Would she have been amused?  I hope not, because the statue temporarily sharing the Kirkgate with Victoria has a serious purpose.  The statue is called The Knife Angel and its presence there is one stop on a UK wide tour advocating against violence, particularly that wrought on young people by the use of knives.  The various related activities in Edinburgh are detailed here.  Today is your last chance to see BALISONG, a play dealing with knife violence which has been touring Edinburgh schools and is this weekend being presented to the public at the Traverse. 

Way back in the 50s when I was young knives were popular with boys.  Like many others I had a sheath knife.  I'm not sure I did much more than throw it at the ground or maybe at a tree in the hope of it sticking into the target.  AI tells me such knives are used in Bushcraft and Survival ( Ideal for heavy-duty tasks like splitting small pieces of wood, carving, or preparing kindling), Hunting and Fishing ( Used for field dressing game or cutting line and bait) and Camping (Handy for general camp chores and food preparation).  I can probably lay claim to the last of these uses.

Whatever we used them for neither I nor my friends had any thoughts of using them as offensive (or for that matter defensive) weapons.  Are my recollections just rose tinted?

I confess to still carrying a knife. It's a miniature Swiss army knife with a small blunt but pointed blade, a combined nailfile and mini screwdriver and the implement that I use most often - mini scissors.

I went to a talk about the violence Edinburgh and thereabouts experienced during the second world war.  How much?  Not much it turns out and after 1942 none.  The speaker has written a book about it called The Bombing of Edinburgh and Leith.  Very interesting and lot of fascinating photos.

Continuing on the theme of WWII I saw a pair of films about De Gaulle and his activities during the war.  Wikipedia has a long article about De Gaulle and the war and AI gives a neat summary if you google "de gaulle's part in world war two".  The films cover all of that pretty accurately as far as I can tell highlighting the struggles he had to weld together such French leaders and forces that were opposed to Vichy and his almost herculean struggles to get France equal billing as it were with the Americans and the British.  The films are maybe a bit on the Boys Own Paper side in their portrayal but I don't think anyone can deny that although he was an awkward bugger to deal with he was a great wartime leader.

Back in WWI Lawrence of Arabia (another awkward bugger) was making his mark and I saw the film, I think for the first time, on the telly.  It's quite long so I split it over two evenings.  It's definitely Boys Own Paper material and very enjoyable to boot.  I'm not surprised it won so many Oscars.  The cinematography was out of this world and made the most out of the films' beautiful locations. 

Everybody Digs Bill Evans gets a well deserved four star review from The Guardian but I was disappointed in the film. Disappointed because I had expected to hear lots of Evans' great piano music, not realising that the film was all about a period in which he was unable to make music because of the grief that he suffered after the death of his friend and musical collaborator Scott LaFaro.  Having got the idea I admired the film.  To hear his music an excellent album of the same name is available on Spotify.

Music that I have heard this month came from the RSNO's and the SCO's opening concerts of the 26/27 season.  Both started with big works, Mahler's 6th Symphony from the former and Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique from the latter.  Both works have tremendous final movements but my mind drifted a good bit waiting for them.

I've always enjoyed Robert Harris's books so I was pleased to join Claire to hear him, courtesy of Toppings, speak about his latest novel, Agrippa.  It's a fictional memoir by a man who we've never really heard of.  He was famous for building aqueducts which is apparently what sparked Harris's interest.  It turns out he was a big chum of Octavius, later Augustus the first of Rome's emperors, and if not exactly the power behind the throne then a pretty significant player.  Harris gave a nice relaxed and informative talk.  I didn't buy the book but Claire did so I hope to borrow it at some point.

This week I heard Robert Harris in his earlier life as a Newsnight reporter on a great Radio 4 series about the Hitler Diaries forgery exposure in 1983.

The Palm Houses at the Botanic Gardens are on the verge of reopening to the public after a five year refurbishment programme.  Those of us who have spent a paltry few quid on membership of the Botanics have been able to steal a march on the public and get in a couple of weeks in advance.  I went down and admiringly walked through.  I had thought that the project included other of the glasshouses and it does but they remain to be tackled.  The restoration is lovely.  I took some pictures but these on the RBGE site are a lot better.  

