Cross-cultural communication （138）　

138) Revisiting Brooklyn
When I say “revisiting,” I don't mean that I actually visited Brooklyn. Recently, I watched two Brooklyn-related works on Netflix, my beloved “nighttime companion.” In 2022, there was “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” a sitcom about a clumsy but talented rookie cop, and in early 2023, there was “Murder Mystery,” a comedy film about a Brooklyn detective and his hairdresser wife who get caught up in a crime while on vacation. There's a sequel to this movie, and it's also interesting, so I ended up staying up late watching it. The detective's T-shirt, which he wore while relaxing at home, had the word “Brooklyn” written on the chest. Actually, I have one too.? These Brooklyn T-shirts can sometimes be seen in Japan, but it seems they're popular all over the world. However, in the early 1980s, when I was working as a resident physician in Brooklyn, it was a place with a negative image of being dangerous and dirty. Yet, despite being the largest and most populous of New York City's five boroughs, Brooklyners have the strongest sense of pride in their hometown. The first Broadway musical I saw during my time in New York was “A Chorus Line,” which tells the story of young people aspiring to make it on Broadway. There is a scene in the musical where each young person is asked where they are from. The audience members from the same hometown applaud, and I still remember how the applause was overwhelmingly loud when a black man answered that he was from Brooklyn.?

Brooklyn has a population of over 2 million, but it's not just about the numbers?it's also home to many world-famous people. For example, Arthur Miller, the playwright famous for marrying Marilyn Monroe; Carl Sagan, the astronomer and writer whose book “Contact” was made into a movie; Spike Lee, the film director known for his controversial works; and Woody Allen, whom I greatly admire (though he was born in the Bronx).?

Now, I would like to introduce the famous person from Brooklyn whom I have personally had the most opportunity to interact with. He is Mike (Biting) Tyson, the former heavyweight champion boxer. This was when I was still practicing medicine in Osaka. There was a girls' high school nearby, and at the time, there were always a few foreign exchange students enrolled there. One day, several American high school girls came in for a health checkup. In my examination room, there were several certificates from my time in the US, and one that caught their attention was the certificate from my residency training in Brooklyn. When I mentioned, “Yeah, I survived three years in Brooklyn,” they were impressed, exaggerating their admiration. In typical Osaka fashion, I thought I should add a joke to lighten the mood. “Mike Tyson was just an unknown troublemaker in Brooklyn back then, and he used to come to my clinic often with injuries from fights.” They responded with a surprised, “No way!” I then smiled and said, “I'm just kidding,” and everyone burst into laughter. Since then, I've been using this Tyson joke, adapting it to the mood of the moment, whenever I'm with Americans. Thank you, brother Mike!?

Postscript: A few days after finishing this blog, in late May 2023, I watched The Super Mario Bros. Movie. My three sons played Mario games a lot when they were kids, but I never played them myself. As an occupational physician working with a gaming company, I went to see it as a topic of conversation. However, even I enjoyed it as a movie. And there was an unexpected discovery: Mario and Luigi are Italian-American brothers from Brooklyn. This was a bit of a surprise. So, I'll add Mario and Luigi to my list of famous people from Brooklyn!

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