Delicate branches
like fingers reaching to sun
touch my heart instead

~ Nancy Yeilding *

[Image: Oak tree, Santa Margarita, California.]

This month’s featured image ~ SANTA MARGARITA OAK ~ is available as a 8″ x 10″ photographic print for $20. Professionally processed with a luminous, iridescent finish. Free shipping.

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* Nancy Yielding currently works as an editor and a business and personal coach. Her teaching activities are expanding via the Internet, which provides a contemporary medium of sharing ageless wisdom with students anywhere in the world through e-study groups, as well as through workshops in various gurukula centers, East and West.

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like to read Platanus Orientalis.

Valley of the Moon:

red grapevines shiny with rain

umbrellas for the birds.

~ Jane Benson

About Jane Benson:

“Poetry has been part of my life since childhood when my mother read aloud her favorite Robert Frost poems and I wore out our copy of Robert Louis Stevensonʼs, A Childʼs Garden of Verses.

“More a reader than writer of verse, I like to collect poems and share them with others, sometimes learning them by heart. Occasionally, I write haiku for myself to capture a feeling, image or experience –a moment in time that I want to remember.

“Recently, I began a group for poetry lovers at Deborahʼs Palm, a new nonprofit community center for women in Palo Alto, CA.”

Image ~ right ~ Autumn Grapes, courtesy of Mark, Flickr.
Thumbnail image ~ Sonoma vineyards, California.

Editor’s Note: Sonoma is the Chocuyen Indian name for “Valley of the Moon.”

On my very first evening in Greece, my friend and I were walking through the main square of the charming seaport town of Nafplio on the Peloponnesian peninsula, enjoying the soft air and the sights and sounds of children playing a makeshift soccer game, weaving around the benches where the town elders relaxed, laughing as they chased the ball, dodging the couples strolling arm in arm or pushing baby strollers. In the growing dusk the lights of the restaurants around the square glowed a welcome, which was extended by the banks of chairs and tables cozily arranged under canopies, conveying more of a feeling of a living room than a formal dining area.

I was soon to discover that this is a typical scene and feeling in the Peloponnese—life lived in the open and with a palpable sense of community. In all the towns and villages we visited, shopkeepers (in between serving their customers) sat outside their doors, in avid conversation with their neighbors or shopkeepers across the often-tiny lanes. Restaurant owners and waiters stood at the edge of their terrace or banks of tables, inviting us in as if to their own home. And, if we accepted, they then invited us in to the kitchen to see and choose from what had been freshly prepared. Or, at other times, we would enter a restaurant where there would be a convivial table, obviously of family members and friends, from which the waiter or owner would rise to serve us, confirming the sense that we had just been “welcomed home.” Children—groups of two or three or bands of them—roamed freely in the village squares, their parents knowing that they were being safely watched over by the whole town.

As we walked across the Nafplio square that first evening, soaking in all these sights and sounds, a lovely fragrance caught my attention. I paused, looking for its source, but saw nothing obvious, and so we continued on down to the waterfront. There, looking back, we could see the lights of the town rising up the steep hillside to the remains of the ancient castle at its crest. It told a story of earlier days, not so friendly, when Nafplio had been an embattled place, its pre-classical fortifications added to by the Byzantines, and later by occupying forces of the Franks, Venetians, and Ottomans. It became the first capital of modern Greece—and the scene of the assassination of the new head of state—before King Otto moved the capital to Athens in 1834. But each of the occupiers had also added some of their art and architecture to the town, contributing to the charm of the streets we wandered.

As we walked back toward our hilltop hotel, we crossed the square once again, and again the sweet fragrance caught my attention. I peered into the darkness, trying to find its source. Finally I became aware that it was coming from the tree I stood beneath, though I could see no flowers. The next day I asked around about the tree and learned that it was a plane tree, Platanus orientalis. I also learned that in the nineteenth century the square had been named Platanos, because of this tree, one that is well loved by the Greek people.

As we visited one town square after another, throughout the Peloponnese we discovered that each was the center of community life, inevitably graced by one or two or several plane trees, generously sharing their redolent shade with the townspeople in the hot summer months. Over time, more facts emerged about this kindly tree. I discovered it has a long history in Greece. According to Pliny, the first century Roman naturalist, a plane tree on the grounds of the Athenian Academy founded by Plato had roots fifty feet long. It is thought to be the tree under which Hippocrates, known as the “Father of Medicine,” taught his students. That is apt, as Platanus orientalis has several medical uses: the leaves are astringent and vulnerary and decoctions are used to treat dysentery and to heal wounds. The bark, too, is used in the treatment of diarrhea, dysentery, hernias, and toothaches.

Platanus orientalis loves water and often is found growing naturally alongside rivers. One reason plane trees are found in so many town squares is that they grew near what became the village spring, around which people naturally congregated, which grew into the center of the growing village. Many of the old springs have been captured, but their presence can still be discovered in a water tap or fountain. In the center of the village square of Mystras, just below the ruins of the ancient Byzantine town, stands a majestic old plane tree, bedecked with climbing roses that rise many feet up into its branches. And at its base, coming right out of its trunk, a small pipe continuously offers fresh water to passersby.

