After an 8 month hiatus, I am have started to work on haniwa again.
For inspiration I’ve been thinking a lot about my childhood memories, of places I’ve been, of people I’ve met, and of music I love. Places I’ve traveled, movies I’ve watched countless times, and books I’ve read have also featured prominently in their creation.
It’s been a challenge to actually break open a bag of clay and to actually start making something, but once I’m doing it I love the process. It’s like that with a lot of things I find, whether it be cooking, exercise, or reading. In my mind, I know it’s going to be fun, but I still need to push myself to actually do it.
Other notes:
I’ve taken the Komainu (guardian dogs) and reinterpreted them. The ungyo and agyo themes seem to work well as octopi.
I think I’ll do a set of Japanese kana characters. Doesn’t it look like he’s saying “O”?
Patterns from kimono, ancient pottery, and other graphic sources make great sources of inspiration for patterning.
It’s kind of nice working only with clay, and not messing with glazes and such. I’d like to start working with wood burning kilns in order to see what kind of effects that I can get by manipulating heat, ash, and clay mixtures.
In Japan, I very rarely used my credit cards and regularly carried large denomination bills on my person.
In the States I use my cards more, and only use cash when I have to. Cash is reserved for places that don’t take credit, splitting the bill when eating with friends, and as a reserve plan, just in case I need it.
I like being able to use credit cards everywhere, but only because I am very wary of over-spending on my limited paycheck.
What I don’t like is trying to find a place that will accept large bills. At some places, you can sense the reluctance to accept them. Some places won’t even take them. I can’t remember one time someone wouldn’t take a 10,000 yen note when I was in Japan. It just didn’t happen.
Then again, there were few times where trying to use my credit card was easy over there. Usually, the clerk looked at it as if it were a puzzle to be solved, and a few minutes later summoned other clerks and then the manager who would either apologize that they didn’t accept credit cards (I suspect that some of them may have accepted them, but didn’t know it themselves because no one ever had used one in their store) or would take over control of the register and demonstrate part of why they had risen to the ranks of management.
It’s hard to say which form of payment I like better. On one hand, I can do almost anything I need to with my credit card. There’s no going to the ATM or planning how much I will need before going out. One major benefit is that as long as you report a card missing or stolen, if you lose your wallet the only money you will lose is the actual money in your wallet.
On the other, having to handle money, instead of just signing receipts, makes process of paying for something less abstract. You can actually see your money entering or leaving your possession. Unlike a credit card, thieves on the internet can’t literally pick your pocket.
I don’t know which I like using better, cash or credit. It would be nice to have a lot more cash though.
I’m going to end this post on something a bit off topic:
I really like bartering. Trading something hot off the grill for a beer, trading some chips for some cookies, and trading a book for a CD. It’s been transactions like that which have given me the most satisfaction.
I think we should bring back bartering on a larger scale. Can you imagine paying your taxes in candy, or trading a chef some fish that you caught in exchange for a free dinner? Ah that would be awesome!
I notice that it’s a lot easier to face the morning now than ever before. I never liked waking up, but up until I started high school, I used to force myself to wake up on the weekends so that I could catch the morning cartoons.
Between high school and college, I gave into the urge to sleep in whenever possible. Up until 2 years ago, the sun coming up signaled time to go to bed on days that I wasn’t working.
Now, I wake up an hour before work in order to shower, cook and eat breakfast, and walk to work. Sleeping in means staying in bed until 10:00 a.m.. It’s nice not to feel dead in the morning, and I’m curious to see if, one day, I will routinely rise in time to watch the sun rise without feeling like my head is full of fog.
It feels so strange to not feel weird about going to bed early, and to actually want to go to bed early. I had to train myself out of trying to stay awake for a few years after college. In the end, it helps to live in a community made up of older folks, where there is nothing to do at night time.
Is this what it’s going to be like as I get older? Is it going to continually be like how it was when I finally started to appreciate spicy foods (before I was a teenager, I didn’t like spicy foods), beer (it took me until my 2nd year at UCSB to really appreciate the taste of good beer rather than the entertaining effects of drinking beer in general), or going to sleep early? How many things are there like this? I guess I’ll just have to wait in order to find out.
I’ve turned off comments for now. Too much Spam. I don’t like Spam.
