Illustration and Story by Lehan Winifred Ramsay

Illustration

I begin this piece with a cup of milk tea at the Cafe de The Francois in Kyoto. Waiting for a friend who didn’t turn up (lost at the other end of the street). The lighting is yellowed like the walls, playing off bald heads and gold spectacles. Well dressed ladies cluster on red velvet upholstery raising their pitch over the piano concerto. A man with his elderly mother bend over cream cakes. He stirs his drink vigorously and when it spills he exclaims and stops all movement. His mother rustles through her purse and takes out tissues to wipe the spill. After finishing his cake, he reaches into his own bag, takes out his own tissues, and wipes his own mouth. I accept a final refill of my glass of water, and leave for the train.

Milk Tea with Cream

This week I’ve been occupied, watching an old 11 week TV Japanese drama on Youtube starring Takuya Kimura, a Japanese singer and actor breaking new ground in pan-asia entertainment, followed by the Julian Assange interview series. I started with the old guys and worked my way down to the new ones, ending with Occupy.

Toward the end of the Occupy compilation he asks a question about the organisation of the occupy sites. You started to put up instructions, he says. For how to organise the police, how to organise yourselves, how to organise interferers, crazy people, the garbage. Was this a model specifically for your events? Or was this some kind enactment of a larger model.

Fascinating to listen to the responses. I had the feeling that Assange is not interested in the Occupy movement as much as his audience. President Obama, did you take note of the cigars he was waving about? Or was that smoke not meant for you.

It seems that there is more to come.