[-empyre-] Hello from Hateruma Island (Japan); eighth excerpt

[{ brad brace }]

very spicy pot this morning: chilis, rice, miso, leafy
greens, dashi, dried-shrimp, seaweed, sesame seeds,
rice-wine, soya sauce; scattered showers... (e-go hon:
english books?)... PMT... did an abbreviated loop around the
SMP as it was very humid: returned to deliver the rent, then
noticed that she had written 3/23 as a date when I'm not
leaving the island until much later.. gobbled-down a big
bowl of okinawan noodles with sardines and went back and I
think she said 3/23 was today's date, which it's not, unless
there's a different calendar or creative accounting in play;
at any rate she seemed to understand that I'm leaving for
Ishigaki on the 28th... offshore/online... down to
post-office to mail 2 cards and Nishi where you can see the
weather's surely about to change: bought 1.5 litre bottle of
curious, but refreshing Calpis water: (Y310: lactic white,
and vaguely citrus (www.calpis.com.jp): seems to be an
alcoholic version as well and aids digestion(?); toasted
fried egg(s) sandwich...  editing [81251]... very windy last
night and still a little this morning: chair blown over
outside but the pinhole is still in place... seems as if
ethanol is also made from the sugarcane; more (worrisome for
the island,) news of trade imbalance between US and Japan...
Japan is an archipelago of 6,852 islands. The four largest
islands are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, together
accounting for ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area.
Japan has the world's tenth-largest population, with over
127 million people. The Greater Tokyo Area, is the largest
metropolitan area in the world, with over 30 million
residents... A major economic power, Japan has the world's
third-largest economy by nominal GDP and by purchasing power
parity. It is also the world's fourth largest exporter and
fifth largest importer. Although Japan has officially
renounced its right to declare war, it maintains an
extensive modern military force in self-defense and
peacekeeping roles. Japan has the second lowest homicide
(including attempted homicide) rate in the world. According
to UN and WHO estimates, it has the highest life expectancy
of any country and the third lowest infant mortality rate...
Japan suffers from a high suicide rate. In 2009, the number
of suicides exceeded 30,000 for the twelfth straight year.
Suicide is the leading cause of death for people under 30...
editing [81252: mostly sanshin from neighbour], [81253]...
PMT... email from Ika: << Hello brace! Nice to hear from you
and thank you a lot for the pictures! Aren't we all cute? I
went into deadline psychosis as soon as I got home, and only
surfaced this morning, as most of the two first volumes were
posted at 09:37 this morning. Still one lap or leg to go,
but at least I have time to come up for breath. My two
months on the island already seem, as you say, like dream,
and certainly a good one. And there you are, still, and with
one month to go. I hope the island is treating you well and
keeping you supplied with vegetables. Fishing on the
breakwater sounds great. Hope you caught some edible fish.
Here [Norway] we still have lots of snow, it has been minus
10 until a couple of days ago, now it has started to creep
up towards zero. But the great tits have started their
springtime singing, the late winter harbinger of hope. All
the best to you, and say hello to the family from me. Best,
Ika >> ... down to the beach and port and grocery store on
the way back: much cooler now, I imagine this is more
typical seasonal weather: another, the last in the store,
loaf of 'special bread' (Y294), different kind of sardines
(Y140) to go with another package of okinawan noodles
(Y140), 8 unrefrigerated white eggs (Y208), plastic bag
(Y3)... saw several clusters of youngsters with what looked
like windspeed vanes mounted on tripods, other gadgetry and
clipboards on their way towards the shore... here's a
posting I just put on the Kindle discussion forums: << I've
been 'publishing' a continuous sequence of greyscale
photo-art images (the 12hr-isbn-jpeg project,) online for
over 17 years! and would like to start to have them (perhaps
freely at first,) delivered to Kindle readers. A new image
is released every 12 hours. How would I best do this?
(http://bbrace.net/12hr.html) /:b >> I'm intrigued by the
social-reading aspect of the Kindle where you can view
others' clippings... reading Zola on the PC: << It measured
about sixteen feet by ten, and was entirely painted over,
