Status Updates From Alberi

I ended up meeting three trees: a pine in the grounds of a temple in Edogawa, Tokyo; a camphor in a paddyeld in Yokkaichi; and a sugi in a eld along the roadside in Fukushima. If something connected them it was that each tree was huge, and stood alone.

Jindai- zakura, as the tree is known, is of the Edohigan variety. I was extremely fortunate, happening to go right on the day when it was in full bloom. The tree was enormous, and you could tell by looking that it was old–as you might anticipate for something named Jindai, or ‘age of the gods’.

Getting to hear a good story is the same as receiving great, everlasting riches.

Some of the cedars on Yakushima are given the name Yakusugi, ………. This name is reserved for sugi trees over a thousand years old, whilst those under a thousand are known as ‘little cedars’. Quite a high bar when you think about it: a thousand years as the boundary between a Yakusugi and a little cedar. I could hear the reverence for the Yakusugi in their name and the way people spoke about them,

Como había tocado el árbol llevada por la emoción, la sensación del contacto permanecía en mis manos y me notaba afectada.

Cada vez que experimento esa tristeza me percato de que mi manera de ver los árboles ha cambiado bastante desde que, hace unos años, empecé a visitar los bosques en busca de las emociones que el contacto con aquellos me procuraba.