The Quiet Ripple Defines The Pond

Tokyo is a big place. The population of greater Tokyo is about 40 million. The population of Scotland is 5 million. San Francisco is less than a million.

I am here spending 14 days of self isolation in a tiny apartment. The Prime Minister, Suga san, announced a state of emergency yesterday. Essentially he says stay at home.

I don’t really understand this but apparently the Japanese Government cannot force citizens to do anything. They can only recommend. Well, I am recommended to stay at home except for food shopping, medical emergency, and recreation. I am recommended not to use to use public transport, metro, taxis, buses.

Anyway, where I am is in the middle of a maze of frankly ugly back streets.

Notwithstanding, I go for treks to exercise myself. The first is to the Sumida Hokusai Museum, which is close to my place. The weather is perfect, blue, crisp. Great walk during which I discover a shabby shop lurking under a railway viaduct that has excellent fish and wine. Can I go into the Museum? Inside is Hokusai’s “The Great Wave off Kanagawa.” This is one of the best known graphics in the world.

I get lost walking home. I spend 20 minutes walking around my building without recognizing it. The Museum is only 10 minutes away.

Today I head off for Asakusa. This is about 25 minutes walk away. Will I ever find my way home?

Asakusa is wonderful. I go to the public toilet. I cannot remember being so happy.

There are lots of people. Stay at home? Maybe they are all, like me, claiming the exercise loophole.

Here is a film.

There are many beautiful young women wearing kimonos. Maybe it is a Saturday tradition to come to Asakusa to be photographed.

Amazingly I found my way home.

At home, I strip off and throw all my clothes in the washing machine. I scrupulously remove all coins, guns, knives etc from my trousers. These trousers are new and have a special pocket to house the Iphone. I forgot about this and remove it not. I put the phone through a 90 minute wash, which killed it.

Do not try to call me.

I leave California, Tokyo bound.

I think I have all the necessary attestations asked for by Japan but the situation is fluid with rumors of Tokyo introducing a state of emergency. Will they let me in when I get there?

Life is full of surprises. I am given a First Class ticket. First Class on ANA is heaven. I am surprised that it is not depicted in medieval paintings of paradise.

My flight leaves at midnight. James takes me to SFO early. I intend to sprawl in the First Class Lounge until I am carried onto the plane. Check in is very long; so many health papers to process. No way onto the flight unless all Covid tests have been documented. When finished I hungrily ask about lounges. “We apologize sir, but all lounges are closed due to COVID-19.” ,

The central theme of traveling internationally in these times of pestilence is emptiness. SFO is empty, the flight is empty, Haneda, when I get there, is empty.

Here is a movie about the trip.

What makes ANA better than all airlines I know is the staff. They are funny, relaxed, super efficient.

I get a separate bedroom and nice, new pyjamas. I sleep for 9 hours and am issued off the plane on arrival by Immigration Officers.

First Class vainglory starts as I am taken off first. I go through several different stations each of which has a certain bureaucratic task. I am terrified that there will be something wrong with my paperwork but I successfully arrive in a booth where I have to salivate into a little plastic tube. The sailva is tested for COVID-19.

From there I am directed to a waiting area to er await the results.

Everything has gone swimmingly but now the tide turns. I mean I travelled First Class. I have been at the front of every queue. In fact there are no queues but I am full of pomp and vainglory. In the waiting room, everyone’s number is called before mine. I am #20. In the 40’s I start to worry that everything has gone wrong. I am positive, I have the wrong paperwork. Since school days I have been naturally guilty.

What joy when my number 20 lights up on the screen!

I am afraid I cannot remember the number of posts I went through before I finally got my passport stamped and burst into baggage collection. There were a lot. They were all staffed by young Japanese, nearly all women. I don’t think any of them were over 30. They were smiling, welcoming, super efficient and spoke great English. I think they must have been trained up in anticipation of the 2020 Olympics. COVID-19 has made use of their skills. Thanks to you all.

I am driven to a bland apartment block somewhere in Tokyo.

I have not been to downtown San Francisco before today. It was a shock. Out here by the Panhandle, life has certainly changed because of COVID-19 but you know not super extravagantly. Out there, where the Snow Goose roams, life goes on more or less the same. I wonder what the geese think.

Downtown is different. It is unrecognizable; principally because it is deserted.

Union Square, once an epicentre of world consumerism is deserted apart from a nice lady giving away free food.

All the stores are closed, even the Apple Store! Powell St, famed for its street cars, runs alongside the square. You could have a picnic in the centre of the road now. Well, you would have move occasionally to let a street car rattle by. The two I see are both empty! Empty street cars – hard to believe!

I am downtown to get a COVID-19 test. I soon return to Japan and a prerequisite for entry is a negative covid test less than 72 hours old.

