Guess Who Took Me To Get My Tattoo?

That’s right,
Yasu!
(That rhymes by the way)
Lunch: Cafe Roca

Gelato: Latte




“I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees, people.
I thought, “This is what it is to be happy.” (Sylvia Plath)



“…and then, I have nature and art and poetry, and if that is not enough, what is enough?”
(Vincent van Gogh)

 

I Need Your Help

Yesterday I had an idea. One that both frightens me and makes me excited. I thought, why don’t I compile a picture book of my time here? Wouldn’t that be the very best way of closing a chapter? No pun intended. Okay, pun totally intended. What do you think? With anecdotes and recipes and maybe one or two poems (because I hear poems don’t really sell). Not that money is a focus for me whatsoever. I swear to God, all I want to do is create. I have dreamt of publishing a book ever since I was a little widdle head-scarf wearing school girl. Won’t you please help? Any ideas, any contacts, any advice, anything at all because I really don’t know one thing about doing this. Will you buy it? Is it a good idea? What do you want to see in it? Who should I contact? How do I do this?

Eagerly awaiting your comments and messages,
Anisa

 

To Make Living Itself An Art, That Is The Goal.

Trying.

If You Get Out Of The Way

…the art will make itself. -Fred Babb

An Unexpected Friend Part Two

Remember my friend Yasu? Last night, her and I went to our pottery sensei’s house to shape our creations. This is the final part before our pottery gets cooked in an oven. For dinner, Naho sensei served us the most delicious Japanese curry with chicken, carrot, eggplant, potato, onion and radish in the most loveliest handmade bowls (after dinner we had Japanese matcha). I especially LOVED her boat-shaped bowl. I thought it incredibly charming. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before. A simple compliment on it in my broken broken horrible Japanese and it was mine. An unexpected friend, numero dos. This morning I served home-made muesli in it for myself. This afternoon, I will visit Naho sensei with a bag of oats. I am going to teach her how to make the same muesli for own.

Live With Your Arms Wide Open

Have started writing goodbye letters to my friends and students. For my students, I am begging them to continue with their English, to travel, to explore, to create and to live with their arms wide open.

An Unexpected Friend

“It is an absolute human certainty that no one can know his own beauty or perceive a sense of his own worth until it has been reflected back to him in the mirror of another loving, caring human being.” ―John Joseph Powell

I was introduced to Yasu unexpectedly. One day, after living in Japan for over a year, I came home to a box of chocolates on my doorstep. A letter was attached to it. It read:

“Ms Anisa

I am Yasuko from upstairs.

When I was tired from moving work, you gave me a dessert. That was very delicious and thank you so much for that. I wanted to always talk with you.
But I will move on April 30 to next village.
The new address is Nishiawakura village.
If you don’t mind, could you hang out with me sometime?
I am really bad at English, but I hope we could be good friends.”

The dessert she was referring to was actually a blueberry smoothie that I made for my neighbors after seeing them gardening on a hot day.

When I finally met Yasu and asked her why she hadn’t introduced herself earlier she said that she had been too shy/scared. Can you believe it? One year of loneliness, living below my now best-friend.

Alas, we have done much since the letter: smoothie-bowls, food outings, yoga-classes, dinners with her family and yesterday, pottery class followed by a home-cooked Japanese dinner and my black-rice pudding for dessert. On the latter, her father told her mother he absolutely didn’t like it. He said this in Japanese but I understood regardless (hehe) but, no matter. It must have been an unusual taste though black rice and coconut milk is readily consumed in Asia. Yasu’s father reminded me of the many times my own father has made inappropriate comments in Persian thinking no one (but us) can understand him when they (the non-persian speakers) can easily read his facial expressions or sense his intent! Oops hehe.

The World Needs More Of You In It

During my year and a bit here, it has been extremely difficult to pursue my passion for healthy eating when the notion of healthy food is so scarce in the Japanese countryside. However, I have preserved. Through “bird” and “rabbit” nicknames from my colleagues for eating nuts, seeds and raw vegetables. Through lack of brown bread. And through unbelievably dare fruit prices. Often, I have made my friends and colleagues healthy cakes explaining that they’re free of gluten, dairy and sugar only to be looked at with wide eyes and responded to by: “but why?! are you on a diet?” Don’t worry I’m not blaming them, I mean, it’s not like I myself came out of my mother’s womb screaming: “quinoa”!

So, as hard as it has been, I have stuck to doing what I love. It has’t been easy and I haven’t had access to the majority of things (both ingredients and cooking materials) that I had back at home but, I have not given up.

Kate Borstein says, “Your life’s work beings when your great joy meets the world’s great hunger.” Taking that literally, my great passion does exactly that. Am I right? (Haha) but really, I know healthy food/mindfulness isn’t the answer to Trump, poverty, terrorism and homophobia but it is still something. My little something to the world.

I would like to think I have had many successes here, in changing attitudes to food (and other) but here are three recent examples of them. First, a picture sent by my neighbour who made the same vegan eggplant and tomato spaghetti that I made her, for her daughter. Next, my friend’s smoothie-bowl attempt after eating two or three in my kitchen. Last but not least, do you remember the burger place in Tottori I posted? Well, I added the chef on Facebook (because I’m creepy like that) and begged the poor dude to make me a vegan burger. Being Japan where customer service is beyond immaculate, he dutifully delivered. The patty was delicious, a little too wide and a little too flat but it was his first try and he promises to work on it.

 

Life Is Tough But So Are You

So I received the best gift ever. Like, I love it so much, I can’t stop thinking about. Handmade with local Japanese mountain Sakura (cherry blossom)! Wow wow wow! Friendships like these don’t come easy. This is why I travel. I love you my Israeli brother. @kodamaliving SO much talent! This, (not just the material thing but also the thought behind it) makes all of the trouble, all of the worries, the homesickness, the weight gain, the mosquito bites, the prejudice, the unfamiliarity, ALL worth it.

Sweet Bean (An): A Movie Review

Before I say anything about this movie, I want to tell you something. But before I do, I want to apologize in advance if I offend anybody. Basically, In my mother tongue of Persian/Farsi, “an” is the word for, put politely, feces. Which by the way, came as a real shock when my family and I left Iran and met numerous Annes and Annies. Again, I’m real sorry for even talking about this but the “ie” downgrades shit to shitty. I am so sorry. But it’s kind of funny, right? Languages, I mean. The Japanese word for persimmon 柿 (kaki) is also the Hebrew word for feces. Okay, enough poop talk, An (the movie not the other) is a must-see.

I watched four movies on the plane to and back from NZ and this one was by far my favorite. An is the story of an uncommon threesome: a middle-aged and troubled male confectioner, an elderly woman and a schoolgirl. Directed by Naomi Kawase, it is a simple story told with plenty of heart. The film explores the power of life’s simple joys, in relieving burdens and uniting souls and the need to hand down skills from generation to generation. That, and some serious, simmering bean foodporn.

By the way, an in Japan is everywhere. As in, EVERYWHERE. And dorayaki (the product of the troubled confectioner; a Japanese red-bean pancake consisting of two small pancake-like patties wrapped around a filling of sweet Azuki red bean paste) is super popular. So, it’s a great movie to see for Japan dwellers seeing as they’ll surely relate but also a great watch for lovers of Japan and/or artsy films.