clams and memories / 浅蜊と思い出

今晩は待望の浅蜊の酒蒸しだぜぇ〜っ！！

と言うか、注文した胡麻油が先週届いたので、試したかったレシピを今晩作ってみました。と、なんと······ヤバいくらい美味い！！さすがの私も、浅蜊の酒蒸しを失敗する事はなかったな〜。

I'd been wanting to make sake-steamed clams for a long time. I like the click-click sound as the clams open up, sitting there waiting for them all to cook, urging the last one to hurry up and open—I don't want to overcook the others...

今夜は久しぶりに思い出話です。お稽古からの帰り道、急に父が私が子供の頃、トトロの CD を買ってくれたのを思い出しました。それは何を隠そう1992年の出来事で、私はまだガキでしてね。でもその CD は私にとって初めての CD で、しかも父は滅多に私や姉にプレゼントを買う様な人ではなかったんですよ。（今もそうですけど。）でも、ある日父は、「こんなモン買ってきたぞ」と照れ臭そうに言って、お店のプラスチックの袋に入ったままの CD を私にくれました。

嬉しかったな、やっぱり。それはトトロの音楽のピアノ · ソロのアルバムで、おそらくピアノの楽譜の本を一緒に売ってたんだと思う。でもそんな事は私も父も知らなくて、そんな事関係なくて、私は毎日その CD を聴きました。で、「さんぽ（右手練習用）」とか「となりのトトロ（左手練習用）」とかあって。で楽譜を持ってない私は、「なんでこれ右手練習用なんだろう？だって、これのまねをしたら左手の練習じゃん？」とか思ってたんですよ。（うるさいな······ガキだったんだってば。）でもそれのおかげで音を拾う事だけは上手くなったな······

Oh, my silly dad. I got your face and height and hands, and I got your shy personality and hatred of large parties. I get bored of things as fast as you do, and I probably will never be as half a good a teacher as you are. But I'm going to work hard so that I can make you proud, pay you back for making "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" the first song I ever learned to play on the piano.

よし、十一月ももう終わりに近い。せっせと仕事しなければ！でも、さすがに浅蜊蒸すのに使った酒を全部飲んだら、フラフラしてきちゃった。ヤバいな、今日こそは論文終わらせるつもりだったのに······でもいいや、生姜と鷹の爪がたっぷり入ってるから、きっと風邪の予防にでもなるだろう······

日本での発見 / Discoveries in Japan #11: 新宿 / Shinjuku

Shinjuku isn't actually a discovery, but this poster I saw in the station today was. I'm not sure when I started thinking of Yoko Ono as "the woman who broke up The Beatles," but I've never been able to shake that association. I like "Oh Yoko!" with reservations...

But reading the story by Gluten-Free Girl about how she met the love of her life just about broke my heart and then reconstructed it again...so in celebration of people in love, I give a thumbs up to the poster.

（最初に読んだ記事じゃないけど、このちょっと重すぎるかもしれない情熱もそんな悪くないと思う······）

日本の謎 / Mysteries in Japan #4: 銀座 / Ginza

Walking around Ginza always gives me the feeling that I don't belong there. It's a place full of lights and glitz and price tags that make my eyeballs pop out of my head. But I admit, sometimes a wave of awe washes over me when I see something really pretty (or shiny), and I wish I had a rich husband who bought me really expensive presents.

I spent the afternoon of Labor Day Friday eating chocolate parfaits and window-shopping at places like Wakō with an equally cynical friend—cynical as in, "How in the world do people decide to buy all this amazingly useless stuff?!"

I'm sure I can find ways a $1,300 scarf can be useful. (I could get invited to a really elegant dinner party!) But then I think...no, I'll stick with the scarf my mum bought me at a discount (my employee discount) at my favorite store in hipster Mission District, thanks. And I'll take the chocolate parfait over the husband who buys me gifts, any day.

日本での発見 / Discoveries in Japan #10: 京都 / Kyoto

今日は面白くていい人達に会い過ぎて、頭も胸もはち切れそうです。

Sitting there talking to people working on their thesis reminded me of just how much fun it can be to find something you care about and to set goals to work toward what you want to achieve. It's always nice to get that reminder. (Great food and great conversation helps, too.)

