Author: TravellinPenguin

Monday, around lunchtime we fly out of Hobart for Tokyo, Japan. Mr. Penguin and I have always travelled to various countries on our own. Busses, Trains, Planes and booking.com have taken us through many countries. For Japan, because of the language neither of us speaks (though there will be lots of English there) and the masses of people, we decided to relax with an organised tour from a company in Adelaide, South Australia. We chose it because it has small groups. There is not supposed to be over 20 people on this 17 day journey (a “taster journey” as we think of it). We’ll see what area we enjoy and then perhaps go back in the future on our own. I love the fact they organise for us but my experience has shown me on every tour whether it be for days or minutes there is always one person. That one person who is in your face, talks all the time, gets lost and doesn’t get back to the bus on time. The general pain in the backside. I am looking forward to seeing who that person is. I know, a bit negative but it is a little game I play. The others will all be wonderful I am sure.

The cats have been taken to a cattery for the time we are away and the dogs will stay home with a house sitter who loves them. She works so we need the pet door open for them to come and go into the back yard. As our cats are not allowed to roam, living mainly in their home and outdoor cat enclosure they get boarded out. We tell them they are going to camp and leave it at that. They, of course are completely, unimpressed.

We will be in rural areas half of the time and in the cities half of the time. Three nights in each place pretty much. We fly into Tokyo and visit other cities. I thought if I am not too exhausted at night from the early breakfasts and the long hours of walking I will have the Penguin contribute to this post a bit. So hang on tight, here we go.

In preparation, I must admit there is little except clothes in the suitcase. My own ‘capsule’ wardrobe where everything goes with everything is rolled and bagged.  I do not read everything about a country before I visit it. I tend to get on the plane or in the hotel for the first night and then cram. Much like I did in university when something was due the next day. Quite often, I skid through life by the seat of my pants.

I picked this book up about two years ago when I saw it in a book shop in Sydney. I bought it because I love drawing and sketching. I would love nothing more than to be an excellent drawer and sketcher. I have decided I will take a small book and some pencils and sketch a few things as I go. I have had two lessons on You Tube and feel I am ready to hit the world. Haha, the circles will not be round, the cubes will look like they are about to collapse and the squares and rectangles will not have equal sides, I am sure. But I am going to do it. It will be fun. The pictures will make me laugh and no one needs to see them but I might share some of them to make you laugh. Go ahead, laugh all you want. I have always believed one should get out of their comfort zone and try whatever they love whether they succeed or not. Besides I know each and every one of you has something you can’t do so I stick out my tongue and say, “Nah, nah, nah? nah, nah.”

Tokyo on Foot by Florent Chavouet. Florent is a young French man who is in Japan for almost a year with his partner who is doing an internship. From June to December, 2006 (I believe it is) he gets a bicycle and a lawn chair and explores the neighbourhoods (his term, not mine) of Tokyo. He is very detailed in his sketching and there are lots of colours. I really love looking through this book. From temples to the cockroaches that infest his apartment.

He takes each neighbourhood, one at a time and begins each chapter with their local ‘boba’ (police station or service.) He has various poses for the policeman who introduces the chapter and they can be quite humorous.

From the back flap of the book:  Florent Chavouet is a young graphic artist and author living in Paris. When he returned from Japan, he realised that all the observing and sketching he had done had helped him develop his own visual style, so his stay there led not only to his discovery of a certain Tokyo but to his evolution as an artist. This is his first book. He is at work on his next one.

If you are interested in Japan, travels by bloggers, hilarious drawing by someone who does not know what they are doing or just following a little stuffed penguin who I now refer to as Penguino, then stay tuned for the next 17 days.

If you are completely bored and want nothing to do with any of us that’s okay too. I’ll be home again on the 19th.

For those spammers who sometimes read this blog and leave stupid messages the house will be inhabited by a determined house sitter and two rottweiller/doberman cross dogs who used to work for the police force. Go ahead, I dare you.

Wish the three of us luck and good weather and lots of scrummy Japanese food.

