Reduce

I am trying to learn to love and understand my Ipod Shuffle, and to reconcile it's simple existance, in comparison with Stuart's Mini, the amazing green machine. This weblog is helping, and it's also really cool. In book news, Penguins turn 70. Cannot remember for the life of me who or where, but at some point I read this comment by a publisher, "People have got this [insert "insane" here] idea that books should be cheap". To attitudes like that I pass along the Penguins success story. I think that no-frills book design is what the bookselling industry needs, more so than "Ryan-air style publishing". Further, an essay on the state of the American bookselling.

In Asia, I enjoyed this interesting article on double-standards and what China can learn about democracy from the Japanese textbook argument. And as an ardent reductionist, I liked this very matter-of-fact take on East Asian tensions.

Hope you find your paradise

Well, the insomnia continued. I couldn't sleep well past 2:00am last night and woke up at 6:30. I had this overwhelming feeling of imminent Christmas, which I both wanted and didn't want to come. And of course the best part of insomnia is catching the cockroaches unaware! Oh yes, the little bastard was hiding from me under the edge of my kitchen sink. He was dead the minute I laid eyes on him.

So I woke up with the sun, and went downstairs and read some of "The Years". And then I began to write a new short story, whose subject popped into my head whilst I was attempting to sleep. I went to work at the usual time, read the International Herald Tribune/Asahi Shimbun on the train as per Saturday usual, but of course nothing was the same. Mainly because I was not displaying classic bad attitude, but rather was quite happy. It was a nice day, last Wednesday was sadder. Today felt more like one quick trip back. From the students, I received presents galore! I got beautiful pearl earrings and a pearl bracelet, a book called "Miffy Says I Love You", a Miffy picture frame, a Japanese cook book, a Miffy glass, a Miffy towel, a Miffy bath soap set and a box of cakes. Stuart also received, from the staff at his school (where I work part time), the most beautiful picture album, which will be used to display the highlights of the Japan life. Nothing was quite as brilliant as the present I got from one student though- she's perhaps the shiest person ever, prone to running away when I meet her and blushing boldly. I decided to give her my big Doraemon stuffed animal, as he is too big (and strange) for Canada. I gave him to her, with a note tucked in his secret pocket. She gave me a four leaf clover.

I feel weird, at odds. I don't know what to do with myself. This life is so safe and cushioned, and now away we go again. We have to of course, and we have wonderful plans but the plans becoming a reality make me anxious. Happily anxious, but still. I think it will be scary as the next months are so transitional, but learning to live like that has been good for me. I've got Stuart, and lovely friends to go home to. So onward and upward. Bring on the permanant vacation.

Last Beautiful Weekend

We had a last beautiful weekend. Yesterday, we dropped off a million books to donate to the library, proudly sent home a money order for a very large amount of cash and discovered we have enough to make the next year work for us, I bought a cheap cotton kimono-like robe, we went to the gallery, got the photos developed from Miyajima and went to karaoke.

We also discovered that we can no longer eat chicken stirfry, which we've been cooking most nights a week for fourteen months now- spiced up by a once-a-week spaghetti (sauce from a bag). This isn't entirely the fault of my cooking skills- it's also the high price of Japanese groceries, absence of a microwave/oven/broiler in fact any heating apparatus beyond one burner and a bread toaster not to mention no counter space. We've been eating a balanced diet this past year, but hardly a varied one and that's the end of it. Serious.

Last night I finished reading "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers, and was depressed as a result. I've also finished reading "An American Childhood" in my giant Annie Dillard book (definitely not her portable collection), which was better. I have begun "The Years" by Virginia Woolf, which the inside cover notes was began first in Nottingham in September 2002 but ne'er finished. I am going to finish it this week and leave it here, as it's well-travelled enough.

