Pacific Saury Without Bitterness and Red Salmon: Autumn Arriving on a Remote Island

October.

On the calendar, it is already autumn. However, living in Okinawa, it is hard to get that feeling. Even though I want to feel it, it is simply impossible.

Air conditioning is still essential, my attire is short sleeves and shorts, and I am wearing sandals.

And the cicadas are still singing.

It sounds nice to say that "summer is long," but I have reached a state of resignation regarding the gap between the calendar and my physical experience.
Even so, there are moments when I think, "It really is autumn."

A night with a full moon.

The outline of the moon is sharp, and the air feels just a little bit clearer.

Or, when I find Pacific saury in the fresh fish section of the supermarket. However, that saury had neither head nor innards. The bitterness of the innards is what makes saury delicious. They are likely removed because they would deteriorate during transport.

To taste the flavors of autumn on a remote island, there is a slight handicap of time and distance.

Fall salmon hasn't arrived yet either. Instead, what was lined up was some surprisingly red salmon from America. It was a red so intense that I couldn't help but mutter, "Is it really okay for it to be this red?"

But America is also in the Northern Hemisphere.

The season is autumn there, too.

Thinking of it that way, perhaps this, too, counts as "fall salmon."

While grilling that red salmon in an air-conditioned room, I think: even if there is no autumn here, the seasons are still turning properly.
The autumn that arrives in a roundabout and incomplete way isn't so bad either. I live in a place where I have no choice but to think that way.