I joined a tour group which started in Tokyo. To help with jet lag, my daughter planned my trip from SFO to arrive at Tokyo two days earlier than my tour group. As such, I also planned a two-day Tokyo trip for myself: I bought a ticket to see the TeamLab Borderless light show; I am going to buy rare gifts and to catch special Pokémon at the Pokémon Centers in Tokyo； I am going to eat Wagyu beef, to drink sake, and to wander the streets of Tokyo; I am going to visit the Tokyo Iris Garden and many other gardens…

Tokyo’s humid and muggy weather challenged the carefully planned outdoor trips and its complex subway system challenged me more, as I don’t like to ride on subways and easily get lost. Plus, Tokyo’s parks close around 5 p.m., so I didn’t have time to visit many parks in Tokyo. As a result, I only visited Hinocho Park (which I stumbled upon) and the Tokyo Iris Garden.

When I learned about Tokyo’s Iris Garden during the pandemic, I imagined the irises, shaded by trees, along winding paths, and beside flowing little streams, would create a magnificent, layered sea of ​​iris flowers during their blooming season. I was eager to see my imagination come to life, so visiting the Tokyo Iris Garden was on the top of my 2-day Tokyo to-do list.

It turns out the iris garden is inside the Meiji Jingu Inner Garden. Although the iris season had passed, I still bought a ticket to see the narrow, winding garden nestled in a shallow area, lush with iris leaves. Strolling along the edge of the iris garden, which was so different from my imagination, I felt that I teased myself using overactive imagination and I laughed silently. When I saw the unique names of irises: Kamari Nishiki, Satsuki Haru, Wada Tsukai, Sunset Stream, Fukamado Beauty, Monkey Dance, and Okitsu Shiranami, I stopped to take pictures and imagine the shapes and colors of the flowers that matched the names, immersing myself in the virtual game of Flower Delight.

(Names of various irises in the lush, leafy little garden.)

While passing by a large bush of after blooming season kerria in a corner of the Iris Garden, I recalled how I first learned what kerria flowers look like during the pandemic lockdown, and the places I’ve seen them: on the side of the entrance of corridor pavilion in Zigong Park, outside the Brandeis University campus in western Massachusetts, in front of the Wall of Love in the Jehan Rictus garden square in Montmartre, Paris, France, and the lyrics “Clusters of kerria, misty morning, quiet waterwheel huts” in the song of “Spring in the North”. “Flowers delight me like a virtual pen, repainting vividly the previous sightseeing of flowers in my memory and bringing joys back again.” Thinking of the longer adjectives that will be associated with this bush of kerria in front me: the kerria flowers by the Iris Garden, in the Meiji Jingu Inner Garden, in the Meiji Jingu Shrine, Tokyo, Japan, I can’t help but smile. The striking beauty of Kerria is unforgettable for flower lovers, as I still remember the large bush of blooming kerria flowers I saw in Zigong Park in my childhood. As a flower lover with good memory, I felt even in their off-blooming season, flowers can still delight me.

(A bush of kerria flowers, past their blooming season, next to the Iris Garden, in Tokyo July 22, 2025.)

(Kerria flowers blooming in the rain outside the Brandeis University campus in western Massachusetts, April 29, 2021.)

(Single-petaled kerria flowers in full bloom in front of the Wall of Love in Paris. 04-18-2022.)

There is a thatched pavilion high above the Iris Garden. Its thick thatch reminds me of the line “The triple thatch on my roof blew away” from Du Fu’s “Song of the Thatched Cottage Destroyed by the Autumn Wind.” I suspected this pavilion might bear traces of Du Fu, as his poem “The country is broken, but the mountains and rivers remain…” is often found in Japanese junior high school language textbooks.

The Inner Garden has few buildings, but abundant flowers, trees, and mosquitoes. The interplay of cicada and bird calls creates a low-key, natural beauty. I read in the tourist brochure that Emperor Meiji admired this place so much that he wrote a poem praising it which reads: “Deep in the woodland of Yoyogi, the quietude creates an illusion of seclusion from the city.”
(The cover of a brochure of Meiji Jingu Inner Garen: the iris garden in bloom, a thatched pavilion, and lush trees.)

Kiyomasa Well

Because I wasn’t in a hurry, I wondered around the Iris Garden for a long time before heading to Kiyomasa Well which provides a constant source of water year-round for the irises who thrive in a moist environment. While lingering by the well, I bumped into a Japanese family of four: father, mother, and two school-age daughters. I watched the couple kneeling down for a bow, then stood up and gently faned the air from the well onto their faces. Curiously, I asked the mother, “Why are you fanning like that?” She explained that they were absorbing the energy from the well, as the well is famous and has magical, and that by fanning the air towards us we can absorb its energy. I thanked her and imitated her, gently fanning the air from the well onto my face. She was delighted to see this, and we stood by the well and chatted for a while. The two daughters stood quietly next to her, her husband facing her nodding and acknowledging her occasionally. I felt it was a picture of family harmony. Hiromi Oguribayashi, unlike typical Japaneses ladies, is talkative, she wrote her name in Chinese for me and told me that she studied economics at a university in Tokyo, that her family flew here to visit Tokyo Disneyland (she told me where her home was, but I didn’t understand) and will fly back home tomorrow. She also said and that her daughters are 11 and 8. After they left, I stayed by the quiet well, continuing to appreciate its magic. Then a young couple came, and the boy skillfully bowed and gently fanned the air from the well onto his face with his hands. I felt that the sincere look on his young face added energy to Kiyomasa Well.

After leaving Kiyomasa Well, I followed the signs to the exit and sat on a stone bench under the shade of a tree on the top of the Iris Garden. Two girls passed by and asked, “Could we sit here for a while?” I quickly moved to one side of the bench and said, “Of course.” We sat on the same bench and chatted for a while. They were from the United States, third-year college students majoring in accounting. Wendy, who spoke Chinese, was born in the United States, she will stay in Japan for a month; Victoria, a tall Caucasian, will return to the US after a week in Japan. They were planning to leave after resting for a while. I asked if they had visited the Kiyomasa Well. They said no. I repeated Hiromi’s words: “Kiyomasa Well is famous and has magical. We can absorb its energy.” I enthusiastically demonstrated to them how to fan air from the well onto my face to absorb its energy. After hearing my introduction, they stood up and walked towards the well. I was happy to put my newly-acquired knowledge into practice as a tour guide for people who had come from afar. Of course, I knew that Kiyomasa Well might not have magical powers. I remembered what the priest said to Eileen in the movie “Miracle Club” which I had just watch during my flight: “The real purpose of the pilgrimage was to sustain one’s faith even in the absence of miracles.” I felt that what I saw and did at Kiyomasa Well was a reflection of the priest’s words. The Kiyomasa Well may not has magical, but Hiromi’s family, the young boy, and I all felt its magical energy at the well. I also passed this magic on to the two American girls. The magic is human love.

(The isolated and tranquil Kiyomasa Well.)

Visiting Tokyo’s Iris Garden, I once again experienced the feeling of “following my interests, obeying my physical strength, exploring foreign lands, and being enchanted by all the beauty, it’s like a dream come true.” How wonderful!

In late July, I went on a four-day Japanese tour. Our first trip was one-day in Tokyo, and the highlight of my day was eating crepes at our last stop, Takeshita in Tokyo, which came as a surprise to me.

Unexpected encounters on a trip could easily surprise me. And when the surprise is connected to one of my favorite foods that was first tasted at a faraway place, the encounter becomes a story that I will tell repeatedly later. Food preserves beautiful memories which are rich and vivid.

I like crepes because it contains the Sichuan flavor that I am familiar with. Enjoying crepes is always a warm and sweet experience for me, because crepes cross my European, American, and Asian memories.

