Someone

For sometime I worked with recently arrived migrants, providing support across a wide range of daily living problems. Margarita had been in to see me earlier in the day. Her second request was to do something about her car which had been damaged in an accident. The details were tumbled up, sketchy and Margarita’s request of me unclear. Clement the telephone swahili interpreter helped me decipher the story and here it is!
When ‘someone’ drove her car to the Plaza with her permission on Sunday he [cos a someone would be a male…wouldn’t it??] backed the car into a wall at the motel. She said the car was still drivable, and this precipitated her true request. She needed the car driven from the motel to her new house. I had spent day’s setting up the new accommodation, the centrelink pays, the utilities etc… but that’s another story.
Margarita said she had tried to get on to numerous community friends, none of whom could or would assist to drive the vehicle to a new location. She could not drive, but had bought the car so that others might chauffeur her to her appointments.
As a last resort she said she had ultimately got on to Golam, who was otherwise known as ‘someone’ [at this point the reader may gasp and sotto voce repeat ‘Oh my God’!!!!!]
He had come around to drive the car away, tried, then advised Margarita the car was in fact undrivable. So I thought, why not go to the motel, get some jumper leads and at least get the car out of the motel so they could relet the room.
At the motel I found her vehicle, parked in front of the unit she had been staying in for several weeks, with its rear end looking like it had been hit by a big big truck at about 60 kph. It was as they say ‘severely damaged’.
I went to the motel manager. She was extremely pissed off, big time. She contained her rage and any danger she might have threatened me with by keeping the door to her office locked and spitting her words at me through the mesh. Thank god for that, cos the wire screen filtered most of it. Spittle hung there across several of the mesh holes, gravity taking hold. I watched fascinated.
She said that last night, very late, her slumbers were broken by a tremendous crash, which when she investigated she found to have been caused by someone driving into the parking spot in front of Margarita’s unit and then reversing and then going forward at speed, braking, then reversing back at speed though not braking, progress being impeded by a substantial block retaining wall. She said that someone repeated this to and fro motion until the car could no longer take it.
Ms Spittle made hand gestures at 10 and 2 o’clock making the 10 rock up and down between 8 and 12 and the 2 simultaneously and synchronously rocking between 2 and 4. She commented that “Someone didn’t know how to turn.” African people she continued confidently, “Only know how to drive in a straight line.” She then raised her eyes, like headlights between her arms, flailing her arms around, like a kid driving a dodgem at a fairground.
By now after several previously unsuccessful attempts, the mudguards of the car were now imbedded in the tyres, the boot reduced to half its length and no taillights shone through the shards of broken brake indicator and backing light covers. Someone tumbled from the car. Someone? OMG yes the very same someone. Pissed as a fart, drunk as a judge, stoned, under the weather, sloshed, wasted, he was drunk, very. Ms Spittle called the police but said she didn’t have someone’s licence or address but had the car rego and she’d use that to charge the owner for the towing fee to move the vehicle. She said ‘someone’ was a frequent caller over the past few weeks.
I left Ms Spittle and scurried away to my car, told Margurita her car was a write off, and that without any insurance she should consider seeking restitution for the damages from Golam. [fat chance]
Well now it was time for the power at the unit! We drove there, I wondered what was going to happen to her car, but clearly that was for another day.
There was no power in tall unit. All the switches were properly set in the unit’s switch board.
With the help of the man in unit 4, whose tee shirt bore the message not to screw with pitbulls, we unscrewed the hasp on the locked main power board and flicked switches up and down till they all looked the same in all the units.
I checked with Country Energy to advise a supply interruption and they called back to say would be an hour or so as there were no other calls in the area.
So I texted my coordinator,

sms reads: Still stuck here. No country no energy. Getting dark sea clouds rolling in. Street lights on

I called Country Energy again at 1920 and at 1928. Aaron told me there were more urgent faults at Corindi Beach and we would have a further wait.

sms reads: Good to hear the crew is up Corindi beach, he told me to “just hang on in there mate, we will get to you some time”

By now it was dark, and we were hungry, so I went up to Maccas and got us a good feed of 4 Mcdouble’s and 2 Double cheeseburgers.

sms reads: I bought the mcafrican lady a suite of fried patties between sesame seed buns plus gherkin. We liked them full and fat

