The Quiet Ripple Defines The Pond

I have always loved going places by boat. My earliest memory is a trip from Campbeltown to Greenock on a steamer. I cannot quantify the excitement. Today I go from Okinawa to Tsuken, the island of carrots.

Notice Carrot metaphor

So Tsuken Island is a little patch of land off the east coat of Okinawa. 30 minutes on the ferry and you are there. The great joy of this trip is the birdwatching .

OK this is fairly specialized but stay with me. Okinawa stands out amongst other sea adjacent places I have lived in by having virtually no seabirds.

I live on an island in the middle of the East China Sea yet there are no Seagulls going “gaaa gaaa gaa gaa.” No Guillemots going, ” Gur gur gur gur.”  The only seabirds are Terns and they are very difficult to spot. So great joy as my boat trip reveals two rare species of Terns.

Dudes ! This is the Black- Naped Tern. Bad photo I know but taken from far away from moving boat.

On the same  seawall!

Roseate Tern! Black hood, red legs.

I arrive on Tsuken Island on fancy bike. Big Red don’t worry this is temporary

So many beaches! No one here.

Pluke

Hermit crabs party

Lady does carrot stuff

Old Boats

Groan, Pacific Swallow

The boat back was much smaller.

My bike and obscure root vegetables leave the island

Phew, it is getting hot.

So I set off on an adventure. I am early for the boat so I set off on the bike to find a restaurant. I am on the East side of Okinawa, just across the road from a fishing port.There is a restaurant.  Hmmm, good place to eat I grunt.

There is an anchor outside

I am very hot and sweaty from cycling and I order a beer.

Nymph in thy Orions be all my sins remembered

The menu is all in Japanese. I order something. I have absolutely no idea what I will get. This is wild because in er, like, normal life we are defined by what we choose. Which car, which jeans, which music, which political party, he can’t be a man cos he doesn’t smoke the same cigarettes as me.

In Okinawa, I am childlike and love it. I stab at the menu : the waitress says “Hai!!” I am not what I choose.

This is what I get.

Quelle surprise!

Chicken fried steak, fries, Milton Keynes Chinese Restaurant soup. I have not eaten anything like this for 5 months.

No, you can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want
And if you try sometime you find
You get what you need

I am not what I choose. What liberation!

I will go on a little bit about the field that is quite close to my apartment. When I got here in February it was fallow. I then spied a man working it with a large motoculteur, which I believe is rotivator in English but for me these machines will always be motoculteurs. He broke it up nicely and then painstakingly built up drills. One morning on my way to work I spied him. He was shuffling along the drills planting by hand.  I returned in the evening and he had almost  finished planting the whole field. Which reminds me of a joke.

In the jailhouse.

Paddy Ugly,  “What are you in for?”

Paddy Sweet, ” I dug up a couple of praties and the landlord caught me eating them. I got two weeks.” “What about you?”

Paddy Ugly, “I got life for rape.”

Paddy Sweet, “Crivens! You must have eaten the whole field!”

A thing of beauty is a joy forever

So the photo above was taken a couple of days post planting. Immediately post planting the little plantings were all weak and floppy – would they make it? Obviously yes, but little did they know that far to the South;  gathering its brows like gathering storm, nursing its wrath to keep it warm, was typhoon Sogda.

The wind burnt the fledglings beyond hope.

God is er unpredictable

Why does God want us to suffer?

The man  put in  I do not know how many hundred plants by hand.  A week later they are destroyed. I mean,  it’s not fair. Isn’t there some kind of tribunal he could complain to? What is the Government going to do?

He loves us!

This morning the same blasted plants are  kicking out the old pessimism and are bursting into life.  Forgiveness and redemption.

Blue sky, turquoise sea and a strong wind to add a little chop to the waves, perfect conditions for the annual Haari Boat races in Maeganeku Fishing Port. Our teams had been practicising in an academic fashion over the previous couple of weeks and their devotion was rewarded when in its heat, to general surprise, the first boat surged ahead from the starting gun.  A deep understanding of wave functions and dopamine paid off at the last turn as the our boat, the crew paddling like young Gods, shot out two boat lengths ahead of their rivals.

Swing swing together,With your bodies between your knees.

A famous victory; but regretfully not amongst the six fastest times and so the team left the competition unbeaten but unqualified for the next round.

Spot the turtle!

The second  boat adopted a different strategy to make their mark.

Second boat gets into the mood

By cleverly using an asynchronous paddling technique and gales of laughter they obliged the commentator to explain all about our new university to the very large crowd during the rather longer than usual time the boat needed to complete the course.

Asynchronous

If not the fastest boat the second crew certainly had the most fun.

The whole village is there. We all eat black squid and pork soup and have a ball.

Biggest vat of squid and pork soup that any us are likely to come across

What it does to you

The winners of the women's final

Then boats appear and dump loads of fruit in the water.  The kids charge in and collect as much as they can. Very polynesian.

Having the best time

I wonder how long this game goes back?

Spectatrices

I get up this morning – eat some miso soup and fire up the computer. My niece has posted a video of Beyonce on Facebook which I look at in a desultory sort of way. I have heard of Beyonce but never listened.  I do know she is really famous. Half way through this very high production clip two young guys dance with her. I know them!   Ouais! C’est Les Twins.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkqUTY3G13M

Met them on a truly memorable night in San Francisco. It was 8 November.http://spikekalashnikov.wordpress.com/2010/11/09/les-twins/

They were incredibly talented – very sweet – very young – very excited about California- very far from fame.  23 May they are in Vegas at the Billboard Awards performing with Beyonce.

