First, let's start this off with some mood music.
Gowns
Hehe, typing something then attaching a link to it instead of just copying and pasting the link reminds me of learning how to make a website in middle school. Does anybody remember that?
DOES ANYBODY REMEMBER THAT?!?!
Actually, despite getting more and more into the Gowns, I'm listening to TV on the Radio right nowBUTDON'TLETTHATFOOLYOU! I don't really know much about them and have barely listened to them, but every single person I know who loves music loves them, and I've really liked the few songs I've heard by them, so now I finally have one of their albums. But it's only the newest one.
Pretty cool.
So, I feel great.
Yes, great.
Not particularly right now, although I do feel pretty good right now, here on my bed with the cold, overcast weather swirling outside in the sky and the streets as I think and take it easy, warm inside the house but cold enough to remember what it's like outside. It's nice.
I've been coming to really appreciate the place in which I live, out here in the mountains but only three hours from the nearest musical center. There are a lot of things I like about living here, but I don't think I could really express them well in writing; things just feel good here. It's interesting because one of the things I love the most about being in the city is the feeling of complete anonymity, being able to walk everywhere and watch people and try different things knowing that people don't know you and probably aren't that interested in finding out what you are doing. But here in this town of 4,400, pretty much everyone knows each other or is related to each other somehow. I run into my students and their families all over the place! It's really pretty interesting. I'm starting to get used to it and like it, in its own way. A lot of things here actually remind me of home, particularly when I went down to the nearest convenience store after work the other week and found like 12 of my students walking back up from it on my way down. I thought, "Huh, I guess in a little town like this, even a convenience store could become a main center for kids to hang out." Then I thought...,"Wait, what do I do with my friends when we hang around our city? We usually...walk around talking and...wind up at the nearest 7-11 getting a snack and hanging out there, haha." So that was fun to think about.
Whenever I get homesick while I'm driving, I just imagine I'm going the wrong way on the left lane and that I'm going to get hit by the next car that comes my way.
I've been eating goya champloo constantly for the past two weeks or so. I love it.
So here you can see my progression, from start to the latest try:
Hey, this album is really sweet.
Yes, that is delicious egg running all over the satsuma imo (potatoe) and goya and tofu and aahh.
However, the next experiment may be the crowning success of this endeavor...
What is that? Yes, yes, it is an egg dropped right into the middle of a sizzling goodness of goya, tofu, paprika (?...looks like just a big, delicious bell pepper to me, but they call it that here), and kim chi. Let's get a closer look:
This was awesome.
So, in the end, the third one, with the runny egg, and the kim chi one have been my favorite. The egg was just the perfect consistency in that number #3! I'm gonna want to try that again so I can get that perfect midway point between cooked and raw again. Number #6 was also quite delicious, but I think that's mainly because I just mixed in a whole package of kim chi, so for that reason I am more partial to number #3, which took more of my own ideas. Anyways, delicious!! All of them! I think it might be time to try some other vegetables as the main part of my dishes for a while now (although I still have one or two goya left that I gotta use before they get moldy oh wait they already started that and the last two I've used I've had to cut off the mold and think maybe the heat and all else will make it all okay...after all, mold is bound to have some kind of nutritional value, too?). I also made a goya mix yesterday and tried steaming it a bit with a lemon juice-shoyu (soy sauce) mix, but that wasn't as good. The sauce was, but I think I've begun to try to mix too much together at one time. I'm thinking of exploring some more simplistic foods next. I tried doing a miso kabocha, Japanese pumpkin steamed then boiled with some miso mixture. I ignored my sixth sense though and put too much miso in, which resulted in a really intense taste. I could try again this week.
But anyway, I think I have gotten to know goya champloo pretty well.
RUNNING!
Yes! I was feeling pretty sluggish and feeling myself get more and more out of shape was kind of getting on me, so last week, I just went out and ran to an area of town I've been wanting to check out. And it was AWESOME. I ended up running up from the main highway, along which I live, to a residential area in the hills with lots of farm fields, houses, windy roadage, trees, mountains around me, and the sky above me. I thought I'd run up to the Forest Station, which is up in the hills, but when I got to the 2 km point, the sky was looking like it was ready to get dark pretty soon so I made a good decision and turned back after looking up the road and telling it, "I'll see you next time, just you wait."
That was a great run. I was completely energized, didn't get any cramps really that lasted a significant amount of time, and found my breathing and rhythm really well and quickly! I think I ended up running about - Man, this album is really good. Damn! - 8 km, which I think works itself out to around 4-4.5 miles. And I felt great! It was getting into darkness when I got back home, so the fact that I had judged the sky well made me feel even better.
I started feeling so much better after that. I love the feeling of being sore for the whole week after I run like that.
