My Flikrd friends have been insinuating for months that I'm a lesser human being for not having a Flickr account. Chris, aggressive bully that he is, finally grabbed my head and smacked it repeatedly against a wall until I agreed to open a Flickr account. The only reason it's taken so long to open it since I last mentioned it was coming on 25th October is that I've been recuperating from my severe head wounds in hospital for the last few weeks.
Also, for my friends who are as technologically reluctant as me but like to read lots of different blogs, I recommend opening a free account on bloglines and using RSS feeds to keep track of when people have updated without having to visit all their sites one by one.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
I'm a Muji Whore!
I've found to my dismay that I'm on the verge of attaining critical mass on ownership of Muji products. Any more and my room will become an unofficial branch of the store.
It hit me when I hung up the curtains that I bought. I went for the brown ones in a bit of a rush because they were the darkest and promised to blot out all light. But once they were up, I realized it was this huge expanse of heavy brown on the wall that lessens the sense of space in the room. However, what freaked me out was the sudden set of brown correspondences that reverberated around the room. My brown curtains now matched my brown duvet cover, my brown floor cushion and my brown towel, all from Muji, plus the four or so items of brown clothing that I have. Argh, all along I had a subconscious fetish for brown cloth - Muji or otherwise - and I didn't realize! Holy Muji bathsponge on a stick, I've become Mr Muji Muji!
My Muji inventory now looks like this:
1 Muji desk
1 Muji desk chair
1 Muji pen holder
1 Muji duvet
1 Muji duvet cover (brown)
1 Muji cushion (brown)
1 Muji curtains (exchanged the brown ones for light grey ones)
2 Muji bins (one for living room use, one for kitchen)
1 Muji iron
1 Muji ironing board
1 Muji bathtowel (brown)
1 Muji floorsweeper
9 Muji translucent plastic storage boxes (4 for desk, 5 in cupboard)
1 Muji collapsable translucent plastic box for laundry
1 Muji shelving set
It doesn't look as bad as it sounds... the shelving system is in the cupboard, as are half of the storage boxes. I do plan to buy the Muji washing machine + metal shelf set to go over it, but only because it's the only nice looking washing machine I can find in Tokyo and I will immediately wash the black, non-Muji duvet cover I was using as a makeshift curtain in my last flat and use that instead of the brown Muji duvet cover on my bed.
I guess I was aware I was buying a lot of Muji stuff when I arrived in Tokyo last year, but as everything was exposed in my previous room, the colour of all my books and DVDs and stuff outshone the muted Muji tones everywhere else. Even a lot of the things I haven't bought from Muji, like my lamps and coffee tables (and, ahem, my MacBook Pro), are essentially Muji style. In the new room, a lot of that colour is now hidden away in the cupboard, which itself has a Muji-ish air to it.
I don't think I've made a mistake though. Muji is a great way of getting cheap, well made goods that have a basic level of good design to them. Muji has a very restricted aesthetic to it, so I think the way forward is to use it as a soft base on which to put more striking objects that are brightly coloured or patterned. Putting some brighly coloured, differently shaped cushions on the floor, a colourful bathmat and towels and a striking desklamp will make my room much more interesting. Considering the beige capsule that is my bathroom, that are in particular desperately needs some colour. I'm also making a point of buying completely unmatching crockery and placemats and as well as putting out some of the unusual souvenirs that I brought back from Tibet, the whole apartment will look better once I have some photos on the walls.
At some point later, I'll post 'before and after' pics of my new room.
It hit me when I hung up the curtains that I bought. I went for the brown ones in a bit of a rush because they were the darkest and promised to blot out all light. But once they were up, I realized it was this huge expanse of heavy brown on the wall that lessens the sense of space in the room. However, what freaked me out was the sudden set of brown correspondences that reverberated around the room. My brown curtains now matched my brown duvet cover, my brown floor cushion and my brown towel, all from Muji, plus the four or so items of brown clothing that I have. Argh, all along I had a subconscious fetish for brown cloth - Muji or otherwise - and I didn't realize! Holy Muji bathsponge on a stick, I've become Mr Muji Muji!
My Muji inventory now looks like this:
1 Muji desk
1 Muji desk chair
1 Muji pen holder
1 Muji duvet
1 Muji duvet cover (brown)
1 Muji cushion (brown)
1 Muji curtains (exchanged the brown ones for light grey ones)
2 Muji bins (one for living room use, one for kitchen)
1 Muji iron
1 Muji ironing board
1 Muji bathtowel (brown)
1 Muji floorsweeper
9 Muji translucent plastic storage boxes (4 for desk, 5 in cupboard)
1 Muji collapsable translucent plastic box for laundry
1 Muji shelving set
It doesn't look as bad as it sounds... the shelving system is in the cupboard, as are half of the storage boxes. I do plan to buy the Muji washing machine + metal shelf set to go over it, but only because it's the only nice looking washing machine I can find in Tokyo and I will immediately wash the black, non-Muji duvet cover I was using as a makeshift curtain in my last flat and use that instead of the brown Muji duvet cover on my bed.
I guess I was aware I was buying a lot of Muji stuff when I arrived in Tokyo last year, but as everything was exposed in my previous room, the colour of all my books and DVDs and stuff outshone the muted Muji tones everywhere else. Even a lot of the things I haven't bought from Muji, like my lamps and coffee tables (and, ahem, my MacBook Pro), are essentially Muji style. In the new room, a lot of that colour is now hidden away in the cupboard, which itself has a Muji-ish air to it.
I don't think I've made a mistake though. Muji is a great way of getting cheap, well made goods that have a basic level of good design to them. Muji has a very restricted aesthetic to it, so I think the way forward is to use it as a soft base on which to put more striking objects that are brightly coloured or patterned. Putting some brighly coloured, differently shaped cushions on the floor, a colourful bathmat and towels and a striking desklamp will make my room much more interesting. Considering the beige capsule that is my bathroom, that are in particular desperately needs some colour. I'm also making a point of buying completely unmatching crockery and placemats and as well as putting out some of the unusual souvenirs that I brought back from Tibet, the whole apartment will look better once I have some photos on the walls.
At some point later, I'll post 'before and after' pics of my new room.
Monday, October 30, 2006
Neo Tokyo
I love my new apartment and the area it's in so much.
The move went very smoothly and quickly. The multi-shapeable scaffolding-like Muji shelving system that I had previously shaped into a sideboard in my last place is now a set of shelves inside the huge cupboards. Having moved most of my stuff into these cupboards, I just spent ages on my sofa, tripping out on how much space there is compared to the last place.