Sarah and I had one of our periodic Japanese meals last weekend.  This time we went to Koyama in Forrest Road.  For a Saturday night they were not at all busy.  I suppose they and other businesses are suffering a post festival slowdown.  The food was good.  I had a lovely grilled aubergine starter and a tasty prawn yakisoba.  Pudding was so-so.  We tried their sake sampler which was small glasses of four or maybe five different sakes.  Unlike Sarah but true to my palate limitations they all tasted much the same to me.  I preferred my gin and tonic and would have had more had they not run out of tonic.  How can you do that??  I enjoyed a Sapporo beer instead.

My last visit to the cinema this month was to see the National Theatre Live production of The Misanthrope.  In a version set in today's world by Martin Crimp this strays somewhat from a direct reproduction. Moliere's play is a fairly straightforward satire on the hypocrisy of  the upper reaches of French society coupled with the paradox of Alceste's hatred of that hypocrisy while being head over heels in love with one of its finest exponents.  I thought Crimp's version, while entertaining and finely performed was overloaded with peripheral concerns.  I took part in Tony Harrison's version many years ago and I'd like to see the National Theatre who premiered it in 1973 perform it again.

Now that the equinox has passed winter is on its way.  I can't say I'm looking forward to it but I've had my boiler serviced in preparation. 

The EIF beanbag concert in tribute to John Wallace the trumpeter was very enjoyable. I particularly liked Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition.  Getting out of the beanbag though was significantly more challenging this year than last.  I can see that next time I'll have to surrender to a conventional concert hall seat.

My other visit to the Usher Hall proved easier with respect to seating but was a little disappointing. Large choral works always attract me but Hiawatha didn't cut the mustard. Not that there was anything wrong with the music or the performance.  My damning critique is that it was inoffensive but dull.

Nothing dull about the music that accompanied the San Francisco Ballet's Mere Mortals.  Nor were the dancing or the staging in the least dull.  This for me was an utterly entrancing evening.  The Guardian's reviewer had lots of good things to say about it but felt that it lacked emotion and gave it a star or two less that I would have done. I'm sure she's right there but I'm happy to have forgone emotion (of which I am normally a strong supporter) in favour of the wonderful presentation.

Verdi's A Masked Ball also received a fine presentation from the Zurich Opera House with no shortage of emotion.  I'd never seen this opera before and opera is not entirely to my taste but I enjoyed all aspects of this production and as usual marvelled at the director's marshalling of her large forces.  This reviewer saw the first performance in Edinburgh and I saw the last so perhaps the weaknesses he found were eliminated over the run.  Or perhaps (which is very likely) I failed to perceive them.  This more sympathetic review accords more closely to my reactions. 

That rounded off my EIF shows.  Meanwhile on the Fringe I saw several things some good, some not so good.  For the record brief remarks on them all.

Wagner’s Ring for people who can’t be bothered to sit through it was a brilliantly funny adroitly managed and delivered romp through a parody of The Ring.  Great fun.

Steak Out was a well written and delivered comedy about a north Edinburgh family's plan to rob an up-market butchery of its meats and sell them in their own shop on Christmas Eve.  Plans naturally go agley and an entertaining hour of rich Edinburgh dialogue ensued. Excellent. Its venue was Teviot House, recently refurbished. As I went in I remarked to myself that it was 65 years ago that I first crossed that threshold. Tempus fugit and all that.

Already Here.  This was a shot in the dark prompted by a leaflet thrust into my hand near a venue and time that suited me.  Alas the play failed to suit me. The story told with great sincerity and feeling on the part of the actors (I felt nothing) is of a grieving widow who, failing to achieve another relationship, turns to AI.  She creates an AI boyfriend and we are condemned to follow the development of their affair. Big no from me but critics generally admired it.   

Through the Shortbread Tin.  This National Theatre of Scotland production which saw the light of day at the Tron a year or more ago was another show that failed to engage me.  Mind you I was tired and didn't attend full-time.  Sorry about that.  I enjoyed the Gaelic singing but otherwise this " Thought-provoking poetic theatre interrogating Scottish history" to quote a review provoked just yawns from me.

