Another winter vacation has passed and we are back to the ordinary days. I hope my readers have had a nice holiday season.
I had a relatively peaceful holiday mostly spent just with my son and my husband. For the Christmas we skipped the family gathering and went to South Tyrol. My two-year-old son was super excited to see a bonfire for the first time on the Christmas Eve, when as an Italian tradition the owner of our hotel was burning things that were old. He was dancing around the big fire and it was quite a primitive scene. The following days he enjoyed excursions in the mountain; walking on a frozen lake, running up and down the hills covered with snow, and seeing 360 degree panoramic view of the Dolomites.
Having returned from the vacation, his Roman cousins joined us for a few days in Bologna. For the parents it was a bit like being in a jungle to have three boys in the house, but was certainly a great time for my son. They are older than him and always open him up to something new.
So, it has been an eventful winter vacation for my little one and I feel like he grew up a lot during those weeks. And I kind of stopped writing down new words he started to say. I used to do that but now there are just too many new expressions come out from his mouth every week. Further, he learned to speak with more than two words: Just one step before he would construct sentences!
And now he expresses himself very clearly. He knows what he wants and how to say "yes" or "no" in Italian and Japanese. His "yes" is really tender and hearing it always makes me smile while his "no" is really strong and it is difficult to go against it.
Likewise, the book we read before bed is exclusively selected by him. His favourite book is usually fixed for a few months and lately he always says "Moomin" when I ask what he wants to read. I want to rotate it with a few other books but my suggestion is almost always denied.
But it is okay, as I myself have always admired the Moomin novels by the Finnish author Tove Jansson. It is a children's literature but popularly read by grown-ups as well. The adventurous stories woven by Moomin, a hippopotamus-like fairy creature, and his family and friends are filled with profound words and philosophical messages. They are one of the books I would read again and again over years.
Although this book my son enjoys at the moment is a spin-off of the Moomin series for children under three and not written by Jansson, it follows the philosophy of Jansson's novels. Each page has a flap to be opened by little hands, under which various characters peek out to say something to Moomin.
I originally checked out this lovely book from the children's library of Bologna and it attracted my son immediately, perhaps because of the flaps. Then in the middle of the book I found this page where unknown animals are hidden under flowers. It looked familiar to me and I soon remembered having seen it at the Bologna Children's Book Fair a few years ago and loved the illustration.
Delighted to rediscover the book, I rushed to bookstores to get one copy for us. Unfortunately, the Italian edition was already out of print, but in the end I managed to buy one of the rare stock from the publisher.
To my another surprise, a few weeks after that, I found a palm-size edition of this book in the original Finnish language from a box brought from Japan last summer. It did not have flaps but illustrations were identical. One of my friends had gave it to me as a souvenir from Helsinki. I had totally forgot about its content while not seeing it for years.
The original title, "Muumipeikko eksyy" means "Moomintroll gets lost." I like it better than the Italian title, "Momin fa un picnic," as the gist of the book is not just about going on a picnic. In short, the story begins with a morning when Moomin prepares to go for a picnic. At first he enjoys his excursions through forests, streams, and beaches, but then it eventually gets dark, perhaps he gets lost. Feeling a bit lonely and scared, he keeps going and then meets his companion, a girl known as Snork Maiden in the novel. At the end he finds himself at home with her and his family, then animals he encountered on the way knock on his door to join the gathering.
My son likes knocking on this door. I improvise dialogues as if we were also in this house with Moomin and his company. Ad-libbing is actually pretty much what I do throughout the book as my son is not old enough to follow the entire story from the beginning. We randomly jump from one page to another to flap doors, leaves, or caves, playing peekaboo and talking about illustrated toys, food, creatures and such that are familiar to him.
Of course, when he is old enough, I want to read aloud all the narrations and dialogues so he can properly appreciate the story. Hopefully, we can also share my novel collection as soon as he learns to read Japanese by himself. I would also love to bring him to Helsinki someday to look for a little Moomin together hidden in this beautiful fresco. When I saw it at a local art museum there years ago it took my breath away. The painter, Tove Jansson, also put her self-portrait in the middle of the party scene.
Speaking of a party, me and my husband did not party much in the past holiday season when many Italians would. Certainly not easy to stay out late with a little child but we could have organized better not to turn down some invitations.
That being said, I do miss the traditional Japanese New Year's Eve when you just hear bells of zen temples resonate in complete silence in the last minutes of the year. It is quite a contrary to those in Italy when streets and squares get noisy and bright as daytime with countless blasts of firecrackers and lights of fireworks.
Oh well, before this article stray to the nostalgia for my homeland, I close today's post. Thanks for reading and see you next time!