Our tour group visited Takeshita Street, our last stop of our one-day Tokyo tour, for a free activity. I strolled along the over 300-meter-long short street and looked around randomly without purpose. The small shops along with the crowds on the street reminded me of Chunxi Road in Chengdu in China in the 1980s. While strolling on Chunxi Road in Chengdu, I was a poor college student with a strong desire to buy things. Now strolling on Takeshita in Tokyo, I am a contented 60-year-old without worldly desires. I said to myself: “Time flies quickly and time has refined me nicely!”

Strolling freely amidst the bustling crowd, a small crepes shop caught my eye, because crepes awaken the happy moments I shared with my daughter vividly. I had my first taste of crepes which was bought for me by my daughter, in Wuerzburg, Germany. In 2017, at the Country Inn Cafe in San Jose California, I ordered a fruit crepes, chatted with my daughter while eating, and made a deep connection for crepes. In 2021, at my daughter’s friend’s house in Waltham, Massachusetts, I enjoyed Rachel’s home-made crepes with a variety of savory and sweet fillings alongside my son. I suddenly remembered that when I was studying in Chengdu, I went to Chunxi Road to eat egg-baked cakes, which I defined as Sichuan style crepes.

With these memories in mind, I happily went to the Tokyo shop, stood in line, and bought a basic crepes. I held the crepes as a souvenir to take photos on Takeshita Street joyfully.

(Two entrances of the Takeshita Street, the crepes I enjoyed on Takeshita Street.)

My daughter is always in my memory of crepes. Eating Japanese style crepes on Takeshita Street in Tokyo Japan also has my daughter’s present, as she planned this Japanese trip for me.

There are many stories about our one-day in Tokyo, but enjoying crepes is my favorite story today, which shows I am a high-end foodie.

After enjoying the crepes, I felt that the taste of crepes all over the world are similar: juicy, delicate, and soft. Crepes can be folded, rolled, and paired with various fillings, to easily present the charm of delicious food.

（The set of fruit crepes I ordered in the Country Inn Cafe in San Jose California in 2017.）

（The set of fruit crepes I made for myself in Rachel’s house in Waltham Massachusetts in 2021.）

One day tour in Tokyo

Our Japanese tour group consists of 14 people who are originally from California, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Washington, all states from the United States. Our tour guide is an Indian with a Japanese green card. He is short, wears earrings, has a shaved head and a goatee beard. Because he wears pants in the sagging style of high school boys in the United States, I had difficulty guessing his real age.

Our one-day tour in Tokyo started at 10am. Under the scorching sun, the tour guide took us for a quick visit of the Imperial Palace East Garden, where the large stone walls were eye-catching. While bypassing the large stone wall, I saw that there were gaps and cracks between the stones, and I felt that the masonry process was very rough and could not be compared to the seamless masonry process of the giant stones in the Inca era Sun Temple in Cusco, Peru. The experience of previous traveling has been awakened during a journey, this is a truly satisfying pleasure for a traveler. I think the ancient people liked to show their strength by playing with giant stones, such as Stonehenge in Britain, Machu Picchu in Peru, Leshan Giant Buddha Scenic Area in China, and the stone wall of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo.

（Our tour group approaching the big stone wall while visiting the Imperial Palace East Garden in Tokyo.）

（The stone chamber in the Inca era Sun Temple in Cusco, Peru, 11-2023.）

Afterwards, we went to Asakusa Temple/Nakami Sei for free activities and individual lunch.

Asakusa Temple is small and crowded with people; Nakamise street is short with small shops along both sides. We went to the temple to pay money to shake bamboo tubes to seek fortune, and went to small shops filled with eye-catching goods for purchase on Nakamise street. The atmosphere here was very harmonious because visitors could easily obtain spiritual and material satisfaction in close proximity to one another.

I went to a small restaurant on the street near Asakusa Temple and asked for Wagyu beef, the waitress recommended the Black Haired Wagyu set meal, which cost over 5000 yen. She brought to me a serving tray with many dishes and bowls, and the Black Haired Beef was even placed with a piece of paper indicating “黑毛和牛” on the top. Each dining table is equipped with an open flame stone pan. The waitress lit up the pan on my table and told me, “If you’re not used to half cooked beef, please use the pan to fully cook it.” She also explained various beef dipping methods to me. At the table next to me sat an elegantly dressed elderly lady, and we studied each other silently using eye contact. I guessed she is a local.

After lunch, our tour group gathered at the Asakusa Temple, then took the subway to Shibuya to experience the Shibuya “Scramble Crossing”, when light is green, people flood the intersection from all directions. I felt this sightseeing is a bit boring, as I was grew up in crowded crowds in China and I don’t understand how a flood with people place became a tourist attraction. While crossing the road in a dense crowd, I saw a pretty lady asking four friends to take photos of her posture in the crowd from different directions. Imagining her “high” appearance from different angles in the photo, I smiled.

Then, we took the subway from Shibuya to Harajuku Takeshita for free activities, which brought me memories of and new stories of crepes, so I was overjoyed.

(Photo collections: Today’s weather in Tokyo, taking the subway, I’m at Asakusa Temple, my black haired Wagyu lunch, strolling around Nakami District, crossing Shibuya Cross Road, and at the entrance of Takeshita Road.)

Our Tour Guide

He has never been to the United States and speaks fluent American English because he attended a bilingual school in English and Japanese since childhood. After graduating from high school, he went to Canada to attend university for a year and missed home. He returned to Japan to attend Tmple University, where students graduated with a bachelor’s degree in four years, but he said it took him six years to graduate. After getting his bachelor degree, he became a tour guide, then the COVID-19 pandemic broke out. He had to switch to a job doing bilingual telephone services. Now, being a tour guide is his side job, and he is 31 years old single without a girlfriend. He has a younger sister who was studying remotely from home during the pandemic when she was in college. She is very good at studying and graduated in four years. She immediately started working in the government and recently switched jobs to a large energy company in Japan because corporate pays higher than the government does. They live with their father, who is an engineer, and their father cooks at home because their mother has passed away. His father has a car. he and his sister use public transportation as they don’t have cars.

Last night, I went to the monthly neighborhood meeting organized by Victoria，one of my neighbors.

Victoria prepared the agenda for the meeting. In addition to residents, local officials will also attend the meeting. Because many residents only speak Spanish, and officials mostly speak English, and I don’t understand Spanish at all, Victoria naturally became a bilingual translator. She translated Spanish into English and English into Spanish to facilitate communication and understanding among attendees. Later in the meeting, District 7 Councilor Bien stood next to Victoria and praised her many times: “You did an awesome job translating!”

Families Children Services

Before the meeting, during the self-introduction phase, the lady who sat next to Victoria said that she came from the county to serve families and children. I wanted to listen to her speech because I thought we (people with families and children) are her service targets. She did not speak during the meeting, so I looked for her after the meeting to learn about her work . I saw her standing and chatting with an African American lady and went over to ask her: “You said you provide services for families and children. What department are you in?” She replied: “Oh, I’m in the County Department of Family Children Services.” I asked again: “I have two grandchildren. What kind of services can you provide for us?” She said: “We provide services to protect children from abuse and neglect, to ensure that no child is left behind.” I nodded and thanked her by saying: “Thank you for your explanation. Now I know it provides services for children in special cases.” I immediately apologized to the African American lady standing next to me, “I’m sorry, I interrupted your conversation because I want to know more about family and children services I just heard tonight.” She smiled and said, “It’s okay. We are colleagues. I’m glad to see that you are interested in our services.” I said, “I’m also glad to hear that the government has such a service to care for children in our community.” Then, we exchanged names and family situations to extend our conversation. I’m Jean, and I have two grandchildren; Lina, who is of Burmese descent, has two children; Sinora, Lina’s African American colleague, has three grandchildren. They all grew up and work in California. After hearing their introductions, I guess that mothers or grandmothers who are working in the Department of Family Children Services would be easier to put themselves in the shoes of children in special cases, and perhaps provide more appropriate services for children in need. We talked about the responsibilities of taking care of children and grandchildren and some other things. I suggested taking a photo together and they both agreed.