I also learned that human beings have valued this tree around the world for a long time—for its welcome shade, rejuvenating fragrance, graceful shape, fall color, and healing and cleansing properties. It is the famed tree of ancient Persian gardens, known as the chenar. And the beloved chinar trees of Srinagar in Kashmir are the same Platanus orientalis. The chinar often has an inner hollow, making a shelter for a meditator, or even for a whole dinner party, according to one of Pliny’s anecdotes. Well-rooted plane trees can be very long-lived. One in Chatargam, Kashmir, is reputed to have been planted in 1374 by a Sufi mystic; a five hundred year old Platanus orientalis stands in Kos, at the site where the Tree of Hippocrates grew, and may be its descendent.

Platanus orientalis has a Western relative, Platanus occidentalis, native to North America, where it is known as a sycamore, plane, or buttonwood tree. The hybrid of the eastern and western plane trees is the London plane tree, which not only offers its shade to many streets of London (and many other large cities, such as Buenos Aires, New York, Paris, Madrid, Melbourne, Mannheim, Shanghai, Chicago, and Sydney), but also absorbs air pollution in its bark, which it then cleverly sheds!

The lovely spreading arms of the plane tree are like an embrace, reaching from village to village, continent to continent, from antiquity to today and on to tomorrow, reminding us of our intimate connections with each other, in our towns and around the globe, and to the web of life of which we are a part, all sustained by earth, water, air, and light, and given space in which to be. These connections speak to us all the time, but we need to listen to their message, which can come to us from our heart’s response to playing children and companionable adults, from the way our steps naturally gravitate toward shade and the sound of trickling water in midday heat, or from a simple fragrance that calls to us at twilight.

Contributor Nancy Yeilding, under blue Peloponnesian skies.

After being born in Washington D.C., Nancy has been fortunate to live in many places on our dear Earth-home, including Burtonwood, Fairborn, San Bernardino, San Clemente, Palo Alto, Beutelsbach, Louisville, Fiuggi, Tahoe, Huelva, Portland, Manoa, Sydney, Udhagamandalam, Tellicherry, and Bainbridge Island.

Education: B.A. English, Stanford University; M.A. Education, University of San Francisco; B.L.L. (Blessed Lover of Life), East-West University of Unitive Sciences.

Nancy has been a devoted student of Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati since the early ’70s. She has facilitated the publication of several of his numerous English books and articles through dictation, transcribing, and editing. In the early ‘80s she was appointed Registrar of the East-West University and continues in that position.

In 1981, with the Guru’s blessing, she founded a gurukula (literally, “home for dispelling darkness”), a universal contemplative center, on Bainbridge Island in WA, which also functions as the Western Headquarters of the East-West University of Unitive Sciences. Throughout the years since then she has taught weekly classes in living wisdom and creativity, and edited and published a quarterly magazine for most of that time.

Currently she works as an editor and a business and personal coach. Her teaching activities are expanding via the Internet, which provides a contemporary medium of sharing ageless wisdom with students anywhere in the world through e-study groups, as well as through workshops in various gurukula centers, East and West.

All images for this post are courtesy of Nancy Yeilding.

]]> http://www.imagesforrenewal.com/guest-writers/platanus-orientalis/feed/ 6 http://www.imagesforrenewal.com/guest-writers/through-wine-colored-glasses/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=through-wine-colored-glasses http://www.imagesforrenewal.com/guest-writers/through-wine-colored-glasses/#comments Mon, 11 Apr 2011 15:30:23 +0000 Steve Dryden http://www.imagesforrenewal.com/?p=9532

Freedom is a question of perspective. And the border that divides Mexico and the United States is a prime example.

I’ve often pondered the reasons why some folks illegally race into the U.S., often risking their lives, to join millions of people there who are living in a rat race. The obvious reason is economics; people need jobs to generate income to feed themselves and their loved ones.

Unfortunately, if you live in a country that can’t offer you a job, you can either leave or starve. Thus, many Mexican’s were forced to leave their homes and families to live marginal lives at minimum wages or less in the U.S.

During the  good economical times many U.S. employers gladly and illegally hired migrant workers to boost their own profits. But those “glory days” are now over and many people on both sides of the border are trying to decide which way to run for survival, into Mexico or into the U.S.?

The issue has become more complicated because of the global economic downturn. For example, in the United States, just over the last three years, American households lost US $11 trillion in stocks, retirement funds, real estate, and savings. In California alone, over two million seniors with limited finances or pensions can’t make ends meet and are facing starvation and homelessness.

Guadalupe Valley, Baja's celebrated wine country, less than an hour's drive from downtown Ensenada. Photo credit: Creative Commons: tj scenes/Flickr.

These days almost half a million people 34 years and older have been forced to move back in with their parents and there has been more than a ten percent increase in the number of households with more than one family. In addition, more than one half of all American workers were forced to take pay cuts in hours or lost their jobs entirely.

