When I lived in Japan, every Sunday I would ride my bike with my best friend Sachiko to the thrift store in search of wonderful things.  My bike had a basket on the front and back and a rusty, old bell.

Although she was thirty years older, we were connected in some strange way.  I was learning Japanese, she was learning English, we both had a sweet tooth and loved to laugh.  She had a loud, boisterous laugh that would make people turn their heads curious of our conversation. Most of our conversations were quite animated, a guessing game of awkward hand gestures, but once we understood each other there was always a lot of laughter.

Every Sunday I would teach her English classes at the local gym. We would then swim laps together in the pool, hop on our bikes to go to the thrift store and the afternoon would end in a Japanese cooking lesson in her kitchen wearing matching aprons.  Her husband would be watching television as we cooked, and we whispered and chuckled.  She was not fond of her husband and would always tell me she looked forward to Sundays as it was reprise from an unhappy and abusive home life.

At the thrift stores, there were so many wonderful things that sparked my curiosity and I would find myself always contemplating their past stories. Calligraphy on Japanese rice paper all rolled up in piles.  When I unraveled them dust would fill the air. Traditional wooden dolls (Kokeshi) – all shapes and sizes on shelves.  Their solemn presence seemed to bear the spirits of their previous owners.  Rusty tools, tarnished silverware, iron kettles, lacquerware bowls, swords and rolled up door curtains (Noren) scattered the walls, hung crookedly side by side.  In large bins piled in a disorderly fashion were wooden shoes (Geta) and swatches of patterned kimono fabric. So many things to look at but I was always drawn to the Japanese ceramics section.  Beautiful ceramic pieces were displayed on dusty shelves and some were displayed as beautiful sets in unopened wooden boxes. Piles and piles of unopened boxes.  Sachiko said that many newlyweds do not appreciate some of the gifts that were given to them or have no room for them, so the beautiful ceramic sets were abandoned gifts -  waiting for the perfect person to give them a special home.  In choosing a specific piece, I was always drawn to colour, texture, the beauty of uneven edges, simplicity in form and the elegant signature imprinted on the bottom of the piece.

​Sachiko and I would fill our bicycle baskets and ride away chatting about our special finds.  When I came home I would package my ceramic pieces and ship them to my home address in Canada.  When I finally returned to Canada I felt like a kid on Christmas Day or my Birthday opening packages of beautiful things and remembering those special Sundays.  I had forgotten some of the pieces I sent to myself so every package was an assortment of wonderful surprises.  These are some of my favorite pieces from my collection – memories of colourful Sundays spent in Japan remembering the feelings of excitement on a bicycle to a thrift store and a genuine connection with an old friend.  I think of her often – her kindness, generosity, her boisterous laugh and love for sweets.

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Karen Bagayawa

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