Enjoying the sights, sounds and smells of first-time parenthood. Progress on the vegetable garden and other ramblings of a gaijin in Japan’s least populous prefecture.
It has rained since Monday and looks set to continue throughout the whole of next week. After the first day, the ground was sodden and the mizo full. Overnight the rain has been particularly heavy. While the water soon drains away, the ground could do with a thorough drying out. The weather seems to go from one extreme to the other; it wouldn’t be so bad if it were every other day. As a result, the lingering green tomatoes are splitting, weeds are overrunning, and the deshima potatoes have rotted in the ground. The flipside is that the sweet potatoes and asparagus are benefiting.
The allotted patch isn’t great, however it is a distance from the rest of veg. Earlier six raspberry plants were transplanted. About a tenth of the number of mosquito bites I picked up. The canes are dry and only one has some leaves, albeit limp ones. Nevertheless, they might perk up and should fare better than their cardboard box home.
We have had a bit of rain overnight, very much nearer the beginning of the week. The seedbed holds one uneaten kohlrabi, a few beetroot shoots, and a tangle of weeds that have appeared suddenly. The cucumbers have become few and far between, I took the last three and added the vine to the freshly charged compost bin. It’s brimming with weeds at the moment. Below is possibly the pick of the crop.
I gave the patch chosen for the raspberries and digging over. It should be double dug it, but it so hot and humid (earlier today it was 35°C). I really can’t be arsed, the raspberries can’t wait until I can. After a few hours, I called it an afternoon and had a beer (it isn’t beer though).
I quite liked the idea of swapping it for a Strigil, the tool used to scrape in Roman baths.
A few hours before my wife’s contractions started, a yamori (house gecko) visited. They are considered to bring good things and to watch over the house. A year on and perhaps by coincidence, we had one appear at about the same time. Last year’s on the left and this year’s on the right.
In the morning Kento opened (with some help), his birthday cards and presents. He got a little excited and was sick on his Thomas The Tank Engine card, it wiped off though.
After a few photos, I had to leave, to conclude securing my first job over here. In the afternoon, I set about making a couple of chocolate sponge cakes. The whisked sponge wasn’t helped with the layer of nashi pear that was stuck on half way through cooking. The other a bit heavier, with butter, managed to rise.
When I was burning myself getting the second out of the oven, the phone rang. It was a school offering a days work. It’s been eighteen months without as much as a whiff.
Celia from purple podded peas has tagged me with the Fantastic Four Meme. The idea is five areas with four points in each. These are not in chronological/preferential order. Apologies for skimping on the detail, but this weather is pushing unbearable.
Four jobs I’ve had in my life:
- Risk Management Consultant: Formulation of strategies to manage clients exposure to energy risk.
- Brewer: Moreover, the jobs that come with it.
- Commercial Analyst: Financial appraisal of sustainable energy projects.
- Assistant Entomologist/Crop Physiologist: My work experience whilst at school. I’ve never counted so many aphids.
Four places I have lived:
- Suffolk, England.
- Suffolk, England.
- Suffolk, England.
- Tottori-ken, Japan: We are still here.
Four places I have been on holiday:
- New Zealand: Ten months touring around in a van. I met my wife Ritsue over there.
- Yucatan Peninsula: Guatemala pipped Mexico as my favourite.
- Réunion Island: I think about there often.
- Poland: The first backpacking adventure. Mostly spent in the Tatras.
Four of my favourite foods:
- Pies: Double shortcrust or else.
- Real ale: Sadly over here keg is king.
- Curry.
- Japanese food: There are a few notable exceptions.
Four places I would rather be right now:
- In the garden.
- Down the pub.
- Somewhere a little less humid.
- Anywhere but a city.
The following four are:
Lit: when rain fall?
It’s been above thirty degrees for weeks. Whilst the humidity has rendered me lethargic, the lack of water has turned the veg patch into parched wasteland - with a few tomatoes. The seedlings survived a week of thunderstorms, but the heat, dry earth and the herbivores has been too much for them to endure. Moreover, I’ve not seen one carrot top.
Early September should bring a change to the weather and the odd shower may offer some respite until then. Although there are plans for autumn and winter vegetables, I reckon the cauliflowers will get the drop and make room for another seed scattering.
The Bon Festival held since the weekend has ended. It is a time where families unite to venerate their ancestors. Graves (haka) are cleaned and at some point, a local Bon dance (bon odori) is performed.
After a tiff with the Nemesis, we went down the road to the gathering. It was one of those times where I was questioning my reason. Is the Japan escapade the better picking for the three of us?
I couldn’t get any decent shots or really capture the atmosphere of the event, but it hit the spot.
Most of the families from the immediate neighbourhood congregated and danced around a Taiko drum in the centre. It serves as a celebration and reminder of the sacrifices made. Bamboo sticks were handed around, and it seemed a little like Morris dance, without partners and bells. After a few dances, including Tanko Bushi where the motions of coal mining played out, everybody sat down talked and drunk the free beer – fruit juice for the children.
In the morning, there was a short program about some American veterans who served on the USS Drexler, meeting a Japanese pilot trained to carry out kamikaze attacks. It was arranged by the filmmakers of Wings of Defeat. The documentary released in July, aims to dispel the myths that the pilots were all crazy fanatics and show many shared mixed emotions. The release comes a couple of months after the film written by Tokyo’s nationalist governor, depicting the pilots as national heroes.
My wife looked a little shocked watching the footage, so I asked her what she knew of the tactics. Nothing was taught at school; it was only by chance that she had seen an animated depiction some years after leaving. It seems no different now, after a couple of days of the earthquake, there has been no mention of the Kashiwazaki power station. There is however, plenty of coverage outside of Japan.
Both the spinach and beetroot have started to emerge. Sadly, the ailing seed potatoes had already started to decompose by the time I finished preparing their bed. I got a kilo of replacements from nearby Land Science.
They are called 出島 (デジマ or deshima). The name is taken from Dejima an artificial island in Nagasaki Bay from which the Portuguese and Dutch traded during the Edo period. They are a high yield hybrid, introduced in the early seventies, grown mainly on the islands of Kyūshū and Shikoku.
After a bit of a lay in this morning, I went out to cut a couple of cucumbers. The first thing I noticed was the distinct rail track running up and down the seedbed. Just after a couple of days of being in the ground, the temperamental kohlrabi has germinated along with the radishes. The latter making up the remainder of one of the rows.
The rain had washed away some of the topsoil, leaving the seeds rather shallower than the inch deep they were sown. I decided to scatter some compost on the top and wish them luck. With, I’m expecting to find carrots around the asparagus.
