Fall Recap

I realize I've gotten far behind, but I'm finally just going through my photos and I found all the fall foliage photos I took and... well... here's a peak at some I took on two different days in Asukayama Park... sigh...

Merry Christmas!

To Chuck or not to Chuck

That, is the question.
Whether 'tis safer to toss it quietly,
Or to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous proselytism....

When my dad was staying with us a few weeks back he answered the door one day to a woman who he deduced was a political canvasser. He said she seemed very friendly and used gestures to promise she'd be back. I didn't think about it much, hoping the fact that the election was soon to be over would solve it.

But, I have since discovered that it is actually illegal to canvass door-to-door for a political party in Japan (trolling the neighbourhood in a truck with loudspeakers that would make a headbanger band cry, however, is perfectly acceptable - go figure!).

I didn't think about my father's visitor, however, until we got up last Sunday. After a... ahem... VERY late night the night before, we slept in on Sunday and discovered our mailbox full of parcel delivery slips (two! different companies!) and a book wrapped in a plastic baggie. U opened the bag and pulled out the bag and accompanying note. The book is old and worn, the pages are yellowing but it has obviously been carefully cared for. The note, written on scented pink paper decorated with cutesy characters, looks like one written by an eight year old girl to her new penpal in some exotic location.

We can't be sure who left it, but the note does make it seem like the woman who did was a repeat visitor, and it is in English.

Now we have two problems - the local odd cult has marked us as foreign targets, I have no doubt they'll be back. (I don't normally answer the door, however, it is much easier to hang up the inter phone on someone than to shut the door when they've inserted themselves into your doorway!)

And, what to do with the book? I don't want it. The note includes the woman's name, address, and phone number, so I could call her to come and get it, but I hardly want to give her the chance! U didn't like my idea of him using it for English practice, and it is too late in the season for me to send it to my father as a Christmas present. U said to just chuck it, but it's a book and I can't seem to do that...

Ideas?

Wordless Wednesday - Rainy Day Park

On Saturday I went on a walk on my lunch hour. It was rainy and cold and miserable, but still beautiful!

Vending Machines

Japan is well known for its vending machines - drink machines can be found on every street corner and out in what seems to be the middle of nowhere by the edge of a rice field. The norm is drink machines, with heated cans or bottles replacing a row or two of the regular chilled drinks during the colder months. Drinks can vary from sodas, juices, green tea, coffee, and milky black tea to beer, sake, corn soup, or even red bean soup.

Some stations have newspaper vending machines and recently I've seen more snack machines - selling chocolate bars and bright yellow boxes of "Calorie Mate." Parking areas or service areas on the highways have vending machines that will (supposedly) heat up a box of french fries or tako-yaki, and others that will make you a fresh cup of coffee - right from grinding the beans - and show you the whole process in real-time via an internal camera.

Then while shopping the other day I saw a new kind of vending machine... a Proactive face wash machine! It was huge - easily the size of three regular drink vending machines across, and appeared well-stocked.

But I still think my favourite vending machine has to be one that I heard about listening to my favourite news podcast, CBC's As it Happens, the Bibliomat, a home-made vending machine that dispenses used books at the Monkey's Paw second-hand bookstore in Toronto!

Seasonal sights

Summer in Japan is hot and sticky and ugly. Winter, in poorly insulated and badly heated homes, is cold and miserable. Spring and fall, however, can be gorgeous - sunny and warm and full of colour. In the spring it is the cherry blossoms covering everything in pompoms of pink and white, and then raining a snow of petals. In the fall it is ginkos and maples and a host of other trees turning colours from deep yellow to bright bright red. Some people have a clear favourite, the sakura (cherry blossoms)

or the koyo (fall colour),

but others, like me, can't choose just one. The sakura, with their fresh but ephemeral beauty and the koyo with its majestic and awe-inspiring ability to paint an entire hillside a rainbow of reds and yellows.

Well what if you didn't have to choose? What if you could have your sakura AND koyo too?!

Known as ju-gatsu sakura or aki-zakura (October or autumn blooming cherry), there are cherry trees that bloom in the fall, their delicate pink and white petals standing out against the showy vibrant trees.

Sure the sakura were rather scraggly, but sakura AND fall leaves?! Now that is having your cake and eating it too!