At their thés dansants my older sister Ling and her friends enjoyed circling a dance fl oor to the latest Western romantic tunes such as Embraceable You, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, and Cheek to Cheek from the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers fiilm Top Hat. But I quickly took a liking to an older, livelier song that had originally been released in 1920, four years after I was born, on a record played by the Paul Whiteman orchestra; it was called The Japanese Sandman.

  I often hummed it as I did other things; but later I found the song that was born about the same time as me taking a rather sinister part in my life. However hard I try to avoid it, turning my thoughts to other matters before sleeping, The Japanese Sandman returns in my dreams.

  At first he was a benign, slight little fiigure at a distance, standing in a sunlit garden under a blossoming cherry tree. Dressed in a black cotton peasant’s top with trousers, he was holding a beige sun umbrella patterned in red peonies. This Japanese Sandman conformed to the cheerful words of the lively American song to which my older sister Ling and her friends danced: “Here’s the Japanese Sandman, sneaking on with the dew… just an old second hand man. He’ll buy your old day from you…” ending with: “And he’ll give you tomorrow just to start life anew.”

  Of course, to a Buddhist like me, starting life anew can mean first
dying: We are in a revolving process of being born and dying, birth and death, until we reach the desired state where we can become one with the light.

  Over time the Japanese Sandman has changed and is becoming ever more sinister. He looms from the shadows behind me. The cotton peasant outfiit has given way to an impeccably tailored military dress uniform.

  Now, in my dreams I can almost see the face of my nocturnal companion; and with dread I know The Japanese Sandman is coming closer. Now, he is my worst nightmare.