Reporting live from the Ark


3rd June 2009


However I look at it, it just doesn’t seem like a pyjama event, even if I wear the black and white ones.

One of the best things about a mostly cultural column is that it can be done in jeans and, if working from home, in pyjamas.

But there isn’t much call for pyjamas when I’m assigned to report on part of President S R Nathan’s visit to Japan earlier this month.

Still, some of the drill is the same. When covering a festival, you go well in advance if you want a good view. And it’s no different with a dignitary’s visit. It’s like hitting a succession of airport departure lounges in a day: rush and wait, rush and wait, rush and wait and wait.

Going early lets you scope out routes, check camera angles, interview staff for background information and, sometimes, do a spot of advertising.

While waiting for the Singapore delegation to arrive at the Cenotaph in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, a Japanese journalist beside me falls into conversation with visiting schoolchildren.

He tells them which newspaper he belongs to. ‘Do you kids subscribe?’

‘My family does,’ a little girl says.

‘Great – thanks for your patronage.’

After watching Mr Nathan lay a wreath at the Cenotaph, we dash off to take up our positions in the Peace Memorial Museum. But we can stay only long enough to see the delegation tour the first floor before we hurtle to the next stop, a room at the other end of the building.

We charge across an open expanse of concrete, startling the shoals of schoolchildren darting about.

An official sprinting ahead of the Singapore journalists reaches the other side first. He yanks open a door to reveal...a stairwell. Someone behind me groans. Then we are charging upstairs. But more slowly.

Ranks of Japanese media are already there and we squeeze in. About 20 people, all wearing black except for the occasional rebel in grey, cluster around the edge of the room. Hardly anyone talks; we wait in the silence of the suits.

Perhaps it’s because we’re indoors. No one seems to have any qualms about chatting when under an open sky.

Earlier at the Cenotaph, a Japanese reporter sidled up to ask the Singaporean journalists how the president’s last name should be pronounced. We told him.

His brow furrowed. Neither the ‘th’ nor ‘ern’ sound are found in Japanese and then there’s the question of whether to use a rising or falling tone. A debate broke out: NAA-zahn or Naa-ZAHN?

The journalist who asked was carrying a thick sheaf of material – event information, maps, the president’s bio data. Everywhere, the Japanese attention to detail.

Watching the hosts bustle about, one visiting Singaporean says: ‘Because it’s Japan, I can relax.’

Not that much relaxing seems to be going on, especially among the younger officials on both sides. Their faces generally appear in one of two settings: tired or tense. They look as if they have to load the animals of the earth onto Noah’s Ark but lightning is already flashing and the headcount is different every time and the lemurs keep escaping and…and…

The ones who manage to keep cracking jokes deserve a special award.

But by the last full day of the trip, the tension is ebbing away. Perhaps because the finish line is in sight or because we’ve arrived on the Hiroshima island of Miyajima and the sea air is working but we forget for a while that we’re in suits.

On our walk in from the harbour, we take photos of the scenery, each other, the deer wandering about.




One official moves as if mesmerised to a roadside stall. His gaze fixed on the oysters sizzling on a grill, he mutters something about not having had breakfast and digs out his wallet. Which is the signal for the others to stop and buy oysters on sticky rice.

‘Totally tourist mode,’ says another official.

Things are looking up on the Ark: the animals – the elephants, the giraffes and the spiny anteaters – are safely stowed in the overhead compartment or under the seat in front and if the lemurs haven’t made it back on time, well, that’s just too bad.

But when we reach the shrine the delegation is scheduled to visit, it’s back to business and a sober discussion about ramps.

The media area at the shrine is marked out with knee-high wooden barricades; every place has a different way of telling journalists where to stand.

At the Sento Gosho imperial gardens the day before, white raffia was pinned down on the gravel to form a discreet triangle. We stepped inside and waited.

After some time, an official told us to move closer to the entrance. Perhaps we made the scenery look untidy in our old spot. Whatever the reason, we got a new triangle at our feet.

When we arrived in the media van earlier, two men with wide bristly brooms were slowly sweeping the sea of gravel spilling across the entrance. We hopped out and crossed to the gardens on the other side.

An official came running up – could we please walk on the perimeter? Chastened, we moved to the side. Another man rushed out with a broom to restore the gravel we’d churned up.

Waiting in the barely visible triangle, I stared out over the composed grey plain. Would the visitors notice the work put in? Could they, given that the convoy vehicles would just plough straight into the gravel?

But this may be what it means to serve. Much has been said about service though most people seem to have a better idea of how they would like to be treated than of what they are prepared to do.

Perhaps real service is to know that what you do will remain invisible to most but to do it anyway as if it will be the first thing seen.

Remembering the men methodically soothing a gravel sea for a foreign Ark, I feel a sudden urge to seize a wide broom and find my own patch to smooth.

I wonder if I can do it in pyjamas.