22. I Knew This Box Was Bullsh*t
Arashiyama Bamboo Forest | Kyoto, Japan
Good morning friends,
Before I share this week’s newsletter, please take a minute to meet five freshly hatched Flapneck Chameleons.
Here’s some more random but interesting internet to brighten up your Sunday.
1. Sounds of the forest
Listen to forest sounds from all over the world.
*you can submit your own recordings and help to support the project here.
2. Bad Ass Banana Bread
Gluten & sugar free via: Josephine.
100g oatmeal
50g butter (vegan or other)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
4 bananas
4 eggs
Mash the bananas with a fork, melt the butter and whisk the eggs in a bowl. Add all of the ingredients in a bowl and whisk together.
Preheat the oven for 225 degrees. Add the mix to a loaf pan and put in the oven for 30 mins until the top is golden.
Feel free to eat the entire thing in your pyjamas at the kitchen counter.
3. A makeover
There are so many things I love about Japan (MY GOD. Let us all just take a minute please to appreciate the divine majesty that is The Japanese Toilet), but nothing comes close to a good soak in a Japanese bath before bed.
Known as a Sentō (銭湯) they are a type of Japanese communal bathhouse where customers pay for entrance. Traditionally these bathhouses have been quite utilitarian, with a tall barrier separating the sexes within one large room, a minimum of lined up faucets on both sides and a single large bath for the already washed bathers to sit in among others.
Japanese public bathhouses have been a long-time favorite communal gathering place where people feel a sense of connection to their communities. Now that 95% of households in Japan own private bathrooms, many sentō have been forced to close due to a shrinking customer base, even though there are a certain number of long-time fans.
Tokyo-based studio Schemata Architects has given new life to Koganeyu sentō, maintaining its original function of socialization and inserting new areas such as a sauna and a beer bar.
4. Reading
Succinct and thought-provoking.
Two of my favourite paragraphs:
“In a world that is ever shifting and unpredictable, I’ve come to believe it is totally fine not to feel fine. It is perfectly okay not to be okay. If truth be told, if from time to time you do not catch yourself overwhelmed with worry and indecision, demoralised and exhausted, or even incandescent, maybe you are not really following what is going on – here, there and everywhere.”
And this:
“We have all the tools to build our societies anew, reform our ways of thinking, fix the inequalities and end the discriminations, and choose earnest wisdom over snippets of information, choose empathy over hatred , choose humanism over tribalism, yet we don’t have much time or room for error while we are losing our planet, our only home. After the pandemic, we won’t go back to the way things were before. And we shouldn’t.”
5. A Quote
“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
― Arundhati Roy
See you next Sunday.