Refraction

I love mink so much; it’s a pity she’s seemed to drop out of the music world altogether. Her favourite song of mine is “One Suitcase”, but since I only had her Shalom album handy, I’ve been listening to “世界で一番奇麗な場所” ¹“The World’s Most Beautiful Place”

I was really struck by these (pre-)chorus passages: ²And I was struck by them 4 years ago, too! Look!

たとえば今から後100日しか生きられないとしたら?
僕は、何をするだろう?何を見るだろう?
何を聞くだろう?何を語るだろう?
For example, what if I only had a hundred days to live?
What would I do? What would I see?
What would I hear? What would I say?

たとえば今から後100日しか生きられないとしたら?
僕は、誰に会うだろう?誰に触れるだろう?
誰を愛すだろう?誰を許すだろう?
For example, what if I only had a hundred days to live?
Who would I see? Who would I touch?
Who would I love? Who would I forgive?

(Although I can tell you, if I had a hundred days to live, I would travel for a month – maybe even two. I would wind my way across the world and live out there. I would hope to see people, hear them, touch them, speak to them. Then I’d come home and do the same thing with my friends and family.) ³I might also go skydiving.

I also have some thoughts churning about forgiveness, but I’ll save those for another time.

It’s important to get perspective on things from time to time as I get deeper and deeper into the murky waters of my thesis. (And trust me, they are murky. I do more experiments to clarify things: and then I find more reactivity I have to explain! -sigh- I’m starting to think of it as thesis fodder.)

(Yes–I am procrastinating. Yes–I will pay for this later. No–I probably shouldn’t be doing this. And no–this will probably not make any sense. At this point I am just SICK of “reflecting on my writing process” in French.)

I’ve been listening to mink’s Shalom album a lot lately. I like mink a lot, but for some reason I always feel extremely guilty when I listen to her music. I think it’s because I find some of it rather formulaic and almost Celine Dion-esque.

僕は、何をするだろう？何を見るだろう？
何を聞くだろう？何を語るだろう？

And then some of it just makes me think of the 80s, and not in a good way: think heavy synthesizer and sugar-coated bubblegum hooks. I’m thinking specifically of “Automatically.”

僕は、誰に会うだろう？誰に触れるだろう？
誰を愛すだろう？誰を許すだろう？

mink’s English is not bad, although it’s not as good as either LOVE’s or Rie fu’s. Her English lyrics, though, wow–some of them are quite beautiful. Take this excerpt from the English version of “Blessing of Love”: “How can I live without the hope that we/Might touch the edge of heaven’s light”

きっと、すべて愛おしくて、すべてきらきらして
でも寂しくて、そばに居て欲しくて

I picked up a mink single and a mink album from Book Off about a month ago. I’m not super-keen on the album, although I do love the single (which also has karaoke tracks for you aspiring divas. ;D)

世界で一番奇麗な場所: あなたの側で