SUIKA ::: incense sachet by TERAI– from the KOUSHIKITOTENKUDO INCENSE EMPORIUM, KAMAKURA

D bought me a lovely powdered incense pouch – swayingly sense-pleasing – from the beautiful Koushikitotenkudo incense shop down Komachidori shopping street in Kamakura, on one of his five or six 15-minute visits.

I hung it from my cupboard – and was allured by it to the point that it took over the room : and I had to secrete it in my clothes.

If there is one defining feature of Japanese incense, it is that there is usually something slightly disconcerting subliminally hidden in the mix : be it a sharp camphor, clove, wince of roasted seashell : a profoundly musty, ancient smelling patchouli, like life in Japan itself, it is rarely easy.

This gives it profundity. An exquisiteness that nevertheless sometimes pulls at the stomach : freshness and light pitted against soft sensuality and pinching austerity and unmistakeably Nipponesque hauteur.

Suika features rosebuds, cornflowers, cloves, cinnamon bark and sandalwood. It has a magnetic giddiness; real throw; but also an olfactory punch from its contradictory melee.

At the shop above – highly recommended – you choose the powdered incense blend from a selection of eight, plus your embroidered pouch and himo cord from which to hang it ( you can perfume a room; yourself; a drawer..), making it a delightfully personalized gift. My heart lit up when d brought it in.

Interestingly, d chose the same blend, Suika, I also chose for Helen as a souvenir this spring (how did this one pan out, H- did it get softer and more drowsy as the informational insert says it should ?). Intense at first, when placed in the padding of a kimono, its compelling eeriness of light sexuality – just the slightest drift on the air – is a million, million miles from the crass, Chernobyls of duty free chemical nausea. They are different universes. And I certainly know which one I prefer.

Speaking of universes, mine is going to change when I leave here in approximately two hours.

I have mixed feelings. Has the operation been successful? I don’t know. The pain increases with the harder exercise; the reduction in opioids – at my request – and the further I walk. There is a very unpleasant ‘click’ with each step that the doctors, nurses, and physios say ‘might’ improve with time, or might not. Mmm. It was better before the op than it is now. But we are still at the early stages – and I am committed to following the rehabilitation instructions to the letter, am strong, and will do my best.

Hysteria aside – plenty of that in other posts – I want to leave this chapter of the Narcissus with some positives.

I am lucky in having an innate fascination with other people – the interactions with the nurses have been really enjoyable. Linguistically, it has also been very stimulating. In my daily work life I speak in English with my English teacher colleagues – that is their preference – as well as in the classroom. Half my J-neighbours want to speak to me in my mother tongue to practice: I therefore, as a terribly lazy student, don’t usually make so much progress with my nihongo.

Here, however, I seem to be speaking it at every turn to the point where it just comes out naturally before I have even thought about it. Sometimes I am spilling utter gobbledygook – as a nurse didn’t hesitate to tell me last night (“I have no idea what you are talking about”) – but at others I am simply conversing and understand everything they are telling me. I know this should be a given considering how long I have been in Japan, but trust me, that is not always how it works.

I have been steeped in Japan, with all its Japanese obsessions – food; the heat; black bears on the loose; the price of fish – the TV on in the background, without sound. We don’t have it at home – and that is exactly how we want it – but it is good once in a while to flick through the channels – and fixate on hot seventies rugby players.

I have enjoyed writing, reading, thinking, listening to music – David Sylvian’s ‘Brilliant Trees’ album has been sublimer than ever;staring into space (you can do this guiltlessly when you are in hospital). People-watching.

But let’s face it : I am ready to go. I have everything packed. I have my lovely Suika incense pouch in my pocket. D will be here to get me in ninety minutes