Flowers, dust, and birds

Today as I was cycling to meet a friend I took some pictures of cherry blossoms in the little parks I passed. Unfortunately the sky was not blue today. It was not blue yesterday either. It was a mucky yellow. It is the famous yellow dust, blowing in from China, and has been awful the last couple of days. Even buildings quite near our house looked hazy. It made me feel as though I needed to clean my contact lenses.

I thought this was just desert dust, but I found an editorial in The Korea Times that says that this dust has been found to contain dioxin and heavy metals. Perhaps we should all be wearing masks. Yesterday it was so bad you could taste it.

Anyway, this meant that taking pictures of gorgeous cherry blossoms against a clear blue sky was out of the question. There is no clear blue sky. There is a revolting haze. However, I noticed that cherry blossoms have a charming way of growing, sometimes, directly out of the tree trunk, so I took photos of that, instead.



As I was cycling along I saw something else rather amazing that I was unable to photograph. I actually had the camera hanging around my neck at the time, but it happened too quickly, and besides, I was too busy gaping. It was a crow, flying across the road to land on someone's roof. It was a flat roof, and I couldn't see what it did when it got there. But what made me gape was that the crow had a wire coat hanger dangling from its beak. It looked really odd. When it landed on the roof I couldn't see it anymore, but I heard it drop the coat hanger, then clatter around a bit adjusting the position of the hanger, and then it appeared on the edge of the roof looking purposeful and flew off again, presumably to look for another coat hanger.

Crows use coat hangers to make nests. I can't imagine they are very comfortable nests, but apparently crows do not agree with me. Here is a picture of a coat hanger nest, from the Japan Times. (The accompanying story requires registration (free), but you can see the picture without registering. I suggest using Bugmenot if you don't want to register but do want to read the story.)

Coat-hanger-carrying crows can't be that unusual a sight, but I had never seen one before. I wish I'd been quicker with the camera.

I did, later, get a picture of a sparrow which appeared to be eating cherry blossoms. I don't suppose it really was eating cherry blossoms, but it was very enthusiastic about whatever it had found.



The other pictures I took today were of the erica tree/bush (I thought it was a bush, but it seems to be growing into a tree, oops) in our garden. I used the macro lens for this photo, and it looks unfamiliar so close up.



Tomorrow I meet another bunch of new students. This is at the place I cycle to, and the forecast is for rain. I hope they don't mind a slightly soggy teacher.

Time for bed!