Luucid

When Will My Reflection Show...

2010-07-07T23:46:00.002-04:00

Today marked the one-year anniversary of my move to NYC. One year ago, I was struggling with luggage at the airport making perhaps one of the biggest moves of my life. One year ago I was moving from a stable job to what could only be considered a start-up. One year ago I was leaving behind the friends and family and the comfort of everything I know on what seemed to be a whim...

So where do I stand? Though it's been tortuously hot these past few days, I think I stand in a very good spot in my life. The job's petered out pretty well for me and I'm enjoying work quite well. I've made a good set of new friends, while hopefully maintaining enough of a connection to my old friends that I'm still aware of what's going on in their lives. I'm going to be an uncle in the very near future. Things, in general, are looking up...

What have I gone through this past year? Hmm... lots of singing Karaoke... Broadway shows... meeting very different types of people than those I tended to keep company back in Atlanta... I had a rather impromptu exhausting trip back to Japan, which I worked throughout. Tried restaurants all over NYC. I experienced NY's blistering summer and frigid winter. I've had many people come and visit NY, as well as making trips of my own to visit. I went to Apple HQ and worked on a prototype iPad before they were released! I went paintballing for the first time in my life... twice! I've been clubbing, which I'd never done before... I've done the most touristy things possible in NY, while also being labeled as a true New Yorker. I've moved offices 3 times, having started working out of parks and sublets, then to 2 rented desks, then to a row of rented desks, then to a 1500 sq ft space with lots of fun perks.

In short, I'm good with where I'm at, and I'm looking forward to seeing what the next year has to offer.

NYC Brokers suck

2009-08-14T17:21:00.000-04:00

I ended up getting the place. The broker Emailed me today:

"Everything looks great. I'm waiting for our boss to come in and review some pending app packets. There are no other applications on your unit and I feel very confident that you'll be just fine. I'll let you know something as soon as I can. Thanks for your patience."

I was feeling pretty optimistic. At 4:30pm I get a voicemail message from the dude saying that he needed to ask me a question; nothing bad, my credit looks great and everything checks out. I gave him a call and he said that basically the brokers aren't even going to go to the management with the $1650 offer since they'd already found two people willing to pay the $1675 full price for two exact same apartments, even with one of them being on the very top floor (so the one I was applying for is technically worth more, since it's only on the 4th floor).

I got kind of mad, because yesterday he'd been talking to his boss on the phone while we were talking and basically made it pretty clear that he thought we could go with the $1650 and they'd approve me based on good credit and everything. The fact remains that they probably still might approve me, but the brokers wouldn't even go to the management with the offer because they felt they could lose their client if they came with an offer for less than the other two apartments. I talked to the boss basically about it and he made it pretty clear I bring it up to $1675, or they give me my deposit back and find someone else.

I took a few minutes to think about it, but in the end, I just don't care anymore. It's a nice enough place in the area I'm looking for and everything, plus I need to find a place by next week (going back down to Atlanta for my beach trip and to grab the rest of my stuff to move up at the beginning of September). In the end, the extra $25 over what I was going to pay anyway amounted to a little more than half an hour of work extra, so at this point it's not really worth my time and energy to keep searching and dealing with these brokers and crap.

I called the guy back up and told him I'd take it, but I was very disappointed with their services and will not be using them again, nor recommending them to use for anyone else I know. He said he understands and he's very sorry (I feel bad for the guy because I know it's not his fault, but his boss' fault who won't budge).

Anyway, I'm signing the lease on Sunday... I'll be fine, the whole process just still leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Apartment Hunt Trials and Tribulations

2009-08-13T23:25:00.004-04:00

So last week I was struggling with my apt decision since I found a studio with a built-in sleep loft on 21st between 8th and 9th. It was $1649/mo with a $50 concession if you paid a week early, but there was a 7.5% fee on a year's rent. Pro-rated out, that ended up costing like $1720/mo in my mind, which was just out of my price range. I was really considering it and I actually saw it a second time and I liked it even more this time. I realized this time that it wasn't actually on the ground floor, but on the "Parlor Floor," so it was actually above the ground a good bit, such that you couldn't even see into the room from the street level. Didn't even have bars on the window. In the end, the main issue was cost. I talked to the broker and she wouldn't budge in any way, shape, or form. She could tell that I wasn't 100% on the place, so told me I could have a couple more days to think it over that weekend. She even gave me the current tenant's phone number, which I thought was really cool 'cause I could ask him questions that would only be answered by someone who's lived there. He told me in general it was a nice enough place, but I definitely wasn't really getting a good deal as I'd be paying the exact same thing he was. Also told me on Saturdays at 7am, they do the recycling so there's like 15 minutes of glass bottles jangling to wake you up. Well, the more I thought about it (and kept seeing more postings on Craigslist), the more I felt like I could do better for the cost (again $1720 in my mind), so I txted her that she could keep showing the place and take applications and maybe I'd be calling her back by the end of the week.

Monday came by and I had like 5 or 6 scheduled studio and 1br viewings. The first 1br I saw was in Chelsea and at a great location (W 16th between 7th and 8th), but it was a little small and the kitchen was definitely a little cramped. Plus there were rotting floor boards and such that the broker didn't think would be fixed. Still, it was doable and gave me more space than the other place since it had the separate bedroom. She told me she was showing it to a bunch of people as well, but she could tell I really wasn't excited about the place and that I should keep looking if I didn't "fall in love" with the place.

I had one scheduled viewing that looked decent on the Craigslist ad, but I went to the address the lady had sent and found out it was "Best Apts," one of the big broker firms notorious for bait and switch tactics so the moment I saw that, I walked right out. Then I saw a place in Gramercy that was a studio, but in a really nice elevator building on the lower level (pretty much like basement level) next to the laundry facilities. For a basement studio, it had decent lighting and an excellent kitchen with great counter space. The main thing I didn't like was the location. It was a little further walk to the L train than some other places, but I was really considering it. I talked to the guy and he said that they would probably bring down the price to $1600 from $1690 if I indeed had good credit and such. Also there was no broker fee! He wasn't showing the place again until 6pm, so I told him I'd call him at 5pm and let him know if I wanted it then and we could do the application then, giving me a chance to look at one more place on my list of appointments.

This next one was a perfect location for me. W 18th between 7th and 8th. 2 blocks down to the L train, and a great location overall. The studio itself was pretty big. Not really a separate kitchen, but definitely doable. Bathroom was decent enough. Elevator building that seemed well-maintained. I jumped on it. Price was $1700 and there was no broker fee, I applied for it at $1600 hoping they'd at least negotiate with me a little based on my great credit and the fact that I had enough in my savings that I could easily pay a year's rent so I'd never default. The kitchen definitely wasn't as nice as the place in Gramercy, but I liked the location a lot better so I decided to go for it. The broker said he'd let me know the next day.

The next day came by and the broker said that the guy who made the decisions was out sick, but apparently there were three applications on the place that all came in at the same time that morning... I guess this was the main issue with applying for a place with a non-exclusive broker. I was kind of pissed, but at that point he was like "the management will probably pick the best offer, which your $1600 probably won't be." I told him I'd go for $1650, but that's the highest I'd go. The next day went by and they still hadn't made a decision yet. I was getting antsy, so I ended up starting to look at places again. I saw one place in Chelsea that, again, had a perfect location (W 16th between 7th and 8th), and the studio was great except the kitchen was awful (two burners, no oven, really really cramped).

Today came and I made an appointment to see one posting in the Union Square/East Village area for $1675 at 4pm ish. I still hadn't heard back about the apt I applied for, but by this point I was pretty skeptical that I'd be getting it. I emailed the broker for the place and finally got a response back around 3:30pm that the management had decided on an application that offered to pay the full price of $1700. Oh well. The broker made an appt with me at noon tomorrow to check out some more places. I showed up to my 4pm and the guy showed me a 1br in Gramercy that was way out of my price range. He said he had something closer to what I was looking for in the East Village so we walked down there to a place on E 13th between 1st and 2nd. There were 3 1br apartments available earlier in the week. Now there was one left at the same price: $1675.

All three places had brand new renovations. Or at least 2 of them were still undergoing renovations and one was actually being moved into today as it already had its renovations done. The people moving in were nice enough to let us check out the place so I could see what the apartment would look like when it was done. It was really nice. The floors are new. All the kitchen appliances were new. The bathroom was new with a new sink and shower stall (no tub). It's a true 1br, so there's a bedroom and a living room, both actually decently sized. In lieu of laundry in the basement, there's actually a Laundromat at the bottom of the building, so that's pretty convenient (I can still bring down my clothes for just the wash and fold if I want, or I can do it myself). Basically I "fell in love" with it, especially at the price range. $1675 was close enough to what I was looking to pay. I talked to the broker and he told me that since the owners had just rented two apartments just like it at $1675, they probably wouldn't go much less since they were pretty sure they could find a renter willing to pay it. I talked to him a while about it, and ended up applying for it for $1650 (the same price I was willing to pay for that Chelsea studio).

So that's where I'm at. I should find out tomorrow if I get the place. The place has an exclusive broker, meaning I can be assured that there won't be any other applications on the place since I paid my "Good Faith" deposit to hold the apt until the owners make a decision. The broker says he's pretty sure I'll get the place, so hopefully I'm done with my search. You can see pictures, Google Maps link, Street View, etc. of the place here:

http://luunatic.com/apts.html

Not-So-Much-Work Day

2009-08-02T01:37:00.002-04:00

Thursday, I took a break from my as-of-late full-time schedule for some entertainment. First I walked up to Bryant Park, grabbing some Gray's Papaya recession special hot dogs along the way, for the Summer Broadway in Bryant Park feature. I waded through the marshy wetlands to grab a chair and watch as the cast from Shrek, Naked Boys Singing, Chicago, and Jersey Boys sang three or four songs each from their respective shows. Neat.

After that I walked/ran down to the SoHo House by 2pm to catch a screening of Passing Strange: The Movie. Long movie directed by Spike Lee that was actually just a filming of the Broadway Musical of the same name (without the "The Movie" subtitle). Long movie... got out around 4:30pm, so I took the subway up to the Upper East Side for another movie screening.

I got to the AMC Loews at 86th st with time to spare so I grabbed some fries from a vendor, then got my AMEX screening ticket to see Funny People. I then waited for my friend, James, to show up and we saw the movie together. Another long movie! Definitely an interesting movie that was a little different than I was expecting. A lot more serious.

Workdays

2009-07-29T01:13:00.000-04:00

There's something odd about waking up late (10-11), having a leisurely lunch, then starting work at 2pm and still managing to put in 8 hours a day by working until midnight... Anyway, did that yesterday and today. Yay.

What is the deal with "weekend?" Should call it WalkEnd

2009-07-27T00:14:00.022-04:00

Another weekend passes and soon to be another Monday. Still doesn't feel like much of a separation between weekend and weekday. I even did a bit of work this weekend! Guess I'll start with Friday. Friday I woke up around my normal time and ate a quick falafel for lunch. Then worked in the park and in my sublet until like 8:15pm! Then I attempted to meet up with a group of people that I was trying to meet in a Malaysian restaurant in Little Italy. I got there about an hour early though (I didn't know when they'd made the reservations) so I waited and waited and realized the fallacy of trying to meet up with a group of Asian Americans right next to Chinatown...

So I texted the group's leader and she never got back to me so I ended up leaving and walking back to Washington Square Park, then to grab a quick dinner at the Papaya Dog, and finally back to my sublet to watch a movie. Oh well. Better luck next time I suppose.

Saturday I walked... and walked... I started out at my sublet (3rd st) after grabbing some Kati Rolls from the official Kati Roll restaurant right around the block from my sublet. I also grabbed a delicious cookie crunch cream puff from Beard Papa's on the recommendation of a friend. I then walked up Eighth Avenue towards Times Square and walked through the sea of humanity up towards Central Park. I knew there was some sort of performance going on at the Summerstage and, heck, I just like Central Park. I got the Summerstage and didn't really dig the music (a very heavy latin band) so I just kept walking. Made my way through the ramble towards The Great Lawn. I took some pictures of it since it was a lot less people saturated than the last time I was there (for the NY Philharmonic concert).

Then I kept walking north to the huge reservoir and walked (the wrong way) towards the upper west end of it. Finally I walked towards the north meadow and relaxed there for a while. Around that time it was starting to get to be dinner time so I looked up some restaurants in the area (Upper West Side) and decided on an authentic Mexican restaurant called Noche Mexicana. It was very good and pretty cheap for the amount of food you got. Anyway, that was at 103rd st (100 blocks north of where I started). I then made the long descent down towards my sublet again. I stopped in the Columbus Circle shops and also in Times Square to think philosophical thoughts of humanity. I also grabbed a pic or two of it because I realized that I'd never actually taken a picture of Times Square. Then made the rest of my way down to 3rd st again (stopping in Union Square for a little breather), covering over 200 blocks and something like 10-11 miles of ground.

Sunday I woke up and grabbed lunch at a local sandwich type shop. It was a pretty good ribeye steak sandwich at a decent price, though must be hard to compete with the Mamoun's right next door. Anyway, I looked up what was going on in NYC today and saw that there was a free folk music concert on Governor's Island today with Judy Collins, a Grammy-award-winning singer. I didn't really know who she was or really cared for folk music, but I figured it'd be fun to check out Governor's Island so I took the N train down to Whitehall station and found the ferry bound for Governor's Island.

The decks were pretty crowded but I managed to stake out a decent spot and tried to take a pic or two of the Manhattan view during the short cruise over to the island. Once there they seemed to be setting up or taking it down or something and I just started walking (again) towards the Great Promenade. The Great Promenade is a path that goes around the island; about 2.2 miles according to the signs and has some great views of the Statue of Liberty and Manhattan/Brooklyn. I took some pictures but it was so bright and sunny that I couldn't see very well to see if I was getting good pictures.

I made my way up to Picnic Point (the point closest to the Statue of Liberty) then back down again in time to get on the 4:00pm ferry back to Manhattan. I was standing on the deck again leaning against the doorway when I heard this loud commotion and lots of applause. Apparently there was Judy Collins, taking the same ferry back to Manhattan. She came up on the deck and had to kind of eke by me to get through the doorway with her entourage, so there was one of my first "brushes" with a celebrity here in NY since I moved up here. Twice actually (she came back out shortly afterward). When we docked there was a bunch of applause in the pier as the people waiting to board the ferry saw her. Took a while, but I finally was able to get through the crowd.

Walked up towards Battery Park to chill out a bit and grab an ice cream. Then walked up towards Brooklyn Bridge, stopping at the South Street Seaport where there were a lot of outdoor restaurants, booths, and street performers. Enjoyed watching some of them for a little while until it started to rain. Then it started to rain hard. I ran towards the closest subway station (Fulton St) and by then it stopped. Typical. So I walked back up trying to make my way further north and it started raining again. So I ducked into the closest subway station (City Hall St) and took an R back up to 8th St station. Then I had to run for it back to my sublet because it was coming down hard at this point.