An hour later at 2017 I called Country Energy to be told that “didn’t I know they had prioritised work on and that heaps of people were without power and that they’d get around to us sometime tonight.”
More waiting!
Well I thought what’s she going to eat in the morning. It’s a bit glum without light so I went up to the Plaza shopping centre and got some candles, Monte Carlos and scotch fingers at Woolies before it closed.
On return we lit the candles, one for the kitchen and one for the bathroom, which gave a nice atmosphere, very restful. We could now see our way into the dunny!
Margurita got some kip on a blanket on the floor in the unit while I waited in the street.

sms reads: Poor lady she has gone to sleep on the floor on a rug in the flickering warming glow of the pillar candle (scentless) while i keep watch for the energy men.

sms reads: She is fast asleep. Mild here by the sea. The light from yon windows beams shafts slightly illuminating the gloom

Then at 2108 a vehicle turns up with its search light on scanning the letterboxes for the numbers. I think its the energy men but it’s a taxi and a passenger gets out. He stands on the kerb and scans around. I see his face lit by the screen of his mobile as he makes a call. Margurita’s phone rings from inside! He prattles a little then walks past me without acknowledgment and down the right side driveway.

sms reads: Now a taxi arrives. He gets out and makes a call. Her phone rings making me superfluous. D’oh!

Together they settle in. Feel kinda like a pimp scanning the street hopefully.

When a panel van, and then an enormous truck pull up, I guess these are energy men. They tong everything, tong this, tong that before deciding its a fault between the main board and the internal board so there ain’t nothing they can do, mate.
I leave a note for Margurita to take round the corner to the agent first thing in the morning. The note urgently requests an electrician to attend.

sms reads: My guess is the candles were a good choice tho rose or lilac scented might have celebrated more carnally her first night in new a home

sms reads: Heading home. Margurita and paramour to sup on the monte carlo and scotch fingers she and i were to enjoy

A light shower commences, misting the window screen of my car as I switch on the ignition to start the wipers.

By 2155 I am homeward bound.

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Nippon 29. The Match

Nippon 29 the Match

Daily we make the journey from the hotel to the venue. The temperature of the clumps of frozen snow in front of the cream brick gymnasium is actually warmer than inside the stadium.

Each day three hours before the game we head out. Prematch preparations are a chance to see around Suragadai University. A private institution, it’s buildings are very much modelled on the academic edifices of the west. Atop one building are steepled shaped roofings, parapets and vaulted glassed windows. On closer inspection, through the tele on my camera, I see they are fake. The room sizes contained would be barely larger than a garrett, so they are not offices. They are simply for appearance.

The bus trip with a mix of hyped up athletes has it’s moments. Some falsetto tune has engrained itself on someone’s boom box, and it belts out in the final few kilometres to the venue daily. To hear beefy men singing in tiny Tim voices about how beautiful they are takes a little getting used to. In fact I never do. There is also the doof doof thump which seeps from the back to the front of the bus. I wonder daily what the white gloved bus driver must think Japan.

The match against Japan is a must win match, a draw is no good.
There are four fans for Australia where I sit, the stadium is full of Japanese supporters. The body heat from all the fans has heated this frigid hall more than on any other day. Cow bells and the incessant blaring of the hooters compete with the over volume loud speakers, it is ear crushing in volume. The sampled music relates to never giving up, not being second, and the bitterness of defeat. I wonder what flavour we will be tasting in ninety minutes or so?

The game starts at a furious pace, both teams are vying for their chance to play in the December world championships in Switzerland. Japan are soon two up, and it takes an effort to pull back this advantage. At two all there seems to be a pattern of play which has worked this time, which somehow eluded the team previously. A further Japanese goal imbalances the Australians but in a power play, following a two minute penalty to Japan, Timbi scores his first international goal for Australia, the teams are locked at three all.
The intensity picks up. When Japan draws a goal ahead there’s two minutes left to play. Desperation sets in and the Aussies play goalie less. It’s a gamble and it doesn’t play off. Not maintaining enough forward pressure an easy goal against the run of play is dribbled in by Japan. The return of the Aussie goalie is too late and the taste is of bitterness, tartness, slightly diluted with tears, though none are shed. For some there won’t be another chance at this level, the next world championship chance is now two years away and it’s a long time to keep fitness. For those who warmed the bench, there’s the thought that maybe they could have made the difference. The coach is faced with the thoughts of whether the whole tournament strategy was correct. The dejection is obvious. It was always a possibility, now the reality sets in.

