New Year Food - Sweet Black Soybeans (Kuromame) Made With Sumikko Gurashi 黒豆とすみっコぐらし

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

What do you think this is?

Not only cawaii but functional! 可愛いだけでなく実用的！

Red Bougainvillea At December End 年末の赤いブーゲンビリア

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I wrote about bougainvillea before, but that was pink. This time I found red ones in my neighborhood. 

Red bougainvillea 赤いブーゲンビリア

Oxalis (Yellow Wood Sorrel) 黄色のオキザリス（カタバミ）

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

All flowers are gone but this lemon yellow one. This is oxalis or commonly yellow wood sorrel.

Oxalis オキザリス

Commonly yellow wood sorrel カタバミ属です

Very hardy! たくましいです！

The lemon yellow color is so bright that it stands out everywhere. But it's not the only reason I like this flower. Oxalis generally sleeps (i.e., closes) early morning, so finding it awake (i.e., open) during daytime made me smile and happy😊 

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オキザリス（カタバミ）です。ほとんど花が咲いていない中、レモンイエローが目立ちます。でもこの花を好きなのはそれだけが理由ではありません。朝お散歩中は寝てる（閉じてる）んです。だからお昼に起きて（開いて）いるのを見てうれしくなっちゃったんです😊

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Red, Yellow, and Orange Leaves in Winter 冬の紅葉

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

The autumn leaf season is over, but still such colorful leaves were/are all around my house and in Tokyo National Museum. I usually have no hesitation to throw away and delete things, including photos, unlike my husband, who is a hoarder😂, but these leaves are so beautiful that I couldn't delete these photos. This is the last post about 2020 autumn leaves!😊

December 12 - Neighborhood  12月12日 - 近所

Long Walk from Zojoji Temple to Atago Jinja Shrine😊 増上寺から愛宕神社まで散歩しました😊

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

These are 3cm tall dolls of a cow (left) and an ox (right) I bought at Zojoji temple. 

I went to the temple to do "hatsumode," a long-standing Japanese tradition of visiting temples or shrines during the New Year period (generally from January 1 to 3) to pray for good luck for the new year. As almost every Japanese goes to at least one temple/shrine, these sacred places across the country are very crowded during that three-day period. So instead of paying a hatsumode visit during the period, I went to Zojoji temple before the New Year to avoid people, and found these cawaii dolls of a cow (i.e., the white one🐄) and an ox (i.e., the brown one🐂) sold by the temple to welcome the New Year or the Year of the Ox/Cow.

Wooden dolls of cow and ox I bought at Zojoji temple 増上寺で買った雌牛と雄牛の人形

Year of the Ox/Cow🐂🐄 Is Coming! 丑ツリー🐂🐄！

Japanese follows English. 英語の後に日本語が続きます。

These are New Year trees of ox/cow to welcome New Year 2021 or the Year of the Ox🐂Cow🐄. I wanted to take photos of their Christmas trees, i.e., trees with oxen and cows in Santa costumes, but I couldn't because I've been working from home and therefore haven't been to the office since February. These trees are near my office, and when I went there on December 25, the oxen and cows had already taken off Christmas costumes😭    

2021 is the Year of Ox/Cow 来年は丑年

Netsuke - Wind and Thunder Gods, Masks, and Blowfish🐡 根付 - 風神雷神、面、フグ🐡

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I've written many posts about netsuke. According to Britannica, netsuke is an ornamental togglelike piece, usually of carved ivory, used to attach a medicine box, pipe, or tobacco pouch to the obi (sash) of a Japanese man’s traditional dress. 

Because of such functionality, netsuke needs to be very small (i.e., about 3cm) and therefore is very miniature and delicate like the three netsuke below on show at Tokyo National Museum.   

Netsuke in the shape of Wind and Thunder Gods, 19th century
風神雷神牙彫根付 19世紀

Thousand-Armed Bodhisattva Kannon and Hattifatteners? 千手観音菩薩坐像とニョロニョロ？

英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I'm very disrespectful. I know that. But to me, the god's arms look like Hattifatteners...