Once I was in the safety of my sublet I waited out the rain (and hail, I believe). It was coming down really hard. When it finally seemed to ease up again, I ventured out through Washington Square Park (lots of downed branches including one huge one that fell behind me as I walked past). I'd the hankering some more good okonomiyaki and takoyaki, so I went back up to Otafuku on E 9th St to indulge myself. Ordered and spoke to the guy in Japanese and then made my way back to Washington Square Park to eat the yummy goodness. Then back to my sublet and that was my night. Just rained a bunch more here (loud thunder too), so looks like I made it back to my sublet just in time.

Oh I Love a Rainy Night

2009-07-24T00:24:00.002-04:00

Just another rainy day today. Woke up. Worked. For lunch I had the leftover half of my sandwich from yesterday. Still good! Worked until 5:15 or so, when I headed up to Korea Town for a try at some Bibimbap. It was good, but still searching for the wonderful Korean dish that as of yet I've only had in Ueno.

After dinner, I walked west a few avenue blocks to the AMC Loews 14 by Penn Station for a screening. The line was already ridiculously long, plus we had to wait out in the rain. They didn't start letting in until about 7:10pm either so I waited around almost an hour in the rain. Not fun. Anyway, I saw a screening of The Ugly Truth. It was pretty good!

By the time the movie ended, the rain had pretty much stopped so I walked the 30 blocks or so down 6th ave back to my apt.

What day is it?

2009-07-22T22:22:00.002-04:00

I've noticed that without a point of reference like work where you go in 9-5 M-F, the days start to kind of blend in and it's harder to tell what day it is. The weekends and weekdays all seem pretty similar to me except on weekends I feel less guilty about not doing work.

Anyway, today is, in fact, Wednesday. Finally got a chance to sleep in today so woke up around 10:30. Got caught up on Emails and stuff, then checked out the Faicco Pork Store, a butcher shop just around the corner. Grabbed a huge sandwich that was quite delicious and ate half and stored the rest for tomorrow. After that I did work as usual until about 4pm or so. Then I decided to go run in the park, so I took the F up to 57th St and walked into Central Park.

I entered around the center of the park and ran all the way up to the Great Lawn, then cut across to the east road and started headed back down. I probably ran somewhere around 2-3 miles. Then I took the long walk down 7th Ave to Broadway all the way from 60th St to 3rd St, about 3-4 miles.

Took a quick rinse-off shower and headed back up to 5th Ave and E 17th St for a Chop't salad. It's an interesting institution. You tell 'em everything you want in the salad and the throw it on a big chopping board and chop it all up, then mix it up with a dressing of your choice. I opted for one of the "chef's selections" of a Monterey salad that was pretty good and a lot of food. Then I just walked back down to Washington Square Park and people-watched for a bit. Overheard someone say that Bob Dylan was discovered there. Anyway, after a bit, headed back to my apt to rest and write up my The Answer Man review and that was my day.

Back to Work

2009-07-21T22:33:00.002-04:00

Monday I got up early (9:00am!) to go check out a couple apartments in the East Village. They were both pretty decent, but of course had their pros and cons. I think if I found a place where I didn't have to compromise anything, I'd jump on it immediately now that I've seen quite a few places and know what to expect.

After that it was about lunch time, so I walked to a local vendor by my sublet that I knew had cheap food and got a $3 gyro and a $1 Brisk tea (yeah... missing the Sweet Tea... I'm gonna have to learn how to make it). Then I do some work in the park until my next apt viewing. The broker lady calls though and basically convinces me not to go since I wouldn't be able to sign immediately. So I work until dinner time, then figure I'll go for some Thai food.

Good thing the best Thai food in the area is pretty close (according to Where The Locals Eat website). I get another good duck curry that was spicy, but had some lychees and pineapples... It was really good. Then I walk around the area a bit and head back to Washington Square Park where I people watch for a bit. Grabbed an ice cream from the Mr. Softee too. After a little while, I headed back to my sublet and that was my day! See? Not every day is an adventure.

Tuesday I woke up early again! 8:30am this time! That's not even counting being rudely awakened by the voice intercom at 5:45am! I had to be up at the Park Avenue Screening Room by 10am for a screening of the Answer Man, with Jeff Daniels and Lauren Graham. Today was a very rainy day in NYC. My umbrella came in handy this time. Took the F train to the 63rd and Lexington station and walked the rest of the way to 500 Park Avenue.

Got there with about 15 min to spare. There's already two older ladies in the back and one gentleman, who I learned was the Cranky Critic. Anyway, after some complaints about the weather and about some other movies, they get the movie started about 5 minutes after 10am. Only to stop it 10 minutes later! The rep comes in and says that there's one more reviewer who just called in and was going to be a tad late so they were going to start the movie over.

The Cranky Critic got to the bottom of it and apparently it was a NY Times reviewer. Typical. So they started the movie again and it was a decent romance comedy drama. Review to come. After the movie, I walk outside and it's still raining so I take the F back down to my sublet and then grab a bite to eat at Cabrito's, which is supposedly a good Mexican restaurant. It was pretty good, but not the "Tex-Mex" stuff I was expecting. Oh well.

After lunch I work a while and nap a while until dinner time. I guess a rainy day makes you pretty productive. For dinner I wanted to head somewhere close by because it was still raining. I also wanted to do something cheap because lunch was a tad expensive. I heard of Gray's Papaya and had walked past it a few time, so I figured I'd check it out. Supposedly they have really good hot dogs. I got the "recession special" which was like $4.50 for 2 hot dogs and a drink. I wasn't terribly impressed. I couldn't really tell the difference from those hot dogs and a $1 hot dog from a vendor down the street.

Walked through the rain back to my apartment and worked into the night. That was pretty much my day. :)

Weekend Fun

2009-07-19T21:57:00.012-04:00

Had a nice weekend. Friday I had a few places to look at as I started my apartment hunt. Basically I know that most places are looking to start leases in August, so I'm a little early, but I decided to go ahead and start checking out some places so that I can get feel for what's out there and for what price ranges and such. I'll probably be keeping a separate page with my current apt hunt findings, but let's just say that over the weekend I looked at maybe 8-10 places and I'm getting a good feeling that I'll be able to find the place that I want for a price that I want in a location that I want. If I had to pick a place right now, I probably could and wouldn't be unhappy with my choice at all.

Friday night I met up with my DT friend Patrick in Washington Square Park, who happened to be in town this weekend. We dropped off his crap at my place and then went to eat at Soba-ya, a Japanese noodle joint I've been wanting to try out that makes their own noodles. We had to wait a while, but eventually got seated and I had a pretty good sea eel tempura udon. When we exited the restaurant it had started to rain so I finally got to use the umbrella that I'd purchased.

We met up with James on the corner of 3rd ave and 9th st and walked back to my place to get out of the rain and chill for a bit. Then I walked them to their respective subway stations and came back to sleep.

Saturday I looked at a bunch of places. 2 in the East Village, 1 in Chelsea (probably my number one choice right now), and 1 in Gramercy. For lunch I went to Papaya Dog and had a pretty decent cheesesteak. Dinner I went to Otafuku, a little hole-in-the-wall that makes authentic Japanese fair-food, including okonomiyaki and takoyaki! So I got a combo deal with some shrimp okonomiyaki and takoyaki! Yum. A bit pricy, but oh so worth it. Came back to my place and wrote up a review for Thirst.

Then I met some new friends at Von, a bar on Bleecker St not too far from my apartment. Basically, an old friend of my sister's has been living in NY for a while now, so she's been giving me some tips on living in NY and Saturday night I met up with her and some of her friends for some drinks at a pretty chill bar. After drinking and attempting to converse in the loud music, we got the munchies and walked towards St Mark's place and a place called Crif Dogs. I know this is going to sound disgusting, but it's basically a place where they deep fry the hot dogs. Oh so good. Oh so bad for you. Anyway, after chilling out there for a while, I got back to my sublet around 3 or so and slept pretty well.

Sunday I saw even more places! 3 in Chelsea, 1 in the East Village. I also went up to Times Square to try and see the Break Out in Song Week performance, but I missed it by 15 minutes. Upon recommendation by one friend, I checked out the Biryani cart to get some Kati rolls. Delicious. Apparently I'd already hit up this cart in the past trip up here looking for some cheap eats around Times Square, but it's still good. Then I just went to Central Park to relax for a little while before heading back into Times Square to do a friend a favor.

Basically my friend Lauren had sent a playbill up to the cast of In the Heights to be signed by one guy (Eliseo Roman, the Piragua Guy) that she had somehow missed. Unfortunately, he couldn't ever find the time to actually stick the self-addressed stamped envelope she'd also sent back in the mail so it'd been sitting in his dressing room for the past three months or so. So I went to the stage door after the matinee performance to try and find him and get it from him. In the process, I saw Mandy Gonzalez again, which was pretty cool (she plays Nina in the show). Anyway, I met Eliseo and was able to get the playbill and stuck it in the mailbox for Lauren.

Along the way on Broadway there was apparently some sort of market going on. Interesting. Anyway, I walked all the way back down to the East Village (breaking out into a run at some points to make my appointment in time) to see an apartment. Then took the L westward to Chelsea to see two more places. Then I grabbed a quick bite to eat at a local Chelsea diner, grabbed a few things at the market on the way home, then came back to rest once and for all...

ThirstDay

2009-07-16T23:47:00.002-04:00

Took it easy today. Didn't do much. Grabbed some takeout at a Chinese restaurant down the street. The food lasted for both lunch and dinner, so pretty cheap day today food-wise... Worked some in Washington Square Park. Went to a screening of Thirst, which is a Park Chan-wook directed Korean vampire movie at 6pm in the same Broadway Screening Room. Then I walked all the way down from 49th street to the sublet on 3rd street, grabbing a $1 hot dog with the works on the way and stopping to get more cash from the ATM. New York seems to need more cash than I'm used to; lots of places don't take credit card or have a minimum to use credit cards. Anyway, that was my day. Interesting note, they've blocked off large portions of Broadway around Times Square to help alleviate sidewalk traffic. Put some lawn chairs and stuff there too. Apparently it's staying like that until the end of the year.

Wednesday - Back to Work... ish

2009-07-16T00:49:00.009-04:00

I woke up naturally, which was a nice change from recent mornings. Take a shower and check my mail. Look up some apartments and note that there's an open house in the location that I'm looking at, so I figured I'll check it out even though it's available ASAP just so I can take a look at what's available in that area for around what price range.

Lunch time comes around and I head downstairs and down the two blocks to Mamoun's to actually get a falafel this time. Of course there's a line. Grab my falafel and diet coke (for a total of $3.50!) and eat as per usual in Washington Square Park. Really not a bad way to start the day.

The open house is on 13th street and I have some time, so I head up to Union Square and chill for a little while. Then I walk over to the apt and ring the intercom, but no one answers... This was at 1:35pm and the open house was supposed to start at 1:30pm. I check the ad again to make sure I had it right... Wait around for a bit and finally the broker comes up. Apologizes for being late and lets me check out the place while he waits for others to come. I check out the place... it doesn't take very long... it's very small. Especially with the couch someone had left in there. It did have a very nice terrace though that was bigger than the apartment (though I think it might have been shared?)

Anyway, after that I walked down towards the sublet again past a Trader Joe's which I briefly enter. They had a line there that went around the entire store! It was absolutely absurd. Like they had people standing around with signs to designate which of the lines that wrapped around the store belonged to which lane (express or non-express). Too bad I didn't get a picture. I then walked to the Whole Foods and checked it out. The prices didn't seem that bad. Maybe my mind is just adjusted to this whole New York mindset. Anyway, their registers weren't as crowded, but still decently crowded (or maybe they just had more registers). I did get a picture of that one.

Took the shortcut through Washington Square Park back to my sublet where I cooled off and did some work. Dinner time came around and I looked up a good sandwich place. Turns out the "Where the Locals Eat" best bakery pick was right around the corner from me. Amy's Breads. Too bad they were out of sandwiches. So I just wandered around some more until I came upon a place called Lenny's, which I knew I read about online so I just ate there.

Afterward, I figured I was close enough so I went ahead and walked to the site of the RiverFlicks; a free movie night at Pier 54 on the Hudson River. It was pretty neat, but already decently crowded. I was also tired and didn't have a blanket to sit on and wasn't terribly interested in the film (Vicky Christina Barcelona) so I decided to skip it and wandered north along the Hudson a little ways. Saw a funky looking building too, which I took a picture of. Anyway, I lazily made my way down to my sublet again, but not before I came across one of the local grocery stores I wanted to check out to see if they were cheaper than the big stores. It wasn't... It was very expensive... and small... I left. Came back, worked some more, watched some Anime, and wrote this up.

The Night of the Burger

2009-07-15T00:38:00.004-04:00

After waking up refreshed, I start the mundane task of shoving all my stuff back into the two suitcases I brought up here to move in to my sublet. Having three bags; one 75 lb big suitcase, one smaller carry-on, and my laptop bag, I opted for the more expensive taxi route instead of walking 15 blocks with that stuff, figuring out the semantics of dealing with the turnstiles, taking the N/W down to 8th St, then walking another 6 blocks or so. Of course, the problem with being in Astoria is I had no idea where the yellow taxi-cabs where.

I call up one private taxi company and they're like "Dude, just find a yellow cab; it's gonna be a lot cheaper than going through us." Deterred, I start walking a few blocks with all my crap and it's very unpleasant. Luckily a car from one of those private companies pulls up and asks if I need a lift. I tell him I'm going downtown and he estimates that'd cost about $40. Now using several taxi fare estimators, I knew that if I got an official yellow taxi-cab, I'd pay about $25 plus tip. I figured I might find one on Steinway and Ditmars so I continue heading down that way.

Then another car pulls up and asks where I need to go. I tell him downtown on W 3rd st and he asks how much I want to pay. I tell him $30 and he says ok. Score! We start heading into town when I realize that I don't have that much cash on me. He tells me $28 is fine (that's all I had on me) meaning it'd be about the same as a yellow taxi (after tip). He takes me across the Queensboro Bridge and down FDR and we get to the East Village pretty quickly. He has a very thick accent, but we had some interesting conversations and I got his number if I ever needed a hired car in the future.

Getting up to the third floor of the walk-up was fun, but I managed ok, got in and took a nap. Looking at the free events website, I found out the NY Philharmonic was playing a free concert on the Great Lawn in Central Park so I figured I'd make the trip up there to check it out. I also look up where an ATM is and a good place for dinner. I opted for the Corner Bistro in the West Village, which has gotten some pretty good rave reviews about the burger there. Didn't see a picture of Regis there. It was a pretty good burger though.

Took the subway up to 59th St and entered Central Park wandering northwards until I hit the Great Lawn. And boy did I know when I hit the Great Lawn... It was PACKED. So many people. I mean the Great Lawn is pretty big and it was literally covered from end to end with people and then some. I walk up and down the paths made by the police barriers used to section off the lawn and finally settled for a tiny spot I could find right in the center of the lawn. The people in front of me seemed pretty nice and even offered me a cup of wine. Some other people came and were pretty annoying; they talked the entire concert (they didn't even pay attention to the concert at all). Why didn't they pick somewhere else to talk?