After taking the photo, we exchanged contact information and I said to them: “I like to write stories about meeting new people and I am very happy to meet you at tonight’s meeting. I will write a story about tonight’s event and share it with you.” I also told them that the services they provide to our community make me happy as it shows our government really cares about children.

The residents’ meeting was rich in content and I felt deeply about a few of them.

Dumpster Day

One of the main topics in the meeting is planning the next “Dumpster Day” event. Before 2017, I lived in Almaden Valley in San Jose and enjoyed the convenience brought by “Dumpster Day” many times, so I like this event very much. Listening to residents and officials discussing: Where to park the garbage trucks? If there are not enough parking spaces where the garbage trucks are located, residents will spend a lot of time in the car lining up on the road to get closer to dump their junk into the truck, which means this event might cause nearby traffic jams. How to notify all the neighbors of this event? If the notification didn’t reach everyone ahead of time, the prepared garbage trucks could not be filled up which will be a waste of resources. How to prevent residents from piling up junk on the roadside instead of sending it to the garbage trucks? … I only now know that scheduling a “Dumpster Day” event is a big project involving both the government and the public.

Closing Schools

Alum Rock School District superintendent Manny addressed residents’ concerns about the District’s plan to close nine schools this year. Here are some Q&A I heard:
Q-Why do you want to close schools?
A-The government funds schools based on the student enrollments. In the past decade, the student enrollments in our school district dropped sharply, the funds received by schools also dropped sharply, but the cost of maintaining school buildings did not change, so some schools need to be closed to reduce maintenance costs.
Q-Why is student enrollments decreasing?
A-Because the birth rate is declining, high housing prices have prevented young families from settling here, and there is competition from charter and private schools.
Q-How to decide which nine schools to close?
A-The school district will set up an organizing committee, including principals of schools in the district, representatives of the Parent Teacher Association (PTA), and representatives of four neighborhood committees. Your neighborhood committee can also apply to be a representative.

Concerns

Lieutenant Jesse, Foothill Division Commander of the San Jose Police Department, also came. He said, “Nancy Pelosi is coming to San Jose tonight. Many of my people are there now, and I will go there soon. Before I leave, do you have any concerns to tell me? ” Someone said: “I have noticed that there have been more graffiti on the wall and road signs in recent weeks.” Jess said, “Please use the 311 App to report the graffiti, and someone will handle these issues.” I am very happy that our area didn’t have concerns which needed the police chief’s immediate attention.

Beautify San Jose

Regarding graffiti, Tara, from the San Jose Mayor’s office, said that she and Victoria worked together to invite painters to paint beautiful pictures on the high wall next to the newly constructed children’s playground through the “Beautify San Jose” project:

Once I heard conversation about the children’s playground, I immediately raised my hand to say: “I hope to install a sunshade tent for the children’s playground so that children can play under the hot sun and utilize the playground fully.” Because I often took my grandchildren there to play, I noticed that the slides are too hot to play in the daytime on sunny day as they are exposed to the sun directly. This is a scene of I played with my granddaughter in the shade under the slides in the playground:

Someone also suggested that it would be safer at night by installing lights in the children’s playground. Someone followed the subject of night to say: “While driving at night, I saw more pedestrians wearing dark clothes crossing the road, it is very unsafe. Why was the law of ‘jaywalking is illegal’ repealed?” The official replied: “In over 20 years of relevant work experience, no pedestrians have ever crossed the road and been hit by cars. Pedestrians should be able to cross the road where they feel it is safe.”

Install a Speed Bump

An official also shared a case: “A neighbor suggested adding a speed bump on a section of the road where the speed is too fast. This is a good suggestion, but it will take a lot of time to implement. First, the relevant department needs to accept this request, then the task of installing a speed monitor equipment can be scheduled, and the actual installation will be much later. After the installation is done and the data is collected, the relevant department will analyze the data to see whether the conditions of adding a speed bump are met. If the conditions are met based on the data, then the relevant department will schedule and perform the task of adding a speed bump.”

This was my first time listening closely to the conversation between local officials and residents, after living more than 30 years in the United States. Not only did I learn a lot of knowledge which I had never been exposed to, but I also felt the people-friendly style of local government officials in the United States, which I felt grateful for. I hope more residents will come to attend this meeting in the future!

The photos from Monday’s residents’ meeting:

Today, my grandchildren are in daycare, and Alex is on vacation at home as his company gives employees three days off for Juneteenth. I decided to go out, so I quickly prepared a simple lunch, then drove to the closest beach (Santa Cruz State Beache) along the W Cliff Dr. It is one of my favorite beaches.

It was already noon when I arrived at Lighthouse Field State Beach, and there were still many empty parking spaces near the lighthouse. After parking my car there, I brought my lunch with me and walked along the sidewalk of W Cliff Drive towards the Beach Boardwalk. This is a busy sidewalk with joggers, walkers by themself or with dogs or with baby strollers, bike riders, and more. While walking among them, I enjoyed the white clouds floating in the blue sky, breathed the salty air unique to the seaside, and felt refreshed. On the right side of the sidewalk under the shade people were sitting on the reefs relaxing and eating. As I happened to pass the concrete steps leading to that area, so I changed my mind and walked down the steps to the seaside where huge reefs were randomly piled up. There were big gaps between the reefs. Afraid of slipping, I used my hands and feet to walk and crawl, passing a few people who were sitting on the reefs earlier than I, and came to sit on a flat reef about ten meters away from the steps.

After sitting down, I looked around. A big reef in the water was right in front of me, steep cliffs were on my right and behind me, and the reef seaside and the concrete steps were on my left. While sitting in this noisy and beautiful, secluded and shady place, I watched the vast curved connecting line between the blue ocean and the blue sky in front of me, saw the white splashes flying high when the ocean waves hit the reefs under my feet, listened to the echoing of the loud sound of the waves crashing against the reefs, I felt relaxed and casually placed my lunch box on the reef to take photos of my lunch and the beautiful landscape behind it.

Today’s lunch is almonds, raisins, celery slices, and purple plum slices. While sitting on the flat reef enjoying the surroundings, I slowly ate my lunch. Chewing almonds along with raisins, I tasted sugar and oil and felt the mix of a crunchy and soft texture, a new way of eating I recently discovered while feeding my grandson Ben healthy snacks. Raw celery slices are juicy, tender, with a strong flavor, I often brought them with me as a snack while going out, as celery is rich in fiber. Purple plum is seasonal, very juicy and sweet. After finishing my health and light lunch, I felt that adding one or two boiled eggs will be even better and I will remember to bring eggs next time.

I was looking at the sea and the memory of the 2022 Chinese Zhongyuan Day at the seaside of Acadia National Park was quietly floating in my mind. I felt that the rocks in the distant East Coast are neater, and the waves here on the West Coast are louder. I took out my phone to find that I was facing Due East, where my late parents are in my thoughts, so I talked with them: “Have you heard the loud sound of the waves at the seaside? I felt it was the happy note of earth, containing the vitality of your grandchildren. There are only two people surfing here today. Oh, a surfer is swimming towards the shore now.”

I started to pay attention to the surfer who was swimming towards the seaside where I was sitting. He stopped by the big reef, unzipped the back of his full-body wetsuit, then continued to swim towards me. I saw that he seemed unable to climb onto the shore, because the reef on the shore where he was leaning against was covered with sharp edge mussels which made climbing them with bare hands painful. He tried to take off his full-body wetsuit in the water, but the waving water made him taking a long time to just get his arms out of his wetsuit. I suddenly heard someone next to me shouting, “Don’t move, I’ll help you!” I looked up and saw an African-American man with finger-thick curly hair was standing near me, then I watched him jumping nimbly over the big gaps between the random big reefs and running to the edge of the shore to the person trapped in the water. I thought this guy must be an athlete!

I watched him bend down to take the surfboard out of the water, then quickly pull the surfer out of the water as well. The surfer sat tiredly on the reef a few steps below me. When the young man carrying the surfboard walked past me toward the cliffs, I looked up and asked, “Are you his coach?” He said, “No, my friends and I were watching him up there.” I said, “Wow, you’re a Good Samaritan!”