To make matters worse, many U.S. cities and the federal government are almost or completely bankrupt. The final blow for the American public was that the only ones “financially bailed out” by the government (with citizen tax dollars) were banks, financial companies, auto manufacturers, and big corporations. Many dedicated and hard working Americans were pushed into the gutters by their own government.

These facts seem to make a point that running into the U.S. for employment or lifestyle enhancement might not be as wise or worth the risk that it once was. The great “American Dream” has turned into a temporary nightmare for people who once so loyally and often blindly believed in their country.

Many Mexicans working in the U.S. have been forced to move back to their native homes but now they are armed with skills and knowledge that have helped to build a bigger and better middle-class in Mexico.

La Bufadora, a favorite attraction, is a marine geyser or blowhole located on the Punta Banda Peninsula, 20 miles south of Ensenada. Photo credit: Viktoria Vidali.

Interestingly, the current unemployment rate in the northwestern State of Baja California is 5%, in contract to about 15% (real numbers) in California.

And many Americans on limited budgets or retirement programs have taken a brave leap into living in Mexico. For example, living in Baja California costs about one third that of living the same quality lifestyle in Southern California. Fresh seafood, hormone and antibiotic free beef, produce, baked goods, and most grocery items are less than one half the price, utilities are one third, rents about half, public transportation is abundant, and medical/dental services are about one third of the cost in the U.S.

Ensenada Harbor. Photo credit: Creative Commons, tj scenes/Flickr.

The pace of life here is in the slow lane, the near-perfect weather of Ensenada is Mediterranean-like, and many U.S. companies like Home Depot, Wal-Mart, Costco, and Smart & Final have opened outlets in the region, making an easy transition for retirees. Many newcomers have set up banking locally and now receive their pension checks and retirement payments directly into their accounts in Mexico.

I’m not a fan or a follower of politicians, lawyers, big government, large corporations or economic slavery, so I took the plunge and moved to Baja California in 2004. I’ve been visiting this area since I was a child, so I understood what I was in for, plus I have always felt comfortable with the simple lifestyle here.

One can say or think what they want about the Mexican government, but one important issue is that for the most part they leave you alone, are less restrictive, and allow you to work and prosper if so desired.

I applied for a legal visa to live and work in Mexico by going through a simple and inexpensive process. Once I became a legal guest resident in Baja California, I purchased my “500 square meters of freedom” in Mexico’s premier wine country. By luck, I was able to purchase property, plant a small vineyard and citrus orchard, and build an adobe studio, all for under $20,000 cash.

Then came the financial crash of 2008 and all I had left was a house, homegrown food, and no liabilities. And, of course, I make about a barrel of wine each year to ease the pain and suffering of my newly found freedom.

Wine offerings from Guadalupe Valley, Baja, California. Photo credit: Steve Dryden.

As an independent freelance writer on wine, food, travel, and film, I’ve found that Mexico’s emerging wine country has provided me with much material to talk and write about over the last seven years. My arrival into this community –  just as the wine industry was transitioning into creating premium wines – was perfect timing. The diverse winemakers here from many parts of the world were perfecting their skills with high quality Baja California grapes and all I had to do was taste it and tell the world about Mexico’s silent revolution in creating high quality wines.

I drove into town to get a kilo of fresh sea bass and some veggies, all for under $10 USD. Saw three chefs I know. It's really hard to beat life here in Ensenada and we've got 45 wineries to taste and tour. Photo credit: Steve Dryden.

Once the wine culture started to emerge and progress, it became apparent that the local artisan chefs were able and capable of creating world-class culinary delights to match with the local wines. Little did we know that Ensenada would eventually become the “Wine and Culinary Capital of Mexico.”  Thus, living in this area became a real blessing with an abundance of world-class wine and cuisine, not to mention the weekly wine and culinary events, concerts, and the unexpected daily adventures only found when living in Mexico.

Freedom is a question of perspective. Sometimes you have to look at borders, walls, barriers, and broken dreams as opportunities. Brave souls know that with faith and determination one can walk from a nightmare into a dream. Wise people understand that the road to freedom is not an easy one, but that possibility is never explored without the first step.

I found my “five hundred square meters of freedom” and I thank Mexico for that opportunity. In reality we’re all migrants, seeking happiness, love and security wherever opportunity and timing allow us to find them. And despite many problems facing the U.S., people can still make dreams come true wherever they are.

Steve Dryden (pictured above) is a wine, culinary, and travel writer based in Mexico’s premier wine country where he grows northern Italian Nebbiolo grapes, makes Barbaresco-style wine, and guides small group wine tours. He can be reached at: sbdryden@hotmail.com. Follow his wine and culinary adventures at Food and Wine Global Guide.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Creative Commons, tj scenes/Flickr.

“What are you going to study at Sydney University?”

