Travellin' Penguin

BOOK OF THE WEEK

I was recently reading an article in the New York Times newspaper about a woman in New York City that had established a women’s only apartment community. It was as much a supported community as accommodation only. The rise in homelessness of more senior women was the impetus to get this project underway. At the end of the article there were recommendations for a few books that are in this vein of thought.

One of them sounded interesting and was available on audible. Narrated by the author. I had a credit so decided to listen to it. The book I chose is a non-fiction memoir of two Korean women in Seoul that decide to pool their resources and buy a house. 

Two Women Living Together by Kim Hana and Huang Sunoco isn’t a novel with fictional characters. It details their unconventional co-living arrangement.

Kim Hana is a Korean writer, podcaster and “chosen family” partner who moved in with Sunwoo in mid life to share a home, domestic life and experiences of friendship, work and everyday routines. 

Hwang Sunwoo is co author who is also a Korean writer and editor who, after years of living alone chose to buy a home together with Kim Hana and share a life not defined by traditional marriage or family roles.

Women in Korea are expected to marry and settle down with families. These families involve the care of children and often living with a mother-in-law.

They wanted to avoid this lifestyle and keep their independence. However it is an expensive choice and that was the main reason the two friends believed they could make shared living work.

The other characters were their four cats. The cats are repeatedly mentioned throughout and are a significant part of their family. 

The structure of the book is composed in alternating brief essays with a focus on the lived experience, personalities and evolving partnership of Hana and Sunwoo. 

***

I really enjoyed this story. It moves along nicely, it is well written and I enjoyed the two women. It was interesting to see how they problem solved. The main problem they needed to work on together is that one woman is very neat and tidy and the other leaves everything out and doesn’t take care of much. The women hadn’t thought of these issues before they moved in together. There were other issues they worked on together but it is overwhelmingly a story of the importance of friendship and the ability to create a life outside of expected norms. 

LIFE IN HOBART

The past couple of weeks have been quite hectic with more events happening than I wanted. Though I did want to participate in all of the events!

There were a couple of events at Fullers that were interesting. Two book launches in particular. One was A Brain that Breathes: Essential Habits for an Overwhelming World by Australian author Jodi Wilson. Four of us attended this believing it would be on the scientific side. However it turned out to be a bit too new “agey” and aimed at younger people immersed in families and full time jobs. Not as relevant as us retirees who have time on our hands to indulge in all the communing with nature, reading books, taking a walk in the rain she prescribed in order to keep our sanity. Pretty average we thought.

The second launch was much more interesting with the Hobart launch of Niki Sava’s book Earthquake. The launch was moved to a large conference room of a local hotel as so many people attended. She was in conversation with Sabra Lane. Sava is an Australian journalist, author and former senior advisor to Prime Minister John. Howard. As this launch was on the same day as the change in leadership of the Australian liberal party there was a lot of interest and the conversations were both enlightening, interesting and funny. 

PHOTOGRAPHY

There wasn’t a lot of photography but I did do a random walk from South Hobart into Hobart City. The photos below show you some of the neighbourhood of South Hobart and where I walked. I quite enjoy a random walk and sometimes while on the bus home I’ll snap a photo out the window every time the bus stops. This changes with every bus ride.

A local church.

TRAVEL

My travels have been quite limited as of late but I am going on a photography workshop on Maria Island very soon. Maria Island is a small island off the east coast of Tasmania and is known for its scenery and wildlife, including wombats and birds. Those photos will be featured in a coming post. 

You can see Maria Island off the east coast.

PENGUIN’S  QUESTION OF THE WEEK

What did you stop and look at on your last walk? What is the last book you put your hand on?

Clouds and 13 degrees C. (55.4 F).

I’m just sitting here with my Sunday morning coffee, reading the digital copy of the New York Times. I don’t read anything political going on over there as it is too overwhelming. But I really like the book section. 

There are so many books by American authors that I seldom hear about here. It is good to know there are those in America who can be a lot more intelligent than the ones I see on the news. 

I found a couple of books I put on a wish list. 

But back here in Tasmania- I just finished an audible book by Sally Vickers that is a real comfort read. It is called The Gardener and it has dormant on my shelf for some time. It was narrated by the author, who did have a good speaking voice. ( A lot of times authors are better writers than speakers. You just don’t want to listen to a squeaky voice for five or six hours.)

The Gardener reminded me of Iris Murdoch’s The Sea, The Sea without the awful food. Two sisters leave the big city and buy a property in a small village, in an old house with a large garden.. One a freelance illustrator who is working for an author of a children’s books who writes about elves. She is very bored by this work.

The other high flying, rich sister commutes from the big city to the property every other week or so.

The sisters have been at odds with each other for years as one was her dad’s favourite and one her mother’s favourite. You get the picture. Throughout the book the sisters renovate the property, put in a garden with the help of a young migrant Muslim man who has his own storyline and argue a lot. There are a couple of other storylines, one a feral child and another a retired old school teacher.

By developing the house and garden, making new friends in the village and a lot of problem solving, they work out the differences in their relationship. Of course one sister thinks the other sister had the best life compared to their own struggle. It is not an original story, but I liked the writing. The characters are well developed and I feel I’d know them if I met them in town. It was just a very comfortable read.

A lot of bloggers I follow read a lot of books. I am happy with one book a week. I spend a lot of time each week studying photography. Videos, instruction, you tube people I follow. One book a week is enough.

Also, so many print books have such small print now and novels cost so much here, as well as my poor reading eye sight, I am enjoying listening to more and more books. I do puzzles, work on my journals, colour funny little books while I listen. The combination of it all is really relaxing and helps me get to sleep at night.  

