This is the second installment of "WORK101 Interview: Tell us about your work life," in which Harazawa, who is in charge of WORK101, interviews people who have interesting working styles. The interviewer is Toyoshima Hideki, a founding member of graf, which is based in Osaka, and currently works at gm projects. (The photo on the cover shows the temporary office that Toyoshima set up during his trip at the foot of a mountain where he was planning to ski the next day.)
I met Toyoshima through an introduction from Manabe, a member of the Monosas Design Team. I thought that Toyoshima's way of looking at work and life might hold some hints for exploring the future of working environments, so I asked him if we could plan something together, and we decided to start a project called the "Kamiyama Hiking Club."
After this memorable first Kamiyama Hiking Club event, we conducted an interview together with Sugimoto-san, a writer who helps out behind the scenes with the Monosasu website.
▼Toyoshima's profile Toyoshima Hideki: One of the founding members of graf, an Osaka-based creative practice, he has been a member of gm projects since 2009 and works mainly in the art field, taking on a wide range of approaches including curation, spatial composition and workshops.
After climbing Mount Takao, he started mountain climbing and became interested in ultralight hiking. He manages the Kyushu-based hiker community "HAPPY HIKERS" and also plans events for the outdoor brand "Yama to Michi."
Are young people confused? In today's world, with more options available
The interview took place at WORK101's headquarters in Kamikado, Kamiyama-cho, on a certain day in September 2020. As soon as we arrived, Toyoshima started the interview by asking the following question.
TOYOSHIMA: Recently, I've been getting a lot of questions about work and lifestyle from younger generations. They asked me if I would like to appear at an online talk event next week. They were in their 30s, and I was curious as to why they wanted to hear about such things and whether everyone was interested in those kinds of things.
Harazawa: This corner (WORK101 Interview) started because I wanted to go and talk to people whose working and living styles I'm interested in, but I think people of my generation are all confused. Which direction is best for the future, including the way we work? When I want to hear from people who have similar interests to me and get something from them, I feel like Toyoshima-san is a good choice.
TOYOSHIMA: Does this mean that there are a lot of people who are worried about work, working style, and lifestyle?
Harazawa: I think there are a lot of them. Also, I feel like the worries themselves are no longer simple. There's also the coronavirus, but it feels like we've been thrown out into the ocean.
Toyoshima: This year is a bit of a special situation.
Harazawa: In a society where digital technology is advancing, there are fewer and fewer jobs where you can do what you're told. When the way we work changes, the way we live also changes. It feels like our worries are becoming more complicated and we don't know the right answers.
TOYOSHIMA: In short, the number of options has increased to the point where it's hard to decide. In our time, we may not have had as much choice in how to live or work as people in their 30s do today. I started working just after the bubble burst, but it was normal to get a job at a company, and I think the number of people who lived a different lifestyle was limited. Compared to now, I don't think there were as many people who wanted to go independent, start a business, or work hard using only their own talents. So maybe I didn't really consider that lifestyle in my options.
Recently, society has been created to give people more freedom to choose. That's probably a good thing, but at the same time, it feels like there are so many things to choose from, but no one knows how to choose.
Harazawa: I think so. I've always felt that in order to live a richer life, true to yourself, you need to have more options. However, while more options give you more freedom, on the other hand, you have to take responsibility for your own work. I'm still unsure about that. Up until now, you could go to a company and have work, and you just had to think simply, but that's no longer the case. I feel like it's now necessary to create your own work.
Toyoshima: Having so many options can be quite daunting.
Harazawa: I myself felt that I was more suited to work that involved completing set tasks more efficiently. However, when I tried to do that all the time, it became tough, or I reached my limit. It's not that a set job is bad, but when the options increase a little, or the degree of freedom increases, I get into trouble. I don't understand anymore. My thinking stops. In that sense, I think my worries are increasing.
TOYOSHIMA: I see, so it seems like I'm part of the group of people who make those kinds of free choices in life.
The difference between work and play: Toyoshima's lifestyle
Sugimoto: By the way, Toyoshima, what kind of questions do people of Harazawa's generation ask you?
TOYOSHIMA: When do you actually work when you're only doing what you love? How do you make money? I myself am searching for my own way to live this kind of life, so I talk about these things. What do people mean when they say "work"? I think most people would answer that it means earning money to live. Until now, the way people perceived work was to do things to achieve that goal, but that's been changing a bit recently, and more and more people are starting to value things other than money.
I think the nature of work and companies is becoming more diverse. But fundamentally, there are still some things we do because we think, "This is work, after all," or we look down on them, saying, "That's just play, isn't it?"
Harazawa: Yes, there is.
Toyoshima: I think the difference between work and play is that "you get paid, which comes with responsibility," whereas "you don't get paid, so there are no responsibilities."
I think that there are things in a day that you do that you get paid for, things that you don't get paid for, and things that you have to pay for. Depending on that, you may or may not have responsibilities, you may or may not work hard, and I don't think you can distinguish between work and play on that basis.
Harazawa: I see.
Toyoshima: I live in Hokkaido from January to April in the winter and ski every day.
At Mt. Yotei, Toyoshima's home mountain. There aren't many days in the harsh winter when it's possible to climb to the summit.
I think I'm a little too into it to call it a pastime. I go to the mountains every day. And it's not a ski resort, it's backcountry skiing, where you go up a mountain and ski down, so there's the risk of avalanches and getting lost. But I'm not a guide or a professional skier, so I don't make money from it. But I think it's a little too much to call it a pastime.
Sugimoto: That's a quarter of the year.
Toyoshima: Another important factor is liking housework.