This question (our conversation was in French) came from my father, a man whose wisdom, insight and perceptiveness had come partly from his reading but more so from experience. A boy during the Russian Revolution, he had been deracinated by that event, winding up in France where he took part in the campaign of France in 1940 as a young soldier in the French army.

Demobilised, he returned to Paris where he saw much that left him cynical during the German occupation. Dissatisfied with the Cold War atmosphere of post-war Europe, he chanced upon an Australian who persuaded him to migrate “down under,” to use an American expression never used in Australia. Thus it was that he forsook Paris for a more peaceful and more prosperous life at “the arse-end of the Earth,” as one of our former Prime Ministers described the Australian continent.

“I don’t know yet,” I responded. “Perhaps French and History and something else.”

Those subjects had been my main fields of study at North Sydney High, a selective school founded in 1912.

“Go and study Japanese!” my father said.

At school I had chosen the Chinese option in my History course in preference to the Japanese option and had been enthralled with the story of the Chinese Revolution, Mao Tse Tung and the Long March. I knew next to nothing about Japanese History and the little I did know about Japan was confined to certain Science Fiction movies such as “The Mysterians,” which I had seen in 1959.

When I asked my father the reason for his suggestion, he told me:

“Because Japan is fast becoming a major economic power and will soon be playing a very important role in the world.”

This opinion was given at a time when much of the outside world still regarded Japan as a source of cheap and shoddy goods and had not understood or appreciated Japanese resilience and determination. As an electronics engineer, my father had realised that far from producing inferior articles, Japan was well on the way to establishing a sophisticated and high-class electronics industry. My father was far-sighted but I doubt that even he realised or envisaged all the consequences of his advice. If one accepts the validity of the concept of Karma, then his suggestion was the first link in the karmic chain that has kept me spiritually and emotionally close to Japan for nearly 40 years.

Serge Yalichev.

I took my father’s advice but to my shame have to admit that my Japanese studies at the university were of highly indifferent quality owing to the fact that my energies were focused on the legions of female students who provided a pleasant distraction in the lecture theatres and the university library. After a couple of years and a few “amourettes” with varying denouements, I gave up on Japanese, turning my attention, much more successfully, to Fine Arts. I nevertheless retained a sense of regret at cutting my links with things Japanese for the elderly Dutch Sea Captain (Let’s face it: All Dutchmen pretend to have been sea captains at one stage or another!), who had taught us Japanese History in his inimitable and eccentric way, had created the interest that I had not felt in high school.

My brief encounter with Japan was over, so I thought. In 1969 I underwent training to become a secondary school teacher in French and History and in January of the following year was sent to my first school in a leafy northern suburb of Sydney as an utterly inexperienced teacher. I almost fell over onto my nether parts when the Principal informed me that I was required to teach Japanese! The Japanese language had been taught in one Australian High School since 1916 but only in the senior years. Now, the next link in the karmic chain decreed that a simple Japanese course was being introduced at Junior High School level in the very same year that I began my long teaching career. This was a mere coincidence perhaps but nevertheless a circumstance which altered my destiny and re-established my contact with things Japanese.

Thus it was that I had to start studying again, seriously this time, so as to impart simple Japanese to my students. In the third year of my teaching, I received a visit from the then Principal of the “Nihonjin Gakkoo,” the school set up by the Japanese Government for the benefit of Japanese families living in Sydney. He happened to come from the province of Chiba and this circumstance might also represent another link in the karmic chain that involved me so indelibly with Japan for it was in Chiba that I wound up, not Tokyo, Osaka or Nagoya, when I had finally saved enough money for the airline ticket.

I arrived in Japan on the 10^th April 1973 which happened to be the birthday of a certain Lady who was later to become my wife and with whom I have shared life ever since. Perhaps this coincidence was also part of that karmic chain?

I had intended to stay in Japan for about two months and after a few home stays among friends or acquaintances of the Principal, I felt the desire to do something memorable in the time I had left. I have to admit, even if it is somewhat unfair on my part, that I was a little disappointed at first for in my youthful conceit I wanted to show my hosts that I knew some Japanese History. They were impressed enough that a foreigner should know anything of Nobunaga, Hideyoshi or Ieyasu or, indeed, of any of the major historical personalities but my hosts lived in the present not the past and were not disposed to talk much about the topics in which I had become enthusiastic! On my very first afternoon in the seaside town of Tateyama I was taken to a pachinko (vertical pin ball) parlour to watch what I considered to be a mindless waste of time. Was this modern Japan?

"Morning Mist," from The 53 Stages of the Tokaido by Ando Hiroshige.

My time was running out. I had but a tourist visa so I packed a shoulder bag, took the guitar that I had bought on my very first day in Japan, told my astonished and disconcerted hosts that I was going to Tokyo and from there proposed to walk along the Tokaido Highway as far as Kyoto if I could. As it happened, I walked about 200 miles between Tokyo and Nagoya, here and there finding some surviving vestige of the places depicted in the series of woodblock prints known as “Tokaido Gojuusantsugi,” The 53 Stages of the Tokaido by Ando Hiroshige.

