That light feeling

This year I am savouring summer like never before. Its dawning on me what a beautiful season it is. Incredibly liberating and the light feeling hasnt left me. Funny - living in places with perennial summers (Mumbai,Singapore..) one just misses this small joyous fact.

For all those inveterate tropical animals - like me - yes you can survive winters (like I did).No, you dont necessarily die/get frost-bitten/suffer hypothermia in the cold (yes even in temperatures below 25 C).And the temperature setting is normally less than in Great World City (mall in Singapore) and no you cant turn it up when you want to. And yes you can get spoilt by it all if you arent careful.

So I survived a winter and am actually reminiscing fondly about its joys (who would have thought). I do miss the long winter walks when I could walk for hours without panting like a Retriever. After walking a while the warm rush of body heat from within made for a neat inbuilt body warmer.

I miss those nippy winter mornings ,bright blue skies and a bright sun lightly toasting your skin (ah bless the Tokyo weather).I miss the excitement of predicting the turn of seasons - spotting the first yellow leaf or the first sakura bud (or read about it in the mornings newspaper)...

Before it sounds all wrong I have to say this...I am still glad, very glad its summer.

I like the feel of cool cotton against my skin again.

I like the feel of the breeze through my open window and the sound of rustling white curtains...

I like not walking around like a shapeless ball of wool (all those layers) weighing a ton (not having learnt the Japanese art of winter chic yet).No wonder I feel lighter.

I like the fact that I can walk out of the house in a lark with just one layer of clothing and my house keys. No more endless dilemnas (everytime) about what to wear and how many - gloves-no gloves, thermals or plain cardigan or fleece.Or all. Neck warmer or cap.Or both. Heck going out should be a hop, step and out and on your own terms.

Its nice to have your feet aired in open toed sandals...and no socks. Freedom.

Its a happy feeling hearing birds sing song-ing in fresh green leafy trees. Goodbye to lonely stick trees sadly reaching out...

No more darkness at five in the evening and six pm seeming like mid night.Thank God. What a weird feeling that.

Am I imagining it or do people around me actually look happier and 'free' this summer..like a burden just lifted off them..

Maybe its just the song in my heart that is making me see things..

Or the humidity.

Sayonara!

Galangal and a far off place

Started the summer by wiggling my toes a bit outside my small boundary in Tokyo. My fascination for the 'far off' suburbs has stayed on with me over the years. Those far off places on the fringes of the big bad city. 'Back- of-the- bandooks' to some cynics. Or 'The-Last-Train-Stop'.


When I recently read in a Tokyo daily an ad for a Thai vegetarian cooking class somewhere "in another prefecture" it had a dangerous ring to it (not the cooking).I liked.I responded.

I have loved the sound of 'prefectures' ever since I set foot in Japan.Ibaraki,Aomori,Gunma,Tochigi....I could well be reading music.

Who knows what mysteries these far off places hold ? Who are the people who live there?



In Hong Kong, the word 'New Territories' similarly stirred my inner 'qi' (chi). From where we stayed as tourists on Hong Kong island (ah the skyline) I had to get a whiff of the dangerous mainland air. I walked its teeming streets (check pic) full of strange sounds and sights - less Hong Kong more China. I understood fewer things there - but thats the whole point of these 'Last-Train-Stops'.

Meanwhile in Japan....my train reached the outskirts of Tokyo Prefecture, where I had to change subway lines to more exotic sounding ones
(Seibu Ikebukoro,Seibu Chichibu..). These lines figure on the fringes of the Tokyo Metro Subway map as thin lines- with a start but only a vague suggestion of an end, in small type, at a romantic sounding station.As if warning me that the journey's end may just be a concept.Who knows.


As the train surfaced from the deep bowels of Tokyo city, the landscape had changed. Tokyo's neurosis considerably ebbed,pulse dropped notches lower. Small houses with their own pocket sized gardens. Men in straw hats tending to small tracts of land (cabbage? spinach?). Mountains rising all around.Pastoral and all that. (Exhibit A: the naive goggling city bumpkin)


Two and a half hours later, I arrived in Koma, my destination in the Saitama Prefecture. I breathed the cool mountain air. Where are the people? The quiet station tucked away in the middle of nowhere could hardly mean serious business. Drivers probably dont even bother stopping here.



The quaint barn-like organic,vegetarian Alishan cafe and shop (venue of cooking class) sat calmly on the banks of the Koma River. May, the Thai chef - our teacher for the afternoon showed us the joys of Thai cooking to the strains of quaint Thai music in the background. One of those mildly disorienting experiences where in flashes I wasnt quite sure which part of the world I was in. Talks of galangal and lemon grass in the Kanto Plain to the strains of lilting South East Asian music and a Canadian exchange student by my side.



As the sun set on the quiet little town of Koma (a dog barking in the distance), my palate tingling with the taste of red chilly,lemon grass and of course galangal ,I headed back to the madness of Tokyo, like moth to a flame.My batteries needed recharging. I think I was wilting. Rural,pastoral is all fine for a day but I needed my crazy cocktail of city sounds. I am headed back to where I belong. Also my family (of scapegoats) await me and my newly honed Thai cooking skills...


PS: I love Thai food. If my journey to the end of the earth doesnt prove it what does.