold Kirin and / or a titty magazine on sale in vending machines. My brother took me to a karaoke bar and he delivered a soulful version of “My Way” every off duty office worker in the place singing along waving steins of beer. I scarfed a platter of crunchy teriyaki grilled heads-on-sparrows on a skewer, while the big screen behind my brother showed a woman masturbating with a carrot. The money shot was blurred out by the censors. Right, so my point is Japan was a psychedelic planet of wonders. The summer Olympics were happening and images of the buff Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson were everywhere. This was right before he was revealed as a steroid popping scofflaw. So was I, a scofflaw, flouting Japanese labor law working on a tourist visa like a common criminal.
“Arbeit!” In the visa office the severe man in a Sam Browne belt insisted, crossing his arms in a negative gesture.
“No Arbeit!” I promised copying his gesture, openly lying to the government official.
In spite of sketchy tourist papers I soon found employment. Blue eyes opened doors and I learned to remove my shoes once inside. No work visa was a problem in the language schools in Okayama where my brother was based but not so upcountry in the small city of Tsuyama.
Funky Tsuyama. A provincial place with the remnants and ramparts of a medieval castle in the middle of town. At the end of WWII, the locals believed that the castle would attract attention of US fighter planes patrolling the region. In fear, they tore it down and only the fortifications remained. Tsuyama was off the beaten track with rundown gabled pagoda shaped buildings from the 19th century Meiji era, cobblestone roads, chickens running around and Mom and Pop ramen houses. A wizened gent in a cluttered tabac shop was a former translator for the American Army, he told me the story of the lost castle.
My gig was English conversation teacher at the Brigitte Academy of Languages.
Masashi, the owner who liked hanging around foreigners, named it after a long gone Swiss girlfriend. Two rooms, a skimpy shelf of dictionaries and phrase books and a couple of desks completed the place. The students were giggly girls who wanted to work in the travel industry, bored high school kids forced to take after school classes by demanding parents and businessmen looking to advance their careers with improved skills. Easy work that consisted mostly of having “conversations’ following scripts for social situations, shopping, ordering in restaurants and so on. I got paid in yen which was at that time the strongest currency in the world. In dollars, I was clearing around $250 US a day and Masashi covered my room and board.
Saturday nights I took a train to a nearby village where Brigitte Academy had a contract with the local English club. The people didn’t want to actually learn English so much as they liked to hang out, gossip, make food and maybe study a little Eeengrish. A few housewives, high school kids and a couple of Buddhist monks in saffron robes, sandals and shaved heads made up the club. I don’t remember any formal lessons but there were always rice balls, snack bags of salty dried fish and squid, canned coffee and batches of beef sukiyaki whipped up in the kitchen of the village community hall. The ladies gossiped, the kids did homework and played video games on primitive 80’s gear and the monks beamed peacefully and also played video games. They all liked to sing in English, over and over, “Edelweiss”, that favorite tune of the German Third Reich. I hung out, exchanged a few phrases and was present as the native English speaker making it all legit.
The second or third class the housewife in charge showed me a Walt Disney book, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
“You teach play,” she told me, “You are Prince.” I looked at the book. Sure enough, Prince Charming was a fair eyed lad in tights, cape, silk sash and regal sword. Looked just like me.
We passed around the book and I taught the actors their lines lifted directly from Walt Disney. No script, we did it all from one grubby dog eared book. The two monks and five high school boys each had one line.
“I’m Grumpy.”
“I’m Happy.”
“I’m Sleepy.”
“I’m Bashful.”
“I’m Sneezy.”
The two monks were Dopey and Doc. As director, I insisted on this detail.
The cutest high school girl was Snow White. In rehearsal, I bent for the rejuvenating, life giving kiss and planted one right on her. Like in the book. Not good. Snow White burst into tears. Dopey winked at me and shrugged like, “What are you gonna do?”
Fake kiss, angled so the audience couldn’t see, was what we did do. In the few following rehearsals, did I nonetheless get a little too close to those tender ruby lips? Who can say.
Opening night and housewife in charge presented me with my Prince Charming regalia complete with a pair of stretchy nude colored tights. Fortunately, the robin’s egg blue Prince tunic provided sufficient coverage and there was no breach of security. The house was packed, every single soul in a 1,000-person village was there, standing room only.
The play couldn’t have been more than a surrealistic blur of twenty minutes tops. It was all good, Dopey and Doc got laughs and when the kiss scene happened I did the right thing.
It was an out of body experience repeatedly bowing in a line with my fellow thespians to the cheering crowd while gathering the folds of my Blue Boy tunic to keep myself under control. I’m average height yet I towered over my play mates.
Then, stage left a camera crew approached, bright lights in my eyes, microphone in the woman reporter’s extended hand and red record light blinking on the camera. She was smiling the smile of a local television personality. I grinned like an idiot and hundreds of rural farm folk cheered.
From stage right Masashi grabbed my elbow dragging me backward.
“Time to go!” he hissed. “Now!”
Out the back we fled, leaping off a loading dock and into his 4-wheel drive motor running Suzuki jeep with the film crew hot on our heels. They actually jumped into their vehicle and gave chase, but Masashi burned rubber and we eluded our pursuers. I lost my gold crown and it rolled under the wheels of the reporter micro-van, flattened into a sheet of glittery cardboard.
“I have your jeans and shirt,” he said, handing me a paper bag. Thoughtful Masashi had gathered up my street gear so I could get out of my royal rags. He was a good boss.
Safely away, he pulled over on a side road and lit a nasty Lucky Seven filter-less cigarette. I lit one too and we cracked up.
I’d been teaching him to curse and he came through with some colorful expletives, “You’re a funny motherfucker! Rook at you in those fucking gay tights! Your sheet is showing!” We both had to laugh, there in the moonlight on a narrow Asian road, orderly, irrigated rice fields on both sides.
If the film crew had corralled me and the name of the Brigitte Academy was mentioned, the publicity could have led to an inquiry as to my work status. Japanese officials can be very diligent. That could have been big trouble for Masashi. With everything on the down low no one really cared. Prince Charming on the evening news was a different story. And that was the reason the Prince left them wanting more, fleeing into the night, tripping on his sword and getting away scot free. Such were the perils of living as, have phrase book will travel, willing to don a fairy tale tunic Eeeengrish Conversation teacher.
Makes for a slacker dude yarn worth immortalizing and no question this true story qualifies as a genuine madcap caper.