帯鋸 バンドソ－ 平行定規 ドリフト角度の直視での簡単な調整方法

帯鋸を購入して、例え、オプションで買える平行定規を使っても、うまく平行に切れない問題の最大の原因は帯鋸の刃の向き（その時点での、特定の帯鋸の刃のセッティングの個性と思えば良い。刃を交換するたびに個性は微妙に変わる）が平行定規の面に対して平行でない事に尽きる。どうやって調整するか、難しく考える事はない。要は、刃の向いている方向を直接目で見る事が出来れば対処の方法はいくらでも考えられるからだ。私はオプションの平行定規は持ってないのですべての平行定規関連の操作にはアルミのLアングルとクリップだけを使っている。

私の場合、ウェブでよく見かける板材料の試し切りなど行わない。材料の無駄だし、実際の模擬切断作業などやらないで刃の向きを直視して、その角度を帯鋸のテーブル上で確定/転写出来るからだ。そのためには出来るだけ軽いアルミのＬアングル（長さ的にはテーブルの奥行+程度）をDAISOで売っている（赤と黒のデザインのかなり強力なクリップで大小2種類ある）の小クリップ（或はヘアピン等）で直接帯鋸の刃に固定する事だ。まあ、何を使っても良いのだが。多分、一番便利で簡単なのはクリップだろう。

そうすると方向指示器としてのＬアングルと帯鋸の刃が一体化して、その時点での刃の向きの方向にＬアングルの長手方向が向くので、そのＬアングルの方向をテーブルの上にそのままの角度で物理的に固定する（或は臨時に張り付ける）事が必要になる。帯鋸の刃の「あさり」による誤差は無視して構わないだろう。

一番望ましい角度の出し方は、こうだ。単純にクリップで帯鋸の刃と方向指示器としてのLアングルを挟んだ時には、左右どちらかに振れるのが普通なので、凡その方向は暫定的に判断できる。だから、クリップを取り付けた後で、Lアングルを、初期判断で刃の向きが左に振れているなら、逆にLアングルを右に少しだけ意図的に振ってから手を離すと、Lアングルが単振動を始めて、徐々に減衰して停まる。軽いLアングルの場合、単振動は7,8回繰り返される。重い場合は1サイクルで停止する事さえあるが、軽いLアングルの場合とほとんど変わらない位置で停止するのは当然だ。

何れにせよ、単振動が収まった時の方向が最も信頼性の高い刃の向きの角度になる。

この時の角度の固定のやり方は色々とあるだろうが、一番簡単なのはＬアングルの両端をDAISOの強力な大クリップでテーブルに仮固定する事だ。でも、Ｌアングルは軽いし、直ぐ動いてしまうので刃の向きの角度をしっかりと保存しながらクリップ等で固定するには、最初に注意深くLアングルの端を指で上から強く押さえつけ、次いでクリップを使って角度を固定するのが肝だ。

後々の作業を円滑に進めるためには、この時点で角度の記憶が出来る分度器で、振れの角度を分度器に固定するのが望ましい。角度の記憶が出来る分度器とは、安物のプラスチックの半円状の分度器でなく、「シンワ」というメーカ－が提供している金属製の方向指示アームのついたものだ。多分、１０００円位でホームセンタ－にあるだろう。

以上はブレ－ドの向いている角度をテーブル上に投射/固定するだけの話なので、実際に帯鋸の刃とどの位の距離で実際の平行ガイドを固定するかは別の問題だ。以下に記述する。

私の場合、刃の角度を見るのに使うＬアングルのテーブルとの接地面での幅を（手間を省くために）元々欲しかった幅（5ｍｍから10ｍｍ程度）に加工してから角度確認する事が多いので、平行定規としての別のＬアングルを方向検出器としてのＬアングルに密着させるだけで済む。

そうでない場合は、方向検出用のＬアングルに押し付ける形で任意の幅の（自作も当然あり）アルミの平板をはめ込んで、更に、それに対して最終的な平行ガイドを押し付けて、その角度のまま、テーブル面に小さくても本格的なクランプ等でしっかりと固定すればよい話だ。但し、これは一定の条件（私の場合は約35ｍｍ以下の場合）が当てはまる場合だ。

この一定の条件とは、それ以上だったらどうするかの記述の中で自ずから明らかになるだろう。任意の平行幅を設定するにはスコヤと角度記憶可能な分度器が必要だからだ。私の場合、両方とも「Shinwa」という企業が作っているものを愛用している。具体的にどうやるかと言うと：

測定した角度記憶用の分度器の半月形の直線部分を帯鋸のテーブルの手前側の端に押し付ける。その上からスコヤの取っ手部分の直角の内側部分（向かって右側）を分度器の方向指示器アームの左の側面にあてがう。その時点で刃から一番遠いスコヤの取っ手の直線部分は約35ｍｍの所にある。そのスコヤの直線部分に平行定規としてのＬアングルをあてがって、固定すれば、35ｍｍ幅以上の平行切断が出来る訳だ。

勿論、スコヤの目盛りに従って、平行切断幅はテーブルの大きさ次第で自由に変える事が出来る。

まだ、関連する記事の記述は続くが、設定ミスに関して、早い段階での情報は有用だと思うので、追加して置く。具体的には：

万が一、方向間違いのまま平行定規を固定してしまった時の症状と対処方法：

平行設定を何らかの理由で間違えた時の帯鋸の挙動は幾つかある。

1.　刃の手前側だけを右手でガイドに押し付けて、刃の後ろ側の領域ではガイドには左手で圧着をしないでフリ－にして置く場合で、切断が進むに連れて材と刃の後ろ側のガイドとの間に隙間が拡大する場合