I enjoy cooking and cleaning, but lately I've been into laundry. Just like skiing or surfing, I decide how much laundry to do by looking at the weather forecast and weather charts, and since there are parts of a single clothesline that get more sun and parts that don't, I adjust the position of the clothes depending on the thickness and material, turn them over, and have a lot of fun trying to dry them as quickly as possible. I think it's exactly the same as looking for a good snow slope or a good wave spot.
I think that working hard at housework will directly lead to a better life than working hard, earning a lot of money, living in a high-rent apartment, or going to expensive, delicious restaurants. When you think about it, housework is more important than work and something that you can't leave to someone else. If there's anything different about my work and life compared to other people, I think it might be how I prioritize.
The joys of becoming a vegetarian
Sugimoto: When you give housework a higher priority, your life becomes richer. That's something I've come to realize since I started working as a freelancer. Toyoshima, did something change that led you to prioritize your housework like this?
TOYOSHIMA: I've been living alone since I was 20, so I did housework as a matter of course. But I wasn't doing it on purpose. I was a student, didn't have money, and I did it out of necessity. I remember one thing my roommate said to me. As I was sweeping the floor every day, I was grumbling, "Why do we produce so much dust every day?" and he said, "That's life!" He was an Israeli man a year older than me who was into meditation and Zen, and these words of his have resonated with me now. Cooking, laundry, and cleaning are directly related to life.
In life, you work to get money, and then you use that money to buy the necessities and services you need. I thought that if I could become a better cook, it would be a shortcut to getting the food I really need right now that is cheap and delicious.
I've been a vegetarian for about 10 years now, and I've especially noticed this since becoming a vegetarian. Even when I go out to eat, there are almost no restaurants that have dishes I can eat, unless I go to a specialty restaurant.
Even if I ask for something without meat, it will be different from what the restaurant wants to serve, and it will be unpleasant for both of us, so it's easier to make my own food than to eat out. That's why I don't eat out much anymore.
Of course, even if you're not vegetarian, cooking is creative and interesting. If you learn to cook, you can eat a lot of delicious food without spending a lot of money. In my case, I changed my eating habits and felt that I was getting healthier and healthier, so vegetarianism seems to fit me well. It's not that I think vegetarianism is good, but there are foods and ways of eating that suit each person, so it's good to find them. Thanks to it, I've become completely healthy. Before, I was always working and I was like a mass of unhealthy lifestyle. (laughs)
South Indian vegetarian food made by Toyoshima. He apparently went to India to go climbing and also attended a cooking class.
Sugimoto: So there was a time like that.
Toyoshima: The Big Bang happened about 15 years ago. (Laughs) Before that, I was like someone who works in design or art, working until late at night and drinking until the morning, and never doing any exercise. I had a big belly. (Laughs) After the Big Bang happened, like a domino effect, switches were flipped and I started to change. It wasn't just one switch, but all of them were linked together, and I was like, "I've been having fun lately!" (Laughs)
Sugimoto: There wasn't just one thing that happened before I could say it was fun. It probably wasn't fun right after the Big Bang though...
Toyoshima: Hmm. I went to an art college in the US and lived in San Francisco. It was around '90 or '91, before the Silicon Valley bubble, and my professors were former hippies from the '60s. At the time, San Francisco still had an atmosphere that was connected to the '60s and '70s, and there were a lot of vegetarians, organic food stores, and supermarkets where everything was sold by weight.
When I think about it, all the things I'm into now, like being a vegetarian, backpacking, surfing, free climbing, and backcountry skiing, were things I did in California when I was a student. At the time, I didn't go there and was absorbed in art, but after more than 20 years, I guess the switches are finally being turned on one by one.
Sugimoto: At that time I didn't think about trying vegetarian food.
Toyoshima: Not at all. In fact, I was rebellious. I was like, "Vegetarian? Absolutely not! I want to eat meat!"
Everything is linked together, a switch is flipped
Harazawa: When Toyoshima says something is fun, it's the result of everything linking together. He said he enjoys doing the laundry, but when he started surfing, he started getting up early in the morning, and he checks the weather forecast on various apps to find out what the weather will be like and how much daylight there will be. I think he's trying to enjoy each and every moment. Toyoshima has had a lot more experience than me and is my senior, but when I hear him say that he's "only just started to understand recently," I feel like I still have a long way to go.
TOYOSHIMA: That's going to take a long time, you say? (laughs)
Sugimoto: How old are you, Harazawa-san?
Harazawa: I'm 31 years old.
Sugimoto: So, if you heard the story that when you were 31, Toyoshima met someone who was like you are now, and one switch after another was flipped on, do you think your own switch was flipped on?
TOYOSHIMA: I don't know. There were times when the words of my seniors helped me. But maybe I was just engrossed in what I was doing at the time. When I was 31, I was living in London. I was attending graduate school at Chelsea College. At that time, graf's activities had already begun, and I really wanted to do something that would have international ties. I said, "Sorry, but I want to leave Osaka and lay the groundwork for overseas expansion," and went to London.
After finishing graduate school, I stayed in London for about three or four years, working locally and commuting back and forth between London and Japan.
That's what it was like being 31. I was going at it pretty aggressively, without much hesitation.
Harazawa: I really respect the way he thinks "Be international" and acts on it, and I think it's something that makes me different from myself. In my case, if I think "this doesn't suit me, I can't do it," I don't try to change the environment, but rather I act in a way that adapts me to that environment.
Sugimoto: Do you try to make it work even if you think it doesn't?
Harazawa: Well, I guess I'm a bit confused now. I think I was that type of person until recently, but I feel like my way of thinking is changing little by little as I've been able to do my own projects like WORK101 and get to know Toyoshima-san and work with him.
Sugimoto: It seems like Harazawa-san is also starting to change.
Toyoshima: Yeah. The switch is starting to turn on.
Continued in Part 2
HARASAWA Shogo