Two Holiday Guests

We are having two gold fish holidaying in our house at the moment during the 10-day absence of their masters.

It is the first time for us to keep pets in the house, and it has been unexpectedly entertaining. They are two creatures which have quite a personality. Being voiceless does not mean that they don't show much emotion. Whenever the bottle of fish food is lifted from a nearby table or carelessly passed across in front of them, they would get extraordinarily stirred. They would open wide their mouths as if they are mumbling a silent protest if nothing ends up in the aquarium.

They also follow human beings' movement unbelievably well. Whenever somebody is near to the small tank, they would immediately crowd to a certain corner to seek attention. Exactly like pet dogs to a certain degree. Occasionally, they become small audiences to watch me dancing aerobics in the room.

Sometimes they would peck at each other, but no serious crime has been committed so far. They also suck up stones and throw them up afterwards to look for more food. Additionally, we were both quite surprised to know that they two would actually, probably by accident, move around the decorative seaweed and miniature bridge. One morning, I found them dislocated and scattered in separate corners.

While we pet them, they also seem to pet a dummy fish in the aquarium. The plastic yellow fish usually rests motionless on the bed of the tank, but it swims around following the water flow caused by the the two gold fish. Sometimes, the two gold masters would go to peck at the yellow object to make it move.

I have the impression that gold fish or carp in outdoor ponds are quite voracious, but I have never thought that pet fish would be as animated as the drama that our two guests create everyday.

A friend once told me that her husband would spend hours watching his aquarium after work everyday. Now I have started to understand the feeling. In the end, life in an aquarium can be quite a theatrical piece, especially when they know there is an audience out there.

Some conspiracy is going on here...

Exhibition: Flowers in Bloom: the Culture of Gardening in Edo

This is an overdue entry regarding an exhibition on the art of gardening in Edo-period Tokyo last year (July 2013): Flowers in Bloom: the Culture of Gardening in Edo. 

It is not a theme popular among young people in Japan, and the relatively young Edo-Tokyo Museum hasn't claimed its importance on the map of tourism of Tokyo. I was then blessed with a quiet morning in leisure with my Korean friend at the exhibition. 

The exhibition showed the ways in which gardening and the passion for plants were a fashion in Tokyo during the Edo period. It was part of the Samurai culture to love and grow plants, and later on the zeal reached out to the general public. 

Unfortunately now I cannot recall much about the exhibition in details. Below are some images that I really love. 

歌川貞秀 亜墨利加之商人小樹之桜を求めて大に歓喜之図

This is a portrait of an American merchant who is said to be overjoyed with his new acquisition of a cherry tree. The image of the lady on top left was probably the one to whom the cherry tree was to be presented. 

歌川国芳 百種接分苗 

Chrysanthemum is the national flower of Japan, and certainly it also created frenzies of adoration during the Edo period. This image shows grafted chrysanthemums blooming in all sorts of colours on one single trunk. Chrysanthemum-viewing events like this are still widely enjoyed in autumn these days. 

戸田熊次郎/序 狩野素川(勝波方信凌雲斎)/画 久留米藩士 江戸勤番長屋絵巻(粉本)

戸田熊次郎/序 狩野素川(勝波方信凌雲斎)/画 久留米藩士 江戸勤番長屋絵巻(粉本)

The two images above show two samurais growing plants in their respective dormitory rooms. Even if the rooms were only small cubicles, it is amazing that their occupants still managed to create a small patch dedicated to gardening, on which they meditate and cultivate the green. In both of the images, one of the common plants is morning glory. Apparently, morning glory was extremely popular at the time. The popularity of that flower can be seen in the image below, too. 

歌川国芳／五行之内 朝顔の土性／個人蔵

Toothbrush was an indispensable element in the depiction of blooming morning glories in woodcuts. Morning would be the time for early-risers and for people to groom before a day. Some other images in the exhibition showed a lady looking into a mirror to wear makeup (to prepare her face) with a morning glory in the background. The everyday-ness of the combination of the elements is intriguing. The love for flowers, for garden, and more generally for nature is considered inseparable from one's everyday life. It feels as if the first thing one would do before a day's routine is to check on his garden. It is also amusing to toss the idea, which is suggested by the motif, that one should prepare a 'morning face' (朝顔), the name of morning glory in Japanese.