though little of the work had gone beyond the roughing-out.
This roughing-out, hastily dashed off, was superb in its
violence and ardent vitality of colour. A flood of sunlight
streamed into a forest clearing, with thick walls of
verdure; to the left, stretched a dark glade with a small
luminous speck in the far distance. On the grass, amidst all
the summer vegetation, lay a nude woman with one arm
supporting her head, and though her eyes were closed she
smiled amidst the golden shower that fell around her. In the
background, two other women, one fair, and the other dark,
wrestled playfully, setting light flesh tints amidst all the
green leaves. And, as the painter had wanted something dark
by way of contrast in the foreground, he had contented
himself with seating there a gentleman, dressed in a black
velveteen jacket. This gentleman had his back turned and the
only part of his flesh that one saw was his left hand, with
which he was supporting himself on the grass. >> ... the
morning pot takes the better part of an hour to prepare:
rice, dashi, seaweed, dried minnows (put these in first this
time), and shrimp, chilis, a little potato, daikon, carrot;
sesame seeds, miso, a lot of leafy greens, rice wine, soya
sauce, and another hour to eat it... _for every star driven
enterprise there are corollary benefits for those who
support it and keep their mouths shut... PMT... two-fried
eggs, with fish flakes on toast... old newspapers (fu-ru-i
shim-bun); collecting stylized vertical headlines for
possible ebook... fellow from the tour bus told me that Nami
guesthouse (the father and son go out fishing,) has free
sashimi and tofu for their guests!... trying to cutback on
expenses but perhaps I'll swing by there at sashimi time
today... (I need to edit my rss.txt files and make a new one
for GIP = sell to Amazon)... another short loop around the
island: breezy, barely visible Iriomote island contour:
Vitamin C.C. Lemon (Y350: 210 lemons worth of vitamin C in
every bottle: suntory.jp/cclemon)... started down to see the
sunset but turned back once beyond the shelter of the town
as it was a little cool/breezy so instead, having resisted
the bottle of fattening peanuts and beer, for about the same
price bought sashimi (Y300; no ma-gu-ro today [tuna]) and
tofu (Y160; with some fish flakes and leek it's actually
quite good: very creamy and still warm)...  shower this
morning: a lot of hair in the drain: no stars visible for
the pinhole: sink-laundry underway... *cool* I'm on the
Puddle-town Art Museum's blacklist! <<curatorial at pam.org>
(reason: 551 Sender is on domain's blacklist (Mode:
normal))>> a greater honour can hardly be imagined! but it's
long past time to shut these bogus, corrupt institutions
down! ...  want to try some kite-aerial digital-films but
need to find a location where I can retrieve the kite/camera
if it takes a dive: going to have a look at Pemichi? beach
this morning but if the wind's blowing inland strongly the
kite will land in dense, impenetrable jungle-like vegetation
that lines the perimeter of the beach: the port's another
possibility nothing but water (waterproof housing on the
miniature camera) and asphalt/cement (power lines are
underground there))... PMT (on Teppan, the discouraged
runner/athlete seems to be leaving the house
despite/becaus-of his feelings for the girl is her name
'Ana?' -- forgot about the pinhole until I looked outside to
check the weather supposed to be isolated showers today only
64F, so it's had about an hour and half more exposure than
any other frame)... a bowl of instant coffee with Hateruma
black-sugar lump while I wait for a slightly warmer
morning...  for fiscal year 2012, the actual U.S. military
budget is something like $1.2 trillion dollars. Trillion
with a T. Just to put that in perspective, a million seconds
is 12 days. A trillion seconds is 31,688 years.... I have
more trouble with batteries! none of the 6 disposable AAAs
seem to have enough juice to keep the camera-on for more
than a couple of seconds, so I'm charging the rechargeable
batteries this is the little camera (along with an
undercover-cop in the pool,) that caused 8 black-clad
Puddle-town armed-goons/cops to suddenly surround, harass
and subsequently defame me and wrongfully-cease the camera
at a public swimming pool, where I was testing it last year
along with new snorkelling gear -- with permission...
anyway, today I'll just bring the kite along...  oh, wait, I
just found a good pair of AAAs in my shaving kit!... off I
go!... but first put the laundry out to dry [dark blue mesh