2.　刃を正面に見て、切断するに連れて、刃が右側に移動したがる場合、極端な場合、刃が刃のガイド溝から這い出して、刃そのものが右側に行きたがる場合

上記のいずれの場合にも、固定された平行ガイドの手前側を少し右方向に変えないと、極端な場合、帯鋸が嫌がり切断が停止する事さえある。そのような場合には、設定を最初からやり直すか、或は、目分量で少しだけ平行ガイドの手前側を右にずらす事だ。どの位とかは言えない。経験次第だからだ。

平行の設定は刃を替える度に必要なので、多少の手間を惜しまない方が良いと思う。私の場合、この記事を上げている時点で、リョ－ビの卓上テーブルソ－でのセッティングでは、向かって左に２.（コンマではなく、ドットだ）３度の偏向があるのが金属製精密分度器で判明している。セッティングに必要な時間は２分ほどだ。実感としては、切断の長さにもよるが、15ｃｍ程度なら設定ミスで１度を超えると帯鋸の刃が猛烈に嫌がり始め、最悪の場合ストライキを起こすと思う。

次に追加する関連情報としては平行ガイドに接する端末部分が平行ガイドと直線で接してない場合の切断方法だ。極端な場合、点でのみ接している場合などだ。端末の形状がどうであれ、平行ガイドに接した部分から任意の幅を切り落としたい場合の話になる。

アンドロイド11でGBoardを使い複数コピペをする場合の考察

以下の記事には重要な追加記事が最後の部分にあります。簡単に言うと一括コピ－をしないで単純なアンドロイド系のコピペをすれば、この記事で言及した改行とか、その他の諸々の細かい作業なしに、作業時間のトータルで見た場合でも一括コピ－と時間的にも変わりなく出来ます。

 

確かにアンドロイド１１以降の環境でも複数コピペを可能にするアプリは、あると言えばあるし、でも、２０２２年３月末の時点では、使い勝手の良さ（アプリの完成度）の観点からすれば、ないと言う方が実情に即していると思う。今後、世界中の誰かが頑張って、使い勝手の良い複数コピペアプリを無料で提供してくれる事を切に望むばかりだ。

然し、ないと困るのが複数コピペを可能にするアプリなのは誰でも同意するだろう。それを大きな苦痛なしに可能にするのがグーグル自身が提供するGボードだ。本来、文字入力のためのものだが、複数回コピ－したアイテムを１時間以内と言う制限付きではあるが特殊なクリップボ－ドに格納してくれるので、使わない手はないのだが、それに関してウエブ上で参考にできる記事はあまり多くない。グーグルの言い分の翻訳としか言いようのないものが殆どで、大して参考にはならない。

この記事は、私のGボード運用の実態を記述するものであり、大いに参考になると自負している。２０２２年３月30日の夕方の時点ではまだ未完成で、今後、２０２２年の４月の第１週頃には一応の完成記事をアップする事が出来るだろう。その後もマイナ－な編集はあると思うが、基本的な運用のやり方は変わらないだろうし、複数コピペが必要な人達には有用だろうと思っている。

まず、私が複数コピペを必要とする理由だが、台湾の語学留学時に出会った各国から来たクラスメ－ト達に自分が有用だと思う複数の中国語表現をLINEで伝える事だ。問題は、つい最近、私の古いバージョンのアンドロイドタブレットが自然死する前まではウエブ上で沢山出回っていた複数コピペアプリの一つを使っていて、全く問題がなかったのにグーグル側の意向でアンドロイド11以降では簡単には使えない状態になってしまった。

当然、必死に代替アプリを探し回ったが、以前使っていたアプリの様に使いやすいものがなく、そんな時にGボードの機能を発見したのだが、使い方について丁寧に教えている記事はなく、自分で調べる他はないと思って、その過程で発見したコツを、似たような必要性を持つ人たちとシェア－するべきだと思ったのが動機になっている。

次に、私の作業環境だが、LINEはPCで使っている。既に（アンドロイド）スマホでもラインを使っているので、（アンドロイド）タブレットではLINEが使えない制限がかかっている状態だ。中国語の辞書はPLECOと言う優れものでアンドロイドで使っている。その辞書で複数コピ－した文例をグーグルドライブの文書に貼り付けて、その文書の内容をPC側で操作して、最終的にLINEに上げるという作業内容だ。（今後は「Hi Native」と言う日本で開発された超優れもののアプリで得た内容もアップしたいと思っている）

つまり、Gボードを起動してある状態で、別のアプリの中で複数コピ－した文例を貼り付け先の文書の中でGボードの機能を使い、その場で編集してから（勿論、同じ文書をGボードでの編集なしで仮想ドライブに単純にアップロ－ドしてから、別途PC上で編集する事も可能だ）仮想ドライブ上の文書に張り付けるという作業がメインなので、そこに至るまでの道筋を詳細に記述したい。

最初にやるべきことはGボードをダウンロ－ドして、簡単な初期的な設定をすることだ。私の場合は複数コピ－したアイテムをグーグルの文書に張り付たいので、グーグル文書ファイルを開いた時に、Gボードの操作パネルを即、使える状態にして置きたい。

なので、そのためには初期設定の場面（Gボードを極最初に単純に最初に開けば、自然とその場面になる）で「重ねての表示の許可をするか、否か」との問いに関連して、対象となりうるアプリの一覧が表示されるが、それに対して設定する事だ。

私の場合は「グーグルに対して許可する」の設定をしてある。何故か言えば、貼り付け先の文書がグーグルの仮想ドライブにあるからだ。人によっては異なる貼り付け先の環境を選ぶ必要があるだろう。例えば、マイクロソフトの「Word」の場合は「マイクロソフト」に対して許可するのだろう。