Anyway, a bunch of people came up to talk introducing the NY Philharmonic, including some people running for office and also Alec Baldwin. The concert went on for a while (maybe a little over 2 hrs). They had an interactive "choose your encore" thing where people could text their choice between two songs for the encore piece. Of course this made all the cell towers very busy in the vicinity, along with all the people trying to contact their friends to meet up. After the concert there was a very brief fireworks display and then a huge sea of humanity exited the park. Quite an experience. I headed back to my sublet and that's it. I'm here writing up these entries. I'll try and post pictures of my sublet soon.

Monday - I'm a tourist again!

2009-07-15T00:12:00.000-04:00

My goal for the day was to show Tamil as many of the sights he wanted to see before he had to head back to JFK to check in and such. Of course rather than deal with the pain of getting from James' place to the airport, we figured we'd take all his luggage into town and find somewhere to store it, then he could hop on the E and not worry about transferring until he got to Jamaica station. Yeah, we did a bunch of touristy stuff, but it didn't really occur to me to take pics... Oh well, maybe when Tamil gets back he'll upload them and I'll link over to them.

So we head into the city and get off at Herald Sq to visit our friendly neighborhood Macy's, which has a coat check that will check luggage for free "while you shop there." You have to use those keywords to get them to hold onto it for you. Unburdened by the luggage now, we head towards the Empire State Building after grabbing an authentic NY hot dog from a Sabrett's. He takes some pics of the Empire State Building and we head downtown to Battery Park City to ogle at Lady Liberty.

We then start heading northwards towards the Financial District. We check out the WTC memorial construction site, then head over to Wall Street and the NYSE. Along the way, we come across the place where George Washington was apparently sworn in as president of the United States. Interesting. We then continue uptown to Chinatown, where we stop and grab a bite at the local Ajisen Ramen restaurant.

We hop on the subway (we'd gotten 24-hour unlimited passes luckily) and check out Union Square for a bit, seeing the park and the market. Then we grab a subway and head all the way up to Central Park, where we dip in and check out some of the lower park features. After stopping to rest a little while in the park, we make our way back towards the Upper East Side and down 5th Ave to come upon Trump Tower. Then head down to 49th St and gawk at Rockefeller Center. We continue south until we hit Times Square and let him take a couple pics. Surprisingly, it wasn't all that crowded compared to other times I'd been there. I guess because on Monday, most of the theatres are closed. Anyway by that time we have to head down back to the Macy's and get his stuff back so he can make his journey back to JFK and I can head back up Broadway to my movie screening. The lady was the same lady who checked his luggage in, so she was kinda suspicious, but I made some touristy comments and she seemed appeased.

After bidding adieu to Tamil (hope his flight was right this time), I head up towards 49th and Broadway to the Broadway Screening Room. Spiffy. I talk to the doorman and head up to the 5th floor where the studio exec checks me in and gives my press materials. The Cove was a powerful documentary on the slaughter of thousands of dolphins in a secret cove in Taiji, Japan. Review to come later. After the movie, I head back to James' and sleep.

Sunday (Insert Toilet Humor here)

2009-07-14T23:55:00.002-04:00

On Sunday James and I decided we were gonna head to JFK to meet our mutual friend, Tamil there. Tamil had a 9 hour layover, landing at 3pm and leaving again at midnight. JFK is actually a hard airport to get to from pretty much anywhere. That was disappointing to me. We ended up walking, then catching a bus, then a subway, then an AirTrain to get to JFK, for a total of $7. Once we got there we met up with Tamil and found his departing terminal and sat at a bar/restaurant talking until James had to leave for rehearsal. Tamil and I sat and talked a little longer, then I headed off to leave Tamil to check in and get ready for his flight.

I decide since I'm already deep in Queens, I might as well check out this Flushing, NY place I've heard about. The Chinatown there is the second largest in NY and arguably more authentic than the NYC Chinatown. I wander around a bit, and, feeling a bit peckish, look up a good Thai restaurant in Flushing and grab a bite to eat at Green Papaya. I had a masaman duck dish that was amazing. I'm tired and Flushing isn't really much to see getting towards night time so I decided to just call it a night and head home.

On my way home, however, I get a phone call from Tamil... Turns out he had read his itinerary wrong and the flight that he flies out on was to leave on Monday at 11:55pm, not Sunday at 11:55pm. Oops. So basically rather than spending 28 hrs at JFK (he's not Tom Hanks after all), I gave him detailed directions on getting to James' place from JFK and met him at James' subway stop. We then spend the rest of the night figuring out what Tamil wants to do in the city the next day since he'd never been to NYC before.

SCAMper off elsewhere

2009-07-12T00:59:00.002-04:00

Today I was browsing Craigslist for apartments when I came across this ad:

http://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/abo/1265474003.html

WAY too good to be true. 2bed/2bath? 1400 sq ft? Washer/dryer? Even has parking spots included? No way. But out of curiosity I emailed them and got this auto-response:

Thanks for taking the time to look at my property.

Here is a vFlyer with pictures and details of the apartment :
http://vflyer.com/home/flyer/home/2636910

My name is Cristine, I'm 38 years old, I'm a construction engineer and
I'm the owner of this condo(2 large bedrooms, 2 full baths, a living
room, there is a

dining area, a Washer And Dryer in the apartment,1400 square footage)
I lived in this beautiful condo for over 5 years and loved every day
of it. The condo

is fully furnished with all necessary amenities(exactly like in the
pics) it is located in a very select downtown neighborhood. The area
is very nice, very

quiet and safe, it is close to all downtown attractions, easy access
to public transportation. Great Restaurants, Bars, Pubs and shopping
abound in the

immediate area, within walking distance. the condo comes with two
parking spots,a storage unit where you can deposit my furniture (if
you don't like it and

you want use your furniture) Pets are allowed. I've moved to United
Kingdom with my job (i am a construction engineer) and decided to rent
it because the

rent is very expensive here.The price is so low because I'm here and
is very hard to find a tenant.I really want to find a good and
responsible tenant for

it, and I hope that you can send me some personal information about yourself.

(water,electricity, Internet,cable, parking,air conditioning,
fireplace, dishwasher, garbage,all included) I want to receive the
money monthly in my bank

account. You can move in the condo in the same day when you receive
the keys and contract. The only problem is that I have nobody in the
United States that

could show you the condo.

Let me know if you are interested because I really need to take care
of this matter by the end of the next week.
All The Best Wishes,
Cristine.

I looked up some key phrases in that Email and got this link: http://www.selfabsorbed.me/emails-to-a-realitor/

So yeah... too bad... would've been perfect for me. Moving on.

They Might Be... Kid-targetted?

2009-07-12T00:52:00.008-04:00

Today was... less productive... but that's ok, it's Saturday! Leisurely woke up today and checked out some websites to see what was going on in NY this weekend. Turns out that the Shakespeare in the Park free show of Twelfth Night starring Anne Hathaway closes this weekend. I found out too late to actually try and get tickets (they start giving out the tickets at 1pm, but the lines start forming as early as 8am). So there was pretty much no way I'd be getting a ticket. I tried to get one online (they have a virtual line, but I'm sure it's very competitive), but wasn't able to get one. Oh well, I'll try for tomorrow's show and if it happens it happens.

I also found out that there was an Accordian festival in NY today. Free! Didn't go to that... but there was also a free Celebrate Brooklyn concert thing in Prospect Park featuring They Might Be Giants that opened at 4pm, so that was definitely a possibility. There was also some sort of Latin Alternative Music thing at the Summerstage in Central Park. So I decided to head out to Central Park and check that out and maybe check out the line to the Twelfth Night thing.

Got to the Park and was hungry so grabbed a couple hot dogs. Started walking towards the theatre, found the Summerstage, walked for a while then decided it wasn't worth it by then (3pm) so turned around and started heading towards the Summerstage. Random pics in Central Park at one the lakes and one of the lawns:

Got to Summerstage and found some standing room to check out the band. This was the Latin Alternative Music Conference featuring Eric Bobo. It was definitely "Alternative" all right. Didn't really dig it that much so stayed for like 30 min and left to start making the trek down to Brooklyn. Took the F all the way down and found Prospect Park pretty easily. Lots of kids around. Apparently They Might Be Giants is very family oriented now. Haven't heard any of their new music. Anyway, that was pretty enjoyable and at one point I had a really good view of the stage. Took some videos too, but my phone doesn't take very good videos so the sound quality is pretty bad. I only recognized two songs: Particle Man and Istanbul (which was the last song they played in their Encore).

After the concert finished, I took the F back up to 2nd Ave and checked out Cafe Habana. I'd been craving a cuban since Kool Korners went away. Pretty long line, but I waited and got my food (I ordered a cuban and corn-on-the-cobb Mexican style) and took it to Washington Square Park so I could eat comfortably instead of in the crowded restaurant. The cuban was good; maybe not as good as Kool Korners, but passable. The corn was awesome. Came with cheese on it and had some lime to squeeze on it too. So good. I didn't get a picture of it, but this is one I found on the Internet that it looked like. Then just chilled in the park watching some of the acts going on.

It started to rain just a tiny bit so I walked uptown and on the way stopped in a CVS to get an umbrella since I left mine in my car in Atlanta. Stopped raining so I walked all the way up to Times Square and people watched for a bit. Got tired though, so I went ahead and headed back to James' apt. Dunno what's in store for tomorrow but we'll see. I submitted for Twelfth Night tickets online and so did James so maybe one of us will luck out and get them.

Productivity Ahoy!

2009-07-11T01:12:00.013-04:00

I hadn't done a lot of work lately due to all the moving and stuff, so on Thursday I buckled down and started doing some serious work. I ended up staying at James' apt and just working all day (with a quick walk to Subway for lunch), which also included a 90 minute conference call with one of our potential clients. At about 5 or so, I started to get really antsy, so decided to walk to Astoria Park to do some work outside. As luck would have it, I found an unsecure wifi spot, so was still able to be online, which helps a lot when programming. I also had a really pretty view of the East River and Manhattan.

My view from Astoria Park while working:

I was getting a good bit of work done when all of a sudden I heard this loud music coming not too far away, so I walked over there and lo and behold, some sort of Waterfront Concert Series was going on. So I grabbed a hot dog from the local vendor ($1.50) and a diet coke ($1) and sat down to enjoy the music while continuing to work. The bad wasn't bad; they played a lot of oldies stuff.

After that, I just walked home (met James on the way) and worked some more. Overall I worked over 9 hrs on Thursday. Woke up Friday and had to go into the city to finish up the sublet stuff before he leaves. He recommended an apparently famous Falafel place called Mamoun's right around the corner from the sublet. Always has a line apparently. I waited in the line and got there to order and they misheard my order so I got some other type of sandwich. Oh well, I'll have plenty of opportunities to make it up. Walked to Washington Square Park and had lunch there, then did some more work there. My view:

After that, I walked up to Central Park and did some more work there after walking around some. I also saw what I think is the fountain from The Producers movie:

Then I went and met up with James in Times Square, then we walked to 32nd St for some good Korean BBQ. Afterward, being on a Korean kick, I looked up Suno for dessert, but apparently we found the Suno clothing store, not a dessert place... oops... Oh well, we rode back to Astoria and grabbed some ice cream at a Mr. Softee's. Then came home, did more work, and now I wrote this blog. Hooray!

Sublet? More like Subgetted... Subgotten? Whatever

2009-07-09T01:34:00.002-04:00

Today I was finally able to sleep in some! Woke up at like 10am! Oh, precious, precious sleep. Got my stuff ready and I was out the door by noon to head to the city for lunch and sublet searching and such. My buddy James' apt is a bit far from the subway, but I made it to lunch at Ajisen Ramen shop in Chinatown by like 1pm.

After lunch I decided to wander around checking out some of the boros I was considering living in. Walked up to the East Village and by one of the places I'm considering for a long-term lease over on 10th st. Along the way I actually passed the Life Cafe as featured in Rent.

I was originally told that I could see one of the sublets at 2-5pm, but the guy never got back to me regarding where the place actually was or what time he actually wanted me to come so I wandered uptown until I got to where the second sublet I was looking at was (by NYU Medical Center). I chilled out a bit there looking up other sublets and actually contacted a guy who was more conveniently located down by Washington Square Park on 3rd St, but he was actually on his way out, so I wouldn't be able to see his place until 6pm or so. Anyway, I called up the subletter by NYU Medical Center and told him I was there early and he went ahead and showed me the place.

Note to future subletters. If you're showing your place to people, you should probably try to clean up and make it look presentable. The kitchen was gross, the bathroom looked like it hadn't been cleaned in a good while and the apt itself was converted to a 2br (though the next roommate wasn't going to be there until early August), which he hadn't mentioned in the ad. When asked if he had any qualms about the place, he then told me that twice a day, a helicopter flies by his window and makes a general ruckus. Pretty view though. Anyway, the place was pretty bad and since it's student housing I'm pretty sure he shouldn't have been subletting anyway. Plus utilities weren't included, so it was even more expensive.

After that I walked down to Union Square (beautiful day) and chilled out there, again looking up more sublets. Well, I found one guy who was trying to sublet, but for a longer term, but his location would have been beautiful for my commute (literally the same block to the L train), so I decided to check it out. He's on the 6th floor of a walkup, but the apt was actually really nice. An alcove studio; decently sized (not huge, but not tiny either). Everything looked clean and it even came partially furnished. Unfortunately, his time scale didn't quite match up with mine and there are a lot of other people checking it out (two girls came up just during my visit) so I probably won't get it, but that's ok, I've got some time to look for a long-term lease.

After that, I walked to Washington Square Park, which is pretty nice and right by the 3rd street sublet. Called the guy up and he just got in from his dentist appt so he was able to let me in (after I got a quick gyro from a vendor for only $3!) and I checked it out. Location's decent (right next to the F/V trains and only a little ways from the N/W trains). Maybe 10 blocks from the L train or I can take one of the closer trains up there. The apt itself is pretty big, relatively clean, though a little unusual for me... The shower is next to the kitchen sink... The bathroom is in the little bedroom alcove, which he doesn't use as a bedroom really (he sleeps in the "living room" section). Anyway, I thought it fit my needs and it was decently cheap and included all utilities so I decided to go for it. Traded some stuff with him and already have a set of keys, though I don't move in until the 14th (Tuesday).

That took a little longer than I was expecting, but I was able to rush uptown to get to the Core Club Screening Room for the movie screening I was supposed to see (Humpday). Pretty swanky... Basically a bunch of stadium-seated couches in front of a nice screen with a pretty good sound system (though smaller than a typical theatre). They even gave free glasses of water, candy, and popcorn. Movie was pretty good; gave it a B+. Then I ran back down to the sublet, exchanged more paperwork, and headed back for the long journey back to James' apt.

Sublets

2009-07-07T22:41:00.003-04:00

These are the two sublets I'm looking at tomorrow:

$1250 per month/ available 2 months, until mid or end of Sept (Chelsea)
Map

$1300 / 1br - Great Deal in Midtown Manhattan (Murray Hill)
Map

New York

2009-07-07T22:27:00.002-04:00

Decided to hijack my Japan blog for my NY experiences. Enjoy:

Woke up at 7:30am to get ready to leave by 8 for my 10:40 flight. Went to the original Dwarf House Chick Fil A for a nice diner breakfast. There was some sort of corporate thing with lots of manager types for some reason. Anyway got to the airport and for some reason two lanes in the drop off section in front of ticketing and check ins were coned off so there was a bit of traffic. After saying my final farewells I checked in at the kiosk and tried to check my one bag. Alas! It was 75 lbs which would have cost $175 to take with me so I attempted to shift the weight a little into my carry ons. Got it down to 67 but still not good enough.