The test is not really painful but odd. I cannot remember the last time someone stuck a Q tip right up my nose. I get my results tomorrow – wish me luck!

Here are some birds to make you happy.

Happy New Year everyone! Let’s hope for an improvement.

Slough is a city in the South of England that no-one seems to like much.

“Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
It isn’t fit for humans now,” John Betjeman

It is pronounced like the sound you make when you cut off your finger. John Bunyan’s Slough of Despond in Pilgrim’s Progress does not sound very nice – wetland bog, sludge, mire, slime.

It is this meaning that has been exported to the U.S. Here it is pronounced slough as in slew. “But as he was ambitious I slew him.”

Anyway, James and I go for a Boxing day ramble to Elkhorn Slough. We break out the Zodiac and electric motor that have been maturing in the store room.

So much wildlife! Sea Otters, Sea Lions, Harbor Seals, so many birds that I am too idle to list.

A wonderful day. We are weary and chilled. As we head out in the late afternoon, James checks, on his phone, Hamburger Restaurants further on down the road. He phones in our order, which we pick up 10 minutes later. This kind of stuff is a revelation to me.

I get a Cheeseburger with Bacon. We eat as we charge over the coastal mountains towards 280. It is the best thing I have ever eaten!

I came over to San Francisco because the landlord is selling the building that our apartment finds itself in. This is an opportunity for the new owner to kick us out. I really do not want to be kicked out. I consult with a lawyer. Because of my advanced age and the fact I have lived there for more than 10 years, it appears unlikely that they can send in the bailiffs. Good.

Covid is rampant in the city and the latest lockdown rules forbid social interaction between others than immediate household members. This means I cannot visit friends, another reason for the trip from Japan. Long trips are discouraged, ruling out new camper adventures. There is not much to do.

I can go on recreational walks, so I do a lot of this. San Francisco and the weather are beautiful so I wallow in both.

I ramble around Haight Ashbury and NOPA. The houses were spared the 1906 earthquake and fire. Some of the most beautiful Victorians are here.

Signs of Covid are everywhere.

I meet the Grateful Dead on Haight.

I traipse around the Mission.

I amble around Alamo Square.

Mostly, I snuggle in my very cosy room.

Not the wildest Xmas but I guiltily quite like having an excuse to sit in front of my fire worrying about getting gout.

Compliments of the season everyone !

Swooping down the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada on I 80, I have not a care in the world. The scenery is dramatic, the novel playing from the car sound system is excellent, I am cosy, 3 maybe 4 hours back to San Francisco..

I accelerate to overtake someone who is going even slower than me. No obvious change in speed but I hear the frantic howling of a high revving engine. I look behind and sure enough there is tuned up Japanese sports machine howling past. I am reassured. I accelerate again and back comes the high rev howl. I look at the rev counter – 6,000rpm! I don’t think the engine has been much above 3,000 rpm all her life. The noise is coming from my truck, I am over revving her. There is no acceleration. My engine has become a detached element from the drive chain. Essentially my clutch has busted.

Ouch, bad, bad news!

Lucky as always, this does not happen in one of the remote snow filled canyons where I have lately spent my time, indeed I roll to a stop on the hard shoulder just in front of the Exit 121 sign. I am able to walk off the freeway into the crazy landscape of cheap motels, gas stations, run down malls, liquor stores, fast food restaurants that line the freeway. I get the number for a tow truck from a motel reception and an hour later my truck has been offloaded outside an Auto Shop.

It is 4:00pm Saturday. “Closed for the weekend,” says the tow truck driver, “No idea if it will be open on Monday, nearly all repair shops have closed because of the virus.”

“What can I do in Auburn?”

“Not much to do around here .” He replies ominously.

I check in at a Super 6 motel.

All museums are closed, restaurants only serve food to go. It is  pouring with rain. I go to a store, stock up on food and drink and go back to hibernate in my hotel room. I make a bear nest on the bed and snuggle. Saturday afternoon and Sunday pass almost unnoticed as I doze, shower, sleep, eat, drink, read, watch lots of US TV. I thoroughly enjoy myself.

9:00 Monday morning, I am outside Jeff’s Auto Repair. It is open!  I explain what happened and Jeff says ”It’s the clutch”

I know it is the clutch and want to engage Jeff on the hydraulic system that pushes the clutch plates, the clutch springs, and maybe a worn plate. He looks a bit confused and reassures me that he can put in a new clutch and seeing as I am stuck he will start right away. I am confronted with US car mechanics. Rather than repair, they just bolt on a new unit. So I am to get a new clutch.

How to spend another day in Auburn waiting for the call announcing the truck is fixed?

There is nowhere to go. There is nowhere to sit down. I have a whole day ahead of me. I wander around the waste land of restaurants, motels, gas stations, clutching a plastic bag. I am a vagrant. The cops move me on. I finally find a bench in a scruffy little mall. I am so pleased. It has stopped raining and I sit on my bench and write this in the sun.

