weirdo's spiel

To Order A Milk Shake... In Foreigner's Way

2011-09-09T17:22:00.005+09:00

I got this story from Mukumoto-san, who suddenly came to me in a small party and asked, “Could you give me a favor?”
I stopped my eating and said, “If I can. What do you want me to do?”
“I will say something in English, and please tell me what do you hear.”
Mukumoto-san was a bit prankster, and actually I was hoping that he planned something funny with it :-), so I said okay. And the words he mouthed was: “Traveler’s check”
“You said 'traveler's check', right?”, I said cautiously, waiting for any trick that he might have set. (Un)fortunately, he was serious that time and didn't set any trick up at all :-). He just disappointedly said, “So you could hear what I said...”
“Just in case you doubt it, I clean my ears regularly, so I don't think I have problem with them...” :-)
“It's not what I meant”, Mukumoto-san replied, and then told me his story.

It was when he and some of his friends went for a vacation to Hawaii. They went into a restaurant, but before making any order, they wanted to make sure whether the restaurant accepted traveler's check or not. After pushing each other to ask the waitress :-), finally one of them stood and boldly asked the question no one was dare to ask :-) “Traveler's check, okay?”
The waitress thought for a while before replied, “okay!”, and disappeared behind the counter. Not long she returned, this time with strawberry milk shake in her hand :-)

“Looked like she mistook 'traveler check' as 'strawberry shake' :-) ... that's why I wanted to know whether my English pronunciation understandable or not. You know, my friend who asked the question went to an English conversation class, and he speaks English way better than me - but still, the waitress couldn't understand him, while you could understand me here...”
Actually I wanted to jokingly say that I have a really good ears that I could even understand his unintelligible mumbling :-), but he looked serious about it, so I quit it.

“Well, I'm not a language expert, but I think you and your friend still left some of your Japanese accent and intonation in your English, just like me still left some of my Indonesian accent and intonation. I won't blame you for that, because unless you learn a language mainly from talking with native speakers, chances that you will still left some of your mother tongue traits in your voice.
“I heard you spoke 'traveler's check' close to the sound of 'torabera- chekku' (Japanese writes traveler`s check as トラベラーチェック (torabera- chekku) in katakana). I've been in Japan for almost 9 years now, and I've already get used to Japanese accented English - so when you said 'torabera-', more or less I could guess that you wanted to say traveler. However, it's not the case with the waitress. I won't blame her for not understanding your friend, since I think she wasn't used to Japanese. Moreover, I think she was expecting that you're gonna make an order, that's why when she heard the sound 'torabera- chekku', she googled the menu in her mind for similar words, and she found strawberry shake in rhyme with it.” :-)
“Looked like I better write the words down and show it next time I have problem with that.”
“I think so. Or you can directly show the traveler's check if you have it. And I think asking in full sentence might also help, like: 'may I pay with traveler's check?' That way, even if she still catch 'traveler's check' as 'strawberry shake', she will know that there's something wrong there, since she'll reckon you for wanting to pay with milk shake... :-) well, it won't be a problem if you go to a country where milk shake is the main currency - I don't know where, though...” :-)

Anyway, if I have the chance again to go to an English speaking country, I think I'd like to make this order: “Can I order 'traveler milk check'? Checken, not stirred, please? :-)

Portkey to My Childhood

2011-07-18T21:02:00.003+09:00

Last week I got a Lego from Eden. I think she knew that deep down actually I was - and am - still just a kid :-), and to please a kid, you need to give him a toy :-). Anyway, we went eating afterward, and as you might have guessed, I quickly opened up the Lego and started putting it together (it was a castle). I was so absorbed with the toy that it's the first time in ages when I went to a restaurant and almost completely ignored the foods :-). If Eden didn't help with some parts like the trees and the gate, I might end up not eating at all. (But, just like a normal kid, I still couldn't ignored the desserts :-) ).

About Lego, it was not just 'a toy' for me - it's 'the toy' :-). I touched it for the first time when I was around 2 or 3 years old. I still remember how we (my siblings and I) built together a house, our first Lego project. Well, actually my brother and sisters who built most of the parts, while my role was mainly disturbing them :-) (I was still 3 years old !). And even though 'officially' the Lego belonged to me, it was a family toy - every now and then everybody fiddling with it. Even my mother once asked me to use it for decoration of my birthday cake. That's why it's more than just a toy - it's a memento packed with memories.

And even though you might think that it contributed to my immaturity (since I played it way up to my high school, even my undergrad days :-) ), I don't bother much about it. I'm doing it because it's fun - as always. And if being mature suppose to mean that I can't have fun anymore, I don't mind being immature for the whole of my life :-). Anyway, so far I chose the way I live by myself, and I almost never blamed other for the hard time that I got due to my decision - so even though I'm still 'a kid', at least I am a responsible kid :-). And I think it's much more better being that way, rather that being an adult who don't want to take the responsibility of what he has done :-P

And Eden: thanks for adding another amusing memory for my Lego :-)

Birthday Platitude

2011-07-02T04:13:00.004+09:00

When I was a kid - and also during my teenage years - I like to write on my birthday. I think most of you have ever done it, too - writing about the passing years and whether everything had gone as you previously hoped or not. In my case, the content didn't change a lot from year to year, so cliché that it would make a remarkable bedtime story (i.e. it was so boring that you'd fall asleep half-way thru' it :-) ). Well, it's been years since the last time I did that, so I think it would be fun to write something like that again this year ('fun to write' wouldn't mean that it would be 'fun to read', so be prepared to fall asleep while you read :-) )

Anyway, what's new with my birthday this year was the questions that came along with all the greetings and wishes. Besides the regular 'question of the decade' (read here and here if you don't know what I meant with that :-) ), a new question also arose. It was “when will you go home?” Well, it was my 9th birthday abroad, and it's almost 4 years that I didn't set my foot on Sidoarjo's soil (left alone its mud :-) ), so no wonder why everybody started asking. And when I asked myself, “did I plan to stay this long when I first came here?”, the answer was no.

I remembered on my departure day, Ari - my undergrad pal - gave me a note saying “knock 'em dead and get back to us a.s.a.p.” (I don't know whether he still remember that or not :-) ). Well, it was my intention, too - actually I was just planning to emulate what Indy Jones had done (what I mean by emulating him was to get a Ph.D., not to find the holy grail :-). Let's just leave the search of holy grail to Robert Langdon, shall we? :-) ), and then go back to Indonesia. According to 'the plan', by this time, I would have already settled in Indonesia, get married and having three kids (I even had prepared names for them :-) ). I was picturing myself being a lecturer in one of the universities in Indonesia, living a normal live: not rich, but happy. And when I see myself now, it looks like I only managed to accomplish one thing: being not rich :-) (well, I'm happy too, and I think that's good enough :-) ).

I really wanted to get back to Indonesia a.s.a.p., but lots of thing happened on the way. I'd like to say that it was my destiny to stay here this long, but it would be irresponsible to say this all just because of fate. God gives us series of options during our life, and it's our own choices that pave the path we step onto, and shape the character of the man (or woman) we are growing into. Like, it was my series of choices that brought me to the place where I am now, and by my choices I grew and gain during the course (not gaining weight, though :-) ). Well, I'm still not in the place where I wanted to be, but I'm not regretting it - it's part of my choices that I'm here now - because I think it's the place that I'm supposed to be right now. I believe this path would help me grow into a better person before I arrive to the place that I wanted to be. (Well, it won't turn me into Superman, but it would be enough to do the role of the Batman... :-) ).

And back to the question about going back to Indonesia: I think I will return someday. I still don't know when, but I believe the options will keep on coming, and I hope options that I choose will lead me back there. I'm not saying that I don't like it here, I really enjoyed my stay. I think it would be 'great' if I could stay here long, but it would be 'fun' if I can go back to Indonesia, having normal live: not rich, but happy and all the stuff :-). Whichever is fine with me, but I'd prefer the 'fun' thing over the 'great' one :-). Well, until the day...

PS: Karin, Rana, Erika (if you wonder who they are, that's the names that I prepared for my kids :-) ): please be patient and wait for a while, won't you? Your mother and I still need to fix something up, like... finding each other? :-) Well, may be we already met each other, it just that we haven't realized it yet...

Will You Eat Your Pet?

2011-06-18T00:47:00.006+09:00

Actually I was planning to write something related to birthday, but there were two interesting movies on the TV, so I just put down my pen and started watching :-). The movies were ブタのいた教室 (English title: Schooldays with a Pig) and ブルータスの心臓 (Brutus' Heart - a mystery drama based on Higashino Keigo's work). Since both movies were shown in the same time, I had to choose one, and the pig won over the mystery... :-)

About the movie: the story revolved around six-grade elementary school kids, whose teacher brought them a pig, and tell them to raise her and eat her by the end of the academic year. You might think it was cruel, but the teacher wanted to teach them the importance of food, and life that comes with it. The kids gladly took the assignment, named the pig 'P-chan' and took care of her as if she was their pet. Even though some problems arose (like some parents who thought that the pig caused troubles), the kids spent a year full of good memories with her, and when it looked like they would live happily ever after, the day when they have to eat P-chan was coming.

As you could already have guessed, days spent with P-chan nurtured emotional bonding between them, it was so strong that some of the kids said that they didn't want to slaughter and eat her. However, they didn't know what to do with her if they graduate and leave the school - P-chan couldn't be left like that without no one to take care of her. The teacher let the kids decide for themselves, and despite there were other alternatives such as giving P-chan to third graders to look after (the third graders already said that they wanted to have P-chan), arguments still stood between them. Some thought that they shouldn't give away P-chan to the third graders ("We're the one who started this out, so we're the one who have to take care of P-chan till the end - even if it means that we have to eat her now" or "Leaving P-chan to the third graders will eventually put them in our position by the time they have to graduate. Are you saying that you're gonna run away from your responsibility and let the third graders decide for you what should be done with P-chan ?"), while others said that they should not slaughter and eat P-chan ("Is the purpose of P-chan's life just to be eaten?" or "I don't think that it is our right to decide when will she has to die").

It was a good story about life, and since the kids were only given partial script for what they had to say in the movie - which made most of their lines were originally theirs - it was interesting to see how they thought about the issues.

I won't spoil you the fun by telling you how did the movie end, but like the teacher said to the kids, there's no right or wrong in their decision - and it also applies to you. Either you decide to become vegetarian after seeing the movie, or whether you think that human was created as omnivore and should live the way it is, it's up to you to choose. The movie just wanted to tell you that there were life in our everyday foods - so it's better to be grateful and not waste it for nothing.

