Basic Black

お好み焼き Okonomiyaki

Do you know about this pan-fried dish that is common in Japanese home kitchens? Okonomiyaki means "Whatever you like, fried", and has a simple base that every Japanese person knows. Usually, okonomiyaki has a batter made of flour, water, beaten egg, and a sticky potato called yamaimo. After that, whatever you want goes into it. Tonight, mine is pork on the bottom with Korean spicy kimchi in the batter.
自分の家庭料理でお好み焼がき出来ました。

I can't really tell you my recipe. I just eyeball it. One egg, well beaten, a tablespoon of flour, a handful of chopped cabbage, a bit of grated potato if you have it, a tablespoon of water if you don't, a teaspoon or so of grated or pickled ginger, and a few grams of pork or bacon. Then I threw in some Korean kimchi. If you want an authentic recipe, see this awesome bilingual blog. I like how this recipe uses daishi fish stock to make up the liquid part of the recipe. There are many regional variations of okonomiyaki, and nearly as many recipes as there are okonomiyaki afficionados.

お好み焼き生で Here is my own home-made okonomiyaki naked.

やっぱり私は青いのりとソースとかつおぶしが乗せています。　そのあとはmayonnaise ですよ。Here is okonomiyaki dressed the way I like it - mysterious brown sauce, Kewpie brand mayonnaise, nori seaweed and katsuo fish flakes. This keeps me warm in the winter!

Black bean and seaweed muffin

Last night, I caught up with some local folks at the Strabucks under the Takashimaya building. There I had a cup of tea 黒豆ひじき赤味噌マフィン Black bean, hijiki seaweed and red miso muffin. And it tasted like chocolate. Only one other of our members would touch it.

My world is changing

I jogged today from home to 柏市民体育館　Kashiwa Municipal Gym down by the park. I've never done this before. Correctly, I've never jogged before. It just kind of happened. I needed to get my shopping bike #1 from the parking lot there, and I was under some time constraints. I don't even own running shoes. I guess I have to get some. I'm kind of chuffed to know I'm in good enough shape to jog that stretch, though it's only a few kilometers. I had no idea I could do that.

This new year is a new world for me.

I had no idea I could return a lot of plastic to point of purchase. Today's discovery is that 長崎屋　Nagasakiya department store, on the food floor, has recycling boxes that handle milk cartons, styrofoam trays, and the plastic trays that tofu, veggies and various other produce come in. My garbage bags get lighter every time I find another way to reduce the load going out. I'm not sure what this styro and the like gets recycled into, but the Yes! Tokyo website's English guide to environmental solutions and experiments in Tokyo gives some insight into how garbage is being handled in Tokyo proper, which may indicate how the 'burbs are handling it.

Ideally, I want to get the plastic consumption down.

I'm getting some inspiritation from Change Everything, an intiative of Vancity, Vancouver's community-based financial institution that gets behind many positive changes in the way we Vancouverites live. Wow, they're inspiring me waaaay over the other side of the Pacific Ocean. Pretty good!

Light in Kashiwa

Another resolution this year is to meet local people and network within Kashiwa and just generally be more social. Already, I've met lovely people through the teacher network and too many late nights at the Hub Pub. And reconnected with the circle of Kanto residents who I had withdrawn from for a season. They are very cool people.

On a bikeride and walk at Teganuma, I met a lovely mother daughter tae kwon do team, and we're corresponding by email in anticipation of meeting up this week. Kashiwa people are fun.

I went around the neighbourhood and greeted people with Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu, a very happy new year. Maro's been nuzzling my feet while I make tea and getting his fuzz on my sofa.

Last night, I had a chance to talk over tea with some local folks, both foreign and native. We got talking about hobbies and interests, and one pointed me to his blog, A Day in the Life, which documents in photos the life he sees here.

Next step is to get back to training. This is already the 9th of January, and I haven't stepped foot in dojo yet! Between seeing folks, work committments and sundry household chores, I haven't been on the mat. Tonight is Shiraishi Sensei's training in Kashiwa. Yay!

Getting an early start on resolution #1

Every time you go out for a bowl of ramen in Tokyo, you likely pick up a pair of 割り箸 waribashi, the disposable wooden chopsticks that you split with a crack before you eat. Waribashi are so ingrained in Japanese culture that there are manners specifically for their use. Break your chopsticks holding them horizontally, never vertically. Don't sand them against each other or roll them like pick up sticks. This implies that the waribashi are cheap and insults the wait staff. When you want to set them down, place them on the paper wrapper which you have artfully folded into a　箸置きhashioki chopstick rest. And when you're done, put them back in the paper wrapper, folding the end of the wrapper diagonally.