「重ねてのアプリの表示」の許可の具体的な結果（或は意味）としては、私の場合、グーグル関連の新規文書（或は既存だが空白の文書）を開く時に、文書の右下に「鉛筆マーク（編集マ－ク）」が見えるので、それをタップすると、その同じ文書の上にGボードの操作パネルがポップアップする仕組みになっている。

つまり、「異なるアプリを重ねた表示状態」だ。一度、その状態で、その文書に対して何らかの操作をしても、鉛筆マ－クは、その都度現れるが、それ程煩わしくはない。1タップだけで済むからだ。

次にGボードとコピ－元のアプリの相性の問題に触れて置きたい。その原因がコピ－元のアプリにあるのか、或はGボードの完成度にあるのかは判らない。おそらくコピ－元のアプリが原因だと思うが、私の場合、PLECOと言う辞書の中で、コピ－出来るものと出来ないものがあることを発見した。以前使っていた複数コピ－アプリの場合には全くなかった問題だ。最初はGボードに字数制限があるのかと思ったが、違うみたいで、逆に言うと、相性の問題がないアプリは沢山あるのかも知れない。

これについては運用の観点から、一度にコピ－するアイテムの数を４,5個に絞って対処していたが、つい最近、抜本的な対処方法を発見した。

具体的には、コピ－出来ないが、どうしてもコピ－したいアイテムが出た場合は、その画面を動かさずに全く同じアイテムを再度検索すれば最初の時と全く同じ初期画面からの手順で、動かさなかったがコピ－出来ないでいたアイテムのある場所が出現するので、最初のコピ－アイテムとして、直前ではコピ－出来ないでいたアイテムを100％コピ－出来るようになる。この裏技は何度でも使えるし、他のアプリ系でも使えるのかも知れない。

 

さて、この辺りからそろそろ本題に入ることになる。まずはGボードの欠陥についてだ。私の見る限り、大きく二つある。一つはコピ－されたアイテムと、その次にコピ－されたアイテムとの間が改行されてない事だ。この問題に関しては裏技的な対処法を発見したが必要となる手順の数を考えると、自分で改行した方が早い。

もう一つの問題は複数コピ－したアイテムを一度に貼り付けする事が出来ない点だ。これについては裏技的な対処法は見つけられなかった。ただ、アイテムを長押しとかでなく、一つ一つ軽くタップするだけで貼り付けが出来るので大量の貼り付けでなければ深刻な問題ではない。コピ－の回数を4，5回で止めて置けば大した手間にはならない。中国語の一つの文字に対する例文は、普通その位の数で十分だからだ。

簡単に言えば、複数コピ－のやり方は、Gボードさえ起動して置けば、Gボードを意識する事無く、自分が利用したいコピ－元の環境の中で、通常のコピ－作業を複数回行うだけだ。Gボードの操作パネルを使う必要は全くないし、単純に普段のコピ－を繰り返すだけでよい。

その結果、複数のコピ－アイテムがGボードの内部に、Gボードとの確認作業のメッセ－ジが出たりする事なく、取り込まれる仕組みだ。然し、それらのアイテムを閲覧したり、編集したりするにはGボードの操作パネルが必要になるが、コピ－されたアイテムを張り付けたい貼り付け先を開けば、簡単にGボードの操作パネルが出現する仕組みになっている。

只、貼り付け先の文書を空にしてある場合には（私の場合の通常の運用方法だが）、新規文書を開く場合と同様に画面右下に鉛筆マ－クが出て、それをタップして呼び出す形になる。文書があらかじめ空の場合であれ、或は貼り付け操作が未完了なので開いた直後で空白に見える場合であれ、あるいは既に文字が存在する場合であれ、最初に表示されるGボードの操作パネルは閲覧用のクリップボ－ドアイコンが見えている状態だ。小さいので、よく見ないと識別は困難だが。

最上部のバ－の内容を切り替えるには操作パネルの左上の矢印で行うが、切り替えられる最上部の１行を除けば、その下に見えている内容は文字入力用のパッドとCRキ－だ。操作パネルの移動はパネルの下に飛び出している部分を掴んで行う。

なので、ここから先はGボードの操作パネルの使い方の話になる。基本的には「見る」と「削除する」の二つの画面の切り替えが軸になる。鉛筆マ－クをタップでポップアップするパネルの大きさの変更は、この「コピ－されたアイテムを見る」アイコンが同席しているバ－に見えている「パネルのアイコン（見ても何だかよく分からないアイコン）をタップすれば出来る。このサイズ変更アイコンはロータリ－スイッチになっているので欲しいサイズに簡単に変更できる。

で、この最初の画面で一番重要なのは「コピ－されたアイテムを見る」アイコンで、それを軽くタップすれば、複数コピ－したアイテムのうち、操作パネルの表示部分の大きさに入り切る数のアイテム「だけ」が表示される。コピ－したアイテムの数によっては、今、見えているアイテムの下に更にアイテムが隠れていることもあるので、その場合は表示画面を左右に二分割している境界線の最下部を上に向かってスワイプすれば見る事が出来る。貼り付けは超簡単で、今見えているアイテムをタップすればGボードが付着している貼り付け先に貼り付けされる仕組みだ。

但し、ここでの問題は張り付けたはずの個々のアイテムは、その直前に張り付けたアイテムの改行後の行に張り付かないので、２番目に重要な画面を呼び出して、つまり、「クリップボ－ド+左向きの矢印」が見えている画面で、その文字列をタップすると操作パネルの表示が変わり、右下に「CR｝が表示されるので、それを使って改行する事になる。

