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May 11, 2015
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| He left home. His neighbor was waiting in front of his house. They nodded. It was the starting signal. They rushed swiftly from their places like runners at a track meet. This was their daily activity. It began one day when they had happened to walk to work to the station together, and they talked about their lack of exercise recently. They were both middle-aged men. One of them suggested, as a joke, to race to the train station. And, after that, it became their daily habit. The neighbor was almost 10 years older than him, but he used to run track. The younger guy began to like running these days thanks to their daily challenge. And, because of this everyday training, their races became kind of fierce. The younger guy got to the station a little bit earlier, by 3 meters or so. The neighbor was really frustrated because he had lost the race three times in a row this week. On the train, the younger guy said to him teasingly, "It might be time for you to
The neighbor thought for a minute and said, "I came up with an idea." He stood up. The train wasn't packed here far from the downtown area. There were only a few passengers in the car. The neighbor started to stand on one of his legs. "Can you do this?" The younger guy hesitated at first, but the neighbor insisted on it. The younger guy sighed but agreed, "Ok, ok. But only one time." But, neither gave up after their first try. Standing on one leg was rather difficult than they had imagined. They'd fall down only after ten seconds. They felt offended that they couldn't stand on one leg easily. They persisted, and continued again and again until the neighbor got off the train. After that day, their curiosity transferred from running to standing on one leg. They jogged to the station as a warm-up, and then competed to see who could stand on one leg longer. It needed special techniques and good balance, as well as a strong leg. When the train came to a curve, it was very difficult for them to keep their balance, they fell down easily. Now, their life revolved around trying to master standing on one leg on a moving train. Thanks to their everyday trial-and-error, their standing time became longer little by little day by day. The other passengers started to find their strange task interesting. High school girls stopped their socializing and stared without breathing. It became popular among the passengers. They enjoyed their race as a performance. The younger guy and the neighbor got on the same number train car every day, and the number of passengers who rode the same car started to increase. Soon the passengers named their race, 'flamingo.' There were some retired people who rode on the train just to watch their performance. They called their friends and it became like a show at a theater. But, one day, the conductor came and stopped them saying it was dangerous. Some of the mainstays in the audience exclaimed that the two were very skillful, and they had never become troublesome to others. (Until this time they became rather professional and kept standing for a long time without moving their bodies.) The conductor noted that some of the children started to copy them, and they were dangerous. Finally, the two guys gave up and quit. One person in the audience who was a big fan of them uploaded their performance videos on the internet, and it was watched many times by viewers. A couple of months passed. On this day, at the station, there were many people gathered. The guy and his neighbor were among them. The train company realized that they, the two performers and their audience, were the heavy users of the train; and, on this day, the train company had prepared a special train car for 'flamingo race.' Many people from all over the country came for this event. They watched the two guys' videos and were fascinated by their beautiful style. Each trained hard for a couple of months for this special race. Like the originators, when they trained on the train on the morning and night time commutes, the ride became fun for them. At the sound of the buzzer, the train started to move and it meant that the race was starting. Hundreds of performers simultaneously stood on their one leg. It was like a flock of flamingos standing in the wild ponds of Africa. They were beautiful. |
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