Today we woke up at the usual time and went to Osaka quite early. We forgot it was a public holiday (the beginning of a weeklong one- and for once we get to play too!) and the world was a madhouse. The trains were crammed, so we sat on the floor and irritated people. When they got fuller, we managed to find one seat and sat in shifts, but I felt sick most of the way so I hogged it. When we got to Umeda, we went to Osaka Kiddyland to search one more time for the elusive Miffy in Overalls. No dice, but it was huge and wonderful. I perused the Miffy goods and selected some appropriate ones, and resisted others. Stuart was wonderfully supportive, though did get irritated by the Monchichi DVD beside the Miffy department and ended up turning off the television. It was my last Kiddyland experience, and Stuart was so patient as I struggled to say goodbye to Miffy goods for all your lifestyle needs. I am really really going to despair leaving it behind. This is not drama. After Kiddyland, we went to Shinsaibashi and hung about. We revisited the Sanrio Gallery, and had a lovely lunch (in a jewelry store's cafe?) and then went to the Apple store. I got an Ipod Shuffle and Stuart got an Ipod Mini in green. Sugoi. The woman at the store asked me what operating system I had, and I told her I had a white mac and it was new. She talked just to Stuart after that. We left Apple, and went to Tower Records in America-Mura, where I bought magazines for the plane. We walked about America-Mura and shop staff were very nice to us, noting our Apple bags. We watched a sunglasses fashion show with human mannequins and it was strange. We drank lemonade outside Freshness Burger and watched the freaks go by. The cute goths were as ever, but my favourite candidate was a woman in harem-pants style acid washed jeans, a red vest with a tropical print on it and red pointy shoes. We went to the Athens bookshop after that, so Stuart could buy a book for the plane and we got "Eleanor Rigby" by Douglas Coupland.

We got the train after that. It was so busy, but we got off in Sannomiya to have dinner- bibimba! We got home after that, and have been eating strawberries and playing with Ipods since then. Tomorrow is our last day of employment for an indiscernible length of time. This is a positive step.

We went to the Himeji City Museum of Art today to see the Katsushika Hokusai exhibit. The Fuji prints were our favourites, particularly this- "The Great Wave off Kanagawa".

My fortune

Every morning for the last two weeks or so, we've awakened at 7:50, perhaps stirred by an outside noise but I'm not aware of what. I wake up and the facts of my reality flow back around me after dreaming, and then there is no way I can go back to sleep. The next few months are beckoning with such treasures in hold, and plans and schemes are constantly running through my busy head. All the while the rest of the world disappoints and horrifies me, and I don't understand the impossible disjunction, when the people and places that I know positively glimmer in their brilliance. Yesterday on my way to work, I cried again, nearly sobbed on the commuter train by myself and everyone pretended not to notice. I cried because I know that route so well; I know the mountains and the blossoms, and each house and its hanging laundry, and then there is only one more day I'll go that way. To love someplace so much, you cry at leaving but then to know where you're going next is even better, where you've got to be, burning with excitement to get there. And to love someone so much that no matter where you go together, something good there will lie. I am fully conscious of my fortune.

Charis' Toronto Island Cottage!

AS Byatt! And a Literary Map of Manhattan. Wouldn’t it be brilliant to do one for Toronto?

Amagasaki

There is really nothing I can say about yesterday's train crash at Amagasaki, but I have to say something. Amagasaki is about 40 minutes from where we live, and we have stopped there numerous times on the way to Osaka. I've never taken that line, though Bronwyn did when she was here and took the train to AstroBoy's Museum in Takarazuka. I take the train to work most days a week, and the train I've seen in pictures looks the very same as mine. This is not to say that one's proximity to tragedy is so paramount, but it's certainly upsetting. Between earthquakes, tsunami and various human-made disasters, one must step carefully on this continent. Or at least it's seemed that way this past year. I am very sad for all those poor people involved, and I'm hoping for a miracle or two.

Good stuff

Sue Townsend reports on the current state from a council estate in Leeds. Great article on writer Hilary Mantel. Observer Music Monthly on Top Ten Rock and Roll Muses. Peaches Geldof’s documentary discussed in this interesting article on teenageness. On how literature is changing the way we’re understand the history of Canadians of colour here.

Pride and defiance

Margaret Atwood has inspired me to do many things. I read this article in a book in August 2002 and it inspired me to move to England, to really go and not as tentatively as I'd done two months previous. If you've ever moved to England, or met me, or most notably met me in August 2002, this article will have a certain resonance.

An interview with Nick Hornby. The Guardian Books Bangkok Diary. A 1977 interview with my beloved Joan Didion in The Paris Review Archives.