I will turn them back on in the future, but for now I’ve had enough Spam. Damn Spam!
According to this story, it appears that hammerheads and possibly other species can reproduce without a father. Here’s an unrelated story on a new anemone found on the bones of a dead whale.
This is why I love marine bio. It seems like every month there is at least one new exciting discovery!
I really don’t know what to say about this story from Kumamoto: link
Some people should really not reproduce. So much unnecessary suffering and hardship is caused by people having babies that will not be adequately cared for.
And whose idea was it to create an anonymous unwanted baby drop off? I can’t see how anyone would ever think that was a good idea! They were practically inviting this kind of thing to happen.
The poor kid is at the mercy of a bunch of idiots. It’s things like this that make me depressed to be a part of humanity.
This post is dedicated to my little sister, who asked for me and Justin to post stuff for her to read in between tests:
This is Yvel. She now has a new, stupid name, but her real name is and shall always be Yvel. When she was young, I used to carry her around in my pocket and she would fall asleep.
Yvel was the smartest of the puppies, and the craziest. She would stop at nothing to attack your toes, and relentlessly smashed through obstacles in order to lick her victim. She also had the strange habit of hopping around like a little bunny.
Aside from her name, it sounds like Yvel is doing well. I have heard that she dines on filet mignon, drinks expensive mineral water, and rolls around in a Bentley. I bet she liked my pocket better.
The Deep has some awesome photos of deep sea creatures, many of them taken by MBARI, and featured in Mysteries of the Deep (not to be confused with the National Geographic series of the same name), one of the shows at Monterey Bay Aquarium.
Check out the impressive gallery on the book’s site (the link is on the bottom right corner).
On the way up from Huntington Beach, Kohei and I picked up some fresh, wild-caught shrimp in a small town right before we reached Santa Barbara. If you are familiar with that stretch of coast line, it’s the place that used to have the banana plantation back in the day.
Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures, but the place selling the shrimp was like something you might encounter in Mexico or a rural coastal village in Thailand. I saw no signs advertising their shrimp, only a broken down taco truck converted into a produce stand, which also sold long skateboards.
Kohei inquired if they were the place that sold shrimp, and the young dude cleared some lettuce off of a battered box, and removed the lid to expose some really fresh shrimp. It still had bright pigmentation, and the only smell was of fresh sea water.
I drove off with my mind blown that such a place could exist, hidden from everyone other than the locals right next to the 101. This is what I had grown addicted to in Japan: finding places that no one else knew of that were extraordinary. Since returning, I’ve found such places, but not nearly as frequently as I did in Kyushu and Kansai.
What was the chances of finding 2 places that surprised me in one day, covering a stretch of California that I have driven through countless times? Well, it was pretty good that day.
“What do you recommend for lunch?” is a question I’ve asked Ko on many occasions, and he has never done me wrong. Tri-tip burgers in Long Beach, Pink’s Hotdogs, and the best chili fries in L.A. are only a few things that we have enjoyed on an afternoon. This guy knows good food, but I was still more than a bit confused when he recommended a Chinese place for Mexican food.
We walked into the restaurant at about 2pm, and there was no one to show us to a seat. Instead, we walked up to a window next to the kitchen, wrote down our order on an order pad. We summoned the cook, and he shaved a seemingly insignificant portion of meat off of the stack, serving us 3 tacos apiece.
This beautiful ball of sizzling pork reminded me of all of the great chunks of roasting meat I’ve sampled, notable those of the kebab places in Pike’s Place Market in Seattle, of tacos in Mexico, and of Churrasco in Kobe.
The salsas and condiments were top rate as well. Notably, they served their tacos with a side of canned pineapple that perfectly complemented the tacos. Pico de gallo, cilantro and onions, jalapenos, sliced radishes, guacamole, and other toppings rested underneath two Shisars, a lacquered hyotan, and a samurai helmet display. Could this place be any more awesome?
The owner clearly liked fishing and hiking in the mountains, as he decorated the restaurant with mounted fish and family pictures in the Sierras. I have no idea about the history of this restaurant, but I intend to return and find out. It will give me a good reason to go back and enjoy some of the best tacos I have ever tasted!
On the China Bowl website there is no mention of tacos, but take my word for it: it is well worth your time to stop by this place if you find yourself passing through Santa Maria. Long live Chinese tacos!