The Tamer Tamed.  Unlike the previous show where I was one of a full house at the Netherbow, for this show I was the entire audience.  That was a shame because there were some good things in it.  The presentation was simple but effective.  The acting was vigorous and committed.  The pace never flagged.  As Wikipedia explains  the play is a counterpart to The Taming of the Shrew in which the tables are turned on Petruchio by his second wife Maria.  It was written around 1620 and the text presented me with some difficulties.  I understood every word but after a bit of dialogue wasn't always sure what it was about.  For example there was some interchange about a wager at the end of which I wasn't at all sure who was wagering or what was being wagered about.

Japanese Grandma Funeral.  This was a great show; funny, warm, entertaining.  This review calls it a must see and they're right but it's too late now.

Wester Ross Story Club. Following on from the dramatised presentation of a story about a kelpie at a previous Fringe  (Was it last year?  I was in it but can't remember) this is a more straightforward telling of a couple of stories with some singing and a piece of music.  It was a pleasant and relaxing way to start the day.

Colin Steele and Martin Kershaw Quintet play Chet Baker and Stan Getz.  The title says it all.  That's what they did in the Jazz Bar with the support of piano from Dave Milligan, double bass from Brian Shiels and drums from Max Popp.  I've heard them do it before but that didn't detract from the pleasure of hearing the music again.  As my sister-in-law Sally said "it's nice to hear jazz with tunes in it".

Concerts of the Future.  This is where I made my own musical contribution to the Fringe.  When you go to this show you are met by chaps in lab coats who tell you that they are researching concert attendance; how to get away from the current convention of sitting quietly and attentively in a concert hall until breaking out into applause at the end. You then answer a few questions on a tablet and are ushered into the instrument lab where you are presented with an "instrument" supposedly fashioned to fit your personal qualities as revealed by your answers.  The group (the show handles five people at a time) then wave their instruments around and the various electronic bits and pieces in the room buzz and whistle, green lines spin across screens and you we get more scientific chatter from the "researchers".  Finally you put on a VR headset and find yourself sitting in an orchestra.  I had cellos to my left and violins to my right.  You then "play" your instrument in the closing section of Beethoven's 7th Symphony along with the orchestra.  It's good fun but the 30 second video of your performance that they send you afterwards is not flattering and best seen only by those who love you and swear not to laugh.  However feel free to react as you wish to this still from it.

It's a shame they don't integrate the participant and the orchestra that can be seen in the headset into the video.

The Curious Case of Osgood Mackenzie.  In this show I made my dramatic contribution to the Fringe. It was a rerun, with one cast change, of a show we performed in the 2023 Fringe and then took to where it is set, Wester Ross, in Autumn 2023 and in Spring 2024.  Osgood created the exceptional garden at Poolewe now in the care of the National Trust for Scotland.  The play though is about his relationship with his English wife Minna, their daughter and his redoubtable mother.  The NTS calls the garden "a labour of love and enduring commitment".  Unfortunately the same could not be said about Osgood and his mother's approach to his marriage. It's a sad tale of constant repression of what we would now regard as Minna's rights leading to complete estrangement between Minna and her daughter.  The Press and Journal published a good article about the genesis of the play in 2023. 

Considering Consciousness.  I've long been interested in the brain and its workings and where consciousness fits into the picture.  My interest tends to be pretty superficial having perhaps been at its deepest when I came across Gilbert Ryle and his Concept of Mind at university. At the book festival this year there were a few events related to the topic and this one was particularly enjoyable.  So enjoyable that I bought the books both authors were promoting.  You can't get more enthusiastic than that.  Let's hope I read them.

So you'll see I was reasonably busy during the festivals though rather less than in previous years.  It's not lack of interest but lack of energy.  I had to devote some energy to visitors.  My brother and sister-in-law stayed with me for a week and their daughter, husband and family who were glamping (though it sounded more camp than glamp) tended to breakfast in my flat.  We ate out together a couple of times.  I'd recommend La Sal but was less smitten by Cilantro (though my visitors loved it) and I mustered my resources and excited them all with my homemade ice-cream.

