What if...

This weekend was my first visit to the Edo Tokyo museum. I had been aware of this museum since we got here but I was had a sense that it was overdone and tacky. I had time this weekend so I thought this was a museum I just needed to get to.

A huge, huge overbearing, ultramodern architectural version of a spaceship greets the visitors. The escalator shown above sucks the visitors up into the bowels of the museum. Much to my amazement and pleasure I was fascinated by the exhibitions. More on the main Edo Period Exhibition later.

Once again I stumbled onto an amazing exhibition that gave me a whole new world of understanding about ancient and modern Japan. Here's the link to the special exhibition:

https://www.edo-tokyo-museum.or.jp/en/s-exhibition/special/10309/特別展「大妖怪展%E3%80%80土偶から妖怪ウォッチまで」

The exhibition consisted of ancient illustrations and scrolls from the last 1000 years in Japan of the "Yokai":

 Coming from many different regions of Japan and from many different eras Yokai represent a wide range of monsters that bring to life many of the fears, anxieties and worries about life. 

                                   

  

During the Meiji era a sociology professor went into the countryside and collected stories about as many of these legendary monsters and ghosts  as he could find.

This website is an exhaustive list of the huge variety of these creatures that have lived in the dark places of Japanese minds over the generations:

http://yokai.com

As I looked at these pictures I began thinking se monsters and what they represented. These monsters inhabited the woods, the mountains, the abandoned houses and the streets where people lived.

         

   

These monsters were both horribly frightening but also humorous and laughable. People would share stories about them, share woodblock prints, scare each other with ghost stories and enjoy The chills coming from the stories. There is a long tradition here in Japan of haunted houses being made for the public during the hot summer month of August.

       

As I walked around the exhibit looking at the unique, special, horrible and fascinating monsters I suddenly had this vision.

What if, in our societies, we kept up this tradition of monsters. We would project our deep-seated fears, our hatreds, our loneliness and our dark corners onto these monsters like they did in ancient Japan.

       

 

As I scan the happenings around the world of hatred; as I see acts of random murder; as I hear divisive words being spoken; as I know the people are blaming other people/races/gender/religions for their own deep-seated fears, I wonder whether perhaps we could all agree on some of these fascinating Yokai as a target for this bile.

       

How about fearing the spirit that might take over our unused old crockery? How about being careful of the monster hanging in the paper lantern used to light up our patios? How about paying special attention to the monsters lurking in the boulders of the river? How about trying to decipher whether that noise actually comes from the yokai with the three arseholes?

                                         

   

By targeting our fears towards the supernatural, would this permit us to be kind to our fellow humans? Would that help us see our neighbors without fear since our fears would be targeted elsewhere? 

Just a thought...

If you are interested more about Japanese Yokai there is a great and humourous book written by an American living in Tokyo. Here's the link:

http://www.tuttlepublishing.com/books-by-country/yokai-attack

A question of taste and preference

One of the fascinating things about being in Japan is the opportunity to see the world thru another set of lenses. Last weekend was another opportunity to be reminded about how tastes, what is beautiful and what is important can be so different from culture to culture.

I had the opportunity to visit the Kyu-Iwasaki-tei Garden 

This was the original estate of the Iwasaki clan who were the founders of the hugely successful Mitsubishi conglomerate. At the time they were one of the wealthiest families in Japan. They hired the British architect Josaih Condor in 1896 to build an appropriate mansion for the family. Condor was well known in Tokyo at the time for designing western style magnificent buildings:

                                    

Sure enough this structure did not disappoint with its sweeping balconies, it's intricate woodwork and hardwood floors, the beveled glass windows, all of the elements seen in estates throughout Europe and places like Newport Rhode Island.

         

                                       

                                       

I thought to myself, oh yes, the Meiji restoration when Japanese aristocrats were entranced by the West and took on all things western. This would make sense that a super wealthy family in Japan would build a home like this to emulate the West... Until I got to the back of this western mansion and saw this corridor:

       

                                 

                                        

     

This corridor is exquisitely built with simple, pure lines, simple wood beams, floors covered with tatami mats and soji screens looking out on an inner garden on the side.

