Carnations

This carnation is in its stunning blossom.

Mum was talking about removing some old books from the house.
I remember there are boxes and boxes of books of folklore and fairy-tale that I used to read over and over again in my youth.
One of the folktales is about the origin of carnations.

Long time ago (what a fairytale opening!), in the heavens lived a goddess and a lot of fairy girls.
It happened in a year that the fairy girls agreed that each of them would create a new species of flower to be dedicated to the goddess on her birthday.

All the fairies, young and mature, spent loads of time preparing their floral presents, except for one little fairy girl. She was probably only 10 years old and was still too naughty to remember important things. She totally forgot this mission and did not remember it until the last minute. Having been having fun in the wild for the entire day, she did not have any material available to her at the moment. She was crying over her carelessness and worried what she could do instead. She was hopeless, everyone thought so.

Crying hard, she used her dirty skirt to wipe tears from her face.
Suddenly, the torn edges of the skirt gave her an inspiration.
She smiled and had an idea about the present.

She made a flower out of the ragged skirt.
It was a brilliant idea!

This new flower is carnation, from a naughty girl's skirt.

どうも　ありがとうね、浩司さん！
私わ　この　えわがきが　好きです。

York Mystery Plays, 16th of July 2006 (Sun) III: Pentecost

In the end of the play, the characters let go of the balloons with which their aspirations went upwards.
With the balloons rising high, every audience was watching the blue dots until they disappeared into the sky.
It was a spirit-up-lifting scene that spoke to a variety of sentiments in a universal language of image.

We don't need to hold our hope object tight.
Loose our hold, look to it, an entire picture of it will come to mind,
And we will be able to find a path right.

Balloon is a cliched symbol of hope, but sometimes the simpler a symbol is, a more effective reminder it is.



It was toward the evening when "Pentecost", one of the mystery plays, was presented. These blue bubbles were flying against the natural backdrop coloured by sunset blue. In the performance, this scene was used to represent the ascension of the disciples.

This play used to be performed by the trade of potters in the Middle Ages. This time it was brought forth by Pocklington School, a boarding and day public school in the north of England. These teenage actors dressed up like potters and they even composed a dance of the potters. The beautiful smiles and fearless innocence of these youthful performers have best annotated the idea of faith that is central to the original play, however it is interpreted within or without the religious context.

It used to be a roll of toilet paper.

Travelogue IV: Chicago, 7-11 May, 2006: Information Feeders

This is one of the amusing objects that I found in the cityscape in Chicago: magazine and newspaper feeders. These colorful plastic boxes always stand quitely one next to another on sidewalks ready to feed busy city passengers with loads of information. But it's not a charity work unfortunately, you have to pay their hardword for sure!

A variety of "useful" information is provided, including daily newspaper, gossip news and some "small aids" for the industry of human desire.

Usually there are 4 or 5 feeders in a group, but this "troupe" that was spotted in Oak Park, a suburban area of Chicago, is unbelievably and amusingly long. They are not pretty, but they are very loyal companions to the city life in Chicago (I am not sure if other US cities also have them).

They look somehow similar to still-standing teletubbies.

Source of image