In politics, kudos to Japan for being better and apologising to China. Pride and defiance are unproductive when it comes to International Relations, and now the Chinese government is banning anti-Japanese protests (which shouldn't be too difficult as they instigated them on in the first place). I do find it too bad that the Japanese can't find a way to honour their war-dead without honouring their war criminals however. China, on the other hand, needs to calm down. And annoying David Frum on the Liberal scandal. I'd take the Liberals over Conservative principles any day.

On Moral Relativism

Over at my friends' Live Free or Die, there's been a bit of a debate about moral relativism, as they put it. I've been thinking a lot about and posted the following comment:

"I think you're right. I think idealism is far too idealistic to work beyond itself, and when people like you dare to condone violence under a certain set of circumstances, take a stand on culturally sensitive issues and hold opinions that don't look so good on t-shirts, it's brave and profound.

But I also believe that violence is always inherently the wrong course of action. I believe that war, death, and violence are issues that require a blanket generalisation with no exceptions. It's wrong to kill people. Perhaps with some regimes, violence is the only language they will understand but personally I would be ashamed to speak that language. We must raise our personal standards, morally, politically and diplomatically. Fire versus fire is a rather predictable fight.

I realise I am saying nothing new or altogether helpful, but you can't just dismiss my opinion because you find it irritating.

You're right that sometimes the only really impactful response to genocide and human rights abuses is war, but I think input from people who disagree with this is essential if these missions are going to be carried out well. Because the thing is they usually aren't carried out well. Liberators have a knack of inflicting human rights atrocities of their own, fuelled by self-righteousness and supposed moral superiority. Further, war-mongering is a reflex with too many people in powerful places, and they have to be kept in check. Also, which countries deserve or require liberation? I, like you, believe in a universal moral standard for humanity, but this is as deeply problematic and simplistic as cultural relativism, because who determines it? Are you really that sure of yourself?

You can't just stake a claim and stay there. Ideas have to be ever-evolving and dialogue must continue from people on all-sides. Everyone must be willing to be proven wrong and you can't always be anti-anti. You have to listen to the Noam Chomskys, and Michael Moores, because they have something worthwhile to say. I know you're both more open-minded than you sometimes let on, and that indeed you do this, hence the balance of sites on your links page that started this debate in the first place.

So does it make me the ultimate relativist to say that you're right, but sometimes the people whose opinions you disagree with are just as right as you are?"

Miyajima Dream

We had a brilliant weekend in Miyajima. Way too tired to write about it in any detail. Yesterday we checked out various shrines and temples, and followed many a meandering path. The weather was beautiful, and we got to eat Hiroshima-yaki. We checked into our ryokan around 3:00, and changed into our yukata. We had an ocean view, and it was phenomenal. Unwound while reading and overlooking the sea. Our dinner was served in our room at 7:00. Fish fish and more fish, The dishes spread across the table and the course kept on coming. After dinner, we went for a walk to see the shrine illuminated, and came back to find our futons set up for the night. We made us of the ryokan's hotspring onsen before we went to bed. The light flooded our room this morning, beautiful through the paper doors. We had breakfast before checking out, and then we went to climb Mount Misen. It was an amazing trek, quite steep and demanding at times. The scenery on the way was well worth it, and when we reached the top, the beauty 360 degrees around us was overwhelming. Also overwhelming were the near 200 school girls in black tracksuits eating their bentos at the summit. We ended up walking down with them, we kept waiting for them to pass but they never really ended. We made many friends. All in all, the mountain experience was about three hours long and we returned to the bottom sore and exhausted. We went splits on Hiroshima-yaki, and tried kaki-yaki, which was oishii! Around 3:30 we got the ferry, and then the train back to Hiroshima, and then the shinkansen home, sunburnt, euphoric and knackered. We're leaving in just over two weeks, and what a note to be going out on.

near the floating shrine
atop tatami we sleep
good-bye to Japan

Mountain High

Us at the top of Mt. Misen after a beautiful climb. We are thirsty.

Kawaii

Stuart Kuhn in his yukata. Kawaii!

From our window

The view from our room at the ryokan.

