昨年以上に暑い岡山の夏ですが、少しの間だけ岡山を脱出してきました。今回の行き先は豪州の北西、ダーウィンです。進化論のチャールズ・ダーウィンに因んで名付けられた街です。

羽田から南にシドニーへ10時間、そのあと飛行機で４時間ほど北上するとダーウィンの街です。そこから車を借り、300km３時間走るとカカドゥ国立公園です。いつも一緒に旅行をするT子さんと二人での個人旅。ちょっとした困りごとはあったものの、雄大・壮大な景色をみるとここまで来てよかったと思う大自然でした。豪州の北西とあって赤道に近くインドネシアにも近い、アボリジニもいる多文化な地域。ダーウィンは地平線を遮るものがないので夕日が美しいことで有名。夕焼けとその後の移り変わる空の色は写真に収めるには不可能でした。想像以上に欧州からの観光客が多く、色々な訛りのある英語が飛び交っていました。さすがに日本からは遠いし、団体で行くととんでもない金額なので、私たちの滞在中に日本人からの観光客は皆無でした。

ここで旅行話から外れ、帰路で会ったオバちゃんとの交流を一筆。

ダーウィンからシドニーへ戻る深夜便を待つ間、携帯の充電をすべく充電箇所を探すと限られた場所しかありませんでした。唯一空いていた１か所にはオバちゃんがお一人で使用中。共有すれば充電ができるので話しかけたら、中国のオバちゃんでした。そしてこの方、全く英語ができない。全く。最近の日本語は英語から取り入れたカタカナ語が相当量あるので、日本人で英語が出来なくてもある程度の単語はカタカナでも知っているから多少は英語で会話ができるものです。が、中国語はそうではない。telephoneと英語で言っても通じない。

そこでわたくし、我流で勉強中の初級中国語をこのオバちゃんにぶつけることにしました。久しぶりに意思疎通に四苦八苦し、久しぶりに外国語を勉強する人のもどかしさを喰らいました。でもオバちゃんから得た情報が理解できた嬉しさは、我流でも今まで中国語を頑張った甲斐があったと思えたのでした。昆明出身のこのオバちゃんは経済的にはゆとりがあるようでカカドゥ国立公園は全て個人的にガイドを雇い（ご主人が）、セスナ機に乗り、また日本来訪は2回あり、北へも南へも行ったことがあるとのこと。最終的には日本と中国の政府のことを言い始めたから私は笑顔で「分からん」として会話を終えました。

そんなワケで、この内容をできるだけ外来語無しで書いてみました。お気づきになったかしら？

写真はそのオバちゃんと。そしてカカドゥ国立公園。そして海から見える日没後の明けの明星。

Recently an old friend of mine came to Japan for a trip with his partner. We had not seen each other for about 12 years, but he got in touch and wanted to catch up. He decided to spend 3 nights in Okayama during one of my weekends. While we were friends in university in New Zealand, he was originally born in England and has been living there for almost as long as I have in Japan. It was interesting to see how he has changed since we both moved away from NZ. We had a great time and were able to visit many places.

On their first night here, it was a workday for me. I was only able to meet them at night. We went out for dinner and had yakitori downtown. They looked exhausted as they had climbed Mt. Fuji only two days earlier. Nonetheless, they were happy to go to a local place for dinner rather than a chain or somewhere well-known. The next day, we did a lot of Okayama tourist activities. Okayama castle, Korakuen, and Bikanchiku. Sadly, it was rainy in the morning, but we spent some time inside the castle and managed to get to the garden when the rain had settled a bit. On that day, the lotus flowers had started to bloom so it was lucky timing. While in Bikanchiku, I took them to an udon shop. This trend of getting them to experience different Japanese foods continued throughout the weekend as that night we went to a yakiniku place. On our last day, we had sushi and tsukumen.

On our last day, we did not spend much time in Okayama. We went over to Himeji. Himeji castle is probably my favorite castle in Japan, so I wanted to show it off to them.  At the time we were planning to go, the England vs Mexico world cup game was live, so my friend insisted on watching it during the train ride. Amusingly, the other foreigners we saw on the train and even the platform at Himeji were also staring at their phones and watching the game. Despite raining in the morning again, it managed to mostly clear up once we reached the castle. My friends were impressed by the size, scale and craftsmanship. We managed to spend a lot more time there than I expected so we ended up just coming back to Okayama, doing some shopping and having dinner.

