This morning I found a new word in my dictionary – ‘bittersweet’. It is a beautiful and a sad word. And it is how I feel now.
Life is sweet here in Sydney in Australia for some reasons.
Tosh is here. She is the stone in my world I may hold when I feel the world wishing to sweep me away into the confusion. She kisses me and uses the soft voice to tell me all is fine.
The air here is clean and fresh. The sky is so blue like the clothes of a baby boy who just arrived from his mother’s body. It is soft blue and so bright the light. I will shop for hats today to cover my face from the powerful sun.
In Sydney the people are friendly. They smile a lot when I talk to them. It is hard to understand when they speak. The sound is difficult to catch and they talk very fast not like my tutor in Tokyo. The sound is not so clear like the English news programs. Our apartment has a TV inside but I do not look at it. Tosh enjoys the news programs and business. I read my book by her side. I ignore the noise of TV.
In Sydney my eyes enjoy so much to see the golden hair girls so tall and pretty. Tosh knows I like to look at beautiful girls. She does not mind. She knows me well. She knows I cannot resist to look at beauty. We will visit the beach in the weekend. Maybe there I will become crazy. *giggle*
Life is bitter here in Sydney for some reasons.
My home is far away. It suffers and I may not help. I send a lot of money for the charity to help. But. It is not help by my own hands. Only with my hands do I know the joy I may give for comfort those suffering people in the north. Maybe not joy to give. But. Take away a little suffering for a time. Only money I may give and the warm sun from my heart.
Friends I may not see for coffee or drink or dance and laugh and shout the stupid words. Stories of friends are not same from reading. From the mouth is so funny and shocking. I miss this.
I must watch the internet for real news of what is happening at home. It is not the same.
I miss the peaceful feeling I have when I may see the palace of our kind Emperor and Empress in the morning when I run around and around the park outside the palace.
I miss so very small things. The signs for the streets. The machines on the street with drinks inside. I do not see them in Sydney. The sign of Lawson Station convenient store where I buy the cigarette. I miss the sound of the noodle eating slurp slurp. I miss the sound of people talking. My favorite cigarette cannot find here. So many things I do not see here. I miss them all.
~~ @ ~~
In the morning after I kiss Toshiko goodbye and she goes out to her office I dress in my running clothes and I run and run and run.
I walk on a street called Bligh Street and then Bent Street and then Phillip Street and go over the road to the place that they have ferries. It is called Circular Quay. By my right side there is a wide path. I begin slow running. It is called jogging I find from my tutor before. I do jogging and soon I arrive before the great building they call Sydney Opera House. OMG! This building is so beautiful. I do jogging around like a circle. My eyes see the harbor. My nose can feel the smell of salty water. I love this smell.
Beside the water there is a path I may follow. It goes far along the water. I do not listen to the music. I listen to the sound of people and boats and birds. The bird they call seagull is all over. I enjoy the sound of their calling. Trees are so many by the path. I run and run and run on the path. Then. I turn inside the big park they call Royal Botanic Garden. Inside there is so beautiful. Trees and grass are all over. I follow the path until I reach the big white building they call the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. It is a special music school for students of great skill. Then. I go right once more and run and run past the building they call Government House.
The path will return to before the Sydney Opera House. But. I do not stop here. If the day is beautiful I will run 2 or 3 times around this path I choose. Must be minimum 2 around. I love running. You know this already. If I do not choose to turn so soon to the Sydney Conservatorium of Music I will run far along to a place like a big park. It is called The Domain. Nearby there they have also the Art Gallery of New South Wales. I did not go inside there yet. Tomorrow I will visit to there. To run around Sydney Opera House and The Domain and go around I may use 2 hours for 2 times around. If I am lazy I will choose this way. Really I wish for 3 times around.
Then. My body will so tired. These legs will so tired. All over my body will shine in the sunshine cover all over with sweating. Inside my little backpack I keep my water and my cloth and my hat. Also sun block. Here it is a must they told me. The sun is so bright it can hurt the skin. I run and wear the hat. I must be so funny to see. This short thin Japanese girl wear the running suit like black skin so tight on the body. Then. The sports hat and little backpack. Sweat on the body and face. Hair tie up in the back. Not so pretty I think. *giggle*
After the run is finish I stop by the cafe by the Circular Quay. There I may enjoy the delicious coffee also maybe little bit cake. Wear my sunglasses. Look to the harbor. Relax after running. So strange. In Sydney I may not enjoy the cigarette when I have the coffee. I may only enjoy the cigarette outside the restaurant. Maybe it is not so bad. But. I enjoy the cigarette with coffee. Ok it is different place.
Oh so strange also. So many men wish to talk with me. So many times I do not understand what they are talking. Sometimes they invite me to enjoy beer with them. Ok I am not so stupid. But. How to say no and do not make offend to them? Mostly I only say Japanese talking. They go away soon then. Naughty Yumi. *giggle*
What do I think about this new home this Sydney? I like it. It is not my real home of course. But. It is beautiful. I may easy relax here. The new ipad Toshiko buy for me can easy go with me in the backpack not so heavy. I may sit and internet and read my book and listen the music.
