flowers – Diary of a Norwegian in Japan

Summer is coming

We had our first mosquito in the house and I wasted no time in going online to find insect repellent. They have «anti-mosquito coils» here, or katorisenko. I also wanted the pig. You can use the coils with the holder that comes with it, but these pigs are very popular here (and cute!).

I had to cut back a lot of my plants (violets, roses, sanchu) due to these little bugs and some mold, and they are slowly coming back to life. I hope the bugs will stay away this time.

I also got some lavender from my mother-in-law, and I bought another one myself after a trip to the dentist. I must admit, I never realised that lavenders actually bloom! My image of lavender was just of the purple buds.

I also experimented putting a potato that had gotten a bit old in a pot and it is growing impressively! I might have to get a bigger pot for this, though I am not sure if this will even yield any new potatoes. I often go into things without any thought or research, it’s a weakness.

My little garden makes me happy, though I worry about the oncoming heat of summer, if my little plants will make it.

After deleting twitter and instagram off my phone, I have started a bit of a new morning routine. It consists of getting up as early as is possible (for me; 6am) and putting on the kettle. While waiting for the water to boil I out in a load of laundry (if the weather is nice) and then I go and clean off all the cat hair from my arm chair. After putting the hot water in the tea pot with the tea, I take out my dry mop and sweep over the apartment, and afterwards I use a brush on the carpet. Even with doing it every day it is amazing how much hair I get. Keeping a long-haired cat is no joke.

If it is a nice day I will also go out on the balcony and check over my little «garden» and water if necessary. Once the tea is done, I sit down in my newly cleaned armchair, put on something on youtube and knit. Or read, depending on the mood.

I have also started seeing hydrangeas around the neighborhood, signaling that the rainy season is close. Before coming to Japan I never paid much attention to the plants and seasons. It mostly was like, if the leaves were changing colour then it’s autumn, if it’s snowing then it is winter, if the snow is melting and dandelions are popping up it is spring, and if it is green and sunny and hot it is summer.

But here; hydrangeas (I wouldn’t even know the name of these flowers back home) mean it is rainy season, then comes summer with cicadas and sunflowers, maple leaves and cosmos and bright red spider lilies are autumn, violets and plum blossoms and camellia in winter, early spring with magnolia blossoms and full spring with its cherry blossoms followed by nemophila and wisteria.

Also wouldn’t be May without plums! Last year I made plum syrup which I enjoyed (more than when I made plum wine) so I got some plums and rock sugar to make again this year. I am thinking of doing it this weekend.

Long time no see

Last time I wrote it was spring, with its cherry blossoms and fair weather.

I was so excited about this but for some reason can’t get into it as I did with the first one, is it that different?

Now it is autumn, beloved autumn (let’s skip summer).

A lot has happened since spring, and some has stayed the same. I got a new job, which accounts for most of the changes in my daily life and wellbeing. Working from home should mean that I have a lot more time as there is no commute, but for some reason it was easier to get in reading on a commute than at home. I am still working on the work/private life balance.

I got my dream table, a table I had in a note in my evernote app years ago titled «future house ideas». I am living in the same apartment but the arrival of the table has brightened it more than I had imagined.

Darjeeling seems to approve of the table as well

My plant keeps growing and I had to repot her a little while ago:

We have been hiking lately so I have seen some beautiful views;

I did some doodling from May on my new phone, mostly of Darjeeling, and opened up a little Redbubble shop! I found doodling on my commute was very relaxing, but I often missed my stop.

It is almost time to break out the autumn fashion, and as usual I couldn’t help myself getting some new pieces this year either;

It’s still just a little too early, a little too hot, to start wearing it though.

I am still writing letters, and being as obsessed with stationery as always. Been buying autumn stationery and stamps like there is no tomorrow;

I would like to blog more, but not sure how to proceed, what to blog about, how often etc. Maybe the blog will be updated more this fall, or maybe not, I cannot say for certain. I have so many hobbies but so little time.

How is everyone doing so far this year, as we pass into autumnal bliss?

Spring is in the air, and on the trees

The plum blossoms are blossoming and the weather is going from winter chill to warm and breezy (and back again to the chill). It is spring.

This year I started a new job, though similar with the old one it is just different enough to not have me dread going to work. (Last year was rough)

I am keeping busy and the house and balcony is slowly filling up with flowers as well. I was walking down the main street on my day off last week and was drawn to the flower shop, and left with a little bouquet. I’m trying to propogate my pothos but it’s going slow and I might not be doing it right.

I also got a cute little bouquet for my birthday from Teddy’s mom

I am still writing a ton of letters, and I recently started, not collecting but, getting my own stamps so that even the postage is cute. I do feel the tendency to hoard them and not use them for what they are intended but I try to keep it in check.

Also thanks to my lovely penpals, my list of books-to-read, outside of my usual sphere of Japanese lit, is growing. I am halfway through Aoyama’s お探し物は図書室まで and loving it, and I started Circe by Madeline Miller and will be reading the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop, both recommended by penpals.

We got a tree for Darjeeling and she likes it, but finds it difficult to get down from the fourth step so we’re considering getting a second more climbable tree on the side

I would like to get back into studying this year, the textbooks on my shelf haunt me, but we’ll see. If only one could learn enough through just reading novels to pass N1 I would be so happy but alas. As they said in If cats disappeared from the world by Genki Kawamura; 「何かを得るためには、何かを失わなけれならない」(I think that’s the quote, it’s been years since I read it) meaning something like “no pain no gain”.

I still go to my piano lessons, though it doesn’t feel like I am improving much. But they’re only for fun anyway so. I’m currently practicing backnumber’s Happy End.

As I settle more into the new routine of daily life, I predict more tea and more books. And more walks. And more baking. I recently made chocolate chip cookies for the first time and they were addictive.

Just a little update before I head off to work. I would like to blog more but I don’t really know what to blog about. Maybe I’ll have a clearer vision in the future.

Until next time~

A farewell to spring flowers

Violets have long been my favourite flowers.

While the typical image of spring in Japan is that of the ever beautiful cherry blossoms, they only grace us with their presence for an instant. The flowers that greet you daily from every flowerbed winter throughout spring are the violets and pansies.

In front of every house, company, station; flowerbeds full of pansies and violets in every colour, a colourful blanket stretching across the city, prefecture, nation-wide.

My own balcony garden also consisted of these two. (And some orange daisies)

However, as spring was nearing its close, my little garden was devastaded by aphids. Too many to save my little flowers. I had to start over from scratch.

At the same time, the rain season rolled in, and with it hydrangeas took over. Everywhere you look there are pink, blue, and purple hudrangeas softening the blow of the gloomy weather.

The rain also seems to have taken away with it all the pansies and violets that used to cover the city. In their place, marigold and sunflowers are planted, yellow and orange to welcome in the summer and sun.

(There are a bunch of other flowers too but I do not know their names. I should invest in a flower dictionary.)

The season of violets have passed, at the home center where they had been so abundant earlier not a petal was left. The new season’s flowers are in and so my garden too must reflect this change. My marigold has yet to blossom for me, but the radiant yellow suns of the mini sunflowers have begun peeking out.

I wonder what changes autumn will bring?