基本的には、これがGボード操作の根幹で、この後は、繰り返しになるが、細かい操作手順になる。コピ－された複数のアイテムを確認して張り付けるにはクリップボ－ドのアイコンを押す。するとコピ－された複数のアイテムが操作パネルのサイズに合わせた数だけ見える。もっとあるなら、前述したように、それらは隠れているので表示部分を掴んで上にずらせば見えるが、私のやり方は見えるものをまず張り付けてしまう事だ。

そもそもコピ－アイテムの表示部分は小さくて見ずらいし、いくつコピ－したかなど覚えていないからだ。だから、タップして張り付けたアイテムを直ちに削除すれば、隠れていたアイテムが下から自分で浮上してくるので間違いを減らすことが出来る。削除作業はGボード操作パネルの右上の鉛筆マ－クで出来る。タップすると鉛筆は「+」の形に変化して、左上には「X]マークと「アイテムを選択」の表示が出る。「X]マークを押せば、その後の操作をキャンセル出来る。

使った感想：

出来る事、出来ない事を理解して置けばの話だが、使えると思う。多くの複数コピ－の無料アプリは完成度がとても低くて、異なるアクションへの交差点で同じ表示が何度も出て来て、イライラするようなことはない。それと、グーグルのアプリなので一定の安心感がある。

 

追加記事：

コピ－元とコピ－先の両方を同時にデスクトップで見られるようにして置き、更にコピ－先の文書に織り込まれているGボードの表示を常にCRが出ているようにして置けば、一括でなく逐次コピペでも時間的には同じで、しかもＣＲが見えているので、ペーストする度にＣＲを押して置けば、この本文で言及した様な煩わしさから解放されます。

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Where rivers meet - Pop go the Greetings

Pop go the greetings
Pop go the bloblets

Since this is the first day of the rest
of my life I might as well depict what
I experienced years earlier up north.

It is awfully cold up there and winter
temperatures go to extremes. One of the worries,
and they had many ranging from fish to bears,

of my in-laws was the damages inflicted
upon the trees that they owned in their mountains.
Part of their businesses was furniture making

and for that they had to have high quality
timbers. However, under these extreme conditions
trees do succum to nature's preoccupation.

Water contents in their trunks get frozen and as
they do so they invariably expand, exerting
enormous pressures within the trees,

with the net result that they actually push
apart the trunks from within. When these happen
the forests reverberate with echoes of the big bang.

This process is commonly known as freeze bursting
(coined).

The energy that previously bonded the tissues
together is now released into the atmosphere
in terms of explosions that could be heard
throughout the northern nights in winter times.

My in-laws' worry, quite predictably, was that
priceless trees are rendered literally pricesless in
these natural processes.

Now, you might think that that is the end of
my story, but you are wrong. These extreme
cold temperatures affect all aspects of life
in the north.

Sure, you have road accidents, avalanches, and
hundred of other things arising from extreme
cold temperatures . You just name them and
you would be damn right in all of them.

However, there is one phenomenon that might be
of inrerest to many. Greetings are, of course,
not forgotten even in these extreme conditions.

People do exchange greetings day and night. The
problem is that as it is so damn cold greetings
get frozen the moment they are uttered.

They get frozen and fall to the ground. In fact,
that process takes only a millionth of a second
and consequently you get enormous temperature

gradients across the surface of the frozen
greetings, which form these tiny bloblets. Yes,
they are therefore amorphous in their structure.

An electron micrograph will bear that out
very cleary. They are also very unstable.
They contain all the phonetic energies

normally associated with greetings. Any
disturbances, no matter how tiny they are,
could bring in the onset of system
failure and mulfunction

and release the energies back into the universe
that we live in. How and when would that be?
Well, it is the arrival of

the very early spring. Of course, the atmospherics
will not be experiencing anything that might remotely
resemble that of the spring in full swing.

However, subzero temperatures do the tricks.
Bloblets lying on the ground are instantly
activated from their unstable states.

In fact, they rapture and pop.

Pop go the greetings.
Pop go the bloblets.

The phonetic energies thus released
push air molecures in the vicinity
and the waves so created propagate through

large distances and reach our ear drums. We hear
the echoes of past greetings, not perfect, of
course. No doubt that there have been
distortions and losses.

Collectively, they go something like this and
there are lots and lots of them to pop.

"Goo", "ood mor", "...ing", "ow you?..." and the towns
and villages suddenly reverberate with lively
echoes of the past greetings.

Pop go the greetings.
Pop go the bloblets.

Where rivers meet - The 6 Star Hotel

What he was mucking about, I had no idea.
Not that I was too concerned, anyway.
A 6 star hotel? Whatever...

Still, he was a pleasant and unusually
cheerful fellow and he had this unique
way of harnessing his own version of the language,
which still lingers in my memory to this day.

Where people would normally have said, "I've got to
find a place to stay", or something of
that sort he would pronounce every
single member of the sentence.

That is, he would say "I have got to find
a place to stay" He would say that with alacrity
and with every single sentence which contained
"'ve got to".

I got used to it soon, though. I naturally
wondered where he had picked up his
language skills.

He was a local tour guide, clean shaven
each morning with a radiant smile
all over his face, probably in his late twenties,
or early thirties.

I still have his namecard, somewhere.

No, I had not been in the habit of
going out with tour groups. I had been
drawn into it by a chance remark made

by an elderly Japanese gentleman,
who was staying in the same cave hotel
and had apparently crossed the border into
Anatolia from Iran by bus.

Yes, he had come up the Silk Road from
Parthia!

He apperared to be a seasoned traveller.
Probably, in his late sixtees, but
still going strong.

I, on my part, was there upon an impulse
and a sudden urge I had felt while
chomping up my mackarel sandwiches

down at the end of the Bridge, linking
the two land masses.