Took out a bunch of clothes out of my big bag to get it down to 50 lbs and some people behind me were kind enough to give me one of their cloth reusable grocery bags to shove my extra clothes into which I would then use as my carry on and check my other smaller bag I was originally going to carry on. Well... Went to the kiosk and tried to check an additional bag and got the message that it was now too late to check bags being 10am at that point.

So basically I'm screwed at this point having too many bags. Someone redirects me to the checkin line to see if I can book another flight. The guy is helpful but can't do a lot for me as all the other flights to NY are overbooked. He estimates that I won't be flying out anytime soon and shouldn't have been mucking around with he weight of my bags. Anyway, somehow he keeps scanning and sees that there is one possible seat available for the 1:40pm flight but since it was only 10:15 he couldn't try to get it until 10:40, being three hours before the flight. Asks me to wait to the side until then and he'd try to get me the seat right on the dot. Maybe ten minutes later the guy is leaving, sees me and remembers that he was going to try to get me on the 1:40pm flight.

Goes there, gets ready to book me, 10:40am on the dot rolls around and he tries to book me. Bam! Taken. Someone had grabbed it before us. In fact that someone was the person two people down from me and an angry New Yorker who seemed to be refusing to pay the $50 fee (he claimed that he got there on time for his flight, but he got there 30 min before the flight, which is too late). So the lady helping him just gives it to me! The guy tries to put me on the flight, but oh no! it didn't work! Apparently they somehow had it set that I was on the original flight I was supposed to be on so it wouldn't let them rebook me. That took another call to the gate to get it fixed and he finally got me the flight.

So I got the 1:40pm flight. Everything's fine, I board and things are going ok. Until the pilot comes on and says "Folks, I've got some bad news. There's a storm going from Philly to New York and they're not letting any planes come in to any of the NY airports. We've got 50 min of fuel left and the update on the situation's coming in 40 min, so we're going to circle around a little while above Washington DC." 40 minutes pass and they're still not letting anyone land in NY, so we end up having to land in DC to refuel and wait out the storm. We do a "hard stop" where we don't even pull up to a gate and just sit there for a while (maybe an hour). Finally, we get the clearance to go and take off again after waiting in line for other planes who had to land too.

End up getting to Laguardia airport at around 7pm. 6 hours after I was originally supposed to be getting there if I had gotten the first flight. But that's cool... whatever... I had to reschedule one of my sublet viewings, but at least I have all my luggage for a reasonable set of fees. Oh wait... no I don't... I wait at the baggage claim until I see the same set of bags over and over again. No new ones coming out... just typical... After a while, finally ended up going to other end of the terminal where the "oversized bags" were supposed to go and finally found both of my bags. What they were doing there, I'll never know. Then I got a cab, drove the mile or so to my friend's apt and got in. Hooray for air travel!

Going from Memory Now

2007-08-05T16:30:00.000-04:00

Well, it turns out I had less pre-written blog entries than I thought. Oh well, I'll try to recount the highlights and also I'll be posting a bunch of the pictures taken while I was on my own in Toyama.

The Company Event
Woke up this morning to go to the company event that had me leave Tokyo early to come to Takaoka. The first thing I encountered was going to CDL early in my morning to my first 朝礼 (chourei), which is a monthly morning pep talk type thing that occurs on the first Saturday of every month. Yep.. had no idea what was going on. I did, however, meet the 社長 (shachou), president of the company Matsubara-san... a man I would soon learn to dread. In any case, they had Kang-san and myself introduce ourselves to the rest of the company and then we recited a bunch of stuff that I don't really recall... except:

出来る。出来る。必ず出来る。出来ないと思えば、出来ない。出来ないと考えず出来ない。

It loosely means "I can do it! I can do it! I can definitely do it! If I think that I can't do it, I can't do it. If I believe I can't do it, I can't do it.

Or something like that. After the morning assembly, we left for the beautiful house that the company event was taking place. To this day, I still have little idea what that meeting was about. A lot of people went up and made presentations about various things, including a concept called LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability), which Shachou-san was very surprised I hadn't heard about. I was still quite tired at this point and there was so much Japanese being spoken that I didn't understand that I must admit I dozed off a little bit, but for the most part, I tried to read the slides as much as possible and follow along.

Looking Back

2007-08-05T15:37:00.000-04:00

Well, it's been quite a while since I've posted here. Almost a year since I last posted. Over a year since I first ventured out to Japan. Around 8 months since I returned from Japan. Life has moved quickly since then and I'm now working as a Senior Engineer at Scientific Atlanta, a CISCO company. Yet still, I always look back on my time in Japan with fondness. Of course, I can't quite post in as vivid detail now about what transpired. In addition, I've had the misfortune of losing all the pictures I'd taken while I was in Japan, though my friends have given me what pictures they had of my time there. I also have a couple posts that I wrote up soon after they happened so I could remember them well. If anyone still reads this, enjoy.

06-30-2006

I wake up after maybe 3 and a half hours of sleep this morning, do my final packings, fold my sheets, and eat breakfast. After breakfast, I turn in my keys and wait around for 10:00am to come around, which is when we were supposed to meet to take the Taxis to Shinjuku. At Shinjuku, I make my last not-so-tearful fairwells to everyone and depart on my own for my own adventures.

Including taking the wrong train at the Shinjuku station. I knew I could take the Chuo line from Shinjuku to Tokyo, however, the train was already there and I didn't want to wait for the next train so I took it and it ended up being the right line, but the opposite direction. In any case, I had ample time so I got off two stations later and took the correct train to Tokyo station. I get to Tokyo station around 11:10am and my train was scheduled for 12:12pm, so I decide to grab some lunch at a local joint. Unfortunately, the cheapest restaurant was an Italian restaurant, so I ended up eating Italian food for the third day in a row. It wasn't bad though; just very expensive still.

I wander around a bit until I decide to find a JR ticket counter to ask where my train was going to be; I ask her if she speaks English and she says only a little, so I proceed to ask her about the train in broken Japanese. She asks to see the tickets, I show her, and she proceeds to tell me in pretty much perfect English how to get to the track. I get to the train, board, and pretty much fall asleep until 10 minutes before we arrive to station that I would have to transfer at. I make the transfer pretty smoothly and again take the train to Takaoka. Everything took as long as it was supposed to and I ended up coming to Takaoka station at around 3:47pm (I was scheduled to come in at 3:48pm). I get to the station and I realize that I didn't know what entrance I was supposed to meet my company people at, so I just followed where the majority of the people were heading. I kind of wander around a bit, expecting to see someone with a "Christopher Luu" sign or something when I kind of wander over to a pair of people and they seem to recognize me and say "Mr. Luu?" So that's how I met Shimomura-san and Kang-san. The younger of the two takes my bag and we head over to Shimomura-san's car.

All this time I don't really know where to do my introduction so I just kind of let them take me wherever. Shimomura-san talks to Kang-san in Japanese and then to me and I find out that Kang-san is actually Korean and studying Japanese. I asked him how long he's been studying Japanese and he doesn't really understand me but somehow we get it across that he's been stuyding since he came here about 3 months ago. His Japanese is pretty good for only 3 months (Korean and Japanese grammar are very similar apparently, and they even use some Kanji), though his pronounciation is pretty hard to understand for some words (he uses "chi" instead of "tsu" so for use he says "chikaimasu"... he also mixes up "b" and "p" sounds). We take some shortcut to my hotel (the Business Inn of Takaoka), I get my room, put my luggage there, then we head out for CDL.

CDL is... small. It's a lot different then I thought it would be. As far as I can tell, I'll be spending most of my time in a room with Shimomura-san and Kang-san. The receptionist lady tells me my luggage has arrived (yay) so we head to the room and I kind of look around while Shimomura-san and Kang-san do stuff. They have a lot of Dells. Shimomura-san gives me my CE (Certificate of Eligibility, which is required for me to get my Visa changed) and Kang-san gives me a map of Takaoka. I ask him where the apartment I will be staying in is on the map and also where CDL is and he shows me, so I mark the points. After watching them do stuff for a bit, 5:45pm comes around and Shimomura-san takes me back to the hotel with my luggage so I can rest (I was still really tired and it showed) before we would go out to eat at 7:00pm. I fall asleep immediately and wake up at 6:45pm to go to dinner.

We head to a standard Japanese restaurant where you grab plates of whatever you want (I got vegetable tempura, katsu, rice, and miso soup). The three of us talk some, then after dinner, we head over to Kang-san's apartment so I can check it out (he lives 3 doors down from where I'll be living). The apartment appears to be very nice. There's hardwood floors everywhere, a washer (no dryer), a kitchen sink, a range with two eyes, a refridgerator, a microwave, a bathroom, a bed with sheets and a blanket, a small table, a desk with a pretty big TV on it, a shelf, closets, etc. The place looks very new (there's even a little monitor/speaker for the front door so I don't have to go all the way to the front door when someone rings my doorbell to see who it is). Kang-san says that the place is nice, but the people upstairs are noisy all the time, so we'll see how bad it gets.

We drink some Korean tea, then I still look tired so Shimomura-san takes me home and I take a shower and sleep pretty early to wake up at 7:15am the next morning for whatever Company event I came early to go to.

Japan: Ooooh! The claw...

2006-11-12T06:24:00.000-05:00

06/20/2006

One of my major goals while in Tokyo was to check out every big dot on the Tokyo subway map. Kind of a dumb goal I guess, because not all the big dots had interesting stuff. In any case, on this day I went to Shibuya with Gretchen. Had fun just walking around Shibuya, when... lo and behold we find a claw machine with some adorable rilakuma that Gretchen decided would be easy to win... There was one right over the hole that she figured all you had to do was push it down into the whole with the claw. Needless to say, we spent like 20 minutes and 1800 yen (about $15), but she finally won it.

06/21/2006

On this day we had a "Mitsubishi" trip scheduled. I thought it would be a lot more interesting than it was, unfortunately. We had a tour of a Mitsubishi campus, but it wasn't any of the Mitsubishi fields I was really interested in. The introduction presentation and tour also used a bunch of words I didn't really know, so I didn't understand most of what was being said. We did get some free stuff though, and got to wear hard hats... We also got to see some huge wind turbines, which was pretty neat.

Japan: Emo Town?

2006-11-09T07:57:00.000-05:00

06/19/2006

Let's see... This day we had class at the Youth Center instead of at TiTech. This was nice because it let us spend more of the day outside of class rather than getting to/from class. Of course the study rooms there are tiny, so you take what you get. Seemed like an ok day this day, so we decided to walk to 原宿 (Harajuku) from the Youth Center. The path there was nice too, because it went through Yoyogi park.

So what's Harajuku? According to Wikipedia, Harajuku became famous in the 1980s due to the large numbers of street performers and wildly dressed teens who gathered there on Sundays when Omotesando was closed to traffic. When you think of Japan and crazy fashion/hair styles, you think of Harajuku. Definitely an interesting place. Right now among the fads in Japan is English, so they've got crazy Engrish everywhere. They've also got some pretty cool shirts that I took some pics of. One of them is a bootleg Totoro shirt that says "Tonari to Retoro." Also there is a pretty decent pizza/Italian restaurant there that we ate at that also has some pretty cheap drinks.

Japan: Yeah... yeah... I know... I thought I'd update more often too...

2006-11-09T07:38:00.000-05:00

06/17/2006

The Youth Center had some crazy architecture all over the place. Some of it really just didn't make any sense. The first picture is where we had breakfast every day and classes some days where we wouldn't go all the way to TiTech. The restaurant where we had breakfast every day wasn't bad, even if it was pretty much the same stuff every day. The good thing is that it was a buffet! So anyway, like I said before, we were kicked out of rooms to go to another room, a whole 2 days after we got into our rooms. A picture below shows Sara in, what I thought, perfectly illustrates the sheer exhaustion of moving in and out of rooms over and over again, never really getting to unpack our suitcases. The picture below that is some more crazy architecture around the center... They had these stairs that were seperated by walls, for absolutely no reason. Each different staircase had different breaks and ended at different places... Stairs would also be angled for seemingly no reason.

Anyway, people wanted to go check out Akihabara again, and being the geek I am, I didn't mind one bit. Unfortunately, we got seperated somehow and I got abandoned at the Youth Center waiting for everyone else (when they'd already left apparently). I knew where everyone was going, but Akiba is so big and always crowded, that it's hard to find people. So anyway, I went to Akiba and wandered around and of course I found everyone.. ish... We checked out a lot of the stairs and found this really awesome music store that had like 7 floors of instrument goodness. We also checked out the Shosen book tower, which was just that... a book tower. hmmm... actually, that's a good place to remember to go back to so that I can spend all the book cards I've gotten. In any case, a good day of walking, shopping, and eating.

06/18/2006

Today was just another day we went all over Tokyo. I explained a little about Asakusa before. Below is a shot that doesn't really capture the whole essense of how crowded it is there, but I tried. I think the woman sticking her tongue out at the bottom of the picture is awesome too. And of course another Engrish sign found in Asakusa. I did end up buying some souvenirs this time, but I'm still saving most of my souvenir buying for the week or so I'll be in Tokyo before I finally head back to America.

Japan: Electric-City

2006-10-24T08:53:00.000-04:00

06/16/2006

No pictures for this day. What this day basically consisted of was getting acquainted with getting to/around TiTech (Tokyo Institute of Technology) and doing random stuff like finding the computer lab/getting access. We also continued classes, although we basically only had Technical Japanese left. After class, I decided I wanted to see how well I could find myself around a new city alone (seeing as how I'd have to do it anyway within a matter of weeks). With this in mind, I took the daunting task of navigating Tokyo's metro system. I made my way to あきはばら (Akihabara), which is Tokyo's electric city. I don't know how to describe Akihabara if you don't know of it, but I guess it's every geek's dream, no matter what you enjoy. Video games, Anime, electronics of any variety; you can find it all at Akiba. It's also the place to go if you want to see Japanese maids around every corner or maid cafes. After eating quite a delicious *yaki* meal (Okonomiyaki, takoyaki, yakisoba set), I made my way back to the Youth Center feeling quite confident in my ability to navigate a new city.

Japan: City Rife

2006-10-16T08:09:00.000-04:00

06/15/2006

After spending the night before doing laundry (stupid dryers didn't work at all) and then packing, I woke up and carried my bags down to the lobby to meet up with a bunch of sleepy LBATers. Another rainy day awaited us as we took our Mega-Taxis to the airport. Of course, Noriko was there to see me off on another tear-filled farewell. Unfortunately, Andy had apparently shipped his ticket to Tokyo... to Tokyo so Masuda-sensei had to help him sort things out. After an uneventful plane ride, we arrived at the hustle and bustle known as Tokyo.

