Things that drive me crazy about bonsai people

[namnhi]

Yeah it was pulloutable. The trouble was with your execution.

My sensei usually teamed up with my opponent's sensei and beat us both senseless.

Uncle, Not sure how your sensei will fare with my sifu.

 

[Cajunrider]

Uncle, Not sure how your sensei will fare with my sifu.

Again my sifu will team up with your sifu and beat us both.

 

[shohin_branches]

I had one from UK ask...why is it...in America people call ones Sensei...and here we call ones like Kevin Wilson...Kev.

In the midwest we don't usually say sensei. I have a mentor and I work for a curator. My mentor and the curator of the collection I volunteer at just happen to be partners so I go to their house to help with bonsai.

 

[Cadillactaste]

I'm kinda surprised. Five pages in and nobody has mentioned "bonsais". It's like nails on a chalkboard

You can have one bonsai. You can have three bonsai. You cannot have three bonsais, you illiterate fool

Oh my gosh...RIGHT!?! Fingernails on a chalkboard!

 

[James W.]

Too many times:
Newbie: "What to do?"
Me: "That's a nice little tree! Bring it (another time and/or place) and we will help you.
Newbie: Awesome! I'll be there.
-at specified time and/or place-
..................[crickets]........................

 

[James W.]

Also
Guy: "Is now the right time to (wrong technique for this species and/or stage of development)"?
Me: "Don't do that."
Guy: "I saw video"
Me: "Saw same. Different species, different stage of development and different climate."
Guy: (muttering "What does he know?") Goes home and does it.
Somehow we never see that tree again.

 

[shohin_branches]

*New Bonsai person styles a non-traditional species*
New Bonsai person: "I'm the first person to ever consider this species for bonsai!"
Old Bonsai person: "I have eight of those I've been training for 20 years."
Me: "here's a photo of Nick Lenz's poison ivy bonsai"

I like to remind newbies that we're all insane here.

 

[BillsBayou]

When I went to my first bonsai event that people traveled to, I remember getting dinner and drinks with a fellow who had flown in from across the country. What he said stuck with me:

“There are ways to do bonsai inexpensively—I have not chosen any of them.”

That statement is quite profound. Would you be able to recall who said this? I'd like to use the quote.

Apologies to Robert Frost:
I shall be developing bonsai
Some quite cheap or at great expense:
Two roads diverged shaping wood, and I—
I took the one where less monies lie,
And that has made all the difference.

 

[pandacular]

That statement is quite profound. Would you be able to recall who said this? I'd like to use the quote.

Apologies to Robert Frost:
I shall be developing bonsai
Some quite cheap or at great expense:
Two roads diverged shaping wood, and I—
I took the one where less monies lie,
And that has made all the difference.

I do recall his name, but he wasn’t a public figure in the community or anything, so I’ll not share.

 

[Cajunrider]

So I skipped lunch and went to the swamp instead. I got back to the office barely in time for a meeting I scheduled. I am now starving and the only thing left in my office was this tiny jar of mushroom truffle sauce.

It was weird eating that sauce with a spoon.

 

[BillsBayou]

*New Bonsai person styles a non-traditional species*
New Bonsai person: "I'm the first person to ever consider this species for bonsai!"
Old Bonsai person: "I have eight of those I've been training for 20 years."
Me: "here's a photo of Nick Lenz's poison ivy bonsai"

I like to remind newbies that we're all insane here.

Okay. I'll play this game.

Me: I'm firing .45 hollow point rounds into the back of a tree as a carving technique.
Old bonsai growers?

Me: I'm removing the top of a tree by pulping it with a sledgehammer.
Old bonsai growers?

Me: I've placed a hot piece of uranium glass in the middle of these three seed trays to screw up their DNA.
My dog: This bench looks like a great place to look over the fence. I'll just knock all this crap on the ground.
Wife: No. We're not getting rid of the dog.

FYI: Seeds in the middle of the tray did not grow. Seedlings on the edge of the dead zone had burnt tips and looked worse for wear. Seedlings at the edge of the tray looked fine. They all looked dead when I found the trays on the ground. The dog can no longer get to the bench because it is surrounded with milk crates, open side up.

