Two Weeks Of Nothing

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Well, the quarter had finally begun to wrap up - it seems that the SCTI midterm season is virtually contiguous with finals season. Which is regretful, because it lumps virtually all of the graded assignments into a few super-stressful weeks. Which, for me, are over with my last final (EE) having just wrapped up on Tuesday. Finally! After that, I have three intense days of summer vacation, followed by moving into my new apartment (!), followed by going to work on this upcoming Monday. And thus will begin the summer.

Hardly anything of note has happened in the last few weeks: I worked hard, got a lot done, learned some academic stuff, but had very little time to party. I gave a presentation on J-Pop as my final presentation for Japanese class, and wrote a 1200-character paper on it in Japanese (which is actually pretty difficult). After turning it in, I realized it might be the last paper I write in Japanese, but felt confident about the language ability I've managed to accumulate in less than two years. I'm pretty terrible at languages in general, so this may be the end of my academic track in terms of Japanese - but I will undoubtedly learn a lot more this summer. As for after college, or later in life, I don't know yet what role this Japan experience will play. I feel, though, that I've built a secure foundation upon which I can continue to build, if I am so inclined - someday.

Other things not worthy of your note but requiring of my mention:

I gave my first non-exclusively-academic presentation last Friday. The Stanford Center for Technology and Innovation (the official name of SCTI, the Japan Overseas program I'm in) and Kyoto University set up a workshop on "Innovation," so I presented my analysis of Horiba, a company that makes scientific instruments. It was pretty cool, in the end - we had interviews with employees, deconstructed market analyses, examined the company structure, and reviewed their fiscal situation to give recommendations on how to improve the company. This was the final project for a class called "Innovation in the United States and Japan," and I ended up learning a lot about the management of technology in it. Most interesting stuff. Anyway, we did these group projects in groups of three (two Stanford students, one Kyodai student) and it went pretty well. Plus, in the typical Japanese way, in the two hour Q&A session / reception afterwards there was good food, beer, and sake. The Japanese enjoy their alcohol - including hard alcohol at legitimate company situations. We got cool presents, too, including Yukatas worn by the official / holy construction workers of the 62nd reconstruction of Isei Temple, which is dismantled and rebuilt every twenty years (so it started 1240 years ago). Snazzy!




Embarrassing thing: I shattered my family's very nice glass door last week. To explain this properly, a little backstory is required.

Background Exhibit A: Remember my aversion to Lee-chan, the annoying over-excited puppy? Well, his indiscriminate urinations finally soiled one-too-many a tatami mat, and he was permanently banished outdoors. Much to my delight. Unfortunately, however, this latest transition was, in fact, not an amelioration of the situation at all and instead evolved Lee-chan into something demonic. Despite being in the backyard, he was chained (I'm personally against this, but he's not my dog, and I guess it was a pretty long chain), and so, now, although he was never seen indoors, the perpetual rattling of chains provided testament to his sinister presence. And since he was on a long chain, if you went outside the sudden clanking of chains indicated a time-to-impact as he hurled himself towards you. Keep in mind, now, that I often come home after the dusk has settled upon my hill, and picture my return: a long bike ride after an equally long day; exhausted, I climb the steps towards my house; I step to the yard, and - suddenly - a flying mass of teeth, tongue, spittle, and metallic chain comes hurling at me. I was less than pleased with this arrangement, especially since the chain does not restrict his range of motion, and the only possible outcome of the attack is collision.

Background Exhibit B: My house is somewhat strange in arrangement: it has a unified second story, but the first floor is divided in half, with a completely outdoor walkway between the two halves of the house. The outdoor area is "B"-shaped, with a front yard, a back yard, and a path connecting the two in the middle. I live mostly in the left half of the first floor, but every night I have to travel to the right half to drop off my dirty towel.

Story: So, one particular evening, after a shower, I exit the bathroom door towards the right half of the house. Immediately, I hear the rattling of chains that indicate that Lee-chan has targeted me. Judging by the ferocity of the sound and the perceived distance, I quickly estimate that I have around three-quarters of a second until he hits me. I open the door across the way as quickly as I can, and launch myself towards it - forgetting that the foundation of the house is raised one foot above ground level. I miss-step, trip over the entrance, and throw up my hands to catch myself as I fall. Unfortunately, the door was opened in such a way that, as I fall, my hand palm-strikes the lower glass window in the wooden door - which promptly explodes. My hand went through it, I think, but not a scratch on that hand. The other hand caught a flying splinter which tore out a little chunk out of my thumb, but it's all healing fine. All in all, I fared pretty well. The door did not.

