November 2005 Archives
Consider this child’s excitement: His home town is a flat place, its mild undulations no match for a bike with enough gears. There are no mountains, nor vivid tracts of vegetation. The trees are ever-greens or suddenly-nots. The drama of autumn is a murder mystery, still lush boughs not cooperating with inquiries. From the Darling scarp, the roof-tile plain seems the antithesis of Gormenghast’s rooftop stone-scape. No gothic wonder here – though it does twinkle awful purdily at night. And now he’s here.
I’m not sure what range of mountains I live under. Just the fact of mountains is enough though. No bicycle could ever attempt one of the roads to my school and I haven’t figured out how the 50cc scooters manage it. On the walk from the school to the bus stop, the streets plunge into a blinking, smoking urbanity, but the mountains still survive, their feet warmed by a rug of colonization. The Rokko mountain range, that’s it. It follows my train-line to Kobe, lazy fingers of condensation ruffling the forested peaks. It steals the sunset an hour earlier. As the night temperatures fell and the sunlight thinned out, clouds of yellow, pink and red traveled across their green spines. I’ve never known geography or weather to be so…
Well, cold. It’s the end of November and the temperatures are challenging a Perth winter (except that it’s dry here). I have been warned that February is the coldest month, so there are many more layers of thermals to be bought. The Japanese are very fond of their seasons, and I am often directed as to how I should enjoy them. Of all the crazy thangs to be asked, one was “How do you know it is winter?� (Ummm, because it’s June and/or it’s cold?). The rush of chlorophyll from the leaves is (I’m told) a reminder for the Japanese that winter is coming (I thought the cold was a sturdy indicator – maple leaves are just the fairy lights on the tree). Each season seems to have its own ritual. Early autumn everyone dons heir long sleeve shirts (even on mid 20 degree days), late autumn you invade Kyoto to see the Golden Pavilion framed by those now frequently remarked on leaves and, now that the cold is setting in, nabe (re: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabemono) is the dish to be had. Of course, there is a ritual to “when� we should enjoy nabe, which leads me to the point of this post. It was an article I read in the paper here (English translation of a few local shimbuns and some US news). The gist of it goes like this …
The Japan Weather Association compiles an “index to recommend eating winter pot cuisine� (re: nabemono). Combining the temperature, wind speed and humidity, they manage to produce a number by which you can tell if it’s a nice time of year to eat nabe. Basically, if it’s cold, windy and dry (i.e. winter-esque) it’s a good time of year to eat shabu-shabu. It’s nice to know there’s a science to it.
Well, it turned into another “Damn, this country’s crazy� rant. Sorry about that. It really is beautiful though, nabe is tasty and it’s getting bloody cold. Hoorah!
P.S. I’d like to thank Mr. P. Pittman for making this post possible.
Yes, a bad play on a title. I've just been filling the quiet hours I have empty on Tuesday afternoon with a glance at the Concrete Journals' main page. So, my prolific betters, Marty and Patrick have been suffering writer's block as well... I think i may have been enduring some version of that for a year or so now - nothing comes out how I want it to, leading me to despair at times, that I may have lost something very important to me. Sigh, I must keep on trying...
Anyways, I may even echo Patrick's weather thematics soon (yes, maple leaf seaon becoming nabe season), but for now, have a look at his entry. Sounds like there's something REALLY COOL going to be online soon. All you Perth people will be hearing about it / seeing it about soon enough tho (if you don't already know). Patrick and Nat - I love you both. I'm so sad that I can't be there at this birth.
As a final note - I don't know what did, but my attempts at purdifying this blog have bleached it. Will take it back to the hairdresser soon.
Aren't I a slacker. After seeing the wonderful homepage for the Concrete Journals (nice work there Patrick), and the prolific blogs of others, i have been shamed into doing some work. That, and the fact that I'm the only person left in the teacher's office. I can either type or sleep. If this entry begins to look like it's encrypted, it's because I've fallen asleep on the keyboard. unfortunately a lack of interesting perceptions leaves this post to be another bland post from Richard. Hopefully I'll write something a little more crowd pleasing soon.
