Autumn Struck

like a lightning bolt, quickly and beautifully. It wasn't until it was almost too late that I realized I needed to go out and see the momiji (autumn leaves); lately I've been busier than ever living my dream.

Two days ago...I unexpectedly received a call from Koichan (one of the younger kids in the dance circle - I'm very happy he's there, because he's one of the few people I can see myself hanging out with in the long term who's not graduating and moving in April). Doubly unexpected, because Japanese people don't make phone calls that often. Or at least not compared to e-mailing on their phone, which I'm estimating goes at an average of 20 messages per day per person - I go beyond that more than occasionally myself. So anyway, he was planning a dinner with "a girl I know, Bitawan-san and Purukogi-san [two dancers from the circle I know quite well] (...)" and was wondering if I had time. After I sent three people messages to see if they could move my appointments with them I realized the after-effects of the Zombie Punch were stronger than I thought, having me mistake Tuesday for Wednesday. Cancelled the cancellations and told Koichan "sure!".

The dinner was last night, and it was a blast. Purukogi was replaced by a buddy of Bitawan's (who knew no-one else) with who got along well from the start, and to match the four boys there were four girls, one of which was a co-worker of Koichan's at the trattoria he works at part-time. The others were school friends of hers, some of which hadn't seen each other in more than a year. The restaurant was another one of those places with a very fine atmosphere, like I am starting to believe there are literally infinite of in Kyoto. But our private room could only be reached by sliding down a rope to the basement (in the way firefighters slide down poles) and then crawling through a small hole in the wall, only to end up in something that could definitely double for a treasure room in a movie. Fantastic! Every single time the waiters came or left I was injected with happiness: of course they won't turn their back to you when leaving, so as they say "sorry for having interrupted" while moving backwards through a small hole in the wall...you can picture it, yeah? And when we commented about it to our main waitress, her "oh, I'm used to it" was so honest I wanted to cry. An evening to treasure, and Bear-chan's phone number as icing on the cake.

Back to autumn! Let's blast off with the scenery - I think you're going to have to agree Japan lives up to its reputation in this regard.








I only went for actual "sightseeing" to the leaves once, in Arashiyama (half an hour from central Kyoto), with Momochan (the ex-substitute-bassist of Jungle Mic), whose family lives minutes away from a major sightseeing area. That's where the above pics are from. Below, then, just a couple from Northern Kyoto: the entrance to the shrine next to school, a tree-lined stream a bit more to the North, where I got lost on the way to Ikeyan's university for dance practice, and an urban scene that made me feel quite nice when I encountered it.



Next, some November dancing:





And finally, other miscellaneities, including some older ones:

The bar at which the geisha encounter happened...


Jungle Mic in the lounge area of a rehearsal studio and at my apartment, where we had the first nabe party of my apartment...


My first calligraphy lesson - that means 'tail' by the way - (I sucked)...


After receiving a temporary replacement, before sending out mine for repairs (just heard I'm getting a good sum of money to replace what I claimed to be my irrepairably-broken-by-the-car-crash keyboard, whoopdeedoo!)...


Some famous face...


Ikeyan in a club...


...and of course, various kinds of too-good-to-be-true-I-LOVE-YOU-ALL food...