This adventure took nine days but I only stayed in paid lodgings for two or three nights. As I made my way on foot along the highway, drivers would stop their cars and invite me to stay the night after I had somewhat impressed them by describing my motives for being on the road. Somehow, one instinctively accepted their invitations such was the sincerity and kindness of all those that I encountered. There was a sense of safeness in Japan at that time which is unique to that country and is still arguably evident by comparison with much of the outside world. The danger that foreigners might encounter in Japan comes from the terrible forces of nature and very rarely from human agencies. Thus, at night I would entertain my hosts with a few songs and talk about Japan and Australia and the following morning be on my way again.

My house in Toke as it was when I first saw it 1973.

When I returned to Chiba after three or four days in Kyoto and Nara, the father of the host family to which I had moved after my sojourn in Tateyama informed me that there was an English teaching job available if I wanted it. “Motto Nihon ni itai desu ka,” said he. Did I want to stay longer in Japan? Did I want to stay!? Thus it was that the two months that I had intended to be in Japan became some four and a half years. My working in Japan entailed an official work visa, which I managed to obtain after two trips to the Japanese Consulate in Pusan, South Korea, for at that time it was not possible to change a tourist visa into a work visa in Japan itself. Having met the requirements I could legally work at the English language institute and find myself a place to live an independent life. Preferring the countryside to some apartment in Chiba city itself, I found a very congenial little house in the middle of fields and forests in the town of Toke.

In the 1970s the small town of Toke (which means Earth Spirit) in Chiba Prefecture was a picturesque place with a community where most people knew each other and often left their doors unlocked. The town lies on one of the highest points of Chiba–ken and at the time was an attractive blend of traditional older style dwellings, peanut and vegetable fields and small forests.

In 1973, I had acquired a deep liking for French Impressionist Painting and, although the landscapes of France and Japan are different, the Japanese country landscape offered plenty of inspiration for impressionist-style oil paintings. When a local real estate agent showed me a house standing among fields and against a forest background, I was instantly attracted and proceeded to rent the place in preference to houses that lay closer to the local station.

View from my house in Toke, Autumn 1976.

I spent the next four years living there, doing paintings of the local landscape, getting up at 4:30 in the morning to travel to an Aikido Dojo three times a week, teaching English (and sometimes, French) in a private institute in Chiba city, growing sunflowers and vegetables and observing the daily lives of the Japanese people. In my first year in Toke I was a subject of some curiosity among the local inhabitants, for Gaijin – as foreigners are called in Japan – were at that time still a rarity in the countryside.

During the second year of my residence, the neighbouring people, assuring themselves that I was not some sort of crazed axe-murderer, got used to seeing me coming and going and I had established particularly good relations with the Ota family who owned a grocery and liquor shop not far from my quaint little house and who would invite me to sumptuous dinners so copious that the long, low Japanese table was invisible beneath all the dishes.

Painting of Ota family shop.

By the third year I was fully accepted as a local. On the nights of the O-bon Festival held every year in summer in memory of the souls of the departed, I was invited to go up onto a platform around which the local people, many dressed in Kimonos, danced for several hours and had a go at playing the Taiko Drum which kept the rhythm. I realised, thinking back on my experience in Toke, that I had been in a sense on trial. The local inhabitants had taken their time to observe the foreigner living amongst them and when they had decided in my favour, I crossed an invisible line of acceptance only later aware that I had done so.

Practicing Aikido.

At my Aikido Dojo much the same thing happened. My sensei later told me that he had thought that I would soon drop out for the rigour of getting up at 4:30 a.m. in winter combined with the rigours of Aikido techniques which do, after all, hurt; these factors should have been enough to permanently deter one who was pretty hopeless at ordinary sport let alone a martial art! But somehow I managed to persevere, gaining greater motivation as I got closer to gaining that much-desired black belt. When I had sufficiently proved my dedication, I again passed my trial period and crossed an invisible line of acceptance as an honorary local. Being accepted as part of the group meant that the other members were ready to help and encourage you. Conversely, acceptance imposed a duty of loyalty towards the group.

One very cold and snowy day, I arrived at the Dojo to find that all of the other Aikido students had preferred the comfort of home to the distinctly unattractive prospect of making their way through very thick snow to attend the six o’clock morning practice. Not that I blame them! There were many times when I chose to stay in my cosy futon rather than brave sub-zero temperatures.

My sensei did turn up. He was a fifth dan black belt, extremely strong but always modest, cheerful and relaxed. We practised together in a silence so profound that we became aware of the slight and gentle sound made by the snowflakes as they landed outside the Dojo. It was a magical moment with Zen-like qualities that particular morning, one that neither of us forgot. Years later when I happened to visit my sensei, he asked me if I remembered the time we had practised just the two of us on that snowy morning.

Thinking back on that incident, I realised that I had again crossed the invisible line of acceptance in showing enough determination to attend morning practice under conditions that had deterred more advanced students of Aikido living much closer to the Dojo than I did. My sensei who, as I said, did not expect me to last long as an Aikido-ka, began to feel that I might yet survive.

