yfritz's Journal

yfritz's Profile | Weight History

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21 January 2023

No-cheat, all from scratch vegan supper, inspired by zen cuisine I enjoyed while in Kyoto 🥢

Grated mountain yam over rice
Sesame paste tofu with mum leaf
Pickled kohlrabi, napa, watercress

Total 12 plant-based ingredients🌿
精進料理

(91 comments)

30 December 2022

Asakusa is a district in Tokyo known for its down-to-earth, old time vibes. I never liked the area. It’s oversaturated with tourists and shops that sell worthless tchotchkes nobody should ever want. The town was destroyed by the air raid in WWII, and although it boasts 1,400 year history, what it presents is mostly a post-war landscape. People love to call the district a symbol of rebirth. “Rebirth,” I sneered, unable to shake off my contempt towards the town that shamelessly panders to the whim of foreign visitors, gratifying every inch of their fantasy at the expense of our true sensitivity and aesthetics. The main street is lined with rickshaws for heaven’s sake. Rickshaws? How kitschy.

Nevertheless, I ended up in Asakusa because Google indicated that there I might be able to find a craftsman who still possesses the gumption to repair an ihai case, which is an integral part of the family altar that houses the mortuary tablets of the ancestors and the recently deceased. Ours is falling apart. My brother’s mortuary tablet is among others’s inside. The tablet bore his after-life name and it felt strange to read that he was no longer my little brother Yakkun.
I walked a lot past two weeks looking for someone who would be willing to repair the ihai. I went to several places except Asakusa. Repairing Buddhist articles is a thankless work and no one was interested. They all wanted me to buy a new altar. The rejection struck me as curiously heartless. Japanese are forever boasting their allegiance to the old way of life, yet in reality they seemed to have succumbed to the modern culture of efficiency. I was not convinced and decided to walk toward Asakusa, to see if the tradition was still intact as the town claims, to see if I could find a true old-school artisan who takes pride in his craftsmanship.

So here I was in Asakusa, to be precise I was in the older part of the town away from the touristy areas. I spotted a tiny obscure Buddhist store sandwiched between more prominent, franchised Buddhist establishments. I opened the old sliding door and inquired if they would look at my broken article. The proprietor didn’t even look at it, he simply declared “of course I can fix it.” He was indignant, as if to say my question was insulting. “We’ve been around, lady.” His indignation made me chuckle. “Sir,” I said, “so far everyone refused to repair it. I went to several places” “They are lazy pieces of shit, did you go to my neighbors first before you came to me?” “No, they didn’t look promising, I didn’t bother.” My answer pleased him and he started to warm up to me. “Now you found me. Well done, let me see what you’ve got,” said he. He took the ihai and handled it ever so gently as one would a newborn child. His compassion moved me. He was an old-school artisan who never forgot why we cared about mortuary tablets. In olden days, say amidst of the wartime firebombing for example, people ran back into the burning houses to retrieve them before salvaging any other household items, he never forgot that, and he instantly understood why I walked miles and miles before locating him.

My view of Asakusa changed after that. I decided to drop some US dollars like a real tourist and did quite a few touristy things, just to experience the genuine warmth and kindness its people claim to provide. I ate Anmitsu with a congenial old lady. Bought beautiful kon-peki chopsticks. At a kimono rental salon, the friendly hairdresser and I had a grand time. She was attentive, taking utmost care to dress me. “Who is going to take your picture?” She asked. “Nobody. I’m here alone.” “That’s a pity. Don’t worry. Ask one of those rickshaw brothers to take pictures. I know, I know, they are a bit rowdy, a bit much really, but they are good people. They wouldn’t mind.” And I believe her. I have no doubt those rickshaw guys are good people and would not have minded doing me a little favor, moreover, I believe they would have addressed me in the term of endearment I have not heard since my brother’s death.

Sensoji, Asakusa Tokyo, est. 645AD
金龍山浅草寺

(127 comments)

30 December 2022

This post is for my dear Russian friend Irina (@IceHeart). My cousin brought me the sweets. The streets are lined with camellia in Tokyo this month.
Photo: Japanese confection served with green tea and Camellia.

(72 comments)

26 December 2022

I averaged nearly 20,000 steps a day last week. Those steps were executed as I chaperoned my father on his trip to Kyoto. He could hardly ambulate without assistance and the trip was ambitious at the very least. Together we walked the treacherous footpaths of the temples and imperial villas in the ancient city.