It was, after all, just a short flight to Kayseri.
No well considered prior plannnig,
nothing, just go!

I actually had had somewhere else,
down south, in mind.

We went to a few places on that day. One of them,
still relatively unknown then, now fairly commonly
heard about was a non-starter.

Who the hell cares about dwelling right underneath
potato fields! Of course we went down
there, all stuffy and dimly lit small world

of its own. I gather that since then a few
more have been uncovered. I could not care less.
I did, however, make a small contribution
while down there.

I discovered another of the markings
left by the underground dwellers, the existence
of which this or for that matter no other
guides would have noticed before.

It had been hidden from the normal viewing angles.
You know that physicists would love to look out
for oddities and odd angles forever!

The Grand Canyon, he said, a local version of it.
We went there, too. Oh well, interesting. There
were lots and lots of trees and clear streams and donkeys.

Oh, come on! Trees and steams and donkeys?
What were so interesting about them?

Only interesting, because out up there,
beyond the Canyon edges into the vast opennes,
vegetation was almost non-exsistent,

too barren for anything. No trees to speak of,
but coarse grasses were seen just about everywhere.

As far as I was concerend where there were grasses
they were not deserts. My deserts would only have consisted
of undulating sand dunes and camels.

There were none of them in sight. Somebody must have
bolted the pack.

"We are now arriving at our 6 star hotel",
proudly announced our guide. It was only then that I
realised what he had been mucking about.

What it was one of the stations on
the Silk Road!

It was a structutre to be amazed at.
For a start it was very large and tall
with stables for the camels and

sleeping quarters, canteens etc,
all in that solid rock building.
I would say that it was easily
50m x 50m across, two storeys
at that!


However, there were grasses all
around! It was not even
sitting on a sand dune, either!

It sat squarely on a very gentle and solid
slope, almost flat, with isolated trees
seen here and there, and over there, too.

Looking back on it now, it probably was the
right decision to have joined the tour.
I did not have my car to drive around.

Distances were quite formidable. You could see that
easily, looking down far below even
the mushroom place appeared a couple of miles away.

It was a vast country. It really was.　And I was practically
in the middle of nowhere.

Around us in the far distance were
hills, very barren, and mountains, high.
I could even see Mt. Erciyas out there.

My thoughts were going back to the early history
of this region, the pre Romans, the Romans
and the Turks, and the Persians, and all those
main players in the history of the region.

I was right in the middle of the homeland of
Hittites!　Local geography
was simple and obvious　and it would have
been the same to all　those participants.

If you want to go east, say, to China,
you must go up that way, passing the foot
of the volcano, Mt. Erciyas (3917m),

which sits right in the middle of Anatolia
and eventually, higher up and up around
Mt. Ararat, which is located at the eastern border.

Now, Mt. Erciyas is the fourth highest volcano
halfway down Anatolia between Mt. Ararat
and Istanbul.

Together, they must have completed
the process of making Anatolia as high
and flat as it is today.

It is a sedimentation of 2 km deep, of white
and soft volcanic ashes and to anybody's eyes
it is a striking feature of the region.

However, the plateau does not continue as far
out as Istanbul. It, in fact, tails off quite
dramatically in the mushroom valley, just west of Kayseri.

Only a few days earlier I was standing
at a vantage point in the pumpkin field
near my hotel, half way down
from the edge of where it all started.

In the far distance was a vast plain
which was completely flat and horizontal
due to gravitational compression,

with Mt. Ercias in the background ,
shinning white.

Its western edges abruptly clipped off
to make way for the valleys
which contained the famous mush room kingdom.

Yes, this was where the eternal process of
errosion had been taking place, creating the
mushrooms and creating those mini
Canyons with small rivers running in them.

You start out from the airport, driving
on a completely flat region for one hour or so.
You see nothing unusual on your way.

Shops are there, filling stations and
towns and villages are also all there
on the vast and flat expanse of the land.

You are driving on the flattest part of
the plateau. Then, a sudden precipitation
is waiting for you at the edge of it all,

with the firm ground cascading into
the mushroom kingom and the valleys far below
your eyes.

It was quite a sensation to be at the edge of it.

And, that was where I was.

I was watching the whole area with exitement
standing in a small pumpkin field.

Ah!, there they go, in a single file.
Are they chariots? Look at those
horrible looking lances and swords!

The snow began initially with only a few flakes
spinning down from nowhere and then
became a steady fall, quickly
obscurring the line of my thoughts...

Where rivers meet - Will you remember me?

"...up there. " My taxi driver pointed to it. Very long stone walls of uneven graynish yellow, perhaps 3,4 meters high obscured anything beyond it, except a glimpse of subtropical bushes through the narrow gap of stone staircase cut into the walls.

Yet, her singing was already audible in the soft drizzling mist, perhaps rare for this island striding across the tropic of cancer. As I approached the gap I knew what she was singing. It was one of the songs she had best covered, "Ye Lai Xian". Musical notes were tumbling down, overriding the walls, down the short flight of stairs. I could see them, all around me.

Literally, I felt that the air surrounding the place was swinging with the mist. And, with the mist were musical notes quietly dancing in unison. Teresa then was, at her best. She was singing for herself, obviously quite unaware of my presence. Initially, as I stepped out on to the cemetary compound I momentarily thought that she was singing through the stone piano that I had read so much about.

No, she was singing from much farther away, at her permanent resting place, which was heavily decorated with bunches of tropical flowers. I also noticed an elderly fellow standing near her tomb, obviously local. I did not like it, because I was wanting to sing for her there, one of her songs, "Ren Er Bu Neng Liu", which I had learnt through internet.

