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Community Center Festival
This weekend was the Kamogawa Kominkan Matsuri, a gathering of all the clubs, circles, and hobby groups that meet at the city’s community centers. Each showed off their activities at the city gymnasium. It was like the craft hall of a county fair. There are so many interesting hobby clubs in this town. Who knew?…
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Camera Roll
Looking at the world around me and finding interest in the mundane. Let’s start with cats. They are always interesting. The weather is cooling down so they are seeking warm places and changing their daily routines Nature continues to provide beautiful moments. I have played in my studio lots this month. For every project I…
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Cat bite
Friday night my friend from Oyama Senmaida, Mai-kun, trotted over to 555 and tried to enter the cat door. I am sure he wanted a snack and cuddles, but Fritter on the inside of the door was having none of it. They were both growling and angry. I ran outside to send Mai home. He…
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Lotus Roots
Today I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Takahashi, who grows lotus root in our area. I went to visit him with my friend Chio and her sister. And with a fresh face to impress, he took us out to the field and showed us how the harvest is done. It was fascinating. The field…
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Yumbo!
We did it! 15 participants from all over Japan joined the Yumbo course that I helped to organise with Chio Yamada from Hosei Sansho and Isono-san from Nihon Kenki. Everyone got their skill certifications and can legally operate small construction machines: excavators, bulldozers, and tractor shovels under 3 tons. The first day was 7 hours…
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38 minutes, 14 tunnels
The mountains in Kimitsu and Kamogawa are drilled through to form backroads and main thoroughfares. We took a drive yesterday and I snapped the light at the end of every tunnel we passed through. These first seven are on the same Chiba forest road and all of a similar style with narrow, straight walls and…
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Election Day (in Japan)
Japan’s democratic process is quite different to the one that drags on in the US. Today is a parliamentary election, called by Prime Minister Ishiba when he dissolved the House of Representatives just eight days after he took office. The run up to the election has been 26 days. Campaigning is a lot more civil…
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Long Drive
Don’t travel on a holiday weekend. Traffic is awful. We knew that, yet chose to drive from Chiba to Niigata. I am glad we did. It was a marathon on the way up. We left at 6 am and I drove the first four hours through various slowdowns and jams until we got past the…
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Naumann Zou
I checked off a bucket list item yesterday by visiting the Lake Nojiri Naumann Elephant Museum. Years ago, Tod and I learned there had been elephants roaming Japan in the Ice Age. We said we’d go see their stomping grounds someday. The museum is nicely put together, with multilingual audio guides and lots of details…
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Signs of Autumn
The two-meter tall ginger is in full bloom outside the kitchen window. Its scent is intoxicating. Hummingbird hawk-moths visit at dawn and dusk to enjoy the nectar. After a long break for summer, Beryl is enjoying her favorite cozy beanbag in the barn. She’s also crawling under the bed covers to sit on me in…
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