After the chicken incident the other day, the remaining four are reluctant to come outside even though I open the pen door when I am around. I also fear for my life (and my eyes - see 1:30 in the video).

Posted by bastish at 04:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday I heard some ruckus going on in the chicken run. By the time I got there, I found only three chickens in the pen, and two were missing in action. A quick search of the fields nearby found one chicken soaking wet, but otherwise OK, in our cabbage patch. As I tried to figure out how she got there, I kep searching for the other missing Lucy. It was a hot day, so after checking the obvious places (the neighbors cabbage shoots), I started looking in the bushes where chickens are likely to retreat from the heat.

In the last bush, the furthest bush, I was relieved to see some movement. That relief quickly faded when I realized that the movement was a cat, at at its feet was Lucy. I can't figure out how the cat got the bird through/under/over the fence and as far away as that bush, but one neighbor sticks to his theory that it was an itachi (weasel) - despite me telling him that I saw the cat with the dead bird.

Now ther are four.

Luckily I got her before the cat had had a chance to feast. Pouring hot water (about 80 celcius) over the body made the feathers quite plucakble. Our neighbor was busy so Tomoe and I decided to do the kaitai ("dividing the body") by outselves with the help of some web sites and The Self Sufficient Life.

We got as far as chopping off the wings and the legs and head, but in Japan people eat more of the inards than in the West. The book did not cover how to handle the guts, kidneys, liver, guts, sunagimo, etc.

I ran to another neighbor (80+y/o) to ask for his help, but he said "if it is a rabbit I can do it, but not a chicken". Likewise, our next-door neighbor said she remembered doing it as a kid, but doens't remmeber enough to show us. Luckily, the neighbor who was once a pro chicken butcher returned and we were able to salvage most of the meat.

In that time, we gathered a little audiance as people of all ages stopped by to see the show.

The photo with the pliers is not torture. Actually the chickens tendons are quite strong, and I was warned that trying to pull the foot off of the leg without a towel or gloves to protect my hand could result in a lot of blood (my blood). I wrapped a towel around it, but still could not get the foot off. I had to grab a pair of pliers to gain some leverage.

Posted by bastish at 08:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Worms we collected from the rice paddy after the big rain were put into the compost, and some were used to feed the Lucies.

Gumi from the tree of a neighbor. Her tree is ten times bigger than ours and still has fruit now, a week after I picked the last of about fifty gumi from our tree.

Cabbage. Much bigger than ours which was planted almost a year ago. I want to just cut our losses, but Tomoe still has hope so they remain in the soil. It doesn't really matter that much though, as we still have un-planted areas in some other fields which I suppose we should plant first before we pull the plug on the one-year-old cabbage sprouts.

Posted by bastish at 03:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The translation is almost done. The plans for our next customer (coming in less than a week) are not set yet. The house looks worse than when we moved in. My parents, my sister, her husband, and her somewhere-between-one-and-two-year-old twins will be visiting for ten days in July. The rice fields are doing well. The hie (weeds in the rice fields) is still abundant, but a lot less than a few weeks ago. The other fields are mostly planted with lots of peanuts, potatoes, edamame, soy, tomatoes, radishes, cucumbers, rhubarb, popcorn, egg plant, and something else, but I forgot. (very late to plant, but late is better than never). There are Kentucky wonder beans sprouting (a gift from my parents smuggled through customs - I think they wanted to eat them when they are here, but they will not be ready). The Rhubarb is thriving. The raspberries and radishes are our first harvest. we get four eggs a day. One chicken, whom we have named Lucy Looser or Lucy Loner (they are all called Lucy) is a bit anti-social/bullied. We worry for her. I gathered a couple hundred worms from the rice paddy yesterday after the big rain, and have transplanted them into our yard/compost area. A few were eaten by the Lucies. I am waking up at 4:30 recently to beautiful views, but have not taken the camera out for about a week now. Volunteer fire brigade trumpet practice is in full swing (every other night - way past my bed time). I am making plans for my epic hike following the border of our village this summer. I am looking for anyone who wants to join me (estimated on-trail time is 7 days.)

Did I miss anything?

The photos are from about a month ago. In order:

• Me getting my picutre taken for once - by the Fuji Television people. I will keep everyone updated when I find out the broadcast schedule.
• Tomoe pushing the weeder through the rice field. The weeder tills the eeds under the mud where they can not grow.
• Frogs
• Customers having a picnic break at a shrine along the bike route.
• Customers planting rice in our field

Posted by bastish at 11:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I can't believe that its almost July! I could have sworn that it was just a few days ago that we were sitting with all of our neighbors (and customers and TV crew) for the annual bamboo shot festival, timed to coincide with the completion of the rice planting. Now the fields are full of weeds, and wven with the help of our neighbor, and two new-fangled hand powered weed tillers (last year we were just pulling by hand one-by-one), we can't keep up. I guess I know what I will be doing today, once I get that first draft of the first part of a book I am in charge of translating off to the editor. It makes my head hurt to think that that too has to be done in just a few weeks.

