You may have noticed that you have an option to change the style of my site. If you have not tried this I encourage you to do so.
I have just added a new site called Anime.
Book Review “Sputnik Sweetheart”
I have just finished the book “Sputnik Sweetheart” by Haruki Murakami. This book is the most moving book I have every read.
Publishing
This book is written by Haruki Murakami and translated from Japanese by Philip Gabriel. I was originally sceptical that a translated book would loose a lot of feeling and context. Especially since the Japanese culture is so different from the our western culture I was afraid that the prose would be lost in the translation. I could not have been more wrong!
Synopsis
This book touches on true friendship, homosexual awakening, extra marital affairs and self awareness.
The narrator, who does not name himself, is in love with a long term friend Sumire. Sumire is a compulsive writer, poring out her thoughts, emotions and ideas in written form all the time. However she can never complete a novel, never able to create a beginning or end. Just events written in beautiful, thoughtful prose. However Sumire sees the story teller as a true friend and has no desire for him.
During a wedding reception Sumire fell in love. “An intense love, a veritable tornado sweeping across the plains – flattening everything in its path, tossing things up in the air, ripping them to shreds, crushing them to bits….. In short, a love of truly monumental proportions.” He goes on to tell us that the object of her desire was a woman 17 years her senior, called Miu.
Sumire ends up working for Miu and travelling through Europe with her on a business trip. On an Island in Greece Sumire disappears like “a puff of smoke”. Mui invites the narrator to Greece to assist her in locating Sumire. While there we learn more about Mui, Sumire and the narrator, this is done through a series of events and conversations in the most clever and beautiful way.
I will not tell you more, or if they find Sumire, but I can tell you that they find out a lot about themselves.
Impression
This is a small book, less than 230 pages, but no lightweight when it comes to depth of story and impact on your emotions.
As I said this is the the most moving book I have ever read. I started reading this book last week and finished it on the plane back down to Canberra. I had the lady on the plane ask me if I was alright as I actually shed tears towards the end of the book. This is not usual for me, just ask my wife, such was the strength of the emotion in this book.
I enjoy Japanese movies, both animated and live action, and am very used to the practice of introspection that many Japanese movies revel in. I enjoyed the authors ability to show us the inner mental workings of all the characters, without stopping the story or loosing you in detail.
Truly I would recommend this book to anyone, it is a wonderfully crafted piece of prose that tugs at your heart strings and introduces you to three people you will not soon forget. I am going to buy additional novels from Haruki Murakami.
Paper Bike
Now I would like to take credit for this, but I can’t. Arnaud is the brother of a friend and he is visiting Australia at the moment. He heard about my hobby and decided he could do that.
Not happy to start as I did on frogs and eagles, Arnaud said he would build the YZF-R1 in a week (he said this in French and his brother translated). Well he said he would and he did, amazing is all I can say.
He was able to use some of paper shaping tools that were lying around the place they were visiting and on standard office paper produced this amazing bike.
The finished bike is approximatly 45 cm long, 15 cm wide and 20 cm high, and Andy (my friend) is currently trying to figure out how to store it.
Here are some photos of the construction process.
Flat Engine
Engine Constructed
Engine in Frame
Sunday Drive
Since I was in Canberra this weekend and had nothing better to do, I went for a drive to Bateman’s Bay on the NSW south coast.
Until I was looking through the Canberra street directory I did not realise how close to the coast Canberra was, on 120Km’s or so. Now that is an easy Sunday drive.
So I got up early and packed the Echo (hired from Hertz), with my iPod, camera, a novel (Sputnik Sweetheart) and my work laptop (I am not allowed to leave it unattended, it might get lonely). Now I knew I had to go through Queanbeyan, Bungendore and Braidwood. This was a good as I know where Queanbeyan was, and I just hoped that the way was easy from there.
I did not have to worry as it is well signed and a very well used minor highway, I was soon aware that I was not the only one with the idea of a Sunday drive. I knew it was going to be an interesting drive when I stopped at the Bengendore wood works gallery. Right there near the Café was parked around 20 bikes, looks like this was a road that the Café racers liked. This meant the road would be windy, hilly but well surfaced. I thought this would be great, fun drive, then I remembered that I was in the Echo, not the most exciting car to drive. Oh well, I was going to take it easy and stop whenever I saw something interesting. Now before you ask, no I do not have any pictures, yet. The digital camera is at home with the family, but I do have the small 35mm camera and I will get them processed as soon as possible.
Ok where was I, that’s right Bengendore wood works gallery. This place is amazing, the stuff in there is great, I would love one of the clocks 
but at the price they were I decided on a gift for my wife instead (I cannot tell you what it is until I give it to her next week). People that can work wood into these creations have my greatest admiration, I mean I cannot cut a piece of wood in half.
I had breakfast in their Café and really enjoyed the Latte, bacon, sausages, mushrooms and eggs, in the quiet surrounds. About 12 of the bike riders where still there, owners of BMW’s, Triumphs and Kawasaki’s, looked like members of the Ulysis club. The owner however informed me that they were a group from Canberra called the “Bad Eggs” and they do a ride every month.
After breakfast I stopped at the leather store over the road and picked up something for my daughter and a wallet and hat for me. Looks like this drive would be the one to pick up the “I’ve been away kids!” presents.
Leaving Bengendore and heading onto Braidwood I saw some great sites that made me chuckle. A sign advertising turf had the line “We guarantee you 1,000’s of roots a year!”, and I saw a site that inspired me to come up with a new gallery, IT in the country. Hopefully the photo’s will work and you will see it later in the week.
Braidwood is an old gold mining town, with some very very old buildings and sights. I walked through the local museum, very much like any small town museum, run by the local historical society. One thing set it apart however, they had a collection of Chinese artefacts. You see during the gold rush many Chinese people moved to Australia and made it rich. Several families of Chinese decent became rich and powerful in the area around Braidwood and a significant number of their cloths, photos and artefacts are now in the museum. Braidwood must rely on the tourist dollar quite a bit as it has the strangest collection of shops I have seen. I went into the little store that only sold model cars, not ones you make but the die-cast ones. I kid you not, only model cars. Near it is the little toy shop, that specialises in toys like you used to get in the 50’s and 60’s. Tin wind-up cars and robots for the boys, and little dolls furniture (in wood) for the girls.
Braidwood to Bateman’s Bay was the “fun” part of the drive, down the Great Dividing Range and onto the South Coast of NSW. Now I am from Queensland where we have beaches called “80 mile beach” because, well, it is 80 miles long (not real original I know). In this part of Australia however there is just a lot of bays and inlets, and small secluded beaches, where a family could be on their own. I stopped at at least four beaches during my drive and three of them had less than two families. It was a beautiful warm clear day and perfect to be on the beach, shame I did not have swimmers or a towel.
Well it was about three in the afternoon and I decided it was time to head home. This time I found out how popular this place was with local Canberrans. The road was full of people coming home from a weekend or day on the water, many got very impatient and I hope they all got home ok.
I will post photo’s sometime soon.