Overall, it was a fun weekend, and a great chance to catch up with an old friend. He said he hopes to visit Japan again in the future. Hopefully I can someday visit England as well.

I went small boat bottom seine fishing on Sunday (小型機船底びき網). Typically, this is a type of commercial fishing in the Seto Inland Sea. Every summer, my boar hunting group charters out a boat and we “help” the crew and divide the haul up between the group.

This is a kind of net trawling, but instead of dragging the 300 meter (984 feet) wide net along the bottom, the boat pays out a 1000 meters (3200 feet) of rope on one side only, drops the net and then drives in a big loop while letting another 1000 meter rope out on the other side. This encloses the fish into the net and then both ropes and the net are hauled in.

We got on the boat on the border between Kojima and Mizushima, only about 45 minutes from my house and basically at the bottom of the hill from Washuzan Highland amusement park with a perfect view of the Seto Ohashi bridge that connects Honshu to Shikoku.

We cruised less than 30 minutes to an area south of the Mizushima industrial port area, dropped the net 3 times to get a full haul and were back in port eating sashimi and freshly boiled fish less than 3 hours later.

We mostly caught two kinds of タイ sea bream, マダイ red sea bream and クロダイ black sea bream or black porgy and some other types, one of which might have been ニベ Japanese croaker. I ended up going home with over 50 fish in my cooler.

Not having that much freezer space, I shared the wealth amongst some friends and descaled, gutted and froze the remainder.

My hunting group usually does this trip while I’m in the States for my summer break, so this was my first time to be able to join in. It was an interesting experience, the three man crew (including a young guy from Indonesia) did most of the work, we just helped haul the net a bit and carry giant baskets of fish to the giant cooler in the back.

私はあまり外食に出ませんが、その代わりに人が誘ってくれるとホイホイと出かけます。今回は少し前に誕生日を迎えた友人の希望で、高梁市にある豆富（豆腐ではない）料理専門店へ予約を取って行ってきました。その名も「雲白（くもじろ）」。こじんまりとした、お昼にだけ営業をされている、年配の方々が働いている、遠い高梁にあるお店です。ですがミシュランプレートに掲載されたとあって駐車場には県外ナンバーもあり、予約なしには入れない状態でした。

お料理はどれも美味しい、大豆の味が濃く感じられるものばかり。でもわざわざ高梁まで片道１時間半かけていくにはなかなか遠いです。

ですがその友人はこう言ってくれるのです。

「あ～、川の景色に山の雰囲気がきれいで、それだけでもここまで来た甲斐があったわぁ。今日はお付き合い、ありがとうね。」と。彼女とはもう２５年程のお付き合い。でもいつもこういった可愛いことを言ってくれるのです。

そういえば、お隣のテーブルには作業服を着た中年男性二人組が美味しくお膳を頂いていました。日曜日にお仕事をされているんであろう、でも予約を取り、男二人、決して安くはないランチを食べに来ていることがなんだかいいなぁと思ったのです。

そう思いながら岡山市内に帰着。美味しくお高い豆富料理を頂き、健康的な胃袋になったあと、その友達とドーナツ屋に寄って、胃袋を油でコーティングして帰りました。

I watched Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai many years ago, and although I enjoyed it, I found it very long and a little hard to follow. Maybe I just wasn’t in the right mood, but I didn’t fully appreciate it.

After discussing Kurosawa films in class a few weeks ago, I decided to try watching a few. The movie I chose last week was Sanjuro, the director’s 22nd film. One of many  Kurosawa films starring Toshiro Mifune, it’s technically a sequel to another picture called Yojimbo.

The talents of both men are on full display here. Kurosawa was deep into his career at this point (Seven Samurai had been made almost a decade before), and he was already famous for his carefully composed scenes and beautiful use of light and motion. Every frame is a painting, as they say. Meanwhile, Mifune plays the brilliant but aloof Sanjuro with the poise and rugged charm worthy of a samurai - or at least a ronin.

There’s a lot to discuss about these old movies. If anyone has seen them before, post a comment here or let me know in class sometime!

P.S. I was secretly hoping I’d find a connection to this Sanjuro:

Source: www.okayama-kanko.jp

…but sadly, Kurosawa’s film has nothing to do with the beloved lord of Bitchu Matsuyama Castle.