How many times does the average salaryman eat a takeout bento or eat in a noodle bar? The waribashi add up in a year to 200 pairs per person, making the total a scary 25 billion sets a year. China has slapped a surcharge on waribashi sold to Japan, which has resulted in some shops looking for alternatives. I've been really good, turning down proferred waribashi, plastic bags and other disposable unrecyclable stuff.

But what could be simpler than carrying your own? I surprised myself when I went to lunch this afternoon and, when my meal came, I automatically reached for the waribashi on the counter. No, no. My own hashi are pretty bamboo with woven handles and a sturdy sheath. I'll get used to it in no time. I have already eliminated plastic register bags from my shopping routine, so I figure I won't miss waribashi.

Meri Kurisumasu in black

Today, Christmas Day, I'm doing what everybody in the neighbourhood is doing - 大掃除 - osoji, the big year-end cleaning effort which originally was a purification rite in preparation for New Year festivities, the most important of the year. This morning, my neighbours were vacuuming loudly below me, and I got into the spirit of the day by laundering everything and scrubbing windows, floors, bath and kitchen.

While I'm working, I'm listening to CBC Radio over the 'Net to remember the day as celebrated on the other side of the ocean.

And I'm thinking about this year's events, lows and highs, mostly highs. This year, I'm grateful for friends from here and abroad, for their good wishes, encouragement, insight and enthusiasm. In the summer, The Phoenix and I visited Osaka to see Maren, then Kyoto, Himeiji, Hiroshima and Matsuyama to see what the rest (real) Japan looks and feels like. This autumn, the Bujinkan presented at the Togakushi festival, and amazing experience. Later, Shiraishi Dojo reprised the performance at the Gyoda City festival. Last Saturday was Shiraishi Dojo Bonenkai, a year-end party to say thank you to sensei and our members, and honour the two new wonderful students.

I'm happy to put 2007 behind me. A friend and inspiration to Vancouver's artists left us this year. On this side, The Phoenix, though a bright light in my world, flew home for what I thought was only a few months, but later thought better of returning to me and Japan. Curiously, despite that spargoing out, he left a little glow - a Japan-resident friend of his brings a lot of happiness into my life.

Next year holds a lot of promise - my new work, which will start in April, promises to change my whole scope of teaching and learning. In May, I hope to be well into my academic studies in the evenings, too.

And Soke's taking us on another trip into darkness, black on black, with the next training theme. Sometimes, yes, I lose heart in my training. What the hell am I doing here, in Japan, doing this? I know so little. Am I getting any better at this stuff? And then I think, 我慢, gaman meaning endurance, and　忍, nin meaning patience and concealment, are my helpers in this endeavour. I will never be the world's most amazing martial artist. But I might, with perseverance and patience, figure out what budo is and why I want to do it with body, mind and spirit. Most of all, spirit.

Reducing the plastic in my life

Today's shopping at Nagasaki-ya was under 1000 yen worth of groceries. In the basket, you can see spinach, carrots, a piece of salmnon, some lemon chuhais, a whole daikon radish, and a bag of udon noodles.

You'll see, too, the pink "No bag, please" card. If I bring my own bag, place this pink "No bag, please" card in my basket and carry my point card, the cashier gives me a stamp for each bag I refuse. After 20 no-bag points, I get a 100 yen discount.

The effort required to bring my own bag (usually my bookbag or whatever bag I brought to work with me, or a furoshiki or repurposed bag I have recieved from shopping) is negligible, yields me a small monetary reward, and makes household waste a little lighter. This year, 2007, I have endeavoured to reduce my plastic bag pile to nil, and very nearly succeeded. The only contributions were from guests. I keep all reusable plastic packaging (plastic sleeves from advertising and the like) in a bag above the fridge, and put it to work when I need to protect valuable papers.

I've been following Envirowoman's plastic free blog, a chronicle of one Vancouver woman's endeavour to eliminate plastic products and packaging from her life for one year.

Kudos to Envirowoman. Trying to follow in her footsteps in Japan is extremely difficult for this expat Canadian living in Japan. Japan has a great record for recycling appliances and paper, but I wonder where the plastic goes to, and what happens to it post-consumer use. Well, the Japan Times recently documented the incineration of plastic waste, and begins to explore the idea of burning the unburnables in Tokyo. It makes me nervous about throwing away that plastic sushi tray. Where's it really going?