Graveled paths and uneven stone steps rendered wheelchairs utterly useless. An imperial guard tsk-tsked as my father stumbled on the imperial moss. There was a tiny, pretentious stone bridge (of course), a naked bridge without rails, basically a stone slab over the pond too narrow for us to walk hand in hand. Miraculously he managed to cross the bridge without falling into the imperial koi pond. Chaperoning was all exhausting. I was getting irritated, irritated by the guard’s smug impatience and my father’s overconfidence. Plus my father was talking too loudly, bragging about his past glory, which included pathetic name dropping, etc, etc, stuff nobody cares about. I stopped being mortified by his narcissism years ago but I do loathe anything that disturbs soundscape, so I tersely told him to hush. My father is a parvenu who is not used to being told off. He was already in a foul mood anyway, now that I fueled his snit, a tantrum was to ensue.

We returned to our car and he was verbally abusive to our chauffeur. This is how his tantrums begin usually. Silently I composed an apology note to the chauffeur which I was going to send via WhatsApp later. The chauffeur was some sort of a saint, he slowed the car and announced to us that we were approaching the Shinto sanctuary my late mother adored. It was not included in our itinerary but I told him, “drop me here.” I left my father in the car and started walking towards the sanctuary alone, which infuriated him even more but I did not care. I needed my mother. How did she put up with dad for so many years? He is a monster, and that is a euphemism. He prevented me from attending my mother’s funeral out of spite (trivia: Jimi Hendrix’s dad did exactly the same and Jimi never forgave him). My father is capable of doing anything out of spite. I’ve been heartbroken for 7 years now, still haven’t forgiven myself for not attending my mother’s funeral. Forgiveness is such a vapid concept anyway, I couldn’t care less, but I desperately want my mother to know that I loved her more than anyone in this world. Adjacent to the shrine there is a primeval grove named “Forest of Atonement.” Mother often talked about the stream that runs through the grove. She wanted to bring me here. The stream was small and quiet, its bed as crimson as she described. The dusk started to descend. Mother receded towards the twilight that was erasing the vermilion Torii gate.

The chauffeur called. He informed me that my father decided to visit another place my mother liked, some obscure museum, and he took off all by himself, refusing the chauffeur’s assistance. “I can’t find your father,” said he. I was not concerned. “He will be okay, he is always okay,” I reassured him. Sure enough, my father emerged, his gait unsteadier than ever, appearing a little shook up. “I fell down,” he stammered. “I thought I broke my glasses.” The fall humbled him. He was quiet rest of the day and content with sightseeing without exiting the car. I watched him pressing his forehead against the car window, sometimes craning his neck trying to get a better view of the city, his mouth wide open like a child. Occasionally he mumbled to himself, “oh I see the streets Grandpa liked,” “I called my wife from that tower a week before she died, and she told me about the tiny garden over there.” He was tracing the paths that were loved by those who once cared about him. No, I and my father will never get along, but I discovered that maybe, maybe I do care about him after all, and that I will visit Kyoto again sometime in the near future, to trace the stone steps we walked, to reconnect with him, to try to hear his loud obnoxious voice traveling between the imperial pines.

Photo: Tadasu no Mori (糺の森) “Forest of Atonement” Kyoto, Japan

(62 comments)

15 December 2022

My father has a pedometer app now. Yesterday he registered >6,000 steps.
Until recently he was ventilator dependent and wheelchair bound due to a near fatal illness, and it is still difficult for him to ambulate. I assisted him to Somei Cemetery in Tokyo yesterday, where the cremains of my mother and brother were interred alongside those of many other ancestral members. It is an old cemetery and the cobbled passages between the plots are quite uneven, but my father managed to navigate the area without falling. He was very pleased with this accomplishment and he started singing most innocently. We do not get along but I do secretly admire his tenacity to overcome obstacles in any given situations.
My father is a survivor of the Great Tokyo Air Raid (1945); during the chaos of the firebombing, he was separated from his mother and fell into the Sumida River where countless bodies were floating. He was a young child then. I don’t know if the memory of the night haunts him or not, rather, it seems that he recollects the inferno as the testament to his own resilience.

Wooden pails at a cemetery florist (Somei Cemetery, Tokyo)

(83 comments)

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