Keeping with the thread:
It's crazy how many newbies come up to me and ask me for advice on their kookie techniques. "How about you learn bonsai first? We'll screw it up later."

 

[Cajunrider]

That statement is quite profound. Would you be able to recall who said this? I'd like to use the quote.

Apologies to Robert Frost:
I shall be developing bonsai
Some quite cheap or at great expense:
Two roads diverged shaping wood, and I—
I took the one where less monies lie,
And that has made all the difference.

I hope you reload. Ammo is expensive nowadays.

 

[BonsaiPoppie]

Are there things other bonsai folk say or do that just make you want to scream? I’ll start with two.

“Crepe” is a fabric or a paper. “Crape” is a myrtle.

Natal plum is not pronounced “NAY-tul”, like a word referring to birth. It’s “nah-TAHL”, as in the part of South Africa to which the tree is indigenous.

I have eaten a crepe or two...

 

[Cajunrider]

Okay. I'll play this game.

Me: I'm firing .45 hollow point rounds into the back of a tree as a carving technique.
Old bonsai growers?
Peter Chan uses his ax. I use my bush knife.

Me: I'm removing the top of a tree by pulping it with a sledgehammer.
Old bonsai growers?
You got me there. I can’t think of a better pulper.

Me: I've placed a hot piece of uranium glass in the middle of these three seed trays to screw up their DNA.
I use a concoction of unknown pesticides

My dog: This bench looks like a great place to look over the fence. I'll just knock all this crap on the ground.
Wife: No. We're not getting rid of the dog.
I am Asian. That dog better tread lightly.

FYI: Seeds in the middle of the tray did not grow. Seedlings on the edge of the dead zone had burnt tips and looked worse for wear. Seedlings at the edge of the tray looked fine. They all looked dead when I found the trays on the ground. The dog can no longer get to the bench because it is surrounded with milk crates, open side up.

Keeping with the thread:
It's crazy how many newbies come up to me and ask me for advice on their kookie techniques. "How about you learn bonsai first? We'll screw it up later."

But but isn’t it true that nearly every new life begins with an effing act?

 

[JudyB]

In the midwest we don't usually say sensei. I have a mentor and I work for a curator. My mentor and the curator of the collection I volunteer at just happen to be partners so I go to their house to help with bonsai.

Yeah this is the one I can’t stand. If you are not Japanese and your teacher is not Japanese then the use of sensei grates on me. Especially when used in profusion as that type generally does. Teacher / student works and I like mentor as well.

 

[pandacular]

Yeah this is the one I can’t stand. If you are not Japanese and your teacher is not Japanese then the use of sensei grates on me. Especially when used in profusion as that type generally does. Teacher / student works and I like mentor as well.

I've never heard this, but I'm not surprised that it happens. It's especially odd as I think it's likely hard for a westerner to understand the meaning of the word and relationship of sensei

...at least that's what my sensei Ryan Neil tells me.

 

[penumbra]

Me: I'm firing .45 hollow point rounds into the back of a tree as a carving technique.

Long Colt or Auto? I am a fan of long colt.

 

[shohin_branches]

More pots arrived but I worked until 8:30pm (12 hour day again ) so I will have to take better photos tomorrow.

At this rate I'll never finish repotting

 

[shinmai]

Some people have brought up a good point on pronouncing words. Certain dialects and languages tend to pronounce foreign words more akin to how their language would say those combined letters.

A key thing to remember (whether you like it or detest it) is that this is all part of the evolution of a language.

I spent a considerable amount of time diving in French Polynesia taking pictures of sharks and mantas. The Polynesian language is totally about inflection. One of the locals told me that, depending on pronunciation, the same sentence could tell a woman that she was a beautiful girl, a pig, or a bar of soap.
Interestingly, a formal greeting in their language is “Iorana”, a phonetic interpretation of ‘your honor’.

 

[shinmai]

My dad was born and raised in Morocco. Apparently when he met my mom in college he would mean to curse but it would sound like “sheet” which is still quite hilarious to me.

When I was in college I had a friend whose mother was Puerto Rican. She rather proudly announced that for his sister’s graduation, she had purchased a beautiful shit cake.