End of game festivities by the winners are looked upon by the losers dolefully. It’s a sad sad sight. There is no second chance. In time the pain will subside.
The return bus trip is different. Hopes and dreams have evaporated, wasted chances rued. No doof doof, no falsetto, nothing at all. What to say, when there is nothing to say. The effort has not been wasted, simply not rewarded. Did they give it their best shot? Later the post-mortems start, the strategies failure and the coaches decisions. But for the score board, the same would have been hailed as sound decisions.
A few jokes are told with nothing to do with floorball. There is none of the annoying music, but what a price to pay for homecoming serenity.

Nippon 28. Food glorious food

Nippon 28. How soon it ends.

Rising as dawn breaks, the sounds of scurrying with breakfast preparations by Emi and her sister readying themselves for work rise from below. I have packed and checked the room obsessively. I eat quickly while the girls make ready. I know I will be burdened by my pack and have suggested we leave five minutes earlier than planned for the train. Together Emi and I trudge to the station. The light is soft and milky, little stirs in the houses we pass. We find a spot towards the end of the station and join a queue for a door. Emi’s sister arrives a minute or so later, we exchange goodbyes.
The chosen place turns out to be challenging. I hoist my pack into the crush of folk in the compartment, we somehow squeeze in. There’s not much space at all and no way to privately say goodbye. People get off and on, more on than off, and the press is suffocating. The second station further on is Emi’s, she will change to to get on the rapid express via Kyoto, but be better able to board the train here. I know this and wonder how to say
“Goodbye, Emi, thank you for your kindness, please thank again your family for having me.”And as the words form in my brain and rush to my mouth, she is gone, absorbed into the throng of people headed across the platform to catch the rapid. All that’s left is a faint relief that the compartment is less crowded and from being supported by the legs of others, my pack falls over. Whoops!
I ride the Shinkansen for the last time. Without meaning to I am on the all stations Kodoma, rather than the faster Hikari. Great choice by accident really, two more hours to write and think, the images, feelings and strangely enough the lack of smells overcome me. I snooze. I have in mind the sample shop Emi has located for me, and with much asking and barely being able to squeeze my pack into a locker I sally forth from Ueno station in pursuit of the samples.
It’s not often that Maccas gets a mention let alone seven eleven but here we go. The google map shows these symbols in a sea of kanji. My eyes have grown weary trying to decipher the kanji on a map and identify the shop or road sign. Lucky I like puzzles, or maybe I’m simply stubborn. The symbols on the map guide me terrestrially as the southern cross does celestially, though not here. On the nights I have looked I have seen the north star. Together with the complete inability to feel comfortable with north and south without my compass, my disorientation is complete. Nevertheless I turn into the street of a thousand cooking utensil shops. I am swayed to look and look and look. It’s like entering a street Bunnings, where you could spend all day wondering at the craftsmanship or ingenuity of designers. But I have a purpose. This sample shop has taken the effort of three of us to find and I am within blocks of it. When I see it across the road I almost commit a mortal sin and jaywalk to it.
The shops has all manner of samples. I notice they are not cheap. There are the meal platefuls almost always displayed in any restaurant’s front window. Then there are the individual pieces, sushi sashimi, tempura prawns, and on and on a whole feast of inedible meals. I chose carefully, adding selected pieces to the tray I carry about. Its like being at a smorgasbord, making sure you eat healthy, thinking of your diet. And then as at a smorgasbord I throw caution to the wind and drop pieces onto the tray without looking at the price. Yes it’s more than I had intended, but no I wont be sad when I play “Let’s have a Japanese make believe meal” when back in Hobart. I think I saw one Japanese restaurant there once.
On the way back to unstuffy my pack from the station locker ( damn thing would barely fit until I backed my bum solidly into the straps and top of pack sticking defiantly out ) I have flashbacks of home. My poor efforts to drape door ways in kimono silk have come at some cost. Here are the real things, at reasonable price in every imaginable design. I’m hooked, why not buy three. Likewise some red lanterns. Good work! And when I get back to the locker I have an additional kilo, maybe more and the dilemma of how to safely pack these things.
“Leave it to later” say to myself and brace myself for the three trains with two changes I need to make to find Timbi’s hotel at Kawagoe. I collapse into the first train, but can’t relax, the trains are speeding between and through stations, a mistake here will cost at least an hour.