Painting of the Old Toke Station.

To reach the Dojo meant nearly an hour’s travel on two trains and a 30 minute walk across suburban fields. In winter especially this was a form of training in itself.

On another occasion, this time in summer, the chief sensei of our Dojo had put up a decorative wooden plaque engraved with large Kanji (Chinese-Japanese characters) on one wall of the training hall. One of my Aikido colleagues asked, “Seruji-kun! Yomeru?” Can you read those Kanji? Without hesitation I answered, “Fu-Rin-Ka-San.” This was the motto of a famous warlord Takeda Shingen which referred to the four divisions of his samurai army who were supposed to be “Swift as the Wind  – Silent as the Forest – Merciless as the Fire  – Immovable as the Mountain.” My colleagues laughed good-naturedly and called me a “Hen-na Gaijin” (a weird foreigner).

This term, not necessarily derogatory, refers to foreigners possessing some knowledge of the Japanese language, culture and history and who have become “Japanified” in varying degrees. The tourist who spends a week or two in Japan, stays in a hotel, visits a few temples and scenic spots and thinks that he or she has seen Japan is not a “Hen-na Gaijin,” just an ordinary Gaijin! Yet again, I realised that my reading those Kanji and the merriment that resulted was another moment of unspoken but genuine acceptance. There is a certain parallel here between the Japanese and Australian attitude towards making friends or accepting people into a group. Both nationalities take their time to know you but once they decide that they like you, the acceptance is genuine. There are very few instantaneous or “five minute” friendships in either country.

Learning the art of pottery from Mr. Watarai.

During 1976 I had begun to make simple pottery thanks to the friendship I had formed with one of the class members who came for night sessions at the English language institute were I worked. He also taught me the fundamentals of Iaido, which involved drawing the Japanese sword from its scabbard at speed and implementing various defensive counter-strokes.

Practicing Iaido.

But it was the pottery that came to have the greater resonance. We had constructed a drum-can kiln behind my house and enjoyed making and later firing the pieces we had produced. My products could scarcely be described as masterpieces but the enjoyment they provided both in their construction and – when they didn’t explode – during the firing (their final state) remains a precious memory.

Firing pottery.

There finally came the time in mid 1977 when I had resolved to move on to France to know my birth place for the first time and, with very mixed feelings, prepared to leave the still picturesque town of Toke.

Shrine entrance.

In an access of sentimentality and gratitude, I took some of my pottery and placed it in a small Shinto Shrine, which lay not too far away among the trees and bamboo groves of a forest. I left a message, too, partly inserted in one of the pieces, which mentioned that I had lived in Toke for four years and contained a wish for the health and prosperity of the Ota family who had been so kind and welcoming. Shortly thereafter, I left Japan bound for Europe.

Author's blue pottery vase and personal note.

I did not return to Japan till 1980 but since that first return visit I made well over a dozen further trips. Some were in a private capacity but seven were as part of a sister-school program that had been established in the mid-1980s. In 1981 I had the extraordinary luck to be appointed as the teacher of Japanese to Fort Street High School, Australia’s oldest secondary school (est. 1849).

Office at Fort Street High School.

Japanese had been taught there since 1916 and the very first teacher had been a Japanese national, Mineichi Miyata. During the First World War Japan had been an ally of the British Empire and not an enemy and several native Japanese teachers had been sent to teach their language in a number of selective schools in Sydney. It was in 1987 when I had been teaching in this excellent establishment for some six years and was, I confess, not a little proud to be carrying on a tradition dating back to 1916, that the then Premier of the state of New South Wales, Neville Wran, himself a former student at Fort Street, established a sister-school relationship with Eifuku High School in Tokyo. This too was another link in that karmic chain that has kept me so deeply involved with Japan.

One of many visits to Japan with the student sister-school group (2001).

The first group of Japanese students from our sister-school came down to Sydney in 1988 and in the following year I took a group of utterly enthusiastic “Fortians,” as they are called, up to Japan. Both the Japanese and the Aussie youngsters soon learned that they had much in common in nearly all areas of their live and there were always lots of tears shed on both sides at Narita or at Sydney Airport when two-week visits came to their inevitable end and it was time to go home! When it was our turn to visit Japan every alternate year, I found time to return to my beloved Toke but my visits became increasingly heart-breaking.

Painting of Shinto Shrine.

The town of Toke has completely changed. Beginning in the early 1980s real estate sharks bought up all the land and began building houses on such a scale that the neighbourhood I had known and loved is almost unrecognisable. My former house is long gone and its surrounding fields are covered by large houses. Many of the old time residents of the town have passed into the next life and the survivors have happy/sad memories of the time when everybody knew everybody and there was a young “Hen-na Gaijin” living amongst them.

There was, of course, deep pleasure in visiting the Ota family and seeing other personalities I had known, although my subsequent visits to their homes were always tinged with sadness for my reappearance probably reminded them of happier times when their charming landscape had not yet been flattened by bulldozers and their family businesses had not yet been destroyed by the large supermarkets that now characterise the town  – a town now dominated by strangers relocated from Tokyo.

