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Last night as I
Last night as I shivered under a blanket waiting for the bed to warm up, I leafed through a department store “white sale” catalog. And I discovered more than one way to stay warm indoors. How about a hot carpet? It’s like an electric blanket for the floor. If you prefer the look of bare…
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At the Inokashira zoo,
At the Inokashira zoo, we saw an old elephant and some squirrels. The elephant was born in Thailand in 1947 and came to the zoo when she was 2 and a half. Japan’s school children named her Hanako. At the advanced age of 53, she has no teeth (I guess elephant dentures are out of…
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Chrysanthemums are the flowers
Chrysanthemums are the flowers of autumn. They are also the symbol of the Imperial family and every autumn for hundreds of years, chrysanthemums, called kiku in Japanese, have been highlighted at festivals. Kiku are trained into plants I’d never guess were chrysanthemums: tiny bonsai with roots growing over rocks; massive two meter wide bushes with…
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Central heating is something
Central heating is something you don’t think about too much unless you’re an American living in Japan. I will grant that winters don’t get bitterly cold in Tokyo. Temperatures dip below freezing on the coldest nights but during the day, they hover around 40. But living in a house whose ambient temperature matches the outdoors…
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Today is a national
Today is a national holiday–Culture Day. Recently a friend and I were discussing the soul of Japan. We have different views. She seems to believe that the soul of Japan is missing; the uninspired, boxy concrete architecture and lack of outdoor spaces in Tokyo indicate a country with no culture; no heart. But I look…
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I’ve always known bowling
I’ve always known bowling wasn’t my game. Now I have a prize to prove it. Last night, I attended Perot Systems’ annual bowling party. My job was to film the event to include it in their year-end video. But I was also assisgned to play on a team! Of the three people listed on our…
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Out running errands, I
Out running errands, I paused at the corner of a tiny street to let a small bus pass through. The driver bowed to me as he eased the bus through the intersection. Inside the bus was one very aged woman wearing a brown sweater and a young woman in a red vest and skirt, a…
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Halloween doesn’t get a
Halloween doesn’t get a lot of notice in Japan. Like most Western, Christian holidays, Halloween in Japan is more of a marketing idea than a day of fun or celebration. Only this one hasn’t caught on the way Valentine’s Day has. I’ve seen very few jack o’lanterns, ghosts or witches in stores. I know of…
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The phone ringing in
The phone ringing in the night is a demon screaming. As a kid, my parents drilled into me that people don’t call in the middle of the night unless its bad news. I don’t think that we ever had one of those calls when I was a kid–news of a death in the family, or…
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Last night after dinner,
Last night after dinner, Tod & I stopped for coffee and dessert at a coffee shop that captured our eye. The sign was decorated with a mosaic of elephants, and carved wooden elephants lined the display case. The name of the shop is “Zou no ko” which means Elephant Child. One middle-aged man tended the…
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