Thousand-armed bodhisattva kannon, 14th century 千手観音菩薩坐像 14世紀

A Meeting to Discuss "Kim Ji-Young: Born 1982" 「82年生まれ、キム・ジョン」について話しました！

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I attended a meeting to discuss "Kim Ji-young: Born 1982," a million selling book by Cho Nam-joo published in 2016, and a film based on the novel, released in 2019.

"Things Left Unsaid" Should Be Said! - Covid-19 Spreads By Airborne Transmission コロナは空気感染します！！

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

What irritates me most about translation is evasiveness, and the term that has been irritating me most recently is "airborne" because in Japan "airborne" has not been translated in the context of Covid-19. 

A Japanese Hoarder... 捨てられない男｡｡｡

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

My husband is a bookworm, so his room is full of books, which is okay, but he also has a lot of things in his room, like envelopes, receipts, letters, cardboard boxes, etc., which no longer are necessary.

Earthquake Clouds, Rainbow, Moon 地震雲、虹、月

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

What's this? I took these pictures early morning a few days ago... 

"Umai bo," small, puffed, corn snack? うまい棒？

Or nine tails of a fox? 九尾の狐？

Some say that these are earthquake clouds, i.e., clouds predicting imminent earthquakes, while others are against the claim saying there is little support for it. I don't know which is true but these clouds were so beautiful that I decided to include other beautiful photos I took before of the rainbow, moon and clouds...

Social Distancing Reduces Family Stress ソーシャルディスタンスでストレス減らしました｡｡｡

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

You may want to believe that your parents are like you, but I know for a fact that's not necessarily true...

Is the Daffodil Chinese or Japanese? 中国水仙？日本水仙？

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

Three daffodil flowers were in bloom early morning in early December....  

Narcissus tazetta var. chinensis 日本水仙

Boiled Azuki Beans With No Sugar 小豆を砂糖なしで茹でました！

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

If I had to say something good about Covid-19, it would be working from home because WFH has given me time to try recipes that take a long time to cook (e.g., boiling, simmering and stewing), which has widened the variety of foods I eat. I've tried dates, goji berries, black soybeans, cacao nibs, etc., so far, and this time azuki beans!! 

Azuki beans before boiling 茹でる前

Autumn Leaves - Red Gives Me Strength! 紅葉 - 赤ってパワフル！

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

These days I can't help but take photos of autumn leaves, especially red ones. Because I need RED😝!

 

Red stands out 赤が際立つ

"Lemon" or "Remon"😅 檸檬の「レ」は「L」？「R」？😅

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I didn't know that lemons fruit in winter. 

Lemon tree レモン

Walking at Night in Tokyo 夜のお散歩

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I don't eat out these days but still go to a few restaurants to enjoy what I can't make at home, and one such food is soba, i.e., noodles made from buckwheat flour. I go to a soba restaurant "Uchida" once a month. I arrive there at 5 p.m. on Saturday and leave there at around 6:30 p.m. before other customers come. There is another thing I like about this restaurant, that is, walking my way back home.  

Chuo Ohashi bridge from Tsukuda Ohashi bridge 佃大橋から中央大橋を望む

Dried Date with Peanut Butter and Cacao Nibs 棗とピーナツバターとカカオニブ

Japanese follows English.　英語の後に日本語が続きます。

I learned about this dried date dessert from ammyg68, a (self proclaimed) chocolate fanatic!! It's easy to make, putting an "appropriate" amount of peanut butter on a dried date with a sprinkle of cacao nibs. 

I said "appropriate" because look at the plate below!! This is my husband's "revised" recipe! I was worried about if this could happen even before buying peanut butter and cacao nibs for this. 

Wroooonnng! 間違ってるでしょ！

Pittosporum Tobira (Japanese Cheesewood) トベラ

英語の後に日本語が続きます。

This is Japanese cheesewood (Pittosporum tobira). Although these red seeds are edible, they are sticky and have no taste or smell, and aren't yummy at all. (But the flowers smell sweet while leaves smell cheese, which is why it's called Japanese cheesewood.)

The term "tobira" contained in its name is a Japanese word, meaning "door." The plant is named as such because a sprig of this (or holly) is hung on the door on the day of setsubun, i.e., February 3, together with a baked sardine head. This is a ritual for setsubun, i.e., the date before the beginning of spring on the lunisolar calendar, to expel evil spirits.  

May 2022

With crane flies in May 2022　ガガンボと