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The power of human understanding is profound, but how much do humans truly understand other people? We can try to shed light on someone else’s heart through communication, but what happens when that light is too bright for someone else? They will look away. Ikoku Nikki is about a lot of things: grief, loneliness, communication, and finding solace and healing.
Ikoku Nikki takes the delicate subject of grief and tells us that emotions are not linear, but rather, something that does not arrive as one wills it to. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, in her 1969 book, On Death and Dying, introduced the five stages of grief model, which includes denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. While this model is widely used to describe human emotions, reality suggests that everyone follows a different path. Asa experienced this early in her life, as her parents were killed in a car crash when she was a teenager. As Makio, the sister of Asa’s mother, took Asa into her home and became her legal guardian, one of the first things she said was:
My place is never clean. And I’m usually in a bad mood. I can’t even guarantee that I love you. But I’ll promise you this. I will never trample on your feelings. If you can accept that, come stay with me tomorrow, the next day, and every day after that!
With eyes like a wolf… she saved me from my loneliness.
One of Makio’s main values is that everyone is entitled to feel, and no one can get in the way of one's own emotions. She taught Asa about that early on in their cohabitation. As a writer who writes books for young people, a strong understanding of how young people feel might have been in Makio’s arsenal, but she never forced her opinions on Asa. While Makio might be a bit of a reclusive author and not a professional in the social aspects of life, her entry into Asa’s life, and vice versa, might have been the best thing to happen to both of them, given the circumstances. Makio does not have the answers for Asa, but she suggests that Asa write her thoughts in a journal, which fits Makio's own personality as a writer.
Time and time again, Asa tried to navigate her new reality of loneliness. She wondered why she did not cry at her parents’ funeral, which is a “natural” reaction to the death of a loved one. To that, Makio told her that she’d cry when she felt sad. Society usually tends to put people into boxes and expects certain things to happen. Makio took Asa away from the prying eyes of society, and so, Asa questioned why she did not act in the performative way society expected to see.
I was very impressed with the visual storytelling at play in this anime. The production is by no means lavish, but the anime makes the most out of limited production with apt metaphors. The most prominent one was depicting Asa’s loneliness as a desert. It represents her feeling isolated and lost, even when surrounded by other people, as she tries to process her grief. Her feeling of emptiness is represented using the vast expanse of an empty desert landscape, so much so that the lines in her journal become the lines of trodden sand. There are also times when the world around Asa just dissolves into the desert sand, which is a good sense of visual contrast that subtly tells the viewer how Asa was feeling at the moment.
▶ Video ▶ Video #####Although Asa’s grieving process may be the main hook of the story, Makio also gets her own focus within the story, and I resonate with her character a lot. While Asa struggles with loneliness, Makio thrives with loneliness. As somewhat of a reclusive author, she works a lot in the waning hours of the night, with a lot of her work done in solitude. Imagine this - I am sure many of us have written long pieces of writing, whether it be for school or for work. Cramming to meet a deadline and writing in the middle of the night is something that I am sure many students have experienced. More or less, this is the life that Makio consistently lives, and she clearly enjoys this solitary feeling of writing to be able to do it for so long. As such, her social skills are not her strong suit. I, myself, am much the same, because I also love writing. I am not a professional author, nor do I plan to be at the moment, but my passion for writing has not faltered. I, too, love writing in the middle of the night, because it is in utter silence where thoughts come to my head. Heck, even some of this review was written in those quiet nighttime hours.
Just like you can't understand the suffocation that I feel, I can't understand your loneliness. Because you and I are two different people.
Makio does not “get” Asa’s loneliness, but I am sure she empathizes in a way. Makio’s loneliness is a choice, while Asa’s loneliness is due to a loss. Asa was desperately looking for water in the desert to quench her own thirst, looking for a motherly guide in Makio. Is it true that when two lonely people meet, it can solve the loneliness of both parties? Not necessarily, but the two people can support each other. The thing that Makio constantly hammered into Asa’s brain was not to put too much stock in what other people say. This value was likely shaped by how Makio’s sister talked down to her on a regular basis and how she criticized her body of work. Makio eventually came to resent her sister, but she did not let her words affect her too greatly. She was able to guide Asa just a little bit, so that Asa’s life is her own, and no one can tell her otherwise. How one decides to live is their prerogative.
One pitfall of shows like this is being overly melodramatic. Ikoku Nikki is not a show that has the characters crying or having loud outbursts often. Rather, it deals with sensitive subjects in a more nuanced way and focuses more on communication and human connection. Sure, in Episode 8, there is a very touching moment of realization for Asa, but it is a moment that feels cathartic rather than outright sad. If you have not watched the show yet, do not expect it to be a conventional tearjerker, because that is not the show’s identity at all.
Kensuke Ushio is becoming one of my favourite anime composers, if not my favourite. His minimalist piano and electronic music soothes the soul, and his usage of field recordings makes his soundtracks feel more emotive and atmospheric. He has a way of making music that fits each scene with perfection. I will admit his soundtrack for this anime is not as memorable as some of his other soundtracks, such as for A Silent Voice or Liz and the Blue Bird, but you can always count on him to elevate an anime adaptation.If there is one shortcoming of this adaptation, it would be the pacing. There are moments that feel a bit sudden, such as Asa’s junior high graduation, which I felt was not properly built up. Currently, the anime is adapting about two to three manga chapters per episode, and for an anime that focuses on character moments as much as this one, I feel the pacing could have been a bit slower, so we could really explore the characters with a bit more depth.
This was a very impressive directorial debut from Miyuki Ooshiro, as she made use of limited production to direct something quite special. She had a good amount of experience under her belt, with her work on Natsume’s Book of Friends, which is a show that tackles emotional subjects as well, although not nearly as dramatically.
It is not often that we come across an anime like this, and it is one that resonates with me deeply. If you are someone who has lost a loved one or felt the weight of social expectations, it may resonate with you, too. If you are not, maybe you will enjoy the slow-burning story of people navigating their lives and finding their own answers. It is not perfect, but it deals with grief, loneliness and the power of communication quite tactfully. Asa coming to terms with the death of her parents was a touching process with a strong realization, and Makio, thrust into the role of a parental figure, was an interesting development in her life, given her struggles in daily, conventional life. Both of them try to find their own answers in life, and it certainly is not an easy thing. When they find some, it might be the best feeling in the world. In tough times, the world may seem empty like a desert, but finding your own oasis is what it is all about.
If I keep giving water to my own loneliness, could a flower bloom in the dead of night?
I heard Makio wanted some Justin Bieber. Well, have I got the perfect song for her! (Credit to Triple-Q)