Thanks to being less active in show going than in the past I managed to read an excellent book which I picked more or less at random from the Book Festival bookshop.  It's A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles.  I enjoyed it so much that I've ordered another of his novels from the library.   

There's probably an eclipse behind these clouds.  I was on my way to Shinjuku (the play not the place) when the eclipse was due so I closed my eyes, raised my phone to the skies and snapped.  But as I said to one of the gathered crowd as I entered the venue I saw an eclipse when I was at primary school and don't really need to see another one.

I caught a final couple of Jazz Festival gigs and had an outing to the Glasgow Botanic Gardens with Andrew and enjoyed some Marilyn Monroe films in the Filmhouse's commemoration of her centenary before the International Festival and its relatives burst upon us. 

I missed the first couple of shows thanks to an upset stomach (the finger of suspicion points to a sandwich and salad consumed at that selfsame Filmhouse) but started off with Wynton Marsalis's tribute to Ellington and carried on from there.  A tribute to the trumpeter John Wallace, a young Edinburgh guitarist and the most amazing The Death of Gesualdo were the musical highlights of the first week for me.  The Guardian called the latter "creepy and compelling" which is absolutely right.  This series of dimly lit tableaux vivants telling the grisly tale of murder and mayhem that was Gesualdo's life deserves a full viewing which this Youtube trailer only hints at. What a treat it was. 

For films You have to hand it to the Film Festival opener, The Incomer.   Directed by Louis Paxton, once a teenage usher in Edinburgh cinemas, this is a glorious comedy about the collision between the forces of Highland local government and the frankly weird brother and sister living alone on a bleak gull infested island.  Due for release in September it's a must see.

The Grads excelled themselves with three super productions at the Royal Scots which earned them two four star and one five star reviews.  Sweet was a nicely crafted albeit polemical look at Edinburgh's slavery backed wealth.  Their production of The Bear took Chekov's classic by the scruff of the neck and squeezed it into forty minutes of action packed brilliance.  As for Plano, trying to pin down what that was all about is tricky for even the subtlest reviewer but my goodness it was an exhilarating watch.

I had some light relief with a couple of films, Sheep in the Box and Sexy Beast before exposing myself to a Dutch remake of Tony Kushner's  Angels in America.  I saw this about forty years ago at the height of the AIDS epidemic which of course is what it is all about.  I confess to remembering nothing and for all I know this retelling is miles better or miles worse.  It's certainly long and its unsympathetic protagonists rabbit on and on.  Its director ignored several jolly good spots in which he could have drawn the affair to a conclusion but persisted in giving us one more slap around the chops.  I was glad when it finished.  I did not join in the standing ovation which in all probability provided those who did some relief from the numb bum syndrome that had been induced by this interminable masterpiece. 

This imitation bird of prey has flown over a roof on the opposite side of Leith Walk for several years and last month was joined by a lion rampant.  I assumed this was in honour of Scotland's appearance in the world cup and that it's rapid disappearance shortly afterwards mirrored Scotland's.  But the bird of prey and the mast disappeared with it.  Was it all blown away or has the plastic eagle landed elsewhere?

I was myself an imitation at Napier University in June in the couple of simulation exercises that I've done there for the last several years.  I haven't committed to them for next year because of uncertainty about how my lung condition will progress.  So possibly my last time which is a shame because they are fun to do.

For weeks the news has been dominated by highly charged reports of record breaking high temperatures.  As is often the case this turns out to be a phenomenon experienced largely in southern parts of the UK.  I've experienced it second hand watching red-faced suncream daubed Wimbledon fans fanning themselves while I've slipped into a woolly cardigan for comfort.  The tennis was very good, though I'd have liked to see Djokovic succeed in his efforts to win a 25th Grand Slam title or perhaps even better to have seen him denied the prize in a final won by the British wunderkind Arthur Fery.  

We are not to be denied summery weather activities completely however.  Phil and Claire held a BBQ on a cloudy but warmish day and we've had a small number of really pleasant days when temperatures exerted them selves sufficiently to reach the middle 20s. On one of those I took a bus out into East Lothian and enjoyed a pleasant walk through fields from the main road to visit Preston Mill.  It's maintained by the National Trust and their guide gave an interesting tour through the building.