新幹線から富士山は見えなかったけど、代わりに飽きれる程雲の写真を取りました。ホント、どうして私ってこんなに雲とか空が好きなんだろ？前世は鳥だったんかいな、って思う程。でも、キレイな物は皆好きだよね···？

Customer Is Not Royalty

PowerPoint? Check. Handouts? Check. Notes? Check. All I need now is to figure out how to get myself to Kyoto on time.

I realized I needed more change when I was making copies at 7-Eleven, but I couldn't bring myself to ask for it at the register. It used to irk me when people came to our store and asked for change. I said, "Buy yourself a two-dollar votive, and I'll give you change."

It isn't that I don't think customer is king/queen...I try to interact with them in a way that would make them want to stay in our store, look at what we have, buy things, come back again, tell their friends about us...but that wasn't because I thought they were royalty. I just wanted them to like our store.

Ah, if only I can go back to working retail. But hey, in order to get change, I bought myself some karaage at 7-Eleven...it was wonderfully half-cooked and super juicy. If I get salmonella and don't make it to Kyoto, I'm going to blame the fact that I didn't want to irk the cashiers.

time passes...quietly

Today was one of those incredible days that made me grateful for all the things I have and all the things I want in my life. (I've been grateful an awful lot lately...I think I'm trying to make up for the fact that in Japan we skip Thanksgiving and go straight from Halloween to Christmas. Go figure.)

冷たい朝の空気はそっと肌に染み込んで、思わず「サングラスがあったら！」って思う程の太陽の光。何となく都会の香りがして、切なくとも幸せな気持ち。どこに目をやっても全てが不思議なくらい輝いてて、まるで間近に迫る冬の前の、秋の最後の日々！って感じでミンナが頑張ってた。

A few months ago I would've wanted to throw up just thinking about the amount of work I have to get done in the next month, but somehow lately I've been feeling very...zen. Like, calmer than a waterless Lagunita on a windless day. It's the feeling of having things I want to wait for, to fight for, to work really hard for...and I just love it. I'm like a fucking saint.

と言う訳で、（珍しく）上手い手料理をワインで味わいながら今週届く胡麻油の事を考えてると、何か人生満ち足りてるな〜って思いますね。ケーキに失敗した時にできたフライパンの焦げも落ちたし、ラベンダーのキャンドルは買ったし、論文は後何回か書き直せば（このバージョンは）終わるし······

There's a place on campus that has "old-fashioned" clocks that mark the time, like this super long one here along with a huge sundial on the floor. They aren't as accurate as the digital clocks we have now, but they remind us of the ways we used to keep time according to the important things that took place in our lives, each day, each month, each year. And I realize that time passes so slowly and yet so fast, sometimes quietly but sometimes with a deafening rush that makes us fear we're letting something important slip between our fingers. I'm looking forward to encountering all the things and people that'll make me want to not let them slip by without a fight.

Food. Here. Now.

I need to stop looking for food that I like from the States here in Japan. I need to stop complaining about the lack of cheese options and gluten-free cupcakes and beef noodles. I need to embrace all that is offered here and just...go with it.

I mean, take this amazing little number, for example. It's a flan on top of a flan! How much more meta can we get? An omelet inside an omelet? A burger inside a burger? A sandwich inside a sandwich?

Except what's brilliant about this is that...well, a sandwich is supposed to have something inside of it. So good for you if you were smart enough to stick a sandwich inside another sandwich. Or a burrito inside a burrito. Or a tamal inside a tamal.

But a flan as topping for a flan? That's just...mind-blowing. I mean, who thinks up stuff like this? What's next, ice cream as topping for ice cream? An okonomiyaki as topping for okonomiyaki?!

See, there are so many brilliant things like this in Japan—along with stuff like the more traditional kashi that I am just beginning to know—that I need to stop sulking about the lack of good wine in this country.

But you know, it does make me sad when things are marketed as being...whatever...and then they're jut not that good, as that thing as which they are marketed or as anything else. I'm not much concerned about authenticity, but man, eating really bad Pad Thai makes me more angry than if someone were to drive over my foot.