Showing posts with label essay. Show all posts
27 February 2016
Sento, public bath, the soap scent in town. [scent of Tokyo]
Sento, the public place, community and hygiene place of the town
The smell of soap reminds us evening has come. In the evening, the smell of soap was coming from the flat, house and Sento. When I passed the people with red face and soap smell each other, I realised he or she had been to Sento to take a bath. The bathroom in the general house in Japan was next to the kitchen and sometimes faced to the street and had the window in the high position of the ground floor. The vapor of the bathroom come through the window with soap smell.
the Sento Entrance in Edogawabashi area. The entrance for gentlemen and laies were completely separated.
How to enjoy the Sento, pablic bath
The Sento was the public bath service for the people. They had the facility of the large geyser with chimney in the building. The entrances of bath facilities were separated as Ladies and Gentlemen. After taking off your shoes, there were the space for changing cloth. The Sento has the rule and habbits for the other user can enjoy the bath with comfort. First you should wash your body not to bring the dirtyness into public bathtab. The prastic pail printed Kerorin is the most traditional style. After wash yourself, you can go to the bathtub. Then you must not dip your towel into the water to keep the water clean. After enjoy the hot water, you should wipe well not to bring the water drops into the dressing space to prevent the peson from slip on the floor. Sento is also public space for local communities. The elder people come to Sento to see their friends or neighbours.The metroporetan Tokyo government has also the finantial assistance service to visit Sento for elderly people as they need.
The scent of soap from the person coming back from Sento reminds us the sweet memories with our families. When the geyser was broken or on over capacity of the bathroom when the relative visited us on the holidays, we used to go to Sento as unusual exciting experiences. The chilled milk from the refregirator was also the unexpected events.
13 February 2016
To eat or not to eat, experience of food and culture is unique in country.
essay
,
Far East
,
Tokyo
,
UK
No comments
:
To eat the meat of venison or pigeons or to hunt foxes were
well cultivated custom in European countries. On the other hands, to eat whales
or to hunt whales were lupine custom in European countries. In the small
islands in Far East, there were the different situations in these customs. Fortunately
or unfortunately, I love both customs. In late autumn, I am looking for the
restaurant where serve nice dishes of venison or pigeons and Burgundy wine from
France. On visiting several favourite restaurants of Japanese foods, Itamae
recommend me the nice part of whales which they bring from Tsukiji market.
Mr. Wingfield-Hays was a very un-lucky gentleman. He and his
friends might have never seen and tried the best part and spices of whales. As
embarrassing, it was the first time when I had really lovely meat of whale at
Kiyokawa three years ago. Draining blood from the meat on the whale boats were
very important process for the meat not to make “gamey flavour”.
My parents had also an unbalanced diet during traveling
around Europa. When we visited to a bistro in Paris, I was very excited to choose
pigeon from venison, pigeon or sole on the lists. My mother was as surprised at
me as she faced the end of the world. One hundred and fifty years ago, eating
four leg animal was prohibited and disliked due to the religious rule of Buddhism.
The dish of pigeon was lovely dish I had never had in Japan. The juicy meat and
nice flavour of sauce was memorable.
As the BBC journalist, he might have had some duties to
write radical articles as Sea Shepard due to commercial reasons, with small
amount of experience having meat of whales. As the typical middle couple from
Japan, my parents have never taste the gibier as traditional French dishes. These
people I described, had huge preoccupation on the ingredients. These
ingredients were not prohibited under their religions and their countries laws.
They felt just an aversion to eating or knowing how the animal be shoot.
The ingredients which was prohibited under the religions
were regarded as importance. The ones which was faced extinction were also
thought as importance. According to the Norwegian Fisheries web sites, Minke
whales were not damaged species. The rumour data among Itamae in Japan said the
number of blue whales landed on the fisherman’s ports were decreasing. These
facts show the balance of ecosystem was already broken under the IWC moratorium,
There was no scientific epidemiological data of whales on the earth from the
countries against whaling in IWC.
All discussions were emotional argument and dichotomy
between desirable and undesirable as my mother’s word “feel sick”.
30 January 2016
“New Normal” of the service in the local restaurant of Mainland China?
The people in People’s Republic of China might have faced
the new phase, not only in their economics but in their industry or view of
profession. During my very short journey, I met a lot of service person of the
restaurants. The staff of the Wanda Sofitel has huge disabilities to
communicate in English, but the customer who can speak Chinese may be welcomed
by all of staff in hotel. On the other hand, the staff in the local restaurant
show us very kind and professional service.
The first memorable communication between the people in PRC
and us was at the mutton hot pot restaurant beside the Shichahai (什刹海).
