Memories of chestnuts

Hurricane Sandy is hitting U.S. east coast, and approaching southern Ontario right now.

Please forgive me to write something fun while many people are suffering from the strong wind.  A week ago, I wrote about scenery and food.  So does weather; typhoon (the Pacific Ocean version of hurricane) in this season reminds me of memories of chestnuts.  When I was a little kid, I liked to play in a park near my place.  There were many trees in the park, and after a typhoon hit my town, I could pick up lots of chestnuts there.

Another thing reminded me of the memories of chestnuts.  I bought a Japanese book through amazon recently, 佐賀のがばいばあちゃん (My Gabai Grandma from Saga).  In the book, the author talks about his memories of his grandma and their financially poor but (and) happy life.  He did not have enough money to buy snack, and climbed trees to get fruits and nuts for snacking.  He learned a lot in his financially-poor and fruitful life.

When I was in my late 20s, I had a chance to pick up chestnuts with a group of friends, and found they did not know how to take out chestnuts out of a bur.  I knew it not because I did not have money to buy snack when I was a little kid but simply because I was curious about many things.  Still, I think that not having enough gives an impulse to learn and stimulates creativity.

October 29, 2012Permalink