Me and 'De Paper'

My interview with the Hokkaido Shimbun ('De paper') has, courtesy of Sanae's mother 'gone viral', if phoning every relative, friend, and acquaintance about her son-in-law's interview can be termed 'going viral'. The original article ran in the Muroran edition of the paper but obviously it dawned on them the 'scoop' they had on their hands ("Christ! It's him. It's really him. Brian Gaynor! Brian feckin Gaynor! Stop, I say, stop the presses!! Hold the front page!!!"). So they promoted me to the island wide edition and long forgotten Japanese acquaintances who thought I had long ago returned to Iceland to resume my simple life of whale-hunting and volcano-dodging, contacted me and begged me to (a) come visit them; and (b) stop my mother-in-law from phoning them.

Now, courtesy of this bit of magic we call "d'auld internet", you too can experience the frenzied excitement of my mother-in-law. Here's the link:

http://www.hokkaido-np.co.jp/news/chiiki/278960.html

For those of you who don't speak the cupla focail of Japanese (shame on you), I will provide a translated summary:

"Brian Gaynor, the brooding, warrior-like albeit strangely poetic manifestation of hairy chested manhood is the voice of Japan for all back in Ireland, his home country (and a sadder place without him). Through his rich, oak-casked, mellow baritone he has reassured an anxious nation of despairing gaels that his adopted home isn't going straight to hell in a radioactive basket. Day after anxious day his quite, steady, rock-like presence on the airwaves has spread a sense of serenity as those worn weary by worry have their heavy hearts lightened by his wise words and unsurpassed alliteration.

His career in journalism has been long and varied - you can see it in his pale blue eyes, eyes, though kindly, that mask a lifetime's worth of lived experience, an experience most of us couldn't imagine let alone live. He has been present at pivotal moments in our shared history - in '75 on the last chopper out of Saigon, in '91 on the first tank into Baghdad, '95 in the Upper Cusack Stand when Clare won the All-Ireland, '99 at the now legendary JET renewer's conference in Kobe ("sort of like the Rolling Stones at Altamont but edgier" as one participant described it), and Amsterdam, 2010, when he was on the last Aer Lingus flight to Dublin on that infamous Christmas Eve.

Through it all he his stoic, big-footed virility has ensured that, no matter what the circumstances, 'he gets the job done' and that is why he is who he is and not who he could be. And he likes small, soft fluffy kittens. And has a thing for world peace and, you know, the Dalai Lama and all that Tibetan stuff, man."

As a postscript, the media over here can't get enough of my 'stoic, big-footed virility' and a television station is dispatching a TV crew from Sapporo down to Muroran this coming Monday to interview me. I will keep you posted.