From the ferry

Miyajima from the ferry. Itsukishima Shrine to be specific.

Addicted to raisins

I liked Ian Jack's article here on the media as a "dictatorship of grief", reflecting on response to the deaths of Diana and the Pope. I really want to read Chernobyl Strawberries by Vesna Goldsworthy. I've been reading up on America lately, first from The Star: How to succeed in Bush's White House. It seems it's not about success at all but suckiness. Isn't that John Bolton terrible? Speaking of terrible, why is anyone opposed to the emergency contraceptive pill? And while we're on about the zealots of piety and the bullshit crusade, how about this little expose on Washington's most devout citizens? (On the disgustingly-wretched-by-any-moral-standard Mr. DeLay: I'll never understand born-again Christians, who mess up royally before they find God, and then believe themselves to be more righteous than those of us who were smart enough by our own accord never to make their mistakes in the first place.)

This weekend we are off to Miyajima to stay here! This mini-break has been a long time coming and we're really excited. I am also addicted to raisins.

Six Mats & One Year

Six Mats & One Year is a beautiful book by Canadian poet Alison Smith, about the time she spent in Japan. In three weeks today, we are leaving Japan to fly to England and let the future begin. The feeling of coming to love a place so well we may never see again is awfully tragic. I have cried more than once lately while looking at the mountains from the train, and I can't quite believe we're actually going. It's strange to be frantically counting down and cherishing every second at the same time.

I really love this poem.

Under-Country
by Alison Smith

I have pushed off and landed far away
but you travel with me as under-country
always close enough to pull here,
a blanket lost in sleep.

Small details have caught under heart
like hair under a painting on a wall:
in the dark they rupture the familiar.
If I were to return
the cities would seem smaller.
Everyday your volcanic reality
shrinks into columns of print
while dream, in dimension of depth
and meaning, continues its expansion.
Words that follow-
When I was in Japan-
will soon outsize you.

I left as we do our childhoods:
rushing to escape, without souvenirs.
I collected no sake cups
no tsukemono plates.
All this time
a core of miso grew.

(You can read my review of her book at my ne'er updated book review website, Now Reading. I bought my copy online from Northwest Passages- Canadian Literature Online)

The art of everyday life

The baby I've been waiting for was born yesterday, unlike the rest of us. My dear friend Paul is now an uncle! The baby is going to be amazingly loved, lucky him.

In technology news, we are getting Ipod Minis. Stuart is getting a grey one and I am getting a pink one. In six months, when I am complaining about having no money, don't remind me of this decision. I still might get an Ipod shuffle instead. We only bought our Mini Disc players a year ago, and I feel a bit guilty shelling out for something new so soon. Though it is a mini-disc.

The papers have been a bit boring this weekend. No kawaii elephant poo. Because I don't believe I'll be one of them, on ubiquitous and poor first-novelists who seem to have forgotten about the art of everyday life. Though this article does reek of something bitter. The poet, Julia Darling, died of cancer this week. She did the January exercise for the Guardian Poetry Workshop and I really enjoyed her stuff. An interesting story on Andrea Dworkin.

We're going to a hanami party tonight at the castle. The blossom life is nearly exhausted, so we'll catch it while we can.

Today

Today was a book-in-the-mail day- this one. The author is going to be my professor in September. Today is also notable because I am waiting for a baby to be born. Due sometime today in the UK afternoon.

Forbidden!