How much longer will I be here? Will I get picked up for being homeless? 

Across the scruffy plaza I spot a table and chair outside a bagel place. I wander over and am greeted by Jasmin who says, “Let me look after you.”  She thinks I am homeless. She is the best person.

I sit at the table, Jasmin gives me the wifi password. It is cold. Over the next few hours she makes me a perfect beef sandwich, an Americano with an extra shot, home made potato soup and a big smoothie. Paradise.

I finally stumble back to Jeff’s auto shop around 4:30, it is getting dark. The truck is fixed! The old clutch plate is worn down to the metal!

Jeff and Dominic also replace a shot universal joint and re rig my exhaust pipe support. Good guys. I finally make it back home at 8:00. Great adventures and the truck now has a new clutch. I find this very reassuring.

Lock down in San Francisco. I find nothing in the rules about not traveling and so I decide to head off into the high hills of Northern California and the lost deserts of Nevada. The goal is to soak in natural hot springs overlooking thousands of square miles of emptiness. Cowboy Onsen.

We drive through orchards, cattle farms and vast spaces. I cannot remember where I stayed the first night but I do remember it being very cold. As usual the camper’s furnace is not working but just in case I had bought a small internal propane heater.

The next day we bumble through fantastic remote country. We see eagles, real cowboys, countless deer and end up camping at the idyllic Blue Lake.

The next day I search for hot springs. I have little success. I have a book, but it is woefully out of date. The first 4 I found are now closed off with barbed wire. The 5th just did not look appealing.

I search around for somewhere to camp and find a great spot under a tree. The sky gets darker and soon it is snowing heavily. I am very snug in the camper but the problem with snow is it covers up the tracks of you coming in and on the way out, it is so easy to drive off the road into terrible trouble.

The radio announces very heavy snow and so I abandon cowboy onsen project and turn for home.

I stay just ahead of the snow and get on I 80 at Reno. Up into the mountains, past Donner Lake, Truckee and into California. I swoop down the west slopes of the Sierras knowing that in just a few hours I will be home. I sing like Yves Montand in the last scene of Le Salaire de la Peur. Actually he doesn’t sing but hums along to The Blue Danube. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Fear

I head North to the open country, away from the heaving miasma of San Francisco Covid.

At this time of year, tens, probably thousands of er thousands of Snow Geese and Ross’ Geese come to feed and gently spend the winter on the wetlands north of Sacramento.

They are an amazing sight.

They, along with White Fronted Geese, sit on the shallow water squabbling until spooked by an eagle or maybe airplane. Then thousands take off with a whoosh!

I spend 2 days. The weather is beautiful and the wildlife astonishing. California!

I drive over coastal mountains to Point Reyes. Fall colors.

Last year you could hardly move for the Elephant Seals and Elk on Point Reyes. This year I saw er none. Boo.

It was a great trip, so soon I am so far from Okinawa. The drive back into San Francisco never fails to please.

So lockdown has been tightened. Curfew from 10:00 to 05:00. This no hardship fo me as I like to be snuggled by that late hour. However no meeting with others than immediate household is a bad one. I have come over to see lots of friends and this appears compromised.

Such a strange trip. There were only about 20 people on the huge Boeing from Tokyo to San Francisco. Boarding was very dignified as there was hardly anyone there.

San Francisco airport is deserted. I walk straight from the plane to the immigration check and am outside in 10 minutes. There are no shuttles, no cabs. There is a lady who will call you a cab. I am the only client. 101 into the city is almost without traffic, so strange.

I wake up very early and go for a stroll.

So here I am. The city is crawling with Covid!

I was employed this month and actually paid real money. I determine to spend it on a Farewell, Thanksgiving, Xmas dinner. I like nothing better than sitting around a beautifully laid table, groaning under the weight of fine food and excellent wine, being jolly with good friends.

We set off to various fish markets to buy fabulous fresh seafood. During the quick lunch break I decide to eat the big fish eyeball in my fish soup.

The menu is :

Sashimi and Oysters

Steamed clams, big ones

Pan fried Scallops in cream sauce

Russian Potatoes (Thanks Arisa)

Salad with exotic dressing (Thanks Izumi, unfortunately I was at the stove when she explained exactly what the dressing was.)

Pan seared Foie Gras

Blanc de poulet a la creme.

Apple Crumble cake with cream, strawberries and Nagano apples (Thanks Mary and Tomomi)

We drank; White Bordeaux, Chablis, Vouvray, Champagne, Morgon and quality Sake (Thanks Ichiro san)

Unforgettable meal. Hilarious conversation.

Now I am off to Covid infested San Francisco. At least I will pass away happy!