Once we got to Tokyo we were immediately whisked off to a smatter of sight-seeing. The first place we went to was a nice park. It was pretty wide and had a lot to see (including a very smelly place that was supposed to be water). Also had a wicked looking old tree. Quite an interesting park because surrounding it, you could see the tall buildings that define a large city like Tokyo.

Andy and Sara had the wrong time that we were supposed to meet at the bus though, so they were late and we had to rush to get to lunch in time (lunch was on a boat called バンデアン (vingt-et-un [21 in French]). This was a nice little 2-hour lunch/cruise around Tokyo bay. The food was really good and pretty westernized, so it was a nice change from the 和食 (Japanese food) we'd become so accustomed to. After lunch, we wandered around the ship taking pictures and just enjoying the scenery. Unfortunately, it started to rain a little bit, but it never got too bad.

We left the port and went to our next destination, the temple at あさくさ (Asakusa). This is a particularly well-known temple in Tokyo that I hear gets crazy mad around まつり (festivals) or special events like New Years. I can believe it. I've got a picture of what it's like to walk around the shops around Asakusa that I'll post later. In any case, on this particular day, it was dreary and raining, but there were still a good deal of people around.

After leaving Asakusa, we arrived at the place we would be staying during our duration in Tokyo: The National Olympics Memorial Youth Center by 代々木公園 (Yoyogi Park). The place is nice and dirt-cheap. Not nearly as nice as the Seminar House in Fukuoka though. We didn't get any people to take care of our linens or anything and the bath time is shared by everyone in the center rather than just the LBATers. In addition, they had this insane habit of kicking us out of our rooms and making us move time and time again. For instance, we had to vacate our rooms only 2 days after we arrived. The reason for this is because there's so much demand for the rooms there.

Japan: I do a due adieu to Fukuoka

2006-10-10T09:24:00.000-04:00

06/12/2006

After the stressful morning of presentations (Business Japanese is done! Hurray!), we had a nice relaxing "attack the paper" session. That's right! Caligraphy... Before we began, the professor showed us how it was done. He showed us various techniques, including the beautiful light / heavy strokes to the almost scary "paper attacking" mode. It was very beautiful and inspired us all to do our best. Ours weren't nearly as good, but it was still fun and stress-relieving. I wrote 福岡 (Fukuoka) on my fan as a souvenir (kinda lame I know). They also gave us the brushes we used as souvenirs! And of course the newspaper we used to wrap them up in...

06/13/2006

So, on this day, Gretchen and I went to check out this nice garden by the Seminar House. It was so beautiful and peaceful. I'm not even going to write about it; I'm just going to post a bunch of pictures. Enjoy.

~Unknown~

So on one day, we also made our very own 判子 (hanko), which is the official stamp that Japanese use instead of signing official documents. My kanji is an old character and it means to conquer. The sound of it makes the first "kuh" sound of Christopher. The process of actually making the hanko was a lot of work; literally scraping out the kanji from a piece of stone (maybe marble?).

06/14/2006

This was our last full day in Fukuoka. Final exams and other fun school stuff. This day was also the day I participated in Masuda-sensei's research again, by having my revisit with Hikaru-san. It had been 3 weeks since we our last conversation was recorded, but it started out the same way (Hey, this feels like we're on the Radio). It was amazing to experience how much my Japanese had improved over such a little time. Hikaru-san said I spoke much more fluidly (not fluently) and my pauses were few and far in between.

Sara and I didn't have enough time to go all the way back to the Seminar House and back before the Fukuoka Daigaku closing ceremony, so we just went to the building and she napped while I played my DS until the party started. The party was great (although we all kinda fell apart without Nacky-sensei there to help us sing 明日がある (a song called There is a Tomorrow) and pretty sad. I got a birthday card signed by everyone and Noriko actually cried because we were leaving. I didn't realized our presence had touched her so much. She asked what time our flight was leaving in the morning to see us off, but I told her that she didn't have to come since it was so early and she had classes in the morning.

After the party, we did what was the only natural next step... Karaoke! Loads of fun for all and great memories to be made before leaving Fukuoka.

Japan: Free (sic) weekend!

2006-09-28T10:18:00.000-04:00

06/10/2006

Woo! This weekend was our free weekend. We got to do whatever we wanted. This weekend was also the weekend before some pretty big deadlines in the class, so a lot of work had to be done. In any case, Sara's brother Steve came to visit his sister in Fukuoka this weekend. He'd been living in Busan in Korean as an English teacher for about a year and Fukuoka and Busan are just a ferry ride away, so he took the opportunity. Early that morning Sara and I took the train to the hotel he'd be staying at. We got there and he was nowhere in sight. Not even that, but the people at the reception desk told us that they couldn't even check anyone in until 2:00pm (this was about 11am). So we didn't really know what to do. We waited in front of the hotel for a little while until about 30 minutes after the time Sara thought we were supposed to meet him. Apparently she was off by 30 minutes. We met up with him and rushed off to meet Nacky-sensei and Masuda-sensei in Tenjin.

This weekend was also when a few old LBAT students came to Japan to visit. They contacted Masuda-sensei and asked if any of us current LBATers wanted to have lunch. So Masuda-sensei, Nacky-sensei, Sara, Steve, and I had lunch at this excellent restaurant in Tenjin. Apparently it's one of the most famous in Fukuoka and we were barely luck enough to be able to get in before they stopped letting people in. Lunch was about 2,500 yen + dessert but it was sooo worth it. Very standard Japanese food, but the quality was so good. Upon entering, we saw them catching squid out of a pond to serve up. Now that's fresh... One of the dishes serves fish so fresh that they're still twitching (to the discomfort of some LBATers).

After lunch, we escorted Steve back to his hotel to check in (on the back we found this excellent Predator/Alien bronze statue thing that the group took a picture in front of). His hotel was rather nice and he was very impressed with his toilet. After letting him settle for a bit, we headed back towards the Ropponmatsu to meet up with the past LBATers for some Karaoke goodness (they were getting DS Lites at a local game store there). We picked up some straddlers at the Seminar House then headed out for some awesome karaoke! Then after that, we had some Okonomiyaki to top it all off (fully introduce Steve to the Japanese culture). In all, it was an excellent day!

06/11/2006

Well, Sara and I hung out with Steve some more in Tenjin until it was time for his Ferry back to Korea. We went to the apparent "Mecca" of otaku in Fukuoka... We... decided not to go up any further than the 3rd floor or so. But, I purchased my DS Lite there. A light blue one. I also purchased the most awesomest "game" for it, a Kanji dictionary! Using it, I can write various Japanese words/kanji and find the meaning. I figured it'd be quite useful for me when I started working (and it has been). After a yummy Italian lunch at the "Italian Tomato" we took Steve to his bus and let him get back to his life in Korea. Then it was time for us to buckle down and do the work that we'd been kinda putting off (homework and presentation stuff... joy...)

Japan: Half-way point

2006-09-13T08:31:00.000-04:00

The end of this week marks the end of half of my Internship here at CDL. I don't really like this company at all and I work way too much, so I'll be glad to see the end of it, however I'll be sad to leave Japan.

I've been here for just about 4 months now and I've definitely experienced a lot. My Japanese has improved and my English has... unproved... I'm much beyond the halfway point in terms of time in Japan (4/6.5 months).

I miss a lot of people and the various things we take for granted in America (like being able to actually understand what's going on). I miss a lot of things, but I really like being here and proving to myself that I could do something like this. I love Japanese food and the various aspects of Japanese culture I've seen. I feel oddly seperated from everything and everyone my life in America has known and I'm always eager to come back to it.

Japan: Another Day, Another Week

2006-08-27T01:58:00.000-04:00

06/05/2006

Not altogether too much today. Classes as normal. After class, Sara, Andy, Nori-ko, her friend, and I went to Karaoke! They say many Anime songs such as the theme from となりのトトロ (My Neighbor Totoro) and 天使のテーゼ (the theme to Neon Genesis Evangelion). Sara and I actually knew that song, so we took it upon ourselves to try and learn it. After about an hour, Nori-ko and her friend had to go to class/work, but Mana-san came to join in the fun! She had a specific request to hear the American song Take Me Out by Franz Ferdinand. We also started the fun game of translating American songs to Japanese on the fun. Karaoke really is a good way to practice Japanese...

Japan fact of the day: Karaoke prices vary widely based on the day, time, and location. In Fukuoka, we always went to a place with a special deal of 2 hours and a drink for 400円 (about $3.75). Later we would experience such prices as 1000円 for 1 hour with a required drink purchase.

After Karaoke, Mana-san joined us for some good times at our favorite お好み焼き (Okonomiyaki) restaurant. Yum! Random picture-taking ensues. At the restaurant, we spend some time trying to translate American jokes ("Who's on first?") and pick-up lines ("Your legs must be tired because you've been running through my mind all day") for Mana-san. After dinner, we grab some ice cream at the local コンビニ (convenience store) and sit and chat for a while in the lobby of the Seminar House. We had fun talking of pirates and ninjas.

06/06/2006

Classes as usual. After class, I assisted Sara in interviewing some Fukuoka University students for our class assignment (she was surveying Japanese movie-watching patterns). I find it fun to randomly approach strangers and try to talk to them in Japanese. Sara... not so much so. She needed moral support. I saw a guy wearing an "East Side Story" shirt that I thought was amusing, but he was too far away so the picture I took is kinda shaky...

06/09/2006

Today we got to end classes a little early for some more field trips. The first was to a 着物 (Kimono) factory. We got to see the room where they make the Kimonos (very noisy process). It reminded me of my dad's taylor shop. After the small tour, they led us up to the "gift shop" where we could buy discounted merchandise. I got a really nice tie for pretty cheap there. We also got as souvenirs some nice business card holders.

Japan fact of the day: Business cards are very important to the Japanese. There is a whole procedure and protocol to follow when giving/receiving business cards. We went through it in class, but there's something to be said about having to do it on your own in an actual business setting.

After the Kimono factory, we went to the Nissan factory. The first room we were in had a a bunch of nice cars on display. They also had some nice PR-type stuff that was interesting. The actual tour was interesting. We got to see the different steps on the assembly line. I think the work would be pretty tedious for the workers (they do the exact same thing everytime for every single car). In addition, we saw the testers of the cars after they were complete. It was interesting to see cars with the steering wheel on the left side after being in Japan for a month. I wonder if they find it weird to drive like that (to test them).

After the tours, we came back and while working on homework, Andy came in and said there was a nice picture moment with the sunset outside. So I got some pictures of the sunset.

Japan: ANOTHER UPDATE! WHOA!

2006-08-26T03:08:00.000-04:00

06/04/2006

Woke up decently early, packed up everything to get ready to leave and talked to my host father a bit (got the family's contact information so I can keep in touch). Had another delicious breakfast (I could get used to that) and then we were off to the train station. We took the train to the city where the Kendo exhibition was and walked to the high school. The gym was kinda stuffy and there were tons of people there.

After the "opening ceremony," the teams split up and there were about 8 matches going on at once. I didn't quite get the rules for it, but it was interesting to watch. After watching it for a while though, it did get a little... less interesting. You can check out a video of my host brother in action Here. Apparently we got to a point where my host brother lost though, so we decided to leave and grab some lunch.

Earlier they'd asked me what my favorite Japanese food was, so I'd told them お好み焼き (okonomiyaki). So that's what we had for lunch. We had the two different styles of okonomiyaki and it was very good. This was my last meal with my host family, so I said all the phrases I was taught to say (basically translating to thank you for taking care of me these three days, even though you were busy). They really were quite good to me and I really enjoyed my homestay experience. I also felt afterwards that my Japanese had improved immensely, haven't spoken mainly Japanese the entire weekend.

After lunch, I bid my homestay family adieu (well, I guess sayonara), except then のりこ (Nori-ko) and I went to see ダヴィンチコード (The Da Vinci Code). We'll pause for a moment to bring you the Japan Fact-of-the-Day-I-Post-a-Blog-Entry! Movie theatres in Japan are extremely expensive! In Fukuoka I paid 1500円 (roughly $13 or so) per ticket for a student discounted ticket. A normal ticket would've cost me 1800円 (maybe $15-$16). Even here in 高岡 (Takaoka), I pay 1200円 (probably about $10.50) for a discounted ticket.

In any case, the movie was alright, but I'd read the book and found faults with it too, so of course the movie would have the same faults. It was interesting to watch a movie in English with Japanese subtitles. Nori-ko said she thought the movie was interesting, but a little hard to follow. After the movie, she escorted me to my train stop and I walked back to the Seminar House.

Seems like I was the first back of the group, but when people started coming in, everyone was abuzz with their experiences. We all swapped experiences, then some of us went to KFC to have a nice "American" dinner. The KFC was a welcome change from all Japanese food, but it was kinda expensive.

Japan: Back on track with my Home Stay experience

2006-08-26T00:58:00.000-04:00

06/03/2006

I woke up early today (about 6am) to the sounds of voices in the kitchen. I guess the walls are literally paper-thin. なつのりさん (Natsunori-san, Nori-ko's brother) had to get up early to head to Tenjin for 剣道 (kendo) practice. I fall asleep again a few times until のりこ (Nori-ko) wakes me up for breakfast. Breakfast is quite a feast, with an egg (sunny-side up), my choice of パン (bread), rice, and 味噌 (miso) soup. After breakfast, we head out by van to 秋月 (Akizuki).

On the way to 秋月 (Akizuki), we stop by 眼鏡橋 (Megane-bashi), which is one of two of these types of bridges in Japan (one here and one in Nagasaki). The bridge type was taught to the Japanese by Dutchmen, according to my host family, and many movie stars come by to see the bridge. A picture of my host family and me on the bridge is shown below. When we reach 秋月 (Akizuki), we walk down this beautiful path with 桜 (cherry blossom) lining the path. Apparently during the Fall and Spring many people from all over come to this place for the cherry blossom festival. We walk down the path to a museum where のりこ (Nori-ko) apparently knows the person working there so we get 4 people in for the price of 2. The museum is very beautiful and has a lot of interesting historical items.

The path down 秋月 (Akizuki) essentially follows that of the moat of an ancient castle that no longer remains. Part of the castle has been replaced by a middle school, which is where たかちゃん (Taka-chan, Nori-ko's youngest brother) goes to school. We wandered around for a bit and I took some good pictures, then we took off in the car to grab some lunch. For lunch, I had a very good カレーうどん (curry udon) that was quite spicy.

After lunch, we visited a huge dam that was very pretty. Then we took off on a scenic car ride up a mountain to check out a famous district where they sell lots of different types of pottery. The merchandise I saw was all really quite nice, but very expensive. A picture of one of the stores is shown below. Apparently, my host father had some business at one of the stores too, so we went there and they discussed business while the rest of us had some good tea and snacks (picture shown below). My host family then proceeded to buy me two very nice 酒 (sake) cups as a souvenir. I hope I can get them home without them breaking.

After that, we were riding in the car on the way back to the house and they asked me what type of things I wanted to do in Japan. There were a few things that I'd heard of so I told them and they found it interesting. Some items on my list: eat 鯛焼 (taiyaki - a fish-shaped pastry filled with bean jam), go to a 祭 (matsuri - a Japanese festival), go to an 温泉 (onsen - a Japanese spa/hot spring). I also mentioned that I'd never played パチンコ (Pachinko) before, because we kept passing all these parlors.