I have a pretty good sleeping schedule, recommended by my GP (as I have never been a strong sleeper) to go to bed at a fixed time and get up at a fixed time. So it is midnight- lights out, alarm at 8 am or 8:30. I listen to a half hour of a podcast but often don’t make it through that 30 minute segment. I listen to a few book review podcasts.

I coped a lot better when working as I had structure and schedules. Once retired these tend to go out the window. Being neurodivergent, I am so much happier with my schedules I have set up for myself with the help of psychologists and general practitioners.

I heard an interview with Australian past woman of the year, Grace Tame on the ABC radio the other day. She is neurodivergent and is in the process of developing a series of episodes of a podcast about neurodivergent women. So many women who weren’t identified during their younger years have now been diagnosed and are changing how they are structuring their lives to cut down on a lot of angst and stress. I am looking forward to hearing what she says.

Isn’t it funny how one can go into stream of consciousness writing when typing out a blog post. I will now move on.

February is looking to be a very busy month with a couple of senior group activities, several Fullers book launches, one about brain development, one political one and one Tasmanian indigenous historical one. More on those once I’ve attended. I am still working with my trainer and we continue to enjoy weekly coffee. The things we talk about that cause belly laughs is always a great way to finish a week. Especially as I suffer through the pilates and Barre’ classes earlier in the week. 

Our diabetic cat is settling into his routine of testing his morning urine from his litter box and giving him his meds at the same time each day. He is doing well. Our adopted cat Pickles has certainly adjusted to her new home. She is very funny as she runs with the dogs or stalks them. She has many little games in her head she enjoys.

Pickles in her large outdoor enclosure for the first time.

Photography has been a bit quiet but I do have a couple of photos to share with you below.  As we all know- life goes on!

Our photo club spent a morning photographing the boat houses at Cornelian Bay and the river Derwent.

Have a good week everyone. I’ll also put up Penguin’s question of the week. I enjoy reading your answers. 

Penguin enjoyed visiting the sisters old home.

Question of the week. Do you have a structure with your reading time or do you just grab a book when the mood grabs you?

Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner.

I finished this….finally. Did I enjoy it? Can’t say that I did. I usually think of story lines being linear or ‘horizontal’. If this story can be visualised I’d say there are several vertical tangents in it. Standing side by side. But they didn’t seem to connect.

This is the story defined by Wikipedia:

Plot and Setting

“The story is narrated in the first person by Sadie Smith, a 34-year-old American undercover operative who now works freelance for shadowy clients. She’s sent to southwestern France to infiltrate a radical, self-sufficient commune called Le Moulin—a group of activists resisting corporate land grabs and industrial agriculture. Sadie’s mission is to provoke and destabilize the group, gathering intelligence and pushing them toward actions that her handlers can exploit. 

However, as she becomes more enmeshed in the commune’s life and relationships, the line between her assignment and her own sense of self begins to blur.”

Did I want to finish it? No. But it is for book club so I persevered. I didn’t like Sadie. She was all over the place. She really played people and I just didn’t see the point. The other characters seemed sketchy. Did not connect with any of them. I would love to talk to someone who loved this book so they can tell me why. The book group discussion should be fun.

Photography

I had two days out with two separate clubs this week. Last Sunday one group went to a spot along the Derwent River called Cornelian Bay. There are several varieties of birds along the banks. I enjoy seeing the black swans. There are colourful boat houses too. I’ve not edited all the photos yet but will share two.

Then on Wednesday another club group went to Mt Field national park. There are a couple of beautiful waterfalls there. Those pics are still in camera as I haven’t had time to download them yet. Hope to share soon.

Life in general

Our big old Grizzy cat who has recently been diagnosed with diabetes is settling into his routine. He sleeps separately from others at night as we test his urine each morning. Then at 4:30 pm he gets his medication. i chose 4:30 as we’re generally home at that time. Too late for lunches or other appointments, too early for night out. The new medication (to Australia) is working so no needles.

I got to training at the gym a couple of times this week. I had to see my gp to adjust my blood pressure meds time as I was getting very light headed doing the squats, etc. I’m already the oldest person in my classes and the last thing I want to do is fall on my face wearing my Target leggings and faded, old t shirt in front of the young people in their specky Lululemon gym gear.

So far, so good.

Looking forward to

The Fullers book shop events are starting up now and I’m booked into a couple of them with Mr P and a couple of friends. I’ll share those later.

Another three friends and I are doing something really silly soon for an afternoon tea event at one’s home. You are probably familiar with the Cozy Colouring books that are everywhere in stores like Kmart and Big W and all over social media. They are little square books with simplistic pictures of cozy scenes. Bears, cats, etc. People colour them in very creative ways. No more worrying about staying in the lines. It now goes deeper than that. Four of us, me in my 70s, two friends in their 80s and one 92 yr old, are going to sit at a table with our cozy colouring books and many pens, acrylic markers, etc and see what we can share. Looking at spots, stripes, shading, snow flurries or sun beams all while enjoying a glass of sparkling or coffee and cake or all three. We are looking to do things together that make us crack up laughing. This should do it. I’ll have to share the results. (Maybe).

Here are a couple of examples of finished pages from looking on google.

My coming week TO DO list

*** To pick a couple of new books to begin

To pick up a couple of Cozy colour books at Big W. It is near the dog beach so will take dogs out first. Don’t worry, dogs won’t be left in hot car. They have an underground cool car park and this errand won’t take more than 10 min.

The dogs love the dog beach.

*** Need to get to the gym a couple of times and get some walks in

*** Edit photos from Cornelian Bay and Mt Field to share.

*** Continue the photography/software education from you tube I do regularly.

*** Keep my journals updated

*** Continue home and pet care for the week. See what everyone needs.

Have a good long holiday weekend to my Aussie friends and all the best to everyone else.

Question of the week. Do any of you still draw or colour or do something else to exploit your inner child??