Ohanami

I went to Ohanami (Cherry blossom-viewing picnic) last Sunday with my friends.

Ohanami is very popular among Japanese in Sakura (cherry blossoms) season.

Poeple eat Bento (boxed meal) and drink Sake under fully blooming cherry trees.

We were very lucky that it was very warm sunny sunday and it was the day that cherry reached fully bloomed. (untill saturday, it was not yet blooming fully, coz it had been a bit chilly.)



Even we look down on the ground, cute modest wild flowers are blooming.
I enjoyed their beauty too.

Permed Me!

I had my hair permed.
This is the second time to make my hair this much messy. :-)

I like it very much.
And so far, I am enjoying to see people's reactions with open eyes surprise!

Spring is the time for wild edible plants

Bamboo Shoots,
These are also brought by a guy who digged them just this morning.

The most precious thing with these freely given foods is in it that we were remembered when someone harvested something tasty and he/her thought of bringing them to us.
It surely made all of us happy, even the one who gave it to us.

The tip to get something tasty for free is not to hesitate to share with people anything I found nice and not to hesitate give out things that I found it will make someone happy.
We have to stimulate a circulation of caring by starting giving out.

Also not to forget the feeling of thanksness. :-)

Gifted Dinner

Living in my place srounded by many good people (many farming, sometimes a fisherman), most of the time, in my dishes, there are something that are given from someone.

Last night, all of these are given from a fisherman (abalone and smoked scallop) and from my friend (freshly harvested asparagus).
I brought these to my friends' house and we shared food and happy time together.

I send this out today,

Can you see these colorful frogs in the prastic bags.
To read the message, they have to place the frogs in order.
Hope they will be able to read it in right way.

Jun, Jet,
these books are for Julian and Marc,
I sent it out today to AsiaDHRRA.
If they can't find the order, there are numbers on the back side. just follow it. :-)

If you were 6 years old, can this make you happy???

To send 2 books to my little friends in the Phil, I enclosed messages in this way.

To make this short message, I had to fold more than 40 paper frogs.

Hope they will like this way of getting messages.

So How was the Oracle I got from the Daruma???

So how was the result???

It was "Daikichi"! the best one!!!!
According to the paper, my everything will go very well, work, money, human relations and love, having kids!!! even!!!
Really!
fufu, may be I used up all of my luck this year for picking up the best paper out of the many Darumas...

Haaaa,
Let's see if it will be realized.

Many Daruma Dolls with Different Faces

This is how they are selling the "Daruma dolls with fortune papers"
You can see all the faces are different.
I just choose one from this many Darumas and placed 300yen instead on the empty place made after I picked up the Daruma doll.

Usually "Omikuji (fortune telling paper in shrines)" doesn't look like this, its just a paper.
This was atractive enough for me to pick up one of them. :-)

The paper is in the doll.

Its made of wood, and in a hole at the bottom, there is a paper put in.
that is telling about my fortune this year.

Hear an oracle from the cute Daruma doll.

At a temple I dropped by, I found the cute daruma doll was sold in which paper fortune is.
Japanese people usually buy fortune paper "Omikuji", when they have the first visit to a shrine.
It is to see their fortune of the year.
This year, I didn't buy the fortune paper with my first shrine visit, I bought the Daruma doll fortune paper.
Isn't this cute?

A Big Japanese Citrus

It was very tasty and fun to wear on our heads.

Big Citrus

We had this big Japanese citrus.
It was very tasty. After we peeled, we all....

A Visitor from Thailand

I was having a visitor from Thailand last week, from Monday to Sunday.
She came from a NGO working for Thai farmers.
This time she came to my organization to get reserch on Organic Farming Situationer in Japan.
While she was here, she was staying in my house.
I enjoyed to share time, meals and my house with her for that week.
I, all in all, like people from south east Asia.
She, unlike some Japanese people and like most of the Fillipinos, had atmosphere not to make anyone nervous or worry for example about time or shedule.
She was just there smiling, and if something didn't go as it planed, it is not the big matter, we just laughed and that's it.
I really had good time, but because I had to work for her, I couldn't do my work last week at all.
Huhu, very busy days are waiting for me...
The one in the left is her.
This is the pix we took in my friends' house with my friend and her husband when we had dinner together. :-)

Chatarjee Carry

A Indian guy, Chatarjee visited our office.
He is heading a rural dev NGO in India and has been had good relationship with our organization.
Whenever he stays in our place, he cooks super yammy carries everyday.
Today, he cooked 2 different carries.
Chicken carry (Chicken, Potatoes, Onion and green chili) and Vegetale carry(radish, sweet potatoes, squash, radish leaves and dried been powder).
It looks amaging that he makes up the carry taste with many different kind of spices.