We got to their house and my host mother and のりこ (Nori-ko) took a rest. My host father turns to me and says he's going to take me to a Pachinko parlor... I figured it'd be an interesting experience, so I went. We get to the parlor and the whole place is excruciatingly noisy. All the aisles of Pachinko machines are filled with tons of people smoking and it hurt my head. We spend some time scounting some good machines (the machines have statistics above them that my host father was looking at), then eventually picked two Indiana Jones Pachinko machines sitting next to each other. My host father tries to explain to me how to play, but I can't hear him at all over the ruckus, so I kind of feel my way around. He then proceeds to put in 10,000円 (about $100) for the two of us (way too much money) and we play for about a half an hour losing it all. Then he proceeds to put in another 10,000円 against my wishes, and we play for about another half an hour. The game itself is like a harder version of slots... Needless to say, it was an interesting experience, but I don't think I'll ever go to another Pachinko parlor.

We then go straight to a Sushi restaurant where the rest of the family is waiting for a table and I proceed to have tons of delicious sushi (and some french fries...). The restaurant is one of the "round sushi" styles where the sushi chefs are in the middle of a conveyer belt system and they make sushi, put it on a plate and on the conveyer belt. You grab whatever sushi you want and dig in. You can also make requests (pictures below). This sushi restaurant had some of the most delicious sushi I've ever had, and it was so cheap. Each plate is 100円 (about $1), so even that huge stack of plates we had for the entire family was not terribly expensive (for sushi).

After dinner, we made plans to go to an onsen, but everyone was too tired so we settled for 蛍 (firefly) viewing. Close to the house is a small creek that is famous for firefly watching. We went there and the whole place was lit up with fireflies. It was very beautiful. The whole neighborhood seemed to be there too, everyone just walking around, being social and watching fireflies. Very peaceful.

Thus ended a very good day. The next day would be my last day with my host family and back to studying abroad.

Japan: Amusing Japanese TV

2006-08-01T07:59:00.000-04:00

The first thing I see is a group of cheerleaders practicing (elementary-middle school age). Then they show the sport that they actually are cheerleading for.

Everyone starts in a line. There's a defense and an offense. The offense primarily has a bunch of nets and the defense has a bunch of huge Japanese traditional fans. A whistle blows and the offense runs to the other side while the defense takes strategic positions, one in front of a main offense player, we'll call the launcher, fanning his heart out. The launcher gets ready and throws his/her paper airplane over the defensive fanner; the launcher's teammate make a desperate effort to catch the airplane in their nets. If it falls, it's an Out (three outs and the round is over). If they succeed they get... a first down!

After the first down the positions are changed and the launcher has to throw a shorter distance (seems harder). Naturally, after the second and third downs, there's a Touchdown!

Very amusing to watch. They showed a coach talking to his team:

Coach: "Kami kami wa?" (Paper God is?)
Boy: "Omoshiroi!" (Interesting!)
Everyone laughs
Coach: "Iie, chigaimasu" (No... no... that's not right)
Coach: "Kami kami wa?" (Paper God is?!")
Everyone: "On our side!"

I actually got a video of it with my digital camera! Click Here to grab a video of this amazing sport!

Japan: Fast Forward

2006-07-30T02:21:00.000-04:00

Alright, well, I obviously don't have as much time as I would like, so I thought I'd give a quick update as to where I stand right now before I resume back to telling my tales of the past. I'm currently in 富山県高岡市 (Toyama Prefecture, Takaoka City) working at CDL (Color Designtec Laboratory). I've been here for roughly a month now. It's definitely been interesting as of yet. Some of you may know this, but I quite dislike the president of the company and his methods. Every day I have to stay late and he yells at me every day (typical Japanese Shachou). There will probably be a more detailed explanation of my work here, but if you'd like, I made a small video tour of my apartment (which is actually pretty nice) here in Takaoka. I live by myself three doors down from my coworker.

Download the Tour Here

Japan: Hoomusutei

2006-07-12T21:49:00.000-04:00

06/02/2006

Classes as normal today, but we had another relatively short day. After classes (Business and Technical Japanese) I met up with Mana-chan at the Kokusai Center. A few of us then went and met up with my host sister のりこ (Nori-ko). Unfortunately, the table they had gotten was too small for all of us, so Sara, Andy, Sandy, and Mana went upstairs while I stayed downstairs to eat with my のりこ (Nori-ko) and her friends. After lunch I went upstairs to meet up with the rest of the group. We all then got some help with our Japanese homework (still feels like cheating) from Mana-san, 大介さん (Daisuke-san). After lunch, we went to オアシス (Oasis) to get some アイス (ice cream). Mine was really good; it had almost a peanut-butter tasting outside and mochi inside.

After that we headed back to the Seminar House to pack, except I wasn't going to meet my host sister until 7pm at 六本松駅 (Ropponmatsu station) whereas everyone else was supposed to meet their hosts at 4pm. I had some time to kill and I was tired so I ended up taking a short nap, then packed and departed for the station. I met with のりこ (Nori-ko) and we proceeded to take two trains and a bus to meet her mother, who then drove us to their home (after stopping a few times with the lights off to see the 蛍 [fireflies], of which there were a lot since we were now in the ルラル [rural] area).

I felt like such a foreigner entering that house. I enter and I try to make my introduction at the entrance hall, but the father says not yet; wait until we get inside. I take off my shoes and try to make them clean like 増田先生 (Masuda-sensei) had shown us in class earlier that day and then they give me slippers to wear (only a bit too small). I walk to the living room and enter with the shoes on (idiot) and they ask me to take off the slippers before entering that area. The TV is on and のりこ (Nori-ko)'s family has already started eating. They point me to a couch and ask me to "relax." That's when I make my introduction (which I'm pretty sure I screwed up somewhere). I give them the present I brought from America (I think it was a good choice from their reaction) and then we proceed to go to the kitchen. The father pours me some お酒 (sake) at the suggestion of のりこ (Nori-ko). Dinner was delicious and interesting keeping up with the conversations. I had 刺身 (sashimi), rice, some muscles, an interesting potato dish, and salad.

After dinner they request me to relax again in the living room while のりこ (Nori-ko) helps her mother with the dishes. They show me the bath and how to use it and I take a quick shower. After that I have as best a conversation as I could with her father and brothers. Everyone keeps telling me my Japanese is good, so I'll take that as a good sign. I show them a few of my gadgets (including my laptop that I got out so I could write this entry down). After that it's time for bed and I come into the room I'm in right now and write this entry up.

The house itself is a traditional Japanese-style house. I'm lying on a futon on the tatami-covered floor (tatami floors are awesome). The family is apparently Buddhist and they have a small altar. They also have two pianos and a few game systems. They have both a urinal and a western-style toilet (yay!) in seperate rooms in the bathroom. There are traditional sliding doors everywhere. The bath consists of a tub with water already in it and moveable shower head with a drain in the floor.

Japan: That's totally Week dude!

2006-07-12T08:20:00.000-04:00

05-29-2006

This day after class, a bunch of us went to check out the shrine and park nearby the Seminar House, 護国神社 (Gokoku Jinja). We didn't go inside the shrine, but we took pictures of it. After the shrine we walked a little ways till we found a swamp and a turtle. We then proceeded to go through the park.

The park was huge! We kept following it and going up and up, but it kept going for a long ways. I tried to get a few pretty pictures (like the sun through the trees), but it didn't work very well. Along the way, we encountered a bunch of girls playing tennis. The most interesting thing was that they were yelling things the entire time. Stuff like ファイト！(Fight!) and がんばれ！(I'll try my best!). A video can be seen here (note the video requires the Xvid codec to see; if you can't get it to work, try www.videolan.org for a player that should work; if you have Quicktime or something trying to open it in the browser, try right clicking it and clicking "Save Target As..." for Internet Explorer and "Save Link As..." for Firefox). In any case we finally reached the top and we took some pictures up until sunset. Very pretty. Pretty pretty pretty.

05-30-2006

After class today, Nacky-sensei took us to Karaoke! Very interesting experience, in my opinion. Maybe 16 people crammed into a "Karaoke Box" singing our hearts out. I sang "Wonderwall" by Oasis with Mana-san and Sara and I tried to sing "空耳ケーキ(Sora Mimi Cake)" from Azumanga Daioh... Tried... Very fun. A video of Emiko-chan and Mana-chan singing along with a quick pan over the room can be seen by clicking here.

05-31-2006

This was a short day of classes followed by a trip to... the Asahi Beer Company! The faculty apparently brings all of the students for a tour at the Asahi Beer Company. The tour was definitely interesting. Apparently they recycle everything (the tourguide's uniform was made of recycled PET bottles). Then after the tour, we had 飲み放題 (all you can drink) for 20 minutes followed by 食べ放題 (all you can eat) 焼肉 (yakiniku). What they didn't tell us was that the all-you-can-eat part also included all-you-can-drink so Sara attempted (and succeeded) to down 4 beers in those 20 minutes. At the yakiniku place, in the bathroom, a "special toilet" was found (see picture below). The sign above the toilet says "If you are feeling bad, please use this." Very amusing. Needless to say, everyone was pretty happy after that experience.

06-01-2006

Went back to Canal City again (with Gretchen and Sara) and actually bought some stuff at the Ghibli store (see picture below for a $900 Totoro plush). Took some more Engrish pictures (Special Plice!!!) and when we were walking by the fountain, the little fountain show was going off so we watched that (to "Be Our Guest" from Beauty and the Beast). We ate at a yakisoba joint in the basement. Along the way we saw the most ridiculous dessert for 780 yen (maybe about $7.50). It was like 7 desserts in one. Fruit cocktail covered with some other desert with an ice cream cone stuck in it, a bunch of fruit on top, some whipped cream, and a cherry to top it all off. After dinner, Sara and I rushed back only to find ourselves back in Tenjin right next to where we just were to listen to 大輔 (Daisuke) at the International Bar. Daisuke has a great voice and sings English songs primarily (very well). A video of him singing can be found here. That about sums it up for this week. Next comes my home-stay experience.

Japan: Otanjoubi omedetou!

2006-07-09T07:39:00.000-04:00

05-28-2006

Happy Birthday to me... Woke up early this day to leave Nagasaki after taking in some of the sights around it (What!? Only 2 days, 1 night in Nagasaki? Yep!) The first place we went on this rather gloomy, beautiful day was the Nagasaki Peace Park, built after a certain incident I'm sure we all know about. The statue, shone below in a group picture, is pointing up to represent the bomb and the other hand, if I recall correctly, represents peace. The park was really pretty (man, I use that adjective a lot describing Japan). Another picture shown below shows a structure with 1000 origami cranes in it. All around the park was several structures all representing peace. There was also a beautiful fountain that, if you stand at a designated spot, frames the statue in the background perfectly.

After the Peace Park, we went to the Atomic Bomb Museum. The effect of the museum on my was about the same as when I went to the Museum of American War Atrocities in Vietnam. You read about things in textbooks, but the impact never quite hits you as much as when you are confronted by the subsequent consequences.

We had lunch near the Chinese restaurant (many students complained about having to eat after going to the Atomic Bomb Museum). Most of the times they provide us with lunch, it's traditional Japanese food and tends to be hit or miss. This one was more of a miss. Most of us rushed through lunch and checked out the shopping around the area. I found another Ghibli store with a HUGE cat-bus that I had to take a picture with.

After that we headed to the Confucious shrine. There are tons of status all over the shrine, each with a unique pose and facial expression. This place is the only Confucious shrine built outside of China by the Chinese for the Chinese. The place was... well, it was pretty...

We then went to the Culture and History Museum, which was not terribly exciting, but was nice nonetheless. The picture below is an old school Japanese-style toilet (with a sign that asks to please not use the toilet.

We got back from Nagasaki and ate okonomiyaki again to celebrate my birthday! At our favorite Sakura restaurant. This time we brought another group of people and racked up the points on our frequent visit card to try and get a free okonomiyaki. Also had their yakisoba, which, while good, just didn't compare to the okonomiyaki.

Japan: NAGASAKI!!!!

2006-07-09T05:15:00.000-04:00

05-27-2006

So this weekend we went to 長崎 (Nagasaki). We woke up early as usual, met in the lobby of the Seminar House, then walked down to the coach bus, which took us to Nagasaki. The bus trip takes about 2 hours to get there, however, we stopped at a few places along the way. The first place we stopped at was in Saga and called 佐賀城本 (Sagajou Honmaru - Saga Castle).

Sagajou was very pretty. It was like this pristine example of traditional Japanese housing. Albeit, quite a lot bigger than normal. The first part if it was like a museum where they showed various places. Hmm... I guess there's not too much else to say about it. The pictures below are just random shots of the place.

The next place we went to was this awesome shrine that was shoved into the side of a mountain. The name of it is 神社 (Yutoku Jinja). This particular jinja had stairs going up for a good ways to see the shrines and such.

After a good bus ride, we finally arrived at the Dejima Historical Island. This place was apparantly an artificial island created by the Dutch maybe? All of the residences had an interesting mix of Japanese and Western culture. Dejima was right next to our hotel so it was only a quick bus ride to Tredia Hotel where I would get my own room to myself! With a private bathroom and shower!

After resting for a bit in the hotel, we went to a Chinese restaurant (the picture below was what I thought to be a very stereotypical Asian picture on the way to the restaurant). I guess the food was pretty good, but it was kind of odd and not typically Chinese food (for instance, there was no rice...) I started playing with the features of my camera this day, which is why some pictures have the kind of Sin City effect where one color is accentuated and everything else is black and white. After dinner, a few of us went wandering around Nagasaki with Nacky-sensei and Matsushima-sensei. In one of the stores we saw this Godzilla made out of meat that looked pretty cool so pretty much everyone took a picture of it.

Japan: School's cool

2006-06-21T11:19:00.000-04:00

Since school started and I became extraordinarily busy, my life went back to the norm of taking classes. Some of the highlights of the week between 05/21/2006 and 05/26/2006 follow in this entry:

05/21/2006: We explore Fukuoka some on our own and find some of the various grocery stores around the area. Oh, for those interested, a picture of the room I stayed in at the Seminar House in Fukuoka is shown below.

05/22/2006: Classes start. Lunch at the Fukuoka University (Fuku-dai) cafeteria is insane. There are people everywhere. The food is very good though and cheap (like $2-$3 for some good rice and curry with a croquette). I also took a nifty picture of a huge line of bicycles at the school. I stood in the middle of the row of bikes and took a picture. The bikes stretch out that far behind me in that picture too. Many of them are not even locked. Typical classroom is shown in the picture below. I went to Tenjin after class today to check it out; it's a big shopping district with overpriced everything.

05/23/2006: We picked our research topic in class today and I met a nice girl named Hikaru-san when we were asking Fuku-dai students about our topics (I worked with Gretchen and our topic was technology). Went to Tenjin again after class. The picture below is in Tenjin.

05/24/2006: I participated in Masuda-sensei's research where a conversation between me and a Japanese person was recorded on this day, then 3 weeks later before we left Fukuoka, a second conversation would be recorded. Masuda-sensei can then listen to the two recordings and see how our conversation skills improved (if at all), including particle use, plain/polite form use, and general fluency. My conversation partner ended up being Hikaru-chan (shown below with myself and Sara-chan).

