The Guardian review of Hokkaido Highway Blues

The trail of cherry blossom, cowsex and saké

If you want real Japanese culture, then follow Will Ferguson as he hitchhikes round the land of the rising sun in "Hokkaido Highway Blues"

Robert MacFarlane

In Japan, the progress of spring up the country is made visible by the sakura, also known as the Cherry Blossom Front. Starting at Cape Sata in the far south, cherry trees burst into flower and a pink isotherm of blossoms sweeps northwards.

The advance of the sakura is tracked, as Will Ferguson puts it, 'with a seriousness usually reserved for armies on the march', and its arrival in a region is celebrated with extempore haiku, and thermosfuls of saké. After a few too many sakés one year, Ferguson - Canadian, English teacher and travel writer of considerable flair and attitude - declared his intention to follow the sakura - and the saké - from toe to tip of Japan, hitchhiking all the way.

Hokkaido Highway Blues is his account of this journey. The book is long, but then so is Japan--almost 3,000 km. He starts on a semi-tropical archipelago and ends up a couple of months later in a blizzard. In the interim, he's persistently mistaken for an American (something that annoys most Canadians, but not Ferguson, whose previous publications include Why I Hate Canadians); is given a lift by a man who yells 'Cowsex!' at him over and over again; encounters Japanese gangsters, Godzilla and underwear vending-machines, revels in all the other ultra-kitsch detritus of 'J-Pop' culture; is arrested; drinks an awful lot; laments his hangovers, and generally gets to know Japan about as well as a gaijin (foreigner) could hope to.

His reason for hitchhiking rather than taking the bullet-train is to see Japan 'not as a spectator, but as a participant'. The car, he explains, 'is an extension of the home but without any of the prescribed formalities that plague Japan. Bumming rides became its own reward, the journey its own destination.'

What makes this book quite so appealing is Ferguson's unpredictability. Stylistically, he never sits still. One moment, he's riffing lyrically about the seascape south-east of Kyushu, the next he's deconstructing the 'cubist orgy' of a Japanese porn film; he seems capable of writing in pretty much any mode that occurs to him, and has opinions on everything. And though he's frequently and savagely ironic, he is also not afraid to declare his feelings - which means you trust both his humour and his insights. All in all an admirable pair of eyes through which to see contemporary Japan.

A lot of the funniest episodes are due to Japanese trying to speak English (despite his declarations to the contrary, Ferguson obviously has good Japanese). The 'Cowsex!' man, it turns out, once Ferguson has unscrambled his gobbledegook, is by trade an artificial inseminator of cattle.

In a bookshop Ferguson discovers a English-learning course called Porno! Learn English by Yourself! 'It combined two great Japanese passions: English and porn,' he notes. 'It was inspired, even if poorly executed. The content varied from archaic Victorian erotica - "presently he guided my hand lower, to that part, in which nature and pleasure keep their stores in concert" - to the crudely direct - "let's do tongue-fuck".' Other bon mots that catch his eye include 'So, you're a horny tomato' and (for the more advanced students) 'The dildo! So perfect for tonight'.

Ferguson is apparently threatening to write his next book about the UK. Given his natural asperity, and the sideswipes he makes here about the British capacity for boredom and incapacity for eroticism, it's unlikely to be a genial, patronising saunter à la Bill Bryson.

Unlike the Japanese, we don't have soft drinks called Sweat, or chocolate called Colon. And unlike the famous Kodo drummers, our Royal Philharmonic percussionists don't get up before dawn and run 10 kilometres, 'near-naked even in the howling depths of winter'. Nevertheless, I have every confidence that Ferguson will find plenty to enjoy in Britain, and plenty to mock. I can't wait to hear him do so.

The Guardian Observer
August 27, 2000