When it rained, there would be no work - and no rice. After a day of rain, maybe day laborers would pawn something. More days of rain meant no rice: they would run out of things to pawn. Some families would subsist on barley alone.
From "Tenements (不動長屋)," told by Terauchi Ryutaro, born in 1905
When he was 15 years old, Terauchi Ryutaro was adopted by his uncle, owner of rice shop Hirose.
It was easy for rice dealers to tell how poor their customers were. Day laborers would come home with 30 or 50 sen, and their wives would come to the store clutching the coins. If they could not come before closing, they would come early in the morning and bang on the door, yelling that their children were hungry. They could only buy one day at a time, maybe 360 or 540 milliliters (2-3 go).
Hanten, coats bearing the brands of large merchants, were the easiest to pawn. Pawn shops could always count on the merchant buying back the coat if its owner could not.
From:
佐賀純一, 佐賀進 「田舎町の肖像」,図書出版社、東京、1993、日本語 - http://amzn.to/sUstqg
This is a collection of 72 reminiscences collected in and around Tsuchiura, a lakeside town located about 50 km northeast of Tokyo. The highlight above is from this edition.
The earlier English book, Memories of Silk and Straw, is a translation of Tsuchiura no Sato: E to Denbun (土浦の里：絵と伝聞) that Dr. Saga published in 1981. It contains 50 reminiscences.
Saga Junichi, Saga Susumu, Garry O. Evans, Memories of Silk and Straw: A Self-Portrait of Small-Town Japan, Kodansha America, 1987, English - http://amzn.to/sudJTy , Paperback edition - http://amzn.to/vHQ2SB
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