A Jewish man in Tokyo named Joni Waka, who used to call himself "Johnnie Walker", is the model of a character in Haruki Murakami's novel Kafka on the Shore. Joni Waka also claims that he is the only Jew left in Japan descending from the old Jewish families in the country: a self-proclaimed outsider, a mythomaniac, a homosexual, and the natural center of every party. Confronted with a social pressure, he seems to ignore dominating norms and morals while using his outside position as a henna gaijin (the "strangest stranger") as a space of freedom to stage his life and create an everyday comedy.
A Jewish man in Tokyo named Joni Waka, who used to call himself "Johnnie Walker", is the model of a character in Haruki Murakami's novel Kafka on the Shore. Joni Waka also claims that he is the only Jew left in Japan descending from the old Jewish families in the country: a self-proclaimed outsider, a mythomaniac, a homosexual, and the natural center of every party. Confronted with a social pressure, he seems to ignore dominating norms and morals while using his outside position as a henna gaijin (the "strangest stranger") as a space of freedom to stage his life and create an everyday comedy.
Magnus Bärtås
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