Preston Mill

To borrow a phrase from the Michelin Guides, it's worth a detour.

My other outing was with Siobhan to Inchcolm.  It was a trip we'd planned to do five years ago but in the event I went alone and didn't set foot on the island. I blogged about it here. 

This time we made it onto the island and had a very pleasant picnic in the sunshine and wandered around the abbey and dawdled about to the extent that we didn't have time in the end to leave the bay where we landed and follow the walks round the island.  That pleasure will have to await a return trip. 

Inchcolm Abbey

I've sadly neglected my window boxes for quite some time but have been encouraged by the good weather to plant out the ones that I still have. (I removed a row of them at one point because I'd never felt they were sufficiently firmly attached to guarantee that they wouldn't fall on top of a passerby.)  The fact that David and Sally are coming to stay next month also put a bit of pressure on me to smarten things up.  So I grabbed a few cheap plants at Aldi and a couple of dearer ones from my local florist and stuck them in.  I'm quite pleased by the results.

Indoor pursuits have not been neglected.  Arkle Theatre came to an end last year but a new group has been created by a number of Arkle stalwarts and presented its first show last month.  The group is called Union Theatre. 

Its first show was announced as Mary by Rona Munro.  This is the sixth instalment of Munro's James cycle of Scottish historical dramas and its appearance was heralded as quite a coup.  Alas it seems that as far as the performing rights were concerned the left hand and the right hand (agent, writer, publisher??) were not operating in concert and Union Theatre were obliged to drop the project.   

Instead they performed a fine piece by a fine writer in the form of  Shall Roger Casement Hang by Peter Arnott.  Critics were appreciative though I was less enthusiastic.  I put that down mostly to my position in the audience which gave me a poor view and made the dialogue a little hard to follow.  In contrast my companion that evening was up on her feet at the end clapping like billy-o as were many others. 

I got more satisfaction from the two dance shows that I went to.  Ballet Black are celebrating 25 years of life by touring the UK with two new pieces.  The Guardian called it a dazzling double bill and I heartily agree.  The first piece was a delightfully joyous dance of love and hope dressed in gorgeous autumnal shades while the second was a sombre portrait of a South African miners' strike.  Not you would have thought prime dance material but it was beautiful, moving and powerful; one of the best pieces of modern dance that I've ever seen.  There are a couple of beautiful pictures of that piece on this site.

Ballet Rambert has been going a fair bit longer than Ballet Black; they are celebrating their centenary with a fine programme some of which I'd seen before.  That's a crazily busy piece set in an airport departure hall.  It manages to combine humour and humanity in the chaos and stress of departures to faraway places.  There are lots of best wishes for the next 100 years in the various reviews of the show online.

Then there was the cinema.  I went to see The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie which I was sure I must have seen before and indeed I had.  It's a very amusing surrealist movie and a joy to watch.  Not so A Private Life which I saw on the same day.  Not that it's bad just that it's not awfully entertaining or so I felt.

Another less than A1 mark in my scoring system would go to The Fall of Sir Douglas Weatherford.  I went to see this because it purports to be a Scottish film.  Indeed it has a Scottish writer/director, lots of Scottish people in it including Peter Mullan and it was shot in Scotland.  I imagine the money came from elsewhere though. The story too is Scottish but I found it a bit weak, could have done with more drama, more jeopardy.  The Guardian reviews it well. 

Amongst the cast is an actor whose name I've forgotten who iks appearing in Claire's Fringe show so hee's my first plug for Shinjuku.  

I've noticed recently something of a fashion for shops and cafes to retain the old name of the premises when it's uncovered during refurbishment and repainting of the exterior.  This is the first example I've seen of the fashion being applied to residential premises.  Seems a bit odd to me.

Nothing very odd has cropped up in my activities though you might consider my enrolling in exercise classes a trifle uncharacteristic.  And you would be right but it's a follow on from the pulmonary rehabilitation classes I've completed. The physios recommend continuing to exercise as a help to counter breathing difficulties and with the best will in the world finding the motivation to do so on my own at home is likely to be tricky.  Hence the discipline of going to a class.