The guy put the surfboard against the cliffs behind me, turned around and quickly jumped over the big reef to help the surfer take off his full-body wetsuit. After the surfer took off his wetsuit, the guy carefully choose the foothold, one reef after another, to guide the tired surfer, who was using his hands and feet to climb up slowly, to reach the cliffs. When the guy and the surfer passed by me, I saw the surfer like a child and couldn’t help but ask: “Boy, how old are you?” “Thirteen.” the boy replied. Seeing the scratches and bleeding marks on the back of his thigh, I told the guy, “Look, he is bleeding, is it serious?” The guy lowered his head and looked at the boy’s legs and said, “No problem.”

I heard applause from above the cliff behind me. I guess it was the cheering for this 2-minute reality show of the Good Samaritan, from the leisurely people who were watching the scenery on the sidewalk. It took less than three minutes for the Good Samaritan to go from standing next to me to helping the surfer up the concrete steps.

I guess the boy lives nearby so he came here to surf alone. Thanks to the Good Samaritans in the world, he is safe. Here are nine-square photos of the Good Samaritan helping the 13-year-old surfer today:

After sitting in this noisy and beautiful, secluded and cool place for more than an hour and after watching the last surfer steadily coming ashore, I left the reef under the shade and climbed up the concrete steps. Today, I was very touched to witness human kindness in action at my favorite beach.

After going back home, I self-evaluated a bit. I was only about five meters away from the surfer who was trapped in the water. I saw him trying to take off his full-body wetsuit and climb ashore, but he failed because of the big waves, the floating surfboard, and the mussels covered reefs. Lacking physical strength and mobility made me not think of helping him. It seems that incompetence will kill impulse and thinking power, sadly.

Little Episodes

Bumping into a Good Samaritan by the sea:

While watching the last surfer steadily climbing up the shore, I also saw sweet scenes of a family of two (the mother in black clothes and red jeans and the daughter in a light blue dress) and a family of four (parents and two daughters) playing nearby on the reefs, which was very soothing.

In the afternoon, I jogged along the seaside sidewalk towards the Natural Bridge Beach. The road that had been closed for cars for nearly a year, was now also closed for walkers, so I turned back and stayed on the dog leash free beach near Lighthouse Beach until 7 o’clock. The scenery on the dog leash free beach was charming: by my resting area, people were relaxing on the beach, dogs were at ease, and a family of five were walking their black dog.

In April 2024, my son, daughter-in-law and I had a day trip. We visited Santa Cruz Beach too.

Sarah is a nanny who comes to take care of my two grandchildren once a week. My grandson Ben often says: “Sarah Ayi” because he likes her very much.

Last week, Sarah gave us a cake she baked. While greeting each other in the kitchen and dining room area, she pointed at the cake and said to me: “This cake goes well with coffee.” I looked at the dark brown juicy cake with a mouth full of saliva and said: “I am currently intermittent fasting and I will have my first meal at 11 o’clock.” When Sarah heard this, she happily replied: “I am also intermittent fasting.”

I was curious about her fast, so I sat with her on the couch in the living room and chatted for a while when my grandchildren were taking their afternoon naps. I told Sarah: “I started intermittent fasting in the summer of 2021 during COVID. I fasted for 16 hours a day and only ate two meals.” Sarah said: “I started intermittent fasting at the beginning of this year and I only ate one meal.” It sounds like that that Sarah’s fasting is more challenging than mine, as eating only one meal a day is harder than eating two meals a day. Sarah asked me: “How many days do you fast every week?” I smiled and said: “Five days of fasting and two days of cheating.” She also smiled and said: “I also cheat for two days. I haven’t eaten rice since February 14th, I have to wait until March 28th to eat rice.” I said, “Wow, I like rice very much, but I used to have no rice at dinner. After I started intermittent fasting, I ate rice every night.It has been almost three years and my body weight is very stable. ” Sarah said that she also likes rice. Sarah told me that she was once keen on boxing, but after her waist injury, her doctor advised her to stop boxing. She said: “Practicing boxing helped me lose more than 20 pounds. Look, I purposely wearing the same clothes to take photos before and after practicing boxing.” I looked at her obviously slim figure after practicing boxing in the photo and said wholeheartedly: “You are so capable! I can only walk and jog.” Sarah said: “We have to take good care of our health so we don’t burden our children.” I nodded in agreement at her thought about others.

Sarah pays great attention to protect her skin from the sunlight, by wearing a wide sun hat every time she takes my grandchildren out. This always reminds me of WL, who also liked to wear a similar sun hat, a memory of almost 20 years ago when my son and her son attended the same class at Greystone Elementary School in Almaden Valley San Jose. Sarah, who is already 40 years old, looks like she is only 30 years old,

She said that since their children are grown up, she and her husband can go hiking every weekend, and they often go on dates. She joked: “The relationship between husband and wife needs to be nourished as well.” She showed me a video of her singing for her daughter at her 18th birthday celebration party. She told me: “I sang the song that I have sung to her since she was a baby.” I said, “You have a beautiful voice. Did you practice singing before?” She said, “No, I just like singing.” I smiled and said, “I like to listen to people sing.” I saw the scene in the video where she wiped her tears at the end of singing and thought she has a soft heart. I said: “Look at the video, I see you held a big birthday celebration party for your daughter!” She said: “Yes, it was held at a club near our home. The 18th birthday of a Filipino girl is very important.” Her explanation reminded me of girls’ 16th birthday is called “Sweet Sixteen” in the United State, a custom I heard and saw in Massachusetts a few years ago.

I showed Sarah a photo of Kara, our cat in Waltham, and she said she had a cat in the Philippines, even though she was allergic to both cats and dogs. She also showed me some photos of a small weekend project that she was very proud of. She repainted a worn-out wooden chair given by a neighbor，made it into a brand new chair, and placed it in her beautiful garden. I felt the chair is a great addition to her garden, as I enjoyed sitting on chairs in gardens. She enjoys gardening, cooking, baking creatively, and selling homemade Filipino food sometimes.

I told her I am retired and like writing short stories. I showed her my “Puddle of Gold” homepage and told her: “This website was built for me by my daughter. The header image was taken by me, a photo of a mother taking pictures of her daughter among the blooming yellow flowers outside of Filoli Garden.” Because this was the first time she heard of Filoli, Sarah quickly searched for this garden online using her iPad in her hand. I told her: “This garden is beautiful in spring. Earlier this year, the meeting between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Biden was held in Filoli’s hall.” I was very happy to tell another flower lover about my favorite garden.

After chatting, I really liked Sarah, who is considerate, has many hobbies and is capable, so I asked her if I could write a story about her. She happily agreed, and we even took a photo to be included in this story.

Little Episodes

（The photos from left to right, top to bottom: the cake Sarah gave us, the desk where I drank coffee and ate the cake, and the grass in front of the Waltham house grew in late March. A photo of Sarah and me. In late March, the small white flowers in Waltham and the colorful spring flowers in San Jose.）

Related Stories

In July 2021, I felt very good after 50 days of intermittent fasting. I wrote a story to commemorate my mother who paid great attention to eating well and staying health throughout her life.

If the weather is nice on Sunday morning, I will take my grandson Ben for a walk. When he pushes his cart, I will follow him as his bodyguard and when he sits on the cart, I will be the rickshaw pusher. My daughter said this is a good bonding activity for two of us.

This morning, the sun was shining brightly, I pushed Ben to the residential area where a highway bridge runs up on top of the roofs of the bungalows to see the effect of cars running above the roofs. After getting there, I parked Ben’s cart on the side of the road so Ben was facing the highway bridge, I squatted next to him looking ahead and asked Ben: “Did you see the cars running on the roof?” Ben answered immediately: “Meiyou.”(No in Chinese) Then I pointed to the highway bridge in front and said: “Look, there are big cars and small cars passing by on the roofs!” Ben still said: “Meiyou.” (No) I guess the traffic signs, big trees and roofs in front of the bridge prevented Ben’s eyes from focusing on the cars running on the farther away bridge, so I pushed him to the place where the highway bridge stood in the air beautifully. However, Ben was not interested in whether there were cars at high altitude, so he got out of the cart and pushed himself to an open space under the bridge and played for a long time.

