The Year of the Dragon, Day Two

The Year of the Dragon is off to a rather inauspicious start. The camera has not yet surfaced. What? Me worry? Not until I work my way through a backlog of pictures I've been meaning to share. Surely the camera is somewhere under all the Christmas debris that I fully intend to tackle once we get back from escorting College Boy to the airport tomorrow.  Or maybe I left it at the Indian restaurant in Hayama last week in which case it won't take a lot of arm-twisting to convince the Ancient Mariner to make a return visit.

While I can't speak for College Boy (more's the pity), I imagine he'll be feeling terribly sad when he boards that airplane and leaves Japan for what could very well be the last time.  We will have moved back to the States by the time his school year ends.  When will he see his girlfriend again?  This is definitely the downside of living overseas during high school.  "You can never go home again" takes on a whole new meaning.

Now for some pictures.  I snapped these in early December when we went to the Ikebana International Holiday Bazaar in Tokyo.  The first is one of those rare arrangements to earn an "I could do that!" response from me.  The fences bordering two sides of our Norfolk house are covered with vines that I am forever hacking into shape.  Sticking the debris in a vase would probably be a lot easier than wrestling it into a lawn and garden bag. 

We saw this sign over the restroom door in a subway station near Shiba Park. It cracked me up. Go figure.

In Search of Narcissus in Kamakura

Six stalwart Explorers hiked up, down, and across Kamakura last week in search of narcissus, following the three-hour route recommended in The Flower Lover’s Guide to Tokyo.

Our first adventure in the Year of the Rabbit began at Meigetsu-in, the Buddhist temple in Kita-Kamakura where we saw all those fabulous hydrangeas last June. This time we saw narcissus – a huge relief for the hike organizers – and several whimsical rabbit statues but it was the Buddha statue that captured our hearts.

Then it was uphill all the way for the next 90 minutes or so. Excelsior! Someone was glad she’d thought to bring that walking stick her husband used to climb Mt. Fuji even though it meant trudging all the way back to the train station to retrieve it from where she’d, chuckle, forgotten it next to a vending machine. That stick sure came in handy when the steep trail narrowed and she had to balance herself on the edge of a ravine to let a clutch of nimble elderly Japanese pass. Hiking is a lot like golfing for her. Just exchange whiffs for huffs.

Near the top of the trail we spotted a pair of porta-potties. From the outside they looked like their American counterparts but let’s see how they compare inside.

Sniff, sniff. Gosh, they don’t smell like any American porta-potty I’ve ever had the misfortune to visit. The broom and cleaning supplies in the corner are a nice touch.


Judy, Sheryl holding Kayden, Ishii, and Victoria at summit

Parts of the descent were even steeper than the ascent but Stickwoman generously doled out caramels to all the Japanese congregated on the summit and then they descended ahead of her to break her fall.

Our hike ended at Zuisen-ji where we explored the temple garden laid out in 1327. This was the first time we spotted any narcissus since leaving Meigetsu-in but what amazed us most was that the maple trees had not yet shed their stunning foliage.

Maple leaf falling at Zuisen-ji, January 5, 2011

Between New Year’s Eve and today I have now visited the requisite three temples and shrines. With such an auspicious beginning, I have high hopes for the Year of the Rabbit.

Unsettling In

This house reeks of Harry Potter.

First, there's the address -- #13 Gridley Lane -- pairing an unlucky number with a word that rhymes with grimly.





Then there are the unfortunate ginko trees stretching dozens of partially-amputed limbs toward Azkaban, I mean the weather station, on the steep hill behind the house. That weather station looks especially ominous around midnight, glowing like a pearl against the inky sky and emitting a steady beam of light that is, of course, the color of blood, and this charming vignette is framed by those trees which look an awful lot like mutant monster hands erupting from the ground once the sun sets. "Help me, Kathy! I've been buried alive!"




Third, it's probably just my imagination but the hedge running along the side of the house up toward Azkaban, I mean the weather station, strikes me as just the sort of place Death-Eaters would lurk.

In the daytime there's a half dozen hawks constantly swooping and soaring overhead, hoping to snack on a tasty little dog. They look like a flock of messenger owls announcing a prison outbreak.














Here's the capper: Darlene (pictured at left maintaining a totally straight face) told me there's a Moaning Myrtle rodent dwelling in the pipes beneath the house. She advised (1) keeping the toilet lids down to keep Myrtle from making a surprise appearance inside the house and (2) flushing Myrtle further under the house immediately prior to using the toilet. Has Darlene given me a kind warning to guard against a potential heart attack or has she cast me as the stooge in the best practical joke anyone has pulled on me since my siblings hid my penuche frosting behind the milk carton?

I can't decide so I am playing it safe by checking all three toilet lids hourly until Matt gets the hang of this new routine and by flushing more water down my toilets in five days than everyone else on this base combined flushed in the last fiscal year.

Rest assured I will figure out how to feed Moaning Myrtle to Hedwig and his pals before you come to visit us.