05/25/2006: Pictured below is Sara-chan and Emiko-chan (a little Japanese bundle of energy). We would end up spending many lunchtimes and other fun activities with Emiko-chan. After classes this day, we had a Sadou (traditional Japanese Tea Ceremony). The tea was very delicious, though during the ceremony, our legs killed us from trying to sit in the traditional Japanese style. The pictures below show various parts of the tea ceremony. After the tea ceremony, Gretchen, Sara, Marissa, and I met up with Sara's host sister (Minori-san) and she took us out to an Okonomiyaki restaurant named Sakura. Okonomiyaki translates roughly to "grilled whatever-you-want." It has been described as Japanese pizza or Japanese pancakes. I suppose it's kind of like an omelette. This particular restaurant lets you cook the okonomiyaki at the table on the grill in the middle of the table. Anyway, it's delicious; pictures at the Okonomiyaki place with a panda puppet thing are below.

05/26/2006: Nacky-sensei takes us to Canal City this day after classes. This is a huge mall area with a hallway leading up to it with a lot of more traditional-style shops. The company has zenzai for the first time here, which is a red bean desert with mochi. It was a little too sweet for me, but Sara and Gretchen got hooked on the stuff. The mall itself is somewhat bigger than a standard American mall, but then has 6 or so levels of that size. It's kind of ridiculous. I took a few of the "Engrish" T-shirt pictures at this mall. I saw lots of ads for Aida here, and was tempted to go see it, but decided against it. Pictures below show various aspects of the mall. Dinner that night was inside the Mall at a place called "Ramen Stadium." The ramen was good, but not as good as the ramen we had earlier in Tenjin at the sidewalk stand. We also found a Ghibli shop there in the basement. Gretchen bought a ridiculously cute Totoro watch there.

Japan: Engrish, Engrish, Everywhere!

2006-06-20T10:52:00.000-04:00

So I'll make a brief interlude to post a few of the pictures I've gotten of Engrish. In case you don't know, the Japanese are rather obsessed with the English language. Consequently, English is everywhere, but some of the signs/shirts made simply do not make sense at all. I have taken pictures of some of them. Enjoy:

I do have more, but I'll keep them to myself until I get back.

Japan: No more pictures!

2006-06-13T20:50:00.000-04:00

After the Fukuoka tour, we started classes and thus begun my descent into overworkload hell. Apparently it's a nice tourist spot in Japan. My classes are: Business Japanese (Japanese related to business), Technical Japanese (useful language stuff), and Japan Today (the fun class).

Business Japanese was insanely intense. Essentially an 18-week course compressed to a 4-week period. (Past tense because I just took the final exam so I'm done with it). For the first week we had a homework every day (each homework covered a chapter so we covered a chapter at least a day).

Technical Japanese is mainly in Tokyo. We've been doing some classes, but they mainly involved learning tons of useful kanji (like food-related kanji, sign-related kanji, etc.)

Japan Today is where we just do fun stuff like make our own hanko, try our hand at calligraphy, and give presentations based on interesting topics such as whether people preferred American movies to Japanese.

I'm tired...

Japan: Yay! An Update! Back to Fukuoka Tour!

2006-05-31T11:12:00.000-04:00

Ok, let's see how far I can get in this hour or so before I'll probably go to sleep. I've been really busy, so haven't been keeping up with the blog as much as I would've liked. As such, the entries will not be as detailed as I would like them to be (for both reasons of having forgotten some of the details and also due to amount of time to make such entries).

5/20/2006

After lunch, we went to the Kyushu National Museum. Unfortunately we really didn't get a lot of time to see the exhibits very much, but we tried to make do with what we had. There were lots of interesting items all over the place. One room which particularly amused me was called the Ideal Asian Room. They also had a room with a bunch of various old instruments that you could hit (drums mainly). In that same room were two more drums that you were not supposed to hit, but looked like all the others. I hit one. Oops. The museum also did not allow pictures inside the exhibits.

After visiting the museum's gift shop, we went down this interesting multicolor pathway and down a pretty long escalator to arrive at... a children's theme park. Well, not really, but we saw one and I took a picture of it. We followed a path to a rather large crowd gathered around some sort of stage. I wasn't able to see what was going on, but I'm sure it was pretty neat. We then went into another temple (this one larger than the others). They had some interesting statues and we took a group picture here. One of the groups told us about a legend of the person who designed the temple. Apparently he was reluctant to leave his home, but he came and his favorite tree flew over to be with its owner. Also of note, a bunch of us purchased fortunes here. If the fortune is bad, you're supposed to tie it up to get rid of your bad luck. If the fortune is good, you're supposed to keep it somewhere safe. My fortune told me that my studies would go well with ease, my traveling would be good if I paid attention to my surroundings, and that I'll find someone special in my life soon. It said a bunch of other stuff too, but I forgot what else it said.

We then went further down the path away from the temple to a little shopping district. This district had a bunch of little shops that sold some pretty cool stuff. We really didn't have much time to carouse through them all though. I did not end up buying anything, though I was tempted by a few things.

Japan: Quick Update

2006-05-24T11:18:00.000-04:00

私たちは授業がもう始まりましたから、とても忙しいんです。それからこのBLOGはあまり書けません。

Class has already started. Very busy. I can't write much in this blog right now.

Packed classes until Friday. Thursday: Tea ceremony class. Friday: 安いデパートをさがします (Looking for the cheap department store). Saturday/Sunday: Trip to Nagasaki.

Japan: Tour de Fukuoka

2006-05-21T05:21:00.000-04:00

5/20/2006 (Getting close to caught up)

I actually woke up before the alarm at around 7:40am. Not tired at all. Brush teeth, walk to 7-11 to buy a quick breakfast (パン！ Bread!), then wait for 8:40am. We meet, Masuda-sensei tells us we'll be taking a chartered bus, we walk down to the bus and we're off for our first destination: Fukuoka Tower.

Fukuoka Tower is really tall and pretty. The height is 234 meters. Sara purchases a 100円 collectable pin for the tower, decides she doesn't like it and buys another. She gets the same one, so I buy it from her and she tries again and gets one of the two that she wanted. We then ride the elevator to maybe half the height at 123m. We take pictures, get a Fukuoka Tower stamp thing, then head down to the third floor for more pictures. On the third floor, it is said if you face the direction of your loved one and make a wish, that wish will come true. After that, we head down to the gift shop and I buy this yummy frozen gummy thing for 10円 (which is like 9 cents). After that we walk down to the bus and we're off for our next destination: とちょじ (Tochoji) Temple.

We enter the temple and the smell of incense permeates the air. We stop at a cleansing station, where Matsushima-sensei and Naki-sensei show us how to perform the ritual before entering the temple. First you clean out the little water scoop, then you take the scoop in one hand, pour it on the other. Take the scoop in the other hand, pour it back on the first hand. Then switch hands again, take water from the scoop, pour it in your hand, then rinse your mouth out with it, then spit it out. The temple was, again, very pretty. There's a nice incense station that you can use to try and get the smoke on the parts of you that need healing. We then proceed to check out this massive Buddha statue (no pictures allowed). According to Matsushima-sensei, this statue is not the old one, but a new one that was recently built. I get to ring the bell, throw money into the box and pray like in all the アニメ (Anime). We look around some more, then once we are finished, walk down to the bus and we're off for our next destination: くしだ神社 (Kushida-jinja).

This Shinto shrine is, like the other places, quite pretty. When we arrive we see that a traditional Shinto wedding is in process. The bride looks beautiful with her 着物 (kimono), but I thought it wouldn't be right to take a picture without asking (and ain't no way I was gonna ask). Sensei tells us about this huge structure that is apparently carried by many men around as a parade during the month of July. There is another ritual here where we pour water into our hands, then drink 1st for your own health, 2nd for the health of your family, and 3rd for the health of your relatives. The water was, frankly, quite disgusting and I accidentally drank too much my first sip (more of a gulp). It tasted somewhat of mineral/salt water. We walked around, took pictures, then we walk down to our bus and we're off for lunch.

Lunch is in a traditional Japanese room with no chairs (the ones where you have to kneel at the table). The food is all traditional fare including some delicious fish, miso soup, sashimi, and lots of other stuff. I didn't last very long kneeling (Naki-sensei didn't even) so I guess I need more discipline in ignoring the fact that no blood is going to my feet. After lunch, we walk down to our bus and we're off for our next destination: Kyushu National Museum.

Japan: Subway of Thought

2006-05-21T04:11:00.000-04:00

05/19/2006 Continued:

I'd already written a lot of this, but my computer crashed and I didn't save it, so I guess I'll have to rewrite it. After the 1 hour or so in the computer lab, we had free time until 5:40pm, which is the time we would meet to go to the Welcome Party. Most everyone went back to the Seminar House, but 4 of us (Gretchen, Sara, Marissa, and I) all decided to go to the てんじん (Tenjin), which is like the shopping district of ふくおか (Fukuoka). Along the way, we saw two of our group walking around (Parner-san and Hales-san) so they started following us (not fun... they're very annoying... Hales-san is obsessed with Japanese school girls so he talks about them non-stop...) to the 地下鉄 (Subway station).

We take the train to 天神南 (Tenjin-minami) and get off to wander around. So Japanese Department stores (デパート) are interesting. They're usually tall buildings (maybe 8-10 floors) that have various departments/stores on each floor (like men's dept, women's dept, Gap). Typically the basement has a kind of food market type place as well. We went up and down one of the department stores, then walked to another one (a bigger one called まつこし [Matsukoshi]). This one was interesting because apparently, it is International Week so they had an Italian fair on the top floor (the 9th floor). This fair very crowded; it consisted of lots of booths selling Italian goods (including food). In addition they had lots of samples of the food, some of which were actually pretty good, whereas some of the other stuff was... less so...

After mooching off the samples, we ride the 18 escalators or so down to the street level again. Across the street from まつこし (Matsukoshi) is an Eddie Bauer, and next to that is a ビックカメラ (Bic Camera: http://www.biccamera.com). We go to the store and I look for a camera to replace my old one that I left at home. I ended up buying a Canon Powershot A530 + a case for 20,844円. I'm pretty sure I could've purchased the camera elsewhere for cheaper, but I needed a camera and it seemed reasonable enough. I give the tenant my credit card she asks if I have a plus card (for discounts). I say no and we get almost to the final point until she holds my card to me and asks me a question... I have no idea what she says. She asks again and I meekly show her my ID thinking that might be what she's asking for. I then promptly get the rest of the group and no one can understand what she's asking. She then asks one of her co-workers and shows her the card; the co-worker says something and she completes the sale. *shrugs*. The entire process was pretty scary though.

After that we went to a Lawsons across the street. Lawsons is a convenience store, similar to 7-11 (of which there are tons here). Gretchen was looking for a specific type of パン (bread roll thing) that is related to an アニメ (Anime) called Yakitate Japan. They are supposed to be selling them now in Lawsons, but we haven't found one yet in ふくおか (Fukuoka) yet so maybe they're only in 東京 (Tokyo) or something. By this time, it's getting to be 5:05pm or so and the latest train that we could use to get back on time leaves at 5:16pm, so we start going back to the train station. We have to run a little bit, but we reach the train on time and all is well, except the train actually left at 5:22pm. We get back to ふくおかだい (Fukuoka University) at 5:38pm and rush towards Building 8 (of course in the pouring rain). We get there a little late, but everything's ok. We go to the building where the Welcome Party is and up to the top floor.

We get our name tags and see lots of tables set up with food (すし！ Sushi!) and chairs to both sides against the walls. We sit and I get my camera setup so I can start taking pictures while we wait for the action to start. At the front of the room is a sign that says "Welcome Georgia Institute of Technology." A few people give speeches (including ムーンさん [Moon-san], who won one of the scholarships) all in Japanese of course and then all of the students are called to the front. We figure this was when we would have to sing the song so when なき先生 (Naki-sensei) hands Sara the microphone, she freaks out not wanting to sing into the mic, but hands it down until I'm holding it in front of all of us. Oops, we were supposed to each introduce ourselves into the microphone. Sara gets it back and we each introduce ourselves in Japanese, saying our major and year in school. Tons of people forgot to say "Please take care of me" which is usually what ends an introduction.

We finish the introductions and that's when we had to sing the song. It seemed ok, except we were singing pretty slowly, I thought. The Japanese people there all clapped along to our song. The song is called 上を向いて歩こう (it's a Sukiyaki song). We then get introduced to our "Host families," who we will be staying with for a weekend in 3 weeks or so. My host insisted I call her のりさん (Nori-san; see above picture). She was very nice and her English was actually pretty good. We spoke and ate and talked with some other host families and had a jolly good time until about 8:30pm - 9:00pm. The director dude says we can take food back (and they even provide us with containers) and so I grab some food and a bottle of coke, then we head to the 地下鉄 (Subway) to come back to the Seminar House. We get off at 六本松 (Ropponmatsu) and walk the rest of the way back. Once back at the Seminar House, Masuda-sensei tells us to meet at 8:40am again the next day so we can have our ふくおか (Fukuoka) city tour. We get Internet working, I take a shower, and we decide to get up at 7:45am the next morning to grab a bite to eat before we meet.

Japan: Fukuoka... DIE! Ja nai!

2006-05-20T11:29:00.000-04:00

For 5/19/2006:

It's wet... dark and wet... it's the kind of weather that penetrates... I wake up early Friday morning to the sound of one of my roommate's alarm (7:17am... he has one of those clocks whose alarm is only the hour hand). The cool thing is that I don't feel tired at all (jet lag kind of takes away all sense of time and you start off again with a clean slate). In any case, I hear the rain going already... slow and steady. I brush my teeth and head down to the dining room to have a nice Western style breakfast. This meal consisted of an omelette, sausage, ketchup, fruit, and bread. After breakfast, we head to the lobby and watch some wonderful Japanese TV until Masuda-sensei comes and tells us what's going on at 8:40am. We each get 2 5,500円 subway/bus passes that speeds up the process of using the two types of transportation.

We then walk to the bus stop in the rain, then all board the number 12 bus bounded for ふくおかだい (Fukuoka university). We get there and rush in the rain to Building 8 (where we will be spending a lot of our time). We head to the International Affairs office and introduce ourselves to the staff (including the guy who is directing most of our program). We then head to room 834 (building 8, floor 3, room 4) and sit in these odd bench/desk combinations (3 seats per desk). The orientation mostly consists of the director reading us the contents of the program packet. After the orientation, a few of us wandered around the halls some, then head back down and Naki-sensei hands us these yellow sheets of paper with lyrics to songs on them. Apparently, we were going to have to sing a Japanese song at the Welcoming Party. Too bad the room we were just using was taken up so about 4 of us started singing this song in the middle of the hall. We then headed downstairs where the rest of the group was and proceeded to practice the song in the middle of that hallway during a class change... yeah... that was fun. I'm terrified of singing in public...