This made me very happy. Young people making it. Dreams coming true.  Not “I could have been a contender” but “I won!” Somehow it all makes sense. If you are good – if you work at it – if you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, then you go to Vegas my son.

Here they are in San Francisco the day after we all danced.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utf856lIKoU

The worst thing about yesterday’s typhoon was that it started too late so I could not see its full fury. It built during the afternoon and went totally crazy at about 9:00 – too late to see.

Barographs don't usually do much. The same old line just goes round and round for weeks on end with minimal variation. Check this: This is last night! The dip to the right is last week's storm which impressed greatly at the time.

Howling and screaming the storm scared me and I only went outside when I realized that my diving gear that I thought was in a place sheltered from the wind was about to be blown away. I rescued it but was literally blown off my feet. This very amateur video may give you some idea – it gets confused when I fall over.

All power goes and I go to bed in the pitch dark with only my IPad to light my way.

I wake at 6:00 and everything is back to normal except the countryside looks like a huge comb has been dragged through it.

"The green reed which bends in the wind is stronger than the mighty oak which breaks in a storm." — Confucius

I watched a farmer plant each on of these whatever they are by hand. Took him the whole day

This morning

I think he will have to start again.

Shame

Poor butterfly with tattered wings. Where do butterflies go during Typhoons?

Roadkill

So here’s to you Captain McWhirr. I cannot imagine being out on a boat during that kind of thing.

Life goes on - on the balcony flowers as I write- where did she hide?

Big typhoon on its way. Hooray! Will I be tested like MacWhirr?

“Captain MacWhirr had sailed over the surface of the oceans as some men go skimming over the years of existence to sink gently into a placid grave, ignorant of life to the last, without ever having been made to see all it may contain of perfidy, of violence, and of terror. There are on sea and land such men thus fortunate — or thus disdained by destiny or by the sea”

Is this me?

Yikes

“The sea  had the surface and the shimmer of an undulating piece of gray silk. The sun, pale and without rays, poured down leaden heat in a strangely indecisive light, and the Chinamen were lying prostrate about the decks.”

Calm before the er um I mean

On its way

Stay tuned

Vegetation here is science fictionish. Spikey- bulbous –  alien – prehistoric. I expect to see a huge purple and yellow iguana  emerge and crunch a scarlet/navy terrapin.

spikey

Eat me

Spielberg

Take me to your leader

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the tropic air.

Douglas Adams

It is a truth universally acknowledged that no matter where you go you will find a group of people playing Irish traditional music. Okinawa ? A Japanese island  somewhat lost in the East China Sea.  I had resigned myself to the occasional playing with myself in the apartment rather than the healthy interaction with others when a stray conversation guided me to The Smugglers in Naha city.

http://smugglers.nahashop.com/index.html

The strains of “The Wild Rover” greet me as I approach the door. My nostrils flare with elitism. Inside there is a 5 piece band who appear to have taken a lot of ecstasy.  They are fronted by the best Irish band mouthpiece I have ever met – Maho Nakajima. The consistent problem with Irish bands is that they look very unhappy. They hunch over their instruments and concentrate on their haemmorhoids. “Thank you that was a set of jigs and now we will play a set of reels that we got from old Spike O’Luggage from Quilty.”

Psycho

Maho howls and wails between tunes. She speaks perfect English and is a very fine fiddler. However it is her stagewomanship that transforms the normally doctor’s waiting room atmosphere of the Irish session into frenzied Ibizan rave.  She and the other very talented fiddler even do dance routines while playing.  The crowd goes wild.

Good Golly Miss Monaghan

Colleens from Naha

I love the Okinawans. They really want to have a good time and you would have to explain the concept of condescension to them.

We play  – The Rakes of Mallow – The Irish Washerwoman – The Kesh Jig  and loads of polkas. Not usually cool but with rampant Okinawan colleens and Maho howling exhortations we have the best evening.

I think this is going to be fun – think I will buy a zoot suit.

In my mail box I find this.

Que?

Seika explains that this indicates that the postman called and there was no one at home. She phones and the postman will come by between 7:00 and 9:00 to deliver. At night that is. I get home at 7:00 on the dot and this is what it looked like from my terrace.

Gentle

7:02 the bell rings and there is grinning postman with a package for me. Thank you Japanese Postal Service.

It is a box of Black Magic chocolates sent by my sister from England. Black Magic have been around for a very long time – since 1933 apparently. One of my clearest childhood memories of joy was getting a cricket bat and an uber box of Black Magic for my 11th – I think – birthday. Now for my 59th birthday I get another.

Suffered a bit battling through the typhoons

I have not seen a box for at least 30 years. Tastes from childhood  – Raspberry Parfait- A luxurious creme perfectly blended with raspberry flavour dipped in fine dark chocolate. Caramel Caress – Flowing golden caramel caressed with dark chocolate.

Prince Phillip at it

Black Magic
the red ribbon tied in a neat diagonal bow
the red Turkish tassel
the pony-tail for show

Years later
the box still oozing chocolate fumes
a few old photographs a letter
the weave of other looms

You were Black Magic
that dark chocolate voice
your rich fruit centre
the most exotic choice

Almost back beyond memory
when porcelain women wore long tapered dresses down to their shiny shoes
you were the shapes of a fairy
a spirit a music a muse

Thanks Rosy!