Zach awry in Japan

Archive for the ‘Friends’ Category

22 March 2010 Pottery Non-Macros

I’ve blogged often about my friend Kamada Koji (鎌田幸二), who has been kind enough to devote decades of his life to becoming a master potter in the Tenmoku (天目) style just so that I could take macros of his stuff. Last week he held a yearly show at Takashimaya, one of the fancier Japanese department stores. I would have loved to bring my tripod, kick everybody out, and adjust the light to my specifications, but any picture-taking at all is ordinarily forbidden. I had his special permission, but still felt it was a good idea to be as discreet and fast as possible.

Kamada-san pointing center, with his wife Kazumi
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Tea powder holder with case
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Vase with cherry blossom branch
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Another tea powder holder with case
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Small vase with flower
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It’s exceedingly difficult to capture the nuances of nearly all his glazes, but this particular one most of all, because in real life the colors are not only extremely subtle, but they shift mercurially (almost literally because they are metallic crystals) with small changes in light.

Tea bowl
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Detail
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7 November 2009 Sorry it took me so long, Maki!

We’re having a very good time of things here in Sausolito/San Francisco/Palo Alto. The first week was the best, when all four of us were here (including for Halloween), but I have managed to keep things from becoming miserable for the remaining three of us after Maki had to go back to Japan for work. Helping me has been many of my extended family, who have flown in from various parts of the US to see my kids (definitely not me!).

Anyway, here are a bunch of pics from the second week of our stay. I unwisely unloaded the first week’s pics onto a friend’s computer, then forgot to get them back before I left their house in Palo Alto. Lucky for me I’m going back there before we leave. These pictures are un-edited in any way. I haven’t even had time to go through and make sure I am selecting the best pic of each series. But, I wanted to get something up here before too much time had passed. Hopefully in a couple days I’ll post some of the best of these individually.

(To view full-screen, first press the Play button in the center, then place the mouse over the slideshow to view the control bar on the bottom, then press the symbol in the lower-right corner.)

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Family, Friends, Lens: 35/1.8, US

24 August 2009 In the Playground

Taking a break from the macros: just some random shots from the playground today.

I don’t know the origin of this particular Japanese quirk, but they are big into what they call tetsubo, which is what Genbo, Zoe, and their friends are playing on here. They teach ‘em really young how to whirl around on the things forward and backward from the waist, and if you can’t do it it’s a horrible mark of shame. One girl I know who is in second grade (I think) has her name perpetually on the blackboard because she can’t do the backflip. Zoe, obviously, can’t do any of that stuff, but she can hang from the bars for an amazingly long time.

Genbo is being pulled into the vortex!
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Just hanging around
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Zoe loves going down the slide, and went down today at least 10 times. On the tenth time, however, she decided it was “scary” and she was having no more of it.

“You’re not going to make me go down that death trap, are you daddy?”
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“I’m begging for mercy here!”
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“Oh well, if you insist…”
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She’s been mastering the swing lately too. She used to be scared of swinging much at all, but now she can go pretty high.

And, finally, Genbo looking dashing as ever as he’s about to go down the slide.

14 May 2009 Finally at the Danged Cherry Blossoms (but few pictures of them anyway)

Dang, I cannot believe it’s been an entire month since I wrote what I thought was the first half of a two-part post describing our trip to Kyoto to see the cherry blossoms. I can’t even claim to have been busy with work, since the Great Depression of the Late-Naughts is still taking its toll on that front. I even have a bunch of other good posts I’ve been meaning to make, but they’ve all been butting their heads against this one, which has remained stubbornly 15 minutes away from posting for the past thirty days. Ah well, such is life.

Zoe and Maki in the setting sun against some cherry blossoms
Have no idea where Genbo picked up this quirky expression

This style of exterior is an old Japanese form of weather-proofing, where planks are charred to keep out the elements. It looks beautiful here in the setting sun.

Japanese equivalent of a red barn
Meanwhile, this bald tree offered an interesting study of lines and color.

We visited a nearby park with our friends Anthony and Jeffrey.

Anthony and Genbo riding off into the sunset.
“Hey there, Pardner”
Zoe sits at the top of the slide contemplating the ride down

It’s easier with mommy. If only they had thought to put a blossoming cherry there instead of that ugly light pole.

Whee!
Three (4?) little munchkins

If you stuck around this long in the hopes of seeing some beautiful pictures of cherry blossoms, I’m sorry to disapoint you. We ended up going back home before it got dark and they were all lit up gloriously. Jeffrey, however, did stick around and took some excellent photos. He also has a great post of some pictures of Zoe that you should check out here.

A little anti-climactic
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Family, Friends, Lens: 35/1.8

24 November 2008 A Day of Play

Today it was raining, and, since it is a national holiday here in Japan (I’m not even sure which one; probably the emperor’s neice’s birthday or something), we all went to Borne Lund on Kawaramachi street in Kyoto, an upscale toystore with a great indoor play area. My friend Jeffrey met us there with his son Anthony, and he happened to have his camera along with him. He was nice enough to send me these photos.