tanktop, black shorts, black T, zebra-mesh swimsuit] -> ok,
still too cold out there and it'll be worse on the beach, so
another bowl of coffee...  more interminable TV footage of
smug Japanese gov't ministers (often seen nodding-off) in
parliament... well, Pemichi beach had only the occasional
gust of wind so I thought I'd try the observation tower (!)
which was quite windy (the adjacent reservoir had a good
chop, and the railings were rattling again maybe it _would
make a good recording if I can find a sheltered spot), but
perhaps too gusty, as the little pocket parafoil kite I had
it on a very short line -- would eventually get knocked-over
[think I bought it in Long Beach WA:
bbrace.net/long_beach.html] -... so, around and down past a
cattle-yard (the radio, which gets much better reception
than mine, seems to be left-on for the grazing faculty), and
down to the port's breakwater which was even windier there
was a broadcast announcement earlier which I guessed was
about the ferries not running, but they were! -- almost lost
my 12hr cap, and then almost everything else in quick
succession as the wind had its way; much too windy for the
kite headed home, buying two bigger tins of mackerel (Y150
each; to go with the okinawan noodles: more bang for the
yen:  www.food.maruha-nichiro.co.jp) and a tiny tin of
wasabi powder (Y180: hoping its real wasabi and that it
dissolves in soya sauce for sashimi days:
www.housefoods.co.jp)...  Russian VoA SW radio slaboda
15250... isj at lists.upei.ca. ...  sanshin festival on TV...
some sun forecast for today and only a 10-15 mph wind (30-35
on Monday,) so perhaps the recording of the reservoir
railings should wait: remembered that I brought along a
contact mic, which I've yet to use, that might be ideal...
in the pot: rice, seaweed, rice-wine, chilis, soya sauce,
dried-shrimp, miso, dashi, remaining millet, potato, carrot
from another pot; sesame seeds, huge stack of chopped
lettuce...  PMT... short loop walk South then back for some
sun... tempted by a bottle of Suntory whiskey that comes
with a free little can of club soda (Y1405); but I need to
economize... it's quite rare to have such convenient (wifi)
means to spontaneously relate the island experience and it's
a shame that the Island Studies list and others reject my
postings not so surprising I suppose as most mailing-lists
have by-now devolved into an institutional/collegial
pronouncement/validation mechanism no real interest in
communicating or exchanging/developing ideas... not to be
melodramatic but I'm _so tired of being routinely excluded,
cheated and persecuted (no other word)... so lately and
especially this island-journal has been about a mutual
indifference (and perhaps not unlike the mainland/mainstream
malaise that islands must face)... no status-quo sashimi
today, so two-fried eggs on toast instead... my mp3 player's
messed-up (will only play one song then locks-up: actually I
think I caused it when I restarted the unit thinking it was
hung-up searching the external SD; if COWON D2+ is
recognized as a removable disk, please paste D2N_P.bin, D2N
_P_RS.bin, and D2N_P_FT.bin files to the root folder (top
folder in COWON D2+) in COWON D2+.: an excellent player,
that sadly has been discontinued), and unfortunately I
didn't bring the upload cable to reinstall the software... a
walk to Nishi... we were cheated-out of a good sunset by a
low-lying bank of institutional cloud-cover... oh, did I
mention that I had the mackerel with noodles today too?...
an orange-grower with samples of course, on the TV this
morning: should be some more sun: green tea... skype call
with D... pinhole in;  no Teppan today :( ... squatting old
lady with typical sunvisor-bonnet, armed as they all seem to
be, with the rusty sugarcane sickle, intent on trimming the
foliage outside my unit: walked out to the SMP, past the
airport, turbines, (Iriomote was shades of misty blue with
brighter short yellow blazes of beach; and I could see
another smaller island to the East: Hatoma?), around and up
the hill home stopping at the main grocery store: pokka cold
tea (Y310: might be jasmine, 2l: okinawa.pokka.co.jp); a
different kind of seaweed (Y160; didn't think I could use an
entire big bag of the sort I just finished before I leave);
Pinky peach & mint sugarless tablets (Y120; very nice); two
tiny free, leftover sandwiches (!)... while most of the
other are, I don't think my cottage is prefab seems more
like cinderblock and plaster, although the interior seems
prefabricated somehow...  big marathon in Japan on the TV...
not sunny enough to sit in the sun but pleasant enough for a
