Fumie's dad brought some Mangos from Malaysia today (quite illegally, I might add — bad Daddy, bad!).
We were warned not to touch them, as some people apparently have some kind of painful skin reaction to mangos (including Fumie's dad, very apparently). We used Saran Wrap to hold it while we peeled it, then ate the fruity flesh with a fork. It was quite tasty... much more musky than the normal store-bought Mango I've had in the US or Japan, perhaps because they were picked ripe, not ripened on a boat during shipping.
I thought the warnings about skin reactions seemed a little farfetched, but it didn't take much searching to find out that Mango is in the same family as Poison Ivy (along with, oddly enough, the cashew tree). It can be quite painful, if you're allergic.
There's a nice page on it in the wikipedia. There's more than anyone will likely ever want to know about the mango on a page at the University of Georgia.
Despite the cold I'm coming down with, I was able to get out for some pictures, and some of the cherry-blossom shots came out okay. I really wish I could place pictures inline in this blog — the lack of this ability may be the one straw that breaks the Yahoo back, and forces me to move my blog elsewhere. (Note: this post was originally written when my blog was on the now-defunct “Yahoo! 360” social platform.)
Some of today's pictures have made their way into my (now defunct) pretty picture gallery. A full-screen view of this pic or this pic is nice.
Cherry-blossom viewing can be wonderful, but only if you can find a quiet, relatively alone place in which to enjoy it. Otherwise, it's just an ugly spectacle. A few minutes' walk from where I live is Kyoto's “Maruyama Park”, famous for its 600 cherry trees, which are appropriately beautiful now that spring has sprung. I went there today, not to see the trees, but rather to see how bad the people were.
They were plentiful. People milling about everywhere, with festival venders hawking octopus balls and squid, people sitting in loud smelly groups on blue vinyl sheets drinking beer and smoking, among tour guides explaining to their charges that they'd be moving along soon. It was everything but beautiful.
For comparison, see this picture, as well as this one, each of the same area, but taken at a more tranquil time.
It was in stark contrast to the many beautiful scenes I'd seen in the previous hour going around town with Anthony, by bike. I'll post some of those (certainly lacking) pictures soon.
During a short drive this morning, it was readily apparent that the cherry blossoms had hit full bloom overnight, as the area offered a dramatically different view than yesterday. I didn't have much time, but did stop to snap the pic above (which certainly does nothing to lend justice to the actual beauty of the scene). It was quite overcast, which mutes the pictures much more than the actual scene.
Unfortunately, I'm coming down with a cold, so slept most of the day. I have to go out in the late afternoon, so will bring my camera along to see if I can get any better shots.
Season changes in Japan tend to arrive like clockwork, and few changes are as well predicted (and highly anticipated) as the blooming of the cherry blossoms (“sakura”). A cherry-blossom tree in full bloom is truly more than the sum of its parts, presenting an almost unearthly, indescribable beauty that no photograph can capture (although that doesn't stop hordes of both amateur and professional photographers from trying, myself included.)
Thus, it was with doubtless disappointment that the throngs of tourists that descend upon Kyoto this past weekend (many, certainly, from all over Japan, with tours scheduled long in advance) were treated to chilly fall-like brisk winds and an unwelcome but quite manifest lack of cherry blossoms. If you looked carefully, though, you could see a few blossoms here and there (of which the picture above is a pair), but that's like seeing a few dabs of paint (as opposed to a masterpiece painting), so it's of little consolation.
Yesterday (Wednesday) it was finally much warmer and there were a few rare areas that were finally almost in full bloom. I went out for a bike ride with Anthony and Katsunori Shimada, a long-time friend, and we sat at a little plaza near Shijo/Kawamachi and it was just wonderful.
I thought today might be The Day that widespread blossomage might happen, but it turns out that it's cold and rainy, so it seems that Mother Nature has it in for the cherry-blossom viewing season this year.
From my front door I can see over to an area adjacent to where I'll be moving in the fall, around where there are lots of cherry trees. I can see a half-hearted attempt at blooming, with the current result looking more like a molting animal than the heavenly-soft puffs of beauty all are looking forward to.
Tomorrow and the next day are supposed to be sunny but not warm, with rain following on Sunday and into the week. Here's hoping we get lucky.