So, has anyone else been watching
Heroes?
Hmm...a couple weeks ago I went to Yokohama with the Boy. Well, I went to Tokyo to visit the Boy, and we spent one of the days in Yokohama, which is a lot closer to Tokyo than I realized. (Only about 15 minute train ride. I knew it was close, but I figured it was more a thirty or forty minute ride....) We went to Chinatown, which was so packed...of course, being a Chinatown, there were dozens of restaurants eveywhere...and we arrived just at lunchtime. Lines out the doors. We ended up at a fun little 'food court' style restaurant, which had the
best gyoza ever. Gyoza are a type of pork dumpling. So very good. We also went to the Landmark Tower, the highest building in Japan. The western view from the tower has an absolutely magnificent view of Mount Fuji.
While we were in Tokyo, though, we went to an art exhibit...any photographers out there, you may want to take a look:
www.ashesandsnow.org/ &nb… only saw the preview for this one,
Ashes and Snow, but we're going to go see the full exhibit during Golden Week. Gorgeous work. I bought a copy of the soundtrack that goes with the 'movie'...some lovely work by Lisa Gerard. Very peaceful. The regular exhibit that we saw was based on Laughter in Japanese Art...some very interesting stuff, ranging from old haniwa figurines to some very odd contemporary art.
Ahhh...and I'm getting nervous. Next Saturday...I'm testing for my black belt.
There's so much to remember...I've been studying...hope I'm ready.
I've been reading a lot of Arthurian again recently. I finished reading
The Mabinogion and now I'm on to Mary Stewart's
Crystal Cave series, based on Merlin's story. Also pulls a LOT from
The Mabinogion. Almost done with the second book. I began to notice, in the first volume...women seem to get portrayed...rather negatively. I'm still trying to figure out why, exactly...the author is a woman, so...why make so many of the female characters so manipulative...in a negative sense? It makes me a little uneasy, reading it...there's a very clear double standard for the women in the books. I'd expect such portrayals of characters like Morgan from mediaeval texts, but from something written in the 70's? It's at it's clearest comparing Uther and Ygraine...Uther sends his son away, he's being kingly, even if he's willing to forget about Arthur if he has another boy. Ygraine agrees to send her son away, she's a big bloated pregant woman who doesn't care about her kids, only about being Queen.
It's probably bothering me since I know the author is female...granted, she's writing from Merlin's 'male' perspective, but even there she's doing some rather funky stuff with his sexuality. I don't usually read books searching for the 'human sexuality' angle, but in some Arthurian (coughMistsofAvaloncough) it's hard to miss. The books are well written and interesting...but this is just niggling at me. Hmm, maybe I can find some sort of information on Mary Stewart or some sort of essays on the books. It just strikes me as odd.
Hmm...well, now that I've babbled and probably bored you all with my book musings, I'll be moving along.