This is nightmare territory for someone doing language study. The handling of apologies is a delicate matter, one that requires tact and grace as well as detailed explanations. I lack all of the above in Japanese. Curses.

Thankfully, however, we had been forced to memorize dialogues in Japanese class - dialogues like inviting and declining, requesting permission, and - wonderfully - apologizing for a mistake. I retrieved that little bit of information from my memory, and, combined with truly regretful facial expressions and recreations of the event, managed to communicate to my host father what had happened and how I felt about it. I offered to pay for it several times, but he said it was fine and told me not to worry about it. Nonetheless, it's still embarrassing.





The country exploded a week or two ago with the World Cup. I figure that it probably didn't make too big a splash in the U.S., but over here the influence was pandemic. Everyone everywhere knew the time of Japan's next game, the probabilities of winning (100%), and was making plans to view it. What with the time difference, this is not an easy task, and we saw Japanese people waking up and coming out at 1:30 in the morning to booze up before the 4 a.m. game. My family was no exception: on an unusually noisy Saturday morning, I emerged to learn whose strange voices were chattering in the living room (adjacent to my bedroom, and rice paper walls don't do much for sound). There, in the living room, was the biggest freakin' TV I've ever seen in my life. It must've been at least six feet across diagonally, and it was flat screen, and it was high definition, and it was plasma. Ye gods, the color, the detail, the brightness.

I gaped in awe at it.

The monolithic black stone of "2001: A Space Oddysey" would've come to mind had my consciousness not been eschewed by the euphoric dancing of pixels. So numerous! So colorful! Their patterns did not simply resemble a living person - they shivered as they became flesh. Pixels glided in delight as they dissolved from Person-ness and took on the form of a Glass of Tea. My mouth watered in anticipation - a four-foot glass filled with a thirsty earth-green liquid, glass so cold that the condensation (palpable, refracting light through the fist-sized droplets) built up and dripped slowly down the outside. Truly, if ever I desired to remove myself from this Television to imbibe liquids strange and colorful, only Suntory Green Tea, Unchanged for Nearly a Hundred Years, could possibly abate my thirst.

I was quite pleased with this new arrangement.

Other things the Japanese are all-about right now: I don't know if it even made the news in the U.S., but Prime Minister Koizumi visited Bush and went to Graceland (Koizumi apparently is a huge Elvis fan), and subsequently did an Elvis impression - uncharacteristic of his office but generally well-recieved by the Japanese public in the spirit in which it was done. And now, of course, the country is FREAKING OUT about those North Korean missiles. A few of the SCTI students were out around the launch time (early morning our time), and one student got a call from his host-mom to come home because "the North Koreans are launching missiles!"

Anyway, life has been good, if busy, and I'm definitely enjoying myself. I'm writing this from a Starbucks along the river, and the night has begun to fall, so the time has come for me to accumulate more stories which I will relate to you at a later point. Adieu!

~Danny

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Photos

Presenting on Horiba 2
Picture Credits: Tatum-sensei.
More of the same, but I'm speaking now.

Presenting on Horiba
Picture Credits: Tatum-sensei.
Hiro, Vincent, and I present on Horiba. Check out that suit jacket I'm wearing - that was purchased that morning, at a fair price, but regretfully still roughly equivalent to three weeks of money-saving. Thankfully, I had done a good job with that and, with the new card in the mail coming towards me, I got myself a nice jacket.

Post-presentation
Picture Credits: Terry-sensei.
We relax. We are done.

Mos Burger
Random evening, chillin' at Mos Burger, the only burger chain worth eating at in Japan. The burgers are unusual, but fairly priced and quite tasty as long as you're not expecting a traditional burger.

My name
To get a bank account, you need a name-stamp (like your signature, except in kanji). So, Lisa-san made all of us name stamps, which we got to choose. This is mine. It has no inherent meaning, but one pronounciation is "Dan Niiru", and the characters approximate to "Step to a manner of greatness and virtue." Which seems like a valid goal.

Japanese Bank Account
Picture Credits: Han
We begin to navigate the difficulties of getting a bank account.

Comments

[G'maD]

Oh, Danny Boy, what a wonderful tour you have taken us on....Please don't stop!