There's More Than Just A Lyric in A Song

2011-04-10T14:46:00.009+09:00

A post after a long hiatus... :-)

Well, actually I just want to post the song below for Eden, who will take her flight today (or tomorrow?) to start a new chapter in her life (oops, I make it sound so dramatic :-) ).

Anyway, if you happen to know Japanese (or can find a good translator out there to translate the lyrics to your language :-) ), you will wonder what's the lyrics got to do with embracing a new journey. Well, actually there's no relation, since the song was about a wife who found her husband cheating on her :-). However, I post this song for two reasons:

First, this is one of the theme songs of 魔女の宅急便 (Kiki's Delivery Service), and I know Eden like the movie.

Second, the song was played when Kiki, the heroine of the movie, took her flight to begin her witch training, completely in the same shoes as Eden right now.

So, I think it was a perfect song for her... :-)

By the way, the song was also featured in おっぱいバレー, and was played when the boys started their hard training to win the volleyball tournament (well, actually there's other reason for them to start training, but I'll let you see it yourself in the movie :-) ). That's why even though it's just a song, I like to listen to it when I was about to face a daunting task in front of me, since it helps lift my spirit up when I was feeling down. And now, when everything around me (including me) started to rebuild after the disaster, I think I could use it again to cheer me up...

You can listen to the song in youtube.

PS. about the おっぱいバレー movie, even though the title suggests otherwise (consult your translator if you don't know the meaning :-) ), it was basically a good and clean movie - like, there's only one kiss scene in the movie, and it was not shown directly - recommended movie if you haven't seen it yet.

あの人のママに会うために

今一人列車に乗ったの

たそがれ迫る街並みや車の流れ

横目で追い越して

あの人はもう気付く頃よ

バスルームにルージュの伝言

浮気な恋を早くあきらめない限り

家には帰らない

不安な気持ちを残したまま

街はディンドーン遠ざかってゆくわ

明日の朝ママから電話で

叱ってもらうわマイダーリン

あの人はあわててる頃よ

バスルームにルージュの伝言

手当たりしだい友達にたずねるかしら

私の行く先を

不安な気持ちを残したまま

街はディンドーン遠ざかってゆくわ

明日の朝ママから電話で

叱ってもらうわマイダーリン

(ルージュの伝言by荒井由実)

How To Get Yourself a Treat While You’re Away from Home

2010-12-07T23:37:00.007+09:00

(Today’s my father’s birthday, and I really wanna write this entry for his birthday)

Basically I’m not the kind of person who can easily make friends. In other words, I’m a shy boy (you may laugh and say you don’t believe it, but it’s true :-P ). But lucky me, almost in every city that I ever lived in, I have friends that treat me like I were one of their own family. If you ask me the reason, I think that’s because I have a really great family back in Sidoarjo. (Well, actually I’d like to say that’s because I’m a fine, adorable, amusing person, plus any other wonderful adjective that I can find in dictionary :-), but I know that you won’t believe it anyway, so I just stick with the truth :-) ).

Here are two stories that made me believe so.

The first is a story from mas Sony, my sister’s friend. Mas Sony lived in Depok, the city where I went to take my bachelor degree. Since his house was close to where I lived, I often visited him on weekend, and he always welcomed me. There were lots of hawkers passed his house on weekend, and when I visited him, he used to stop two or three of them and bought me the foods, and he never let me pay. Like, he could buy me bubur ayam and bakso on one weekend, batagor, bakso, and es cendol on other weekend, and bakso and siomay on yet another weekend (if you good at learning pattern, you’ll realize that there’s always bakso (meatballs) in every weekend that I visit him :-) ). This made me wonder, not only why I still couldn’t gain weight even after all those feasts… :-), but also why he did that to me. Well, I was his guest, and it’s a normal custom for a host to treat his guest. But treating me two or three times in only several hours was a little too much. Then he told me his own story about that.

It was when he visited Sidoarjo and stayed in our house for several days. As a visitor, he wanted to try all Sidoarjo’s local foods. Almost everyday he ate them, either my mother cooked it at home, or my sisters brought him to some restaurants. My sisters never let him pay for everything that he had, just like what he did to me in Depok. One time he insisted to pay, but my sister refused and said,
“We’ll pay for you. But that’s not for free. You know, my brother is in Depok now. We will pay for everything while you’re staying here, so please never let my brother hungry during his stay there.”
And my sisters successfully ‘trapped’ mas Sony to treat me bakso every time I visit him… :-)
(And if you still wonder why bakso, there’s another story, but I want to keep it for my mother birthday… :-) )

The other story is when Yuki, my friend from Japan, visited my home. At that time she was studying bahasa Indonesia in Jogja. She told me once that she really wanted to know how it is like to live in a normal Indonesian family. That’s why when she heard that I was going to visit Indonesia for some conference, she asked me whether it’s okay for her to stay at my home for several days. My family didn’t mind at all, so I let her come.

While Yuki was curious about normal Indonesian family, my family was curious about her, since she was the first foreigner ever visit my home. The mutual curiosity seemed to work well :-), and in a short time she had already fitted there, just as if we had already known her for a long time. Everybody tried to make her stay as enjoyable as possible. Even when my brother and his wife planned a trip to Malang and asked the whole family to tag along, they also asked Yuki to join.

To make it short, we had a wonderful trip to Malang, and not long, it's time for her to go back to Jogja. She came to me and asked,
“So, how much should I pay for the Malang trip?”
My family (most of it my brother) paid for the whole trip, so I replied, “I didn’t pay at all, so I think you don’t need to pay either.”
She insisted, “That's not how it's work. You’re their family. It’s no problem if you don’t pay, but I’m nobody here.”
“You may think so, but I think they don’t expect you to pay. Don't worry about it.”
”C’mon!”
I thought for a while and then said, “Well, just put it this way. You don’t need to pay this time, but next time you visit my family again, bring something for them, okay? Just bring simple stuff, I’m sure they will appreciate it.”
Finally Yuki agreed with that.

Later, my father told me this about why he treated Yuki well.
“She really reminds me of you. Studying in a far country all alone without her family around her. Well, nothing we can do about you because Japan is beyond our reach, but we can do something for her here. It's not much, but I believe if we help her here, God will send someone else to take care of you for us there.”
And I believe that's why a lot of people taking care of me while I was away...

So, back to the title, to get yourself a treat while you’re away from home, you need to have a good family. Well, it's not something that you can do about, but at least you can be that 'good family' for your own family. Just try helping someone around you, and I think God will take care not only of your family, but also of you.
(Sorry for talking so big, but this advice is not only for you. Most of it is for me myself... :-) )

Everything Happen for A Reason

2010-10-24T11:08:00.010+09:00

Sometimes, it only needs something as small as one phone call to get things going, like the phone call that I got from Tomoko-san last week, telling me that she and her husband would go to Jakarta to join a conference.

"That's cool", I responded.
"Yeah! Well, actually there's something that I want to ask you."
"What is it?"
"I want to give my friend in Bandung a present, but it seems that we won't have the time to meet. Do you think it's possible to send it via postal service?"
"Of course. Why?"
I started wondering whether Tomoko-san thought that Indonesia still using medieval ways to deliver things - such as doves, or even owls :-) - and that the package would be too heavy for them to carry. But she replied, "I just afraid that if I go to post office to ask, the officer won't be able to understand my English..."
"You speak good English! I think you won't have problem there... but how about if I ask one of my friends there to help you? I think some of my undergrad friends are still in Jakarta now."
"Really? I will appreciate it."
"I'll let you know soon."
And the next minute I was digging through my closet, trying to find the phone list of my friends in Jakarta.

Basically, I believe that no news is good news, and as you can guess, I'm not often call my friends just to say hi - I always call for a reason. Well, sometimes I do want to talk to them with no particular purpose. At those times, usually I just try to find a reason (sometimes a far fetched one :-) ), and then call. So, if you think that I ever called you with a very lame excuse (like: my cat just dialed your number... :-) ), chances that at that very moment, I really wanted to talk to you :-).

And if my memory didn't fail me, the last time I talked with one of the gp96ers (that's how we call our class) was 3 years ago, and it looked like during these three years, I couldn't find an excuse (even a lame one :-) ) to call them. If you believe that everything happen for a reason, perhaps the reason why God sent Tomoko-san to call me was to give me a solid reason to call them again :-).

I found the phone list and started to dial the numbers. (The order of whom I called first basically based on who that I thought know Jakarta enough and could easily help Tomoko-san - so if you happened to be last in my list, it didn't mean that I hate you, okay? :-) ). First I called Ari, and his number told me that the phone couldn't be reached at that time. Well, may be he still trapped somewhere, so I continued with Ratna's number. This time it told me that the number was not in service. Hmm, did she change her number? I moved on to Bonggo's, and I heard the dial tone (finally!)... but nobody showed up at the other end :-).

I got a little bit worried that I could contact nobody that night. Well, I couldn't blame anyone, it's my own fault that I don't keep in touch with them. There's nothing else I could do, so I continued with Lisya's number. Again, I heard the dial tone, and while waiting for respond, I started thinking on what should I said if she'd already forgotten me. Lisya and I still send mails sometimes, but the last time we talked was about 6 years ago. Anyway, there wasn't much time to think, because soon somebody picked up on the other end. I opened my mouth to say 'hello', but Lisya's voice made me stop.
"What's up, Awan?"
I clean my ears regularly, so I was sure that it didn't play trick on me :-). But how could she know that it was me?
"Pardon?", I tried to make sure.
"It's you isn't it?"
"How could you know?"
"Well, not many people call me from Japanese number", she explained. " What's up?"
It looked like Lisya still remember that I almost never call only to say hi :-), so I could skip the chitchat and got down to business. I quickly tell her about Tomoko-san, and asked her whether she could help.
"No problem", she replied quickly. "Do you know where she will stay?"
"Kempinski Hotel."
"Lucky you! My office is just across the street. I can visit her on lunch time if she wants..."

And for the second time that night, I really thought that everything happen for a reason. May be the reason that I couldn't get to my other friends phone was that God knew that Lisya worked the closest to where Tomoko-san would stay, and that she's the best person to help her... (yeah, I know that it really sound that I was just fitting everything up, but who knows? :-) )

We had a small chitchat after Tomoko-san business settled, and Lisya told about some of our old friends that she had just talked to recently. Hmm, suddenly I felt lots of guilt for not keeping in touch with them... Now, it really looked like the real reason why God sent Tomoko-san to call me was to remind me of my old friends, and also to help me strengthen my relation with them again... Well, if I still couldn't do it this time, I hope He gives me more and more reasons (and lame excuses :-) ) to keep in touch with them again...