Looking back on it now I could not have done it, because she would not stop singing. Wondering if she was always singing the same Ye Lai Xian I approached her and knelt down on my knees in the mist. I had not brought anything with me in terms of extra flowers or anything else for that matter. It was then that this fellow produced a long stick of already lit incense for me to take, not even a single word exchanged.

I just grabbed it in silence and placed it in front of her photo. I only then realised that it was the same photo carried on one of her web pages. I remained in that posture for a long time indeed, because I was talking to her. Funny, that I had not known her in any significant way until recently, let alone her songs. It all started, historically, from my search for the identity of that virtual singer, who even managed to get a free ride on a flight to Venus.

Anyway, that then was the moment in life as it happened on a whim in December 2014.

My song?, yes, I sang it for her all in Chinese at the piano...hope she liked it...

Where rivers meet - Across the Miles

I stood there watching, watching right across
miles of shallow and translucent waters in disbelief.

I was disturbed and dismayed perhaps,
because the whole thing just did not look right!

The tropical air was heavy and dense.
I was not there for the sun and beaches. I was not
being a bloody tourist.

Was I seeing parts of Indonesia? Was the whole thing
just a figment of my imagination? Was I watching anything at all?
I could not decide. In any event, we could not
have navigated in these extremely shallow waters.

But then, I had meticulously planned to be here,
come right to the point where I was,

with a friend of mine and a local driver, who
we had brought all the way from the capital
on our chartered drive.

I sat there in the sand at the edge of the
water, splashing in the foam as
gentle waves broke across my feet.

My mind was slowly drifting back to the days,
quite oblivious to the presence of my companion,
when I had been in my early twenties,

aboard a huge ship that had left the port
of Kobe far, far back in time,

on my way to where history abounded and
my destiny still hidden away.

After all, I, at that time, was an ex who had
majored in the Spanish language, not knowing
that I would be reading physics in England

エイミ－、最近のマチュピチュで英語には過去過去完了がないと
言いましたよね？その一例がこれです。なので、 at that time
と言う副詞句で弱弱しく、その不備を補っています。

私にとっては理由は明快です。昔の人たちは忙しくて、
文など書いているひまはなかったのです。なので、
どの言語をとっても、過去過去完了など、あるはずが

ありません。丁度、３世代を超えてのお墓参りが
成立しないようなものです。過去過去完了など、
文の中でしか必要がないでしょう。

中国語でも似たようなことを副詞句で行なうとは、ずっと前に
言いました。中国語には動詞の活用がないので、
避けられないのです。

漢字が複雑なので、動詞の活用まで手が回らなかったのが
中国語です。

これが、名詞なら、言語が何であれ、辞書になくても
自分で勝手に作れば良いのですが、さすがに文法の
根幹はいじれません。

and doing experiments day in and day out
in my postgrad laboratories, let alone
making spoons and chopsticks later on in my life!!!

OK, it then must have been during the night
that we crossed this part of the Straight,
or had it been?

I had no recollection of having seen anything
during our passage through the Straight.

I did remember, though, that I had longed to
catch a glimpse of the Straight
and all those things tropical that you would
naturaly have
associated with it and expected to see around it.

If my memory served me right our ship always
had left our port of calls during morning hours.
I was confused then as now.

It could have been either during the night hours
that we had gone through the narrowest part of it,

or that even the narrowest part had not been
narrow enough for me to have seen
anything exciting during day time.

After all, if you were really out at sea
you would not see a thing but waters and
a few occasional ships and flocks of birds.

Waves were still coming in gently
in transparent sheets of water and
ebbing away in slow succession, breaking
only very occasionally and as they did
ever so feebly as if in near whisper
around my ankles.

My mind was swaying back and forth,
not being able to absorb what all these shallow
waters really epitomized.

In a sudden flash, though, I spotted myself.

Standing right out there!, right at the very front
edge of the huge ship going majestically
down the Straight,

with me standing tall, clutching the railings
firmly, gazing into the vast expanse
of the Indian Ocean ahead,

trying to make sense of life, trying to
see what perhaps lay ahead and yet all
restricted from my immediate access.

I was being Kate Winslet on the Titanic

It had not been 84, but mere 30 odd years ,
and I could still smell fresh paint, but no china.

エイミ－、この最後の部分はタイタニックの冒頭の台詞を知らないと
理解できないでしょう。その時、ケイトは１００歳以上
でしたが（映画では）、未使用の磁器等が沢山あったと、
言っています。


でも、私の乗っていた船にはそんなものはありません。なので、
この最後のパラグラフは、それを反映しています。

正確に言うと、船客の一人はドイツ人のお婆さんで、
彼女は香港で、なんと、磁器、陶器の類をトラックの
台数で５、６台分くらい買っていました。

あれも、もしかしたら彼女のタイタニック？

私もケイトも、でも、ペンキの匂いは覚えていました。
航海中はペンキを塗るのですよ。ヒマだから。

おまけに、皆で大きなハンマ－で鉄板を叩きつけて
サビを落とします。洋上で。私も勿論参加しました。
その後でペンキを塗ります！

Where rivers meet - the Med!

All air attendants are formal and frigid creatures,
no matter what airline you are flying with,
no matter what their nationalities are,
let alone their ages

I was out to melt and defrost and crack them,
but how and why?

The WHY bit was easy. I had been bored
to death as usual even with this relatively
short flight, and as everthere was

nothing much to kill time by in my confined space.
I do not read books in flight nor do I much
listen to musics. And I abhore movies and games.

We had been out over the Med and
I could see wakes all over the calm
surface of the sea right down there.
I could even see boats and ships!

Somehow, we had not shot up into the stratsphere.
We were not doing an intercontinental,
if you come to think about it.