I am the worst post office customer ever. Not only am I unable to communicate beyond wild gestures, but I am functionally illiterate. I am the post office chimpanzee. Further, I never require anything easy. One letter first class stamp? Oh no, not I. I have never made a request of the post-office staff that wasn't bizarre in some construct. I send multiple packages to various continents, I sent 60+ cards and parcels at Christmas, I've been sending enormous boxes of our random stuff home monthly since January, there were about 50 wedding invitations mailed two weeks ago, registered mail. Ecetera. Today we sent two boxes containing, among other things, our winter coats, my porcelain Hello Kitty, a few books, knitting needles, my Miffy mugs, hats and scarves. A third box consisted of my entire CD collection, all 5 kilograms of it. This is the end of our stuff, and I was thrilled about that. So thrilled that I decided to explain as much to the Post Office staff member who has to help us every time. "Finished" I said to her in Japanese, pointing to our stuff. She looked confused. I repeated myself a few times, pointing, with a large smile hoping she would understand. Then I realised Stuart was also looking at me rather strangely. "What are you doing?" he asked. I realised I wasn't actually saying "Dekita!", which means "finished". I was saying "Dammait!" which is a very strong way to say "Forbidden!", and you would yell it at someone who was groping you on the train. I stopped yelling "Forbidden" in the post office, at that realisation. The staff member, who no doubt already thinks I am crazy, didn't really bat an eye. We ended up spending $150.00, which has become quite normal for us. It beats paying excess luggage fees at the airport. We must be the post office's best customers. In Japan, it is common for stores to give "gifts" to customers who spend large amounts of money. Today, in spite of me shouting "Forbidden, Forbidden!" at the Post Office staff, we were given the gift of a brand new sponge.

English is also bustin out all over

Must draw attention to this article from This Magazine, which takes issue with "linguistic imperialism" and the ethical problem that has been my daily life for the past year. English has become a hot commodity and people are desperate to get it, paying massive fees and going into debt to do so. I think of one of my students, who works night shifts in a toothpaste factory and is usually far too nervous to speak in her English classes, another who had mental problems to begin with (and this is more common than you'd think among our clientele) and now has been admitted to hospital for the next three months. She has lost all the points she bought for English lessons as they'll expire by the time she's out. The number of students who feel utterly diminished by their lack of English skills, regardless of what other accomplishments they've managed in their lives, and so exalt people such as myself and my co-workers to a near-Godlike status for something we've put in no effort to achieve. The people who are desperate to learn idioms and slang, to sound "natural", like a native speaker- and no one ever does. They want to sound and act Westernized, and at the expense of what? Their parents can't help but be proud of them though. The article's missionary metaphor is a successful one- blatantly as some teachers are eager to share their religious faith with students, and others (I am definitely not innocent here) try to share their ideals, which go against cultural grain. We challenge students to defy their parents, to stand up for themselves, to express themselves, to be individuals, on a daily basis.

It's not all bad. I think there are many teachers who allow themselves to come away with a broadened perspective as a result of their international experience. In a country like Japan, exposing people to the rare foreigner does them a remarkable amount of worldly good. I think the idea of an international communication tool is a positive thing, even if I have to bear the guilt that it's the language I was born with. Learning a second language is a worthy occupation. The problem is the business, which exploits its customers, preying on their inferiority complexes to make them open their wallets wide, all the while delivering a product that isn't so entirely good. The problem is this insistence on "nativeness" that allows students to chase an unachievable-for-most goal, and gives companies an excuse to hire teachers (such as myself) with the bare minimum of qualifications.

I've had an incredible year like you can't imagine and I wouldn't want to take that away from anyone else. But I think it's important that teachers maintain a realistic perspective on what it is we're doing here, and so an article like this is a good thing.

Britney's bustin out all over

In the midst of financial freak-outs, because I am not a resident of Ontario and therefore may not qualify for govmt loans. Anyway, I think this may be big news, though only time will tell. I am currently finishing the novel I've been writing for a year and a half, and very pleased with the results. I'm thinking ahead to my next project, which will probably turn into my graduate thesis. I'm excited. I know the characters already. It's going to be a little bit of 1980s Whitby suburbia, Cold War Mania, expatriate family life in the Middle East, the Revolution in Iran. It's going to involve a ton of research and I think I am going to make something really incredible.

We said good bye to Julie tonight. Her bag weighs an absolute ton, and watching her pack was a scary glimpse into our immediate future. We must send another couple of boxed home tomorrow. How does the stuff gather? It's our weekend again, and in view of our imminent poverty, we've elected to stay in town this weekend. The usual karaoke, lunch out, hang about routine. We might go to the garden at Himeji Castle, which we haven't seen yet.

And on with the big news, though I sure you know by now. Britney is pregnant! Has Kevin Federline not heard of birth control? That man has been impregnating women at a crazy rate of late. In less idiotic news, Alice Munro is one of Time's Most influential people. There is a Northrop Frye Lit Festival in Moncton this month. The man who is regrettingly behind the famous necropheliac duck, on being Donald, which is the name of Charles Kennedy's baby son. Ee-na!- a summer music festival guide. A very short excerpt from my beloved Douglas Coupland's new book on Terry Fox. And a sensible perspective on the Japanese textbook debate.

