Once, I woke up to a pair of beautifully shaped eyes.
Large, round eyes unlike anything I had been accustomed to, stared at me through the blackness of night. They were accompanied by a hypnotic voice. A voice that enveloped me with songs, songs with foreign melodies that were sung in words I didn’t understand.
I say once, but this happened over and over again, like a recurring dream, for months. In the middle of the night, I would open my eyes to darkness, a darkness that was complete. And through the darkness I would become aware of a melody. Then, slowly, I would become aware of the two eyes peering out from the darkness, their gaze locked on me longingly, lovingly, feverishly.
Once is a series of micro memoirs inspired by a book of the same title in which Wim Wenders, the German filmmaker, uses a combination of photographs and text to reveal what he considers to be the beginnings of untold stories, which he encourages his readers/viewers to complete.
Similarly, I offer these moments of my life to you as if they were not my own, as if they were in no way connected to me, which in many cases they no longer seem to be. I encourage you to consider these moments as beginnings, beginnings of stories or travels that you are free to write, live, or complete as you see fit.
If you enjoyed this post, please also consider reading my This Is Japan series to learn about everyday life in Japan as seen, discovered, and experienced through the eyes of a foreigner. You can read my latest post here, The Toy Maker.