That I could see wakes must have
meant calm seas. I was therefore
quite excited about the prospect of
fishing off the Island.

I had brought my own primitive, but
devastatingly effective fishing gear
that I had made at home.

On our way out there I had seen the European
Alps, or so I had assumed, but then it could not
have been. The onboard flight chart clearly
indicated otherwise,

that we were flying over Marseille en route,
where my wife had been holidaying
with our children.

No, I had not seen the Alps, which must have been
way out somewhere down in that direction.
However, that snow capped mountainous

region off Marseille, immediately to
the north east must have been a bad omen
to Hannibal and his lot with all those
thirty odd elephants.

You clearly do not wish to waste them,
not so early on during your millitary campaign, if you
knew that you were going to cross
the Alps into where the Romans were waiting.

Books say that they went deep inland in Gallia
and that sheer mass of it, falling sharply
into the Med

must have been the reason, to turn away from
coastal areas, away from hot pursuits,
trying desperately to blend into dark forests.

My moments of thoughts were interrupted by
sudden wailing and shreaks of a small baby
girl who was seated
two rows down with her father.

He did not seem capable of coping
with his child, or even qualified to do so.
You know how annoying it can be with

crying babies. Air attendants were uniformly
conniving at the state of affairs. Oh, yes, they
were all pretty Malties, except that

they did not seem to do anything
about it, not wanting to, perhaps.

I was therefore about to take the matter
into my own hands, but then, to my surprise
her crying came to an abrupt end. Finito!

I actually had some tricks in mind I was going to
play on the girl. So, I decided to savage one of the
attendants instead, who came down my way.

M. Excuse me, Ms! Did you see him?
Did you see him just now?

A. I beg your pardon, sir?

She was being amply formal, with a very stern
expression on her pretty and slightly Sun tanned face,
and that is exactly what you would expect
of them,

after so many hundred hours of solid training,
to be formal and yet friendly. However, under
these rather abnormal circumstances,

not explicit in their training manuals, perhaps,
she was obviously confused as to how to take
control of this situation.

She did not know how to react to this
strange and perhaps crazy Oriental gentleman,
probably to the extent of assuming that
my linguistic ability was causing some problems.

(Why the hell are you supposed to be
seeing anybody new on board or outboard, anyway?)

M. He was out there just now, flying with us!

I pointed to the window.

She was reasonable up top and probably was
in her mid twenties. She was very quick to realise, however,
what I was on about!

Her ice cold face melted
in a billionth of a second into that of
a pretty woman of her age.

Her subsequent reaction was something I had not
expected, something quite extraordinary!!!.
In fact, you were not supposed to
do anything as naughty as that
with your guests!

She smacked me right on my head and then nudged me
hard with her elbow with a big and rupturous
smile, which was highly contageous and
bordering on a laughter!

That precisely was the moment I had cracked an air
attendant while on duty. Yes, she did bring me an
extra glass of champagne to celebrate the occasion.

We had not shared that moment with anybody else.
After all nobody could have overheard our fleeting
conversation in such a short span of time.

It probably was all over within 15 seconds from
the onset of it all.

Our captain was blaring out something about the local weather, no
significant air turbulance ahead. I was now rapidly
approaching the days of fishing in the Med.

8 May

Earlier, I perhaps waxed poetic on her.

However, the compound atmosphere on that day looked very surreal, with
all that faintly shining, eerie mist in the soft drizzling rain, hiding her
resting place on and off, and partially.

Besides, she was singing, from nowhere, and it was quite obvious that she was
not exactly happy that she had had to depart from this world, so prematurely.

Recent news relating to her anniversary alone compels me to accept it, that
she had regrets. I would not have been surprised had she been there and
slowly turned my way and smiled, as if she had been expecting me, wanting to
tell me all about them...

Yes, we would have talked in Japanese, perhaps, or possibly in English. She was
fluent in several different languages anyway, and that alone would have taken
care of one of her worries. I would have patted her on the back. About her
other worries and regrets I could not have said a lot, I think...

We all live with that sort of things. Perhaps, she would be there, trying
to sing them away. Perhaps, we could do with talking graves. You point your
smart phone at the bar code, engraved somewhere on the stone and you hear of
all the things she would have liked to talk to you about.

It would not be purely by way of her pre-recorded voice. Rather, it would have
been computer generated, and subsequently modulated by her own recorded voice
for reference purposes...

Would I want one? I think I do...

Where rivers meet - the music student

All that day summer sulked and gathered
intensely over the university, and heat
shimmered on pavement.

I had at long last made it back to
where we were staying for the rest of
our project.

It had been so damn outrageously hot,
and it felt enormously reassuring to
be back in such a colossal volume of space

that had been constantly deenergised
for comfort. All of my fellow project
team members had dispersed into

their own retreats and I was on my own,
wondering if I should go for some ice cold
beers., or even hydrogen beers.

I then realised that a live piano performance
was starting right next to where I was
contemplating on my next move.

She appeared to be a student, although dressed
profusely and formally for the occasion I could
see that she was one, perhaps from a nearby college of
music.

I quickly abandoned the thought of going for
beers and decided to stay there for the next
ten minutes or so.

After all, I had been yarning to be able to
play those what might be described as screen
musics. She was playing good.

I was being entranced by what I was listening to
after all those long hours of work, first into
the heat and then out back into the heat.

It would have been a perfect combination of
heat and subsequent comfort, bar one thing I
was about to witness within the next few seconds.

There, to my sheer astonishment, I saw it
She did exactly just that, too! I could not
take my eyes off her very attractive hip,

that had so blatantly made such an unbeliebable
move, coming no doubt from hours of training
at the keyboard from morning till night,

which was a stark contrast to what
I could have afforded to myself.

