Through the Looking-Glass

She looked in the mirror and said, "Who's there?"

She heard nothing but a voice from behind.

"Hey, it's just a reflection of ours."

"No," she said to her behalf, "this must be the other side of a looking-glass! We must be a part of the garden of live flowers!"

She looked into the mirror, leaning forward with her neck craned.

"Oh my god, this is so beautiful!"

She saw herself in colours, delicate pink and tender green.

"This is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen...!"

Colours...they are what people normally take for granted. I'm glad that I can SEE those beautiful colours in this world. I love all kinds of colours. And whenever I said this, my boyfriend told me I should have been a politician. Well, why not?;)

Spring Tart:)

I'm quite a perfectionist, I think, but it's funny that I normally don't care about too much details.

Let's take cooking as an example; I've been cooking since I was 11 or 12, not just for fun, but for my family of six people. It was one of my mom's principles to make her four kids independent in any ways. Even in kitchen.

She taught us how to cut vegetables, how to use ovens, and how to measure ingredients... "Oh c'mon! I know what I'm doing!" Yeah, here comes the youngest in the family, who thinks she's the best at anything.

I really don't care about "half a cup" or "2 table spoons", oh please. I pour soy sauce into a pan of soup as much as my instinct tells me, here, sugar, here, salt...adding things that instructions never mention can be seen in my cooking. I would say, "well, they were in the fridge, and I thought they would go with the dish."

As you can imagine, my food never tasted as good as my mom's.

But sometimes, SOMETIMES, I get visited by a surge of tidiness and neatness. I obediently follow instructions, measuring flour and sugar and butter and everything. And this beautiful tart, deliberately crafted, was the very first tart I've ever made. Phew, that was quite a work.

After the Rain

Winter is not really fun here in Fukuoka, where it doesn't snow but just cold and windy.

On the other hand, the winter in Eau Claire, Wisconsin in the States, was extremely cold. Well, like -30 degree Celcius cold.

Although inside buildings was warm and comfy, window views sucked almost all the time. Snow is white and pretty, I liked it first, but got sick of it within the first month. They said that the year I arrived there saw the coldest winter in the last 50 years. How lucky was that?

But thanks to the experience in the freaking cold world, I've become to appreciate the beauty and festive mood of spring air. My antena for seasons, especially for spring, is very keen and sensitive now, never failing to sense any subtle change in air and view.

White turns to brown, then green with specks of various colours. It is like you are watching a life history of flowers on fast forward. Popping and springing up everywhere, new faces say "Hello!" to you.

When it rains in spring, it seems like everything turns silent. What you can hear is the melancholic rain falling onto the ground, newborn leaves and flowers....and the next day, you just come to know that plants were actually embracing the tear drops, growing upwards at a stunning speed.

Wind and Wisteria

The wind from the sea was blowing the wisteria really hard, and it made it almost impossible to get a nice, clear shot of the climing plant.

I was only used to taking pictures of well-protected flowers in my garden. Nothing moves there, unlike the coast.

Yeah, I totally forgot, my skin tissue is growing and dying as I'm writing here.

I just felt the wisteria was there, fully alive in the dancing wind, under the cloudy grey sky.

Happy Secrets

When something great is expected to come, but not with a 100% certainty, I keep my lips sealed till it really comes true.

Japanese people think (maybe this is a worlwide thing) that bad dreams should not kept in one's head, but shared. By just talking about them, ominous incidents in sleep can be prevented from actually happening.

Then, the other way round for sweet dreams!

Especially when you see them not in your dream but in real life.

Yesterday was the happiest day ever since I left the States 2 months ago; this is all I can tell you for now. I felt I was alive once again, breathing in the awakening fresh air into my lungs to full.

My happy secrets, I'm ready to see you come true!!:)

Once: Falling Slowly

A relatively short movie from Ireland, superb content.
Won an Oscar for its music which is just so soothing and moving.
Worth watching if you have a free time of 87 minutes!

Falling Slowly

I don't know you
But I want you
All the more for that
Words fall through me
And always fool me
And I can't react
And games that never amount
To more than they're meant
Will play themselves out

Take this sinking boat and point it home
We've still got time
Raise your hopeful voice
You have a choice
You'll make it now

Falling slowly, eyes that know me
And I can't go back
Moods that take me and erase me
And I'm painted black
You have suffered enough
And warred with yourself
It's time that you won

Take this sinking boat and point it home
We've still got time
Raise your hopeful voice
You had a choice
You've made it now
Falling slowly sing your melody
I'll sing along

Happily Ever After

"Enchanted" has just been added to my favourite movie list.

It's just so lovely...sigh ;)

I hadn't expected the movie to be a perfectly woven fairy tale like this.

Why do we need to always focus on sadness and agony in life?

Yes, it might be a naive thing to say that I want to believe in happy endings, but if I was given any choice, I would rather choose to embrace every happy moment in my life, dreaming of my Prince Charming yet to come. Haha:)

This movie makes you happier and lovelier.

Forgiveness

The hands of Judas Iscariot.

The cheeks of Jesus Christ.

I am a human being covered with mud of self-pity.

Can't be Jesus but no need to be.

I believe in the light of hope in my very own eyes.

Mini the Brontosaurus

Mini the Brontosaurus goes for a walk...

Found a tree and climbed up...

Looked up and thought, "Hey, I want to see the sky!"

On his way up to the top, he saw some tear drops from the sky...

Here and there...

And he finally saw...

This beautiful sky of April 17 2009.

Space in Between

"The aspect of solitude is important in every person's life; it's like a conversation or music.

You've got to have space in between the notes, or it doesn't mean anything.

The solitude is space between the notes."

Thomas Merton in his book

Thoughts in Solitude

Here begins my blog, Space in Between!:)