share the moon

Calligraphy

2008-06-28T00:06:00.002+09:00

Ink stick. It gives fluid ink if you rub it with water.

Lately, calligraphy devours quite a large part of the time given to me. This is a part of my workshop. Together with the twisted faced dragon Nathan, I wade through the quaggy but beautiful and satisfying marsh of the Japanese calligraphy.

Field of gold, field of happiness, field of ice-cream

2008-06-28T00:04:00.000+09:00

Kintarô candy 金太郎飴

2008-06-27T23:43:00.004+09:00

Kintarô was born in 10th century as a robust sweet kiddo. He was one of the strongest and bravest boys in the area, could even beat a bear in a wrestling competition. When he grew up, he became a successful, handsome guy, the man in the town (of Kyoto).
In present, every parent who discovers that his newborn child is a boy, wants him to become a person like Kintarô. The candies are simply sweet.

Holy fish.

2008-06-27T23:35:00.002+09:00

All of the sudden, one day after work the boss gave me those two lovely creatures. I suppose they are imitations of the temple-side carps (koi 鯉) of a worldwide fame. The colors match. This　species is know for its inclination to creep into humans' bath tubs to enjoy the hot water celebration together with them.

Quiet, please

2008-06-27T23:24:00.002+09:00

"quiet, please!
and listen up
feel free to grab the hand
of the person on your right"

- Cold War Kids sing. In the Tokyo metro, feel free to sleep on the shoulder of the person on your right. It is also allowed to read or write messages. Nevertheless, eating, doing make-up, couple of other such rebellious actions are recommended not to be taken. Apparently, there were many among those who didn't respect the not-speaking-on-the-phone rule since a poster displayed above hung on the Tube walls.
"Turn your mobile off when you are near the priority seats. In other areas, set your mobile to the silent mode and refrain from talking on the phone". The sentence is curved deeply in my cortex.

Monoï - tiaré

2008-06-27T23:14:00.002+09:00

A genuine body butter from Tahiti. A present from dear French friends Jean and Danielle, who visited Tokyo lately. No joke, the butter is a real thing. It is stuffed into a perrier water bottle, because it hasn't been fabricated in an industrial way. Monoï is coconut oil, while tiaré stands for a Tahitian gardenia. Every time I rub it into my body before a training, there is someone asking what kind of smell it is. Tempting.

My team T-shirt

2008-06-27T23:01:00.002+09:00

My sports team is in fact a Surugadai University's students' activity club. I am not studying there, but I could get a real fancy team T-shirt. Besides all the pride and courage it gave me on the field, it interested me with its tag. An unusually educative one. First glimpse - nothing special
. Second - it explains a complete know-how of the first aid. Moreover, it reminds to attach some light while walking down a dark street, for your own and drivers' safety. How right!

Breakfast

2008-06-27T23:00:00.000+09:00

Volleyball

2008-06-27T22:52:00.005+09:00

Kuba & Iguś

Franek

Tosia 　＾＿＾

We did it to the Olympic Games. Our volleyball "Goldies" won against Puerto Rico 25-22, 25-22, 25-22. Steady. We were screaming like hell though.

Chôshi trip. Chiba prefecture.

2008-06-27T22:42:00.003+09:00

A local speciality - 伊達巻すし datemaki sushi. Fish & company enveloped in an egg roll. Tasty after the all-day-long battle against the pouring rain.

Odawara trip.

2008-06-27T22:37:00.001+09:00

Mama style lunchbox (o-bento). By Mitsuko-san.

Odawara bunny

2008-06-27T22:27:00.003+09:00

Odawara (小田原) castle was built a long time ago in order to defend various clans from the angry lords from the neighborhood. First, by the end of the 15th century, the Hôjo clan was controlling it, to cede it to the Ôkubo family about 100 years afterwards. In the end, the most famous of the famous, the Tokugawa clan had it in its power.
Late spring trip with Mrs Mitsuko.
Were there many bunnies there? It is not unprobable, because they do appear in the city from time to time. like this chair-y one.

a flowery path to the neverending awaitness (Motokaji)

2008-06-03T20:44:00.002+09:00

Kids' considerations

2008-06-03T20:39:00.001+09:00

The voice from between the Indian Ocean waves says: Let's quit smoking!

Th smart looking kid asks to use bicycles.