Getting a leg up on that astronaut training

If you can believe it, the rule was no throwing balls in this ball cage

Nice arm, Genbo!

And, no jumping….(but even the nice workers seemed resigned to having their admonitions repeatedly ignored)

Jeronimo!

Today was the first time Genbo really played in this ball thing without being too scared

Guess all it took was a slightly older friend

Zoe got her fill of playing in too, but she’s also just recovering from a cold, so she also spend lots of time exactly as you see here.

Aww….



13 August 2008 Our Personal Fountain

Genbo has spent an awful lot of time in the water this summer. He’s shaping up to be quite a water-lover. First it was the vinyl pool on our balcony (which I’ll post pictures of later), then it escalated to the condo fountain (pictured below), and finally to the neighborhood community pool near us (again, pictures to come). He won’t even come out of the bath, he loves splashing and playing around in it so much.

Zoe, too, in just the past few weeks, has undergone a veritable phase change from a passive blob of baby-dom to an active toddler who feels quite at home playing with her brother and his friends (regardless of whether they might want her to).

Here are some shots of Genbo playing with Nao, his best friend in the building, while Zoe gamely participates.

Zoe has a thing for shoes, a predilection I hope doesn’t end up costing me money
Nao’s mom and little brother Asaki
Zoe doesn’t mind being wet one bit
I like how her face isn’t in focus here, but the water droplets are
What a smile…
Genbo and Nao
Grrr…..
Little Asaki. He’s so square and solidly built we call him Oyabun, which means “Yakuza boss”

They are building a new condo in the lot behind ours. The developers lied to everyone in our building, of course, saying that it would be a retail space of only a few storeys, but it’s a condo just as tall as ours (15 storeys). They just didn’t lie on paper, and the wheels of Japanese justice turn excruciatingly slowly, so it’s not worth it trying to do anything about it.

Someone is having a very different kind of day

Pictures of Genbo in the same fountain last year are here.

10 August 2008 Second year of fireworks

This past Friday was a huge fireworks festival held every year on the lake we can see from our balcony. As with last year we invited a bunch of people, only this time I decided to check out my cooking prowess by making everything by hand instead of buying stuff at Cosco. Of course, we ended up with way too much food. I invited about 20, cooked for 30, and 12 came. And, some people brought their own dishes as well. Still, somehow everything got eaten, but only because I wasn’t above making people go home with souvenirs of about a quart of pasta sauce.

Six quarts of pasta sauce. The first time I’ve ever maxed out the “Cauldron,” as I call my huge cast iron monster
I also used the Cauldron for making a huge loaf of bread. Yummy….
Two purple cabbages, three bell peppers, an onion, and a head of garlic before being cooked with red wine vinegar and sake on very low heat for about 90 minutes. I love the colors.

I also cooked enough potato salad (recipe taught me by my Japanese mother-in-law) for an entire army regiment, but I didn’t bother shooting that.

Maki and Zoe getting ready for the fireworks

If you’ve read through this post in the hopes of seeing pretty pictures of fireworks, I’m sorry to disappoint. Right at the end of an entire day of cooking I grabbed a steel pot lid, having forgotten that it had been in the oven for the past hour. And, I didn’t just graze the thing, I grabbed it hard to pick it up. I think Genbo learned about five new words in the ensuing pain-induced swear-fest. So, I had one hand permanently encased in ice for the remainder of the night, and wasn’t able to take pictures. I refer you to last year’s post instead.



28 July 2008 Open Letter

Dear Old Friend,

Thank you so much for your invitation to join Social Networking Site X (SNSX). I am touched that, although we haven’t spoken or written in years, you have refrained from erasing my email address and thereby extended this digital hand of friendship to me along with likely hundreds of others. (Tell them I said hi, by the way.)

I recognize that the invitation to join you at SNSX represents a delightful optimism on your part, a hope that the nonzero probability that that you and I might wish to resume our relationship at some time in the future might be sustained and even nurtured by the beneficent hand of SNSX.

Alas, I must decline your invitation. Do not take it personally.

In my old age I find myself becoming ever more the grouchy hermit, and I am no longer able to hold onto the youthful, exuberant ideals embodied by your invitation to perpetual contact. No, cold and heartless as I am, I find myself subscribing to a more organic, Darwinian model of friendship, ie those that are worthy of persisting do so without the technological assistance of SNSX and its brethren, while the rest are more than welcome to settle into the warm ooze of my longterm memory.

In other words, Old Friend, whose memory I will always cherish, if we need SNSX to stay in touch, then, well, perhaps we shouldn’t.