The bathroom is one of those prefab capsules that is only just big enough for one person. And my, my the things one person can do in there. You can have a bath and wash your hands in the sink at the same time, piss all over the walls and it will all wash away, you could even shower while you're taking a shit. Japan is the master of miniaturization and efficiency.
The neighbourhood is amazing. It's an intriguing mix of old and new buildings, and either way the architecture is really diverse and beautiful. Walking home at night, I'm going down all these quiet little residential streets and in the near distance the Shinjuku skyscrapers rise up over everything (including the striking Park Hyatt Hotel from Lost in Translation), lit up against the night sky. It's pure Tokyo.
The move went very smoothly and quickly. The multi-shapeable scaffolding-like Muji shelving system that I had previously shaped into a sideboard in my last place is now a set of shelves inside the huge cupboards. Having moved most of my stuff into these cupboards, I just spent ages on my sofa, tripping out on how much space there is compared to the last place.
The bathroom is one of those prefab capsules that is only just big enough for one person. And my, my the things one person can do in there. You can have a bath and wash your hands in the sink at the same time, piss all over the walls and it will all wash away, you could even shower while you're taking a shit. Japan is the master of miniaturization and efficiency.
The neighbourhood is amazing. It's an intriguing mix of old and new buildings, and either way the architecture is really diverse and beautiful. Walking home at night, I'm going down all these quiet little residential streets and in the near distance the Shinjuku skyscrapers rise up over everything (including the striking Park Hyatt Hotel from Lost in Translation), lit up against the night sky. It's pure Tokyo.
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Monday, October 23, 2006
Liberation!
I'm very happy to say that in three days I will finally be moving into my own apartment. After coming back from Tibet as serene as the Buddha himself, my housemate did a couple of things that made my stress levels hit Defcon 5 and I realised our co-living situation was completely unsustainable. It's dawned on me that I'm so busy all the time and I'm constantly surrounded by people all day, so my personal space has become more important than ever. In any case, I will be here for several years to come, so it makes sense to move into my own place now.
For those of you who know Tokyo, I'm moving to Yoyogi, eight minutes walk from JR Yoyogi Station and 15 minutes walk from Shinjuku Station. For those of you who don't know Tokyo, this means I live slap bang in the centre of Tokyo!! Well, you can argue that Tokyo either doesn't have a centre, or that it has lots of centres, but to me the arc encompassing Shinjuku/Yoyogi/Harajuku/Shibuya is the centre of Tokyo. It's the perfect location for me: it's within walking distance of Shinjuku and Yoyogi Park; easy cycling distance of so many places like Harajuku, Shibuya and Shimokitazawa; the nearby train station has the two lines that I use the most and it's cuts my commute to the various places I got to work and study by fifteen minutes.
(The crazy thing about this photo is that, while the area depicted is huge, it only represents at most a third of Tokyo.)
Moving apartment in Japan is an insanely expensive affair. My new rent is 400 pounds a month. You pay one month's rent in advance + one or two month's non-refundable deposit ("gratitude money") + one to two month's deposit refunded when you leave + one month's rent in estate agent fees + approximately half a month's rent in other shitty fees. So in my case I've had to pay about 2400 pounds upfront. Other people have it worse sometimes. (I'm not rich, by the way, this has involved a massive loan from my parents).
I don't know what the prices are like in London, but I imagine you would probably get more space for that kind of money, plus furniture/facilities, albeit probably in a slightly run down, noisy place. In Japan, rooms come completely bare and to most Westerners would seem very small. My rent will go from the current 350 pounds a month to 450 pounds a month, plus I have the extra expense of having to buy my own washing machine, fridge, microwave, hoover and crockery etc. But it will be my own uncluttered, hamsterless space and will feel way bigger as a result, and I will be considerably happier.
I've always grown up in smallish rooms so I know how to make the most of space. It looks like the place is dead quiet as it's in a residential dead end. What I love about the room is one whole wall consists of built-in cupboard space, so all my stuff that's been lying exposed in my current cupboard-less room can be hidden from view and I can keep my actual living space simple. And did I mention already that it'll be hamster free?!!
For those of you who know Tokyo, I'm moving to Yoyogi, eight minutes walk from JR Yoyogi Station and 15 minutes walk from Shinjuku Station. For those of you who don't know Tokyo, this means I live slap bang in the centre of Tokyo!! Well, you can argue that Tokyo either doesn't have a centre, or that it has lots of centres, but to me the arc encompassing Shinjuku/Yoyogi/Harajuku/Shibuya is the centre of Tokyo. It's the perfect location for me: it's within walking distance of Shinjuku and Yoyogi Park; easy cycling distance of so many places like Harajuku, Shibuya and Shimokitazawa; the nearby train station has the two lines that I use the most and it's cuts my commute to the various places I got to work and study by fifteen minutes.
(The crazy thing about this photo is that, while the area depicted is huge, it only represents at most a third of Tokyo.)
Moving apartment in Japan is an insanely expensive affair. My new rent is 400 pounds a month. You pay one month's rent in advance + one or two month's non-refundable deposit ("gratitude money") + one to two month's deposit refunded when you leave + one month's rent in estate agent fees + approximately half a month's rent in other shitty fees. So in my case I've had to pay about 2400 pounds upfront. Other people have it worse sometimes. (I'm not rich, by the way, this has involved a massive loan from my parents).
I don't know what the prices are like in London, but I imagine you would probably get more space for that kind of money, plus furniture/facilities, albeit probably in a slightly run down, noisy place. In Japan, rooms come completely bare and to most Westerners would seem very small. My rent will go from the current 350 pounds a month to 450 pounds a month, plus I have the extra expense of having to buy my own washing machine, fridge, microwave, hoover and crockery etc. But it will be my own uncluttered, hamsterless space and will feel way bigger as a result, and I will be considerably happier.
I've always grown up in smallish rooms so I know how to make the most of space. It looks like the place is dead quiet as it's in a residential dead end. What I love about the room is one whole wall consists of built-in cupboard space, so all my stuff that's been lying exposed in my current cupboard-less room can be hidden from view and I can keep my actual living space simple. And did I mention already that it'll be hamster free?!!
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Tibetan Tip for Today
Do not attempt to machine wash Tibetan prayer flags: they come out as prayer rags.
Luckily it was the set I bought in San Francisco last year and not the ones from my trip last month.