When it rains it pours as the saying goes. We are leaving for Japan on 3rd of April for 2 1/2 weeks. I can’t wait to get on the plane and fly out of here. Life has been chaotic. Rule no. 1 in this household. If there is a three day holiday weekend or a trip coming up you can bet one of the pets will get sick. True to form we took our wheezing, lethargic 12 year old terrier Molly to the vet to find out her mitral valve in her heart is leaking. The beginning of heart failure.  Over several visits of x-rays and ultra-sounds it has been sorted out and medication prescribed. So far so good. Thank goodness for pet insurance.

One of our members in our senior’s club died suddenly due to complications of a long term illness and his funeral was yesterday.

Then the photo club I belong to opened their big exhibition down at the wharf last night and we all have two hour shifts to man the exhibit in upcoming hot weather in the glass building it is housed in.

At this stage I take a deck of cards and throw it in the air. Did I mention I slept on my hip wrong and am hobbling around the house with a pulled muscle? Okay, whinge over.

I just started Robin Dalton’s book Aunts Up the Cross an older Australian book published by Text Classics. It is most entertaining but more on that later. This will be a tick against Australian Women Writers challenge.

Our book club will be meeting next week to discuss Songs of a War Boy another Australian story of a child soldier in Sudan who eventually came to Australia, learned English, finished school and became a well known lawyer and a 2017 nominee for Australian of the Year.  An amazing tale.

I threw my hands up (I was out of cards) over the book The Underground Railroad by Col Whitehead. I know, everyone loves it but me. The story irritated me to no end and the violence was increasingly sickening and I thought a bit gratuitous at times. After reading War Boy then moving onto this was just too much. When I was younger I was fascinated about the horrors of slavery in the United States (in that I couldn’t believe how bad it had been) years ago and I read everything I could find about it and the Civil War. I just can’t read anymore about it now and the fictional train that actually goes underground but you can look up out of it and see buildings was the last straw. I know metaphors and symbolism but I am just over it. Maybe I’ll pick it up again but I am so sick of cruelty to everyone I just quit!

I will scatter a few photos through here and suffice to say this blog may be erratic for the next month. I will post up some things of the trip after all the Penguin will be travelling and that is what this blog is about. Either traveling through countries or books.

I do have a lunch to attend today in a historic old town up the midlands of Tasmania today. Whisky tasting begins at 11:30 but I am not a whisky drinker and being on my motorbike it probably isn’t a good idea. Lunch should be nice

Our Play Reading class finishes Waiting for Godot this next Tuesday. I have enjoyed the reading of this play very much.

So enjoy the scattered photos, be kind to one another and I’ll be back before long.  I must run now, the dog just came out of the kitchen with kitty litter on his nose.

A French Translation

The Guardian says:

From his earliest childhood, Eddy exhibits all the classic symptoms of his stigmatised condition; his hands over-gesture, his voice is too high and he instinctively loathes the food, sexuality and clothes of his peers. In consequence, he is beaten, abused and terrorised. As a “faggot” or “homo” he is the lowest of the low; lower than women, lower than even an Arab, Jew or Algerian – everyone in the book, young Eddy included, is casually racist. Nothing equips him to protect himself from the shame and terror that are his constant companions, and – not surprisingly – he lives and breathes unqualified self-loathing. He makes repeated attempts to assume the proper masculine role that his culture requires of him, and every time he fails, he assumes the fault is entirely his.

The author is a 28 year old French man who has based this book on his own experiences. It is sometimes a difficult read because Eddy just puts up with so much.

I loved this book. I really loved it. I think it is the best book I have read this year. This boy has such a miserable family and school life and there is absolutely nothing he can do about it but survive. But Eddy does more than survive. He eventually escapes this life but his childhood makes one wonder what on earth is wrong with people. Why can’t they just open their eyes and their mind and quit being so damn ignorant all the time . This book will create rage in the reader. I think it should be required reading in every high school in the world.

The book is extremely well written. A point is never belaboured, the facts are simply told. It is interesting to see how he copes with everything. I don’t think I could watch a film of this book. The reader is always on the side of Eddy and we always want what is best for him. I am not going to say anything else about him.

If you want more information about this book before you read it you can read the
Guardian’s review of it here.   I think this is what literature is all about. Suspending ignorance in the name of love for the character. The real boy who exists behind the story and others like him.