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Wet and Chilly, a Dark Autumn Sunday in Niigata, JAPAN

My another photo blog “LQ Laoshi’s Photo Gallery”(outside wordpress)

This is a blog post only for the purpose that I wanted to upload something. Today is Sunday but now almost over. I have been exhausted by hardworking for online classes. I should have taken a rest whole of yesterday without uploading a blog post which was actually so unpopular that no one visited.

a persimmon on the cutting board

Walking across railway, I got to rice field. The sky was dark because now it is late autumn. This is my hometown in Niigata Prefecture, JAPAN. Climate at this time of year is always like this. It’s wet and chilly. Living here under this circumstance might make you nerve wrenching. But you know, you can never have a choice for your birth place.


pieces of persimmon ready for eating

Cherry trees “Sakura” are Japanese favorite. People want to plant sakura trees anywhere. Yes it is beautiful in blooming. But I’d say their leaves are also beautiful in autumn.


View of Iide Mountain, from Niigata

Leaves had become beautiful, but it was a sign that they would soon be falling down onto the ground. They will turn to be soil that is where they came from, I am not sure, though.
Actually when I took photos of these leaves, rain became strong. I gave up taking photo like yesterday, and went to a supermarket. I bought some foods like fish and chicken for supper. I planned to cook fish today and chicken tomorrow. Since I got rosemary, I am thinking to cook chicken with tomato sauce and rosemary.


On the way back from the supermarket, I dropped by a small park. No kids were there.


The sun goes down and it’s getting dark.
17:30 – Cooked supper
18:30 – Ate supper
19:00 – Checked students’ homework
21:00 – Wrote this post
22:00 – Uploaded this post

Late Autumn in Niigata under the Dark Sky

My another photo blog “LQ Laoshi’s Photo Gallery”(outside wordpress)

a persimmon on the cutting board

So I decided to eat this bitter persimmon because part of it became so soft.


pieces of persimmon ready for eating

Some slices that were so soft were sweet a little. Some slices that were not so soft were tasted as if remaining some bitterness. My conclusion was simple. Sawashi-gaki was far better than this. I mean, sawashi-gaki is persimmon that got rid of bitterness by strong alcohol.


View of Iide Mountain, from Niigata

I went out with my Olympus camera when I finished the online conversation class for sophomore students at 4p.m. on Friday. So it was getting dark already. Now it is late autumn. The top of the Mountain IIDE was already covered with snow.


I heard these days voices of swans flying over my head, I mean, in the sky. They are coming from Siberia to Japan to spend winter time. I saw one of them on Saturday morning. She/he was alone, though they are always in herds. I wished her safe migration.


Leaves in my garden have turned to red and yellow, although this happens in everywhere in northern hemisphere in this time around, anyway.


This region is cold, so it is impossible to raise rice crops twice a year. The paddy fields are left as-is through the winter.



Farming people like to plant flowers at the edges of their fields. When I took these photos, rain started falling. I gave up taking photos and came back house.


I wish if I had more time to practice this.

Morning Market in Niitsu, Niigata-ken, JAPAN

Because of corona virus pandemic and my hectic job for online teaching, I don’t have chances to go outside for these months. If there is a chance for me to go outside world, it had been to go for a walk one hour, or to go shopping in the morning market in Niitsu. I went to Niitsu this morning. And what I saw when I got off the train was a locomotive pulling passenger cars. The steam locomotive runs only on the weekend as a sightseeing train.


But anyway, my destination is here, the parking lot that turns to be a morning market on the dates with 1 and 6.


Every time I come to Niitsu morning market, I buy Kimch from Ms. Minami Yamashita.


This is her cooler box. There are three types of Kimchi; Chinese cabbage, Radish, and Cucumber kimchi(s).


山下南さんのキムチ、販売場所と時間

This is the information of her Kimchi selling. Her Kimchi is available in Niitsu, Gosen, and Suibara.


Another shop.


I was interested in mushroom of 250 JPY, but I didn’t buy them.


Flower shop.


I bought one basket of these Shuyo-Ringo(s).