Luckily it was the set I bought in San Francisco last year and not the ones from my trip last month.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Nam-tso lake
About four hours out of Lhasa is the world's highest salt water lake, Nam-tso at about 4,300 metres. The sense of space was vast, the air totally pure, the clouds clean and the water crystal clear.
Carved rocks lying around everywhere.
The tent encampment early the next day. The previous day, the central area had been full of hundreds of land cruisers that had brought day-trippers who don't stay at Nam-tso. It kind of had the air of a theme park, so it was great to have stayed overnight and have a quieter morning. The 4 person tent I stayed in is one of the brown ones in the bottom left of the picture.
The weather had changed completely and there was a storm coming in. The normally static prayer flags you see everywhere in Tibet were billowing in the wind like crazy.
The lake took on such an eerily beautiful colour that morning. The water didn't look like water.
The land didn't even look like land.
Tiny, tiny, insignificant people. This landscape will probably still be here long, long after the human race is gone.
Some park ranger I met.
Carved rocks lying around everywhere.
The tent encampment early the next day. The previous day, the central area had been full of hundreds of land cruisers that had brought day-trippers who don't stay at Nam-tso. It kind of had the air of a theme park, so it was great to have stayed overnight and have a quieter morning. The 4 person tent I stayed in is one of the brown ones in the bottom left of the picture.
The weather had changed completely and there was a storm coming in. The normally static prayer flags you see everywhere in Tibet were billowing in the wind like crazy.
The lake took on such an eerily beautiful colour that morning. The water didn't look like water.
The land didn't even look like land.
Tiny, tiny, insignificant people. This landscape will probably still be here long, long after the human race is gone.
Some park ranger I met.
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Sera Monastery
Sera Monastery is on the northern edge of Lhasa and I went there twice. The first time was very calm and quiet, although I got to see the monks debating, making their dramatic claps whenever they make a point. The second time was for the Yoghurt Festival on the 23rd August, when the whole of Lhasa descends on the two main monasteries around the city.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Lhasa
In our first few days in Lhasa, Emily and I took it really easy so as not to aggravate the symptoms of altitude sickness that we were feeling. Everybody gets it in different ways, but in my case my muscles felt weaker and my head a bit light sometimes. Going up stairs was 30% more effort, and while walking around was mostly fine, talking continuously at the same time could get me out of breath. So that's what it's like to be an old age pensioner....
The Tibetan centre of the city is called the Barkhor, and it's made up of randomly connecting streets of Tibetan architecture, full of market stalls selling fruit, meat, yak produce, clothes, arts and crafts and tourist souvenirs. Outside of that area is mostly a Chinese city like any other, with its wide, straight boulevards and cheap clothes shops lining them all the way.
Backstreets of the Barkhor.
Every morning, when we left our hostel on the edge of the Barkhor, we would have to run this gauntlet of butchers selling slabs of yak meat. Yak produce is absolutely essential to Tibet: yak meat, yak butter, yak butter tea, yak cheese, the fur... and so on. Yak meat is okay, but it has a strong taste that I can't quite place, so I didn't really want to eat it. Not that you'd want to eat it anyway when it is sold in these conditions. At best, some meat-sellers would put out a stick of incense to ward off the flies. I guess the whole commerce depends on them selling the meat before the flies have time to lay eggs, and that you will cook it well enough to kill off any germs that may have built up on it. Yeesh.
But all that meaty grossness was made up for by watching Emily the vegetarian squirm and cover her mouth with a shawl every time we left the hostel. One night on our way back to the hostel we were even treated to the full, gutted carcass of a yak being thrown out on the pavement in front of us. She screamed, I laughed.
This is an ingenious invention and one that I saw all over Tibet: a contraption that focusses the sun's rays to boil your kettle. It even had a crank at the bottom so you could adjust the focus and switch it off if necessary.
The scary stairs leading up to our room at the hostel. They were perfectly well welded and structurally sound, but the metal of the step surface was itself pretty thin, so when you trod on it, it buckled a little and made a noise. For a week I trudged up and down those stairs, nervous and out of breath, but by the end of the trip I was bounding up and down them.
This was in the Summit Cafe... which may not be Starbucks by name but was certainly Starbucks by nature, and we would come here a lot to relax and read, and we also met some interesting travellers here. It's a toss-up as to what the cafe's best feature was: the immaculate, western style toilets which even had toilet paper or the world's best ice mocha, smooth and thick like a milkshake.
Apparently, the Tibetans love snooker (or pool, whatever). You'd see these pool tables everywhere in the backstreets and even out in the countryside, in the middle of nowhere, or on top of mountains.
This was the candle room (for want of a better term) at the Ramoche Temple. Boiling hot beyond belief, but so beautiful. The floor was incredibly slippery from candle wax.
The light coming in from the ceiling.
This was the adorable boy who I wanted to adopt. He was just radiated such an aura of kindness.
Walking up the mountain-like stairs of the Potala Palace. Some say this building is boxy and ugly, but I felt it had beautiful colour, texture and proportion and I really liked its gradated asymmetry.
One of the few places within the building that you could get away with taking a photo. Unfortunately the interior feels like little more than a museum; it has been stripped of monastic life and the prescribed route which tourists take runs anticlockwise around the building, in direct contravention of the Tibetan custom of walking clockwise around religious sites.
A view from the Potala over part of northern Lhasa, showing how unexpectedly big the city is. And this is only a small part - I wasn't ever able to get a panoramic view of Lhasa.
On the way out, I saw these Tibetan workers laying new plaster on part of the walls. Builders in Tibet always sing while they are doing their work and it gave a little touch of humanity to an otherwise beautiful but spiritually empty visit.
Starting around the 23rd September was the Yoghurt Festival in Lhasa, which I will mention a little more about another time. There was some Tibetan dance taking place in the "People's Square" built opposite the Potala (after having razed Tibetan homes). The crowd wanted to watch up close, but the Chinese guards kept pushing us back and back and back. They weren't brutal or anything, but it was just such a frustrating display of authority.
Tibet is thronging with pilgrims, constantly murmuring prayers, counting rosary beads, swinging these lollipop-like prayer wheels in their hands, walking clockwise around religious sites and most moving of all, prostrating themselves in front of temples and monasteries. I have never been somewhere where the people are so devout.
The prostration in this picture and the one above is taking place in front of the Jokhang Monastery in the centre of the Barkhor, the most sacred place in Tibet. Inside, it was a remarkable contrast to the Potala - monks were chanting, pilgrims were lining up to pray to the statue of the Buddha and so on; it felt alive.