Edinburgh Leisure run lots of classes aimed at helping older people maintain a degree of fitness.  The first one I tried was called Active Life but it was just too active for me so I moved on to Strength and Balance which is a closer fit to my degree of (un)fitness though one of them, run by an enthusiastic dancer is pretty vigorous.  I'm also doing Sing to Breathe run by a group called The Cheyne Gang, named for the street in Stockbridge where they started rather than the homophonic length of metal links.  Even when my lungs were in A1 nick I couldn't sing for toffee but fortunately they're not looking for choral excellence.

Unlike the RSNO Chorus who performed Beethoven's Ode to Joy in the orchestra's final concert of the season. There was a full house made slightly fuller by Ewan's presence. He was in the UK to attend a conference in Aberdeen and as well as visiting his mum and his brothers managed to spend three weekends in Edinburgh. 

Ewan is a fervent rugby enthusiast and the weekend he arrived in the UK we enjoyed a rugby 7s tournament at Raeburn Place. He then went south and got back from those visits too late the following Friday to join me at Lounge 33 to hear Haftor Medboe and Konrad Wiszniewski perform in the Leith Jazz and Blues Festival or at the Usher Hall to hear Elgar's Cello Concerto. The following day he went unaccompanied to watch more rugby, this time at Murrayfield.  I'd planned for more jazz that evening but I'd had a cold building up for a few days so stayed at home wrapped around a hot toddy while Ewan got ready to go to Aberdeen.

After Aberdeen, as well as the Ode to Joy concert we spent time on Leith Links at the Leith Festival Gala Day and went to the Lyceum to see Sweat, a fine play about the decline of American manufacturing and the damage it wrought in people's lives and relationship. 

The Gala Day featured lots of different stalls and included a number of musical entertainments including a set by Buskin' Sharks starring several of my saxophone chums. 

I learnt that money from the famous not yet implemented visitor levy has been pledged to two Leith projects.  One is the redevelopment by the council of the disused bowling greens on the Links to provide various facilities such as a skate park.  There are already tennis courts run by the LTA who presumably financed them.

The other is the bringing back to life of Leith Theatre which I heartily applaud. The lottery fund is also dipping its hands into its pocket for that and I imagine is a major contributor.  The public can help the cause by donating.  Follow the Support Us link.

Theatre doesn't always need purpose built premises and to prove that point as it were The Lyceum currently has four short pieces being performed in people's houses. Friends of mine hosted one in their flat in Fountainbridge and I was invited along.  It was an entertaining one man work as much a story telling as a play. These pieces are all to be performed in the Lyceum itself on three evenings next week. I think the one I saw may be a little lost on the Lyceum stage although it's not a particularly large theatre.  Unfortunately I'm not free on any of those evenings so I shan't see how it fares. 

Last summer a couple of Spanish friends made a brief visit to Edinburgh.  They said that they hoped to come again this summer but for a longer period.  In anticipation of the possibility of long conversations I decided to give my very rusty Spanish a brush up and enrolled on a short City of Edinburgh adult education course.  Imagine my surprise when I turned up at Craigentinny community centre not a ten minute busride away to find this imposing castle.  The classrooms are actually in a single level extension but the community council meets on the top floor.  For the building's history visit this site.   The class unfortunately is not as imposing as its setting.  I comfort myself with the thought that you can always learn something.

The girls at Grangewood School learn lessons for life in the Grads production of Daisy Pulls It Off.  This is a delightful parody of  the boarding school genre of children's fiction exemplified by the Chalet School series, The Jennings books, Billy Bunter, the Malory Towers series and so on.  Our local critic found much to admire as did I.  Another company are doing it in the Fringe this year but you'll have to get up early to see it, start time 09.25.

At the more civilized 19.30 I saw two shows recently.  Windrush at The Lyceum is about the palm tree that had to be cut down prior to the renovation of the plant houses at the Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh.  An unusual subject but presented delicately (some critics said elegiacally) in speech and song by Karine Polwart.  

Baby Mash-up, What Are You Doing at the Traverse was mystifying.  The presentation was super and the performances were excellent but what was it all about?  An absurdist view of  one person's life in Northern Ireland?  If I'd stayed for the post show discussion and asked piercing questions I might have found out but I left Claire and Ross to do that and so far they haven't enlightened me.