So I'm throwing my efforts at consuming less plastic because I fear it is impossible to eliminate it from my diet. Virtually everything I buy, from rice crackers to fruit to noodles, is packaged in plastic. If I were to buy in bulk or one item at a time, I might be able to reduce plastic packaging, but it is impractical and expensive for the single Japanese resident. One orange is more expensive when you cost it out, and buying in bulk presents storage problems that are unique to the Japanese domestic environment.

So, for now, I'll work on getting my plastic consumption down in 2008, but barriers to eliminating it appear to insurmountable right now.

I'll still look for advice and information at Japan for Sustainability and see what information I can glean.

Meanwhile, I had a wonderful and healthful dinner of , making the most of a piece of salmon, chopped carrots and daikon radish, flavoured with miso paste, and accompanied by a side dish of Korean kimchi. If I eat whole foods, I eat better right away.

The remainder of the day's shopping haul will go into a container and turned into Japanese-style tsukemono pickles. Made with love, no extra plastic required.

Culture Day Dai Rakudakan

   This weekend was Culture Day 文化の日　in Japan, and in Kashiwa, Joban Art Line, a local organization that promotes public arts displays bring lots of interesting performances to Kashiwa and Matsudo cities.

As I was making my way to the supermarket, the Kashiwa Information Center personnel were announcing and martialling people in Howdy Dori (that's what they call the station front street here), and seating was arranged around the street in front of Ito Yokado. To everyone's surprise, 5 gold-painted shaven headed men rushed onto the pavement and the dark ambient feedback noise of guitars underlaid by taiko drums hammered the audience. The five dancers performed for perhaps 10 minutes but the moment felt like forever. What really got me was how the audience reacted. Little kids shouted "Scary!" when the dancers were close, people looked startled, high school boys mouths agape couldn't blink, old people squinted. These five dancers showed us raw power, total transformation, embodiment of animal spirits. They became this undancelike dance, this total expression of themselves.

This is Dai Rakudakan. I looked them up online to confirm what I suspected - this dance company is a direct decendant of Butoh. This performance art, which some describe as not dance, is a form that shows the metamorphosis of the dancer into the thing or creature being danced. Some say this is the meaning of butoh - the dancer becoming. This is a wonderful example for budoka. We can become our budo, pull it out of ourselves, embody it.

Lights and music in Kashiwa and Tokyo

Coming home to Kashiwa Station, I walk out onto the plaza to hear live music - it's time for 音街かしわ２００７, a weeklong music event hosted by Streetbreakers, a local arts group, featuring local musicians. This evening was a jazz trio doing standards, and tomorrow night is mostly solo acts from 5 to 7:30 pm at the east exit of the station.

Kashiwa has long been known for live music, starving artists, high school kids in need of practice, local characters and the ubiquitous two-boys-with-guitar. Kazuya can be found out there some weekends entertaining his loyal crowd of hopelessly single middle-aged ladies, fawning high school girls and assorted friends. It's a fun atmosphere.

Starting next week is the 20th Tokyo International Film Festival. Some things I want to see are Kari Skoglund's screen adaptation of Margaret Lawrence's novel The Stone Angel, Waltz (original title Valzer), a film about a day in the lives of hotel guests and staff shot in one sequence, and Eat and Run (Japanese title 真・女立喰師列伝) about crazy women bikers eating there way through various dangerous scenarios brought to you by the makers of Ghost in the Shell.

Tomorrow night Japan's Mille Miglia 2007 ends in Yokohama's Motomachi. Get this, they drove way out to Fukushima Prefecture a few days ago in a car rally with over 100 vintage cars, foreign and domestic.  Let's see if all of them come home.

Just Bake

This says it all. Just bake. It's hitting 33 degrees celcius some days. I've tried to survive with just the fan going, but I'm dripping just sitting at the computer. Feh.

Wednesday we had an early morning earthquake, which you can see on the US Geological Survey on the Asia region map. I couldn't sleep after the heat, the quake and the aftershocks. On Thursday evening, at the dojo, I found one of our members sacked out on the sofa in the lobby. Few people got decent sleep.

The good part about this weekend is the Teganuma Marsh Fireworks Festival on Saturday night.

Gah, it's so hot, I don't sleep well, and then I can't focus enough to do much. I've been preparing props and things for our embukai at Togakushi Matsuri in September, cleaning up and organizing things in the apartment, reading and scribbling.