Issey Miyake exhibition

2008-06-03T20:24:00.004+09:00

A fine day. April? May? Time flows faster than elsewhere in Tokyo, they say from time to time. Memory's too weak to recall. A fine day on an Issey Miyake showroom exhibition. Tokyo Midtown in Roppongi, a nice posh department store stuffed with galleries of a considerate value. Miyake's place is a building apart.

A photo under cover. A designer teaching kids his profession.

At the moment the grass, delighted by a peaceful, absent-minded Sunday crowd on the photo, is closed for all the lawn lovers. It must take a breath and grow back.

Nobu got some new fancy cuffs.

差出人 = sender = nadawca

2008-06-03T20:18:00.004+09:00

Once a package came by post. Who is it from?! What an outstanding coincidence. It is from Mr/Ms SENDER!

差出人 = sender = nadawca

Stelmasiewicz, yet not.

2008-06-03T20:08:00.001+09:00

Stelmasiewicz Anie.

Stelmasiewicz, a nie.

Stelmasiewicz, but not quite.

Who am I then?

Suteru Aniera

2008-06-03T20:04:00.002+09:00

Commuter's pass.

The answer to the above is: something to throw away. Suteru ステル　捨てる。Thow away. Dump. Dump Aniera. Suteru Aniera. ステル　アニエラ (look down middle)

The day of birth

2008-06-03T19:34:00.005+09:00

What happened on April 14th was utterly unexpected.
On the preceding Saturday some chocolates were delivered to the tired after a training lips of all the teammates. All the 50 stomachs. The usual state doesn't surpass a neat number of 25, so it was thanks to a brilliant idea who haunted my mind on the day of chocolate purchase - let's make everyone eat 2 chokiees. A 50 piece box was just right, one less would be not enough.

Anyway, an absolutely non-Japanese habit, giving sweets for one's one birthday. When the sentence "I brought some chocolates because of today's birthday. " crawled out of its diaphragmal source, another person's larynx took its turn expressing a doubt whose birthday was it actually.

Anyway anyway, in the meanwhile da galz offered to have a drink/dried(grilled) fish soon. On the following Monday the act of chewing the dried to bone animal that once saw the ocean had been quite suddenly interrupted by arrival of darkness in the restaurant room. A song began to float in the air, I thought I'd join it. Yet this is what came afterwards, together with a Japanese cook book plus a...em...rabbit ornamented box.

Cakemmmmmmmmmmmm

Seiko feeling like having it right then right there.

Chika, Mihoko, Keiko.

Dutch Naruto and Polish Canadian on the Yamanote line

2008-05-20T18:25:00.004+09:00

I'm coming back from a meeting with Nobuya. I'm waiting for a green circus line Yamanote train at Ikebukuro station. Initially queuing to one of the front wagons, suddenly feel like having a coke. I search for a vending machine, tracking it finally in some one third of the platform. The train arrives. I look inside and think: "Oh, someone wants to be Naruto" . I see a foreigner close to the hairy figure and think, not seeing Naruto's white face, that they are probably not together. Judging from the thinness of Uzumaki's arm, I think he's Japanese. I enter the train. They are sitting together. "Can i take a photo?" - I ask. I've forgotten about the photographer's inner need implied in a conversation. I'm from Poland - I answer, asked. "Jesteś z Polski!" the Polish Canadian cries out loud with absolutely no accent. Seemed happy to speak the language.

Bicyclissimini

2008-05-20T17:21:00.004+09:00

My new friend, 13.5 kg. MINI.

Detail.

The whole beast or beauty.

Attention: it is not a wheelchair.

Fits me?

2008-04-23T17:12:00.002+09:00

I mean the t-shirt, of course.

O-hanami

2008-04-06T20:23:00.001+09:00

O-hanami, the flower watching. 御花見
Ｔｈｅｓｅ　ｔｗｏ　ｙｏｕｎｇ　ｇｅｎｔｌｅman, Seigo at the left, Fukuta presenting himself at the right side of the display, are hereby in the position of two lunatics trying all their best to give me a "normal face". I took 8 shots for a satisfactory result.
Maybe they were too amazed by the glaring beauty of the outstanding cheery blossom flakes or maybe the flash had taken the power of their senses together with the face muscles control.

For the purpose of admiration did we arrive in Inariyama Park after an over 5 hour long training. It is right after we sat on the blue-sheet that we forgot all about the preliminary aim. From then on, each time somebody raised his head and saw the delightful flower flow flirting with the zephyr up in the branches, he was surprised, once and again. The big event called "the flower watching" is in fact one of the major occasions during the year to meet people. In fact, we have to do with a celebration every time humans meet.

