Year: 2023
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Tanegashima Island: A strategic casualty
The day we flew out of the “cosmoport” of Tanegashima, a remote island (ritō) off the southern coast of Kyushu, was actually historically significant. Not because of my presence of course.
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“Truly Asia” Pt 2: Melaka
Read Part 1 “Kuala Lumpur” here → It took about two and a half hours to reach Melaka from the busy bus depot in southern Kuala Lumpur. We had loaded up on snacks and sandwiches for our lunchtime departure, just liking getting the “ekiben” or packed lunches in Japan before getting on the Shinkansen for…
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“Truly Asia” Pt 1: Kuala Lumpur
PREFACE: this is a whirlwind post meant to give you the tiniest sliver of context for the accompanying photos which I hope you have a spin through. They are at the bottom of the post. Back in about 2018 my wife and I started talking about living in a third country for a while. My…
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Japan doubles its islands
A couple years ago, after moving to Ikijima, I introduced you all to the idea of ritō, or “remote island”. Being a “stratovolcanic archipelago” Japan has a lot more islands than you can likely name. In fact, there are 6,852 at the last official count. A few days ago, the Japan Times reported that the…
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1 year an Upāsaka
Halfway through last year I described my year-long commitment as a lay devotee of Buddhism in the Thai Forest Monastery under Ajahn Sona. I completed the commitment at the end of December and was given the Pali name of Sanghapāla — “protector of the Sangha (the Buddhist community).” I use that name now when in…