Nippon 27. Goodbyes

Nippon 27. Goodbyes

Arriving back in town, we decide on a coffee. Not as easy as it sounds, for there are favourite and very favourite coffee places. There are lots of coffee places to walk past in the search. By the time we reach town favourite one is closing so we try for number two. My eye isn’t keen enough to detect what makes a good one or a bad one, well maybe a not so good one.
Eventually we find what they are looking for, I just need some warm fluid. We sit and chat, it’s a wonderful time to listen to how life is for these girls. Everything seems so removed from my life in Australia, then again the daily grind, the long hours and commutes and variable shift hours in casual work are the same here as there. Travel and English is possibly one way out. From the people around us in the coffee shop I imagine that what these girls have done, traveled alone to far away places would be regarded as bold. There is little in their demeanour which gives their intrepidness away. They have taken the English, which all in Japan learn at school and extended it to immersing themselves in foreign culture to speak better. And they have succeeded. What they now need is conversational practice, and thats what we do.
With coffee finished, we head out into the street and make our goodbyes, Yuka takes her little hamburger sample phone dangler and gives it to me, in case I don’t find the food sample shop in Tokyo. It’s a thoughtful gift. I am touched.

Nippon 26. Bruce

Nippon 26. Bruce

His feet look like boiled lobsters. He smiles as we all joke together. We have been speaking in English, practicing. Emi has been speaking about her mum showing her calligraphy, and what fun we had. The man poet has placed his entries in the slot and asks if he may see the girl’s work. He approves.
When his partner arrives he explains to her in perfect English what we have been doing, it’s a revealing moment, unexpected, then again not. I review my mental tape of anything I may have said which might have caused offence while we had sat there chatting for thirty minutes or so before he rose to leave. The tape was blank.
With softened warmed feet in our shoes we float along the the pathways to the bamboo groves. On the way we come across the home of a hermit haiku master of the seventeenth century. Its closed but over the wall theres a link to England, at the time of the Bard.
In Stratford upon Avon I’d stood in front of Shakespeare’s house before entering, marvelling at the thatched roof, which looked like a plumped hairstyle in the basin cut style sitting on the building’s brow. Here was the same thatched roof, under which elegant haiku were written.
We enter the groves, the bamboo sways, the tops forty or fifty feet above, the afternoon sunlight all but blotted out. It’s a forest which has been tended. The stumps of lopped stalks show where the thinning has taken place, though the use is unclear. Perhaps scaffolding material, maybe furniture, no one knows. Small shrines along the narrow roadway and two cemeteries give a sense of the age of the forest. Some newish looking very upmarket ryokans and hotels give the sense of the crowds that the girls say come here for the spring and the fall. I can but imagine the beauty of the autumnal leaf fall or the blossoming which will follow my visit in the next month or so. Nevertheless, the forest and the bare deciduous trees have a stark edginess which matches the crispness of the season.
We stop where the bamboo is densest, and it’s a call for a photo. Somehow the girls sense the need for an asian pose and they obligingly hold up their fingers in the V shape favoured from Korea/Japan, all the way around to the subcontinent. What it means is unclear. It doesn’t appear to be rabbit’s ears. In the Australian usage, the sign is surreptitiously raised behind an unwitting photographic subject’s head in faint mockery. The V used here appears to be more of ” Hi there, hello” and when you see this pic of me I am saluting you with good wishes. Then again I could be entirely wrong. Probably am, my enquiries of the girls lend no explanation.
When we leave the forest we walk the street of the little village which makes it’s living from the grove tourists. One shop is called “Bruce” what the hell could that be about? After examining the merchandise it’s no clearer. Bruce is a fabric man about nine inches long. A pencil case. Bruce has a zipper from his crotch to his neck. Little arms and longer legs have him in a pose not unreminiscent of da Vinci’s proportion of man drawing with arms and legs similarly extended. Bruce though is in every different fabric imaginable. Most likely off cuts, there are all colours, texture, patterns and designs. There are smaller decorative non pencil cases for use as key ring hangers, Bruce as mobile phone danglers, and there in the back of the shop is the Bruce making machinery. I hope they are making money from what strikes me as a bad idea poorly executed, then again this is Japan.

