Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Thinking about fall

It is fall: or it is at least starting to be fall.

I love this time of year and I know that I did miss BC’s Indian Summer. The weather here at this time is always perfect: just the right bit of warmth with a little bit of crispness in the air to make you feel alive.

The leaves are also changing and some trees are already starting to shed. I need to get out the camera this weekend and take some photos of all the colours for my Japanese friends.

One of the things I will miss about Japan is their celebration of the changing of seasons. Every season had a reason to get out of the house and celebrate – it was wonderful and made me appreciate the beauty of each season more. I know that right now in Japan my friends are planning their traditional hike into the mountains to take photos of all the changing leaves. They would then share all the photos with their friends and everyone would ohh and aww over them.

Why don’t we do that here?
We don’t seem to appreciate things like that here in the same way.

Another big notice for me this year was the geese.
I haven’t heard the Canadian geese in YEARS. I missed them. Japan does not have huge flocks of geese flying overhead through out the day. The geese are one of the big symbols of fall.

ToddlerJi noticed the geese as well.

Isn’t it amazing how we adults don’t seem to notice the little wonders of the world until our children point it out to us?

Well ToddlerJi is absolutely fascinated by the Canadian geese. She stares up at the sky pointing them out and making ‘oohhhh’ noises and just gazing in wonder at these giant birds in the sky. She loves them.

But then there are the things from Japan that I grew to love at this time of year – the fall festivals.
I loved these festivals: the yatais and the screaming of ‘yaada yaada yaada ya’ over and over again and again. Even ToddlerJi knew how to yell it out on festival day.

Then there are the roasted chestnuts – you just can’t get them here, and I love them! There was the crisp dry wind that would dry my clothes in about one minute after I hung them and the strange red flowers that would start to blossom on those bushes whose name I never did figure out.

**sigh**

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Posted by (Top)Andrea::9/12/2006 :: 8 Comments:

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