Like most harbours, the only place to see Yokohama Port is from the water. While Connie hailed from a long line of seafarers, Vince himself had nearly got seasick on the Hikawa Maru, a former ocean liner which was bolted hard to the sea bottom. Vince would claim that the commentary in the boiler room of the former ocean liner had the Hikawa Maru steering into a typhoon, the first mate crying, "Hard to Starboard! Hard to Starboard." Despite the Hikawa Maru experience, Connie was able to convince Vince to take the Red Shoes cruise around the Port of Yokohama. Like most members of seafaring families, she couldn't possibly see how he could get sea sick on a cruise that took little over an hour and was on waters as choppy as an ice skating rink.
For Vince's part, he was more fascinated by the name of the boat upon which he would ride the high seas. The Red Shoes had been a Hans Christian Andersen tale that he had heard frequently from an aunt, Auntie Thora, during his youth. The story of the little girl who had put on the red ballet slippers and been condemned to dance forever, had been turned into a film which Vince had never seen, but which had been inspiration for hordes of young ballet dancers from all over the world.
This particular red shoes legend was from another story that was all Japanese. There was supposedly a statue of the Little Girl with the Red Shoes in Yamashita Park, but Vince had looked everywhere for it and had never seen it, himself. The story that the statue tells is of a young Japanese girl abused by a foreign man who was giving away red shoes. Or that was as far as Vince could gather. The message seemed all too clear to Vince and he felt there were parallels between it and the Yellow Cab documentary that had warned of young Japanese women in search of decent sex being used by hordes of gigolos to support their families. The actors who had played the parts in the documentary later admitted it was a sham. Sham or not, Vince was attracted by a tiny red shoes key ring he had seen in a nearby souvenir stall. He bought it for Connie and watched the woman behind the counter give a lesson in typical Japanese overwrapping. The key ring had only cost ¥250 and yet she insisted on wrapping it once, putting it in a box, wrapping the box and then placing it in a plastic bag. As if this wasn't enough, the woman then put it in a second oversized paper bag with cord handles. As soon as he had given it to Connie, she unravelled each layer of wrapping, almost within sight of the woman who'd taken such care in bundling it up. She put it in a single plastic bag and dropped it into her handbag. She then folded the rest of the paper and put it in her backpack.
Vince boarded the Red Shoes boat with little trepidation. Indeed, he was feeling fine as they cruised past the inner breakwater and Yamashita Pier which, a recorded message informed him, had once been the main pier. It was only when they passed under the Yokohama Bay Bridge, "the second largest cable span bridge in the world, 860 metres long, 172 metres high, with a central span of 460 metres and a 55 metre clearance for ships" that he started to feel at all queasy.
Vince decided to go up on deck to get a glimpse of the round observation tower under the Bay Bridge and the F-Cap floating car park "that could hold up to 300 vehicles". He felt the need of some fresh air. By the time, the Red Shoes had been in and out of the Honmoku Pier's finger jetties with their super gantry cranes, Vince had two fingers pressed firmly on the motion sickness pressure point on his left wrist and was trying to get a glimpse of the horizon. This was one of only two sea sickness cures that Vince knew. The other was to get rolling drunk, but there was no bar on the Red Shoes, just a vending machine from which you could buy beer. They passed the Yokohama Tower with its flashing F, which "stands for free, meaning that ships are free to come and go from Yokohama Port as they wish." Vince thought glibly of a number of other words that F could stand for. The boat passed another breakwater which was crowded with fishermen even though "it is illegal and very dangerous to fish here." As the Red Shoes picked up pace, Vince started to despair of the pressure point cure for sea sickness. They skirted through far less lubberly boats than the Red Shoes and were told that " a black ball on the mast meant that they were at anchor." Connie had since climbed onto the deck as the boat slowed to pass Nippon Kaikan, the largest steel mill in Japan on the border of Kawasaki and Yokohama.
" ... the raw materials are off-loaded on the Kawasaki side which is painted red and it goes through the manufacturing process to be reloaded at the Yokohama side which is painted green ..." "Goodness, Vince," Connie remarked. "You look as green as the Yokohama side of Nippon Kaikan." " ... and on the port side, you can see the Daikoku pier, which is a state of the arts artificial island pier ..." Vince leaned precariously over the side and groaned.
"And right in front of the bow, you can see the second Bay Bridge, which is still under construction." "Vince!" Connie screamed, grabbing her husband by the belt. "You're not going to be sick, are you?" " ... it is another cable stage bridge and when it is completed it will be the longest such bridge in the world ..." "You can't do it over the side. What will people ...?" "It is due to open in 1994 and will link Yokohama to the Metro Shore Expressway ..." "Here," Connie pulled something from her hand bag, "use this." " ... it will enable vehicles to drive from Yokohama to Haneda Airport without passing through Tokyo ..." Connie thrust the plastic bag in Vince's direction.
" ... on the starboard side, you can see the Showa Shell Oil Company ..." Vince teetered momentarily.
" ... the Tokyo Electric Company Tower ..." Lurched.
" ... and the mouth of the Tsurumi River." And veered back towards the deck. He fumbled at the bag and something small dropped out, clinked on the deck and bounced overboard.
The red shoes, Vince thought.
But it was too late. He fell to his knees, retching, groaning, gagging and generally missing the bag altogether. Vince didn't even hear the guide tell him about the Daikoku Bridge which had once been the only bridge in the harbour or the Mizuko Pier, which as well as being occupied by the United States Army was the best located in the entire port and the only one in which you could turn around. Or the Nippon Kokan Asano Shipyard where they had once made ships. Or the New Grand Hotel. Or the Landmark Tower, Japan's tallest building at 70 stories high. Or the Kanagawa Prefecture police headquarters and Yokohama Customs house.