The Quiet Ripple Defines The Pond

Yay! Apparently that is what I am. Japan now has a new category of work visa. I amazingly get one. I drop off my application to the wonderful Kadena immigration office on Tuesday and on Thursday they call to tell me my visa is ready. I love Japan – everything works here.

Hooray!

I have heard it said that this visa  simplifies application for resident status. This is my goal as it would allow me to grow old in Okinawa. Ok, I am already old but I intend to get somewhat older. Why stay in Okinawa in old age? Here are some arguments.

23 December

23 December

23 December

23 December. I think these are Little Stints. If so, they are right, dead, rare.

If I am going to stay here I need some kind of shelter. I drive North to talk to amazing architect Masak.

Something like this.

Inside

Outside

Sweet dreams are made of this.

I do very little all weekend other than watch the ospreys that fish in front of the house.

These are wonderful birds

Have you ever seen a rainbow like this?

Grey Tailed Tattler. Why Tattler?

Nice to do very little.

Big day today. Lots of action in Tokyo.

Uber VIP room Naha airport

A room in the Cabinet Office

Uber VIP room Haneda airport

This will probably have some impact on my future.

http://www.oist.jp/news-center/news/2016/12/15/dr-peter-gruss-appointed-next-president-oist-graduate-university

Rumi. Sebastien took this photo.

The very graceful Rumi san, even she of baby turtle fame,

https://quietripple.wordpress.com/2016/07/24/scramble/

He took this one also.

left  a big bunch of bananas outside my door this morning. Thanks Rumi san.

She also left me more plumeria cuttings.

Rumi’s banana and plumeria trees.

I was invited to the Gakush Happyo Kai, well this is what it sounded like anyway,at the Onna elementary school. I think it means ‘ What we have been learning’ . It was truly happy making. Japanese kids are adorable.

The programme

Parents sit on floor

Nice day.

This is the name of a bike I have inherited. It is a very fine bike. You will remember it from ancient history in Okinawa. https://quietripple.wordpress.com/2011/06/11/la-zanahoria/

Anyroadupwards, this incredibly high quality instrument has now become mine. I am very happy. What about Big Red you ask?

Big Red just after I purchased her in San Francisco in 2010

Big Red was my companion through one of the healthiest periods of my life. She powered me all around San Francisco and subsequently around Okinawa.

She never done me no wrong

I got lazy, I cycled less, the real crunch was my knee operation which rendered  me old and creaky. I left poor Big Red outside in the howling storm.

Japanese are bikeheads

A very fine pump

I ride my bike.

Big Blue?

Susy? As in supersymmetry.

New bike, I will keep you inside away from the invisible worm. I promise

So Tricolor are a very accomplished and creative bunch. It has been my privilege to spend time with them. They play Irish music that is so Japanese. Check out this video. Incidentally they do all the filming and direction.

Anyway they are in Okinawa. I play with them on Saturday night. This actually puts severe strain on my abilities. Musically clearly, as these people are seriously skilled musicians who understand stuff like harmony, playing in tune, different keys and stuff. I do not.  The real strain comes from driving down to Naha in a continual traffic jam and then trying to find somewhere to park.

Peace and love

We play in a bar and it is incredible. Very good Irish traditional music for hours in Naha, Okinawa. How does that happen?

I drive home, having drunk water all night. I go to bed at 2:00 am. This is very unhealthy.

The next day, or today if you wish, is Open Campus at OIST. 5,000 people show up. Tricolor play in a corner.

Peace and love

Ani san wants me to shut up. Nakatoh san and Tomoko san are typically indulgent.

Anyway great fun and it is restorative to be with such creative people who are totally devoid of vanity. Not many scientists are like that.

Anyway buy all Tricolors albums.

http://tricolor-web.com/

Just for my own archive, my sporran went to it recently. I bought her in 1980 in Glasgow in the full flush of my youth. Okinawa did not agree with her and the sealskin, of which she is made, shed. Trying to strap her onto my huge bulk recently was too much for her and one of the straps broke. RIP faithful sporran.