So this is a photo of what I bought today in the Niitsu morning market.
8 apples “Shuyo”: 800yen
11 persimmons: 500yen
1 Chinese cabbage Kimchi: 500yen
1 Radish Kimchi: 500yen
2 Pears “Niitaka”: 400yen
1 Radish with green leaves: 100yen
1 Bitter persimmon: 100yen
——– 2,900JPY in total

There is an issue about persimmons. Since Niigata is in northern part of Japan, most of persimmons here are bitter because of chilly climate. You can get naturally sweet persimmon, if you were in Hiroshima or Wakayama because they are warm places. The issue in Niigata is how to get rid of bitterness from the persimmons. There are three ways to do that:
1) To make persimmon dry fruits; You peel off, tie with code, and hang them outside under the roof. You might need some nets as a protection preventing birds from eating them.
2) To use chemical reaction of strong alcohol; You put the upper part of persimmons into alcohol that is stronger than 40%. And put them into plastic bags to keep them airtight for several days.
3) is surprising one, You just keep the bitter persimmon until it gets sweet. I don’t know how long it would take. There is a moment between ripening and rotting. So it must be a very short period of time. In that moment, the bitter persimmon becomes sweet. It is not “You eat when you want to eat”, but you have to eat when it happens. I know a person who said that it tasted rotten when she ate this type of persimmon. She said she would never eat any kind of persimmons again. So it seems that bad experience left trauma about persimmon.

Today I found this type of bitter persimmon. A lady explained to me. She raised her sample persimmon. “See, this is a little early. You keep it more time, then you can eat this sweet”. I have been interested in this type of bitter persimmon for so long. I asked her to sell that sample to me. It was 100 yen. Shown in the photo is the one. Part of it looks ready but other part of it looks still early to eat. I will tell you the result.

At the End of October in Northern JAPAN

There were a little chilly autumn days recently. I thought the mountain Iide might have got snow on the top. As I expected, I found that there was snow on Wednesday 28th.


These sparrows had been somewhere for one month or so. It was the season that there were a plenty of rice grains in paddy fields. They liked rice better than bird seeds that I give them. But now the season has changed, they have com back to my garden.


A ginkgo tree has not become yellow enough. It would be still earlier to be the best color.


Another yellow thing in autumn is this introduced species from north America. You can see this flower anywhere in Japan at this time of season.


A river and the mountain Sugana-dake. Soon the leaves will be yellow and red on the mountains.

Weekly Logs: Sep.21 – 27, 2020

Photographs on the week (Another blog of mine)

Monday, September 21
I taught two classes in the morning and in the evening as usual. In addition to the classes, I had to instruct a nominee of speech contest. I sent her my handwriting that indicate low-high accent of Japanese in red ink.in

Tuesday, September 22
I taught two classes in the morning and in the evening as usual. Both were business manner classes.

Wednesday, September 23
I worked all day except one hour from 2p.m. I went to a dentist. Thanks to national health insurance, Japanese can see a doctor with reasonable cost. I got strange feeling in my mouth because of an aesthesia.

Thursday, September 24
I taught three classes. I worked even in the night. It was almost midnight when I finished working

Friday, September 25
I lost my memory I don’t remember the day. But it was sure that I taught two classes that were conversation course for the second grade.

Saturday, September 26
I went to a morning market in Niitsu. There is one man who comes to the morning market in this time of season. He brings and sells his grapes. Unfortunately his farm couldn’t produce any “Kyoho” grape this year, though I didn’t hear the reason. He was only selling a tiny amount of “Shine Muscat”. One tray was 1,000JPY. He laid only three plastic trays of Shine Muscat on his blue-sheet. They looked clean green fruits. But I saw behind him, there were some grapes whose peel had got some stains. I asked him to sell me that brawn stained Shine Muscat by 1,000 yen. He got happy because he could sell unpopular grapes with stains on the peel surface. He put a lot on a plastic tray and sold it to me.

Sunday, September 27
I worked almost all day. But I took a walk just an hour from 3 to 4p.m. While walking I found a board as below.

I don’t think a dog can read that Japanese sentence.

Weekly Logs: Sep.14 – 20, 2020

Photographs on the week (Another blog of mine)

Monday, September 14
9:05 – 10:25 Reading for Second grade, Class F
16:25 – 17:45 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class A
The business class was about communication between colleagues.

Tuesday, September 15
8:55 – 10:15 Business Manner for Fourth grade, Class A
16:25 – 17:45 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class B
Between the two classes, I went to supermarket to buy food. And then I took a nap before the evening class that was the business class. I talked about team work in business, effectiveness on communication, and business attire.

Wednesday, September 16
I worked all day because I had to make two PPT slide shows for the conversation classes on Thursday and Friday. Since I had to teach three classes on Thursday, there was no time on Thursday to prepare for Friday.

Thursday, September 17
9:05 – 10:25 Conversation for Second grade, Class E
10:50 – 12:10 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class B
14:40 – 16:00 Conversation for Second grade, Class F
The toughest day of the week, but on that day, I was liberated from household, because my mom had gone for a travel, although I cook the meals only as household. Cooking only for me was far easier and less time consuming than cooking for two.

Friday, September 18
8:55 – 10:15 Conversation for Second grade, Class F
14:40 – 16:00 Conversation for Second grade, Class E
I wanted to go to bed earlier because it was the last weekday. But I proofread a draft of speech contest in which one of my students wanted to participate.