Among the most poignant moments from the visits I made to Toke from 1980 onward were the “pilgrimages” I made to that old Shrine, for my pottery pieces were still there where I had l placed them along with the message I had left. And they are still there untouched by any human agency.

The old Shinto Shrine.

In January of 2011 I made yet another visit to the Shrine. It looks sad now for much of the forest near it has gone and the principal building once surrounded by greenery stands stark and cheerless against the skyline. The tall bamboo groves, which were a distinguishing feature of the site, have also disappeared forever. But in the small Shrine adjacent to the main building where I had left them 34 years ago were the pottery pieces and the message, tattered and torn now in places but still legible. I felt a bitter irony as I carefully extracted the paper and re-read my hopes for the prosperity of the Otas, for their once-thriving business had been among the casualties when the small and charming town of Toke fell victim to capitalist greed and became a soulless, impersonal and unremarkable mass of prefabricated houses.

If there is one theme that runs through all classical Japanese literature it is the theme of the impermanence of all things. As the Japanese chronicler, Kamo no Chomei, wrote around the year 1212 A.D.:

Ceaselessly the river flows and the water is never the same. In the still pools bubbles rise for a moment and then are gone. Even so are human beings and their houses….

Serge Yalichev was born in Paris in 1947. At age 4-½ he migrated to Australia. Serge lived in Japan for 4 ½ years, during which time he taught English and learned Aikido. He holds an MA in history from Sydney University. In 1996, his book, Mercenaries of The Ancient World was published.
From 1981-2006, Serge taught Japanese and French at Fort Street High School in Sydney, Australia, where he now resides with his wife Takiko. His interests include astronomy, art, music, figurine painting, photography and reading.

All paintings in this post (unless otherwise indicated) as well as photographs are the work of the author.

To fly
you must be free

To be free
you must let go

To let go
you must find trust

To find trust
you must have faith

To have faith
you must keep hope

To keep hope
you must see beauty

To see beauty
you must know love

To know love
you must learn to fly

The lesson is this:
If you love to fly
you must fly to love.

Wayne Visser submitted this poem as part of the “Reflections on Love/Poems on Peace,” 2010 Valentine Peace Project. Wayne is Senior Associate at the University of Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership and Visiting Professor of Sustainability at Magna Carta College, Oxford.

This week’s image ~ above right ~ Pelicans Aloft, Santa Cruz, California.

If you enjoyed this poem, you might also like to read One Flower At A Time and Painted Blossoms.

yellow lupine lean
petals cupped to hear
the ocean softly singing

About Jane Benson:

“Poetry has been part of my life since childhood when my mother read aloud her favorite Robert Frost poems and I wore out our copy of Robert Louis Stevensonʼs, A Childʼs Garden of Verses.

“More a reader than writer of verse, I like to collect poems and share them with others, sometimes learning them by heart. Occasionally, I write haiku for myself to capture a feeling, image or experience –a moment in time that I want to remember.

“Recently, I began a group for poetry lovers at Deborahʼs Palm, a new nonprofit community center for women in Palo Alto, CA.”

This week’s image ~ above right ~ Jane Benson, Pescadero Beach.
Thumbnail image ~ Yellow Lupine.

Deep within an indigo sky,
On a cold dark winter’s night,
A river of stars makes a pathway above
All frost and golden bright.

Between one place and another,
Long ago and far away,
We sent a message
To reach us when the time was right,
on the darkest of nights……
It came to us;
The Sign we’ve been waiting for.

Deep within an indigo sky
On the Winter Solstice eve,
A magical event;
A full Moon eclipse,
Hidden by a rainy mist,
Announcing the arrival
Of the Avatar of the Great Divide.

Between what we know as time
And something other,
We are shown a mystic key……
It came to us;
How to walk in the Middle Way.
How to meet in the center of extremes.

From deep within this season
Of Light;
Kindness, service and good works,
on the longest night of the year,
We sense a change within ourselves
Reflecting the  Gift of Enlightenment;

Merry is the person who can find
In every way, to Love,
To believe in goodness,
To see magic all around……
To dance in the evolutionary stream.

Between one place and another,
A Star comes down from the sky;
The Avatar of the Great Divide,
Who can gather us all into One
And who has begun to turn the Key,
Unlocking a new Circle of Time.

Read more of Renee’s poems on her website.

This week’s image ~ above right ~ Carina Nebula (“Mystic Mountain”), NASA, Public Domain.
Thumbnail image ~ Boomerang Nebula, NASA, Public Domain.

The Cattail

The beautiful Cattail dinnerware design was sold by many companies in the 1930′s and 40′s, most notable Sears and Roebuck, Universal Pottery and Hall China. Its striking Chinese red-colored blooms on an ivory background made it a bestseller. Although collectible and used for display, what is more important is that it immortalizes a remarkable wildflower that has myriad uses along with medicinal properties.