When Ben got tired of pushing, he climbed on to the cart to sit down, it was almost eleven o’clock. While pushing him home, we passed by a basketball court and saw someone playing there. Ben, who loves playing ball, pointed over there which meant he wanted to go over there to watch. While walking toward the basketball court, I saw a shirtless young man shooting and dribbling. We stooped at at a place less than ten feet away from the court, Ben sat on the cart and looked at the player quietly with an expression of eagerness to try from time to time, such as kicking his feet, smiling, leaning forward, and standing up. I asked him if he wanted to get off the cart and play. He then quickly walked to the basketball court after getting off. I also followed Ben to the court and asked the young man if he could let Ben play with his ball. He quickly put on his shirt and handed the ball to Ben to play with. We exchanged names and happily discovered that Ben, a 17-year-old high school student, and Ben, a two-year-old toddler, met by chance. Watching the two Bens playing basketball together, I praised Big Ben: “You are good at playing with children. Do you have any younger siblings?” He replied: “I only have a 19-year-old sister who went to college in Berkeley.” I asked again: “Then where did you learn to play with children?” He said: “I volunteered in our church to babysit children about five years old. They are older than Ben.” “What kind of church?” “Catholic.” I told him quickly: “Oh, I graduated from the Catholic University of America， which is next to the largest Roman Catholic Church in North America, the church is the biggest National Shrine of the United States.” I felt that it was his first time hearing about the Catholic University of America and was very happy to advertise for my beloved alma mater CUA.

Big Ben was playing ball with Little Ben and chatting with me. When Big Ben learned that little Ben has a six-month-old sister, he casually asked: “Can his sister crawl?” I was impressed that a high school boy could ask such a relevant question, so I praised him: “You really know kids! His sister is almost able to crawl.” Hearing my praise, he smiled shyly like a school kid. I looked at this sweet boy and thought about the common saying that high school students are studying long hours, so I asked curiously: “Do you feel high school studies are very time consuming?” He said: “Studying is okay, I spent many hours on a lot of extracurricular activities.” I asked: “What extracurricular activities? The school basketball team?” He said: “I am the president of the school leadership club and I am responsible for organizing activities.” It sounded like a high level club, so I asked : “Is it easy to join this club?” “Every year about half of the applicants can join. The club has about fifty of us. I also host a writing club and participate in a Vietnamese culture club.” “Are you Vietnamese?” “Yes, both my parents are.” I said, “Little Ben’s parents are Chinese.” I also told him that I studied chemistry at the Catholic University of America and later became a software engineer. He said that his parents were both engaged in medical research, and his sister majored in biomedicine. I asked him: “Do you know what you want to do in the future?” He said: “I want to join politics or become a lawyer.” I said: “Not many Asians participate in politics. It’s great that you have this wish so young! Your parents must be very proud of you.”

They had been playing for almost half an hour, and it was already past 11:30. I told Big Ben: “Little Ben should take a nap at 12 o’clock. Could you please go first? That way I can easily convince Little Ben to go home.” He said : “Okay, I’ll go first.” Before he left, I asked again: “Do you usually come here to play on weekend days?” He said: “I usually come here to play at night. This morning my mother asked me to go to a restaurant for breakfast with my uncle from Texas, because he came from Texas yesterday to attend another uncle’s wedding and he was leaving today. After breakfast, I had nothing to do, so I came here today.” I said: “I am retired and like to write short stories. Can I write a story using the photos of you two playing ball together?” He said: “Sure.” We then exchanged phone numbers and I said: “If you come here to play during the weekend in daytime, please let me know. I will bring little Ben here to play with you?” He said, “Okay.” Later I sent him the video and photos I took of them playing together and he liked them.

Little Episodes

1. Timeline:

At 10:19 a.m., we were under the highway bridge and Ben pushed his cart walked for more than half an hour.
At 11:14, we came to the basketball court to watch Big Ben playing, then two Bens played together.
At 11:44, Big Ben and little Ben fist bumped to say goodbye.

2. Little Ben was watching

While sitting on the cart and quietly watching Big Ben pitch and dribble, Ben showed an eagerness to try from time to time, such as kicking his feet, smiling, leaning forward, and standing up.

3. Two Bens were playing together

Last night, one of my daughter’s coworker S and her husband invited us to their house to have hot pot. S put a cooked cuttlefish ball in each of our bowls. My daughter and Alex didn’t eat it, so I ate three at a time. The cuttlefish ball was a very new thing to me and I liked the chewy texture and the seafood flavor. I looked at the black ping-pong sized cuttlefish balls floating in the boiling hot pot and gradually picked up and ate three more balls during the dinner while drinking a mango-flavored beer for the first time.

While eating hot pot, we were chatting casually about work and pleasure. S asked me how was my trip to Peru. I am happy to share my trip so I quickly said a lot: “This is my first time traveling in a group and I had a great time! Machu Picchu is spectacular and worth a visit! Most of our 30-people tour group were empty-nest couples over 50 years old. I also got to chat with many of them who were from South Africa, Australia, Romania, Greece, Malaysia, and Singapore.” These words refreshed my memory of my trip to Peru last November…

I spent the 2023 Thanksgiving in Cuzco, Peru.

On Thanksgiving, people who continued on the group touring left the hotel at 6 a.m., and rest of us who already completed the 6-day group tour needed to check out of the hotel before 11 a.m.

I went to the hotel cafe for the free breakfast buffet at 8:30 a.m. There were more than ten tables but just a few people dining in the cafe with many Christmas decorations. I poured a glass of fresh papaya juice, sat at an empty table and slowly drank my newly discovered favorite juice as I liked its soft thick fresh taste and its soft bright orange color.

I thought it would be a quiet Thanksgiving breakfast alone, but thanks to like-minded people, I enjoyed a chatty Thanksgiving breakfast with three of my tour group members.

After drinking two glasses of papaya juice, Leann who is from South Africa came over. We exchanged names on the first day of the tour and got to know each other through casual chats over the past few days’ traveling and eating together. She is single, a doctor, a lecturer at a medical school, a great cook who enjoys cooking and entertaining. After saying good morning to each other, she sat next to me on my right side. While I was drinking papaya juice and eating scrambled eggs and baby potatoes, she was tasting her plain coffee. She said to me: “Have you noticed that the coffee here is very strong?” I replied: “Oh, I haven’t had any coffee yet as I only drink fresh papaya juice.”

Then, Mag and Paul, a tall couple from Australia, came. Mag is lean with light brown shoulder-length straight hair and Paul is muscular with a white beard. I haven’t had a chance to chat with them yet, but Leann knew them well and invited them to join us at the same table. When they went to get their food, Leann told me: “Mag runs a wedding ceremony service（not a wedding planner service), and when they travel, they put their house on AirBnb for rent.” Hearing this, I said with admiration: “I can imagine they must be very good at management!”

When Mag and Paul brought their food and drinks sat down on my left, I turned my head and introduced myself: “I am retired and on vacation from taking care of my two young grandchildren. Do you have any grandchildren?” Mag said with a noticeable British accent: “We have five children and four grandchildren and our eldest grandson is 14 years old.” At this time, a familiar song was playing in the cafe and I asked hesitantly: “Is this Adele’s song?” Leann firmly replied: “Yes, it is hers!” Mag said: “It doesn’t sound like Adele is singing.” I also said: “Yes, it is not her voice.” Leann smiled and said: “That’s not surprising, re-singing a famous singer’s songs is common in South America.”