We get let into our next room (824) and there are about 5 or 6 Japanese students who seem terrified already in the room. The director comes up and tells us (oh yeah, he spoke pretty much entirely in Japanese btw... just so you get a scope of what we're going through) that these students are going to be our tour guides for the campus. He calls them all up and he tells them to introduce themselves. The first person goes up and says "英語で？" (In English?) and he responds "No, they can speak in Japanese." She proceeds to introduce herself anyway in a heavily accented English. They each introduce themself; some in English and some in Japanese. It's funny, but these people have been taking English classes for upwards of 10 years and they're scared to death of speaking it, whereas we have been taking Japanese for like 5-8 semesters or so and we're now fully immersed in it.

Anyway, Masuda-sensei splits our groups up into groups of 4 or 5 for the tours. My tour group consisted of Lee-san, Luu-san, Liu-san, and Moon-san. Our tour leader was a Biology major and he actually spoke a decent amount of English. He kept commented that we spoke very good Japanese though. He showed us various parts of the campus (in pouring rain) including a few buildings (some with computer labs we can use) and a restaurant or too (a place called "Mo's Burger" - Welcome to Mo's!), the gym, the library, etc. He also points us to the 地下鉄 (Subway), which we can take to てんじん which he states as a great shopping district. He takes us to one of the school stores and I buy an umbrella for 350円 so that I wouldn't get quite as soaked anymore. Of course right after I buy the umbrella it stops raining.

We're getting pretty hungry by this time so we head to the cafeteria and I get かつカレ for like 330円 or so plus 90円 for a coke (so around $4). Not bad for a lot of food, that was decent. We have lots of fun talking to our tour guide and he even offers to let us tag along with him and his friends to go see a movie sometime. We exchange Email addresses and phone numbers and such, then head back to Building 8 to get ready to go to a computer lab to setup our accounts. The computer room is extremely hot and I was very wet from the rain. Hence my title from the posting I made in the lab. Computer stuff set up and we now had student accounts to use. The keyboards in the lab are pretty interesting. I may try to get a picture of one before I leave. Lots of random Japanese stuff. They also have both Linux and Windows installed :)

Wow... tired already... More to come about this day later. Jeeze... I need to catch up; I'm falling behind. みんなさんおやすみなさい！ (good night)

Japan: Backtracking and Backpacking

2006-05-19T09:41:00.000-04:00

Let's go back a bit. I'll now write about a few days ago, when we were still in Tokyo. Gretchen and I are both staying in Japan after the LBAT program to work abroad, meaning we had a lot of extra clothes and such that we wouldn't be needing until after LBAT. Fortunately, Gretchen's company (JCD) allowed us to keep a bag each here while we were in Fukuoka so that we wouldn't have to worry about it so our next quest was to find her company with our bags so they could hold them for us.

Now we were staying at the Holiday Inn by Narita Airport, which is about 45 minutes to an hour away from Tokyo by train. We checked out of our hotel at 8am, left our luggage at the hotel to pickup before we went back to the airport for our flight to Fukuoka, then took the train with the two bags in hand and my laptop (I didn't want to leave it at the hotel with the rest of the bags).

We bought the cheapest train that would take us to Tokyo from Narita (the JR Line Rapid Train) for 1280円. Unfortunately, we didn't quite understand the train systems yet, so we didn't take the first train that we could, and thus we had to wait about 45 minutes for the next Rapid Train (the others were Limited Express which are more expensive and make less stops).

We finally got to Tokyo at around noon (we were trying to get there around 11am) and transfered to the Yamanote line to go up to Ueno where JCD is located. We then reached Ueno and tried to follow Gretchen's map, which she had copied down from the company website into her Palm Tungsten. We obviously didn't know where to start from the train station, so we asked a police officer in a police box and he gave a really awful map and some directions to get to the building.

We walked and walked and walked and turned and walked and eventually we figured we'd walked to far and stopped somewhere to ask a local if he could help us. The local spoke no English but he very excited pointed towards the direction we'd come from and said such words that I caught as "second traffic light" and "white building." We wandered around some more, then decided it was best for Gretchen to call her company to get better directions from someone we could understand. The person who answered the phone spoke no English and the person with whom Gretchen kept Email correspondance was not in the office so after some time, Gretchen finally got them to agree to meet us in front of the nearby McDonalds she thought. In any case we waited about 15 minutes and started to get pretty discouraged. Then a woman approached us and it was actually the person Gretchen spoke to via Email and not the one who she talked to on the phone (yay! English speaker!). We finally relinquished ourselves of our extra luggage, though I still had my laptop case, and were really hungry so we stopped at a local restaurant to grab a bite to eat.

We were standing outside the restaurant and the people inside saw me and started waving (I figured because they knew we were foreigners). We went inside and they saw me then said "ちがいます！すみません！すみません！" which basically means "Oops we were wrong, sorry, sorry." Apparently they'd thought I was someone else. Anyway, we were looking at the items to choose from and trying to pick the one with the least kanji (so we'd know what were getting). We then just decided to get カレうどん (curry udon), but they didn't have curry... So she started saying other stuff and I decided to get curry with tempura. Gretchen was having trouble deciding what she wanted instead, but then they informed us that they had enough curry for one person, but not both of us so she got that. The food was good, except Gretchen's was too spicy.

Having fed ourselves (my food was only like 340円!) we walked back to the train station. We were going to go to Akihabara so that I could buy myself a digital camera, but our time in Ueno took longer than expected so we ended up deciding against that and heading back to Narita. We looked around the Ueno train station for a faster train (but cheaper than the JR Limited Express which was twice the price of the JR Rapid), but couldn't find one so we decided just to take the JR Rapid line, which took FOREVER. Plus we had to transfer trains at Narita to get to the Airport, which took even more time. Needless to say we got to the Narita airport at 4:50pm for our 5:55pm flight, then ran to a taxi (remember? we still had our luggage at the airport and we didn't want to wait for shuttles!). Took the taxi to the hotel, asked the taxi driver to wait (in Japanese), grabbed our bags, then ran back to the airport. 5:10pm.

Run run run run until we get to the domestic check-in. Of course, we get a trainee at the check-in counter... so she has a supervisor explaining to her what she's doing and she also doesn't speak English very well. Anyway, it's creeping on 5:20pm, 35 minutes before the flight leaves, and she's asking us all these questions (since the flight was full we couldn't sit together) to which we kept replying "That's fine! That's fine!" since we just wanted to get on the plane. She then explained that we had to take a middle seat each! Agh! The last thing she said was "Make sure you get to the gate by 5:30pm" which was ironic because she was holding us up so much. We then run to the gate and get there around 5:26pm! We actually made it with time to spare so Gretchen got a drink because she was thirsty from all the running around we did. We got on the flight, took off and I promptly fell asleep and woke up when we landed (I was out cold).

Fukuoka was rainy (something about a typhoon) and we arrive at the Seminar House after a taxi ride. Wait in the lobby as check-in process goes on; catch up a bit with the other LBAT participants. Everyone else was obviously very tired because they'd just gotten in that day so they'd been flying all day. We get explained the rules, get our keys, then have to carry our luggage up the third floor because there's no elevator. We get explained more rules then head to our rooms. Some rules: 11pm curfew period (gate closes) and we are only allowed to use the showers in the basement (communal) from 9pm - 11pm. Since we got in at 10pm, we got extended special permission until 12am for that night. I take a shower. People try to use Internet, but fail miserably as the temporary usernames / passwords do not work. We'd have to wait until we got our Fukuoka University (FU... hehe) student IDs.

Fall asleep on the rock-hard beds and pillows to wake up decently early to go to Fukuoka University for our campus tour / orientation. More on that to come. Also some pictures as I have now purchased my digital camera from "ビックカメラ" (Bic Camera). I'm kinda tired now and wrote this long entry so that will have to wait. おやすみなさい！ (Good night!)

Japan: Hot and Wet

2006-05-19T00:46:00.000-04:00

Hmm... currently I am in Fukuoka after another flight yesterday from Tokyo. That is another story in itself (I will try to post again later). I'm at Fukuoka University in one of the computer rooms (they gave us username / password). Typhoon season is apparently upon us so it was crazy raining during our campus tour. The Seminar House we are staying at is nice, but we couldn't use Internet yet, so hopefully I can post from my room later tonight... Unfortunately, I forgot my AC adapter for my Router (either in Tokyo or in Atlanta) so I'm gonna try to steal Gretchen's wireless Internet (with her permission).

Japan: Ici at Last!

2006-05-17T13:13:00.000-04:00

And now I'm in Japan... Yay! We landed and went through Immigration (we lied and said that we were planning on staying only 6 weeks instead of our actual length since we don't have full VISAs yet). That took about 30 minutes. Then we got our bags (yay! nothing was lost!) and I exchanged $400 to Yen (boo! the exchange rate went down!)... We then waited for about 30 minutes for the shuttle for our hotel (Holiday Inn) and then checked into the hotel and the room is actually pretty nice for the cost, but smells of smoke. Free Internet though, which is nice. Of course the geek in us had us setting Gretchen's router up so that we can share the Internet =D.

We were pretty tired so we kinda dozed while watching Japanese TV (specifically a Tom Hanks movie subbed in Japanese) and then at around 7pm we walked to a Family Mart to buy dinner (we didn't feel like eating at the hotel for more than the cost of the room). Of course we enter and the store owners are all like いらっしゃいませ！ which means "Welcome!" We browse around and I end up getting an orange mango drink, some yakisoba, and some dumplings for 633円. First experience with being confronted with full-fledged Japanese was paying for the food/getting them to heat it up. Very scary. I haven't quite grasped the amounts of money available via coinage and via bills so I was trying to pay the amount in coins, but didn't have enough so I paid with a 1000 yen bill so now I have a lot of coins.

The food was really good though for being store-bought and microwaved. The drinks are expensive. All in all, I'm having fun! After dinner I tried to stay up till at least 9pm JST to call my family via Skype (it'd be 8am EST) but the Internet was down and I fell asleep so we woke up at like 1am JST and the Internet was back up so I called then and posted this entry. Now it's back to sleep until tomorrow, when we'll head to 東京 (Tokyo) and うえの　(Ueno) then back to Narita to fly to ふくおか　(Fukuoka).

Japan: In Transit

2006-05-17T13:12:00.000-04:00

The time is 9:06am JST. I am currently on the plane from San Francisco to Tokyo. I have been on the plane for roughly 5 hours after the 5-hour flight from Atlanta to San Francisco. The flights gave been pretty uneventful so far, which is a good thing I think. We're supposed to arrive at Narita Airport at 1:48pm. Since I got about 2 or 3 hours of sleep last night, I slept most of the way to San Francisco and a good bit of the way to Tokyo. Otherwise I've watched Anime, played some games on my PDA and written this entry. Movie on ATL -> SF flight: King Kong. Movies on SF -> Tokyo flight: Nanny McPhee, Lion Witch Wardrobe, The Interpreter, and The Transporter 2. Food was less than stellar so far but ok: white rice with chicken curry and various side dishes. Second meal was a pasta dish with no meat that was actually pretty good.

Japan: 2 Midnights Gone

2006-05-15T23:44:00.000-04:00

My flight leaves tomorrow morning at 7:20am. I have to get up at 4:30am to get to the airport on time. The next entry in this blog will be from Japan. I'm going to be tired. I'm an idiot though. I already realized that I forgot to pack a camera. Oh well, too late now. I'll buy one in Japan. Let's get this party started!

Ramblings: 1 Midnight Gone...

2006-05-14T02:15:00.000-04:00

It's quite sad to think that I'll be seeing all these people for the last time for several months. I had a very pleasant dinner at an Italian restaurant recommended by Jim (my boss) on Friday night with good company, then watched a good movie (Art School Confidential) with some more good company.

Tonight I spent a lot of the day prepping my computer for travel (lame I know), then headed to Aubrie's and Will's place for a lovely Southern dinner and another interesting movie (The 40-year-old Virgin).

Tomorrow I'll be having Dim Sum with my family (Father's side) and then I have to go shopping for some clothes to wear for work while I'm at Japan, then I'll be having dinner with Casey and Kelly (and Pat if we can ever get in contact with him). Then... back home to pack my life into a suitcase or two. Monday will be spent running errands (getting traveler's checks, some yen, turning in some paperwork) and then sleeping until my early awakening Tuesday morning around 5am to leave to get to the Airport for my 8am flight.

Ramblings: Back at Home Again

2006-05-09T02:15:00.000-04:00

After an exhausting weekend, I've finally moved everything back home. Now I've got a pile of boxen and random junk lying on my floor. I don't really want to unpack, because A) I'm going to Japan in a week and 2) Once I get back from Japan, I'm likely to move again.

Got my grades using the CAPP hack. A in ECE7102 (expected, but I'm pretty sure everyone else got an A...), A in CS7491 (glad... I worked my butt off on that last project), B in ECE6500 (HAHAHAHAHA! I skipped the entire last two months!), C in ECE6610 (can't say that I'm very surprised, though still disappointed in my first C at Tech), and S in JAPN3001.

I got an Email from my company regarding my VISA issue, so hopefully that's taken care of. I need some help carefully crafting an Email to my company to find out what dress code they have. I also probably need to buy some clothes to match their dress code.

Also trying to schedule last dinners with people so I can see my friends one last time before I'm off to 日本 (Japan). If you have not gotten contacted by me about having dinner yet, let me know (if anyone even reads this?)

Quotes/Songs: Why Do I End Up Dreaming?

2006-05-09T01:47:00.000-04:00

どうして私はゆめを見てしまんだろう？　くれかいしあきもせつ　分かる一つもぶ見たい。　- Honey and Clover

Translated:

Why do I end up dreaming? Over and over again, without getting tired of it. As if that's all I know. - Honey and Clover

Ramblings: Done With That

2006-05-05T00:06:00.000-04:00

So I had my last final today: ECE6610 - Wireless Networks. Let's just say... yeah... we'll see... I really had lost pretty much all motivation to perform well in my classes. I never really had senioritis at all, but now it's like I have "graduitis" or something.

I also started checking people out of their rooms. Being a CA was interesting, but I don't think I want that responsibility again. It was definitely worth doing, but as everything winds down I just don't see myself doing it again. I've got a long weekend ahead of me of checking people out, meaning a long weekend of people complaining and stressing out and not wanting to charge people extra, etc. etc. etc. After all that I have to move myself out too, which I don't really know how long it will take me to do.

For now, I still have to grade a few more papers.

In any case, countdown to Japan: 11 days. Scary...

Ramblings: これはテストです

2006-05-04T01:08:00.000-04:00

あのう。。。これを読めますか？　みんなさんおはようございます！　これは私のテストですね。。。　日本語を書けるかどうか分からないから、見ようね？

Ramblings: Back on the Dark Side

2006-05-04T00:38:00.000-04:00

In light of new experiences, allow me to illuminate the web once more again with my luuminosity. Do not glare too long at the brilliance, or the glow shall provide edifications of the elucidations.

A brief history of my past blogging experiences shows the initial name of "Luuminosity" referencing a bit of light in the darkness of the world. Some time afterwards, I changed the name to "Luucid" representing that same light, but also playing on the phrase "Luu's Id" to represent some of my deeper thoughts and the like. Now the main purpose of this blog will be to provide a place for me to jot down my experiences in Japan and post pictures.

Enjoy.