End Jan 2022/Feb 2022
End Jan 2022/Feb 2022
Feb 2021
Feb 2021
Our sakura tree doesn't bloom abundantly this year. It looks poorly and pitiful. This must be due to the cutting my houseman made on one fork of its main branch. We saw white ants gnawing on that particular fork. Digging deeper into the branch, we saw the inside was just dry dust. It was eaten away internally. If we let it be, the white ants would have taken over the other fork as well. It has to go. This year, left with just one side, the tree seems to struggle into blooming, forcing itself to follow the flow of the season. Anyway, the top 2 images show how hard it struggles this year.
One particular characteristic of the sakura bloom in Okinawa is that it always coincides with the Chinese Lunar New Year. This means whenever the sakura blooms in Okinawa, it opens the spring season for the Chinese people.
There is no public holiday in Japan for the Lunar New Year even as there exist fishermen villages and communities that depend on the sea for their livelihood. The community of the fishing villages on the southern part of the main Okinawa island celebrate Lunar New Year or they called it 旧正月 or Kyu shogatsu. This makes me believe that Lunar New Year is a cultural event rather than a religious ceremony. The fisherman community here base their daily sea activity on the cycle of the moon, in fact, most calendars printed in Okinawa jot down the cycle of the new moon and full moon.
In another 10 days, our sakura blooms will wrinkle and fall off its branches. If you want to know about the cherry or sakura blossom in Okinawa, this link should be good for light reading.
Here's wishing friends who celebrate the Lunar New Year. Hoping the symbolic strength of the Tiger will win over the coronavirus and return back our travelling freedom again.
Haiku
On Lunar New Year
Tiger and Omicron War
Long fight of two years.
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