Early June, the rice fields of Northern Tohoku were in and the Ojii-sans were taking a bit of rest. Plowing the fields, fertilizing, reconstructing the せぎ (rice field water ditches), planting the little rice starts – all that was done and the valley could pause. The pause came naturally, as the 長雨 settled over the valley and prepared it for the humid summer ahead. The rainy season, 梅雨（つゆ）, of the south is associated with the plums ripening – but up here it comes a bit later. There is a danger here as well, for these old gentlemen. The やませ , a damp cold easterly wind coming off the Sea of Okhotsk can ruin a growing season – and has. But there is not much you can do about that but pray and make offerings at the little shrines that protect the fields. So they wait, and watch.
Obaa-san wildcrafting fuki
My house, a 古民家 (kominka) we remodeled when I retired here, overlooks a patchwork of rice paddies where an ocean-born fog mingles with the mist. On the far edge is an obaa-san, dressed head-to-toe in the traditional Japanese farming attire, 農作業着 (のうさぎょうぎ, nōsagyōgi). It keeps the sun and the bugs off in summer – today it offered some protection from the damp. She worked her way along the creek bank, across from the far edge of the field, under the shade of the mulberry thickets that border everything in this valley. I was sipping some coffee and found the scene oddly perfect.
She was picking the フキ (fuki) that grows so readily in the shaded boundary areas. A single stalk bursting out of the ground, ending in one giant leaf that can grow as large as a pizza pan – and larger. When young, the locals will pick those stems, peel the stringy outer layer and boil them with a bit of soy sauce, mirin, and sesame.
The lady was working through an entire bed of them. Banks of fog drifted through the light rain. Sometimes almost as slowly as my obaa-san worked her fuki patch. But the fog would move on and still she tended her wild-crafting.
Coffee with the Ojii-san
Our neighbor brought the 回覧板（かいらんばん） by today, the folder the neighborhood passes from house to house with local notices. He usually leaves it in our mailbox and goes back to work – a rice farmer is not inactive in the summer! But it was the 長雨 season, the rice was in, and he stayed for a cup of coffee. Not lost on me is his preference for tea, but coffee will do when it is the company that is desired on a damp spring day.
He is a fine fellow – wonderfully sharp with eyes that glitter at small jokes and flash when questions catch his interest. The sound of children is a fading memory in many parts of rural Japan and I suspect he comes over to watch them play as often as he comes to sit with me. Their laughter draws his cackles. All four of his remaining teeth flashing in the sun.
My Japanese is effective, but I am not great at small talk yet. Which suits him fine, the older set likes peace and a ‘gaijin’ that can’t prattle away at nothing is an acceptable substitute for peace. We sat and listened to the rain on my deck roof. He hadn’t seen my obaa-san across the field, working the fuki patch.
I poured another cup of coffee and the silence deepened. I drifted with the fog. The obaa-san’s gaze brought me back. Odd, as we were so far apart. But still, I could see her, so why shouldn’t she see us?
I shifted in my chair and my neighbor stirred in his. He had been wandering too. I gestured to the obaa-san across the field and asked ‘あそこのおばあちゃん、知ってる？ 一日中、雨の中でフキを採ってたよ。
“Do you know that old lady over there? She was picking fuki all day in the rain.”
My neighbor gazed across the field, through the drizzle and slowly shifting fog banks, to my obaa-san.
His old eyes flashed and glittered deep under that brow. It seemed a long time before he said ‘あぁ、山さんだ。毎年だ。(oh, that’s Mrs. Yama (Yama-san). Every year). He peered through the soft light ‘あそこのは、うめぇど。 (‘The ones over there are good’)
I pointed into the shaded forest next to my own garden, where a large patch of fuki was growing. ‘These are ok, but they can be quite bitter sometimes. Are those better?’
The ojii-san smiled at some hidden joke I had strode across – Yes, they are. But ‘勝手に採るなよ。’ (Don’t just go picking them (without permission).) I understood. It was her patch. She probably had been picking that patch since she was a child.
The ojii-san put his empty cup down and headed back to his house. Thanking me for the time in that understated way of the inaka. That is to say, he grunted and waved.
I poured another cup of coffee, spiked it with a bit of shochu, and settled back down.
Across the field the fogs drifted through.
The misting stretched and stirred itself into a proper drizzle.
