dawn and dusk 02

Quick notes to self on the project I want to do, before this brief clarity fades.

1. Collect stories of falling in love and falling out of love

2. Yesterday I was on Horohira Bashi (the main bridge overlooking Toyohira river in the city), intending to film the sunset on my mobile phone. I was looking up at the sky, thinking big and profound thougts, when something compelled me to look down. I laughed out loud, because all along the banister of the bridge, people had scrawled love notes in Japanese. I had stumbled upon the city's secret repository of love graffiti. It was a humbling moment - you can have this grand idea of what you want to do or express, and the street will always beat your imagination. Look down, always remember to look down. I spent the rest of the fading light photographing each little note... mostly executed in liquid paper ('blanco' to some people).

3. Turn these love notes into stamps (almost all tourist/public spots like museums, onsen and temples have these stamps for people to commemorate their visit), so that people can take home a souvenir.

4. Extract the colors of sunset and sunrise, print these out on sheets of paper - enough to cover a wall. People can stamp the love notes on these sheets of paper.

5. Project videos of love stories collected on the wall.

6. Film self at the most scenic and beautiful spots to catch sunrise and sunset telling own story of falling in and out of love.

That's it!

Healthy

UPDATE: Now with pics to make you salivate. What's that's reflex thing again? The one that makes dogs drool? I'd google it. But...

Le ingredients. Fried rice is the same whichever continent you find yourself on. But my dad taught me to follow this rule: never put garlic in fried rice. Only onion. I don't know why, but I've never questioned this wisdom.

Managing a non-personal blog is like managing a thousand egos. And that's not even counting my own (substantial) one. At least I'm geographically distant from it all at the moment. Now I know why sometimes gallerist/blogger/super nice fellow Ed Winkleman just loses it and lashes out in the comments. In fact, I don't know how he manages to do it so seldom. I love you Ed!

Tonight I made use of last night's rice and made fried rice with long beans, onion, tofu and tomatoes. Surely enjoying one's own cooking as much as I did smacks of vulgar, sinful pride. It's just that I was so happy eating it. Tried a new Sapporo beer as well. I promised Z. some images, but I'll add them tomorrow. Enough of the internet and my computer today.

In the midst of cooking. I have a tiny frying pan, so I use the soup pot for pretty much everything.

You know that scene in Heidi (by Joanna Spyri), where she gets used to her new life in the Swiss Alps with her grandfather - she takes a cold bath, then drinks a glass of fresh milk, and eats a big slab of toasted cheese with bread and has the best sleep of her life? That's how I feel.

Presentation is everything. So is beer. I try a different beer every night so that I can build up a collection of beer cans. My motives are purely aesthetic of course.

Today I cooked

...a Spanish Tortilla - basically an omelette with onions and thin slices of fried potatoes in it. Drizzled on top about 1/3 of a tiny, ridiculously expensive bottle of Thai chili sauce I splurged on at the supa-maruketto. Cos, I'm South East Asian, yo. And we need our chili sauce.

And then for dinner, it was plain rice. Eaten with a bunch of grilled white asparagus seasoned with oil, salt and pepper. Tender bamboo shoot stewed in soysauce and mirin (sweet rice vinegar). Some fresh cherry tomatoes.

Plenty of flesh on me bones at the moment. Enjoying the tastes and textures of Hokkaido produce!