Rebecca Otowa

Self-Introduction for Writers in Kyoto

Rebecca in her writing office, complete with typewriter (all photos courtesy the author)

I was born in 1950s America, grew up in 1970s Australia, and came of age in 1980s Japan. My Kyoto years (when I lived there as a student and then as a young wife and mother) are 1978-1984. I now live in Shiga, the next-door prefecture, so I can make regular trips to my favorite city.

I came to Japan on a Monbusho scholarship. I had been studying Japanese in high school and university in Australia, and came here to further my study of Buddhism. It was only as I approached my MA graduation at Otani University that I realized Buddhism can’t be learned from books, no matter how dusty and august they may be. My MA, however, has proved invaluable in obtaining work. I also studied tea in the foreigners’ class at Urasenke. Those were busy years.

I married in 1981 into an old farming family whose land is tucked up against the Suzuka mountain range that divides Shiga from Mie. My husband is the 19th generation of his family. The house has been continuously occupied for 350+ years, so it’s a hodgepodge of periods, requiring a lot of maintenance; but the first time I saw it I felt that I was home. I shared it with my mother-in-law for 12 years, until she passed in 1999; endured my husband’s fierce daily commute to the Osaka area; and brought up two sons, now married and gone (though my elder son will move back home with his family next year to become the 20th generation of caretakers). During this time I have been doing all the veggie patch, neighborhood and temple things, while pursuing my work (part-time University English teacher) and a (sort of) writing career, and also going back to my childhood love of painting and drawing.

On the writing side, I have continuously written for the closed-audience Journal of the Association of Foreign Wives of Japanese, also writing for Eigo Kyoiku, Sunday Mainichi, and more recently, Kyoto Journal, and doing translation work for various publications including the sadly now-defunct Eastern Buddhist and Chanoyu Quarterly. My first book, At Home in Japan, published by Tuttle in 2010, is a collection of essays on various Japan-and-me-related topics. It is lavishly illustrated by me, and because of that, Tuttle asked me to write a full-color illustrated children’s book, My Awesome Japan Adventure, published in 2013. This was an answer to other children’s books on Japan, most of which are centered in Tokyo — it’s a story about an American boy who has a homestay in the Kansai countryside. I am now under contract to submit a third book, this time a short story collection about various Japanese and foreign characters. Yes, my interests are eclectic and my writing genres are too.

My other interests include working with my hands (sewing, knitting, beadwork, stained glass), reading voraciously and multiple times (hard copy only), searching for DVDs worth watching, cooking, and spirituality of all types, especially the Western magical tradition. (My days of being a Buddhist are over, though I still feel connected to it when visiting temples and enjoying Eastern art.)

I look forward to being a member of Writers in Kyoto and contributing as best I can to this valuable organization.

The 350 year old house in Shiga where Rebecca lives with the 19th generation of a farming family

One of Rebecca’s paintings, entitled Mandala of Four Elements / Japan’ (2013)