Nippon 25. Poetic licence

Nippon 25. Poetic licence

When the scrolls are put way we leave. From Karasaki station a view of Japan’s largest fresh water lake is glimpsed between some buildings, maybe a kilometre distant. The lake’s water is used as drinking water for the shoreline cities, after careful treatment. Karasaki is wedge between water and mountains not at all uncommon in Japan. Any flat land is intensively used.
In Osaka Emi has a plan to find the food samples in a mega department store. Girls her age attend the information booths and are always helpful. When we arrive on the fourth floor, we find only toy food samples, I want the full sized ones. We leave disappointed.
Osaka station is the city’s answer to Kyoto’s. The shopping complexes tower high above the station footprint, the station being a collection of Shinkansen, the high speed rail, JR and private tracks, JR and private subways. At least some direction signs are in English.
We leave Osaka to meet Yuka in Kyoto. She waits for us at a bus stop in the outer city, and together we walk to lunch. The girls have chosen their favourite place to eat, several blocks away from the main road, in a never to be rediscovered location. It’s traditional, I resist the temptation to say very traditional, not knowing what either means. A wetted cobbled entry courtyard where we remove our shoes, in my case boots has me hopping around like an ibis in mud, thankfully not landing an unbooted foot on the living space side, a mistake for which I was corrected, at the palace yesterday.
In soft whitish sandals, a little small for my size ten feet we shuffle around three corners, up a little rise into the most perfect of settings o’er looking a garden of great delicacy. The girls lower themselves as awkwardly as I do, making me feel a little more at home. My left knee wants to get in touch with my left cheek instead of staying crossed with my right leg. I forget the aches and send myself a brain memo to get up slowly to save popping a cartilage.
We are welcomed to the restaurant by the owner and waitresses ply the table with heated towels, and set places before each kneeling guest. Now I feel like in am “in” Japan.
We chat over the meal, we are silent when thinking to reply. Yuka works in a hotel, and travelled to New Zealand to study English, like Emi who went to Ireland. These girls are intrepid. They meet studying English and still do so. Having a foreigner to practice on is a real treat. Together they speak a little Japanese only when needed to deal with the staff.
I gaze into the garden, and all too soon it is time to leave. We play with the owner’s dog while waiting to pay our bills. It is surprisingly reasonable, about AUD 12. I ask why.
“Oh we could never afford to come here at night” says Yuka, ” This is one of the best restaurants in Kyoto for night dining, this is only the lunch”
So how lucky am I!
After some discussion with Emi, Yuka takes the lead and we are soon on a subway then a subway then a little train, they have in mind the bamboo groves. I had seen these mentioned in the books and on the maps, where they appeared to be closer than the journey we were making seemed to indicate.
“Are we far from the city now?” I ask them.
“Quite far” is the reply, and I am really no better informed. Dumb question really.
On the platform at the end of the line, he ticket man asks if we want to take a hot foot spa. Looking at each other we smile “Yes”
For a modest price we are handed towels and directed back up the platform to a little wooden building at the end. A man sits at the end of one of the wooden tables whose legs are in the hot spring. There are two adjacent tables with a slatted wooden bench seat around the spa. Its hot and steam rises into the cold air giving a sense of relaxation and welcome. We arrange ourselves around the far wooden table, the man is concentrating intensely on writing with a pencil on a form. There’s a pad of forms and a tin box with a slot near its top with signs indicating that the best of the haiku written on the subject of the spa will be displayed on the station noticeboards. A chance to be recognized, so we too set to the task. The girls take the task seriously, heads down, the quietness is momentarily broken by the arrival of a train and the commencement of it’s return journey. I try to imagine where in Australia we might find the opportunity to scribble a ditty about some scenic attraction. I can recall seeing some examples public written work, though not in the sonnet poetic form favoured by the Bard, more doggrel ditties such as,

“Here upon the can I sit
Waiting for a little shit
When it comes I’ll be relieved
Wiping arse with prickly leaves.”

Or the more directed proposition

“For a great time phone kylie 044230988”

Or the footy slogan appealing to club loyalty such as

“Go Cats”

I recall at one workplace place being honoured as a manager for my change management skills. Within three months some one had inscribed my name below my bosses accolade

“Brial is a killer”

Adding

“Poon is a cunt”

Apart from these types of written displays Australia seems bereft of publicly written poetry.

Here’s what I came up with in the haiku form, three lines five syllable, seven syllable, five syllables

“Hot springs heats my feet,
Train speeds up the mountain top,
Friends meet, life is good.”

I posted it in the slot, with my email address. I doubt I will be hearing from them.