Saturday, September 19
I went to a supermarket in the morning hours to buy food and flowers. I wanted to offer new flowers by my father’s photograph, because my aunts and an uncle came to my house to pray. It was the time of the first autumn OHIGAN since my dad died. After they left, I went out for a walk and took some digital photos.

Sunday, September 20
I worked all day. Preparation for the classes on Monday was the only thing that I did on Sunday.

Weekly Logs: Sep.7 – 13, 2020

Photographs on the week (Another blog of mine)

Monday, September 7
9:05 – 10:25 Reading for Second grade, Class F
16:25 – 17:45 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class A

Tuesday, September 8
8:55 – 10:15 Business Manner for Fourth grade, Class A
16:25 – 17:45 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class B
Between the two classes, I went to haircut. It was only just 1,100 JPY. One customer who got haircut before me came back and claimed the finishing of his hair. At the time I had already sat on the chair in front of the mirror, but I had to stand up from the chair for him.

Wednesday, September 9
There was no class on Wednesday. I went to supermarket by walk at 10 a.m. because I wanted to do that before it got too hot. I saw a dentist at 2 p.m. Of course I kept working other than those two things.

Thursday, September 10
9:05 – 10:25 Conversation for Second grade, Class E
10:50 – 12:10 Business manner for Fourth grade, Class B
14:40 – 16:00 Conversation for Second grade, Class F
So Thursday is the toughest day of the week. Even worse was that the supplemental tests were required on this day. The test was for students who failed to pass the final examinations in the last semester. The command said that teachers had to register the scores by 4 p.m. on Monday. As was always, it is a short notice. Since I had to prepare for the PPT slides for Friday class, it was 3 a.m. in the early Friday morning when I went to bed.

Friday, September 11
8:55 – 10:15 Conversation for Second grade, Class F
14:40 – 16:00 Conversation for Second grade, Class E
I made eight students took my supplemental examination for conversation class in the last semester. I started giving test direction at 10 p.m. It was 9 p.m. for them, but it was late at night for me. All the students sent me their audio data by 11p.m.

Saturday, September 12
On Thursday morning, 10 students were absent from my conversation class because they had to take supplemental examination for computer class of the last semester. I’d say it was a bad scheduling. So I made a small session for those ten students on Saturday morning. The rest of the day was spent for making PPT slides for business manner class.

Sunday, September 13
Since the weather forecast said that a heavy rain was coming in the afternoon, I went to a branch library at 10 a.m. to return six books. On the way and way back, I took some photographs to upload onto my blog. I had been scoring the supplemental examination of composition all the afternoon.

Weekly Logs: Aug.24-30, 2020

Photographs on the week (Another blog of mine)

August 24, Monday
No memory, no record. But I am sure that I had been working all day.

August 25, Tuesday
Ditto

August 26, Wednesday
I borrowed six books in the branch library in the town. I bought two portions (?) of herrings for supper in the supermarket. It was 321 JPY. I always buy something that is not necessary when I go to a supermarket. So, on the day, I just made up my mind that I wouldn’t buy anything other than fish meat of herrings.

August 27, Thursday
In a small town in Japan, many old, or out of day, habits still remain. On Thursday, I was in charge of opening and closing the door of Garbage collecting place in the village.This role comes to each home once in two or three months. I got up a little earlier than usual and went to the garbage place at 4:40 a.m. Then I saw that someone had already brought his or her trash to the place and put them in front of the door. I heard that there was such a kind of person who brought the trash very early in the morning. Probably it was fun for him or her to make other people carry the trash to inside. And I also heard that it was almost identified who did that.
Anyway, the day was too hot to go outside. I had been in my house and continued to work for my Japanese classes all day.

August 28, Friday
I brought a document to the agricultural association. But I made a mistake on the document. It was a typo of just a one letter of Chinese character. The letter was the same pronunciation, but totally different meanings. I had to correct the character, to print it again, and to send it again to ask other’s stamps.
In the afternoon I went to dentist.

August 29, Saturday
I needed a photograph of my face. So I went to a town next to my town in the morning. I said hello at the entrance of a camera shop. The shop was open already, but no one came. A funny thing was that one family member walked into the shop by my side, but she didn’t say anything to me nor told someone that I was there. I was disappointed by that camera shop. So I got on a train and headed Niigata. I was not sure but believed that there should be a photo studio in some certain part of the Niigata. Luckily enough I found a photo studio there. I got a digital data of my face photo in my USB thumb drive. While I was waiting for the photo, I went see Shinano River.

August 30, Sunday
It is today. The classes will start tomorrow. Everyone is now in the university and will have in-person classes from tomorrow. But I am the only one who cannot be back in the campus. It is terrible that I cannot teach Japanese in the class but still I have to do online classes. I don’t like this situation.