The gorgeous roof of the Jokhang.
Looking down from the roof of the Jokhang onto Barkhor Square at dusk.
The Tibetan centre of the city is called the Barkhor, and it's made up of randomly connecting streets of Tibetan architecture, full of market stalls selling fruit, meat, yak produce, clothes, arts and crafts and tourist souvenirs. Outside of that area is mostly a Chinese city like any other, with its wide, straight boulevards and cheap clothes shops lining them all the way.
Backstreets of the Barkhor.
Every morning, when we left our hostel on the edge of the Barkhor, we would have to run this gauntlet of butchers selling slabs of yak meat. Yak produce is absolutely essential to Tibet: yak meat, yak butter, yak butter tea, yak cheese, the fur... and so on. Yak meat is okay, but it has a strong taste that I can't quite place, so I didn't really want to eat it. Not that you'd want to eat it anyway when it is sold in these conditions. At best, some meat-sellers would put out a stick of incense to ward off the flies. I guess the whole commerce depends on them selling the meat before the flies have time to lay eggs, and that you will cook it well enough to kill off any germs that may have built up on it. Yeesh.
But all that meaty grossness was made up for by watching Emily the vegetarian squirm and cover her mouth with a shawl every time we left the hostel. One night on our way back to the hostel we were even treated to the full, gutted carcass of a yak being thrown out on the pavement in front of us. She screamed, I laughed.
This is an ingenious invention and one that I saw all over Tibet: a contraption that focusses the sun's rays to boil your kettle. It even had a crank at the bottom so you could adjust the focus and switch it off if necessary.
The scary stairs leading up to our room at the hostel. They were perfectly well welded and structurally sound, but the metal of the step surface was itself pretty thin, so when you trod on it, it buckled a little and made a noise. For a week I trudged up and down those stairs, nervous and out of breath, but by the end of the trip I was bounding up and down them.
This was in the Summit Cafe... which may not be Starbucks by name but was certainly Starbucks by nature, and we would come here a lot to relax and read, and we also met some interesting travellers here. It's a toss-up as to what the cafe's best feature was: the immaculate, western style toilets which even had toilet paper or the world's best ice mocha, smooth and thick like a milkshake.
Apparently, the Tibetans love snooker (or pool, whatever). You'd see these pool tables everywhere in the backstreets and even out in the countryside, in the middle of nowhere, or on top of mountains.
This was the candle room (for want of a better term) at the Ramoche Temple. Boiling hot beyond belief, but so beautiful. The floor was incredibly slippery from candle wax.
The light coming in from the ceiling.
This was the adorable boy who I wanted to adopt. He was just radiated such an aura of kindness.
Walking up the mountain-like stairs of the Potala Palace. Some say this building is boxy and ugly, but I felt it had beautiful colour, texture and proportion and I really liked its gradated asymmetry.
One of the few places within the building that you could get away with taking a photo. Unfortunately the interior feels like little more than a museum; it has been stripped of monastic life and the prescribed route which tourists take runs anticlockwise around the building, in direct contravention of the Tibetan custom of walking clockwise around religious sites.
A view from the Potala over part of northern Lhasa, showing how unexpectedly big the city is. And this is only a small part - I wasn't ever able to get a panoramic view of Lhasa.
On the way out, I saw these Tibetan workers laying new plaster on part of the walls. Builders in Tibet always sing while they are doing their work and it gave a little touch of humanity to an otherwise beautiful but spiritually empty visit.
Starting around the 23rd September was the Yoghurt Festival in Lhasa, which I will mention a little more about another time. There was some Tibetan dance taking place in the "People's Square" built opposite the Potala (after having razed Tibetan homes). The crowd wanted to watch up close, but the Chinese guards kept pushing us back and back and back. They weren't brutal or anything, but it was just such a frustrating display of authority.
Tibet is thronging with pilgrims, constantly murmuring prayers, counting rosary beads, swinging these lollipop-like prayer wheels in their hands, walking clockwise around religious sites and most moving of all, prostrating themselves in front of temples and monasteries. I have never been somewhere where the people are so devout.
The prostration in this picture and the one above is taking place in front of the Jokhang Monastery in the centre of the Barkhor, the most sacred place in Tibet. Inside, it was a remarkable contrast to the Potala - monks were chanting, pilgrims were lining up to pray to the statue of the Buddha and so on; it felt alive.
The gorgeous roof of the Jokhang.
Looking down from the roof of the Jokhang onto Barkhor Square at dusk.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
The Beard Project
Since I was away for a long time, I decided to let my stubble grow out and see what happened. The climate in Tibet is very dry, so the ever-growing beard didn't get itchy like it does after only ten days in humid Japan. I was also free from the daily comments I would otherwise get from colleagues and friends if I attempted this in Japan...
Week One: A little thicker than usual.
Week Two: Doesn't look all that different, although I could feel it was longer.
Week Three: This is not an official beard commemoration pic -- taken while I was on a horse-pulled vegetable cart on its way to a monastery near Tingri -- but shows how well bushy it had become. If I'd been wearing sunglasses as well as the hat in this pic, I doubt anyone I know would have been able to recognise me.
Official pic for Week Three.
Week Four: a couple of days before going to Beijing. Couldn't be bothered to keep it going, and would be meeting people I knew in Beijing soon. Rare opportunity to see what I would look like with a mustache. Yeesh, I guess that's what I would have looked like if I were 25 years old in 1973, albeit with longer hair and a side parting.
Post-shave, looking fresh and young again!
Week One: A little thicker than usual.
Week Two: Doesn't look all that different, although I could feel it was longer.
Week Three: This is not an official beard commemoration pic -- taken while I was on a horse-pulled vegetable cart on its way to a monastery near Tingri -- but shows how well bushy it had become. If I'd been wearing sunglasses as well as the hat in this pic, I doubt anyone I know would have been able to recognise me.
Official pic for Week Three.
Week Four: a couple of days before going to Beijing. Couldn't be bothered to keep it going, and would be meeting people I knew in Beijing soon. Rare opportunity to see what I would look like with a mustache. Yeesh, I guess that's what I would have looked like if I were 25 years old in 1973, albeit with longer hair and a side parting.
Post-shave, looking fresh and young again!
Friday, September 08, 2006
The first new post of many more to come
I'm back, having had a truly fantastic time in Tibet. It's the most phenomenal country I have ever been to. I reckon that what I've been doing over the past month will be more interesting than what I do over the next month, so I think I'm going to be posting in retrospect about Tibet for a while to come.
