I am a potter, photographer and linguist. I speak Japanese, Mandarin, French, English as well as other dialects in each. I am interested in the language of minority speakers including Inuit, the Zhuang, the Okinawan dialect, Quebecois and many others. I like it when I hear people speak one language at home, another language in the street and a common language in the train stations, this gives people their vibrant culture and strong sense of identity.

This is the official blog of the Iroha Project. Please don’t forget to subscribe to my mailing list on the left. As much as I love what I do here I also like to eat so any small donation of 25 cents would be more than appreciated.

I’ve been reading Blithe Tomato by Mike Madison. A compilation of a series of short stories it is an insider’s look at farmers’ market society. I particularity like the section “Eat Bitterness” it is about how farmers are pressured to grow the sh-2 or super sweet gene variety of corn because that is what the consumers want. Unfortunately this gene us showing up in other varieties as well, for example beets, grapes and apples. On approaching the local supermarket the author asks what is the most popular grocery item – the reply being some super sweet cereal with a sugar content of over 60%. Well this doesn’t really surprise me at all and even though the author is American I can believe it still holds true for Canada as well. Face it – sugar, salt and oil are nearly the cheapest commodities anywhere also they are also the result of poor diets in the USA and Canada and perhaps other western countries too. In Chinese traditional medicine the Chinese say if it isn’t bitter and poor tasting then it isn’t working. I have to change this and to say somethings are naturally bitter, sweet and others are sour. If it in nature it was intended to be sweet, sour or bitter then don’t change it let it be. Well I find these to be entirely all subjective what is hot to one is not hot to another. What is bitter to one is sweet to another.