27 July 2008 Fine wine and pottery

So today we went to visit the Kamadas, old neighbors of ours whom I describe here. We usually go back and enjoy their company and incredible cooking every month or so, although tonight we went back for a special occasion. Their eldest son, Keisuke, turned 20, which is the age of majority in Japan, and to celebrate they opened a magnum of wine purchased about 10 years ago that was made in the same year as Keisuke was born.They invited us to come and enjoy it with them.

The wine itself, pictured below, was amazing. I have always enjoyed wine, but have never tasted the really nice stuff. Now I know what I’ve been missing. This 20-year Burgundy was easily better than anything else I’ve had. The only way I can describe it is that it was deep and complex without being heavy. It just went down incredibly smoothly, and if you wanted to pay attention to it you could, but it wasn’t overpowering. Now I can’t wait until their middle child turns 20 in a few years.

Some classy wine
Kamada-san with a cavorting Genbo and Zoe
Genbo in the canonical “elbow-grabbing” pose

I’ve been meaning to take some more pictures of Kamada-san’s work, and this time I remembered to bring my camera and ZF100/2 macro lens. I still can’t get over the fact that, of all the potters in this pottery-loving country, the single one (literally) whose work I love best just happened to live next to me, and be a really nice guy who likes to invite me over, play with my children, and get me drunk with great wine and food. His work is very hard to capture, though, because so much of it is glossy and reflects light. The different metallic crystals are so beautiful, though, and have a fractal beauty that draws you in. By this I mean that you can appreciate the beauty of the glass at any number of scales, and there is complexity and beauty at each one, from viewed afar to the tiniest detail.

Works by Kamada Koji (鎌田幸二)

A wealth of photographic opportunity
I love these delicate lavenders and pinks
VERY close up
Two sake thimbles side by side
A detail (100% crop)
Cold sake out of these cups tastes SO good…
Another detail
One more…

12 June 2008 Today in the park

 

As I described in my previous post, today Genbo, Zoe and I went with Anthony and his dad Jeffrey up into the hills near my house. At the very top was a small military graveyard. More on that later, but I just downed a big glass of beer, and I don’t feel like sleeping quite yet, so I thought I would just throw these up for now. First two photos taken by Jeffrey.

 

The engraved inscription reads, “To the memory of all fallen soldiers from the Sino-Japanese War, Russo-Japanese War, WWI, and WWII.” Genbo wanted to climb up and start throwing the stones, and wanted me to explain why he couldn’t. After a second’s thought I resorted to the all-powerful, “Because I said so!”

 

Zoe and I


 

Genbo crossing bridge, newly shorn (by me) head glinting nicely in the sun. Click here to see the exact same moment taken by Jeffrey, with a completely different result.

 

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Family, Friends, Japan, Lens: 16-85

22 March 2008 Fun Day in the Park

 

We had a fun day in the park today. Read all about it here.

If you visit Jeffrey’s site, please leave a comment thanking him for saving my son’s neck.

 

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Family, Friends

26 November 2007 Young Friends

 

 

 

12 October 2007 Real Coal Choo-Choo Trains

Genbo loves trains more than anything else in this world. For a while fully half of his active vocabulary was Thomas the Tank Engine-related. So, when Jeffrey invited us to the bazaar at his son’s kindergarten (which continues up all the way to college on a connected campus), at which there was a real, live, coal-fired train to ride on, we couldn’t say no. (Thanks Jeffrey for some of the pictures.)

 

Genbo and Anthony on the train. For his first few rides Genbo was very intent, not smiling, as though studying or savoring the experience. Or maybe he was just nervous.

 

What are you looking at, boys? The affiliated girls high school had dance performances all throughout the day.

 

Genbo taking it easy.

 

Genbo and Anthony cavorting.

 

A convergence of blue hats.

12 September 2007 Saturday with the Friedls

I’ve been meaning to write about Jeffrey Friedl, a new friend of mine here in Kyoto. I first found him through his blog, an excellent photoblog that is largely responsible for my decision to start my own blog again with a photographic concentration. He lived in the Bay Area for a long time as an early employee of Yahoo!, is as much or more of a camera geek as I am (we have plans to go all the way down to Osaka this month to paw advanced models of Nikons new cameras), and has a bilingual 5 year old son. He also literally wrote the book on regular expressions (don’t worry if you don’t know what that is), which makes him a huge stud.

We took everyone to the zoo last weekend. It was nice and all, but Kyoto has one of those zoos where you just end up feeling sorry for all the animals but the monkeys, who can have fun anywhere, so I doubt we’ll be heading back anytime soon.

Jeffrey, his son Anthony, Genbo and Maki watching the monkeys cavort

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Anthony and Genbo on the zoo’s mini-train. Genbo’s starting that Japanese “peace” thing in front of cameras, which I will beat out of him if I have to.

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Maki carrying Genbo.

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Some kind of a grave or memorial at the zoo. Kids kept me from investigating closer.

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Anthony was very good about helping us herd Genbo.

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Busted!

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Finally, Jeffrey let me use his excellent new tripod back at my house.

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