Yoga

I started Yoga from last week.
Once a week Yoga session allows me to reset myself for the coming week.
Consentrating into my body work, every movement of my spine, tendon and nerves, makes me empty so that I can be opened and ready to accept new things from outsdide.

Okuyama Meiboku Ten

These are the pix of the book store inside.
Can you see they are selling wood too, some wood are placed behind books. It looks part of interior design. Cool!
I bought these 3 books today.
"Messages from Antonio Gaudi"
"Men who are groaning with love affairs"
"Story of Moomin　Ｔroll (Finnish story book)"

Okuyama Meiboku Ten In Tsu city, Mie prefecture

This is a book store we found 2 weeks ago when we lost our way. The name of the shop is "Okuyama Meiboku Ten (Okuyama (family name) Meiboku (wood) Ten (shop). As the name shows, they sell wood, but they are selling books too.
I like their book selection. There are many books about art, architecture, wood and forest, and some other interesting themes. I like the atmosphere inside. Its cozy with nice music and smells of wood and books. Also the big windows can bring warm sun light into the shop. I feel happy to browse many books in the shop.
Today I bought 3 books. 

Lastly, Lolo Angelo :-)

Lolo Angelo is Miren's neighbor.
According to Miren, he knows many old stories and old skills to make things out of trees and so on.
On the way down to the village, he was on farm work and shouted to us that "You get some veges from my harvest". And when we were on the way back to Miren's house, we found a bagfull of veges freshly harvested from his farm and left beside the small wooden fence deviding his farm and the path!
Hearing our voice of joy, he came out to the balcony and we exchanged some words.
It was Sayang we didn't have time to talk more with him.
But even though I couldn't talk with him much, I could feel from his appearance that he is a very special one like an Angel.
Hope to talk with him more next time when I visit Miren.
I have to learn Spanish for it.

A Basque House

What a beautiful contrast with the blue sky and the white wall.
This was taken in a small town just 15mins distance from Miren's house.
The town was peaceful and people were happy and warm.
I remember the color of the eaves was green, although it can't be recognized from this picture.

Walking a forest behind

Miren's neighbor, Begonia brought me to a forest behind her house. I had some short walk with her and her doggies. I found many acons fallen off from trees. According to Begonia, if we can find many acons fallen off in autumn, the coming winter will be very cold.
I collected some of them for my Japanese friend who loves acons and studied about it in a university.

Miren's farm

Miren's house and the farm around was just so great!
On the night we arrived, very strong wind was blowing and we had blackout!! According to Miren, it seldom happens.
Oh really! so I was lucky to have this very rare occasion:-) We spent the night with candle rights. And the most great thing was stars in the dark sky.
I haven't seen that much stars in my life. It was FULL of stars. Millions of stars were closing down on me!!!
I was out rapping myself with a thick wool branket and just looking up the sky.
Also very chilly air hitting my cheeks and the smells of the wind was lovely.

Playing with Water

While I was playing with seawater with bear feet, these cute kids (Miren's nephew and niece) was making a stage for my favorite shoes.
It looks like a ship bravely heading to the big waves. 

Beach Beach Beach!!!

The purpose of this visit was to attend a congress. After the congress finished, My friend Miren brought me to her place.
On the way, we dropped by a beautiful beach and could see her relatives.

A Dog Bar Hopping

I went to Basque in Spain.
On a small street of San Sebastian, I found a dog bar hopping.
There are many small bars like this where people are enjoying drinking and chatting.
The dog went into the bar, threading his way through people's legs, looking for food on the floor, and after he went 1 round, he went to the next.
No one was either caring about him nor kicking him out.

What I observe often when I travel abroad is faces of stray dogs.
They look more relaxed and easier than these of Japanese dogs.
So do humans'.

Pasta with Genovese Sauce

Easy and super yummy lunch. :-)~

Grind it by Jucer

 

Genovese sauce

I am gona make basil paste.
Olive oil. Parmesan Cheeze, Garlic, Fresh Basil and walnuts.
According to recepies for Genovese sauce, pine nuts are used instead of walnuts.
But since pine nuts is very expensive in Japan, I used walnut. instead.

Today's Lunch

Freshly harvested Basil from a yard of our office.
Can u see the green small spider is on the leaf?
Cute! 

Persimmon

Here it is.
Very sweet and jucy.

:-)~

Letter from autumn "Persimmon" (Kaki)

We got a persimmon from one of graduates of Ainou high school which is locating in a same lot of our office.
He got this from his old classmate.
These are very beautiful and tasty but can't sell to markets since it has scars or the size is out of standard.

Today it was really autumn fine day with clear light blue sky in high place.