And, to all my friends, near, far, wherever you are (sorry for snatching lines from Titanic's theme song :-) ): I really miss you all...

Can You Please Stop Saying ‘Sweet’?

2010-02-24T17:37:00.004+09:00

Close to my graduation day, Rachma promised to treat me a jumbo ice cream at a shop in Musashi Koyama. But since there were lots of things to do during graduation day (such as party, party, submitting papers, preparing for moving, party, and party :-), look, it’s not my fault that everyone’s so fancy about graduation party :-) ), eventually we didn’t go. And as I moved to Fukushima soon after the graduation, it was harder for us to go fulfilling the promise.

Anyway, last December, I had the time to pay Tokyo a visit. Actually I left a shamisen at Rachma’s place during my moving, and Rachma was already screaming that it took spaces :-), so I needed to get it back. I wasn’t in a hurry this time, that’s why we said that we’d go to the ice cream shop. Yuli, Rachma’s husband, was already in Japan this time, so the three of us went.

To make it short, we got in the shop. Rachma and Yuli quickly asked.
“How big is the jumbo one?”
“I’ve shown you the picture, right? If you two can eat a lot, we should go for it.”
“Are you sure?”
“The last time I went here it was me and 3 other friends, and we could finish it. Well, it's just three of us now, but if we try a little bit harder...”
Rachma and Yuli bought my explanation, so it was set. We went for the jumbo ice cream.

By the way, about me and 3 other friends that successfully finished the ice cream, I forgot to mention one small detail. When we went there, it was summer. This time, it was winter. I was thinking that it was not a problem at all, until I saw the waitress came bringing the iceberg, oops, the ice cream… oh my God, was it that big?

The waitress put the ice cream in front of us, and I started to think that it would be an uphill battle to eat it... (well, 'up-iceberg battle' would be more appropriate :-) ).

Some other guests that just came in looked at us in awe.
“Three of you gonna eat that all?"
“We’ll try”, I smiled back.

And so begun the battle of iceberg... :-)

We started taking the ice cream to our bowls, and the first couples of it went to our stomach without any problem. Anyway, we like sweets. But as I continued to eat, an unpleasant feeling started creeping all over my stomach, and I felt like I wanted to throw up every time I gave another bite. Well, actually my stomach wasn’t full yet, it just refused sweet thing. People used to say that there is a butterfly in their stomach if they get nervous - well, it's kind of like that, and the butterfly started to fly frantically every time I gulped more ice cream :-). It looked like Rachma and Yuli also felt the same, and finally we gave it up and left two small bowls of melted ice cream.

Even though I could manage myself not to throw up, I was just not feeling well. As much as I like sweet stuff - and I was thinking that I can never get enough of it - I can’t take it anymore if it’s too much. And the lesson was simple: there’s a limit for (almost) everything, and overdo something would lead to no good.

Rachma, Yuli, and I parted ways at the station. Since I’ve been not in Tokyo for quite sometimes, I took the time to visit the Seino family. The family was one of the closest families to me, and the parents, Rainier and Grace, were already like my own brother and sister (The couple actual names are Yoshiteru and Kyoko, but since I knew them as hippo members, I called them with their Hippo nicknames, Rainier and Grace - can you guess where they got these names? :-) ).

Still feeling sick of something sweet, I headed to their place. Haruka, their sweet 5-year-old daughter already waited in front of the elevator when I got there (she’s so sweet, but I don’t have problem with this kind of sweet thing :-) ). She showed me the way to their apartment, where the rest of the family had been waiting.

“It’s been a while! How are you doing? And by the way, what do you want to eat today?”, Grace bombarded me with questions, but the last question about food was the one that caught my attention :-). Grace is a good chef, and a lot of tasty foods flashed in my mind when she asked that question. Anyway, my stomach was still not full and it would welcome anything... anything? Well, 'the butterfly' still rejected sweet things, though... :-)
“I’ll eat anything”, I replied, and after a brief pause I added, “as long as it’s not sweet.”
“You’re sure?”, Grace looked at me as if my head had been hit by something. “I thought you really like sweet, right?”
“Yeah, but there’s something today, and I don’t want to eat anything sweet again for at least a week... well, I’ll tell you later why.”
“Okay, but that’s too bad... Actually I prepared kolak when I heard you going to come...”
Kolak? Oh, how I’d love to eat it... but of all things, why should Grace made kolak when my stomach refused sweet stuff? It’s not fair… but it looked like Grace still not finished yet.
“...I use brown sugar this time, you know. And because you said that you used to have it very sweet in Indonesia, I made it extra sweet today...”
I stopped, tried to control 'the butterfly' in my stomach that started to fly in panic again :-).
“Grace, can you help me and stop saying sweet? It makes me sick just to hear the word...” :-)

Do Talk To A Stranger

2009-09-25T23:18:00.000+09:00

I can't find a picture of me getting sick, so I use my nephew's pics instead... :-)

I didn’t have serious health problem during my stay in Japan. Occasionally I catch cold, though, but since I’m very susceptible to cold and get a running nose almost every morning - even during summer - I just consider it a daily routine, not something big enough for consulting a doctor. But this year swine flu spreads and everybody get anxious, that’s why when I got cold symptoms similar to those of the flu, my dormitory manager told me to go to the hospital, just in case.

The hospital was just next to the dormitory (actually, it also belonged to the company), so I just went there with no preparation: no shower, no shaving. I just realized it when I got to the hospital that, given how I looked at that time, people might think I was a suspicious scary stranger :-). But even if I had came normally prepared, I might still have drawn attention, because there’s not so many foreigners around (unlike Tokyo), so I just tried to ignore what people might think and quickly lined up in front of the receptionist to register for an examination.

The receptionist showed me to the general department. There were already quite a number of people there (welcome to the swine flu suspect club! :-) ). I just sat there with my head blank for some time (well, I can’t think clearly when I still sleepy, and catching cold didn’t help at all) then I saw newspapers and magazines rack in the corner. I was about to go and get one of them, when I overheard the conversation of the couple sat across me.
“Look at the boy (boy? :-) – we’ll the lady said ‘ko’ (子)). He’s a foreigner, isn’t he?”
“It looks so. He must be lonely here”
“Well, it’s hard to get sick. It’s even harder if you get sick all alone abroad...”

I looked at them. The couple looked several years younger than my parent. Perhaps they had kid in the same age as me, that’s why they call me ‘boy’. The couple noticed that I was looking, so I smiled at them.
“You were talking about me?”
“Oh, so you can speak Japanese”
And I forgot about the newspaper as we started to chat.
“By the way, where are you from? Portugal?” (This is about the fourth time that people think me of a Hispanic descent :-) ).
“No. I am from Indonesia.”
“Indonesia? Actually I was lived in Srilanka for a year some times ago.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. It was quite hard at first, but it’s getting better as I got used to the country. It’s even getting better after I made some friends there. By the way, have you made any friends around here?”
I thought about my colleagues, and because we go out together regularly to have fun, I thought that I could call us friends :-).
“Yes, I think so.”
“Good then. It will be much more fun if you have your friends around, right?”

Well, I’m quite an antisocial person :-), but I think I agree with her that it’s fun to be able to enjoy the company of others. It doesn’t have to be friends, though, even a total strangers like me and the couple can also enjoy the company of each other.

Unfortunately, our conversation should be stopped because the nurse called my name. I went for the examination, and thanks God it was just a normal cold :-). As I left, I waved to the couple, and they waved back. I was really glad the couple didn’t care that I looked like a suspicious person :-) and was willing to have a chat with me. Well, talking with them didn’t make my body feeling well, but it did make my heart feeling well. :-)

Anyway, next time, if you happen to see some harmless cute little lonely stranger (just like me :-) ) sitting all alone, could you give him a favor and hold a conversation with him? He might appreciate your company...

Oops, I Just Knew That I Have Religion...

2008-11-16T16:29:00.009+09:00

I quite hesitated to put this here, because I think that the subject was too 'heavy' - I believe that the right to choose religion is one of the basic human rights, and no one has the right to influence other decision regarding of this. Anyway, I tried to make this as light as possible, and in the end, it is you yourself who have to choose the religion that you think is right (or not to choose at all...), because finally it is you who have to take all the responsibility that will ensue.

Yuri had to write a report about how Japanese think about religion, and since she thought that it would be interesting to include how non-Japanese think about it, she asked me to give some comments. For those of you who haven't known it yet, lots of Japanese have a quite strange perception about religion. For example, it's normal for somebody to celebrate Christmas on December 25th, while on new year eve 6 days later, he goes praying in a 神社 (jinja - Japanese shrine). Or it is also normal for someone to have his birth celebrate by a Shinto priest, pledge his wedding in front of Christian pastor, and have his funeral ceremony by a Buddhist monk. Quite a complicated religion... :-)

Well, anyway, when Yuri, me, and Yuka (who was also being kidnapped to help her :-) ), met in a family restaurant to talk about that, Yuri explained the outline of her report - while eating. She told us that she also wanted to put the background of major religions in the world (to make the report longer :-) ), and she was thinking about writing on Islam, Christianity, and Buddhism. She had already asked her other friend about Christianity, and she would write about Islam from my account. But when she wanted to add Buddhism, she knew no Buddhist to whom she could ask. If your social science textbook told you that most Japanese are either Shintoist or Buddhist, and you think that it should be easy to find a Buddhist here, well, you might need to add some correction in your book. I don't know the real fact either, but my Japanese friends told me (and so far I found so), that most Japanese believe no religion. And since both Yuri and Yuka also have no religion, they also have no clue about Buddhism.

Actually Buddhism can be checked quickly in internet, but we didn't have any internet connection at that time, so we couldn't do that. That's when Yuka got a bright idea: in Japan, there is a dictionary called 広辞苑 (kojien) which more or less can be used as an encyclopedia, due to it's detailed explanation on a word. And this dictionary is often available in an electronic dictionary - which three of us brought - and she wasted no time to find the explanation and started dictating it to Yuri. The explanation was quite detailed, she could even find about the praying ritual that a Buddhist has to do.

"The Buddhist had to do a praying ceremony twice a day in the morning and evening in front of the small altar... hey, wait a sec, I do this kind of ceremony everyday... that means that I'm a Buddhist!", Yuka looked quite perplexed.

Yuri and I looked at Yuka disbelievingly. "You do the ceremony everyday, and you don't know that it was a Buddhist ritual?"

