Well, it's supposed to be a thought-provoking show, and it got me thinking....

A Journey With Kino

Recently an online friend who knew of my interest in anime suggested that I try a series entitled “Kino’s Journey” (Kino no Tabi). It’s the story of a young woman named Kino who travels on a “motorrad”, a kind of sentient motorcycle that serves as both transportation and traveling companion. Kino and her steed Hermes journey through a world of smallish, isolated city-states, staying three days at each one and observing its customs. These poleis and their people tend to have a vaguely early-20th-century European look to them. Technology mostly appears to be from around that time, though there are sometimes glimpses of machines that are much more sophisticated. In terms of genre you’d classify it as science fiction, yet there’s also a bit of a fairy-tale quality to the way the stories about the different cities unfold.

Though not without humor, the show clearly takes itself rather seriously. As Kino journeys through different societies the viewer is meant to think about human nature, the nature of society, and more. At times the approach comes across as a bit pretentious. Still, it does offer some genuine food for thought.

The cartoon has a lot going for it. The production design and animation are attractive. There is a nice opening theme and an okay closer. Kino, Hermes, and some of the characters they meet are quite engaging. Unfortunately, though there are exceptions, the great majority of the series’ thirteen episodes deal with stories of tragedy and violence. The cities Kino visits often have ugly secrets. Some episodes deal with the destruction of whole communities. The viewer sees this sort of thing so often that I began wondering whether there wasn’t a streak of nihilism running through the writing.

After seeing the final episode I realized that this wasn’t really the case. In this one Kino comes to a town whose people have a reputation for being inhospitable. She finds instead that they welcome her and treat her kindly. I spent most of the episode expecting this community to have yet another horrible secret or hidden custom. But no, the only unpleasantness Kino experiences comes when she uncharacteristically tries to stay a bit longer and is sternly informed that she must leave when her three days are up. Even then people insist on giving her souvenirs before she obligingly leaves.

That night, on a ridge above town where she is camped, Kino sees the whole community wiped out by an erupting volcano. She then finds a note among her souvenirs that explains that the people knew what was about to happen. Not wishing to leave the one place in the world where they had been happy (Their ancestors had been persecuted elsewhere before making their home in the valley—hence their traditional fear of strangers), and not wanting to be remembered as unfriendly, they had decided to welcome any strangers who came to visit before the disaster in hopes that someone would remember them. That person was Kino.

I realized then that the emphasis on tragedy in the series was not so much nihilistic as simply a recognition of the fact that all individuals and societies eventually come to an end. This being the case, the best that people could do was to make the most of their lives while they had them—not through hedonistic indulgence, but through kindness. Early on it is said that “The world is not beautiful—therefore it is.” In other words, the ugly things about the world make the good things about it more precious. These are all rather nice sentiments. For me, though, they aren’t really enough.

In one episode an extended flashback shows Kino as a young girl, not yet named Kino, living in a society where everybody seems peaceful and contented. They seem that way because at the age of twelve they must undergo a brain surgery to make them that way. Under the influence of a visiting traveler named Kino the girl decides to refuse the traditional brainwashing. Rather than try to make her conform her parents, as part of the town’s sinister group mind, promptly try to murder her right there in the street. The girl’s life is saved when Kino the traveler takes the knife thrust meant for her, giving her the chance to escape on his motorrad. So the girl becomes a traveler herself, and takes the name Kino in honor of the traveler who gave his life for her.

The episode is probably meant to be some kind of statement about the extreme conformity of Japanese society. But a Christian viewer can’t help seeing a Christian significance in the way a visitor is shown giving his own life to allow someone else to escape a place of death and evil. The beneficiary leaves the home that she has come to realize is no real home at all and becomes a traveler. And she chooses to be called by her benefactor’s name.

The image of life in the here and now as a journey from death to true life dates back to the earliest years of Christianity. New Testament Christians were said to follow the Way—the Road, the Path. The Christian life is often likened to a race. The author of the letter to the Hebrews speaks of the heroes of the faith as imitators of Abraham, who left his settled life in search of “a city whose architect and builder is God.” John Bunyan’s allegory The Pilgrim’s Progress and various songs have used the same metaphor of Christian as homeless traveler seeking a true home.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to realize just how not-at-home I am in the world, and just how transient it is. Changes in the global economy have all but strangled the town I grew up in. They are also strangling the place where I live now. Most of the values and institutions I have been taught to value are quickly passing away. Even the natural world’s beauty is being lost as the climate and environment change at a rate unprecedented in human history. Though I wouldn’t be so rash as to try to set a date for the end of the world, I honestly wouldn’t expect it to take as long as another century to arrive.

No matter how long the world has left, it ends for some people every day. And there’s no predicting when it will happen. A high school student died in an accident right down the road from where I work only days ago. Though I have no particular reason to believe it’s likely, there’s no guarantee that something might not happen to me in the long drive to see my doctor tomorrow, or that he might not have some life-alteringly bad news for me when I see him.

But the thought that I’m roughly halfway through my life—and just maybe near the end of it—doesn’t bother me. Because it’s not really my life, and this dying world isn’t really my home. It’s just a trip I’m taking. I’m in no great hurry for it to end. I have a sense that there are still a lot of things that I need to do for other people and would like to do for myself. But whenever it does end, soon or many years from now, I’ll be ready. I’ve got my exit visa that I got years ago when I took on the name—Christian--of the visitor from beyond who gave it to me (And who offers it to anyone else who asks for one). In the meantime I’ve got plenty to do and plenty to look forward to before finally settling down. Like the opening song of “Kino’s Journey” says:

“I want to embrace my own transience, and put out my hand.”