October 10th 2025年10月10日

Fancy a bite? Someone does in these woods, but I assume they know what they are doing….

Because they always leave these guys alone….

Perhaps the black and white pattern is a warning sign…

Of course none of this is noticed by the passengers sitting in the cosy seats of their Inter Regio train which roars by…..

I’m on a little walk between Neu Isenburg and Langen. Right beside the railway. My archaeological training is spurred to life by the sight of this bronze age artifact….a weapon of some sort maybe?…..It is well preserved I must say…….

However, on reflection…..hmmm. Has a rather late 20thc. aura about it.

Back to those mushrooms. I prefer the fruits of trees. Like this one. The fig tree outside my door. The sensation of biting into that soft flesh – ever so slightly grainy and subtly sweet- so soon reduced to the mere stalk and then the need for the next one….

Preceded by some Gyozas and a Kirin and I am in heaven…or at least in Takumi….(Mendelssohn Str. Frankfurt)

Autumn………I must have been in an “flowing” mood when I drew this Kanji character…..

The turn of the season seems to affect different trees in different ways..The Acacia looks like it is getting a disease….

…and reminds me of the time I once drew the Kanji character for tree (Ki), but realized after the first stroke that I didn’t have enough ink in my brush……😮

It is also easy to get too much ink on the brush. The ink itself has this extraordinary tendency to create forms – here the silhouette of a man’s head (?)………

Being confined to home this weekend with some bug or other I turned my attention to my calligraphy efforts. Of which there are many…..(!)

With a well-loaded brush you can make music…🎵..The first character means “sound”, the second one “fun/enjoy”. Nice!

In the meantime I have found another little “bit of Autumn” ちいさい秋みつけた [Chīsai Aki Mitsuketa]…..This maple leaf has drifted graciously to earth…..

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What shall I cook today?

Certainly none of those mushrooms near the railway…..Maybe some hearty European stew…? after all, the parsnip was a rare find in Aldi…

Aha….let’s add a bit of Asian pep…..mmmm….

In fact a warm vegetable stew was just right for the chilly downturn of the weather this week….

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The other day a Chinese friend of mine called round to pick up a ‘cello case. With her 3 yr- old son bounding about with far too much energy, I decided to dig out some childrens’ books 📔📚 as a distraction. Of course they were all in English, but this didn’t seem to matter. However, later on I found the book which I had been looking for the whole time.

Lao Lao -🐉 is an old Chinese folk tale about a simple good person being maligned by a greedy emperor. The poor woman is forced to sit in a cold tower and produce paper cuttings ad infinitum (rather like the girl in Rumpelstiltskin who has to weave gold thread). However, in the end good conquers over evil through the intervention (Deus ex machina – rather like a Handel opera) of the dragon who roams the earth, who sees and hears everything.

The text is in Chinese and English and is beautifully illustrated…

…..following the main theme of the story – paper cuttings…….

…with the chance at the end to have a go yourself. This is a very special children’s book. I thought the story was probably an old Chinese classic, but my friend had never heard of it. One wonders what they teach children in China these days….

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Well, I’m told a typhoon is approaching Japan this weekend. And I see I once tried to paint the character. Not a good example of brushwork, but very fitting to the current season! Literally “great wind”…….🍃

And it also seems to be the season for that home-made plum wine…………..☺️

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👉 Well, thank you for reading this, and feel free to pass it on to anyone you think might be interested. These days you can translate a web site instantaneously with A.I. or Google translate.

さて、これを読んでいただきありがとうございます。興味があると思われる方に、遠慮なくお伝えください。

See you またね 😉

nigelwruddock@gmail.com

The End

終わり

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