CLUB MASTER HOANG: POST 373 16DEC2018 TAMARACK PHOTOS Exercise BIEN THU

	16 December 2018 *(Please click on –Follow-)*
	www.clubmasterhoang.blogspot.com POST 373 16 December 2018 THE CHRISTMAS SEASON 2018 From charles phan hoang
	Christmas is coming. In downtown thousands of colorful decorations illuminate the Parliament Hill and the core of the city. Like a little boy I enjoy enormously the ambiance of Christmas when I am wandering here and there in the city, in some parks or in large shopping malls. I often get lost in reverie when I recall many unforgettable Christmas seasons in different cities I have known along my way. Harrods in London with millions of lights; a hundred colorful fake ‘Santa Claus’ reunited in a park of Tokyo; wonderful Japanese dancers performing at Naha in Okinawa; the midnight mass in Caen -the city of hundred churches; the Christmas great decorations of Galeries Lafayette and Champs Elysées in Paris at a peaceful time; the first Christmas in Canada with so many lights everywhere and snow; the traditional Mexican Christmas season las posadas … and the celebration of Christmas in Spanish by Latin-American Japanese who speak Spanish and live in a suburb of Tokyo. On a late night, in a crowded Latin style bar, near Fujisawa, I felt totally part of them because I understood the language, the dance, the loud music, and the way they were. They adopted me and I sat among them, drank with them and made them tell their story. Many were Latin American immigrants in Japan, others were Japanese descendants from Peru and Chile. When they were in their native country, in Latin America, they did feel they were rather Japanese, but now living in Japan they do feel the need of being among their native people to speak Spanish and to celebrate altogether Christmas and the New Year. In Western countries, for most people Christmas is the time they celebrate with their family. But for me and for many of my colleagues teaching at the university, Christmas also means long vacations! Vacations mean traveling then go back to work with some new ideas, or sometimes no new ideas at all, only with the skin looking darker after a visit at some sunny countries. I think I was born to travel. Out of the Christmas period, in recent years I have visited some popular cities such as Milano, Trieste, Venice, Paris, Oxford, Cambridge, Tokyo, Taipei, Pusan … and I also enormously enjoyed visiting other places, much less known, to discover something special such as admiring a beautiful collection of Joan Miro at a small town of Rovinj in Croatia; appreciating a cup of rare tea prepared by a master of tea at the hill Maokung inTaiwan; coming back after over 30 years to Hei-in Temple in South Korea to hear again the profound recitation sounds of the Heart Sutra. This year I have revisited Pisa, Bergamo, Nantes, Caen… and enjoyed drinking an ICEBERG beer in the village of Quidi Vidi; seeing huge whales from the boat Iceberg Quest; taking a nice lunch at the building ‘The Rooms’ looking down on the city of St John’s in Newfoundland where many rows of houses are in vivid colors: red, blue, yellow, pink. I know Christmas is time to send greeting cards to family and close friends with a good wishes message on the occasion and give them some news. The question is not really what to say in the message but what card to choose for different people with different relationship. Writing greeting card reminds me of a game I loved much in my youth: Skimming Pebble. The joy in this game is to see your messenger, the thin stone, go as far as possible in any direction above the water. The joy is in the action, not in the expectation of getting back something. Charles P. Hoang (December 2018)