The floor manager was very fair gentleman who was able to speak only in
Mandarin. He coordinated our table one hour and half after we arrived the
restaurant. There were hundred customers were waiting for their table. In the
End of the dinner, the staff had come to clear the next table to ours. The middle
age lady staff has told us how to say, ”Thank you” in Mandarin. The pronunciation
of xiexie was different among the Mandarin in Beijing and in Taipei. The sound
in Taipei was very clear and articulated.
The second one was at the Peking style local restaurant where
we had Zha jiang noodle in Quanmen. The middle class people, the communist
party will strongly deny their being, had large lunch with their friends or
families late morning. There were more than ten service staff at this restaurant.
We had ordered only Zha jiang noodle and some Chinese pancakes. The staff had
made a wondering look. The noodle was very lovely with sophisticated miso paste
and well-balanced topping. After our payment, a young lady were sent us off to
the entrance. She said me “Wear, Wear” in Chinese. The outside were very chilled climate.
The rumour of Mainland China was smile-less continent among 60s-70s
old people. Under the communism society, the service industry had never
developed. After the gauge jaufang (economic reform in PRC), the rapid growth
of tourists to Western countries may have had small outcome in the PRC society.
The upper class and middle class people had come to Japan, North America, South
East Asia countries or Europa. They had felt what the real comfortable service
is, which they had forgotten for 60 years after communism revolutions.
25 December 2015
Merry Christmas!! Saesons greeting.
essay
,
Far East
,
Japan
,
Tokyo
No comments
:
Dear gentle reader,
Merry Christmas. I wish you all have happy holiday with your precious persons.
In this current year, there were several but grevious events around the world. We should keep our daily life, culture and diversity in this situation. Japanese use "いつものように"(itsumo no youni) meaning "as usual". Though the grevious events must not be happened as usual, I would like to spend my holiday as usual with friends or my family.
We wish our happy holiday and present new year 2016.
Lim Ken at Tokyo
Merry Christmas. I wish you all have happy holiday with your precious persons.
In this current year, there were several but grevious events around the world. We should keep our daily life, culture and diversity in this situation. Japanese use "いつものように"(itsumo no youni) meaning "as usual". Though the grevious events must not be happened as usual, I would like to spend my holiday as usual with friends or my family.
We wish our happy holiday and present new year 2016.
Lim Ken at Tokyo
The View of Megane bashi at Nagasaki
19 November 2015
Is the Bond martini (shaken vodka martini) delicious for drinkers?
Bar
,
essay
,
Far East
,
James Bond
,
Japan
,
Tokyo
No comments
:
Spector is released on 4th December in Japanese market. The new 007 film Spector has already released in UK.
http://www.bmj.com/content/347/bmj.f7255.full.pdf+html
“James is not a real drinker, I think. The Bond martini is
small amount of alcohol because the shaking sound is very dull with clashing
ice sound, thus the martini glasses are very large.” The lady who love to taste
the cocktails in the famous bar said and I said “The Martini which Japanese skilful
bartender had shaken will throw him down, with the strong alcohol contains in
the Shaken vodka martini.” We told about the weak martini in the 007 movies over
a glass of sherry and a glass of thick White lady at the early evening.
The shaken vodka martini must have been very thin and tasteless
in the Bond movies as Sky fall (the bartender in Macao was at least better than
other ones.), Casino Royal or Living Daylight (we may know the taste of the poison
in such as thin martini). When I visited to the bars in these Anglo-Saxon countries,
I had been very disappointed the quality of the cocktails. The bar man in these
countries used very loose ices containing a lot of airs bubble and almost
melting for their cocktails. They also were not able to measure the amount of liquors
for the cocktails. The shaken vodka martini made with loose ices were nicely
weak cocktail before going out on missions. In the United States or England,
the ice for the cocktails is really low quality.
From the economist web site
Ian Fleming may have known and anticipated the worrying future
of cocktail in UK. He had Mr Bond drunk 92 units per week in his novels. In this
“scientific” article, the author had described that he counted the vodka
martini as 3 units alcohol (1unit is 8 g of ethanol.) same amount as the glass (150mL)
of the wine or Japanese sake. The Dukes bar in Dukes hotel, London where Sir
Fleming loved to drink and was inspired the Vesper martini is serving 8 units alcohol
martini with 150mL Martini glass. He had written Mr Bond as the strong role
model but the movie producers had drawn his as the “not-real drinker.” The
amount of alcohol unit must flexed depends on the recipes of the cocktail.
http://www.bmj.com/content/347/bmj.f7255.full.pdf+html
16 November 2015
Keep calm, enjoy the diversities of the huge world, and then think about the people in far place. After Terror attack in Paris.
essay
,
Far East
,
France
,
Japan
No comments
:
Read "Soumission" written by Michel Houellebecq in
Far East anew after the massacre in Paris
If the massacre on last Friday would happen on the “Soumission”
situation after 2022, what comment will the people talk on the media or SNS?
