Zōkyō

Happy New Year from Fujisan!

Happy 2010!!! 2009 has been one of the best years of my life. I have a Fuji Mountain of thanks for all I have been blessed with this year. I’ve been surrounded with people I admire so much, I’ve travelled to San Francisco, Hong Kong, Indonesia, to Kobe and Isu and Hokkaido. (Thank you to my beloved adopted home of Tokyo who hast hosted me for five years now.) I’ve taken some of the best photos of my life and learned so much. I’ve shared so many new friendships and have taken many big strides in 2009 to make 2010 one of the best years in my life. all with a woman that I wholeheartedly love.

My Family and old friends are far but close in heart. I miss them all dearly and look forward to the very moment we meet again.

Despite all the craziness in the world, I have remained optimistic about our future and tried to keep the people around me happy. As we go through life, we must learn to accept eachother’s differences and learn to live life in peace. I do have hope that we can get there and I vow this year to work towards getting us closer. 

This photo was taken just a few moments right after the clock struck midnight. This year already looks like it will be a special one. To all my loved ones, near and far, I wish you the happiest year in 2010.

Happy New Year 2010 from Fuji san.
With Love Always, 

Brian 

Yesterday, I dropped by my mate Koga san‘s awesome bookstore cafe, Tegamisha in Tsutsujigaoka and had a coffee and some sweets. The cafe is located in an unsuspecting location in the courtyard of a giant drab apartment complex.
The people living in the area are very lucky to have this enclave of goodness at the center, serving up its amazing concoctions with extreme attention to beautiful detail in the way only Japanese do. Although I didn’t eat anything, every dish that came out of the kitchen made me giggle with mouth-watering delight seeing such wonderfully thought out dishes.

The coffee was amazing and served in a beautiful hand-made ceramic cup that kept my hands warm while I perused many of the awesome old books there.

I found one old book from maybe the 70′s that featured 100 Japanese photographers. I got to a page that looked somewhat familiar by an artist known as Hiromichi Moriyama.

Upon closer inspection there was no mistaking it was Daido.

Here are some close-ups.

Haha, so cool…

Anyway, you should go check this place out. Its really cool and well worth a walk over. Here’s a map.

Chimpanzee

This was taken with a Leica M8 on loan from Joi. I have been having a lot of fun with this camera a enjoying the ease of workflow that comes with working in digital. I’m quite impressed with how similar the photos from this camera look when compared to the film versions although I find that I am shooting ten times the amount of photos with it and perhaps tend to not take as much time to get it right the first time. While its a same form factor as my M6′s its a totally different shooting style, but one I am quite enjoying. Looking forward to using it more…

My Lovely wife Yasuko is an absolutely incredible cook. I try to tell people but they just can’t understand. I can’t talk it up enough so I just decided to put up some photos. She is completely to be blamed for the ten pounds I have gained since getting married. But it is certainly worth it. Having said that, she has a great sense to always make healthy, really balanced, beautiful food. This is just some of it. Hands down one the the best perks of being married.

Spotted some PDA with trees up at Isejingu.