Francesca Forrest's Blog, page 19

Wednesday reading: Tales from the Inner City

I've been slowly reading through Shaun Tan's Tale from the Inner City, short stories and poems that accompany beautiful paintings of animals surreally present in a nameless city. I'd put it on my to-read list years ago, but was actually moved to read it when a Japanese guy on my Twitter reading list wrote an essay about one of the stories.

The essay (which I haven't finished yet) is about the cat story. Both the cat story and the dog story-poem are lovely; they say touching things about dogs and...

neighbors

I was in the supermarket, and an old guy came up to me--I thought I recognized him--and he asked, "Are you my neighbor?"

In that moment I realized who he was: he lives at the top of a cul-de-sac in the housing development I live in; his house is unlike any of the other houses in the development, a totally idiosyncratic pattern, never quite finished, with cinder blocks propping up the porch and real wood shingles instead of vinyl siding. I think he lives alone, except for his dog: he always has a ...

A Love Letter, by Nanao Sakaki

I first came upon this poem in 2007; I love it. I shared it back at the time, but that was 16 years ago, so I'm sharing it again--this time with illustrations. (Some of them are click-through-able to the original person's photo on Flickr... others are just shamelessly ripped from stock photos and what-have-you.)

"A Love Letter" was originally published in a collection called Break the Mirror.

( A Love Letter, by Nanao Sakaki )

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A new book in Sherwood Smith's Sartorias-deles series

Let the Torrent Dance Thee Down follows immediately on the harrowing saga of the Norsunder war. It has two parts. The first, Bridges, looks at the aftermath of the war for the various kings, queens, and assorted others we've come to know--characters whom we've seen grow up and who are still feeling out who they now are. Some have overcome terrible pasts or crippling self images; others are still in the process. Some can't grow past old injuries; others are learning to.

The second half, Torrent, ...

dandelion mandala

I made this over several hours, breathing in the scent of apple blossoms. Pure bliss.









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planting an egg

It's been a while, but I finished the next illustration for my Semillas y Huevos picture book, where the kids plant an egg and put an avocado seed under a chicken to hatch.

It took extra long because I finished one drawing but was dissatisfied with it, so had to start over. (I like this one better)

Here the kids are, planting the egg.

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learning Tikuna

My friend Francy is looking for work, and I am eager to learn Tikuna without taking advantage of her, so I proposed to pay for a month or so of lessons (I don't want to saddle her with a long-term obligation and don't know how long I can afford to do this) as a source of income while she looks.

I should have known from how graciously and easily she taught me words when I was visiting that she'd be an excellent teacher, but I've been truly blown away. She's made me two diagrams of the forest field...

Jennifer

A kid came up to me in the early evening of my first full day in Letícia as I was going into an eatery. She was skinny, with hair going every which-way and dark patches on her face that might have been bruising or dirt or a birth mark. She said something to me that I didn't quite understand--but I suspected that she was asking for money, so I opened my purse to get out some money.

"No, no," she said. And then something else ending in "sopa" (soup).

"You want me to buy you a soup?" I asked.

She nod...

cassava-based plastic packaging substitute for Letícia

When we went to the Amazon in July, we took shelter from a downpour at the Instituto Amazónico de Investigaciones Científicas SINCHI--the Sinchi Amazonic Institute of Scientific Research, "a nonprofit research institute of the Government of Colombia charged with carrying out scientific investigations on matters relating to the Amazon Rainforest, the Amazon River and the Amazon Region of Colombia for its better understanding and protection." There we met Dr. Clara Patricia Peña-Venegas , who gave ...

more banyans, more flooded forest

When we went to the Amazon in July, I took this photo of a banyan, also known as an arbol caminante, or walking tree, because of how it spreads. The water was low at this point--you can see the ground beneath the tree.



Now here are some banyans in March, when the water was much higher. You can no longer see the ground! But you can also see the high-water mark--that's how much higher the water will rise.



( I promised some pictures of me in a banyan... )

We went in a canoe with no motor, just paddle...