gym people

I have started going to gym. Its very odd. But nice. It started when I was deeply miserable and I hated being here so desperately I wanted to rip people's heads off - but you can't. The gym was the next best option on terms of stress relief. I am no longer hating it here by the way. Must have just been the winter.
I'm getting all kinds of new muscles (thanks to my genes, I sprout fat leg muscles by just looking at the rowing machine). I try to stretch them out - make them long and balletic by stretching for at least half an hour. This is also a great time to stare at the other people in the gym. I don't feel bad about staring because they ogle me shamelessly. So I sweat more than anyone they have ever seen. Must they really make me feel so so very alien? I don't know if I will ever get used to these stares.

So when I am staring - getting my own back, there a some specific people I like to stare at the most. The first one is the fittest octogenarian alive. A leetle old lady with a bad pot haircut that can bench her body weight and run on the stair master for what would probably equal forty temples' worth of stairs. She's supple too, folding flat onto the floor between her legs if she wants to whilst staring at my boobs and tummy that prevent me from getting anywhere near that far. Next I like to stare at a man who is square in shape. I think he is a boxer or he likes to pretend to be a boxer. He wears leg warmers and doo-rags and likes to punch the little scrotum shaped punching ball a lot. He doesn't do any cardio, if he did he might loose his perfect rhomboid proportions. There is a very good looking young guy who likes to work on his carves and stretch. I like to stare at him. He is slightly mysterious and very ridiculous because he wears sunglasses and a beanie for the entire duration of his work out. A mother and daughter duo are often at the gym while I am there. The mum wears normal outside clothes - flannel shirts and cords and is there only to look after her daughter who has some kind of muscular dystrophy or something. She's a trooper though, the girl. She does bike, treadmill and stair master for ages in her peculiar jerky way. the mum just sits idly drinking tea. I'm sure she would help her daughter out if she needed it but she clearly doesn't. One of my students has started coming to the gym. No, he has probably been coming for ages but recently our times have overlapped. I guess he's been coming for ages because he is almost as fit as the octogenarian. He likes to walk around on his hands and he does his exercises according to an elaborate set of notes he carries around in a slim red file.

As you can probably tell from the patrons, this aint no Virgin Super Active Delux. I hope, with summer approaching, that is has air conditioning.

cherry blossom picnic and a bit of badminton

picture c/o Nick Bradley.

(an extract from an email to Mia)

I had a beautiful picnic on top of a mountain this weekend with a big lolloping bunch of expats. We noised and messed and yet the Japanese still love us. We are untrained puppies. The picnic was in honour of the cherry blossoms which are waning now. Saturday was an exceptional day to watch the change - in the morning the entire park was bright and shining with fat petals but as the day progressed the breeze sent them dancing from the branches into our hair and our open beers. By the time we left, late in the evening, the trees were more leaf than flower. Spring turned into summer right before my eyes. It was beautiful. And also cunningly sad somehow. The death that was wrapped up in the life of it.

On Sunday I prepared my balcony for my parents imminent arrival. It was a real dump site with black muck on everything, old cigarette butts and dead plants. Now it has super retro green astro turf on the floor and everything is clean (I even swept the walls!) I'm gonna plant basil and other things once I have properly aired and fertilized the soil in the window boxes (guess who's been reading about gardeing on the internet?). Im also coveting a wooden bench that has been lying outside my apartment building for the last few weeks. It'll go just poifectly with the fake grass. Gunch helped me word a little note that I have now attached to the bench. It says 'This bench is too good to waste! I want it. If it has not moved by Sunday I am going to take it with much thanks." . I attached the last of my South African beaded brooches to the note...just to let them know I am from a poor place but my heart is pure. Gunch says leaving little love notes on abandoned bicycles and furniture and things is not all that unusual and can sometimes lead to new friends. Oh Japan you sweet thing!