ChanomiTalk

dazzling light–
and his eyelids closed
to great applause


Today, a patient we’ve had for over a month afflicted with a serious disturbance of conscious closed his eyes in response to a penlight shone in his face to check his reflexes. Up until now, there hadn’t been any sort of facial response to light or touch. Even though this response was only small, I’m very happy. At least he seems to want to protect his eyes from stimuli. What’s more, he seemed to actually be looking at me when he turned his head in my direction. Other staff members saw this too. I called out to him loudly and explained his current circumstances, and his mouth seemed to move in response. At the very least, the sound coming in through his ears is probably stimulating his mind and causing a response. I felt like we had a conversation in a way.



眩しくてびっくり閉眼大拍手

まぶしくて　びっくり へいがん　だい はくしゅ



今日、重篤な意識障害をきたして、1ヶ月以上経過した患者さんが、対光反射をチェックするためのペンライトの光を眩しく感じたかのように目を閉じました。今まではライトを当てても顔に触れても反応がなかったのに。小さな反応ですが、とても嬉しいことです。少なくとも刺激から目を守ろうとしたのです。それだけでなく、何となくこちらを見返し、視線があっているような気がしました。他のスタッフも同じ反応を目にしました。私は大きな声で話しかけ、今の状態を話しました。すると、少し口元が動いたように見えました。少なくとも、耳から入った音が脳を刺激し、それに対する反応が出たわけです。会話ができたような気がしました。





– Fujisaki Yukiyo
– English by Chay Schiller

thoughts are spoken
without a single word
eyes tell stories


Although it is very difficult for patients afflicted with aphasia to form words, their facial expressions can say a lot. Particularly, they can communicate their thoughts by looking at you with a firm stare. This is not to say that their eyes alone are capable of such a level of expression. Rather, it is though using the expressive muscles around their mouth, cheeks, eyebrows and forehead that they can communicate so effectively by looking at someone.


目で語る言葉出ずとも伝わる思い

め で かたる　ことば でず とも　つたわる おもい



失語症の患者さんは言葉をうまく紡ぎ出すことが難しいですが、表情は豊かです。特に目でじっと見つめて意思を伝えようとされます。目自体が表情を作るわけでなく、口元や頬、眉やおでこなど顔面にある表情筋が表情を作っているのに、目をみると、なぜだか感情が一直線に伝わってきます。





– Fujisaki Yukiyo
– English by Chay Schiller

Ruminations on English, Japanese, and haiku.



English and Japanese have completely different vocabularies and grammatical structures. Everyone knows this. Yet what not many are aware of are the imprints that words and thought patterns leave on our minds. Those of us fluent in more than one language tend to think differently depending on the language we choose, and even if the thoughts are the same, their manner of expression is certainly different. In Japanese, with its subject-object-verb structure, the important idea tends to emerge at the end, while in English we tend to get things out in the open earlier, and quite often the end of a sentence amounts to something of an afterthought.

One thing I have realized in the course of translating a great number of haiku for NACOS, interestingly, is that this reverse dynamic also applies to looser poetic expression in which the words spoken may not actually be in the form of proper sentences. Indeed, in a brief poem such as a Haiku, there are typically many very important components, and it would be foolish to claim that only the last line carries the important information, as would be the case in a Japanese sentence. Yet, somehow, even though there is no requirement when translating haiku to modify the order of the lines to adhere to the grammar of English, I always find myself doing so. Things just don’t sound good sometimes unless I do so. Counterintuitively, I often see myself taking a very important point in the Japanese original and putting it at the end of the English translation, even though this is supposedly the way of the Japanese language.

There must be something deeper. The Japanese believe that words are more than just sounds; in their culture, words are often thought to have power on a metaphysical level. If this is the case, the language that holds all those words together may even be said to have a spirit or a soul. Perhaps it is because of the different souls of these languages that one manner of expression fits better than another.