They say our love won't pay the rent

Realizing just how poor we're going to be, as I enter Graduate School and my husband waits for his landed immigrant status. What a way to start our marriage. It's going to be an incredibly crazy couple of years. And beyond that too, I'm sure.

Andrea Dworkin has died. "In a world where teenage girls believe that breast implants will make them happy and where rape convictions are down to a record low of 5.6% of reported rapes; in a public culture which has been relentlessly pornographised, in an academic environment which has allowed postmodernism to remove all politics from feminism, we will miss Andrea Dworkin"- from The Guardian. Her ideas are not easy to stomach, but they get important dialogues started, no matter where they lead. In other feminist news, an attack on Title IX.

Pink Poo in the Press

On the inequality of parenthood. It was an interesting story, but a bit silly and it's tiresome to continually read the tragic plights of women the likes of whom can actually afford nannies and au pairs. I've never been one to knock the upper-middle class, but all the same. Also, when you marry a massively-driven-career-monster, you can't really be surprised when he opts out of household chores. Disappointed, yes but what were you expecting? I did love the woman in this story who has gladly accepted full responsibility for household matters while her husband works, and has given up most of her life to do so. Her child is three! Call her in ten years and see if she's still so content, even with her daytime home help.

In more women-sans-choice news, Hillary Rodham Clinton goes to war to fight the troglodytes for the Morning-After Pill's availability. May she filibuster vigilently.

Fantastic! An interview with Margot Kidder. She describes Pierre Trudeau as a "great lover" and George Bush as "a monkey".

George Elliott Clarke reviews Red Silk: An Anthology of South Asian Canadian Women Poets.

On the fantastic Takashi Murakami art show in New York. This article focuses particularly on Chinatsu Ban's Central Park exhibit, VWX Yellow Elephant Underwear/ HIJ Kiddy Elephant Underwear, which as an elephant-lover I'm obsessed with. Today at work we had a conversation on how the pink pile of elephant poo, spotted with hearts, was very cute, and then we realised we'd been in Japan too long.

Listlessness

Stuart is justifiably often irritated by my obsessive list-making, and so I retired my book of lists this past weekend so we could spend time relaxedly. It was not an unenjoyable experiment, but yet I felt somewhat at a loss. Listless, you might even say. Do you feel listless when you are listless? I'd never thought about it before. We looked it up in the dictionary, and found that that meaning" lacking energy or disinclined to exert effort" comes from root "liste" meaning "to desire" in Middle English. However "list" as in "a series of things in an order" comes from the French "liste" which presumably means something different. It is sad that I do not have lingual authority for my neuroses.

Sakura Haiku

spring comes suddenly
pass hanami afternoons
beneath the blossoms

The Rites of Spring

At Himeji Castle yesterday.

Hanami Afternoon

The freakin weekend has passed all too quickly. Yesterday we went to Kobe Harborland and met my friend Katch for lunch. We went to this fabulous restaurant with an all-you-can eat bread buffet. We actually weren't sure if it was all-you-can-eat, but we treated it as such. This is what happens when you set foreigners loose at a bread buffet. It was comically embarrassing when they had to bring another plate, as all our bread couldn't possibly fit on the three we'd been allotted. We each had an exquisite lunch. I am deeply going to miss Japanese lunch sets- they're phenomenal. We did prikura and then said good bye to Katch and walked for ages to Motomachi to supplement my soup habit, and then farther to Sannomiya to get the train home. I was exhausted by then. A backpack full of soup will do that to you. Last night we hit karaoke and it was great. Stuart was very supportive, and duetted with me to "Almost Paradise- Love Theme From Footloose" and "Always" by Atlantic Starr. In cooler tunes, Hush by Kula Shakur was fantastic. This morning, Stuart went to the gym and I stayed home, presumably to make good use of my time but instead I fell into yet another of my infamous and socially embarrassing scrapes, though I don't want to talk about it. I spent the morning neither writing, working out or cleaning my apartment, but rather clutching my head with idiot angst. We left the house around 1:00 but had to come home after one as it was so warm, and I hate wearing jeans when it's hot outside. It was cotton capris and a sleeveless top, and sandals. Welcome to summer. We went up to the castle and the blossoms were out in full force, absolutely beautiful. We sat on a bamboo mat under the trees, drank and blissed. I played a little guitar and it was truly lovely. Baskin Robbins and more prikura after that. Needless to say, this weekend was an exercise in pleasure.