After that I had been wanting to run more but was so busy this week I didn't get the chance. THEN, yesterday I just put everything aside and went out and ran again! The same course except this time I went all the way to the top. And oh boy am I glad I didn't try to do that the first time. I would have gotten back so much later. The last 2 km to the Forest Station were also entirely uphill at an angle that reminded me of Mt. SAC's course. I mean, pretty much the entire route is uphill, but the previous few kms didn't feel like anything compared to this. Man, at a couple of points, I was running at a speed that was barely faster than walking, but that was kind of cool, too, because it reminded me of doing the extra long, exhausting runs that have always made me feel alive. When I finally got to the top, it was so amazing. I rounded the flat top of this hill and found myself looking down on the majestic, small sprawl of the different lots and buildings that are the Forest Station. I walked around there for a while, looked at some motorcyclers that were taking a break too, checked out a river that ran nearby, just took things in.
And then I was on my way back. My mouth was pretty dry and I probably could have gotten some water somewhere there for a more comfortable way back, but whatever. Like I thought, the way down was pretty hard on my knees. We're talking some pretty steep inclines. And I was actually getting a little tired at this point, so I didn't feel like bounding down the entire way, yet stopping short of that was jerkier for my knees and got me a little more cramped in the breathing area. But really, that was nothing compared to the awesome beauty of the sun setting behind the mountains, shining its light through the lines of thin trees that filled the entire valley to my left. It took it easier on the way home this time than before, and when I finally got back, I was so happy. That was...just awesome. Haha, when I have experiences like these I find it hard to express them quite right with words. But I think you know what I'm talking about, especially if you are of the cross country persuasion.
It was also really cool because it turned out the house right on the corner to go up the last 2km is where a couple of my students in elementary school live. They were having friends over and playing when I passed by and it was really nice to talk to them for a while before doing into the final haul (which I had no idea was coming) up the mountain. Then, on the way back down, I was able to say hi to one of my middle school students and his mom in their van as they drove down, as well as the dad of the kids who live in that house on the turn. It just felt good.
Well, this is pretty long, but hey I haven't updated any of you all for about two week at least. I think those were my main enjoyments. I felt amazing after that last run, which I think averaged out to about 12 km, or maybe 7 miles. I'm happy because I've gone through periods of not running after which I get back into it for a little bit, ever since I left high school, and the first run is almost always the best, maybe just because I have so much stored up energy. Then the second and following ones take more actual discipline. But this time, I felt purely amazing for both of them. And 4 and especially 7 miles are way more than I usually do when I'm getting back into it. 7 was even on the longer side for high school practice. I am excited. I was more tired than I remember feeling after even a 7 mile run yesterday though, which was interesting, but hey, I did it purely out of desire and can allow myself to enjoy some tire sometimes.
If you would like to see the breakfast that got me through that run yesterday, here you go:
Yes, that is right! The greatness and simplicity of papas con huevos saves the day before it has even gotten past morning again!
I had made something like papas con huevos before that looked like this,
and was delicious as well, but yesterday was the first time I made pure papas con huevos since I've been in Japan (and maybe ever...?). It tasted so good. Haha, that's all I can say. The eggs were so puffy and it was just perfect. It brought back memories and images of eating breakfast at the table at home and at grandma's house when I was a little kid. Happy.
Oh yeah, a bunch of cool cultural stuff happened, too.
No, I'm just kidding. I mean, it did really happen, if you can really separate that from anything else I've been talking about, but...yeah whatever, it's not really a joke anymore.
The moon-watching festival was nice, even though the moon didn't come out. The town mayor said to remember tonight as the night we came out to the moon-watching ceremony and thought, wouldn't it be nice if the moon would come out. I think that is really awesome. There was no koto music but there were music bells (apparently different from hand bells because they are the "Japanese imitation of the foreign music bells" according to the group...?)! One difference I noticed was there were no big bells and they used more of the chime-looking ones. All woman group, most of them were housewives, the leader said.
So that was a nice night. I got to know some more members of the community as they asked me where I was from and responded with surprise to me saying "the United States of America." Hah, but beside all that, yeah, very nice.
My supervisor came by and dropped off a couple of ice creams for me a couple of weeks ago.
Yeah, insane right? Well, I've eaten all but two by now and might be addicted. They are so, so good. Plus, I love this:
Reads: Danger! Falling Crunch! We have put a large helping of big pieces of crunch on the outside of this ice cream. It falls off easily, so when you eat it, please use this carton as a tray.
I get to now think of "crunch" as a noun, as well as take extraordinary measures to ensure that I do not spill any of this "crunch" on myself, or even worse on my floor.
Well, I think that's about it, seeing as I've been writing for 52 minutes now. TV on the Radio goes really well into UA. And I really like Dear Science,. I'm moving through music faster than usual right now for some reason. Kind of cool. Still really into Beach House, though. And the Fernandez have been my staple for driving around. I'm also beginning to think that I will never get tired of Blur. So good. Speaking of which, on impulse I decided to cover one of their songs, "Sing," the other night, putting myself into another state of mind as I strummed three chords over and over again for 20 minutes, singing, screaming, moaning, crying, laughing, throat-singing, and just existing. Hm, that was pretty personal, but yeah, that felt amazing. I feel like I've been able to express myself to myself a lot more lately and it feels great.
Three-day weekend coming up with prospects of more hijinx in Osaka and an Afrirampo concert.
1 comment:
oi you just made me so hungry
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