There was no wine for breakfast in the cafe, but the well-known Adele brought us closer together and also made me want to chat. I showed them my grandson and granddaughter, the cover photo of my phone. Mag also showed us photos of her four-year-old granddaughter dressed up on her phone. I looked at Mag’s doll-like granddaughter and said, “Her pink dress is so pretty!” Mag said, “This is the dress I made for her and she also asked me to make a small flower basket of the same color.” I looked carefully in the photo and saw the little girl is holding a pink basket. I said to Mag: “You made pretty dresses and nice flower baskets. Unfortunately, I can only make short skirts.” I found a photo of the three short skirts I made for my daughter a few years ago on my photo and showed it to Mag. Mag looked at the short skirts on the photo and said: “The patterns of the skirts are very unique, especially the one with angel pattern.” I said: “My daughter also likes this angel pattern skirt. But I haven’t touched a sewing machine for a while now as my eyesight is getting worse.” Mag said: “After I had my eye surgery, I have no trouble using a sewing machine and often use it.” She talked about the eye surgery she had done. I smiled and said: “I’m afraid of pain and surgery. Because of this, many years ago, I didn’t get a laser surgery to correct my nearsightedness.” Mag laughed. Leann was not interested in sewing so she and Paul were chatting about our travel experiences.

After chatting about sewing, we all talked about afterthoughts of our six-day group tour. Leann said: “I think the people in our group are very nice and we had a good time together for a few days.” Mag said: “The tour guide also said that our group is a easy one to handle as everyone agrees on the trip schedule.” I said: “This is my first time join a group tour, I had great time chatting with people from many different places.”

At this time, Paul looked in front of him and said, “That lady is about to collapse.” I then turned my head and saw three people sitting around a table on my right. One of them, a young lady was swaying her upper body, seemingly about to lose consciousness. One of her friends fed her something, I guess some medicine, and she quickly stopped swaying. After watching this realistic short drama about altitude sickness, I asked casually: “Have you experienced altitude sickness?” Leann said: “No, because I took medicine in advance.” Mag said: “We didn’t take medicine and didn’t feel much discomfort..” I said: “My altitude sickness is much worse than I expected, so this trip to Machu Picchu is my first and last.” Mag said: “Oh, I wouldn’t mind visiting Machu Picchu again.” She turned to look at Paul and said, “We wouldn’t mind visiting Machu Picchu again, right?” Paul nodded with a sweet smile. Mag said again: “We may not come again. The world is so big and there are so many other places we still want to visit.” I thought for a while and said: “The world is big and I had wanted to visit Machu Picchu for a long time. I brought the photos of my late parents and nanny with me on this trip. After visiting Machu Picchu, one of the seven wonders of the world, I realized that even if they are still alive, they would not be able to visit Machu Picchu in person as they cannot bear the altitude sickness and the bumpy journey.” Mag said: “The tour guide also said that you brought the photos of your late parents with you to visit Machu Picchu. Would you mind showing me the photo?” At this moment, Leann’s phone rang, she said it was her mother calling and left the table to talk on the phone.

I took out the color photo of my late parents and the black-and-white photo of my late nanny from my small satchel and handed them to Mag. She looked at the color photo of my parents and handed it to her husband. She looked at the black-and-white photo of my nanny carefully and asked curiously: “How many years ago did your nanny pass away?” I said: “More than ten years ago. Oh. Recently, my brother went back to our hometown and visited her grave. We found on her tombstone our names were side-by-side with her sons’ names and we were treated as her children on the tombstone.” Mag asked carefully after thinking about it: “Was it your nanny’s idea to put your names on her tombstone?” This was the first time I heard this question. I thought about it and said, “It was probably not her idea as she had Alzheimer’s disease a few years before she passed away. Maybe it was her sons’ idea.” I explained more: “My brother was just half a year old when my nanny came to our house. She lived with us for more than ten years, and she left after my brother and I went to college, so she had taken care of me since I was born.” Mag commented: “You are a family!” Mag asked those questions because she was really interested in my nanny on the photo. I hope my nanny in heaven is satisfied with what I said about her.

On Thanksgiving Day, thanks to bumping into like-minded people in Cuzco, Peru, in South America, a couple from Australia got to know my late nanny from China during our casual conversation at breakfast.

Before saying goodbye, we had a photo at the cafe to remember the happy moment far from our homeland in Cuzco Peru.

Little more

11-16-2023, The story about I had a great time on my first day to Lima Peru.

In early 2019, The story about I made three short skirts for my daughter who just lived in the winter in Massachusetts for the first time.

https://puddleofgold.org/?p=2850

Hi Eileen and Qingzi,

Thanks for arranging the trip for me, I enjoyed my first day in Lima very much! I met five people and had a great experience with them.

The first: the driver who picked me up

The flight was about an hour later than the scheduled time, right after I got out of customs, I saw a lady with a “CostSaveer” sign and she drove me to the hotel, which is about 20 km, which took her more than 40 minutes as the traffic was bad.

While driving, we chatted about her family, COVID, and Peru. She is a freelancer and has two daughters are 12 and 13. They play volleyball at school, which is far from their home, so the girls need to take a public bus to school daily and school time is 7:30 to 2:00. She went to a special language school to learn English and she speaks very good American English. COVID hit Peru badly, one of her relatives, very health, over 80 years old, passed away during the delta wave of COVID. Her family of four all got three doses of Pfizer. Her husband and one of their daughters had fever when they were positive, but she and another daughter had no symptoms. She grew up in a Catholic family, but she doesn’t practice in religion now, both of her daughters have no religion at all. She told me the popular sports in Peru are soccer and volleyball. Peru has more than ten parties, three are strong parties, there is an election every five years. She introduced two local dishes to me, one is potato, another is beef. She said she cooks them at home but not as good as the restaurant.

The second: Edduar, the waiter

The waiter who suggested both the cocktail and the main dish for me. Passion fruit cocktail and Ceviche tradic (raw fish marinated in lemon juice). I liked the cocktail.

The third and the fourth: Barbel and Henry, a couple from Borken

The couple sat on the next table, they asked about my Cevishe tradic, then Barbel suggested I have before and after meal photos, so her husband took the photos for me. After I finished my meal I described to them how I felt about the raw fish: I only felt the tender texture of raw meat without flavor, as the lemon and onion are strong, covering the fish taste, unlike sushi raw fish which is delicious.

As they drank beer, I was having cocktail, and the alcohol made us very chatty. I told them I have two grandchildren and I am on vacation from them (as Eileen taught me). I showed them both Ben and Meimei’s photo. Then Henry showed me photos of their family (30s son, pursuing a master degree, with his girlfriend, 28s daughter, physical therapy like her mother, with her boy friend, 20s daughter, a dog trainer, with her girlfriend and their golden retriever), his late father, his mother in nursery, and his older brother and younger sister,

Both of them came form families with three siblings, each side family in their generations have total eight children. Barbel is part time physical therapist and Henry is a handyman for plumbing. They have been retried for three years, and have traveled to many places.

This is their 18-day private tour trip with a guide for just the two of them.

At the end, we had desserts together, and exchanged email and want to keep in touch happily like children. Then, Henry said that he was a CEO for over a thousand people company; he worked 7 days a week for almost 40 years and never had the time to take care of their children; while working, he never told anyone about his family. I told him that one of my daughter’s professors also said that he started to tell little life stories in the class after he was 70 years old.

I told them I am a blogger, and I worked at eBay during its early stage.

The fifth: Daniel, the taxi driver

The taxi driver who drove me to the Magic Water Circuit. He asked for S40 of the local currency to drive me there, I bargained it down to S35. Then he offered to wait for me there for an hour, but don’t charge me for the hour, then send me back to the hotel.

He doesn’t speak English, so he talk to google translator then I read the English text version to understand him.

One the way back, he talked a lot and passed the English text version to me. It is about the national soccer stadium. I was confused, but he was very insistent on telling me and pointing to a building next to the circuit. Finally I realized he want to me to see the national soccer stadium. I immediately looked back at the the national soccer stadium big building in the dark and said thanks!

For the back trip, I gave him S42, S7 as his tip, and he was very happy. He then told me his name is Daniel.