The Cattail is of the genus Typha (T. latifolia) and grows throughout the United States in wetlands or any soil that remains saturated; therefore, it may be seen growing densely in ditches, rivers, streams and ponds. Like most primitive plants, its male pollen and female bloom spikes grow separately with the brown cigar-shaped seed head being the female. The Native Americans had a hundred uses for Cattail, among them weaving the plant’s hemp fibers into fishing line, mats for sitting and burials, coverings for wigwams, shoes, dolls and baskets.

It is recorded that the wigwam coverings were so well crafted that not a single drop of rain entered, even during a torrential downpour. Also called “bulrush,” it boasts many edible uses depending on the season and has been called a “wild supermarket”¹ or “four season plant.”

In early spring the new roots or corms may be dug up and peeled and eaten in salads or stews. Later when the male and female shoots appear, they may be shucked and eaten much like corn and are said to be delicious.² Later in the summer the male head will develop powdery pollen, which can be shaken into a jar and used with flour in breads, cakes and as a thickener. In addition, when the plant starts to toughen, the roots produce a starch which contains gluten, the mainstay of wheat bread, and which can be harvested and eaten like potatoes up until the following spring.

As if this were not enough, this incredible wildflower also has medicinal properties. Its roots have been used as an antiseptic for burns, insect bites and toothaches.

Its seeds have a downy coating that is used as stuffing in bedding and pillows and its cigar shaped heads have been dipped in oil and used as torches.

With so many uses and applications, it is not remarkable that this wildflower’s design would be chosen as décor for pottery. What is amazing is that it has not been even more properly revered. So the next time you are out “roughing it,” look for a cluster of Cattails, as this is truly a survivalist’s food stuff.

Saguaro Cactus

Of the many popular decals used on vintage dinnerware, some of the most sought after are the Mexican designs. Brightly colored in orange, reds and greens, the details of the designs almost always feature a cactus tree. Called Tia Juana, Sleeping Mexican and Mexicali, among other design names, the cactus most often featured is the Saguaro Cactus (Cereus giganteus). It is striking and immediately noticeable in the landscape. Usually seen in dry areas, it is a symbol of the Southwest and its night blooming blossoms are Arizona’s state flower.

Tall and stately, the Saguaro grows from 50 to 75 feet and will hold a ton of water in its arms, which take 45 to 75 years to sprout. Saguaro blooms in May and June from the top of its stem and is cross pollinated by bees and bats. It is an important part of its desert ecosystem in that its fruits feed the desert animals and wildlife and it provides a shady home for many birds. Considering that it can live to be over 200 years old but is very slow growing, about an inch a year, this fact has put the Saguaro on the endangered list and Arizona actually has laws pertaining to moving or harming the Saguaro. Popular in art and design, its symbol adds a great touch to kitchen décor.

Left: Tulip pattern; Middle: Orange/Apple Tree pattern

Kitchen Kraft

The 1930′s saw the production of a dinnerware line called Kitchen Kraft produced by the Homer Laughlin China Co. with Frederick Rhead as the designer. With few exceptions, the company featured a host of floral designs that are still very popular today. This heavy duty ware is suitable for table or oven, some is even embossed with the design, instead of fired on, and hand-painted. The floral decals are too numerous to mention but shown (above) are some of the more popular floral designs.

Citations:
1. http://www.wildmanstevebrill.com/Plants.Folder/Cattails.html
2. http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/duffyk43.html
3. Permission to use Aquaplant Cattail photo [panel 1, right-most image] given by Michael P. Masser, Ph.D., Professor and Extension Fisheries Specialist, Texas A&M University.

Joyce B. Gladden, a transplanted New Yorker now living in Virginia, is an author, novice gardener, quilter, and book collector. She is a frequent contributor to Dave’s Garden. Her plant of choice, about which she has written, is the coleus. In text photographs for this post are courtesy of Joyce.

Image ~ above right ~ Saguaro Cactus.
Thumbnail image ~ Creative Commons, Rich Anderson.

Yesterday, the golden crescent of an old moon
woke me, bright above the horizon
an hour before the sun,

but while I looked for it today,
thinking I should catch its gleam
just before sun up, it wasn’t there,
losing itself instead in the brightness
of February’s icy flare.

For two days now, it will ride the day
leaving the chill stars to glitter
brighter in their ways, as winter stars
are wont, and we will wait
for it to choose first dusk, then dark.

About Kathleen Tenpas: We have a grazing dairy of 55 cows in the rolling hills of western New York State where we raised two daughters who have now blessed us with four grandchildren. I have messy, jungly beds of old roses, (some real antiques left by former owners), perennials, wildflowers and lots and lots of not so ornamental grasses! I have a Masters degree in Creative Writing: Poetry from Antioch University. I am a photographer and fabric artist and I bake a mean loaf of bread.

This week’s image ~ above right ~ Old Moon, courtesy of Kathleen Tenpas.
Thumbnail image ~ Creative Commons, roskifte/Flickr.