Here are some of the very many highs and some of the handful of lows of my trip, some of which I will write about in more detail later.
HIGHS
- Flying with Iran Air. And surviving.
- The Jokhang Temple in Lhasa. One of the most spiritually intense places I have ever been.
- Witnessing the destruction of a mandala at Sera monastery, followed by the monks playing unforgettable music on 3 metre long trumpets.
- Watching the monks debate at Sera monastery.
- The adorable kid tending the candles in Ramoche Temple. I wanted to adopt him.
- The Potala Palace seen from the outside (the inside wasn't as special).
- Picnicking with a monk and his friends on the side of a mountain at Ganden monastery.
- Laughing with Emily about Tibet's shitty toilets (oh so literally shitty).
- Making a spoof lonely hearts advert for George Bush and posting it up in Lhasa.
- The world's best ice mocha in the Summit Cafe, Lhasa.
- The total relaxation of being on holiday for so long. Playing Jenga with Emily like a kid again.
- Reading "The Life of Pi", which Saara recommended to me about three years ago and I only just got around to.
- The awe-inspiring landscapes of Tibet. The vast space, the pure air, clouds and sky, the serene quiet.
- Nam-tso lake. The highest salt-water lake in the world.
- Hanging out with a 23 year old monk in his monastery in Shigatse.
- Walking to Everest from the world's highest monastery.
- Getting to know the other people I shared the land cruiser around south-west Tibet with for six days and despite them not being soul mates or anything, being sad to see them go when we went our separate ways.
- Meeting a Japanese-speaking Tibetan in Lhasa in the most random way possible.
- Brief conversation with a bank employee through the credit card slot of an ATM in Lhasa.
- The kindness of two strangers at Lhasa airport when I was in a bit of a fix.
- The satisfaction of screwing over two Chinese girls who tried to con me in Beijing.
- And above all, the Tibetan people. Absolutely inspirational.
LOWS
(Some of them pretty low, most not so bad)
- Drinking one can of shittily-made Lhasa beer and being violently ill for two days.
- Tibetan toilets.
- Kind of being sexually molested by a monk in Ramoche temple in Lhasa.
- Being attacked by a dog in Gyantse.
- The other passengers on the bus from Shigatse to Lhasa. Chronic smokers and chronic spitters.
- The zoo in the Norbunlingka park in Lhasa. An animal gulag.
- Generally finding that my Chinese was too basic to be of much use for anything but the simplest statements.
- Getting a little smelly after not being able to find a shower for several days while on the road and having to wear the same dirty clothes for days on end.
- The taxi driver to Lhasa airport.
- Having not been bitten by a single mosquito in Tibet during three weeks, getting bitten by about twenty in one day in Beijing.
Here are some of the very many highs and some of the handful of lows of my trip, some of which I will write about in more detail later.
HIGHS
- Flying with Iran Air. And surviving.
- The Jokhang Temple in Lhasa. One of the most spiritually intense places I have ever been.
- Witnessing the destruction of a mandala at Sera monastery, followed by the monks playing unforgettable music on 3 metre long trumpets.
- Watching the monks debate at Sera monastery.
- The adorable kid tending the candles in Ramoche Temple. I wanted to adopt him.
- The Potala Palace seen from the outside (the inside wasn't as special).
- Picnicking with a monk and his friends on the side of a mountain at Ganden monastery.
- Laughing with Emily about Tibet's shitty toilets (oh so literally shitty).
- Making a spoof lonely hearts advert for George Bush and posting it up in Lhasa.
- The world's best ice mocha in the Summit Cafe, Lhasa.
- The total relaxation of being on holiday for so long. Playing Jenga with Emily like a kid again.
- Reading "The Life of Pi", which Saara recommended to me about three years ago and I only just got around to.
- The awe-inspiring landscapes of Tibet. The vast space, the pure air, clouds and sky, the serene quiet.
- Nam-tso lake. The highest salt-water lake in the world.
- Hanging out with a 23 year old monk in his monastery in Shigatse.
- Walking to Everest from the world's highest monastery.
- Getting to know the other people I shared the land cruiser around south-west Tibet with for six days and despite them not being soul mates or anything, being sad to see them go when we went our separate ways.
- Meeting a Japanese-speaking Tibetan in Lhasa in the most random way possible.
- Brief conversation with a bank employee through the credit card slot of an ATM in Lhasa.
- The kindness of two strangers at Lhasa airport when I was in a bit of a fix.
- The satisfaction of screwing over two Chinese girls who tried to con me in Beijing.
- And above all, the Tibetan people. Absolutely inspirational.
LOWS
(Some of them pretty low, most not so bad)
- Drinking one can of shittily-made Lhasa beer and being violently ill for two days.
- Tibetan toilets.
- Kind of being sexually molested by a monk in Ramoche temple in Lhasa.
- Being attacked by a dog in Gyantse.
- The other passengers on the bus from Shigatse to Lhasa. Chronic smokers and chronic spitters.
- The zoo in the Norbunlingka park in Lhasa. An animal gulag.
- Generally finding that my Chinese was too basic to be of much use for anything but the simplest statements.
- Getting a little smelly after not being able to find a shower for several days while on the road and having to wear the same dirty clothes for days on end.
- The taxi driver to Lhasa airport.
- Having not been bitten by a single mosquito in Tibet during three weeks, getting bitten by about twenty in one day in Beijing.
Thursday, August 10, 2006
Void
My backpack is something else. I pulled it out of the bag to find it had no straps. Then I realised that the cunning beast is able to pack away its own straps into a long tongue-shaped pocket running up the part that rests against your back. Having pulled out all the straps, and oooh my there are a lot -- including a variety of straps to strap straps onto straps -- the whole thing looked like a huge dead stag beetle on its back.
Then the dilemma came. What do I do with the long tongue-shaped flap that I unzipped to release all the straps? It can't zip back up because the straps are in the way now... and there appears to be nowhere for it to go... unless, of course, I'm content with walking around with this long black flap hanging off my arse.
I start to look everywhere on the backpack, almost turning it inside out in the hopes that it might solve the problem.... all the time finding more and more pockets and sub-compartments -- even a kind of parachute-like thing made of waterproof material that comes out of a side pocket to cover up the whole bag when it rains -- but nowhere for this flap. To make things more mysterious, it has an enigmatic strip of velcro along its bottom edge, at the point where it joins the bottom of the backpack, and yet there is no other velcro in sight for it to stick to.
