So What Am I Doing in California?

Well... we had a hotspell in Chichibu and, though we were up in the mountains a good ways away from Tokyo, we had smog! Now, I grew up in LA and I have had more than enough smog to last me a lifetime. I decided that I could not remain in Chichibu for the summer. I hadn't been to see my family in a couple years, so, I booked my ticket. I'm here til the end of September, then, I go back to Chichibu for another three months intensive. This has turned out well. I'm enjoying playing my shakuhachi without the pressure of a lesson every three days and, yet, making progress that will make my next three month intensive even more productive.

I arrived in LAX. Spent a night with my nephew Paul and family and the next day took the train to San Luis Obispo where my brother lives. SLO is half way between LA and SF. It's 15 miles in from the coast with a dry mild climate.

That's my brother standing with me in front of his alternative energy store. Twenty- seven years he's been in the business!

That's his electric scooter that he lets me use while I'm visiting. It is classified as a bicycle, so, no license and I can use the overpass across the railway tracks and save a couple miles on my way downtown. I use it when I'm going shopping but I prefer to walk.

John and family were away in Europe when I first arrived in California. Slovenia, Switzerland, Romania and Italy. Meanwhile, back in their home, my sister Mary, her boyfriend, Max and I were enjoying the good life. SLO was once called the best place in the nation to live. Lots of refugees from LA. Very prosperous, laid back town. Weekly farmer's market on thursday evenings. Large performance venue out at the university. Mary had season tickets to an international choral competition. She gave me the ticket for one afternoon. I was stunned at the quality of the performances.

A few days after the return of John, Stephanie, Renee and Curt, I headed north to Arcata. I have now returned to John and Steph's til the beginning of September. Then, it's off to my sister's place for three weeks. I fly back to Japan September 25th.

The following posts have more photos.

Arcata California

Arcata is a town of 17,000 located way up the north coast of Califonia in Humbolt County. The tourist mostly peter out before they get this far. There is a narrow strip of land along this coast and then small mountains. In the summer, it's foggy on this side and boiling on the other. The forest covered mountains are green with redwood trees and federal helicopters flying over at certain times of the year. The older part of the town has many Victorian style houses. Here's a photo of one of the biggest and fanciest.

Humbolt State University swells the population most of the year. My niece Renee lives here. She just got her BA in English. Plans to be a high school teacher. She's one of the reasons that I chose to come to this particular spot. Summer is a less crowded with the school on break. One of the local radio stations plays 60s and 70s rock music all day. Janis wailing about a piece of her heart...

Renee is next to me. She and her friends took me out one night. It's not your eyes. The photo was blurred. Shot in a pub.



There is a gallery on the plaza that is run as a cooperative by twelve artists. The works are various mediums and very high quality. I then spied a shop called the "Humbolt Glassblowers" near the plaza. I thought it would be interesting to see some local glassblowing. I walked into the shop. One wall had a large assortment of equipment for golf frisbie. The other side of the long room had a glass display case with all sizes, shapes and colours of Bongs! They even had padded velour shoulder bags specially for carrying the larger bongs. I guess if you're going to a party and you want to show off your latest addition to your collection... They had a tshirt on a rack that read 'vagetarian'. I liked that.


Renee took me to a ball game. The stadium is just a block from the plaza. (That photo's a baseball diamond for you Aussies.)

There was an interesting band giving a bit of support and entertainment in the stands. A very lively bunch.


The town centre has lovely grass covered plaza. The buildings on the streets surrounding it have been restored and everything is very neat and pretty except for one row of four bars (not taverns or pubs) that have managed to retain a seedy feel about them.

Every Saturday is the farmers market at the plaza. The stalls are set in the street around the perimeter. In the centre of the plaza are a few food stalls and the band for the day. Here's a pic of the local steel drum band. They were really enjoying themselves. The week before it was a raggae band. The week after The Buckey Walters! (Read the post about the Garden House to hear of the Bucky Walters.)

A guy cooking with a solar cooker made from a satellite dish. I think maybe the cover on the rim was to control the heat on his skillet.










Some of the crowd playing and cruising the stalls.



On the second Friday evening of the month,
Shops around the plaza stay open, have free wine and nibblies and live music. A cafe had a jazz qaurtet. The furniture store had a blues band. (Guys my age) They let you sit on the display couches and listen. At the book shop, there was a fiddle, guitar and mandolin playing appalachian music.... Then, on my way home, as I was passing an intimate restaurant/ bar away from the plaza, I happened to look in and discover a guitar, mondolin and double bass playing Jango style gypsy music. They were hot! It was their regular biweekly dinner gig. I went up to the bar and nursed a schooner for a nice long while.

A few blocks away from the centre of town is Cafe Mokka. Finnish saunas and hot tubs. The sauna huts have sod roofs.

The interior shot is the cafe with newspapers and magazines from around the world. It became my favourite hangout. They even had the best prices for refreshments, cakes and snacks in town.








