Question: What do you most like about your partner?
Answer from F (18, after some deliberation): His feet.
Answer from H (50 something, spontaneous): The long time we have been together.
We went to watch the kite flying at Sagami River the other day, which seemed to illustrate some of the significant differences between humans and the rest of the living world - while most organisms aim for the efficient use of energy, many human activities often appear to be irrational and senseless on the one hand, but filled with optimism and hope on the other. Huge resources and amounts of time had gone in to attempting to fly enormous kites, up to one ton in weight and 100 tatami mats in area - against all odds and in defiance of logic and experience they battled on in a desperate attempt to get them off the ground and keep them there for a few seconds.
I guess they were quite efficient at getting large numbers of people together on a rather wet and blustery day, to scratch their heads and wonder what they were doing there.
We went sailing in Sagami Bay and snorkelling in the Izu Peninsula over the last couple of days - and how beautiful it was - like diving through a membrane, a thin curtain, separating two co-existing worlds, whose occupants are largely ignorant of each other. We snorkellers and divers are the lucky ones, the papalagi, swimming, floating in a 3D world of art - everything is beautiful - the fish, crabs, rocks, squid, puffer fish, rockfish, sea weed, shells, urchins... and such abundance, depth and variety of colour.
Could be a moral there - look within, don't go by first impressions, go deeper, further - seek the beauty below the surface of things, etc.