By now I'm starting to think there must be an instruction booklet that I threw away without realising and so I start rummaging around in my bin. It's at this point that I start to swear at the air, cursing 21st century man for inventing backpacks so fucking complicated that they would conceivably need instruction manuals.
I give up for a while. Later I take a look at my backpack and I notice the thinnest, slenderest hint of a slit at the bottom of the bag. Working my fingers into it, I find more velcro! And lo and behold it opens up into a vast tongue-shaped cavity, running up the entire front of the bag, so deep that I can stick my arm in up to my elbow... a true Mary Poppins handbag moment. If I'm not careful, I'll be packing this bag somewhere out in a plain in Tibet and it'll swallow me up, and nobody will ever know what happened to me.
Then the dilemma came. What do I do with the long tongue-shaped flap that I unzipped to release all the straps? It can't zip back up because the straps are in the way now... and there appears to be nowhere for it to go... unless, of course, I'm content with walking around with this long black flap hanging off my arse.
I start to look everywhere on the backpack, almost turning it inside out in the hopes that it might solve the problem.... all the time finding more and more pockets and sub-compartments -- even a kind of parachute-like thing made of waterproof material that comes out of a side pocket to cover up the whole bag when it rains -- but nowhere for this flap. To make things more mysterious, it has an enigmatic strip of velcro along its bottom edge, at the point where it joins the bottom of the backpack, and yet there is no other velcro in sight for it to stick to.
By now I'm starting to think there must be an instruction booklet that I threw away without realising and so I start rummaging around in my bin. It's at this point that I start to swear at the air, cursing 21st century man for inventing backpacks so fucking complicated that they would conceivably need instruction manuals.
I give up for a while. Later I take a look at my backpack and I notice the thinnest, slenderest hint of a slit at the bottom of the bag. Working my fingers into it, I find more velcro! And lo and behold it opens up into a vast tongue-shaped cavity, running up the entire front of the bag, so deep that I can stick my arm in up to my elbow... a true Mary Poppins handbag moment. If I'm not careful, I'll be packing this bag somewhere out in a plain in Tibet and it'll swallow me up, and nobody will ever know what happened to me.
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Time to move on
Talking of dogs I'd like to kill.... there was the poster of a dog that appeared on the wall of the living room/kitchen in my flat the other week. One of the ugliest posters I have ever seen.
I really don't get who made this this image and why - it's not cute, it's just horrible. And it appeared here (where I have drawn the red box), above the hamster cage.
Now this really caught me by surprise. My flatmate Kogo is one of those people who accumulates all sorts of shit that he doesn't need, and our living room is often treated as something of a warehouse. As I mentioned with the frog rug in a previous post, these things often appear without my consultation, even though I have to live with them. The hamsters also appeared without me being asked my opinion; he just assumed I would find them cute, when in fact I find them noisy and smelly. And that's quite apart from the fact that I can't believe I live with a 34 year old who sits there for hours looking at them, feeding them, photographing them and so on...
Well, I can tolerate all this providing nothing goes up on the white walls, as the whiteness gives the illusion of there being more space than there actually is. And since nothing has ever been on the walls, I assumed he saw things the same way. But then, suddenly this poster appears and it baffled me as much as the frog rug. What kind of grown man would actually choose to put that thing on his wall, especially when it's the only thing on the wall?? I suspect it was probably his girlfriend, that almost silent, ever present figure in the house (and I did NOT know she was going to be here all the time before I moved in).
Anyway, I was having none of it, so I told him it had to go, that the walls have to stay clear. And since I don't complain about things often he obliged, but what surprised me came next: I was expecting him to take it down, realise how ridiculous it is and either throw it away or put it away somewhere. Instead, he immediately started pulling down magnets and other posters off the side of the fridge and put it up there. This poster really seems to matter!
Unfortunately, while there was no tension over this, it did seem to trigger off a mini arms-race of minor complaint and counter minor-complaint about various little things around the house. I can't be bothered to go into them all, but suffice to say that he's a patronising cunt at times and takes the line that when there's a "problem" in the house like forgetting to turn off the light in the toilet it can only be me who's doing it. It was complete news to him that he does it sometimes too. Overall, I'm pretty fed up with his idiosyncracies and the intrusions they have on my personal space. I guess to sum it up, I pay half the rent, but I don't feel like I have authority over the flat -- 95% of the crap in here is his. Living here is a very fine balance between the cheapness of the rent and the convenience of the location versus the experience of living with the myriad idiosyncracies of this weird, human hamster and his little will-o-the-wisp concubine. If I can't live with someone I truly like and respect, then I need my own space. I'm not really in a financial position to move, but I may have a chance... and I will aim to have my own place soon, if not at some point later this year, then definitely next year.
I really don't get who made this this image and why - it's not cute, it's just horrible. And it appeared here (where I have drawn the red box), above the hamster cage.
Now this really caught me by surprise. My flatmate Kogo is one of those people who accumulates all sorts of shit that he doesn't need, and our living room is often treated as something of a warehouse. As I mentioned with the frog rug in a previous post, these things often appear without my consultation, even though I have to live with them. The hamsters also appeared without me being asked my opinion; he just assumed I would find them cute, when in fact I find them noisy and smelly. And that's quite apart from the fact that I can't believe I live with a 34 year old who sits there for hours looking at them, feeding them, photographing them and so on...
Well, I can tolerate all this providing nothing goes up on the white walls, as the whiteness gives the illusion of there being more space than there actually is. And since nothing has ever been on the walls, I assumed he saw things the same way. But then, suddenly this poster appears and it baffled me as much as the frog rug. What kind of grown man would actually choose to put that thing on his wall, especially when it's the only thing on the wall?? I suspect it was probably his girlfriend, that almost silent, ever present figure in the house (and I did NOT know she was going to be here all the time before I moved in).
Anyway, I was having none of it, so I told him it had to go, that the walls have to stay clear. And since I don't complain about things often he obliged, but what surprised me came next: I was expecting him to take it down, realise how ridiculous it is and either throw it away or put it away somewhere. Instead, he immediately started pulling down magnets and other posters off the side of the fridge and put it up there. This poster really seems to matter!
