The felted slippers have turned out to be far from hard-wearing. Holes in the soles again. I only just mended them six weeks ago, and three of the past weeks I haven’t even been here to wear them. I’ve needle-felted more wool over the holes and near-holes for now, but this is clearly not sustainable.

A hit of the felted wool shows on the inside of the slippers. Which is logical but still somehow fascinating. The felting needle really pushes the fibres all the way into the existing material and some of it all the way through.

I’ll be wearing these for a day or two just to get the patched bits properly evened out, but after that, I’ll see if I can add proper soles.

We ate a lot of good food in Japan. Still, by the end of the trip I had had rather enough of it and was really looking forward to proper food. Especially proper bread – crusty and chewy and flavourful, not the bland stuff that the Japanese seem to prefer.

Their bread was white, very soft, very airy, bland, and often sweet. The sandwiches all had the crusts cut off, and the golden surface on the buns could not be called crust, either, as soft as it was. It was like eating baby food.

Today’s meals:
– Breakfast: porridge
– Lunch: sourdough bread
– Dinner: barley stew