# Title
Discomfort/Changing/State
違和感/変化/状態
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Rice has been an interest of mine since the disaster struck Fukushima in 2011. This tiny grain could very well trigger a large change to our fundamental necessities of food, clothing and shelter.

While researching rice and the environment in which it grows, my interests expanded to include not only ecology, but also the physical and psychological habits of food and nutritional science.

Since 2008, I have had numerous opportunities to visit the Tohoku region of Japan for months at a time. I was in Scotland when the March 2011 Great Earthquake and subsequent tsunami ravaged eastern Japan, flooding not only the region I had grown fond of over the years, but also the internet with shocking images of destruction. About a year after the earthquake and tsunami, I found myself in Fukushima again in 2012. While visiting the affected areas, a strange sensation overcame me. I can only describe this sensation as "discomfort". Being in Fukushima during this time, my memories of seeing the disaster unfold live on the news in 2011, as well as the time I had previously spent in the Tohoku region contributed to this feeling. I was familiar with the affected areas and the state of the population and economy from having lived in the area.


These areas experienced an abnormally steep decline after everything that had happened. However, a number of locals continued to remain in the area. Conversations with those who chose to remain touched on topics like the meaning of life, responsibility and contributing to the land, but also the reality of the disaster and the deleterious effects of remaining.

Needless to say, "rice" not only serves as a food staple in Asia, but a way of life. This workshop will focus on the food, environment, customs, and the fundamental theme of human beings. I will research and investigate a variety of local plants and rice which will serve as the material used during this workshop. I intend to germinate the brown rice in Petri dishes as a part of the experimental process.

Depending on the moisture of the environment, different molds and fungi can be expected to cultivate on the rice. An example would be the fungus "Rhizopus" which grows on the banana leaf and is used in making "tempeh".


My goal is to germinate the brown rice and other plant seeds collected in the field and raise them not in traditional soil, but in an agar-agar medium. The plants raised in this environment will be exposed to bacteria and fungi that naturally occur in soil ecology. At the end of this, the plants will be harvested with the end-goal of human consumption.



Process

1 Germination of brown rice

Transplantation of germinated rice on agar medium.
Serving the rice grown on the agar medium (about 2-3 days) at dinner.

Inhalator
Distillate extracted from rice seedlings and medium grown on agar medium

Suppository from the distillate.

2 Rice field
Pasted rice and molding by leaves
Join with a stem made of capillaries
Plant in the soil.

The rice
Fukushima rice
Yamaguchi rice
Kyoto rice
Several types of rice provided from Yilan

Selection of plant leaves
Native or naturalized in Okinawa-Taiwan
as a common plant
Gajumaru; Ficus microcarpa 細葉榕　
Fukugi; Garcinia subelliptica 菲島福木
Sandanka; Ixora chinensis 仙丹花

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MONDATORY QUARANTINE

day 1-2
1. Obtain rice and leaves
2. Pasted rice and mold with leaves
3. Dry for 2 days
4. Join with a stem made of capillaries

day 3-4
1.  Germination of brown rice