short walk through town where there was a funeral (everyone
in black(?)); several young boys with a red kite... gosh,
I'm going to need to buy more rice! either that or switch to
noodles... started down to Nishi for the sunset but it's
rapidly clouding over with a little rain in the air...
very still outside this morning despite the 35mph wind
forecast:  the usual big rice 'n' vegetable pot...  6 a.m.
the driving-rain and wind have arrived!... the island's
roads, a few paved, most not, are sort of concentric loops,
being 'tighter' towards the centre of town and looser more
irregular toward shore: if you venture too far toward the
shore, down the wrong road, you'll need to backtrack, as I
had to today, in order to approach the reservoir with the
rattling railings -- behind the observation tower -- through
the back fence that has a scalable opening: anyway, once
there, using the contact mic like a stethoscope, I initially
despaired of finding a decent sound and I was thinking the
contact mic, which is advertised as a hear through walls
device, might also pick-up some of the sound of the water
being blown around in the reservoir but I probably ended-up
with 90 monaural minutes of something pretty interesting:
the very long, hollow aluminum railings would rattle, drum,
hum, warble and produce choral overtones as the wind gusted
over the water (~ a polite/restrained refrain of Japanese
noise-art)... finally (my fingertips were numb), headed home
even though I had first intended to fill the 160 minute
disc: stopped at the main grocery store to buy the 5kg bag
of cheap rice (Y1860?), but as I'd feared, they were all
gone, as usual; so I bought a different variety in a 3 kg
bag (Y1240) which actually should work out pretty well for
the 10 remaining meals (eating every other day): at first I
had selected an expensive variety (Y1750 for 3 kg), despite
being in a plain paper bag: not sure I'd taste the
difference but maybe ten kinds to choose from... home for
okinawan noodles with tinned mackerel and coffee... this
being Monday, I'm hoping for some free vegetables soon...
still very windy so don't think it's worth checking on the
sashimi as there won't be many boats out in this...
editing another wordpress news collage that features nations
I've visited or planning to visit for my Global Islands
Project [bradbrace.net/id.html]: probably the biggest one
yet mainly as I delayed assembling the 'cuttings' and denied
access to search engines because I recently read stories
about evil lawyers deliberately buying 'copyrights' of
news-items so they could sue bloggers... it's still
interesting to forge new readings of widely concurrent
events [bradbrace.net/wordpress & bbrace.net/wordpress]...
Mae-san has put new signs, with pictures(!), above the five
recycling bins...  young fellow next door from Tokyo: he
thinks it's very cold here ;) the wind is still blowing:
went for a short walk and made a couple of film clips of the
rippling sugarcane fields it must be terrifying seeing a
typhoon approach ... a bedtime snack of tofu with fish
flakes... I need to find an affordable, non-caffeinated,
no-sugar beverage... I shudder to think what a litre of
orange juice costs... more TV pavement chalk markings and
the weather snowmen are frowning, so perhaps warmer weather
on the mainland today...  PMT, but forgot to change the
gain-setting back from yesterday... still quite chilly
outside so another bowl of instant coffee while I continue
to edit the big WP news-collage... derailed TV train... and
ukuleles seem popular: Hawaiian connection -- there was one
being played as the sun went down on Nishi the other
night... did the "paved loop" walk as I've nearly worn
through the new running shoes I brought; picked-up more old
Yaeyama Mainichi newspapers for the vertical headline
collection... more groceries: another C.C. lemon drink
(Y350), pale yellow miso (Y260), more chilis (Y130; whole,
dried), more roasted black sesame seeds (Y120), plastic-bag
(Y3)... sunny now but still cool out: looking for go-game
diagrams for my GIP book and learning the basics of the
game.. quite a few visitors on the island today -- I assume
it's the Okinawans who travel with their sanshins... . and
then there's the Sanba (?) which I've only seen on TV so
far: a percussion musical instrument from the Ryukyu
Islands. The name itself means "three slabs" or "three
boards/planks," and it consists of three shards ebony or
other woods that are bound together by twine. It produces a
variety of clicking sounds similar to that of castanets. It