I was recommended the film L'Etranger, a new adaptation of Camus' novel and liked it a lot. It happened to be on at Filmhouse and I happened to see it on the first of May and happened to pick up a copy of what was on over the month  The reult was a lot of visits to the cinema but I'm only going to mention three.

According to the British Film Institute Akira is "One of the most influential anime films ever made, Katsuhiro Otomo’s dystopian cyberpunk film introduced the western world to the cinematic spectacle that anime has to offer."  After 40 years or so this cult masterpiece is back with us.  I missed it the first time round and only wish I'd missed it this time as well. To be fair I suppose the look and feel of the film is impressive but for me outweighed by my total inability to follow the plot.  Lots of people rushing around shooting other people for incomprehensible reasons.

A Japanese film much more to my liking was Kokuho.  It's a somewhat melodramatic story about two men who are both colleagues and rivals in the world of kabuki where they are "onnagata", men playing female parts.  One is the son of a famous kabuki actor and the other the son of a murdered gangster who is taken in by the actor and brought up and trained with his own son.  The film features several kabuki scenes which are ravishingly beautiful. 

The Guardian called Eagles of the Republic a seductive thriller.  It both seduced and thrilled me.  The story concerns an Egyptian actor, an idol to his public, who is persuaded/bullied into taking a role in a presidential vanity biopic project.  Things go awry in a number of ways and our hero sees heads roll and fears for his own.  Gripping stuff. I read that it's the third part of a trilogy so I must try to see the two earlier films.

The world of nature is well covered on TV but while the inimitable David Attenborough still thriving at 100 is a brilliant presenter and programme creator there is an army of fine cameramen who merit our attention as well.  One of these is Gordon Buchanan who gave a talk at the museum this month. In introducing his talk he said he'd been inspired by another Scottish cinematographer, Doug Allen, and like him aspired to work underwater but in the event became closely associated with big cats.  They were the main focus of his talk.  He showed many fine slides and video clips of his work.  Much of the talk was a repetition of material I'd seen on TV which was a bit disappointing but it was good to hear the man in the flesh.

The U3A organised a talk this month by an Edinburgh history teacher about the First World War actions in Africa.  It's not an aspect of the war that is terribly well known. The speaker had a wealth of detail and commentary and his talk was well illustrated with photos and maps.  Many of the latter from German sources.  Two intrtiguing facts to take away from the talk were that the first shots of the war were fired in west Africa and that the war finally ended with the surrender of General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck on November 25th 1918 at what is now Mbala in Zambia. 

I went to a wine tasting last night.  It was very sociable but it confirmed the pointlessness of my going to these events because the floral notes and all that stuff escape me.  I can't tell one wine from another.

 

On a delightfully sunny and warm Friday afternoon the Meadows were as busy as I've ever seen them and the cherry trees were in full bloom. I've recently read a book about Collingwood Ingram, an Englishman who was instrumental in saving cherry varieties from extinction and in promoting the cultivation of cherry trees both in Japan and worldwide. It's a very good read. In an appendix the Meadows are listed as one of the best places in the UK to admire cherry trees in bloom. 

Not to be outdone the Friends of Starbank Park hosted a Cherry Blossom Picnic on Sunday which had all the hallmarks of Japanes hanami celebrations.  I bumped into Hilda who used to play trumpet with Dunedin but who was at Starbank to play with the Edinburgh Brass Band.  Here's a snap of the event and of the brass band.

Continuing in a Japanese vein I went to a U3A talk on Japan in which the speaker focused on the co-existence of traditional and modern features in the country.  I think those in the audience who had not been to Japan would have gained more knowledge and enjoyment from it than I did. 

I enjoyed a Japanese meal with Sarah at Harajuku, an Italian meal with Connor at Vittoria's, a Persian meal with Ross, Claire and Siobhan at Konj.  I also celebrated Ross's birthday at Sotto where I know I had a delicious meal and even more delicious wine but can't for the life of me remember what I had though it must have been Italian in spirit.  Not content with eating out in restaurants I was liberally fed by both Siobhan and Claire in their homes.  A good month for digestive diversions.