Mashiko was in a rebellious mood of a black and violet colored attitude toward the world. In consequence, he was attempting to boycott the event by banning the photos. Here, by Keiko.

In the end, he was forced to give in.

Shrovetide – Ostatki

2008-03-12T12:35:00.000+09:00

A photo which is not that recent, quite a month leaked through the 4^th dimension since it has been taken. The very last trace of winter, Shrovetide. The snowman was accompanying my every home-coming, knowing how to find a smile above my chin. He would not survive the incredible today’s 15°C. Let him make you smile too.

Sumida

2008-02-21T01:37:00.001+09:00

An assignment of photographing a district of Tokyo called Sumida has crept to me lately. Most unexpectedly, what I found, forgotten on one of the streets was a devil. He looked at us with his wide, black, innocent eyes until our hearts thew. We were lucky enough to meet his best companion, the black cat. This one, on his turn, got crammed in a window.

Utagawa Kuniyoshi 歌川国芳 (1797 - April 14, 1861) comment soon

2008-02-11T00:56:00.000+09:00

The man called Utagawa (not so different from his collegues and teacher, also Utagawas) Kuniyoshi would celebrate his birthday just one day after me. But his time fell down on the age of ukiyo-e at its peak and one has to admit he has become a something in the matter. Depicting "the floating, pleasant world", he must have enjoyed his life to the full making at the same time an impressive use of his sense of observation. The upper work is a reproduction of his, while the lower image presents a temptation of the creative Japanese to make the Kuniyoushi's print live a life with real blood circulating in its veins as well as in its arteries. Program number 3 of Japanese TV :D

Theme : red

2008-02-07T22:11:00.001+09:00

Setsubun 節分

2008-01-31T20:55:00.000+09:00

In the past, Japan used to celebrate the coming of Spring on the 4th of February, an event called Risshun 立春, "the standing up of Spring". Every kid knows that in order to proceed to a new thing in life, open a new page of the new year, you first have to get rid of the darkness who might pursue you from the whirlpools of the past. That is why it is advised to knock the poor Oni 鬼 demons with a handful of roasted beans, to throw the grains at the sinner or rather sin-teaser as violently as possible, so that the bastard wouldn't think of coming back. This event, held on the Spring's (and actually whenever seasons change, but this one is the most famous) faultline is called Setsubun 節分。
The custom orders (according to what the author have heard) the MOM of the house to disguise into Kami 神 god (the big happy face) and the DAD of the household into the demon mentioned above (the ugly red face). Then everyone tells the red face to kindly get the hell out of their lives for the next year.
Safe and sound, each member of the celebrating family eats as many beans as many Springs he have already seen in his life travel trough these Japanese islands plus one for the sake of the coming year.

The photo displays a rather spicy or salty cracker called osembei 御煎餅 which is being used by devouring all year long. It is only the occasional design that differs now.
Ijô desu. 以上です。 That's all folks.

Osembei, the cracker.

2008-01-23T21:13:00.001+09:00

Inside these intricate wrappings shaped into a citrus the lucky can discover yuzu (a citrus slightly similar to a mandarin) – shrimp, delicate cracker (below). Its usual quality involves an utmost lightness which results in outstanding taste and sensation impressions.

Yuki. Snow. Śnieg.

2008-01-23T20:05:00.000+09:00

The winter has come for good. Not quite invited, low temperatures rushed into our nights leaving us with some white foam this morning. Nobody in Tokyo believed in snow any more. Those who kept their faith were singled out. Nevertheless.

This young lady saw the phenomenon of snow falling from the shy for the first time in her entire life. She did catch a glimpse of it before, but then it was silently placed on the ground. On the contrary, today I was roaring down on the Earth with a varying speed, size and noise. The young lady, called Josiane, reported of her great surprise on stepping out of her apartment. At first she thought the snowflakes were ashes and that there was a big fire somewhere close.

The local Shinto shrine lion displayed his discontentment of the precipitations by the flabbiness of his ears.

Where art thy?

2008-01-22T22:37:00.000+09:00

Winter, for a change. Photos by Kasia P.

2008-01-22T21:52:00.001+09:00

Ostrzyce, Kaszuby, Poland

Puck. A day in summer.

2008-01-22T19:16:00.000+09:00

It was quite a day. Justyna. A summer day of a nature of plait. Not exactly warm, thought definitely summerish. It could already smell the scent of Japan as well as the aroma of London. New things that have never seen the sea from this angle appeared.