"No", Yuka was thinking for a while. "My grandpa told me to do that everyday, and I just do that. Of course I know that I'm praying while doing that, but I didn't know that I was praying for Buddha."

It looked like Yuri was trying to scan her memory - trying to check whether she might also belong to one of the religions - unconsciously :-).

Yuka's 'revelation' :-) brought a new topic to our chat: whether they believe in God or not, despite the fact that they don't have religion - or for Yuka - despite the fact that she thought that she didn't have religion :-).

"I believe that God does exist", said Yuri. "I may have no religion, but I believe that there's a greater power that arrange our everyday life."

Yuka also said that she believe in God, and that she even believed in the concept of fate and sin. "If you believe in sin, it will prohibit you from doing something bad, isn't it?"

That seemed to be the answer to a question that often being asked to me, about why people with religion sometimes still act badly. In the past, I had a preconception that a person with no religion was bad. However, after came to Japan and met lots of people with no religion but they still are good persons - even better than some people I know who proudly said that they have religion - I started to think that it's not just a religion that makes a person better. It is whether they really believe in God or not. I still believe that my religion is right, but by only having a religion, it won't make you a good person compared to anybody else. If you don't truly believe in God, if you don't truly believe in the concept of sin - that when a person does something bad, he will get a punishment equal to what he'd done - I don't think that you'd be a better person.

Our discussion - which actually out of the topic :-) - left Yuri with lots of material (and lots of work :-) ) to put in her report. Anyway, she said that she would use our conclusion for her report: It is not by having religion that made us a better person - if you don't actually believe in God, it won't bring you any further.

By the way, I think Yuka's 'revelation' won't change her a lot from now on, given the fact that she had believe in God even when she still didn't know that she's a believer in any religion. It made her a good person - may be thousands times better than those who proclaim that they're a believer, but not practicing on what they believe.

The Last Days of My Twenties

2008-09-16T10:58:00.016+09:00

Actually my birthday is in June, but since I didn't have time to write this at that time, I upload it now :-)

Yes, I turned 30 this year.

And like my any other previous birthday, this year's birthday was also special. One of it because some of my friends threw a surprise party for me - it really caught me by surprise (that's what a 'surprise' party suppose to mean, isn't it? :-) ). However, there's one problem...

"Happy birthday!", screamed everyone when I was entering Akki's place (I was invited to her place to have some small party, but I didn't know that it was for my birthday).
Surprised and astonished, and after made sure that my calendar not showing the wrong date, I replied, "Thanks! It's very nice of you all... but actually my birthday is still next week..."
And everybody quickly glared at Fujiko-san who provided the wrong date... :-).

Anyway, even though it was one week early, it was great. It also gave me time to realize that I'm going to leave my 20s, and that I should leave it with one memorable thing. But, with what?

After pondering for a while that 30 should mean that I'm not a kid anymore, and given the fact that I still spent lots of sleepless nights trying to complete an RPG recently :-), I finally decided that it's time for me 'to put my sword to rest' :-) and stop playing those games. That's why, when I got home, I started collecting those RPG games in my hard disk, and thinking about deleting them all on my birthday.

However, several turn of events swayed my decision.

First, Ishida - one of my juniors in lab - had problem with his computer and he asked my help. Thanks God that it was not a big problem, and within minutes it had already solved. While waiting for his computer to reboot, I pulled a nearby computer and started playing minesweeper :-).
Ishida noticed that, and said, "I like to play that too. But sometimes it's more than just logic, isn't it? Sometimes you also need luck to guess it right."
I agreed with him, but suddenly I remember that there is a cheat for minesweeper to know which block contains the mines (the 'xyzzy' stuff). Well, I thought it was a good chance for a little bit show up :-), so I stealthily activated the cheat, and turned to him, "you know, I can guess correctly which block contains the mines without opening them."
"Really?"
"Sure! Just see."
And in the next 3 minutes Ishida watched in awe as I cleared the mines one by one correctly. In the end I couldn't hold it anymore, I laughed and told him about the trick.

"This is awesome!", he was excited after tried it himself. And for the next 10 minutes, he was completely absorbed into the minesweeper... :-). I was going to tell him that it's just a basic trick, however, after thinking that he might ask me to show more advance tricks and spend the whole day trying them one by one if I told him so, I just let him toying with that :-). Anyway, I think Ari would protest if he find that I taught my junior to use cheat on games :-) (he's a 'pro' in games and often protested if he found me using 'unnecessary' cheat during games :-) ).

"I hope the trick doesn't make you play the game all the time and forget doing anything else", I told him after he finally could get out of his addiction :-).
"No problem. I usually do it only for a pastime. Everybody need a break sometimes, right?"

He made a point on that, and I was thinking about my RPGs, which are great companies during free times :-). May be I should not delete them all, I still can play them during holiday...
But after considering that RPGs take lots of time to finish (unlike minesweeper that can be solved even within seconds - I once saw Maul finished it in just 8 seconds), I shook off the idea, and decided to delete them all after all.

The second 'wind' that swayed my decision blew when I was analyzing my samples. You know, now that most of stuffs had been automatized, basically the process called 'analysis' had turn into 'hard work' consists of putting your sample inside the machine (0.5%), setting up the condition (0.5%), and waiting (99%) :-) . This left me with plenty of waiting time, and of course, my favorite way of killing time is playing minesweeper in the equipment's computer :-).

Horioka who happened to be doing her analysis in the room, laughed when she found me playing, but she soon followed suit. While playing I also showed her the trick, and her response was a carbon copy of Ishida :-).

"You know, sometimes we have a minesweeper competition in my lab... may be I can use this next time...", Horioka started to scheme up a nasty plan.
"Your lab has minesweeper tournament?", I startled. Well, in my lab we sometimes have a small sport tournament (like table tennis) - but computer games? I've never heard about it before! If my FPE gang were here, we could dominate and become kings here - well, at least in the game tournament... :-).
"It's informal tournament. Anyway, my professor also likes gaming. I heard that he sometimes plays Dragon Quest"
"Really? Actually I also play RPG, but I prefer Final Fantasy..."
"Me too! I also play Final Fantasy!"

And the talk expanding to all kind of FF stuff (like: which series is your favorite, which gold saucer date that you get when you play seven, and the like. You'll understand that if you're also into RPG :-) ). And without knowing it, the analysis of our samples was done... it should have been longer... :-)

"Actually, I will have an internship in the Philippines next month. I was thinking of bringing some RPG to complete there if I can found one", Horioka said while checking her data.
"Well, I still kept my copy of final fantasy 7... It's illegal, but if you don't mind about it, I can give you..."
"Really? Give me! Give me!"

I've seen others who also be full of energy when they talked about RPG :-), so I wasn't surprised to see her so enthusiastic (if I'm in her position, I'd act like her... or even worse.. oops, better... :-) ). When I got home, I quickly burned the FF7 into disc so I could give her the following day. While doing so, I took a look on the RPG files on my hard disk and gave a thought about it for a while. I finally set my mind not to delete them. I could really feel Horioka enthusiasm, and I know that I also always get that kind of energy anytime I play those RPGs. Well, for now I think I will really 'put my sword to rest', but I think there will come a time when I shall draw it again and go down adventuring in that fantasy land. Anyway, there will always be a kid inside of me, and I think he deserves to have some fun from time to time - and in return he'll fill me with spirit that will help me facing hardship in life. Growing up is not about quitting playing for the rest of your life, it is about to know when is the time to play, and when is the time to take something seriously.

Anyway, for the special memorable thing that I did for the last days of my 20s, finally I opted to do something else. Well, since it'll be more special if it's a secret, just let it be a secret , shall we? :-)

Question of The Decade, Part 2: Bride's Bouquet of Flower

2008-06-25T13:33:00.002+09:00

(The words people said in this blog might be a little bit different from what they actually said, since besides they all spoke Japanese (and this blog is in English), I can't remember the exact words that they said. Anyway, the general story is okay, if my memory didn't fail me... :-) )

Yutaka and Miki got married this month, and they invited me to their wedding party. It was the first formal wedding party that I attended in Japan, and I worried that I would make mistakes (There are lots of trivial details in Japanese wedding such as the kind of envelope that you have to use when you present money to the couple, that even my Japanese friends have to consult their parents to get it right. Perhaps, even the parents need to consult their parents to get it right too :-) ). To avoid troubles, they told me to come with Akiko, their close friend. Akiko was actually the one who served as the cupid that introduced Yutaka to Miki :-), and for that reason they asked her to act as the MC for the party.
"If she's the MC, does it mean that she'll be busy most of the time?"
"We think so. But she doesn't have to come early, so you two can come together. I'll asked her about it."

It seemed that later Miki asked Akiko to contact me about the party. Akiko mailed me that her older sister would come with her boyfriend, so I could stay with the two while she is busy with her MC stuff. I was quite worried that I would disturb the couple's time together :-), but Akiko told me that she's sure that her sister wouldn't mind about it. So it was set. Now my only worry was that there would be loads of people who would asked me 'the question' at the party... :-) (Hey, it's a weeding party. What else do you think people would talk about there? :-) )

The day came, and the party started. Tomoko, Akiko's sister and her boyfriend were great companies. They even helped me by drinking my champagne during the cheers for the bride and the groom :-) (you know, I'm forbidden to drink liquor). The party went without problem, and I think it was a pleasant party indeed, since unlike what I've been afraid of, no one was asking 'the question' around. :-)

As we had thought, Akiko spent most of the time doing her role as MC. However, in between her job, she sometimes popped out in our place, stealing cakes from my plate :-).

Finally, it was the time for the bride to throw her bouquet. Akiko came to me, handed me her purse.
"Can you hold this for me? I wanna catch the bouquet, too."
I raised my eyebrows. "You're the MC right? Is it okay for you to go?"
"The bouquet catching is open for every single girl", she said, with a flash of nasty look in her eyes.
"Well, good luck! But the chance is one in a million, you know."
She laughed, and quickly darted beyond the balcony from where the bride would throw the bouquet. Not long that Miki showed up in the balcony. She turned her back to the audience, and threw the bouquet over her head.

And I don't know where the statistic went, but what I said to be one in a million really happened :-). The bouquet headed right to Akiko, and without much effort she caught it. (Well, it's not one in a million actually. There were around 30 girls beyond the balcony, so the odds was one in thirty :-) ).