歌川広重　東都名所　上野不忍蓮池

One of the motifs of Edo-period woodcuts is the depiction of sightseeing spots in Tokyo. The lotus pond in the image is Ueno park, still a must-see nowadays when people visit Japan. 

 三代歌川豊国　向ふ島の夜桜

Night-viewing of cherry-blossoms is a total soul-cleansing event. Here I particularly like the colour of lapis lazuli for the kimono and the inky trunk of the cherry tree. 

松亭金水[十返舎十九]/題 歌川広重(初代・二代)/画　絵本江戸土産 第4編　小金井の桜

The cherry blossoms in Koganei city, where I live, has been a hot spot since the Edo period. I do not know to which direction Mt. Fuji will be seen though. However, Koganei park still maintains its fame and commands its authority during hanami season now. 

葛飾北齋 菊図

This is another depiction of chrysanthemums blooming like fireworks on summer nights. 

Source

The triptych here shows a flower-vending space. The three images respectively represent flowers in different seasons. I am fond of flowers but not leaves; however, foliage was the most valuable and prestigious possession a real expert would appreciate in the Edo period. A large percentage of the plants on display on the shelf are leaves. According to some manuals for horticulturists in the Edo period, spotty leaves rather than simple green foliage were more likely to be the gems in the market. For instance, leaves with white stripes or spots of other colours were more pricy than anything else. If my memory does not fail me, I remember they even had charts illustrating the hierarchy of the values of leaves.

Source

I like some components contributing to this triptych. It also depicts a florist, but it sells fish and fishing tools (?) at the same time. The central image has some baskets of fish in the background, and in the first image on the left, the white-and-blue-checked shelf stores some braided baskets on the top. Inside the baskets are worms for sale, possibly, to be used as baits. I don't know if these two businesses are still closely related in modern days, but I found amusing the ecological concept behind the mixture of the two activities: gardening and fishing. 

Funerals and Weddings

Having been informed that it would be only a small event for colleagues and friends in relation to the career of the deceased, I gave up the idea of attending the memorial gathering for him.

He passed away last October, a distressing loss to people around him. I did not know him well, but he interviewed me for a job, and although we did not see each other often after that, I had always thought that he was a respectable acquaintance.

I was upset when being denied my condolence in person, but it does not bother me any more. No matter how much one minds, nothing will change the fact of death.

My dismay did not result from the absence of an invitation, perhaps. It was probably a more selfish reason that I felt strongly being prevented from showing my gratitude and sending my heart. So it was perhaps more about the living rather than the dead in this case.

A friend of mine believes that invitations to occasions, such as weddings, are a testament to friendship. Is this thought applicable to the understanding of the significance of a funeral note? Perhaps not, given that the deceased is no longer in charge of the guest list for his own party. I do not believe in the analogy between invitation and friendship, as there are many indeterminable factors to complicate the issue. Funerals and weddings are supposed to be occasions, I think, where a relationship is re-established or created between hosts and guests.

Interestingly, funerals and weddings have become an issue on which I muse since then. Having been living away from my hometown for half of my life now, I have missed many weddings and some funerals. Geographical distance has been the main hindrance. Although I do not necessarily believe in the importance of these rituals, I cannot help but feel lost many times. I think that wedding is the last chance for friends to be just friends before they go on separate ways to make their respective families; funeral is another last (already too late) opportunity before an extant relationship falls apart gradually. I have no objection to the value of family or to the natural development for human beings to peel off from their shared life and to march on their due course. Therefore, such moment proves to be significant in the sense that one has to say goodbye to his foregone past. These occasions help to nurture a self-acknowledge of what is lost and a preparation for what it will become in the future.

On the one hand, I am probably blessed with the fact that I am always far away to be exempted from the formalities all these customs would involve; on the other, I feel inevitably deprived of a sense of belonging in a social surrounding in which there is no custom to oblige me.

Without these rites de passage, existence feels innocent and somehow weightless.