Another poem

For the April Guardian Poetry Workshop.

Henry Pulling's Dahlias

I'd left my dahlias, unwatered, to die.
Called away on a whim by a not-maiden Aunt.
Rare spontaneity for a banking man such as I.

She had to keep running, though I wasn't sure why.
Brighton, Paris, Madrid, then Istanbul we went.
I'd left my dahlias, unwatered, to die.

My Aunt was a smuggler but I didn't pry.
I left her to her vices though I thought that I shant.
Rare spontaneity for a banking man such as I.

On the Orient Express, something stuck in my eye.
Living on pot and chocolate felt too delinquent.
I'd left my dahlias, unwatered, to die

But the man I'd been before her, I was forced to decry.
I followed her to Paraguay, as was her want.
Rare spontaneity for a banking man such as I.

Too much of my life spent bored, awkward and shy.
Now I'm embroiled in torridness but I dare not recant.
I'd left my dahlias, unwatered, to die.
Rare spontaneity for a banking man such as I.

Poetic Interlude

I wish my enemies were Russians

for the privilege of your naiveté
they played you like an instrument
set against that Europe
your Russia was a love story;
the thinking man’s erotic fantasy.
You wrote odes to odes on lunacy
but even the polarity was illusion
shifty spies confused the confusion.
That war was all in your head;
endless scenes of winter
intrigue. Your house with
picture windows and a fallout shelter;
mutually assured destruction.
Your history was the cinematic stuff
of fiction. The enemies were Russians
with beady eyes and edgy names.
Your symbols were comic book
red menaces and red phones,
iron curtains and star wars.

Just red

Graham Greene, Travels With My Aunt was excellent. I love Graham Greene. His books end so magnificently. This book is quite different from his others, as it's quite whimsical, but has the same measured brilliance. Then Hiroshima by John Hersey. I think after visiting Hiroshima, the experience of reading a book about it is a bit paled, but still an important book that underlines the unnecessary agony of war. There is no excuse for such horror, no matter how great your intentions. And then The Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-Time, which I've been putting off reading due to my illogical problem with adults reading hyped childrens books. Illogical indeed. This book was incredible with the most convincing narrative voice I've read in a long time and a gripping story I stayed up half the night obsessed with.

Books etc.

Okay then, I've accepted the fact it will be too expensive to get to and be admitted to EXPO so it seems that nothing will happen on the way to the World's Fair. I've been reading the papers and I cannot claim understanding of the people who are "shocked" at the Pope's death. In other news, the fascinating life of Amber Reeves, HG Wells' mistress and feminist author in her own right. This article of interest primarily because it's written by my beloved Margaret Drabble. This profile taught me about Laura Nyro and I think I'm in love. Women crime writers are bustin out all over in Moscow. This new book on Virginia Woolf sounds excellent. Tom Bissell's amazing article about visiting Vietnam with his father, which I read previously in UTNE is in The Observer today. A survey of Canadian book habits here, with the truth that "Bookish people tend to be active people".

An awfully skewed perspective

The Pope is dying. Politics aside, he is an eighty-four year old man. Terri Schiavo died. Politics aside, she was living in a vegetative state for a decade and a half. As far as I am concerned, the things that send people out weeping in the streets versus all of that which no one is too worked up about, show an awfully skewed human perspective.

