(Real) Winter Has Come ― 2011/12/03
Today, I found this winter’s first lost glove and face mask (as you know, among certain people in this country wearing face mask is a winter custom to avoid flu).
After a long and warm winter, General Winter has finally arrived in this town!
Toothpaste for Aged Gums ― 2011/12/07
It took a while for me to know why my teeth grow bigger and bigger. Yes, after I reached a certain age, my mouth looks like horse’s.
This toothpaste told me the answer: the older you become, the more your gums sag—as a result the bigger your teeth look. Eureka!
This toothpaste, named “Tomarina”, meaning Stop It!(imperative) —what a direct naming—is clamed to reconstruct aged gums and prevent the gum from more sagging.
It cost me JPY643 at a local supermarket, quite expensive as I usually use a JPY118 toothpaste… getting old means having to spend money on keeping the status quo rather than making any progress….very sad thing.
Aaaaaaaaaaanyway, Tomarina looks like this.
looks more like jelly than toothpaste.
And it taste like jelly, too. Tomarina doesn’t have refreshing effect that most of toothpastes have. Or rather, while brushing, I felt like damaging my teeth because of its tacky sweetness, just like brushing the teeth with some kinds of syrup. Could you imagine?
The effect…. I have been using it for a week or so, but I don’t think my teeth got smaller. However, it has certainly made my gums less sensitive to cold water and other stimuli. Maybe I need to use this for a bit more to decide whether it’s worth the JPY643.
Christmas in the Town ― 2011/12/15
Built with Guts! ― 2011/12/19
The other day I visited a Western-style building built in 1910, less than 50 years after the end of Edo era during which Japan closed its door to foreign countries.
Despite that, this building looks very “west (the French-Renaissance style, according to the guide there)”,
using imported materials
and having high ceilings, and western-style bathrooms (How did people used this then? there was no boiler or water pipes at the time. The water supply system in Fukuoka began working in 1923!) .
Despite the somewhat frightening western looks (probably only for me), the interior felt somewhat Japanese-friendly. For example, the doorknobs were set at much lower position in proportion with the size of the doors,
and there was even a Japanese-style bath room which was much bigger than the one in my home.
As listening to the gentleman guiding the building as a volunteer, I learnt the building was in fact designed by a local engineer who didn’t study abroad. He must have studied hard through books and other learning materials without knowing how it would “feel” the “real” Western buildings, and designed this (and other culturally important buildings in this area) only with knowledge and guts.
This has nothing to do with this building, but having heard about the architect, I felt somehow encouraged to try to do translation between English and Japanese. If a Meiji person could do this job only with knowledge and guts and without knowing the real thing, maybe I don’t have to be ashamed of my “desk-top English”, getting nice marks at examinations but useless at supermarkets—as Antonio Inoki said “Guts can make anything happen!“(translated by me). …Sorry, I seem to have made a huge jump in logic, as usual.
Tree of Greed ― 2011/12/19
I found a new kind of Christmas tree at a local shopping mall. It seems that you can write your wish on a piece of paper and hung the wish card on the tree. I guess someone planned this tree confused Christmas with Tanabata.
The tree looked heavy with people’s insatiable desire…
“I want XXX (toy, clothing, car, or money)”, “wishing to win ¥XXX in the year-end lottery”, or “I want to pass an entrance exam to XXX school”… Looking at the cards, some adjectives came up to my mind… greedy… selfish…and shameless…(no one asked me to look at the cards, though). Only few good-natured people wrote about others’ happiness or peace.
If you ask me what I would wish … It would be… the lifting of a ban on smoking in public places—only for me!
Great Kimchi Challenge: Day 1 ― 2011/12/20
This time of year, temperature goes below 10 ceisius at
maximum and not rainy, is time to make kimch to last until March next year. Kimuchi is not a Japanese food, it is a Korean pickle. But brought up by a mother who used to live in Korea and in a town closely neighbouring to the Korean peninsula, I've got a taste for this Korean souls food.
I started making kimchi myself three years ago, fed up with the outrageous price of the ready-made ones, so I am still an amateur kimchi pickler and am not sure if my method is “genuine”.
I found a plump Chinese cabbage weighting about 2.3kg, at a market. By the way, “kg” is the unit rarely appear in everyday cooking recipes, don’t you think so?
Anyway, I had to start the procedure while the cabbage was still fresh.
Cut into quarter, lengthways, and Air them outdoor for a few hours
Pickle with salt (5% of the weight of the cabage)
Leave overnight…
Today's job has been done!
Bamboo Sprout in December ― 2011/12/21
JPY400
A fruit of advanced farming technologies, or just a result of climate change? – I wondered, when I found bamboo sprouts, which are supposed to be a spring vegetable, in a local market today. But it turned out that they are available in Kyushu from October. I just didn’t know that.
Although the real winter is still coming, we relished the taste and flavour of spring (very much ahead of the real season!) with Takenoko Gohan.
Great Kimchi Challenge: Day2 ― 2011/12/21
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