Unfortunately, while there was no tension over this, it did seem to trigger off a mini arms-race of minor complaint and counter minor-complaint about various little things around the house. I can't be bothered to go into them all, but suffice to say that he's a patronising cunt at times and takes the line that when there's a "problem" in the house like forgetting to turn off the light in the toilet it can only be me who's doing it. It was complete news to him that he does it sometimes too. Overall, I'm pretty fed up with his idiosyncracies and the intrusions they have on my personal space. I guess to sum it up, I pay half the rent, but I don't feel like I have authority over the flat -- 95% of the crap in here is his. Living here is a very fine balance between the cheapness of the rent and the convenience of the location versus the experience of living with the myriad idiosyncracies of this weird, human hamster and his little will-o-the-wisp concubine. If I can't live with someone I truly like and respect, then I need my own space. I'm not really in a financial position to move, but I may have a chance... and I will aim to have my own place soon, if not at some point later this year, then definitely next year.
Monday, August 07, 2006
Here boy, here boy, yeeees.... fetch the grenade.
For the last few days I've been doing all sorts of shopping and preparation for going to Tibet on Thursday. It's the first time I've ventured out somewhere where I actually need a backpack ("damn these mountains, why has nobody paved them yet!" I hear myself saying in a parallel dimension in which I took my stuff to Tibet in a wheelie bag) .
Wandering around outdoor shops has been very interesting... albeit a wallet-bleedingly expensive affair. I'm utterly resolved to travel as light as possible and have made sure I only bought a backpack big enough for what I really need. And yet going around these shops always entices you to buy things you hadn't thought of... like a large, filtered straw which allows you to drink water out of a pond or lake, should you find yourself stranded. It even comes with a purifying powder you can add to the water in a cup (assuming you have a cup) should it be particularly dirty. I felt it would be a useful, compact and light thing to have if things somehow go awry. The straw's packaging does remind you however, that the filter cannot purify water which fish are unable to live in or which contains industrial waste. Duh.
But being a Japanese product of course, this life-or-death situation has to be made cute. See the little angel, sucking the pond water out of a glass.
The picture tells you that even though you're so dehydrated and desperate as to suck water out of a high-altitude pond, you'll still look like an angel doing it. Awww. Or else that you're so far gone you'll be hallucinating that winged angels have come to save you when in fact it's the vultures that are gathering to finish you off.
Meanwhile, not so cute are the highly aggressive, rabid dogs that all five of my guidebooks (yes, five, no less) tell me I will encounter. At first I thought I could just carry rocks and throw them hard whenever an unfriendly dog gets too close, but upon buying guidebook number five yesterday (but it surpasses the other four in so many ways!) I read that even rocks don't deter them.
So this week I've been thinking at length about how to deter mad dogs. Fireworks? A chain I could tie around my waist and then pull out and swing at them if attacked? A bag of hot spices to throw in their faces? Coincidentally, a couple of regions of China have been doing mass culls of their dog populations because of some children getting rabies from dog bites. Basically that means the authorities have been clubbing them all to death unless their owners find a better way first. I love animals, but was a bit disappointed to hear Tibet wasn't culling its dogs. But I guess getting the Buddhist heartland to start killing things is going to be a bit hard.
So, the ideal solution would be an electronic dog repeller, which you can buy on the internet, although it's too late for that now. I've been trying to ask around at pet stores but the staff all look at me incredulously when I say I want to repel dogs, as if to say "Why would you want to repel dogs, dogs are kawaiiiiiii" and then I explain that I'm not talking namby-pamby Japanese rat-dogs that get carried around in Louis Vuitton cases, but hard core Chinese motherfuckers. Then they understand. However, the best they can offer is some weak spray that humans find okay but which dogs find repellent... but it's more the kind of thing designed to spray on a sofa so the family mutt doesn't sit on it.
I have managed to find a dog-whistle designed for "training" your dog, but I'm not sure if that means the sound it produces is unpleasant to the dog or just attracts it. As you can imagine, that detail matters quite a lot. While looking at torches, which I need so as to see the interior decor of unlit monasteries, I was considering buying a full-size metal Maglite, weighing it in my hands, knowing it could have dual use as a club.
But, don't get me wrong, I really do like animals. I saw a picture of a yak for the first time today and I'm sincerely looking forward to meeting one and exchanging pleasantries.
Wandering around outdoor shops has been very interesting... albeit a wallet-bleedingly expensive affair. I'm utterly resolved to travel as light as possible and have made sure I only bought a backpack big enough for what I really need. And yet going around these shops always entices you to buy things you hadn't thought of... like a large, filtered straw which allows you to drink water out of a pond or lake, should you find yourself stranded. It even comes with a purifying powder you can add to the water in a cup (assuming you have a cup) should it be particularly dirty. I felt it would be a useful, compact and light thing to have if things somehow go awry. The straw's packaging does remind you however, that the filter cannot purify water which fish are unable to live in or which contains industrial waste. Duh.
But being a Japanese product of course, this life-or-death situation has to be made cute. See the little angel, sucking the pond water out of a glass.
The picture tells you that even though you're so dehydrated and desperate as to suck water out of a high-altitude pond, you'll still look like an angel doing it. Awww. Or else that you're so far gone you'll be hallucinating that winged angels have come to save you when in fact it's the vultures that are gathering to finish you off.
Meanwhile, not so cute are the highly aggressive, rabid dogs that all five of my guidebooks (yes, five, no less) tell me I will encounter. At first I thought I could just carry rocks and throw them hard whenever an unfriendly dog gets too close, but upon buying guidebook number five yesterday (but it surpasses the other four in so many ways!) I read that even rocks don't deter them.
So this week I've been thinking at length about how to deter mad dogs. Fireworks? A chain I could tie around my waist and then pull out and swing at them if attacked? A bag of hot spices to throw in their faces? Coincidentally, a couple of regions of China have been doing mass culls of their dog populations because of some children getting rabies from dog bites. Basically that means the authorities have been clubbing them all to death unless their owners find a better way first. I love animals, but was a bit disappointed to hear Tibet wasn't culling its dogs. But I guess getting the Buddhist heartland to start killing things is going to be a bit hard.
So, the ideal solution would be an electronic dog repeller, which you can buy on the internet, although it's too late for that now. I've been trying to ask around at pet stores but the staff all look at me incredulously when I say I want to repel dogs, as if to say "Why would you want to repel dogs, dogs are kawaiiiiiii" and then I explain that I'm not talking namby-pamby Japanese rat-dogs that get carried around in Louis Vuitton cases, but hard core Chinese motherfuckers. Then they understand. However, the best they can offer is some weak spray that humans find okay but which dogs find repellent... but it's more the kind of thing designed to spray on a sofa so the family mutt doesn't sit on it.
