two glasses of wine…

it should be listed as a requirement on the CD jacket “best listened to slightly drunk, preferably on two or three glasses of wine, alone and without distraction”.

“From her place on the stairs

or sat on the back seat

Sometimes you’re only a passenger

in the time of your life”

“and the adrenalin rush

had left her exausted

when under the blue sky

nothing need be explained”

road

 

autumn

 

blows chilly and cold

 

 

it’s a shame…

when you stumble upon something so pretty, so unexpected.

you assume it’ll be there next year

forever.

in the grand scheme of things I don’t suppose

it was particularly important

and there are others

but like a stray cat that wanders by

or the surprising colour of the last light in the sky

life was just a little bit better

site sight

I could have lived in the city

a well paid job, a BMW, a skinny wife.

 

 

but then I would have to have paid to see this….

but I get it for free.

stray cats

some people are uncomfortable when everything is not in order

 

Rice harvest

it’s that time of year again…

slap a bit of colour on it

it’s just smoke and mirrors

without the mirrors

A quick guide to the Japanese judicial system using simple math.

Unlike the inferior systems practised in other lesser countries the Japanese judicial system is uniquely simple and is best described by two defining rules.

1: If you are poor, ordinary or otherwise of no consequence you are guilty and will be fucked.

2: If you are any of the following: A bureaucrat, a politician, a member of an “erai” profession or just plain rich you are either innocent or couldn’t help it.

If you belong to group 2 you may rape and murder hostesses in Roppongi quite freely.

You may be responsible for the deaths of others – as long as those “others” belong to group 1 and not group 2.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/2782802/Former-Mitsubishi-chiefs-convicted.html

You’ll only get a suspended sentence for that.

Stalking? No problem if you’re a bureaucrat or she’s a foreigner or otherwise of no consequence..

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20080809a2.html

Another suspended sentence? What a surprise!

If the members of group 1 are dirty, homeless, sick or otherwise useless a member of group 2 may kill upwards of 500 and still only receive 2 years in jail….suspended.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV-tainted_blood_scandal_(Japan)

This is as equally serious as a member of group 1 stealing a ¥98 eraser.

In simple math:

Failure to pay a traffic violation fine may result in a prison term calculated at one day per ¥5,000 of penalty.

Eg. a ¥60,000 fine would result in a 12 day stay in a detention centre. A prison.

If one day = ¥5,000 then two years = ¥3,650,000 (5000 x 730)

Therefore a prison sentence of two years for the causing the deaths of 500 people in the HIV scandal works out at…..a ¥7,300 fine per death (3.650,000÷500).

Things are much clearer in simple math.

local colour

Don’t go…

chasing waterfalls…

summer came…

and went

some people…

have have spent their whole life getting here.

someone else’s garden

Just in case…

you sometimes think we are somehow special…

if you take all the invention and technology embodied in the space race from day one it wouldn’t contain the complexity found in these few square yards of this ordinary garden.

YoYo

just a few…

small steps away

tiny

cute as a button

and not much bigger

just another day…

in Japan.

A mountain we couldn’t see.

Chicken nuggets with no sauce.

A town with nowhere to eat except a restaurant with no food

and a waitress who wasn’t a waitress.

A dog park with no dogs…

and a flower park with no flowers…

Still it was fun all the same. I couldn’t have had a day like this back home.

Too little, too late #2

Pham Thi Trinh’s story

I looked out of my house and saw my sister, Moi.

She was 14 that year.

An American was pressing on top of her.

She had no clothing on her.

At the time I didn’t understand what that meant.

My sister was trying to resist him.

After the American got up.

he put his clothes on….

and then he shot her.

I decided to leave my hiding place.

I saw my house had burned completely

and in the yard…..

my loved ones were burned to death.

My mother and my little brother

still in my mother’s arms,

my seven month old brother

whose body was half burned.

I didn’t know anything anymore.

I stood by my mother’s body and cried.

Not one of those resposible was properly called to account.

black