A little out of touch

I saw Spiderman 2 and Fahrenheit 9/11 in the theatres this summer, though long after they were playing in the rest of the world. Did you know that apart from these movies, I haven't watched a new movie in over a year? And then our video store closed, so I didn't even get them as DVD releases. I am an avid magazine reader so I know new movies exist, but I couldn't tell you much about them. What is a Napoleon dynamite? And that Spotless Mind movie with Kate Winslet where she has pink hair and sleeps on a bed on a beach? Not to mention, Sideways, which sounds sort of sexual to me. And what's with Jude Law's ubiquity? I am also sort of glad I didn't see The Aviator. Anyway, the same goes for television- what's this The OC business all the kids are talking about, and the blathering going on about Desperate Housewives? I can't say I miss the television so much, though this is probably because I follow the Eastenders online synopses religiously. But I miss movies, and can't wait to spend a week or three just watching at least one a day. The list of movies I've got to see is absolutely massive.

However out of touch I am however, there is a List of Things I Now Know about Japan.
1) People breakdance every night in the covered arcades wearing crash helmets while they spin on their heads
2) The badasses drive either souped up mini-vans or 1970s Cadillacs
3) Loose kneesocks are the ultimate in rebel schoolgirl wear
4) Tokyo Disneyland has a park called "Disney Sea" beside it but no one can tell me what one does there
5) The number one children's clothing company is called Miki House, the name donning socks, shoes, sweaters, pants and underpants (as I learn daily when young girls in dresses do somersaults in my class)
6) If something is "service", it's free. If you live in a "mansion", it's an apartment. And when you invite someone to your "room", you're really just inviting them to your "mansion". A sundae is a "parfait". Allergies are "allurgee"- and everybody is currently suffering.
7) Relating to the latter, blowing your nose is rude, but snorting it back is ok. (I fear social problems when I return to the real world).
8) Crews of volunteers clean up local public areas every Saturday morning wearing identical jump suits. In fact, any group of people doing anything wear identical jump suits.
9) Black vans with big red suns drive around regularly with loud speakers blaring, "Foreigners, get out...
10) The people who are employed to unnecessarily guide cars out of parking lots carry light sabres.

Literature is not a verb

Polly Toynbee on consumerist voting and the danger of eating politicians for dinner. This lot manage to make the politicians look noble. Regarding books, the golden age of kid lit. Some interesting ideas about storytelling- from Rana Dasgupta Tokyo Cancelled; this collection of stranded travellers sharing stories presents literature "as something that normal people do. If it seems fantastical that a collection of travellers might tell such stories then this raises the question of why it is so much easier to stomach the idea that Chaucerian illiterates might do so." And then Ian McEwan's Saturday- neurosurgeon-lit. Indeed, literature about a man to whom literature means nothing. New April poetry exercise here at The Guardian Books. Today we bought Paper Tigers by the Caesars. It's an excellent album. And I continue to be quite overwhelmed/underwhelmed by recent events.

They are pleased to inform us

My mother called at 2:00 this morning, interrupting sleep and our plans for a day trip today to Kurashiki, to inform me that I have been accepted to the graduate program I've been dreaming of for about two years now. So that is the good good news, and I'm quite blown over by it.

Yesterday was a busy day. We finished our wedding invitations and posted most of them (so watch your mailboxes. You just could be an invitee!) We went to pick up the porcelain Hello Kitty in a kimono that I've been lusting after for months, and ran other errands. It was a beautiful day, and I was outdoors with just a hoodie for warmth. We went to Himeji castle where sakura (cherry blossom) season is just about upon us. The cherry blossoms are only buds at the moment, but lanterns deck the castle grounds, and it's lousy with tourists. Next week it will be madness, acres jammed with drunken Japanese people under the blossoms with portable karaoke machines and copious sake. Hanami (cherry blossom viewing parties) is one of the most remarkable experiences I have had here and it's wonderful to be here and experience it again. I haven't been following the daily Sakura report (absolutely a weather report with flowers on the map rather than sunshine and rainclouds) on the Japanese news (it takes a mighty constitution to stomach the Japanese news), but apparently they're due in a matter of days. And yesterday I lay down on the grass, and watched the blue sky turn above me, and after any long winter that's quite a formidable experience. Anyway, we went to the gym after that. I am getting better at the gym, since the first day where I couldn't read the changeroom signs and didn't know which one to go into and cried. And went out to the izakaya last night with friends from work. I didn't drink as my tuberculosis is acting up, but we ate so much and had a wonderful time. Always the double mark of a good evening.