2022 年 10 月 11 日
I give English conversation lessons to Svitlana, who should be living in her home town of Lviv. We meet in cafés in Frankfurt. She took this picture last week. It was a happy session.....a relaxed, civilized morning with coffee and cake. As I write today, the Russian leaders have slipped under the lowest threshold of anything which can be called civilization or humanity. In two awful waves they have wantonly and indescriminately bombed their neighbours.
In our session today we concentrated on homework and poetry. What can I say? スヴィトラーナに英会話レッスンをします.
I have a confession to make: I have a vice. A vice you say.. but we all have vices don't we? just like the priest in this sketch...(although "weaknesses" is the word used here!).......https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvnS0IJjKZU
Ok, my vice is not one of those. It is red, and it cracks nuts. When you don't have a nutcracker, a violin workshop is very handy. (まんりき 万力/あくへき悪癖.....英語では同じ単語ですが、意味が異なります!!!!!!)
Oh...now I have a broken heart....今、私は失恋しました....well, we all know about those, don't we....🙄
I picked up these walnuts on my morning walk along the side of the railway today. They taste good, but they are really tough to crack. The birds have an easier job with the rosehips hagebutte.......ローズヒップ
I often pass by this magnificent oak tree. The squirrels will no doubt be eyeing it up for acorns.......どんぐり
There were also pears on the ground. And they belonged to this marvellous old tree which a farmer had left standing between two fields.......A wonderful blazing celebration of colour...素敵な梨の木
Wow! better than an Aldi supermarket any day! スーパーのナシよりうまい！
I bit into this one....a sort of perfumy aroma combined with a sweet bouquet plus a hint of sharpness.....am I describing a wine????....Yummy, 😋 anyway.....and this is where it lay.....
There were also plums on the ground, but they had mostly been attacked by some hungry insects. Plums....aah, yes,....😏..memories of sour plum on top of a miso soup.......mmmmm.......with a dash of wasabi on the side.....梅
When I got back to the house I checked our fig tree, just to see if the hornets had missed some. Today I am lucky.......いちじく 無花果
Shall I wait until I am back in my kitchen to eat one with a cup of coffee? No..I am hopelessly weak .......I take a bite NOW!!........... mmmmmm, scrumptious!! 美味しい 😋！
The day actually starts not with coffee, but tea. I am absolutely hooked on Sencha. せんちゃ煎茶. This is a green tea which you will only find in Japan. You open the package, and sniff - yes, you get that fresh grassy, earthy smell of the tea plantations of Kyushu or Shizuoka. It gives me a high before I even drink it 😅.The caffeine effect comes slower than coffee, and also goes away slower . The next time I go to Japan I will bring an extra suitcase full of Sencha. Chinese green tea by the way, is completely different.
Once, when I was buying tea in the Japanese shop in Frankfurt, I bought a packet without really checking the Kanji (chinese origin characters) on the package. When I opened it I saw to my horror that the tea was mixed with roasted rice. A speciality I had heard about but, well, I don't need any extra cereal for breakfast, thank you. げんまいちゃ玄米茶.
Well, that's food and drink covered. Now what about some culture? At the weekend I was invited to an afternoon concert of Japanese dance, Koto performance and Taiko - drumming. By the time I got to Enkeim (a suburb of Frankfurt), things were well underway. Here's the Koto trio, led by Mei Kurosa....
The concert poster......
Traditional dance - Nihon buyo...Ren Nishikawa and Sentsubai Nishikawa, to give them their formal dancer names, perform "Tenaraiko". Girls walk home from school enjoying the summer sun, catching butterflies with their parasols.....how very Japanese!
Here Alice Uehara ('Cello) and Mutsumi Ito (Flute) are playing the introduction to "Prayer"いの 祈り. A wonderful synthesis of `cello and flute. Ethereal. This dance was performed by Senyumeji Nishikawa, and is a dance of hope, a dance for world peace.....
Autumn colour こうよう紅葉
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