is played by placing the shards between the fingers of one
hand, while using the other hand to flick the pieces of wood
together. It can be played in slow or fast rhythms,
depending on the musical genre. It is often heard in folk
music native to the Ryukyu Islands... I read two
walking-tour books by Alan Booth before I traveled here: The
Roads to Sata, and Looking for the Lost: Journeys Through a
Vanishing Japan, which I recommend, although they refer to a
quite different mainland Japan... PMT... giant celery stalks
featured on TV talk-show...  two fried eggs on toast then a
near-circular paved-walk all around the island -- something
very satisfying about circumambulating an island; will try
and work this into my daily routine although it's about a
three-hour walk...  well I've had lots of time to finally
reestablish the link between twitter and the blogs... and I
see that corrupt-crony-curator Martha Hanna has again
blocked the email address to which the 12hr-jpegs are sent,
so had to unsubscribe her: imagine how a Canadian
photography museum would fail to be even remotely interested
in a 40+ year-old Canadian photo-art career?... which
reminds me that I've seen two weasels (tiny, reddish fur)
lately, hopping along the road and by my unit... I thought
Mae-san (who was pushing a cart loaded with a flat of beer
and luggage of two new young couples in unit 'B',) asked me
if I'd like more vegetables (ya-sai), which I thought was
odd as he just left me some on Monday, but seeing as how
there are no more here, perhaps he was asking if I got the
ones he left, or wanted to be thanked again... I was so sure
there'd be sashimi today as it was calm and I spotted
several boats when out on my walk, but my presence at Nami
seemed only to please the little dog: I had been listening
to GIP mp3s on my older player and started to think this
island was rather staid in comparison especially to Lamu
(Island 3.0) where there was a public speakers' square and
everything seemed so lively, happening all at once. On
islands I tend to seek out "sonic centers": where several
sound sources merge, but it's usually very quiet and there's
really, with the exception of The Day of the Dead
festivities, no social gathering centers here (despite the
several community buildings, which D&D says are the outcome
of a corrupt national construction mega-industry), and the
two cafes/bars that were operated by younger people are
closed -- but perhaps they only attracted tourists
anyway.... the grimacing sisha (made a few drawings in the
moleskin), on the roofs suggest another aspect I've yet to
see (unless the shisha ensure the sedateness;), but I dunno,
outside of the sugar harvest and the rare golf/croquet
match, it sometimes seems to be mostly just a lot of tombs
-- ancient presence/power -- and elderly ladies plopped down
in their gardens... (the sanshin that is often heard,
usually seems like more of an individual's lament), so I
brought the discrete recording rig I used in Africa along to
the sashimi shop hoping to eat there and maybe capture some
local exchanges (some of the guesthouses sound lively on
occasion) -- but when that didn't pan-out, I thought I'd
found, coming back from Nishi, a good location in the
concrete cattle, goat, duck enclosure that had a
radio-playing.. I should have realized why all the animals
were so excited to see me: it was feeding time, and the
owner arrived shortly and he was _not happy to see me
there... so perhaps I'll try another day/time...
finished-off the remaining tofu with fish-flakes as a snack
when what I really wanted was another bottle of those tasty
peanuts and a Southern Star... very fat female Japanese
wrestlers on TV weight-loss program... J emailed me a
question about sake and I replied: < I've read that the more
the rice is 'polished' (refined to remove impurities: shown
as a percentage of original size), the better the
flavour/product. The best, at 50% is apparently termed
"dai-ginjo." I don't know the brand names. >... pinhole out:
waxing crescent moon... earthquakes/tsunami-warnings in
eastern Japan (Honshu)  and PNG (New Britain)... Bingata
(Okinawan: , literally "red style") is an Okinawan
traditional resist dyed cloth, made using stencils and other
methods. It is generally bright-colored and features various
patterns, usually depicting natural subjects such as fish,
water, and flowers... Kumi odori (?), meaning "combination
dance" or "ensemble dance" in both the Okinawan and Japanese
languages, is a form of narrative traditional Ryukyuan
dance; perhaps like the opening Teppan dance?...


