Chinatown, Vancouver

August 11 2006

Completed a tiny volume of Burton Watson stories (essays really) today, entitled The Rainbow Road, or something approximating that. Charming, personal, revealing to a point. Gary Snyder not only provided a jacket review but I was surprised to learn that they were acquainted.

I am now sitting in the Sun Yat-sen garden and there is a quite large orange and white koi approaching me and now passing. Walking through Vancouver's Chinatown on my way to the garden I am as usual aware of my ownfeeling of incongruity with what is one of my favourite neighbourhoods of my new city. Really I haven't even been able to comprehend but a fraction of what goes on around me here. I find the garden quite peaceful; I can relax into the place and sometimes I am even able to harmonize with the large numbers of tourists who frequent it. Mostly I try to ignore them. I am more interested in the frogs and the plants. This garden is one of the places of solace or sanity for me here.

This is becoming a year of gardens to me.