Tomoko's boyfriend who stood beside me turned at me and said, "Congratulation! Akiko caught the bouquet!"
I was about to ask why he congratulated me, when I realized that lots of people there must have thought that Akiko was my girlfriend. Anyway, I couldn't blame anyone for that, given that we came to the party together, and the fact that she stole cakes from my plate should have added to their suspicion :-). I was wondering whether I should say that we're just friend, when Akiko came showing her bouquet.
"I got it! Smell it! It smells really good!"
Akiko poked the bouquet to my nose, and all that I could sniff was the smell of grass.
"It smells like grass", I said honestly.
She raised her eyebrows and smelled the bouquet.
"What did you mean? It smells good."
I smelled the bouquet again, and no matter how hard I tried, I still couldn't scent the smell that she meant. If not for the MC job that she had to do, perhaps we'd spend the whole afternoon quarreling over the bouquet's smell :-). Anyway, she returned to do the MC, and the next agenda was lunch. There was 1 hour allocated for that, but since Akiko had other things to do, basically she only had less than 10 minutes to eat. I thought that she wouldn't have the time to take the food herself and that she'd bug me again like what she did in the morning :-), so I anticipated by piling foods on my plate (anyway, if she's not coming, I could finish it all by myself... :-) ). Unfortunately, she did come to eat from my plate :-).

As we ate, the bouquet stuff came again to my mind. Some people believe that the person who catches bridal bouquet will soon follow the bride footstep, and I wonder whether Akiko wanted to get married soon. She's 23, and I don't know whether a girl of her age want to get married soon or not. So I asked her about that.
"I'm not planning to get married soon... why'd you ask?"
"You were running to the balcony as if Miki would throw 100 million yen there."
She laughed. "I don't believe in that superstition. I just think that it would be cool if I can catch the bouquet"
She then added while eating, "Of course, if there's a chance to marry, I will take it. But I don't want to put too much effort on it. Human relation is a thing to feel and enjoy, not to think and worry about. If I put too much effort to find that special someone, I think I won't be able to enjoy it."

A good reason indeed. I begin to wonder what's the reason that make people married, so when I had the chance to talk with Yutaka for a while, I asked his reason. Actually it was a simple reason:
"Well, we think that we can be happy together, so actually I and Miki planned to live together. However, Miki's parent didn't like about the idea. When I asked them whether they will allow me to marry her, they said it was okay, so I proposed her."

And he also offered me his groom's wisdom :-).
"Now that I got married, I won't tell you to follow me soon. It's your life, so it should be you who decide when you want to, and of course with who you want it to be done. But if you find someone that you really like and you think you can be happy spending your time with her, I think you should really consider the idea."

And I think I will take this wisdom of his. I won't wed just because I want 'the question' stopped from being asked to me. Even, for example, I finally get married and 'the question' be gone, other questions like "when will you have babies?" will come to replace. Those questions will naturally come one after another, and not a thing to worry about. I think the people who asked such questions are genuinely care about me, and all that they want is to wish happiness come upon me. Hearing lots of questions like that is actually the sign that people still care about me. The way to answer for their affection is to be happy, and do the thing that I think is best for me.

I and Akiko went home from the party together, and besides quarreling about the bouquet (yes, it's still on :-) ), we talked about all kind of things. She was funny and I really enjoyed her company. She was planning to rent a DVD, and she asked whether I could recommend one good horror movie. It's quite hard to pick one, since she'd seen most of the horror movies on my list. We stopped at DVD rental shop, and after a small venture to the part where the semi-x-rated movie was on display (It was unintentional. I mistakenly read the floor map of the shop, and we were wondering why DVD of horror movie would need to feature a cover with people dressed so provocatively :-) ), finally I picked "IT" for her (glad she'd not seen it yet). I was planning to rent Michael Keaton's Batman for myself when she saw me browsing batman DVD and asked whether I like Batman. I said yes, and then she asked: "Do you know that the new batman movie will be on screen on August? Wanna watch it together?"

Well, it's just a date. We might keep our relation as friend, or the relation might grow stronger. I don't know. Anyway, I wouldn't ponder to much on it. Like she said in the party, human relation is something to feel and enjoy, not to worry about. I won't stock pain upon myself by thinking a lot on what will happened next, I'll just let it goes naturally. She's a fine girl to have around, that's why I said I'd be glad to go with her. And for what's stored in the future for us, just let it be secret until it comes... :-)

("Question of The Decade" concludes here. I might find other interesting things to write related to the matrimony things, and at that time I think I'll use the title again)

Question of The Decade, Part 1: If The Prophecy Were Right...

2008-05-29T17:15:00.013+09:00

I think everyone near my age know what is the question that I mean. If you still underage :-) and don't know what question is it, it's "When?" And for those of you who still act as if you don't know what's when, it's "when will you get married?" :-)

Believe it or not, I've heard the question asked again and again that little by little I've got used to it. I even had my lip automatically answer it: "Well, I still don't have the bride. Can you introduce one to me?"

Usually my friends just consider it as a joke, but some take it seriously. Some even try to advise me using fortune telling, like what happened when I went to Kuki (a city in Saitama prefecture) 2 weeks ago.
(I told you before that a lot of my friends here believe in fortune telling. Just read this blog if you haven't read it yet.)

I was invited to a BBQ party by Sekine family, and since it's been a while I didn't go there (and since party means lots of food :-) ), I went. Sekine family also invited many of their friends, and quite a lot people came, young and old. The party lasted until late at night, and because I already missed the last train to Tokyo, they told me to stay over that night. Some other guests had their home near by, so even though it's already late, more than 15 people still stayed and had a chat. Many of them were new faces to me, but still, we could hold a warm conversation (anyway, I was the only foreigner in the room and those people were eager to know more about foreign things :-) ). Topic of talk came one after another, and finally, came along the long expected theme: marriage (long expected? who's expecting it? :-) ). I was wondering who's among the people there who would (dare :-) ) to ask "the question", when Sumiko-san, the mother of Sekine family, look at me and asked it.
I felt every single eyes on the room focused on me and, instinctively, I answered with "the answer". :-)

Sumiko-san took a deep look at me for a while, then said mysteriously like professor Trelawney from Harry Potter :-), "I can help you found your girl of destiny if you told me your birthday"
She's rummaging a shelf behind her, and I was 100% sure that she's trying to get her crystal ball there :-). To much of my relief, it wasn't crystal ball or other medieval tools often found in a magical movie. Instead, she produced a book from there. I gave a peek on the cover and it said that it's about birthday fortune telling. :-)

Sumiko-san opened the book on my birthday and she mentioned a list of dates that, according to the book, should be the birthday of the girl of my destiny. There were around 7 dates (does it mean that I will have 7 girls of destiny? :-) ), and even though I don't believe in fortune telling, I tried to scanned my memory for those who born in those dates.
"Sorry, it seems that there's no one close to me now that was born on those days"
Tachihara-san, one of the guests, said, "I know one"
"Really?", I asked enthusiastically (over-enthusiastically for someone who said that he doesn't believe in fortune telling :-) )
"Yes, my daughter was born on that day... but as you know that she's still 9 years old now, you have to wait for 11 years if you want to marry her" :-) (For your information, here in Japan people come of age at the age of 20)

Of course she was joking. The topic of talk turned from marriage to fortune telling (at last... :-) ), however, one of the guests asked whether he might see my palm. I extended my palm to him, and after gave a glance on it for a while, he smiled and asked my age. I told him that I would turn 30 this year, and he smiled again (why do people have to be so mysterious when it come to fortune telling?).

I really had to to fight the temptation to say: "what did you see, master Yoda?" :-), when finally he said, "Don't worry, she'll come. Just do what you should do now, and when the time comes, you'll be ready"

I'm not trying to tell you that I believe in fortune telling now, but I try to use any good advice that people can offer me. It was a good advice of him (regardless what he saw on my palm was correct or not), that I should try to do what I can do today, enjoy everything that I only can do when I'm on my own, so that when the time for someone to step into my life finally comes, I can welcome her with no regret... (the question now is, will "that time" finally come? :-) )

Anyway, I think I don't need to hurry. If the prophecy were right, I still need to wait for 11 years until my girl of destiny coming of age, then I'll be ready to answer "the question" :-)

Why There's Not Much Sakura Tree in Tokyo University (Hongo Campus)

2008-04-06T12:34:00.005+09:00

Well, I've never been to Hongo Campus of Tokyo University during spring, so I don't know whether the rumor is true or not. However, I often hear that Hongo campus very beautiful during autumn - which means that the trees there are dominated by Gingko or Maple - and not Sakura.

True or not, here's what I heard regarding the rumor. The first president of Tokyo University wanted to make the campus a conducing place for study, thus he tried to eliminate places that can be used for romantic rendezvous. And since the pink sakura is often closely related to romance, oops, the tree should also be 'banished' from the campus... :-)

I've tried to check in the internet about the fact, but I can't found any (either in Japanese nor English), so if you ever heard about it, please let me know... :-)

In contrary, TITech is very famous for its sakura - there's even a slope called ロマン坂 (romansaka - slope of romance) in TITech, where one side of the slope is adorned with sakura trees - so I think the president of TITech didn't bother at all about that romance stuff. Well, on the second thought, he didn't need to worry about it, since most of the TITech students are boys... :-) (But that's no problem at all. You can always invite girls to have hanami at TITech... ;-) )

Anyway, I'm glad that I went to TITech...

Monument in The City of Wind, And Why I Took Doctoral Course

2008-02-28T15:29:00.005+09:00

Me try to mimic the liberty statue behind. taken by Eden in Odaiba. The picture has no relation with the story, but anyway, it's one of my picture with a monument in it... :-)

The shortest official reason for my taking this long gruesome course called Ph.D. is actually that Indy Jones has a Ph.D. degree :-) - you might think that's a joke, but trust me, it's half true... anyway, for you who didn't buy it, I have another story... hope you'll be convinced this time... :-)

February 2001, I was attending my BCR (Basic Consulting Readiness) training for "the Firm" (what I mean with "the Firm" is indeed "the Firm" :-), didn't help much, did it?). For team building exercise, the instructor assigned us to build a paper monument for a ruler company. The motto of the company was "inch by inch", which meant that the higher the monument, the better. They wanna build the monument in Chicago (because their headquarter was there), and if you can recall that Chicago is often dubbed as "City of Wind", it would imply an additional requirement: not only the monument should be high enough, it should also be strong enough to withstand the wind (in our exercise it's not a real wind actually, it's just the instructor blowing at our monument :-) ).

There are 19 of us, and we were divided into 4 teams, 3 teams would have 5 members and 1 with 4 members. It just happened that there were only 3 engineers there (of course, this is a management consulting company - we do fishy business here. No straight and honest engineer would be tricked to join us... :-) ). Basic arithmetic would show that should the engineers be divided evenly, one team would short of engineer - and the four-member team happened to be the team that missed the engineer.