After the peace of Westphalia, the “shape” of Europa have been destroyed and
re-constructed again and again. For these several years after Greek crisis, the
people of Europa is losing the identity as the citizen of Europa. In addition the
population of the Muslim is increasing as the immigrants and refugees from the
Middle East area. The immigrants were formed local communities in the countries
only with Muslims in the European countries.
What kind of the situation are the citizens in our developed
countries? They had the smartphone, convenient fast food, middle to high
education, not big but not little income and small number of family. An
individual will communicate with other individuals one way through the SNS (as
Facebook or twitter) or internet through the smart phone without seeing their
voice or face each other. The people in Japan are following the current trends
of fashion, food or also politics in the mass media. They have never made decision
if like or not, fit them or not, realistic or not. This type of society may be
very weak to the sudden and slight terrorist attacks.
Tokyo is one of the most international cities in the world. The
major cities of Europa in these days also show the huge diversity in international
culture, religious, foods and customs. Francois drank a lot of amount and kinds
of liquor or wines and ate broadly international foods, including from the Islamic
cultures, in the novel. The restaurant which the terrorist had attacked was the
Cambodian restaurant. Fundamentalist would not have the tolerance of the
diversity (In the situation in “Soumission”, the Islamic fundamentalist may
attack the 2022 Arabic government in France.). On the other hand, the citizens
in Europa might enjoy the difference between the original nationalities or
cultures in the communities. We should know more about each other on the earth.
The elite in the countries are very frail in their
principle, will and social position. Under the Nazi government in Germany or
Austria, in the South Korea or in the Post-World War II Japan, the class of
elite has converted to the complete opposite side to keep their position or
incomes. The pressure from the social awareness, unemployment or promotion will
easily break the spirits of the elite.
We should keep our daily life as going to the restaurant or cafe, meeting our friends, going to working by metro or bus as usual, drinking some drinks in bar and watching movies. The terrorist wanted to destroy our daily life and our communities with their despicable attacks. And After enjoying the daily life with grief, then we should think about the farther places as France, Iraq, Sylia and Lebanon etc. Under the dynamic and rapid transition of the world, we
should broadly take notice of this Paris massacre to find what we must know and
think. We forgot a lot of attacks around Middle East as the Turkey, Lebanon or
Iraq. The attacks were not only Paris. To know something, the culture or friends
will help us.
6 August 2015
On the occasion of 70th "that day"
"That day" had come again.
The mid-summer heat in Tokyo reminds me the school day of Nagasaki in the summer vacation on my teenage, twenty years ago. Every August, I cannot help but think about the national security and peace of Japan."That day" for Nagasaki
On “That day”, the pupils in Nagasaki prefecture were gathered
in the auditorium without air conditioner. We heard the cicada chirping outside and had felt sweltering of the
auditorium during listening to what Nagasaki city had on that day and how
bloody American had done as one atomic bomb were exploded to kill the seventy
thousand citizens. I felt that the sadness of the atomic bomb was amplified
with the sound of cicada and the sweltering hot.
Peace education had very political message
The education at the primary school in Nagasaki was including “peace education.” But I have never learned about the definition of “peace” by our teachers who just thought “peace” is the antonym of war. The education was dominated by the context of the historical perspective of the Japan Teachers Union which stands Anti- America, Anti- Japanese military, Anti- Japanese government and sympathy to Chinese communist party and Workers’ party of Korea. As the part of “peace education” the pupils were gathered for the purpose they imprinting that military system is evil and US is evil, on this school day on 9th August.Foreign affair and "That day"
The discussion about the national security has frozen on this August. The opponents against the collective defence were giving up thinking on hearing the word of “military.” The supporters have faced on the strict on revision of the written constitution which had never been revised for seventy years. The education and tendency that the left media and the Unions spread propaganda against the military had stopped Japanese to think about the national security. All citizen of Japan will hope peace as the Constitution of Japan said the world peace, but the governor and the opposition are not able to explain how we can keep the peace in Asia where the government of Mainland China and Korea show the expansionism and imperialism.
We
must not do as the Tragedy through Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Fukushima over
again. We should not stop our discussion about the national security for our
peace.
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)
