The Displaced Nation

A home for international creatives

For this precocious global adventurer, videographer and committed expat, a picture says…

2 Comments Posted by ML Awanohara on December 18, 2015

Greetings, Displaced Nationers who are also photography buffs! “A Picture Says…” columnist James King promises to be back in the new year, so this may be my last column for a while. We’ll see! (James like to keep us guessing…)

In any event, I’m super excited about today’s guest, Andrew Marston. Andrew first flashed across my screen when an exploit of his got featured on Rocket News 24, the English-language blog that reports interesting, strange, and random news items from Asia.

According to the report, Andrew had made a video, “Mt. Fuji: Sea to Summit,” about climbing to the top of Mt. Fuji with a few of his expat mates.

Now, reaching the summit of Japan’s sacred mountain in and of itself wouldn’t merit special news coverage. Fuji-san is, after all, the most ascended peak in the world, and people of all ages, including some centenarians, go to the top every year. Their numbers also include expats, some of whom view it as a rite of passage into Japanese culture. It’s said that a foreigner shouldn’t leave the country without having attempted to climb Mt Fuji once—with the emphasis on “once.” If you remember nothing else from this introduction, remember this:

A wise man will climb Mt Fuji once; a fool will climb Mt Fuji twice.

But I digress. What exactly had Andrew and his friends done to attract the attention of reporters? They had upped the ante, starting at Japan’s lowest point, at the sands of Taganoura Beach in Shizuoka Prefecture—50 kilometers (31 miles) away from and 3,776 meters (12,388 feet) below their destination—to reach its highest point, a journey of some 27 hours. And then they stayed at the top long enough to watch the sun rise, a storied tradition in the Land of the Rising Sun.

As I did a little more research on Andrew, I discovered he describes himself as a “creative freelancer,” who has been making a living doing photo shoots, films, graphic and Web design for clients. As his sea-to-summit Fuji trek attests, he has a passion for producing travel videos about Japan. He also enjoys watching samurai dramas and running.

Andrew Marston doing a “palm jump” in Indonesia (supplied).

But let’s talk to him about his photography, shall we, before he dashes off on another of his madcap adventures?

* * *

Hi, Andrew, and welcome to the Displaced Nation. I’d like to start by asking: where were you born, and when did you spread your wings to start traveling?
Hi, ML, and thank you for inviting me to take part in this column. I was born in Portland, Maine, USA. My family took a lot of road trips up and down the east coast when I was growing up. It wasn’t until I went to university that the travel bug bit me hard. When I was 19 I went to Japan for the summer on my own. I think this cemented my love of travel and discovery.

Wow, you traveled to Japan on your own at age 19? That’s pretty gutsy! I didn’t get there until I was an adult, and that was challenging enough. What did you do once you arrived?
I volunteered as a maintenance man at an ESL camp in far western Tokyo prefecture.

And Japan, I understand, was just the beginning. Which countries have you visited thus far?
Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Cambodia, India, Singapore, Ecuador, Mexico, Canada, USA… so only 12.

Ha! “Only 12,” he says, modestly. Which of these countries have you lived in and for how long?
I lived in Singapore for 2 years, and Japan for three years total. The rest of my life I’ve lived in the US.

Where are you living right now?
Nagoya, which is in the center of Japan. My wife, who is also American, and I arrived here last summer. We both love living in Japan. We travel a lot domestically. We’ve got no plans to move away. For work I make Japan travel videos, and she is a science teacher at an international school.

百聞は一見に如かず(hyakubun wa ikken ni shikazu): Hearing about something one hundred times is not as good as seeing it once

Now, I know you’re into moving images, but this column focuses on photography, which is also a passion of yours. Can you share with us three photos that capture some of your favorite memories of the so-called “displaced” life of global residency and travel and tell us about the memory each photo captures, and why it remains special to you?
We took an end-to-end cycle tour of Japan one month after the 2011 earthquake there. (You can see the whole documentary of the trip, Japan by Bicycle, and download the accompanying e-book.) This first photo was taken about mid-way through the tour, right after waking up and putting away our tents after camping for a night in a bamboo forest.