Chinese Herald March 28 is the anniversary of Ryuichi Sakamoto's death. He was called a professor because he looked like a professor when he was in graduate school, and when he formed the YMO band, he was nicknamed "professor" and it spread. In addition to public publications, in fact, Ryuichi Sakamoto also served as a life coach on the Internet in Japan to answer readers' questions, called "Ryuichi Sakamoto Talk Room" in 2015. The editors of Chinese Herald hereby compile Q&A for the benefit of readers.
1. Don't believe in fortune tellers, believe in yourself
Question: Divination and fortune-telling are popular everywhere, and I'm not interested in it, but what about Mr. Sakamoto?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: I don't know how to tell fortunes. There is always a corner of the magazine to write fortunes, there is always a big sister who tells fortunes on the street, and TV shows are also common. But I had no interest. However, I went to Amami Oshima last year and asked a fortune teller to do the math there, and I also met someone in Mongolia who was said to be very powerful. I am interested in them in the sense of folklore. I remember that in Mongolia, I went all the way through the steppe, but as soon as the fortune teller came and said, "The gods are angry!" Why didn't you take out the money in the first place?
Before I went, someone had already contacted her for me, and she instructed me to bring three tributes: money, candy, and gasoline. I can understand that there is a shortage of sweets on the grassland, and so can money, but what about gasoline?
Because she said that the gods were angry, I gave her money, sugar, and gasoline in the order she said. She was happy and started telling my fortune. I was concerned about the earth's environment, so I asked her what would happen to the earth if it went on like this.
She didn't seem to understand the problem, and said, well, Mongolia will come out with a new Great Commander.
I didn't ask you about Mongolia, I think. I asked her again what the Mongols asked when they came to tell fortunes, and she said, "Where are the lost livestock?"
And she replied, on the other side of the mountain.
In conclusion, I think that divination is a method of interpreting the world. Because people like to put things that they imagine with their brains around them. For the world, it is not confirmed with one's own eyes, but explained with one's brain. Meng Si said that human beings are "brainized", and people are such creatures.
Divination comes from the fear of the future in human beings. This psychology will always be there.
Some people also went to fortune tellers and asked, "Who will my lover be?" Will I be able to get a job?
How do people know about this kind of thing?
I think these people actually know the answer, and they are just enjoying this state of asking for help when the future is uncertain.
Let me conclude it: don't rely on fortune tellers, trust yourself.
2. The basic form of living things is matrilineal
Question: What does Professor Ryuichi Sakamoto think is expected of women?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: What I ask of women is to be strong and dependable. Then, there's beauty, although it's too ordinary to say so. Also, it would be better if it could make money. For example, the lion is the lioness who goes to catch the prey and comes back, and the male lion does nothing.
The basic form of the 4 billion-year-old biological system is matrilineal, and there is nothing for men to do, with or without men. Because men have nothing to do, they go to war and money-making games.
I'm willing to take it my own leisure, let women do the work, and I abide by the basic form of biology.
That being said, I've done a lot of work (laughs).
3. Identifying friends depends on who do you call when you encounter robbers?
Question: I believe that Professor Sakamoto has many good friends, what do you think is a real friendship, and what kind of person do you need to be to get such a friendship?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: For friends, I have a pointer. When I first moved to my current home in New York, I was terrified when a robber broke into my house at 5 a.m. (luckily it was just a new bike that had been stolen). At that time, I deeply thought that who I would call and who I would turn to for help in such a time of crisis was the benchmark for whether or not I was a true friend. I was thinking of Atorinsay (American singer), but it was 5 a.m. and I still didn't play. I have one or two friends like this in Japan, Europe, Brazil, and other countries, so maybe that's happiness.
4. Falling in love and getting married Do I have to go through it?
Question: Now the word marriage is in the Chinese dictionary. I've been thinking about the purpose and necessity of getting married lately. I'm enjoying my life on my own, but I'm about to turn 40 and have a baby. Ask the professor how to look at the problem of marriage and love.
Ryuichi Sakamoto: Falling in love with someone else is a trap. My answer has nothing to do with social common sense. Maybe it can't be called the answer. I think it's easy to get married, just a piece of paper, but it's very troublesome and takes a lot of labor to end it (laughs). So that's kind of a trap.
But when people fall in love with others, they are blind, and that's a trap, and of course it's not just humans. This is engraved in the DNA, because DNA needs to be passed on by a human as a carrier.
5. Be a scumbag when you break up with a woman
Question: Ask me how to break up with a woman. Is it necessary to have an appropriate distance with women?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: There is no such thing as a good way to break up and a proper distance. People are working hard, and they're all suffering to get through it (laughs). I don't know what a good way to break up, but the cunning method is to take the initiative to be the wrong party. It's all my fault, and it's all the blame, which is the easiest and most refreshing way, and I'm like this personally (laughs). I taught my son the same thing.
When you break up, it's easiest to put all the blame on the other party, blame the other party, and then the matter is over. So make the woman feel that she is right, and it is the man who is wrong, so this thing becomes a thing of the past. So men (women too?) can have a rose-colored life if they endure the fact that they are at fault.
6. What books have influenced you?
Question: Professor, it feels like you've read a lot. Ask what changed your thoughts or values, i.e., books that you were deeply influenced by.