As it turns out the family actually lived in a sprawling complex of Japanese style rooms which they preferred to live in. At the end of this hall they had shoes and western clothes stored so that they could emerge to welcome their foreign guests dressed as Westerners surrounded by the Western tastes that guests were used to.

As a family they preferred this environment:

Simple rooms with tatami mats on the floor looking out over gardens...

Like most traditional rooms next to no furniture but small alcoves in each room for a few simple but exquisite art pieces to display....

                                   

Beautifully crafted overhangs out of exquisite wood beams to provide shade and shelter form the rain...

                                    

Surrounded by gardens of ancient trees and stone lanterns to remind them of their ancestors...

                                   

With my early life in the US and Europe I resonate to the beauty of Condor's design. I am humbled and 

inspired to realize once again that tastes and cultures are different and that people around the world understand "comfort", "beauty", and "home" differently.

Another lesson relearned last Sunday.

Lovely summer to re-connect with our "home" roots in Kalso

We are grateful to have had the holiday time during the summer to get home and reconnect with family and friends in North America.

The summer began with a trip to Parksville, on Vancouver Island, to drop in on our DD students who were spent 5 weeks in a full English immersion program course of Social Studies 10. It was fun to see them experiencing things they had never done before.

                                             

From there some too short time to be based at our serene Kaslo home overlooking the mountains.

                                          

We took as many opportunities as we could to get out in the beauty of nature in the great Canadian wilderness...

Paddling on Duncan Lake:

Hiking up to Mt. Jardine:

Paddling on peaceful lakes in the Muskokas:

                     

Totally appreciating the exquisite taste of camp food on Slocan Lake:

The rhythmic exercise of long paddling days:

And the gentle waking up of yoga on the cliffs:

                                        

Our daughters lives were busy with their work but we got in the visits we could with them. Helene enjoying her new career and home in Creston, BC with the city's planning department:

And Sarah, based out of Kananaskis and Calgary work her work as a supervisor of one of the biggest Y camps:

We really enjoyed spending time with each of their partners as well; Eric...

                                       

And Alexi; news flash Sarah and Alexi have decided to get married!

This summer was also our chance to celebrate a very special milestone for us, this being our 30th wedding anniversary. Thanks to friends and family for sharing the celebration with us, and for Sonya and her group for beautiful music.

It was also Mary Stickel's  (Shelley's mother) birthday on that dad so we celebrated with her as well.

We also celebrated other friends celebrating their own relationship markers: Sean and Uli with their 25th:

A trip to Ontario permitted us to celebrate Shelley's sister Patty and Blair, starting a new marriage this summer with Shelley as the officiant:

This was a chance to reconnect with family (Mary and brother Charlie)

Charlie and his children...

And Mary's gathering of great-grandchildren around her:

We said good-bye to the Sinclair home where three generations of Sinclair doctors have worked (Shelley's uncle Duncan and wife Marg, the last doctor to work out of the house). This house has now been sold.

We visited some of the historical Sinclair family grave sites near Aylmer. 

We made a point of visiting other relatives in Southern Ontario; aunt Norma:

Aunt Agnes:

And in between visiting we fit in as many swims as possible and enjoyed as many sunsets over the great lakes as we could

On Dan's family side a trip to the finger lakes in up-state New York gave us the chance to celebrate with family the life of his aunt Nancy who passed away this year. We enjoyed some very special sharing time with cousins Walter (and Rebecca and kids)) and Ben (and his daughter) and Alice at the long time water front family cottage.

Back in the Kootenays we continued to be grounded at Argenta Quaker meeting with our community there.

Dan's last breakfast on the house deck in Kaslo to soak in the view, the quiet, the green came all too soon...

An over-night with Art and Lin in Vancouver helped Dan slowly re-orient to the world of the big city..

To dive back into this amazing, huge world of Tokyo: 

And our home here:

In this world of air travel and instant communication, it is a blessing to be linked to friends and families around the globe, reminding us that the norm in this world is people who care, who are kind, and who are working in their own way to make this world a better place.