My mind flashed back to the humiliation
I had suffered years earlier at a small concert
where I was supposed to be

playing, for the first time in my life,
Chopin's La Adieu, an Etude, op 10-3,
which is one of the most difficult by him.

I had gone over it, spending long hours,
for the occasion. There had not been any
significant problem with my playing it.

However, I must now admit that I had been
totally optimistic that I would be able to
perform it without hitches.

It was a grand piano I was sitting to.
My fingers flew, quite elegantly for the first
part of the score.

Then, soon, I realised that I was getting
quite a strong glare into my eyes. I had not thought
about the hypnotic effect of such a bright light source.

After all, it was a formal occation. However,
the worst was still looming over the horizon.

As anybody who plays La Adieu knows the
introductory slow start will soon turn into
frensic motions of fingers,

just like mixing mahjon pieces on the table.
It was that part my fingers could no longer
follow the score properly.

The reason was obvious to me as I tried to
continue. With my own piano, which is an old
Steinway, its chair is intended for tandem use.

I could occupy all of it to myself, gaining
all the space I needed to cope with the
most rigorous part of the score.

Alas, on the mini concert stage the chair
was intended for a single player only!

Where I would have normally moved my hip
around on the tandem chair I now had to extend
my arms and fingers to the limit.

I simply was not coping. There was no room
on that damn single player chair for me to move
my hip sideways.

Well, what she had was a tandem chair
She would have coped with a single player chair,
if that had been what she had to be content with.

After all, she was a student of music, and after all
it was not a contest of any kind. Who else would have
noticed except me anything extraordinary about her hip

movement during that pocket money earning performance
of hers!

Her fingers were happily dancing
over and across the keyboard.

Where rivers meet - The Asia Minor

Anatolia, and with it the whole of Asia Minor
is lopsided, very.

Mt. Ararat stands prominently at 5,165m on the
eastern border with Iran and only a few winding and
steep, trecherous roads precipitate into that part of Asia.

Amazingly, though, they were part of the Silk Road
into Anatolia and they continue in the opposite
direction literally right down the middle of Anatolia
to Istanbul.

And, two rivers emanate,from half way down
its slow decent, directly to the south of
Mt. Ararat, into the great plain of Mesopotamia,

which is really Syria and Iraq, the cradle of
civilization and where the two rivers will meet.

何故、この記述が必要かというと、あくまでも
ロ－マ人の視点からアナトリア以西の歴史を
見てみたい、それは、文明が初めて大規模に

激しく衝突した時期だったからです。アナトリアは
その舞台でした。長い間。。。

まず、大枠を確定する、その特徴を理解して
おく、それが今後の旅行や滞在に欠かせないと
思っているのです！

それがコルレオ－ネ村に滞在する時の歴史的な
背景ブリ－フィングになるのですから！

The average altitude even at the centre of
Central Anatolia is staggering 2 km !!!, that,
running down from Mt. Aratat, westward

over a distance of 800 km, past Mt. Erciyas,
standing at 3,917m, which is located
to the south of Kayseri, the town
the Romans named after Julius Caeser.

So, you can see that the whole of Asia Minor is,
not just simply lopsided, but that it is a
lopsided highland, twice as large in area as
Japan at that!

This story will soon unfold around that town,
nearly four thousand years since the days
of the iron people, the Hittites.

They had a spell in and disappeared as an entity
from history, not knowing that I would be there
one day right in the middle of their homeland,

that after a lapse of four thausand years
I would be watching the same mountain
they called "the white mountain",

nor that I would be there, reflecting upon
the intervening sanguine history of the area,
that was to emerge in their long absence...

In the mean time the gradual decent still
continues west towards Istanbul with
a tell-tale example, down the descent

in terms of the Great Salt Lake, which is the
product of the sheer heat in the region,
with river waters being unable to reach

the Srtaight area as they were exhausted
through a massive evaporation process on
their way down there.

In fact, there are no major rivers
making it successfully into the seas in the
whole of western half of Anatolia.

The Romans knew it, must have known it
and that explains what they did with the pagans
in this region.

This area was largely treated as
a single entity by the Romans, to
protect the Empire from invasion
from further affield, Parthia.

It was a buffer zone where the two
civilizations met seriously for the
first time in history, Asia and Europe.

That is exactly what makes Anatolia
such an interesting place to history freaks.

The poor Turks still do not know whether
they are Asians or Europeans!

The Romans, however, would have been
very much more interested in controlling the
areas south of Anatolia, Syria in particular.

In describing these I have been heavily
supported by satellite pictures
of the whole region.

Where would natural paths be for
waters and the movements of armies
and soldiers, and logistic supplies?

By looking at satellite imagery
I begin to see how the Romans might have
thought about the whole area.

People would have moved like streams
of water, taking the least painful and perhaps
sometimes hazzardous, but logicaly sound routes,

with roads spontaneously being created along them,
water and food supplies sometimes guaranteed
along the routes.

You will see in my narratives soon, why
I think that way, how roads might have
developped in these virtually inhabitable places.
+

The "White Moutain" stood shining aloof in the far distance,
covered by snow from top to bottom, but somehow appeared as if
inviting me to ski on his slopes in the not too distant future.

It was very sunny and bright, and slightly warmer than a few days earlier
when it had snowed. Blown in the wind
I was treading over snow-coated and half-perished pumpkins.

I was chasing them one by one,
trying to destroy them all.

I looked up again for a puf, and the Mountain
sprung back into view.

With all spontaneity I saluted in silence,
in my own humble way
, just in case I might...

Was it my imagination then that the Mountain
appeared to notice my tiny presence there
and echoed with a nod of approval?