Grant didn't think Barry's idea of translating his mystery phone call was actually all that bad, but he thought he might have a better way to go about it. The call came again on Thursday, and Grant decided to use the record feature on his phone. He pressed a button and set the receiver down, figuring the voice on the other side was going to say what it was going to say no matter what he did. This seemed to be correct. He then presented the recording to the Stars' Japan area scout, Kenta Okano, who was in town before going out to Japan for the big high school baseball tournament, saying that he thought one of his friends might be pranking him, and he was curious about what the message might actually be. Would Kenta mind giving it a listen?
Okano comes by Grant's office on Friday afternoon. He's a tall and slender man about Grant's age, married to a biology professor, if Grant recalls correctly.
“Your friends are weird,” he says, handing Grant a thumb drive.
“So it was a joke?” asks Grant, mildly disappointed, inserting the drive into his computer.
“I don't know,” says Kenta. “I wrote down what I think is in that sound file.” He hands Grant a neatly folded piece of paper.
Grant unfolds it and reads first Kenta's transliteration of the Japanese:
Below that, is Okano's translation:Kyū, go, ichi, shichi, kyū, shi, shichi, shichi, kyū, san.
Me ni wa aoba
Yama hototogisu
Hatsu gatsuo
Roku, hachi, hachi, shi, san, shichi, kyū, go, shi, ni.
Grant looks up at Kenta. “I have some questions.”Nine, five, one, seven, nine, four, seven, seven, nine, three.
The green leaves for eyes
The little cuckoo in the mountain
The first bonito of the season
Six, eight, eight, four, three, seven, nine, five, four, two.
“No doubt,” says Kenta, taking a seat.
“Is this it? I mean, that guy talked forever.”
“He did talk forever. It's a recording, I'm fairly certain. Possibly a very old one, judging by the audio quality. And it repeats. The number sequences, the words, they do not change, at least for the five repetitions I listened to.”
“And what's a bonito?” asks Grant.
“A kind of tuna,” replies Kenta. “In Japan, these three lines are a fairly well-known haiku. The sort a school child might memorize for class.”
“What about the speaker's tone? Did it sound odd to you?”
“Odd?” says Kenta, considering the question. “There is some strain in his voice, almost like he is in some kind of distress, but it's hard to tell.”
“Yeah,” says Grant, “I thought something along those lines. And I guess I do have some weird friends,” he says, deleting the file. “Thanks for doing this for me, Kenta.”