It will do.
~~ @ ~~
愛の生活 – Ai no seikatsu – love life
Later, Yumi
It sounds like you are adjusting to your new life in Australia, Yumi. Many people also call Australia by the name, “Oz.” My neighbours who live across the hall from me are from Australia, but not from Sydney. Do you remember when my friend Kimberly stopped in Singapore to visit me about six months ago? She was my best friend from childhood and I hadn’t seen her in like 20 years. She lives in Sydney now, not too far from the Opera House.
One of the things I noticed about Japan when I lived there was how many people smoked inside. It is not like that in most countries, actually. They do not smoke inside in America or here in Singapore either. I think most places do not allow it anymore because of “secondhand smoke” and how dangerous it can be for other people to breathe the smoke. Maybe this is a good time for Yumi to give up her unhealthy habit?
I know what you are going through missing all those things from home, Yumi. On Tuesday this week was three years since we moved to Singapore. Before that, I was in Tokyo for a little less than a year. I have been away from my home country for almost four years now. A lot has changed since then. My friends and I are not as close as we used to be, but I have found new friends. These friends do not replace them, but they are very special to me and because most of them are also from another country, they know what I am going through living in a country which is not my home country. Now you will also understand what that is like. (Of course, I think you did this once before also, if I am not mistaken.) Maybe one day you will feel comfortable sending me your address and you will allow me to send you a small box with some things I really enjoy about Singapore. I love to send “care packages” to my friends to show them that I care for them. It is nice to receive something in the mail, especially when you are so far from home.
Very good to read more words from you, Yumi. I have been very busy and have been trying to stay off the computer as much as possible because it only makes the pain worse, but medicine is making it better so maybe I will come back a little more often now.
xx
Oh dear Akina. I did not know of new pain for you! You cannot type with it? Oh my poor dear. Do not give pain to yourself writing so much to me. A few words will do. Each one is a drop of sunshine. A little sunshine is pleasant and healthy.
It has been important to be positive recently. My new doctor here (told to me by my doctor at home) told me it is too easy to ‘slip into despair’ (this is beautiful and sad words yes?) when I am away from so many dear things. She is right. The strong spirit I build for so long has been so weak since March 11. Their pain has been my pain. But. It is not real. I dishonor them to call it the same pain. I can only share my heart feeling. And. Hope they are ok in the north. So far north now.
So. Yumi will be strong in the heart like the tree in the field who will shake but will not fall. In my writing now you will see soft words from the strong heart. I will find the strong spirit of Tohoku people! Nature will be close to the heart once more.
Smoking I had done for many years. After I was split from my first gf and I was alone in Tokyo I begin to smoke. Then with the band all did smoke. It is not so strange. But. Yes. You are correct. It is not good for health. Maybe here I can stop it. You know Akina smoking is something deep for me. Toshiko lives inside my heart so deep, deeper than any thing. But. Deeper is some deep pain from young. There the smoking can give the comfort. Maybe in later time Tosh will swim that deep. For now it is a place of smoke and darkness. But. Enough of dark for now.
I do not smoking in our home. Tosh does not like it. So. I stand outside in the night air and make little clouds.
Akina I do not remember Kimberly. I am sorry. Maybe Sydney is strange for her too. By the Opera House is a beautiful place. In some way I like now to be a stranger in this place. Only Tosh and me and all others I see like some old day sailor who will see the new place first time. They are strange. And they speak strange. Their custom is strange. I like this. Every day is explore. I enjoy to discover alone the new places. So exciting. In the night time I do not go alone. I do not know it so well yet.
I did not ask before. Why did you live in Japan? If you do not know the language of my country it will be very difficult to live there. You enjoy Singapore I think. You stay there so long. Will you stay there all of the life? Yes. I did stay away from my home one time before. But. Not for so long time as this time will be. With Toshiko we can move fast. She told me other offices wish for her to work there. But. She does not wish to move so much. Not with me along. I do not wish to hurt her career I told her. She smiled to me and told me it is fine. Ok.
Ha! Maybe I get old now. Before I am the bitch. Take care myself. Drink. Party. Foul language. Endless sex. Party drugs. Now. I am different. I hope different is better. I wish to be better. Still. I live in a cave of my own mostly. Not many may enter that cave. Tosh, you, friends at home. That is all. Oh and nature. One day the cave may become an open field. But. Now it is a cave. There is light at the opening.
“Care packages”. This is a good sound. Please do not understand wrong Akina. Things to me now have no meaning. Precious to me is the kind word of a friend. Love from the heart is higher than any object. That is why I take Grandson Stone back to his home. He is inside my heart. The memory of he is he. In this same way you are real to me Akina. You are inside my heart more real than objects. Just in this way also I do not write on paper. Internet is my paper. Maybe you think I am strange. Really I am I guess. But. Heart is my safest place. If all around me is destroy the heart will keep all of it. In the times I am down in illness the things in the heart help me return to light. Akina you already sent me so many gifts. I look and they are there every day. In my heart.
Please dear Akina take care that pain. I will look from my window at the harbor and I will send thoughts for heal you over the sea.
xxx
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