And to give us a good motivation, the instructor offered champagne for the first prize and chocolate for the second prize, so we went to our team room with head full of champagne and chocolate... :-)

As I was the engineer in my team, by the time we got to our room, every single eyes quickly directed at me and the question that I was afraid to be asked was asked: " You're the engineer here, aren't you? What should we do?"
I tried my best to offer an honest answer without stirring a mass hysteria :-) : "Well, I am a (gas petro) chemical engineer, not civil engineer! I have no clue just like you are..."

I was wondering whether the other two engineers had the same problem as mine. Jin-il and Veronique were both mechanical engineers, and I was sure their knowledge of building a stable monument were just as much (or in this case: as less :-) ) as what I had, so I was save to think that it was a fair contest. My team started some trial and error, and finally we came out with a monument that high enough and strong enough to be presented.

Back to the training room, I could hardly hold my laughter as I saw Jinil's team and Veronique's team came up with more or less the same design as ours (you know, engineer's mindset :-) ). However, I was struck when I saw the fourth team design: it was completely out of common -sense, however, you didn't need to blow it to know whether it was the best: it was rock solid and twice higher than our team (and, for your information, our monument was the highest among the engineer-designed monument, so theirs was simply unbeatable in term of height :-) ).

To make it short, the instructor blew the monument one by one, and the non-engineer team won. Kim (the leader of the team) jokingly said that it was because his team had the less members that the quarrel was also less and they could focus more on creating the best monument. However, if you look closely to their team members, 3 out of 4 have a Doctoral degree, and if my memory didn't fail me, Vivian (one of their team members) got her Ph.D. in Physics (which means that she should be able to tackle the problem better than all of us engineers here... :-) ). Excuses excuses you might say, anyway, our teams got the second price (which was actually better for me since I cannot drink the champagne but any amount of chocolate are welcomed :-) )

In the night after the session, all of us went out for a drink. At that time I had the chance to talk with Dali (one of the Ph.D.), and he told me some about his doctoral course.
"It's not about the class or the research that you do during the course. It's about the experience that you can get. Being a student is one of the most privileged statuses that you can get, and with it you can go to a lot of place and enter a lot of society without much barrier. There you can get to know a lot of people and acquire a lot of thing. But if you close yourself and concentrate solely to your subject, there's not much that you will get."

The bottom line of what he said was: the more people you meet and the more things you try, it will bring you a lot of friends and perspectives, which will help you to win the champagne next time around... :-) well, I don't mind about the champagne at all, but it really gives me the reason to try the Ph.D. course...

Anyway, if you still didn't wanna believe that I want to take my doctor because of that story, just believe the Indy Jones's stuff, will you? It's much more simple... :-)

Out of Kotatsu and Through A Cold Winter Night

2008-01-13T19:28:00.003+09:00

It is said that a lot of Japanese believe in superstitions. I don't know whether it is true or not, but a lot of my Japanese friends believe in fortune telling. If you wanna know how big the influence of this fortune telling, you can read below.

(By the way, I cannot mention any name here to protect 'the innocent'. The innocent that I mean here is me, not my friend. If she find that I write her name alongside this story, I think she's gonna kill me... :-) )

It was close to new year day, and one of my friends asked me whether I fancy to see the turn of year in a 神社 (jinja - Japanese shrine). I never been to a shrine in a new year eve and it should be interesting sight, so I accepted the offer. I came to her place around 8 pm, and while waiting until close to midnight, we sat in a 炬燵 (kotatsu - short legged table with heater), watched TV, drunk some hot tea... a really nice way to spend a cold night (it was winter, of course). The kotatsu was so cozy that the more the night grew, the less we wanted to crawl out of it, let alone to go to the shrine. The clock turned its hand to 11, and finally she said lazily, "It's cold outside. Why don't we just stay here and eat 年越し蕎麦?"(toshikoshi soba - soba (Japanese traditional noodle made from buckwheat) that usually eaten on the new year eve)

Of course I didn't mind at all. We continued watching TV, and the program happened to be a fortune telling program. It told you how your luck would be in the coming year, and it also mentioned the lucky item that you should have during the turn of year. I forgot what was the lucky item for my zodiac, however, I clearly remembered what the lucky item for 蠍座 (sasori-za - Scorpio (my friend's zodiac)): it was 甘酒 (amazake - sweet half sake).

And since it is well known that shrines usually offer free amazake on new year eve, you can easily guess what was my friend reaction: she jumped out of kotatsu, grabbed her coat, and said, "What are we waiting for? Let's go!"

Off we went, and in 30 minutes she got her lucky item for that night. I didn't know whether she got lucky after she drunk the amazake or not, but since the night was cold, it should be great to drink it. Unfortunately, I cannot drink it because it contain alcohol, but later we had our toshikoshi soba, enough to warm me up in that cold night... :-)

Well, I don't know whether faith can really move a mountain or not, but I know now that faith (in fortune telling) can get you out of kotatsu and through a cold winter night... :-)

Furuzawa Scholarship

2007-10-02T10:40:00.000+09:00

I first published this entry in my other blog, but since my friend told me that I should have put this in wierdo's spiel, I put it here also...

My friends often asked me how would I pay for my doctor course when they heard I planned to apply for Ph.D course, and usually I answered in jest, "I heard that you offer scholarship. May I apply?"
Most of the times my friend also reply jokingly, like Yoshizawa-san that said I already failed the test for Yoshizawa scholarship, or Yanagita that said that the Yanagita scholarship is worth 100 yen per month - barely enough to buy soft drink :-). That's why when Fujiko-san asked me the same question, I replied, "I heard that Furuzawa Scholarship (Furuzawa is Fujiko-san's family name) seeks for new scholars. May I apply?". And as always, Fujiko-san just laughed.

One day Fujiko-san had two Mexicans home-staying at her home, and she invited me to come over and have dinner with them. The dinner was fun - as usual - and since one of her guest like Uno a lot, we ended up playing Uno after the dinner finished. At that time Fujiko-san handed me five 10-yen coins. Seeing me having no clues on what I should do with the coins, Fujiko-san said, "You need it for the game. We bet."
"I can use my money then..."
"That's Furuzawa scholarship. You use it on the game, and let's see how much you can win. May be you can pay your school fee with that."
(Of course she was kidding. There's no way I can get more than 260 000 yen out of 50 yen in just one night :-). And that's why I also didn't explain to her that my religion forbid me to use money from gambling.)

The game went quite fast, and when it was close to 11 o'clock I've already multiplied my money three times :-). Actually the guests still wanted to play, but they had plan from early in the morning the next day, and I also have to go to my lab, so we stopped.

"You played well. I'll invite you again next time we play", Fujiko-san told me when I left. We think that if I can play like that every time, I might really able to pay my tuition fee with that :-).

Anyway, the guests returned to Mexico several days later, and we didn't have sparring partner anymore :-). I finally got scholarship from Itoen, however, Fujiko-san sometimes still invited me to have dinner with her friends and family - that may be part of Furuzawa scholarship :-).

Come to think of it, not only Fujiko-san, my other friends are also supportive during my stay here. May be that's one of the things that made me decided to stay for my Ph.D here. It's always great to be surrounded by those kind of friends...

Long Vacation

2007-09-28T10:27:00.000+09:00

Been staying in the hospital for one week plus another week at home because of Chickenpox, but it's not what I mean with the vacation. It's also not about the fact that more than a year I hadn't wrote a new entry in this blog.

Well, it's longer than that, but I've just realized it when I get hospitalized. Chicken pox is very contagious, and I got my own room in the hospital, where I alone most of the time (well, the nurses sometimes came and I could talk with them). I must admit that it was sometimes boring, but what's good with it is that I got a lot of time to think.

This is the second time I've got hospitalized and I've just realized during that time alone in the hospital that I've changed after my first hospitalization. It seemed that after getting out of hospital, I always chasing something, always felt that I've been left behind (even my dream analysis showed that :-) ). Well, it might be due to the fact that I left school for several days and I think I had to catch up with what I've been missing, but that feeling linger, even after I finished my school and I started new course of live - where I'm actually not behind anymore. Well, sometimes the feeling is good, it motivates me to work faster, however it made me lost my attention to details, and even worst, made me cannot enjoy work anymore.

That's why this time I really took my time during my leave. I wasn't thinking about school at all (glad that my professor told me to really take rest :-) ). Even when Inako (one of my friends) visited me and asked me whether there is anything that she could bring me, I resisted the temptation to ask her to bring me my notebook (she finally brought me some magazine instead, great because I started to running out of idea what to think about to kill time :-) ). With that I hope that I can be fresh (and free from stress, if I may borrow Makii's words :-) ) when I return to school.

Now I've started going to school again, and I really hope that the normal 'me' had already returned from his vacation :-). Anyway, it's been a long break for him, and he should be fresh enough to start doing my work again :-).

お帰り！

Durian, A Story (Part 3): Can You Keep It a Secret?

2006-07-11T13:46:00.001+09:00

Mochi that Pecolin gave me when we had Durian feast...
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This story actually occurred before the second part of the story, but I'd like to use this to close the trilogy (starwars? Indy Jones? :-) ).

Like I had mentioned before, I was ‘magnificiently’ successful in obtaining Durian this year, and without waiting until my room became Durian-scented, I brought it to Pecolin house. For a particular reason (that you'll also know after you read this through), I remember the date: it was May 14th.

Pecolin was surprised when I came, and indeed looked happier than usual. I often visit the family and she's always looks happy, but I never saw her grinned from ear to ear like that before. Even after I gave her the Durian, the smell couldn't erase the smile on her face (well, she likes Durian anyway, so it didn't count :-) ). Sonoyo was not there at that time, therefore we kept some for her and three of us had the Durian feast: me, Pecolin, and Otoosan (my home stay father. Otoosan literally means father. May be you will consider it strange that I call Pecolin by her name but call her husband 'father'). Anyway, the feast went without any accident. Pecolin likes Durian (so no problem with her), and even Otoosan who had never eaten Durian before had no problem to finish it (he even didn't need to rush for toothbrush after that :-) ).

Several days later I met Yoshimi. It looked like she had talked with Pecolin because she knew about the Durian feast.