Not on these green hills of Tyrol

“Behold also the ships, which though they be so great, and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with a very small helm, whithersoever the governor listeth.” Thus spoke the Lord.

The reverse is also true. With no rudder,ships, which though they be so great, are totally helpless.

I must get a new rudder for the Scaffie.

I have assurances from the makers  the esteemed Honnor Marine, http://www.honnormarine.co.uk/index.htm that they can send me a drawing of the rudder and the pintle mountings.

The original rudder was made from heavily varnished plywood some 24 mm wide. I toy with the the idea of getting a slab of Okinawan hardwood and cutting out a rudder shape but I fear it would be very heavy and prone to splitting. I therefor go on a search for  big slab of 24 mm plywood.

I go to the wonderful Make Manu.

They sell everything and have a very pleasing Monkey logo.

I mime 24 mm plywood and am immediately directed to racks and racks of the stuff.

What a great store!

I wish I had brought the Truckette but alas, as the original purpose of the sortie was not to buy huge slab of plywood but something much less substantial, I have only the Fitu.

The slab does not fit in the Fitu.

No room at the inn

No problem. I wander back into the huge hardware emporium and mime “baby rope”  with very satisfying outcome.

Very good baby rope

Plywood, little does it know what trials and adventures await it.

So,  I now await news from Honor Marine with baited breath. Once I have a template I can starting cutting. Luckily the slab is large so I can probably mess it up the first time.

The slab lives in the front room because I do not want it to get wet.

Not a good week er last week. Actually, like the curate’s egg, parts of it were excellent. Visit by His Imperial Highness Prince Akishino, an 800 person conference and a big moon.

Sponge Cake

All this made irrelevant by a very distressing accident.

http://www.oist.jp/news-center/news/2016/11/18/diving-incident

The weekend turns out to be wet and windy.

Rain on Monday, Sunshine next Sunday

What can a poor boy except to stay home, play the flute and eat?

To market, to market to buy a fresh squid, Home again, home again, you owe me 6 quid.

I go to the Squid Emporium and buy a very fine squid that has been freshly pulled from the Forth.

Squid with ink-black rice.

I also have a rack of lamb.

Totally not Okinawan

I cut some of it into chunks

I have never eaten so well.

Why am I so fat?

Yesterday was the best day ever but today was even better. November in Okinawa is blissful.

7:00 am Sunday 13 November 2016

I remember that I still have the cover for the late and much lamented Dileas. As I survey my early morning flowers, I wonder if it might fit the Scaffie.

My plumeria has done really well.

The middle bit

Anyway I haul it out and stretch it over the Scaffie. It fits, more or less

24 C. Excellent North East breeze, calm indigo sea. no rudder.

I rig a long pole supported by plant pots judicially placed inside the Scaffie. This creates a tent effect, hopefully forcing rainwater to run off rather than pooling depressingly in the the concave cover.

Judicious

I stretch the cover as well as I can, trimming the rope with an I:XL knife I bought in Tarbert decades ago.

All that glistens is not gold.

During the manoeuvres, I called upon an aged neighbor to lend a hand. He is older than me by at least a decade but has the Okinawan sparkle in his eye. He takes me to his house to show me his crab trap. The concept is the same a  lobster pot. The hapless crab is lured into the trap by delicious bait, in this case chicken, but cannot get out again. Greed. I go on about creels in Scotland and he looks delighted. Try miming a lobster pot. He helps me with my boat and I help him position the trap in the low water just in front of my house.

I am sure that it will be full of crabs tomorrow. Tomorrow I work so will not see. Time I stopped working.

Covered Scaffie

I think this will work unless high winds get under the cover, by way of the openings at the stern, and rip it up.

What does this look like?

Pacific Golden Plovers just in front of the house.

Bad week but amazing day.

It is Saturday. It is the most beautiful day ever. I go to the Octopus shop to buy an Octopus.

Scenes inside the Octopus Shop

This is an Octopus

I cut it into chunks

Scallops are nonsensically cheap here.  I grate lots of cabbage.

I dredge some octopus and the scallops in magic powder.

I deep fry

Scallops and octopus a la poudre magique

I eat it. Actually not all as it is too much.