Green triangles, red cylinders: Japanese soup

At the 7-11 in Japan in winter, you can get hot soup.  You use tongs and a ladle to chose from among some 12 cages in hot broth.  If a clerk helps with the slippery exchange, you can name the shape--if you know it or can read. The descriptions are written for triangular grey green herb gelatin; weiner; egg; tofu.  

Or you can point. 

Green tea and horseradish

Below the revolving sushi  a conveyor belt holds big teacups.  I put a teacup under the spigot at my place in the Tokyo Station fast food restaurant. Hot water pours into my cup.  But where is the tea?  

I give up on the tea and take a plate with one piece of sushi.  I tap green powder from a can into a dish the size of a silver dollar and mix in some hot water.  I wait -- I know powdered horseradish must set for five minutes.  Alas, the liquid does not thicken; there is no piquancy.  It tastes like tea. 

The powder I tap onto the now lukewarm water floats.  The waitress helps as I mime:  first  put the tea powder into the cup, then add hot water.  Nobody says anything--not the sushi master nor the guy eating next to me.

North east corners are unlucky in Japan, and called the "devils' gate."  My cat exits through a small space between a cinder block fence and a chain link fence; he thus gains entrance  into a quiet cul de sac.  But my stack of boxes was repeatedly removed by my landlords.  Finally, they explained that this was the KIMON, and nothing could block the 30 centimeter square corner.  Thus, the suspended plank leads over the "sacred spot" to the hole between the fences.

Pun on name

The last day of a summer intensive essay writing class for Osaka University graduate and undergraduate students, the class poses with the teacher.

The pun on my name is standard word play.

Fire bucket, Kyoto

Kyoto fights fire with water buckets outside many residences.  The middle symbol means fire--see the two flames?

Cat cave under stairs

In the hot summer, my cat finds the  recess for shoes cool.

Writing Japanese

Japanese children spend years learning what I can practice with small effect.

This effort at writing Japanese carries red corrections by the professor who teaches cadets from other countries at the Defense Academy.

I thought when I learned the syllabalary -- corresponding to a phonetic alphabet-- I would be able to read.  But all the interesting words --and word parts--are written in Chinese characters.  These pictograms are  called Kanji (CHinese letters, literally).

Metamorphosis: cicada

A cicada emerges.  The winged insect metamorphosis took a few hours.  I thought at first two creatures battled.

The close up took place on a Yokohama porch in the summer.

Curvy bamboo

Not all bamboo is straight!  Here is a curvy bamboo in Kyoto at a sightseeing area called Arashimaya in November 2008.   I thought it was fake, but my Japanese friend assured me that it was real.  

"It is curved like a tortoise shell," she said.

Kiko-chiku in Japanese--internodes at stem base are suppressed until 3 feet high.  Phyllostachys herterocycla

My class wanted to pose with me next to the rescue truck after the fire drill at the campus of Osaka University, October 11, 2008.

A fire drill on the university campus today brought this rescue truck in Osaka, Japan.

Tokyo-Osaka hiking trail

Walking around my new neighborhood in Kyoto, I asked a passerby to pronounce this sign. I could enter phonetic into a word processor and match the six kanji and search on the web. It is long hiking trail between Tokyo and Osaka, a few hundred miles. An access point is 20 minutes by foot from my front door in the northern suburbs of Kyoto.

Tokai shizen hodou=long distance nature trail

Kyoto autumn hike

I take a cell phone photo and ask a Japanese friend to translate. Luckily, she is an avid mushroom hunter.

"The sign which says 'dont enter from 25 sep to 10 nov because of harvesting of matsutake mushrooms.'

I have never seen the place where matsutake grow! you know, matsutake grow only under the special paintree and it's so rare to find them!! I wish I could visit kyoto in this season and eat a lot of matsutake."