Little Episodes

1. My lunch time.
Edduar, the waiter:

My left front view at lunch：

My right side view at lunch：

Ceviche recommended by Edduar：

The photo of before the meal (taken by Henry)：

The photo of after meal (taken by Henry)：

Our desserts：

2. Tunnel Fountain of Surprises in the Magic Water Circuit:

3. The traffic jam on my way back to the hotel：

On Saturday night, my friends and my family had a dinner at a western style restaurant.

It is only the beginning of December but the restaurant is already filled with holiday spirit: dress-up guests took photos next to the Christmas tree in the hall from time to time and the walls of the restaurant were decorated with Christmas ornaments.

We were led to a separate room with two rows of long tables. A long table was already filled with food, and a group of people in casual holiday clothes were eating. They looked happy and talked very loudly.

After we sat down at another empty long table, a tall man in a Christmas hat at the next table got up and came to us. He put his arms on the backs of two chairs and bent down to greet us: “Happy holidays! We are graduated from Overfelt High School in 1970, and we are here to celebrate the 50th anniversary of high school graduation. Because of COVID, our celebration was postponed for two years. We may be a bit loud so please forgive us.” Hearing what he said, we immediately felt the noise at the next table was like entertainment to us. We started to guess the age of the people at the next table: they graduated from high school in 1970, based on how people usually graduate from high school at the age of 18, most of them should have passed age 70 already. Watching the old classmates of more than 50 years ago together, talking, laughing, singing and applauding, a few of us who were born in the 60′s in China couldn’t help admiring the passion, vitality, cohesion and organization of this group of old classmates.

The waitress who served us was a tall and fit middle-aged beauty. She quickly sent our orders to the kitchen and appeared to be very efficient. While waiting for the main course, we finished a basket of free bread, and asked the busboy for the second basket of bread. When we finished the second basket of bread, the waitress came to tell us: “Sorry, because there are many small parties tonight, and the kitchen is busy and your orders will be late.”

While waiting for the food, I was not hunger because I ate a lot of free bread; I didn’t feel bored at all because of the singing, laughter, and applause at the next table. After chatting with my son sitting next to me and my friend Ann sitting across the table for a while, I looked at Ben, my grandson who was sitting on the high chair at the front of the long table from afar. I, in silence for a long time, enjoyed the sight of him behaving calmly while being exposed to a group of strangers with loud voices. Attracted by the singing and applause at the next table, Ben looked around curiously from time to time, and the ladies sitting against the wall at the next table praised the curious and quiet Ben with thumb-up from time to time.

Before the end of the party at the next table, someone suggested that everyone stand up and say a sentence begin with “I am thankful for”. At this time, our food was not served yet. I turned my attention to these old classmates and watched them stand up and say, “I am thankful for…” one by one: “I am thankful for my family and children.” “I am thankful for your friendship.” “I am thankful that my parents are healthy, my mother is 104 and my father is 96 this year.” “I am thankful that the Lord is with me.” “I am thankful that I still have love in my heart.” “I am thankful for my children, my grandchildren, and my great grandchildren.” Everyone got warm applause before sitting down. When the waitress started to serve us food, she overheard “my mother is 104″ so she asked me curiously: “Is that 104 year old mother here tonight?” I said: “No, tonight is her son’s high school reunion.” All of us were amazed about having great grandchildren around age of 70, because there must be a generation age gap less than 20 in these four generations.

After finishing their round of “I am thankful for”, a lady came by and said to me: “Sorry, we are so loud tonight. Do you want to know why we were so loud?” I nodded immediately. She smiled and said: “If we didn’t talk so loudly, many of us will fall asleep while sitting.” I laughed loudly after hearing what she said. I couldn’t help looking at this thoughtful and witty intellectual lady. Her body is full, she is dressed in a low cut tight black sweater, wearing a double breasted pearl necklace with a pair of matching pearl earrings; her face is round, she is wearing a pair of black rimmed glasses with brown and yellow short hair, sweet and elegant.

When we left our table, there were still many people chatting at the next table. Before we got out of the restaurant, we saw several people who had left their table earlier were drinking and dancing at the bar. They were really a group of living old urchins. I can’t help thinking of their jokes at the dinner table. A man asked the man who got up and ready to say “I am thankful for” to turn around, then slapped the man’s butt that was towards the table and said: “Look at this. This was the cutest butt in our yearbook that year.” The man seems to proud of himself and said:”I used it well.” There was a burst of laughter. A man recalled an old time story: “I had a motorcycle at that time. I wanted to take the pretty girl who always wore a miniskirt, but I took you.” The man then put his hands around a woman’s shoulder and said: “Before we arrived to your house, you asked me to turn off the engine, because you didn’t want your mother to know that you came back on a motorcycle.” Another burst of laughter. Because I have learnt that this was a high school reunion with family members or partners. Listening to the interesting memories they shared, I feel that this reunion with family members or partners told the ordinary oldness wanted to share their past happiness with people close to them.

After back home, I thought about how “I am thankful for” at the age of 70′s reunion was all about ordinary things. I guess it was the common mentality of ordinary oldness: to thankful for their family, their friendship, their healthy family tree, and their firm beliefs.

Little Episodes

（Celebrate the 50th anniversary of high school graduation. Because of COVID, the celebration was postponed for two years. ）

（The dinning room was filled with holiday spirit.)

（The dinning room was filled with holiday spirit. While Hearing “Jingle bell time is a swell time”, Ben is following his daddy clapping his hands.）

（Christmas decorations on the wall at the restaurant.）

After walking in the Rose Garden for a long time，as the very few shaded benches in the garden were all occupied, I went back to my car, took a folding chair from the trunk, brought it to a shady place, unfolded the folding chair, sat down, took my MacBook Air out from my backpack, and quietly enjoyed the beauty in front of the blooming roses and also inside my memories, I slowly continued writing my story about Lake Cunningham Park which I visited a few days ago.

Suddenly a voice came from my left asking what I was doing. I looked up and saw a man wearing sunglasses, a cowboy hat, and holding a cane standing to my left side in front of a big tree. I didn’t want to be disturbed, so I politely told him: “I am writing a story.” He then asked me what I was writing, how did I connect to the internet, and how did I charge my gadgets. Guessing the people visiting here on a Thursday are likely flower lovers like me, I told him that I was writing a story about visiting an East San Jose Park, my MacBook was online via my iPhone’s personal hotspot, and I used a portable charger only for my iPhone as the MacBook has enough power for a day. Then he said he is also a writer, so we started chatting while he was standing and I was sitting.

After we enjoyed our conversation, he said his name is Rhawn Joseph (I call him RJ), seventy over half, a serious writer who focuses on cosmology. As I didn’t know anything about cosmology, I asked him if he had been to the Lick Observatory on Mt Hamilton and was surprised to hear he hadn’t visited there. Then He said his team had found photographic evidence of fungus-like organisms on Mars. After I got home, I found out: “Astronomy is the study of objects and phenomena beyond the earth, while cosmology is a branch of astronomy that studies the origin of the universe and its evolution, such as the Big Bang, the origin of chemical elements, and the cosmic microwave background etc.”

Chatting about Brain

I didn’t know much about cosmology, but I thought it was cutting-edge science, so I asked him if he hires newbies, because my son, who graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Kings College London, was studying for a master’s degree in applied mathematics at Santa Clara University, is currently looking for a job. He said he isn’t hiring.

Thinking of he is over seventy, I asked him what else he had studied before. He said that he studied neurology in the 1970s. I am interested in the brain, so I asked him a few questions and felt his answers were concise and easy to understand, and I felt grateful.

I once bought three brain-mind music CDs, because I often felt I did not have enough brain cells to help me process work related information and I wanted to improve the power of my brain. I listened to them for several months, but I didn’t feel any effect on my feeling of short of brain cells. So I had doubt on the music-brain relation. In mid-July, after my granddaughter was born, Alex, the new father, often plays music for her. I wanted to know if listening to music can really strengthen the brain. After hearing my question, RJ said: For example, repeated exercises are always beneficial to strengthening the body muscles; some music makes him happy, and some music makes him crazy. My comprehension is: “Listening to certain music is good for strengthening brain muscles and regulating emotions.” I started to play musics that I feel relaxing and cheerful to my two-month-old granddaughter now.

