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I was confused, I was exhausted, I was operating on autopilot. But I was also having fun. I mean, this was to be expected. I was in Morioka to launch Kissa by Kissa’s Japanese edition and it was my tenth interview (!!) in two days (with ten more to follow) and it was sort of early (for me) and I had shoved all of these new Japanese phrases into my head in attempt to more clearly articulate why this or why that.

I repeated to myself, The soul of a city is nurtured by its people, as the cab took me to the TV studio. Which one? I couldn’t tell you. A man named Baba who runs the Azumaya wanko soba shop had put together a media gauntlet the likes of which I’ve never experienced. Fill up my days, I told him, and boy did he.

The TV was live. Live TV. Go! Go! Iwate! It was Saturday morning. It was one of the most watched shows in Iwate Prefecture. How many people watched? Was it tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands? Certainly not millions. (How many people lived in Iwate again? [ed. — 1,165,886]) It was a ninety-minute show and nothing had been explained. What should I say? I could say The soul of a city is nurtured by its people. I was in the green room for ten seconds. I carried a coffee cup to set. They told me to bring it on because it would be funny. The set was ablaze. The main host was a guy named Tenshin Kimura who gained fame as an erotic comedian in Osaka, now he was one of the most popular TV personalities around Morioka. He had a female co-host and was accompanied by two other women, sitting off to the side who commented on things. I think. I didn’t really know. Though I’ve lived here for the majority of my life, I’ve never owned a TV and have never watched more than a snippet of shows like these.

Still, understanding or not: The miracle of live TV began. Out they called me. I walked on set bowing and carrying my coffee and wearing my camera like a talisman, but also as a promotional prop. Who was this guy? He was at the very least a guy who wore a camera around his neck on TV.

But, no, no — they knew who I was. I was Craigu-san the New York Times 52-Places guy. Everyone knew me. (So they said) The ninety minutes went surprisingly quickly. It was fun. My head floated in a little circle as I made reaction faces to other videos and live reporting out around the city. I ate some bread on camera, although I refused to say the requisite OISHIIIIIII or UMMAAAIIII, instead saying, Yeah man, this works. There was a “riddle” — “Why did the granddaughter laugh at the grandpa when she saw him shoveling snow?” Who knows why. I wrote on my big pad of paper: “Because he was holding the book Kissa by Kissa!”

Because that’s what catalyzed all of this. The Japanese edition of my book was out. Finally. Years in the making. Many meetings, many video calls later: It was out. Imai Eiichi had translated it beautifully and Hayasaka Daisuke of BOOKNERD Morioka had published it, and now I was running that media gauntlet.

I am firmly of the camp that you need to do this — that is, as much as possible — for a book launch. A thing you’ve spent possibly years on finally has form, and you get to “launch” it but once. Make it count. Or at least make it as fun and interesting as possible.

I postulated that a launch event in Morioka (and heck, it was being published by a Morioka publisher) would be the most fun and interesting way to launch the thing. So I arrived on Thursday early afternoon, and it was straight into the interviews: TV interviews, live radio interviews (my favorite), newspaper interviews, magazine interviews. In hindsight, we probably should have held a press conference to simplify things.

I shot an on-location TV special with that selfsame Tenshin Kimura in which we walked the old shopping street of a nearby town. We talked about my philosophies of walking, my rules: No news, no social media, no distractions from the phone; create “boring time;” talk to as many people as possible, say helllllooooooo to everyone, etcetera.

Together, we greeted a woman opening her ice cream shop (who by chance had Tenshin’s book of erotic poetry on her counter) and a man in his 90s (wearing very cute shoes) told us all about the medicine he was off to get from the pharmacy. We investigated a bus stop with the double-whammy of both a public phone and ashtray, making us feel like we should buy lottery tickets. We saw a dog, a very good dog. I talked about ichi-ri-zuka. And we had pizza toast in a hidden kissa that looked like it was someone’s clapboard home out next to the rice fields.

Launching

The proper book launch event was on Saturday afternoon. The venue we chose was somewhat size-limited but otherwise excellent. It held about 120 people and those tickets sold out before I had even started my media tour. Could we have filled a 300-person space? Probably. But the 100+ who showed up were lovely, and the event had a nice pinch of grandness while retaining intimacy. Some folks trekked out from Tokyo, from Kamakura (big thanks to Alex Smith for taking all the photos with me in them), from Chiba.

The governor of Iwate Prefecture, Tasso Takuya, graciously came and gave the opening remarks for the event. They were sweet and heartfelt. Although I’m sure he had a million other things on his schedule for that day, he then sat in the front row for our entire talk event (lasting about ninety minutes), nodding, fully present, taking copious notes, and generally just being a fantastic attendee.

Together, on stage, Imai-san and Hayasaka-san and I discussed the book and toast, discussed the loss of Shōwa culture, the shifting tides of the countryside. Why were we launching in Morioka if the book wasn’t about Morioka?, someone asked. A fine question. I had added an epilogue that talked about Morioka a bit. But mainly, it was that this book — this walk, the Nakasendō walk I had taken in 2019 — catalyzed the tumbling sequence of walks, membership support, and general curiosity that lead to my 2021 Tiny Barber Ten Cities tour, which lead to me to spend time in Morioka … putting the city fully on my mental map, and being so moved by the experience as to recommend it to the Times. There you had it — a somewhat circuitous but undeniable line between Kissa by Kissa and Morioka.

It was also nice to feed back into the local ecosystem of a city that had been so generous — generous in their embracing of that Times pick, and generous in their support of me and my work. BOOKNERD was a publisher and bookshop I respected. (And the more I travel and talk with folks, the more I realize that BOOKNERD is beloved by small bookshops everywhere.) Hayasaka-san’s focus seems to be first and foremost on community, which I think is a kind of publishing ideal. So in publishing with him (my hope was) — given decent press — we could draw even more attention to his great work and community building efforts, while also getting the Japanese edition of this book out in a form that felt refined. I am tremendously proud of the final object, design (by Ayaka Shinoda), and translation.

The day after launching we had an impromptu signing event at BOOKNERD’s new (more spacious, ever more beautiful) shop, mainly because we had so much attendance spillover of folks who couldn’t make the launch. I sat and signed books for about four hours, a few hundred copies. And then signed a few hundred more to be sold in the shop (they’ve since sold out).

It looks like we’ll plow through this first run pretty soon. BOOKNERD is planning on reprinting. The book is sold at funky local bookshops across Japan. It’s also sold in my SPECIAL PROJECTS store, as a set with the English edition.

If you want to buy the Japanese edition alone, please buy it from BOOKNERD. They ship internationally.

Here’s a couple of print stories from the launch:

Thank you to everyone who helped make this happen. I am in awe of — and filled with gratitude by — the last few weeks.

Extra special thank-yous (once again) to Baba-san for mega-coordinating, Ayako-san for supporting, Terui-san for spinning tunes, Nagasawa-san for providing delicious coffee, Hayasaka-san for publishing this little book, Imai-san for the tonally precise and joyful translation, Mika-san for the stellar MCing, Governor Tasso for kicking off the launch, all the media folks for their on-air time and column-inches, and of course the people of Morioka City for the kind words along the way. In the end, it’s true: The soul of a city is nurtured by its people. The soul of Morioka feels good, indeed.

Hayasaka, Imai, and I are planning more talk events for 2025 (our first is going to be in Nagoya on January 22), at bookshops throughout Japan. Hope to see some of you out there!

C