A day in a rural area

 Today my family visited my wife's aunt, who is my gardening teacher and an owner of a large-scale vegetable farm, to get rice husk.

 Inside a large green house which is designed for farmers, not for vegetables, her aunt and some of her friends were busy in packing their products, Komatunas. I wish I could have helped them but packaging vegetables neatly was more difficult than and I think so I should leave it to "veteran farmers" who acquired techniques because I know that beautiful appearance of their products determines sales amount in stores.



 When I see vegetables produced by my teacher, I always envy her. Because All of her vegetables look perfect! Her komatunas also had bigger trunks, leaves and the color were darker green than mine.



 Other vegetables and fruits in her farm were also beautiful! I'll introduce some of them which I was impressed with,,,,.

A shiny red chili, which looks like the picture of "Mark's Veg Plot Chilli Award"?

Giant leeks

A tunip

Daikon radishes are so think, long and fleshy.

Kiwi fruits beside her green house have grown and ripen well.

A plastic box is full of hundreds of persimmon fruits!

Visiting Toshodaiji-temple, one of the World Heritage Sites in Nara

 Today My family visited my father in law living in Nara where many famous tourism spots are located. Toshodaiji-Temple, which is not only one of them but is designated as the World Heritage Site by UNESCO, is located very near his house. The temple is most attractive spot for me since its serene, austere atmosphere created by its old and beautiful wooden temples and gardens. Today I visited there for searching for healing of my mind.

 We can see many old wooden structures in the precinct of the temple and most famous one among them is the Golden hall or Main hall, which was constructed in AD 759. It's not colorful, not golden-plated on its pillars and beams like other Buddhist temples but its beauty of austerity attracts many tourists and Buddhist prayers.

The Golden hall (mail hall) of Toshodaiji-temple.

Precinct of the temple

In the hall, we can see the Rushana Buddha statue/盧舎那仏. Most of statues of Buddha open their eyelids incompletely. According to the Buddhism doctrine, their incomplete eyelid opening represents achieving enlightenment and Buddha can see everything in the real world with his opened eyes and everything in his mind with his closed eyes.

 

 In the precinct of the temple, there are some gardens where we can enjoy many kinds of flowers, trees and their landscapes. Now in the mid of August, we can enjoy seeing lotus flowers. Lotus is very important plants in Buddhism because blooming lotus flowers told people the birth of Buddha according to the Buddhism doctrine.

Is it a shower head??

No, it's a receptacle of a lotus.

Some buds of lotus were found in lotus pond.
They are blooming in a few days.....

I'm very happy to see some flowers were blooming!

A dragonfly on an iris

 A green moss is incorporated so often in design of traditional gardens in Japan.  In the precinct of the temple we can enjoy a garden covered with green moss. I love a landscape of rocks and woods covered with beautiful green moss, which can create beauty of serenity and austerity.






















-- from iPod touch

Golden rice ears

 Golden rice ears swung by autumn wind.....

paddy field filled with water

 In Nara, an ancient capital city and my wife's home town, there are many rice paddy fields as well as old temples.

 I love to watch green rice plants swung by wind. We are gonna harvest them in nearly the middle of October.

 (above) Yakushiji temple and rice paddy fields.

 (below) A paddy fields near my wife's house.

launching my first blog on my small vegetable garden!

I start my first blog on my small vegetable garden I rent near to my house.

I began farming in Osaka and Nara in Japan last year and have experience of raising cucumbers, tomatoes, eggplants and so on.

I'm very happy if many people who are interested in farming as a hobby visit my blog and we can exchange ideas and opinions about farm and gardening.

I launched the blog not only for introducing my farming but also for keeping my English fluent.

If you find a mistype,grammatical errors on my English,Please tell me and correct it.