During the three-year COVID-19 pandemic, I saw and heard that friends around me experienced different types of depression. I wanted to know from the perspective of brain nerves, “Why do people become depressed?” RJ roughly said: People who are depressed may think about too many problems; if I try to think a lot I may feel depressed too; nowadays, too much information on the Internet and a lot of them are negative information, reading too much negative information will easily lead to depression; so he does not read negative information about himself, otherwise he may also become depressed. My understanding is: “Think simpler and read less negative information online will help to avoid depression.” Unfortunately, I forgot to ask him how to self-heal from depression. My personal experience is that the ups and downs of experiencing hardship in life may enhance the power of self-healing of depression.

While living in Waltham, Massachusetts, on the East Coast, I visited Walden Pond often. Every time I walked around Walden Pond I smelled marijuana in part of the wood trail. Now living in San Jose, California, the private use of marijuana has been legalized. I noticed more places where I smelled marijuana, so I asked: “It seems that more people are using marijuana in public park now. Should I avoid taking my grandchildren to those places?” RJ answered: Smoking damages the lungs, and drinking alcohol is not good. The Hawaii fires in August had adverse effects on people’s lungs and skin; the dangers of second-hand smoke are well known. After listening to his explanation, I thought that marijuana also belongs to second-hand smoke and it is best to avoid it if possible. Of course, with my true love for liquor, I said that drinking a little alcohol is good. I also remember what Professor A, who is also a serious writer, said at one of his birthday dinner: “When I was young, if I had an idea but felt writer’s block, I drank a bit of single barrel whiskey, and after that my writing became much smoother.”

Chatting about Rose

Flowers always bring me joy, so I enjoyed chatting about roses with a regular visitor here in my favorite rose garden; I enthusiastically shared all my knowledge about roses, and it was very satisfying.

RJ asked me: “Do you like it here?”

“Yes, I like this place a lot. I used to come here often at lunch time when I was still working. I wrote a few short stories about this rose garden.

RJ said: “I often walk here, and of course I drive here at night.”

Hearing that he often comes here, I shared my opinion of this garden with him: “I think this is one of the best gardens in the world, because the roses in the rose gardens of British and German palaces are not as variety as here, nor as beautiful as here.”

RJ added: “Rose.”

I didn’t understand, why he said that, so I continued: “Because California’s climate, there are many varieties of roses that bloom for a long time here, so I think it is one of the best gardens.”

RJ repeated: “Rose.”

It suddenly dawned on me that he was correcting my imprecision when he said rose. I quickly changed my words and emphasized the rose: “I think this rose garden is one of the best rose gardens in the world.”

Suddenly, he reminded me of the brave gentleman I met by the Charles River in Massachusetts, because he came to talk with me in the middle of COVID, while answering my question, he corrected himself that the binocular on his cane should be a monocular. Then I thought of the roses in Boston Public Garden and asked RJ: “Have you been to Boston?”

RJ said, “I studied at Yale, which is near Boston.”

Hearing that he had gone to school near Boston, I thought it would be a rare opportunity to express my dissatisfaction with the metal fenced roses in the Boston Public Gardens to a person who had been to Boston, at a rose garden where everyone could stroll among the flowers. I said quickly: “Did you know? at the Boston Public Garden, the oldest park in the United States, roses there are all fenced inside metal railings. You can only see the flowers from a distance but cannot smell the fragrance up close.” After finishing speaking, I remembered that I had noticed the roses were all fenced while visiting the Public Garden in June 2021, along with my daughter and Shirah.

RJ asked: “Did you smell the fragrance of roses here?”

I pointed to the left side of the garden behind him and said: “Yes, I just went and smelled my favorite sugar moon, a white and very sweet fragrant rose. Unfortunately, there are only a few blooming sugar moon roses there, I had to put my nose close to the flowers to smell the fragrance.”

“In April and May, the whole garden is filled with the fragrance of roses.”

I said, “Oh, I came here in late April this year and saw a lot of flower buds, but not many roses. I didn’t smell the fragrance here.” In fact, there is no trace of the garden full of fragrance in my memory.

RJ added: “I also went to another place to see roses.”

I can’t find another good place to enjoy roses near Silicon Valley in my memory, because the roses in Filoli are not as good as here, and it is not worth going there just to see the roses. I blurted out: “Where else would you go to see roses?”

RJ didn’t expect that I was serious about the place he went to see roses. He thought for a while and then said: “Guadalupe Rose Garden.”

I also knew about the rose garden there and said: “I went there a long time ago to see roses too.” Remembering that the last time I went to Guadalupe Rose Garden as a driver for my daughter and niece who were playing Pokemon Go. I asked RJ: “Do you play Pokemon Go?”

RJ: “No, I don’t play.”

“I think the roses there don’t grow as well as here, because the garden was too dry.”

RJ: “Yeah, that place hasn’t been good these past few years.”

…

After returning home, I carefully sorted through the photos and writings of my visits to the rose garden in April and May in the past few years. I really didn’t write down the scene of the garden filled with fragrance. I must go to the rose garden more often in April and May next year, maybe then I will be able to feel the grand scene of the garden full of fragrance of roses.

More about RJ

Before we say goodbye, I asked RJ if I could take a photo of him to write a story about chatting with him here. He happily agreed. After I showed him a few photos I took, he seems not satisfied and put down his cane and did a few cool poses for me to take a few more photos.

Because I heard from Alisa that her husband Ronnie, my Ph.D. advisor, recently went to a senior center to give a lecture about Mars, I sent them RJ’s Cosmology website, hope they are interested.

Me and the Rose Garden

1. 04-23-2023, the first spring after returning from Massachusetts, I visited the rose garden and saw many buds and very few flowers.

2. On December 11, 2019, before I left California for Massachusetts, I thought I would miss the rose garden, so I hurriedly drove to see it at night. I still remember that I felt very heavy when I took this photo…

3. On 2019-05-04, Limin invited me to volunteer at the rose garden. I enjoyed our long-lasting friendship and taking care of the garden.

【Youth Day】 Volunteer. Together with the middle school students in their early teens, we pulled weeds and laid shredded wood for the flourishing rose garden… Feel the youthful vitality, breathe the fragrance of roses, and nourish the evergreen heart in the beautiful and attractive San Jose Rose Garden, my paradise. Happy May 4th Youth Day.

4. 2018-04-14 【Rose Garden】The San Jose Rose Garden is festive and cheerful at dusk, filled with young men in suits and ties and pretty girls in floor-length skirts. Roses in the garden: many are ready to bloom, but few are in full bloom, with different beauty.

5. 2017

In September, after the very hot summer, I visited The San Jose Rose Garden to look for roses matching the red shade of my pretty toenail that was painted by my daughter.”

In April, 【Beautiful scenery】The flowers in the San Jose Rose Garden are in their prime and intoxicating. I am in their colorful world at dusk: tender, sweet, and infatuated.

Guadalupe Rose Garden

2016-08-14 【Smile】 Today, Sunday, I accompanied two young beauties to play Pokemon Go in downtown San Jose. As a driver, my uniform was approved after four rounds of inspections (the cheongsam, dotted dress, and black and white twill dress were all rejected). Fortunately, I am humble. Tonight I am wearing blue health slippers to go with this short skirt!

Related Stories

In September 2017, I and my daughter visited one of my favorite local gardens Filoli in Silicon Valley.

In June 2020, I had noticed the roses were all fenced while visiting the Boston Public Garden in June 2021, along with my daughter and Shirah.

In September 2020， I visited Walden Pond.

In October 2020, I met a brave old gentleman who came over to chat with me and was very articulate.

In January 2021, on a super cold Sunday in Boston, My daughter, my son, and I played Pokemon Go for an entire day.