Ryuichi Sakamoto: It was Takaaki Yoshimoto and Yutaka Hakoya who influenced me when I entered high school. I borrowed it from the library at the time, and I guess I have this book at home, but it's hard to find. Yoshimoto's book is "The Theory of Common Illusions", and Hajiya's book is called "The Void". When I was in high school, my classmates recommended me to read it, and I often mentioned it when I heard my father call at home. Their ideas influenced me. The books I read from high school to college are the logical way I think about problems now. It was the time when people could read the most, and now there is always a pile of books that are too late to read. Social media, email, there are many things that affect people's reading in modern society. I would like to read the complete works of folklore scholar and Chinese scholar Nobuo Origuchi after retiring.
(Translator's note: Takaaki Yoshimoto was a well-known left-wing thinker who studied under Fujita Seizo. Chizuruko Ueno was also deeply influenced by it. He is the father of Banana Yoshimoto.
Yutaka Hanaya is also a well-known Japanese writer, he was born in Taiwan, and "The Void" is about the past of Taiwan when it was occupied as a Japanese colony. He writes that as a Japanese, he was unhappy to see the Japanese people's different views on the local population. ）
7. Selflessness and doing what you want to do is the way
Question: I am a Korean student and I want to go to Japan to continue my language studies, but my family is not wealthy, so I need to apply for a scholarship while working, and I heard that it is difficult to find a job after learning a language. Should I move on?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: Well, if you want to learn, you can learn it. It seems that you are uneasy, "uneasy", which means that you are not committed to doing what you want to do, and if you are invested, the uneasiness will disappear. You ask me if I should move on, and if I say "stop", will you listen. You already know the answer. Just do what you love.
I remember when I was young, I was a myopic person, I could only see what was in front of me, I was very happy every day, I didn't think about tomorrow, I didn't know tomorrow.
8. Whoever I hate hates hates me
Question: Professor, do you have a liking or a dislike for people? I hate a lot of people and don't know how to like people.
Ryuichi Sakamoto: Of course, I have people I like and people I hate. My answer next may be too ordinary. At my age I understand that whoever I hate, everyone hates me, so the reason is you. Let anger and jealousy calm down first, and let yourself not have all kinds of emotions towards people. It's hard to do though. In general, people don't hate people who have a crush on them.
9. Acupuncture and moxibustion to quit smoking
Question: Smoking is not allowed in many places now, which is particularly inconvenient. I also wanted to quit smoking, but I couldn't. How did the professor quit?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: To be honest, I'm weak-willed, and I've long been said to be "as weak as a leaf." But I have been a smoker for a long time, and sometimes my chest is uncomfortable, and I feel that the problem is serious. But I know it's hard to quit smoking on your own. I once met my friend Laurie Anderson, who was a smoker, but he didn't smoke at that meeting, and I was surprised and asked him, "Laurie, what's going on?" and he told me that he had the worst tea in the world, so he quit smoking.
When I heard about it, I immediately learned from him, ran to a Chinese Chinese medicine doctor in New York that he introduced, and said to her, please give me the most unpleasant tea in the world. As a result, the Kampo doctor said that it was not tea, and that Laurie was able to quit smoking because of the needles, and the decoction of tea was only an auxiliary effect. Then I asked her to give me a needle, although I was a little afraid of the pain.
I went to the female doctor once every two days to get a needle, but it didn't seem to work, and after an hour of acupuncture each time, I had already stuffed my cigarette in my mouth as soon as I came out of the door of the clinic. I went to acupuncture nine times to no avail, and I thought, go again, if it doesn't work, I won't go. After the 10th acupuncture, I closed the door, I took out my cigarette again, something strange happened, my body didn't want to smoke anymore. "What's going on, how can this be?" I thought. The mood is like smoking, but the body doesn't want to.
Since then, I haven't smoked. This taught me how conservative and persistent the human heart is, while the body is constantly changing, changing with the environment. Acupuncture adjusted the inside of my body.
10. To be an artist is to be yourself
Question: I'm a student at the University of the Arts, and my teacher said that society will need artists from now on, but I don't think so at all, I think what artists need is to think deeply, think about their relationship with others, and how to survive in an art environment like Japan. I would like to ask Mr. Sakamoto, what are the requirements for being an artist, and will the world need artists in the future?
Ryuichi Sakamoto: Society doesn't need art, art is a superfluous thing. So, if you want to be an artist who is needed by society, it is a stupid idea. The artist is an "extra" thing, a desire to be himself, and has nothing to do with whether he is needed by society or not.
Sometimes I find it inexplicable to see people using art to portray environmental protection and poverty alleviation. That's brainwashing with art and music, and art shouldn't be a propaganda tool. I read Sade, Goya, Mozart, and on July 14, 1789, at the time of the storming of the Bastille, the three of them were alive in different places. Before the French Revolution overthrew the Ancien Régime, music, painting and other arts were developed by the powerful people of the time, such as the church, princes and nobles, and then through the bourgeoisie, and in modern times, it is the wealthy enterprises and paying consumers who support the arts. In other words, in the era of absolute monarchy, craftsmen and artists meant the same thing, both were employed by wealthy people, and no one doubted this. "Do something for the sake of art", that is the most recent, starting with the French Revolution and the formation of a new society. I'll say the opposite: art only develops where there is money.
So, don't think about the necessity for the world and go your way. There are no conditions to become an artist, and you don't want to learn art in school.