Nippon 24 trip highlight

Nippon 24. Trip Highlight

Dawn has broken, the house creaks good morning. Somewhere a door slides open, it’s breakfast time. The dining room heater chases away the night’s cold into the passageways, I take my appointed seat.
Many foods are served, the tv chats away to itself, I only recognize figures, red and blue for max and min temperatures.
“What does your dad do now,” I ask Emi.
“Um, he how do we say, he um, er ” and she puts her hands to her face trying find the words to express his hobby.
“He collects, um, makes collections of the names, um the namings of families, you know?”
“So he collects these names. But how?” I ask and wonder what he is collecting and also how.
“He collects the names, how you say the family names of Japanese families, there are many many of them.”
“So where does he find these names, are they in telephone books, or prefecture records?” I wonder aloud.
“Yes, yes,” she replies, ” He makes them into lists ” and I guess that perhaps it’s the chronology and evolution of the names and where they are derived from. Perhaps in the way in which Smith is a shortening of blacksmith, an iron working trade now nearly vanished. I gain an understanding that this etymology of names is also location based almost down to village level.
It seems to be an academic pastime and suited well to a retired teacher whose life has been words.
“And your mum,” I enquire, “Does she too have a hobby?”
“Ah yes, mum does the writing with the brush, how you say”
And before she can express the word I butt in with,
“Oh, calligraphy!”
“Yes that is correct, is this the proper way to say ‘cah – lig – laffy’ ”
“Yes that’s very good and you could grr more when you say ‘laffy’, more like grraffy”
We exchange a laugh, as Emi goes on to explain that her mum has been doing classes for about ten years.
“Your mum must be very good at this” I comment, as Emi relays the conversation to her mother in Japanese.
“She has been practicing, she will show you some of her work.”
Emi’s mum searches through the low cabinets, then back across the lounge to the kitchen and out into the hall.
She is gone for a little time, we chat about where we will go today, before meeting her friend in Kyoto, while her mum searches.
Mum returns, under her left arm two square long boxes perhaps five by five centimetres and sixty centimetres long. In her right hand she carries more carefully another similar box. She kneels on the floor, laying the pair of boxes to one side and places the right hand box on the carpet in front of her. All the time she is explaining that her work is not very good and that she has much to learn. Emi translates.
From the box laid flat she takes out, then unfurls a scroll on which are several verses of a poem six or seven lines per stanza. She reads aloud to herself but for our benefit, the poem written by her teacher. It is clearly a scroll of importance for her. In the peace of her living room I feel that respect and pride in the craft worked on this scroll. More meaningful to me than seeing the writings of famous folk, unknown to me, in a museum, castle or, oh no, a temple!
Mum puts away the teacher’s scroll and takes the first of her scrolls.
Five characters in a strong hand have brushed the words of a poem or saying onto the parchment. Once started there is no turning back. Perfection is only achieved in completion, the time to stand, and observe the harmony and balance created on the parchment, which had not before existed.
An animated conversation between Emi and her mum takes place. A character is described by her mum, then Emi questions her about it’s meaning in this context. Clearly Emi can read the words but it’s the place in this writing which gives it a meaning, a poetic meaning which she is struggling with. Worse still she needs to find the words to tell me and convey the beauty of what is written in English. Patiently we wait while Emi ‘s mum passes on that which in usual circumstances is less often thought about.
“Mountain, is this word” which though it sounds different I recognize from the Chinese script.
“Then wind, then smell, then spring, is smell the right word?” she asks.
“Maybe, odour? ” I try.
Mountain, wind, odour, spring, hardly sounds the stuff of poetry.
This is not an easy translation to make, requiring understanding the subtlety of one’s own language to distill into the essence of the other language.
“Maybe it’s mountain, breeze, fragrance, spring” she guesses and this seems right to me
“Wow, that sounds right for English, Emi, ” I say.
The beauty of the balance of the black characters on the paper represents hours and years of practice. To achieve the level of confidence required before the five or so minutes of writing, requires great mastery. A stilling of the heart and nerves to be steady of hand and totally within oneself. The outcome is pure simplicity.
Mum takes her second achievement from it’s box, and lays it alongside, mother and daughter have a discussion which I am sure has not happened before in this room about these works, but had it been had, surely not at seven thirty on a Tuesday workday morning. When the second scroll has been explained, there is mutual agreement to take a few pics of these rare objects.
Emi’s mum hold’s two scrolls up and Emi the third. The look of serious pride on mum’s smily face as she stands dwarfed bedside her work are the highlight pictures of my trip. There will be pictures of O- Toni, the peace bell, even snow drifted villages in fellow travellers cameras. These are the only pictures of these scrolls and I feel so so privileged.