And finally, a few miles up the coast in a small bay is the shortest lighthouse I've ever seen.

The Garden House

I guess that it's time to tell you about the house where I stayed in Arcata. I sublet a room in a shared house that I found through craigslist. Here's why it's called the Garden House.













I saw photos of the house from when the present owner bought it. The front and one side were covered by flat empty lawn. The third side by concrete. The only concrete left is a narrow strip in front of the gargage that is used for a patio.

The house is in the 'bottomland' on the ocean side of the town. It was originally salt marsh and would now not be zoned for building. Under the house is a sump pump for the rainy season. Fortunately, it wasn't the rainy season 'cause the pump is broken. There was no refrigerator in the house. Instead, there is a hole in the dining room floor that used to be part of the defunct central heating. A three sided box is set into the square ducting and used as a cool box. For most things, it worked ok, however, milk only lasted a couple days and I had to buy my beer cold and drink it as soon as I got home.

It was only a fifteen minute walk into town and another ten minutes up into the hills where there is a redwood forest remnant that is a city park. This is the lawn of the park.







Redwoods are amazing trees. Some of the oldest and tallest on earth. There is a tree that is living and they drive cars through! Not my kind of thing but it gives you and idea of their potential size. These are second growth forests. Still, the trees have a very soft bark. To be in a redwood forest is to be in a very gentle place. I would hike up into the forest and play my flute some days.


The Buckey Walters

Kitty corner from the Garden House lived a couple members of the Buckey Walters. The Buckey Walters are a bluegrass band and I could occasionally hear banjo being played over there. The mandolin player dropped in occasionally and we became friends. I heard them my first weekend when I biked an hour inland to the the annual Humbolt Folklife Festival at the little town of Blue Lake. They were one of my favourite acts of the day.

There is a town down the coast on the other side of the mountains called Boonville. In Boonville, they have their own slang called 'Boontling'. 'Buckey Walters' is what they called the phone box.




Don't know where to stick this photo. I thought it was a new age shop but it turned out to be a hairdressing salon.

The 1% Program

The following is a letter I sent to the Byron Shire Echo:

Hello Friends:
I am visiting a city of 17,000 on the far north California coast. This university town, Arcata, has two health food shops each the size of Woolies. One of them, a cooperative, has at it's check out line a list of about twenty local not-for-profits with a code number next to each. A customer can request that an addtional 1% of the total cost of purchases be added as a donation to a not-for-profit selected from that list.

I consider this a great idea. It is totally voluntary for both the merchant to initiate and for the customer to participate. Say your purchase is $30.00. 1% is only $.30. Negligible for the customer but it all adds up. The merchant could send off a cheque when the sum is large enough and at a convenient time. With the computerised cash registers, once set up, the adding of the 1% would be easy.

It only takes one merchant to start this program. Of course, the more the merrier and if enough merchants were involved, they could display a placard, 'Member of the 1% Program'. There could be literature available for visitors to the shire explaining the benefits to the community that they so like to visit. Perhaps the NCRF might want to consider a role.

So, there ya are.

G'day, Kundan Ewan

Ahhh, how I miss hearing g'day, mate, no worries....

Kundan's New Obsessions

Just before I left Japan, I began a new writing project. It involves a fictitious large intentional community. While doing research, I came across a book, 'Village Wisdom, Future Cities' that is a collection of presentations from the Third International Ecocity and Ecovillage Conference in Senegal in 1996. I have found out that the next 7th International Ecocity Conference is happening in San Francisco next April. So, after returning to Australia next January, I will then be coming back to California for the conference. Then, back to Oz by July 2008 for the International Shakuhachi Society Conference in Sydney.

Ecocity Conference website: http://www.ecocityworldsummit.org/index.htm

Shakuhachi Conference website: http://worldshakuhachifestival08.com/index.html

I was concerned about all the flying as it is such a high carbon count. Then, I discovered a study done at Tufts University about companies that trade in personal carbon credits. (Some of these companies are not ethical. They do such things as sell credits for projects that would happen anyway.) Of the recommended companies, one was australian- http://www.climatefriendly.com/

So, I will be paying an extra AUD$163.61 to Climatefriendly for carbon credits when I fly to SF for the conference next year.

I'm not sure how but Byron Shire will be hearing from me on this subject in the not to distant future.

Kind of in the same vein: I have been looking at recumbent cycles for a couple of years. My favourite is made just south of San Francisco; the EasyRacer. I was feeling that soon I would jump in and purchase one, however, the price for the EasyRacer Tour Easy is an initial US$2000.00. Then, there are the accessories.
The gods must have been happy with me, becaus the other day I went on the Australian ebay site and found a recumbent for sale. It was designed by EasyRacer but built by Sun. The model is the Sun Sport LE. It is similar to the Tour Easy.It was for sale for less than half what I would pay new. This was the second time that the guy had listed the bike and I was the only bidder. I won the bid and Tony Parker has very kindly agreed to take delivery for me. I'm itching to give it a go. Here's a photo.