(I don’t like writing a long blog neither reading a long one, thus I cut this story into (hopefully :-) ) 3 parts - if I have the time and the mood to write them all...)
The story started close to the new year of 2005.
Like any other new year during my stay in Japan so far, my home stay family invited me to a party at their home. Agenda: eating, eating, eating, (eating?), playing cards, and chatting (I forget whether we ate three or four times that time :-) ). Sonoyo (the daughter), asked me what kind of fruit that I like when we had the dessert, and after thinking for a while I replied without any hesitation: “Durian”.
“Is it delicious? I never eat one.”
“Well, I like it. I even like the smell, though lots of people hate it. If I can find it, I can bring one next time if you want to.”
“Really? I’m looking forward for it.”
In the following month I searched Tokyo for Durian, and I couldn’t found one. I also missed Thai Festival that year, where I should have been able to find the fruit easily. Anyway, in April, my family told me that Tina, a friend of mine from my childhood, would visit Japan in May, and they asked whether I wanted something from Indonesia that she could carry with. The same reply as my answer to Sonoyo’s question (also with no hesitation) came out: “Durian”.
May came, and because it was hard to find Durian in Sidoarjo (my hometown) that time, Tina couldn’t bring me one. However, she brought Durian candies instead. It was in quite an amount that after gave some to Pecolin (my homestay mother), many still left. Then, along came the great idea: “Why don’t I give it to my lab mates?”
Durian reputation really precedes it, and only by mentioning that I brought Durian candy to the lab, little commotion occurred :-). One by one my lab mates turned down my offer to try the candy: Kahara just laughed, Kurata and Makii firmly said “no!” Anyway, finally I could find four volunteers that boldly eat what no one had eaten before :-) : my professor, Kim-san, Chou-san, and Yanagita. Similar replies came: it was more delicious than they thought before (I told you so!), but (still), the smell is strong. I was starting to feel glad that four of them like it, until we (they?) realized that there was a small problem (well, small for me, but may be not for them :-) ): unlike the actual fruit, the candy was made from the essence of Durian which has higher concentration, which meant that the taste would stay longer in your tongue. Chou-san didn’t mind about it, but my professor and Kim-san said that the taste leftover was too strong. Yanagita even complained that the taste wouldn’t go even after drinking two cups of coffee.
Another problem came from the smell. Although less than half of the members of my lab ate it, Durian smell spread throughout the room, and like a very aggressive salesman, it refused to go. Yanagita happened to eat it in the experiment room, and at that time no one couldn’t tell whether the smell came from the candy or from gas leaking.
Lessons learned: (1) each person has different perception on anything given to them (I still can’t believe that one can ever dislike something as good as Durian! :-) ). (2) Never eat Durian candy in closed room :-).
Picture taken from party at my professor home, where I can meet (and 'meet' :-) ) not only the current member of my lab, but sometimes some alumni too...Picture upload by Picasa
Again, about kanji.
You know that there’re several kanji in Japan that have the same pronunciation and the same English translation, but they give different nuance to the sentences? One of them (well, actually this is the only example that I know... :-) ) is kanji for the word au (あう), which English translation is ‘to meet’ and it can be written by several kanji (e.g. 会う, 逢う, 遭う). The ‘normal’ kanji is 会う, and I just happened to run across the other kanji (遭う) several days ago, thus I quickly asked Makii the difference between the kanji (you know one of the great things being a member of my laboratory? It is easy to find a free good Japanese teacher... :-). After reading this, I think Makii will charge me the next time I ask her about Japanese...).
Well, while the kanji 会う and 遭う are both read au, and both literally mean ‘to meet’, the usages are different. While the 会う kanji is normally used when you meet someone, the kanji 遭う is used when you meet danger or bad thing (e.g.盗難に遭う(tounan ni au), which means being robbed).
And it was not long when I finally had the chance to use it. Yanagita called me to have dinner together with Saito and Konishi, and when I mailed Makii about the news, here’s what I wrote: 「今夜柳田と遭う予定ですよ」(“I’m going to meet Yanagita tonight”).
(It’s just a joke. Actually, the kanji cannot be used if you want to say that you meet someone, even if you think he is dangerous).
The mail developed into a short chat. Makii wanted to ask me about something, and we then said that we’re going to meet in the lab. When closing the mail, she wrote: “I’m looking forward to meet you in the lab”. You can guess which ‘meet’ that is... :-).
Well, the picture has no connection with this blog (as usual :-) ), but eating that indeed can help you forgetting something (for the time being...) Picture upload by Picasa
Sorry if this time my writing is a little bit cryptic...
I was about to start my doctoral course when I took Nia’s offer to help in PIEF activities. And now that I found I’m getting busy in my lab (really? :-) ), it looks like PIEF will also claim some of my time soon. Anyway, I didn’t regret at all taking that decision. PIEF helps a lot of kids out there, and it’ll be great if I can help them, even only a bit. But most of all, it’s not others that I want to help by joining PIEF. It is more to me myself that I want to help. If I’m getting busy, may be I can try to get over someone... well, no, I don’t want to get over someone so special, it’s my feeling that I’m trying to forget. The feeling that I (might?) still want to keep, but I can feel that it starts consuming me, and bit by bit the parts of me are dying... (did I sound too poetic? :-) ).
Well, anyway, I just want to enshroud that feeling, and when eventually it comes to the time when it uncloaks itself again, I hope it already ‘the right time’ to let it blooms. Or if ‘the right time’ never comes, I hope it has already evolved that I can let it flow to someone else...
I’m just trying to be positive, and I really need to be positive. Like Yanagita often says that I’m an enthusiastic and positive type of person, I think it is time for me to live ‘that legend’, and not let it become just an empty reputation...