"You know, she was very happy that you visit her last week."
"I can see that too." Pecolin ear-to-ear grin was still fresh in my mind. "She's always cheerful, but I never saw her so happy before. Was there any particular reason?"
"You didn't know it?"
I shocked my head.
"Do you still remember the date you visited her?"
"May 14th"
"You don't know what date it was, do you?"
I shocked my head again. ('Ear-to-ear grin' day? :-) )
"It's mother day! You know that she always considers you as her own son, and it was very meaningful for her when you visited her on Mother Day..."
Suddenly everything became clear.
"Actually I didn't know that it was Mother Day..."
"But still, she's very happy because of that..."

Well, should I tell Pecolin the truth, that it was just a coincident that I visited her on Mother Day? I didn't intended to lie to her, and if I keep it a secret from her, it wasn't a lie either, was it? As long as Pecolin herself doesn’t ask about it, I don't have the need to tell a lie, and everybody’s happy...

"Yoshimi, could you do me a favor? I hope you don't mind to keep it a secret from her? That I actually didn't know that it was Mother Day? I don't ask you to lie, just don't tell her about it. I think it's better to leave it that way..."
"Of course! Leave it on me."

May be someday Pecolin will find out about it anyway. Still, I think it is best to keep it a secret as long as possible. And if someday she finally finds it out, I hope at that time I had already had the chance to show her in other ways that I also consider her as my mother...

Anyway, several days later, I received a mail from Sonoyo. (Actually it has nothing to do with the 'Mother Day' stuff, but since this story started with I promised Sonoyo to find her Durian, I think it is better to close it with a mail from her).

アワンくん、こんばんは。先日はドリアンありがとうございました。初めて食べました。匂いは本当に強いですね。びっくりしました。(@_@)
味は匂いとは違っておいしかったです。主人は一口いただきましたが、ちょっと難しかったみたいです。私はたくさんいただきました。でも、日本人にとって、食べなれない味ですね。きっとアワンくんにいただかなかったら、生涯ドリアンを知ることはなかったかもしれない。
本当にありがとうございました。また会いましょう！

(Awan-kun, good night. Thanks for the Durian you gave us the other day. It was my first time to eat it. I was really surprised that it smells that strong.(@_@)
However, different from the smell, it tastes good. My husband could only eat a bit and it looked hard for him, but in contrary, I eat a lot. I think it is difficult for Japanese to eat it. May be if you never gave us the fruit, we will never eat it at all.
We really appreciate it. See you next time!)

In my reply I can only pray that her husband won't get any nightmare about Durian... :-)

Durian, A Story (Part 2): I Told You Not To Keep It Too Long in Your Refrigerator...

2006-06-30T14:17:00.001+09:00

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One year from “Durian Candy” affair, and May came again. This time I carefully marked my agenda for the Thai Festival, and I was lucky enough not to forget it or happened to have other plans on those dates. It was raining, but I still took my time to go to Yoyogi park (where the festival held) for that crazy little fruit called Durian (well, not ‘little’, perhaps :-) ).

The ‘fragrance’ (I think my lab pals won’t agree with this wording :-) ) quickly guided me to the right spot, and without further ado I started to choose the fruits. Wondering how much Durian I should buy, I began to think to whom I would give the fruit besides Pecolin and Sonoyo. The remaining members of my lab who witnessed “Durian Candy Panic” episode were Kurata and Makii, and I think both of them would kill me if I still dared to bring the smelly object to the lab. I didn’t want to risk my chance to graduate from my lab by giving the fruit to my professor, either :-), thus the option to bring it to the lab was out of question. After short-listing candidates for my next ‘Durian victim’ :-), the (un)lucky :-) person was Aki. Hippo members are always a good choice on something like this, for most of them dare to try new things. And most of all, Aki sometimes invited me for a dinner, and I think this was one of the way to express gratitude (honestly, at that time I didn’t reckon that Aki might not consider it as a gift, but as a disaster :-) ).

Anyway, I mailed her to ask whether she liked Durian or not. She said that she never ate it before, but, as I had guessed it, would like to give a bite. She also offered a pasta dinner for the exchange of the fruit, and we set the date to the next Thursday.

Thursday came and I brought the Durian to her place. This time I had already came to my sense (?) and realized that she might not like it, thus I also brought Azuki ice cream with me, just in case. Like I often said before, Aki is a good chef, and even though it was only two of us, she cooked pasta that enough to feed 10 hungry persons (exaggerating :-) ). Anyway, we started to eat, and it was really delicious that we (We? May be it was only me :-) ) ate a lot. Finished with the dinner, we were about to proceed to the long awaited dessert (yes, Durian...), when Aki said: ”Can we skip the Durian tonight? I think I prefer the Azuki Ice Cream...”

Well, I had no problem at all with that, thus we proceed to the ice cream. I told Aki before I left not to keep the Durian too long in the refrigerator, because the ‘fragrance’ would spread out (The Durian was double sealed, but you could still smell it. Even in the train back home from Yoyogi park to my home I started to worry when I could feel the smell creeping out of my bag. Accidentally, I was taking Toyoko line, where around a decade ago the Sarin gas accident occurred. I started to wonder whether people around me who could smell the Durian suspected me as a member of strange religion which planned to do a mass suicide in the subway :-) ).

The following Saturday Yoshimi and Aki invited me for a sushi along with Chesda (a guy from Kampuchea) and Akane (another Hippo member). At that time Aki told me that she still kept the Durian in her refrig and that all her stuff there seemed to have turned to Durian (well, at least the smell :-) ).

“I told you not to keep it too long there”
“I know, but I don’t have the confidence to finish it all by myself. Can we all come to my home and help me finish it?”

Yoshimi and Akane seemed interested with the idea, and I would be surprised if Chesda didn’t like Durian (he’s a southeast asian!) so after the sushi we went to Aki’s place to do her the ‘favor’. To make it short, we opened the fruit, and one by one tried it. As I already guessed, they found that it was more delicious than they thought before, but learning from “Durian Candy” affair, I prepared for the worst: their reaction for the “after effect” (when only the smell left in the mouth).

Well, may be because I had prepared myself for it, their “after effect” reaction were not as bad as I predicted. Aki and Akane did race for toothbrush after eating (literally :-) ), but at least they said that they would have no problem with it if the smell was not that strong. Moreover, Yoshimi was doing fine (and not reached for mouthwash :-) ), and thus we finished the remained Durian together.

“Is there any other way to eat Durian beside eat directly like this?” Yoshimi asked when we about to finish the fruit.
“Well, sometimes I eat it as ice cream”
Yoshimi savored the Durian taste in her mouth. “I think it suit a vanilla ice cream. I’d like to give it a try”

Well, now I know what’s my “Durian project” for next year: to find Durian ice cream in Japan.
And since this time the result was not so bad, I think it’s not a bad idea to test it again to my lab pals...

Durian, A Story (Part 1): Candy Frenzy

2006-05-27T19:33:00.001+09:00

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(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 :-).

Nice to Meet You

2006-05-15T23:17:00.000+09:00

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...
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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... :-).

Get Busy...

2006-05-15T23:08:00.000+09:00

Well, the picture has no connection with this blog (as usual :-) ), but eating that indeed can help you forgetting something (for the time being...)
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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...

I Confess I Had Lived My Master Years

2006-04-03T14:03:00.000+09:00

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I think I don’t need to tell you that if you’re enjoying something, the time will flash by like the wind. Well, it’s true. It feels like just yesterday that I attending the entrance ceremony for my masters course, taking pictures in front of fountain in sakura namiki (the fountain had already gone now), and being anxious about what lies ahead in two-year time; and suddenly, graduation day had passed.

Well, I won’t write much here, and if I’m to sum up all the things that happened these past two years, the words is fun, and a lot more fun. Of course some troubles also got in the way, but with those around me who have special knack to lift me up when I’m feeling down, and also those who’re far but keep on sending me their prayers, there’s only fine memories that come up anytime I recall those days.

I’m glad that God had let me live my master years to the fullest, even beyond what I had expected before; and now as I enter a new chapter of my life, I hope there’re still plenty of blesses that I would find along my endeavor...

Because Gossip Travels Twice the Speed of Light...

2006-03-25T11:36:00.000+09:00

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I was so busy in these past few weeks to prepare my master defense that I didn’t contact my friends from Hippo at all (the last time I met some of them was when I had new year party at my home-stay family’s place). Finally most of the works were done, and I casually sent mail to Akki (one of Hippo members) to say hi and tell her that I’ve done with my presentation. The mail developed into short chat (she wondered whether I was fine after hiking at mount Ooyama in January because the other members of hiking caught cold after returning) when she asked whether I fancied to have dinner at her place the following Sunday. Akki is a good chef and she likes experimenting with new dishes, so I didn’t waste much time to say yes, and my schedule for that day was fixed.

I was planning to call Pecolin (my home-stay mother) to tell her about the news too, but it seemed that I didn’t need to worry because she soon had heard about it.

“Congratulation!”, she said on the phone, and I quickly guessed that it was about my master defense. I was thinking that I needed to thank Akki for spreading the news (thus I didn’t need to bother to let everybody knew one by one and consequently saved my telephone bill :-) ), when Pecolin continued, “I’m glad that you will continue your doctoral course here.”

Doctoral course? Wait a sec, it seemed that something’s misplaced here. I quickly recalled whether I ever mentioned about doctoral course to Akki, and I’m sure I didn’t: so either my ear played trick on me, or the news that I told Akki was a little bit ‘modified’ :-) (By who, I didn’t know).

I quickly explained to Pecolin that I had passed my master thesis defense, but still didn’t know whether I will continue my doctoral course here or not (I even had not taken the entrance examination that time!). And even though I didn’t mind at all about the ‘customized’ news, I get a bit curious on who’s the one that ‘translated’ my news incorrectly. I was thinking to start the ‘investigation’ by calling Akki, but then I thought asking her at the dinner would be better (and would save my telephone bill again :-) ).

So, Sunday night came, and another surprise was waiting for me. When I get to Akki place, it was not only her, but Tomo-chan also there to help her prepared the dishes. Akki said that there would be some more to come, and therefore I asked whether there’s a special occasion that a lot of people would come to celebrate. And she playfully replied: “Well, I forgot to mention that tonight we will have a little party to celebrate your finishing of master’s defense!”

Well, I’m fine with that little secret, however, it reminded me about the gossip that had already spread so I asked Akki what did she told the others. What she said was a carbon copy of what I had told her (without the doctoral course part) so I thought the problem should be on the other ‘chain of communication’. And while waiting for the next ‘suspects’ to come, I helped them preparing the dishes.