I have managed to find a dog-whistle designed for "training" your dog, but I'm not sure if that means the sound it produces is unpleasant to the dog or just attracts it. As you can imagine, that detail matters quite a lot. While looking at torches, which I need so as to see the interior decor of unlit monasteries, I was considering buying a full-size metal Maglite, weighing it in my hands, knowing it could have dual use as a club.
But, don't get me wrong, I really do like animals. I saw a picture of a yak for the first time today and I'm sincerely looking forward to meeting one and exchanging pleasantries.
Sunday, August 06, 2006
I couldn't give a flying shit.
Finally getting around to posting yesterday's photos that illustrate Japan's culture of mollycoddling its citizens was in fact just to pave the way for this... the holy grail of the Japanese Nanny State.
What follows is a picture of a poster up in the toilet at the office... that tells you how to take a shit. Really.
The Japanese reads, in creepily familiar, friendly language, "Line up your body with the water properly, okay?"
And the diagrams show... well... the diagram on the left shows a little shitman doing a backflip dive into the bowl, getting it wrong and splurging his little shithead on the pan. And the diagram on the right shows the same little shitman attempting the same backflip dive and scoring full points for accuracy as he then goes potholing up the u-bend.
---
UPDATE
Aargh, I knew it was too good to be true. Apparently the poster was made by one of my non-Japanese colleagues, who wasn't impressed with the frequent occurences of collateral splatter left on the toilet. Still, it makes me feel like making my own signs and posting them up around Tokyo.
What follows is a picture of a poster up in the toilet at the office... that tells you how to take a shit. Really.
The Japanese reads, in creepily familiar, friendly language, "Line up your body with the water properly, okay?"
And the diagrams show... well... the diagram on the left shows a little shitman doing a backflip dive into the bowl, getting it wrong and splurging his little shithead on the pan. And the diagram on the right shows the same little shitman attempting the same backflip dive and scoring full points for accuracy as he then goes potholing up the u-bend.
---
UPDATE
Aargh, I knew it was too good to be true. Apparently the poster was made by one of my non-Japanese colleagues, who wasn't impressed with the frequent occurences of collateral splatter left on the toilet. Still, it makes me feel like making my own signs and posting them up around Tokyo.
Saturday, August 05, 2006
Mind the Air
This is a post I've been wanting to put up for several months, but have been waiting until I collected the the minimum number of photos to illustrate my case...
It's no news to any foreigner who's been living in Japan for any period of time, no matter how short, that the Japanese love to warn you about stuff. This has been written about plenty by all sorts of bloggers living in Japan, and my blog isn't specifically meant to be about Japan's quirky differences (my blog isn't actually about anything, really, just whatever comes into my head)... but I had to do a little photo essay on this topic for those of you back home who don't get to enjoy this everyday.
So, there are notices stuck on everything, particularly anything that can be perceived as a physical obstruction to your walking down the street. This means there are a hell of a lot of cones everywhere. And in addition, almost invariably a man with a white helmet and a stumpy light sabre to wave you in the right direction as you walk past the cone. Yes, even if the cone is at the side of an otherwise unobstructed pavement.
I don't have many photos of the storm troopers at work, but here are a couple:
"This way please, people. In spite of the cones, we can't trust you not to throw yourself blindly into the man on the ladder."
(Through loudhailer) "People, be aware that there is a fat white cable on the ground. Yes, a fat white cable surrounded by flashing cones, and which two seconds prior to the taking of this photo was entirely covered with yellow and black metal protective ramps for your safety. And yet in spite of all of this we simply cannot trust you not to throw yourself on the floor."
And then there is the issue of cones set out for the protection of... well, what?
Steps?
Flowers?
Air?
Question: "If the wind knocks over some cones in Japan, and nobody is around to see or hear it, does anyone care?"
Answer: "Duuh, of course! The people approaching the cones still walked around the outside of them and shortly thereafter a stormtrooper appeared to put them upright again."
And how do they hande this in England, you might ask? Well, as far back as in March, with this post in mind, I took some photos to show just how England deals with public safety.
"Aahh, faack it, that'll do."
"Aahh, faack it, pile 'em on. That'll do."
Interestingly, this is a sort of public artwork/fountain built into the pavement in the new "More London Place" near City Hall (yes, stupid name I know, but that's what the street is actually called)... and while it is essentially a cattle trap built to break the ankle of anyone who isn't looking where they're going, it goes mostly unguarded. I say mostly...
Because this exceptionally dangerous point is covered.
It's no news to any foreigner who's been living in Japan for any period of time, no matter how short, that the Japanese love to warn you about stuff. This has been written about plenty by all sorts of bloggers living in Japan, and my blog isn't specifically meant to be about Japan's quirky differences (my blog isn't actually about anything, really, just whatever comes into my head)... but I had to do a little photo essay on this topic for those of you back home who don't get to enjoy this everyday.
So, there are notices stuck on everything, particularly anything that can be perceived as a physical obstruction to your walking down the street. This means there are a hell of a lot of cones everywhere. And in addition, almost invariably a man with a white helmet and a stumpy light sabre to wave you in the right direction as you walk past the cone. Yes, even if the cone is at the side of an otherwise unobstructed pavement.
I don't have many photos of the storm troopers at work, but here are a couple:
"This way please, people. In spite of the cones, we can't trust you not to throw yourself blindly into the man on the ladder."
(Through loudhailer) "People, be aware that there is a fat white cable on the ground. Yes, a fat white cable surrounded by flashing cones, and which two seconds prior to the taking of this photo was entirely covered with yellow and black metal protective ramps for your safety. And yet in spite of all of this we simply cannot trust you not to throw yourself on the floor."
And then there is the issue of cones set out for the protection of... well, what?
Steps?
Flowers?
Air?
Question: "If the wind knocks over some cones in Japan, and nobody is around to see or hear it, does anyone care?"
Answer: "Duuh, of course! The people approaching the cones still walked around the outside of them and shortly thereafter a stormtrooper appeared to put them upright again."
And how do they hande this in England, you might ask? Well, as far back as in March, with this post in mind, I took some photos to show just how England deals with public safety.
"Aahh, faack it, that'll do."
"Aahh, faack it, pile 'em on. That'll do."
Interestingly, this is a sort of public artwork/fountain built into the pavement in the new "More London Place" near City Hall (yes, stupid name I know, but that's what the street is actually called)... and while it is essentially a cattle trap built to break the ankle of anyone who isn't looking where they're going, it goes mostly unguarded. I say mostly...
Because this exceptionally dangerous point is covered.
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