Cultural diversions include a Stabat Mater by a Belgian group La Chapelle Sauvage at Easter in the Queen's Hall and again in the Queen's Hall from the SCO a concert of Czech music including a wonderful piece I'd never heard before, Martinu's 2nd Violin concerto.  I absolutely loved it.  My own musical activities were limited to a Sunday afternoon Big Blaw where I had a great deal of trouble getting anything out of my sax in such contrast to the weekend at Stirling University last month.  Maybe time to put the instrument away.

I was at the pictures twice though once was to see an NT Live cast of All My Sons.  It's oe of my favourite plays.  This was what we used to call a very Brechtian production, i.e. no set or almost none. In this case they had a backcloth with a door shaped hole and above the hole a large round aperture which acted as a window into the house.  The forestage held a large tree which we saw collapse in a storm in the opening scene. So it all depended on the performances which were splendid.  I particulary liked Marianne Jean-Baptiste who played the mother clinging on to the fiction that her son will return now the war is over despite his aircraft having been reported missing three years earlier for fear of having to face the part his father played in the deaths of American airmen.   Altogether an excellent production which Esther who was with me also enjoyed.

Two Prosecutors was the film I saw.  Set in Stalin's Russia The Guardian called it petrifying in this 5 star review.  It certainly makes you thank your lucky stars for our albeit imperfect society.

The only live drama I've seen recently was Vanishing Point's What I'm Here For, a collaboration with a Danish theatre company performed in a mixture of Danish and English with surtitles in both languages. From what little I know of the Danes they probably understood the English dialogue without having recourse to the surtitles.  We knew Danes in Nairobi who chatting away happily amongst themselves in Danish would immediately switch to English when we hove into sight. 

I liked the presentation but wasn't all that impressed by the play.  It deals with the pressures on over-stretched staff in a hospital, the mistakes and oversights that can lead to etc.  It doesn't offer any solution nor does it tell us anything we don't already know, except perhaps that Denmark has similar problems to us.    

However my recent experience with the NHS has been very positive and continues to be so.  Having dealt with my bowel cancer they have turned back to checking out my lungs.  I saw a consultant who like my bowel surgeon is an Irishman and he gave me the lowdown on my condition.  Although I have emphesema it's apparently limited and not of much consequence. My main problem is progressive pulmonary fibrosis.  He said that what I would find when I googled it was that I had less than five years to live but stressed that mine was a slightly different flavour.  "What you've got is not good" he said "but it's not that."

Nevertheless they can't cure it, can't repair the damage already done and can't stop it destroying more of my lung tissue.  What they can do is slow down the progression but the side effects of the two alternative treatments he described are not attractive.  I've been left to ponder and in the meantime I'm on a pulmonary rehabilitation course.  That's basically a set of six weekly exercise classes aimed at improving my breathing and getting oxygen into my muscles. I've also got contacts for choirs for the breathless thanks to my meeting Hilda at Starbank park.  We'll see how they can fit in a non-singer like me.

On a cheerier note I picked the horse that came second in the Grand National.  Pity I hadn't gone the length of putting money on it.  I enjoyed Scotland's women's rugby team's victory over Wales and lamented the thrashing they got from England.  I didn't subject myself to more pain by avoiding their Italian defeat.

But Scotland so far has come out tops in snooker's world championship with a couple of superb matches from John Higgins.  How he recovered from being five frames behind Ronnie O'Sullivan to beat him 13-12 was awe-inspiring.

The National Galleries of Scotland talks are popular and the one on Art Deco in Scotland was sold out when I was booking but happily it was also available to stream which I did and which I found very worth watching.  Given by Bruce Peter from Glasgow School of Art he traced art deco's precursors in 19th century decorative arts, discussed how art deco became significant in Scotland between the wars and gave a potted insight into the contents of his book Art Deco Scotland:Design and Architecture in the Jazz Age.

The whole talk was beautifully illustrated by lovely slides including many of ocean liner interiors, mostly Clyde built.  He admits to a fascination with ocean liners which I share.  I saw an excellent exhibition relating to design within ocean liners in Genoa some years ago.