The photos are of some of the neighbors peeling the bamboo shoots and just having fun.

Posted by bastish at 09:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In nearby Tsunan there are several archaeological digs going on. The area had been set to rebuild a section of rice fields, so the archaeologists swooped in and borrowed some of the land to look for artifacts. They found quite a few places with hand-carved rock and they date it by taking soil samples to see where the rock is in relation to volcanic ash. Since they know when the volcanoes erupted, they know about what time people were settled in the valley. The little rectangular holes you see in the photo above is where they found something, and then took the earth samples to date it.

The rocks they find are presumed to have been collected a few kilometers deeper in the valley where there is a mountain with stones perfect for making tools.

They only have one summer to find as much as they can, as by next year this area will once again be growing rice and they will have moved on. Even with that rush, it really is amazing to see how painstakingly detailed they are. Clearing out that entire area one little spoon-full at a time, and placing it on the conveyor belt you see in one of the photos.

Just after you pass this site, riding deeper into the mountains, the scenery is spectacular with rice fields and vegetable patches wild flowers and planted flowers, great views of the mountains and rivers, eventually running into two little hamlets which still have some thatch roofs... I can't help but wonder how amazing this place would have looked before concrete and electric lines, and how peaceful without the roar of tractors and combines and the whir of weed-whackers, or how wild it would have been back when those first stone-tooled settlers arrived to settle and hunt.

I know there are ancient remains like this ALLLLLL over the place in Japan, but anyone in this area that is interested in this type of thing should definitely stop by at Najyomon, a great natural history museum with lots of activities to "keep the culture alive", such as making earthn pots as people would have in the Jyomon period, or making rice-straw crafts, working with silk, etc. The only thing I don't like is thier spooky website.

Posted by bastish at 09:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you likes Baraka, you will love Home (If you get the "copyright" message, or would like to see a slightly larger version, click here,)

I am going to mention this film in every post I write for the next monnth - or maybe year - until EVERYONE who reads this blog sends me an email or leaves a comment telling me that they have watched it. I've watched it twice now and will watch it again with Tomoe tonight.

Many many thanks to Dave Pollard for pointing this one out!

Posted by bastish at 08:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

A few more photos from the big search last week (or was it two weeks ago?) We never found the lost man, despite three days of searching. Generally the fire department, police, and volunteer fire brigade spend three days, and if the family asks for more, we would spend longer. In this case, the lost man was 75, and the general belief was that he had already passed on.

While there are some steep slopes out there, this guy had been coming there to pick bamboo shoots for years, and so he knew what he was doing. It would have been difficult to get lost as well, considering that simply climbing a short mountain gives one views of obvious landmarks (an abandoned ranch) that would have led him back to his car.

In the end, it seems a bit like it was more to show the family that we were trying, than it was to actually find the lost man. Even up until the last minute, the helicopter kept circling the same area it had searched for two days with no luck and the same area that 100+ grunts were searching on the ground.

There was one point where we found what might have been a plastic bag he had brought along to gather the bamboo shoots, the bamboo shoots in that area were the fastest and juiciest I have ever seen, and there were signs of harvested shoots from a few days earlier. We all climbed up a steep slope (picking bamboo shoots all along the way) and reached a ridge where we were told "This side is too steep and dangerous, so we will not search here". I understand the idea of keeping all the searchers safe, but if I were to go search for him again, that is the first place I would look!

All the while I was searching, I wondered what to do if I found the body, and once the search had finished, my neighbor told me what to do... pretend like you didn't see it and let the guy next to you find it. Apparently, the first person to find the body will be consumed with police reports and forms to fill out.

I feel a bit bad to say that it was "fun", but it was, and I think that that is also part of the point. For those members of the volunteer fire brigade who have their own business, taking an unexpected two days off can cause stress, but for those who are employed at more monotonous jobs that are less deadline based (store clerks, etc.), this could be seen as a welcome break from daily routine (most employers allow employees a day off for any volunteer fire-dpt. activities) to hang out with the guys and climb a mountain (and pick bamboo shoots). Also, after each day, everyone got together with the other volunteer fireman from their own hamlet and drank and ate until late - and there is nothing that the wife can complain about... I mean c'mon, we spent our day doing search and rescue!

On a side note... hopefully this is the closest I will ever get to being a war-photographer.

Posted by bastish at 04:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)