Island 6.0 is now available online!
====================================
http://bbrace.net/islands/island6/island6.html
http://bradbrace.net/islands/island6/island6.html

Global Islands Project -- ongoing series of multi-media
pdf-ebooks/field-recordings -- a pastoral, pictorial and
phonic elicitation of island parameters. An intensive
examination of small islands and their paradigmatic
solutions to globalism.

Your (Art)world is based on mutual relief at your common
corruption. Maybe some cultures are based on even worse. But
that wouldn't change the bad faith of it and as years go by,
you wake at night in terror of your whole life being an act
of bad faith, where everything is self-interest and nothing
more, where every human interaction is driven by a silent,
even subconscious calculation of some ulterior motive, to
the point that a sea of bad faith has taken over your whole
life, there's no small island left from which you can even
try to build a bridge of good faith, because even that
effort becomes suspect, even good faith is nothing but
self-interested, even altruism is nothing but solipsistic,
even your professed agonizing right here right now is
nothing but a gesture, made to the conscience in order to
assure it that it exists.

http://bradbrace.net/id.html
http://bbrace.net/id.html

Island 1.0 is Ambergris Caye, Belize
Island 2.0 is Koh Si Chang, Thailand
Island 3.0 is Lamu, Kenya
Island 4.0 is Narikel Jingira, Bangladesh
Island 5.0 is Isla Mais, Nicaragua
Island 6.0 are The Grenadines, West Indies

Global Islands Project:

Island 1.0 -> http://bbrace.net/islands/island1/island1.html
or http://bradbrace.net/islands/island1/island1.html
-- over 800 images and hour-long audiotrack -- 69mb -- (acrobat 6)

Island 2.0 -> http://bbrace.net/islands/island2/island2.html
or http://bradbrace.net/islands/island2/island2.html
 -- over 535 images and hour-long audiotrack -- 78mb -- (acrobat 6)

***

http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_1.0
http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_2.0
http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_3.0
http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_4.0
http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_5.0
http://www.archive.org/details/global_islands_project_island_6.0


***

Global Islands Project -- ongoing series of multi-media
pdf-books -- a pastoral, pictorial and phonic elicitation of
island parameters...

Vientos del pueblo me llevan
Vientos del pueblo me arrastran
Me eparcen mi corazon
Ye me aventan la garganta

http://www.bbrace.net/id.html
http://bradbrace.net/id.html

bbs: brad brace sound
http://69.64.229.114:8000
http://www.bbrace.net/undisclosed.html

Waters Colours:
http://bradbrace.net/webgallerywc/wc.html

Eroticized Japanese/Malaysian Snack Foods:
http://bradbrace.net/greenscreen.html

Additional GIP texts/blog:
http://bbrace.net/wordpress/
http://bradbrace.net/wordpress/

12 mailing list:

You cannot politically defy the institutions when all you
really wanted was to be clasped to their bosoms and hope in
time to be cherished under the very framework of oppressive
values you are thinking of overcoming. That would be
co-optation, revolution only in the sense of a circulation
of elites rather than the extirpation of the very impulses
of elitism.

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/:b