Tag Archives: japan

Surprising View from a Room

Its been so cold and cloudy these last few days and then this morning clear blue skies at 5 o’clock in the morning. That was the view from my bed in Pullman Court.

I’m feeling a bit throaty but remember that when the weather started to clear yesterday, the pollen that feels like grains of acid made its presence known … Very late in the ‘summer’. What has happened to our weather.

Talking about colds, Nick the Framer said he had worn a mask from his workshop when caring for his ancient mother yesterday morning; just so she didn’t catch anything. Charlotte the French Horn noted that the Japanese did this too.

What? I’d seen pictures of this with people masked up in public and always thought this had to do with their own fastidiousness. It turns out that it was thoughtfulness about their fellows. It’s the same mindset that makes them wash before having a bath.

That is what came to mind this morning looking out over South London from the top floor. Sometimes your views say more about you than they do about your subject … and more about your subject than you realise.

The Japanese never cease to surprise and inspire.

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A bird needs a big sky

I read a great book called Japan Through the Looking Glass by Alan MacFarlane. He notes that for the Japanese it is often the spaces between the words that carry the real meaning. And he recounts an old story about a famous artist who is asked to paint a picture of a bird. He does so but the person who has commissioned the picture is disappointed to find that the artist has painted a small bird in one corner of the canvas and left the rest empty. When asked why he hadn’t painted a larger bird, replied ‘then where would the bird have flown’. Sent from my BlackBerry?? wireless device