He wrote,
“I had no idea how much sub-Saharan West Africa influenced Morocco. I was in over my head in Tangier. This tale is sad. I needed help.”
Read about it in his Tales til Christmas: https://www.amazon.com/kindle-vella/story/B0BNZDYKKC
Or read his own story, Tangier Gardens: Out of the classroom into real life, via plant portals.
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!
21Dec2022
The first day of winter.
Four days til Christmas.
And CJ posted four tales.
4.1–The Oval Garden experiences inspired me to address the things that were at the very heart of landscape architecture. In this tale, I talk about the sun and sunlight.
4.2–After my Oval Garden visits, I went over and over my portal experiences, trying to understand logically what happened. I, in this short tale, share my own conclusions.
4.3–I used my own forest experience to construct a short tale in which I talked about forests in the landscape, their life beyond the senses and salubrious exchanges.
4.4–I described what I was missing in Tangier. But I did have a rooftop garden terrace with a view over the Strait of Gibraltar.
Who is CJ and why is he writing these tales?
In June 2000, Christopher Janus, a senior studying landscape architecture at a mid-west America university, finds himself in Tangier on a term abroad design study. The strange culture, the North African landscape and Mediterranean gardens are not what he expected. CJ, as his friends called him, could not wait to be home for Christmas.
To complete his term abroad design study, CJ documented his strange culture, landscape and garden experiences in Morocco in a series of 43 short stories that are being released on Amazon Kindle Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve. The first 3 are FREE! You can find them here: Tales til Christmas Vella link ASIN: B0BNZDYKKC
Tales til Christmas–CJ’sJourney
Majoun, jajouka, gnawa…CJ wasn’t sure where to turn. He just wanted to finish his term-abroad design study. But all around him…culture, landscape, gardens; they were all different. They were all strange. He thought he knew what he was getting into…but did he? He did know one thing for certain—he wanted to be home for Christmas. Read his short stories.
Those short stories are, for the first time, being released on Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve: find them here=http://bit.ly/3B9rJXE
ENJOY!!
***
If you wonder what actually happened during CJ’s six months in Tangier, pick up the eBook, Tangier Gardens–out of the classroom into the real world–via plant portals, here: https://amzn.to/3HLrtyv
The strange culture, the North African landscape and Mediterranean gardens are not what he expected.
In June 2000, Christopher Janus, an American landscape architecture student at a mid-western university, finds himself in Tangier on a term-abroad design study.
CJ, as his friends called him, could not wait to be home for Christmas.
To complete his Moroccan term-abroad design study, CJ writes about his strange culture, landscape and garden experiences in a series of 40 short stories.
Those short stories are now, for the first time, being released on Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve.
Take a break and ENJOY!!
15Aug2022 Last day FREE ebook Tangier Gardens
CJ tells about his living in Tangier.
Take an international trip to Tangier without covid travel hassle.
I am on a hunt.
For genre, for references.
You all know I write about landscape. In my own words, landscape that takes you to the foggy edge where normal transforms into paranormal.
I have only one writer who inspired me–Algernon Blackwood. He showed respect for the observable landscape. He also felt another side of landscape–its power. Its indefinable power that, in a fleeting second, can overwhelm.
I don’t copy him. But my experience in the landscape is similar. Tangier Gardens is about a young man just making his first discoveries beyond the foggy edge of normal. Nature is like that–if you let it.
If we look at nature, in a traditional sense, we see it as a source of human inspiration.
What about landscape? Landscape is the canvas upon which nature sits.
What about landscape architecture? Now that is confusing. It is a modern profession, that in my opinion, mistakenly moves natural elements around, often losing the traditional inspirational quality of nature. Failure.
So, in Tangier Gardens, the young man, CJ, tries to find how he, as a student of landscape architecture, can impart the inspiration of nature into his landscape design. Difficult. Tons of adminstrative regulations that bind nature into some kind of measurable pop experience. Not fun or helpful.
So I turn to a Algernon Blackwood aficionado, Eugene Thacker, who writes about Blackwood’s approach to nature and landscape:
If we are to call Blackwood a naturalist, then we must do so with caution, for his sublime awe before the mysteries of nature is always coupled with an acute awareness of the indifference of what we dutifully tag as “nature.” His novella, “The Willows”, suggests something different. Perhaps what we call the “supernatural” is simply the nature either we don’t see or don’t comprehend. It is the site of myth, religion, metaphysics—and perhaps of science as well. The strangest or “weirdest” understanding of nature is given to us not from ancient superstitions but from modern science. Perhaps the natural is supernatural, and vice-versa.
https://lithub.com/how-algernon-blackwood-turned-nature-into-sublime-horror/
If you would like to see my take on nature via the landscape, read Tangier Gardens.
Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE TODAY. Get it!!!
And if you know of contemporary authors in the same vein, please include them in your comment.
And lastly genre: after you have read Tangier Gardens, tell me what genre you think it fits.
This almond orchard grows in Morocco. Soils are rich and because of hydroelectric dams, water for agriculture is plentiful north of the Middle Atlas.
This landscape attracted CJ; but the landscape gave root to elements that undid CJ.
Read about how he reacted to these landscape challenges in Tangier Gardens.
Mimosa and narcissus.
Balancing, cleansing, energising, relaxing, uplifting…we can all do with some of that.
Acacia dealbata–it grows like a native in the northern third of Morocco; and, in spring, you can always find its cut flowers, fresh from the bled (countryside), being sold by Rif ladies in Tangier.
CJ reckoned when you get this close to a flower, it is because the flower has invited you. That invitation is the key that unlocks a portal–a paranormal portal.
Don’t believe me? Read his story, his take on plants in Tangier Gardens.
Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE TODAY.
Find out about the magic of plants and their flowers at the Hibiscus House.
I’m flogging my book.
The book? Tangier Gardens.
This is a typical Moroccan medina water fountain that, in Tangier Gardens, CJ was planning to study. Why?
Because these beautifully tiled fountains were local community nodes for daily gathering of water to use at home. Everyone felt and knew the importance of water supplied by these beautiful fountains.
In Tangier Gardens CJ documents his attempt to study these community landmarks–and the strange challenges he faced.
Today, Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE!
This is a Tangier medina riad.
A small courtyard garden, as we in the USA would say. A garden surrounded by the house–your home.
In CJ’s view, it is an excellent, safe and intimate space to get close to plants.
Traditionally it is a practical place for edible plants, medicinal plants, fragrant plants, beautiful plants–and it doesn’t require much water. What’s wrong with that?
Want to learn more about CJ’s discoveries in Tangier riads?
Get Tangier Gardens.
