having a break

The island has been cool and without rain in the past three days. The air is light and agile, drier and thinner. The sunlight also seems less harsh. Can it be that spring has come, at last?

I was at Japanese class on Monday night and the sensei (teacher) taught us the words for summer holiday, winter holiday, spring holiday. When she asked the student on her left, what did you do in the summer holiday, everyone in the class laughed. We don't have summer holiday, someone said. It's always summer here, said another student. What about spring holiday? Nope, we don't have that either. What about winter holiday? We wish. More laughter.

It happens very often in the Japanese class, this communal owning-up to the island's have-not's. And it's done with a good measure of embarrassment, mirth, and contempt. In a much earlier class, with a different group of students, another sensei had said that she was new to the island and would like to know which places she ought to visit. The students looked around at each other and exchanged knowing smiles. This is the camaraderie of the island's people. Looking at the island and seeing it always in terms of the not-enough and the not-here.

When I sit, like the boy in the picture, in front of my book shelves, I am reminded of what a friend once said about not having to travel physically because by sitting in an armchair with a book his mind can go to all kinds of places. I think the island needs to sit in front of its bookshelves and find some way to travel. It has looked far too long at itself and found itself unlovely far too many times.