Not long Yoshimi-san came with flower for me and congratulated me for finishing my master (well, she’s got it right, so she’s also free from all charges :-) ). Then along came Fujiko-san, who without much ado quickly congratulated me for finishing the test for doctoral course (well, now we know where the news changed... :-) ).

Anyway, like I had mentioned before, I didn’t mind at all about the ‘misinterpretation’. Fujiko-san didn’t mean to change the news, and by thinking that I had already passed my doctoral course test, it meant that she was wishing that I pass the test (and of course I’m glad to know that).

We had a good party that night, and Yoshimi-san even said that they will throw another party if I already settle with my doctoral course. When I asked what will happen in case I won’t continue my doctoral course here, she simply said: “We still can have a farewell party for you”.

Cool. Whatever waits ahead, there will still be a party to look forward to... :-)

Bizarre Love Triangle, Oops Rectangle

2006-02-26T14:49:00.000+09:00

(Picture from: http://drawings.love.ecards.free.fr/)
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Everything started one week ago. Carmela wanted to buy a digital camera so she asked me to show her the way around in Akihabara (electronic centre in Tokyo). Because two other friends of mine also wanted to go there for computer shopping, we then went in group.

On the way, we talk about all kind of things. I forget how did the conversation flowed, but finally Carmela asked me whether Makii (one of my lab members) has already had boyfriend or not. She was asking that because she wanted to do a matchmaking of her with one of her friends. And my reply at that time was more or less sounded like this: “You shouldn’t matchmake her with anyone because I like her too” :-).
(That was intended to be a joke. Makii is cute and funny, and I think I like her, but Yanagita once told me that she has already had boyfriend so the option is off).

I thought that the conversation would soon pass and would cause no problem at all, but I was wrong. The problem occurred on the following Thursday, the day of the thesis defense for bachelor students. Tan-san, who actually wanted badly to go back to China (he was going to get married soon), postponed his departure because our professor asked him to help Makii preparing her presentation (they have similar research theme). And after her presentation, to express her gratitude, Makii walked Tan-san to the building door (Tan-san went directly to the airport after the presentation). Carmela saw them going, and she asked Yanagita where they went.

“Tan-san is going back to China to get married”

And Carmela reaction was: “They are going to get married in China? Won’t Awan get upset about that?”

And, as predicted, the rumor spread widely even beyond my lab (so far I know that Saito and Konishi had heard that too, and even my professor knows, too). And because Carmela also moved her desk away from my side to a quite far place (she did this because in the new place she can watch movie in her computer with less disturbance :-) ), additional rumor said that she moved her place because she was angry to hear I like Makii :-).

Anyway, since all members of my lab seem not to take this rumor seriously (even Makii laughed when I told her about it), I think I don’t need to worry too much (honestly, I’m easily get worried about something like this). But at least if one day you ever hear about all of this, you know how this all started up...

(Perhaps I’m not recalling some of the details described above correctly, but more or less that’s how the story was flowing...)

To Educatedly Say “Your Eyes are Beautiful” to Japanese Girl

2006-01-26T23:34:00.000+09:00

I was planning to use Mouri Ran (毛利蘭) picture from Detective Conan (名探偵コナン), however it is hard to find her picture from net. Thus, I used Kamiya Kaoru (神谷かおる) from Rurouni Kenshin (るろうに検心) here...
(Picture from: http://sobakasu.free.fr/)

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If you’re not a native English speaker, I think you’ve ever been in a point on your English learning when you find that definite and indefinite articles (‘the’ and ‘a’) are extremely hard to comprehend, that it makes you think that unless you were reborn as a native, you will never understand them (honestly, sometimes I still feel so :-) ). Or, if you ever happen to learn German, you’ll know that its definite articles not only change according to gender, but also to the noun role in a sentence (nominative, accusative, dative, genitive), and that they could fill up your nightmares, specially before your German test :-). Well, every language has their difficult part, and when I was happy to find that there is no such articles in Japanese when I started to learn it, I should’ve known that the ‘phantasm’ that would haunt me through the rest of my life like the crawling creature in “The Ring” had yet to come (Okay, I’m exaggerating here... :-) ).

Well, those ‘horrors’ finally came to me, and they are called particles. They are short, most of them are only expressed by a single kana, but they play an important role in Japanese. Using the wrong particle in a particular sentence doesn’t make the sentences wrong sometimes; but worse, it makes the sentence convey a message totally different from what you intent to say. I give the example below. (I got this from Makii. We keep a shared diary where I write in Japanese and she write in English, and then we check each other’s entries and write our correction there. I made so many mistakes related to the particles that now the diary is full of particles usage explanations from Makii. The good point is, I think our diary is qualified enough now to be used as a Japanese Particles Guidebook :-) )

Here's the example:

Let’s say that you met a Japanese girl with shining eyes, and you’d go to the center of the universe just to say that out loud (世界の中心で、「your eyes are beautiful!｣を叫ぶ <-- if you know the movie you’ll understand this :-) ). Anyway, you want to look cool while doing it, and you think by saying it in Japanese will do the trick. So you type the sentence in your favorite automatic English-Japanese translator and whisper the sentence that the translator gives you to the girl...

Well, at this point, I could only hope that either the girl realizes that you’re not native Japanese, or she has a good sense of humor to think that you were just joking when saying it. Most of automatic translators would translate the sentence into ｢あなたの目は美しいです｣ (Anata no me wa utsukushii desu), or if you want it in a more colloquial way: ｢目は可愛いです｣ (Me wa kawaii desu) --> your eyes are cute. (In fact, I tried 3 translators and all of them gave me the same results). The sentences are grammatically correct, but the girl will reckon you saying that only her eyes are beautiful (and other parts are not). The grammatically and ‘spiritually’ correct translation would be ｢あなたの目が美しいです｣ (Anata no me ga utsukushii desu) or ｢目が可愛いです｣ (Me ga kawaii desu). You can see that the differences are only in wa (は) and ga (が), and these are the horrors, oops, the particles that I mean.

The problem will also arise if you want to say “You look great today!”. You shouldn’t say ｢今日君は素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi wa suteki da yo!), but ｢今日君が素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi ga suteki da yo!). Actually, there’s another particle for this that will give a better effect on what you intent to say: mo (も). If you say ｢今日君も素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi mo suteki da yo!), it would translate as “You also look great today! (as great as usual)”.

To sum up, here’s the list of “you look great today!” translation:
｢今日君も素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi mo suteki da yo!) (highly recommended!)
｢今日君が素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi ga suteki da yo!) (okay)
｢今日君は素敵だよ！｣ (Kyou kimi wa suteki da yo!) (never ever say this unless you really really know what you're saying).

Well, either way, I hope the girl understood what you really wanted to say... (even if what you actually want to say was "you (only) look great today!" :-) )

The Second Sheet

2006-01-17T22:12:00.000+09:00

I tried to find a picture of kabuki, but unfortunately I don't have it. This is the closest thing to kabuki that I ever took picture of, therefore I use this instead...
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Last week there was a thesis defense for doctor candidates in my department and, as usual, it was followed by party in the evening. I won’t tell how it all began (since it’ll claim too much space here), but after some chat, Carmela, UNESCO fellow who currently stay in our lab, said to Saito (Saito belongs to another lab) that she was lucky to had landed in a lab with handsome members like ours (ahem... :-) ). This reminded me to one of my earliest question for Japanese (and I almost always forget to ask about it): Why there’s no native word for handsome in Japanese (they use ハンサム, hansamu, which was adapted from English word handsome), while there’s a native word for beautiful (綺麗, kirei). And as you might well guess it, I wasted no time to ask about it.

To my surprise, all Japanese that surrounded me that night said that there’s indeed a native word for handsome. The problem is that just I never heard about it before. The word with the closest meaning to handsome that I often hear is 格好いい(kakkou ii), which more or less means cool (I hear this word a lot because a lot of people say that I’m kakkou ii :-). And before you send me any objection mail, there’re indeed some people who say that I’m kakkou ii, and most of them are kids :-). Anyway, you know that kids are still pure and won’t tell a lie... :-). Well, to this point I think I have made most of you throw up so I better carry on with the story...). Back to the main topic, the word that they meant was nimaime (二枚目). I rushed for my dictionary after I hear the word, since I get an impression that my ears played trick on me. Nimaime literally means ‘the second sheet’, and even with my absurdly entangled way of thinking I couldn’t see any connection between handsomeness and sheet. Konishi and Makii was about to tell me why, when Kim-san came and they let him explained.

Well, the word originated from practice in kabuki (歌舞伎: Japanese traditional theatrical drama). In the poster for the show, the first picture of the players would display the face of the leading role. For the second picture - I think it was in order to attract some visitors who would come for pretty faces - the picture of the most handsome player in the group will be displayed (here where the term nimaime come from). And if we go to the next picture, we’ll find the most entertaining player in the group.

Just to make sure, we (we?), search the dictionary for the first sheet (一枚目, ichimaime) and the third sheet (三枚目, sanmaime) terms. There was no word for ichimaime, but the entry for sanmaime tells that it stand for the word comedian or clown in English, which fits with the explanation of the word origin above.

By the way, quiz time: if you happen to be in the kabuki group, would you prefer to have your face in the first, second, or third sheet?

The Sloppiest Year of My Life

2006-01-01T17:43:00.000+09:00

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I broke my glasses while I was in Vietnam. Actually it got slammed when I was trying to close taxi door, but so far almost nobody could believe it. Yanagita and Makii even accused that it was because I looked so much at Vietnamese girls that the strength of my sight crumped my poor glasses :-) (They said this because Yoshizawa-san, who was in Vietnam with me, said that I was taking some girls into my hotel room. Two girls indeed visited me, but they were my friend’s sister and her friend, and we did nothing fishy, unless they teaching me how to say ‘I love you’ in Viet could be categorized into one :-) ). Anyway, despite all ‘allegations’, without being asked Yanagita escorted me to an optic so I could make a new pair.

But back to the broken glasses, after giving a second thought, it might hard to believe that someone could be so careless to get his glasses slammed by a taxi door. However, I’d been careless in lots of occasions last year and looking back to all that had happened makes crushing my pity little glasses won’t look even close to an accident at all.

Well, my friends who know me well must’ve learned that I’m reckless by nature, but particularly for important thing, few would see me as a careless person. Even some of my friends feel save when they have me in the room while doing experiment, because sometimes I warn them if there’re something misplaced that could lead to danger (I don’t know whether they will still feel safe if they know how I had been last year :-) ). I should still be grateful that none of my recklessness led to any catastrophe; I was still able to deliver report on time and my research went close to as planned. However, I did most of the works on the last hours of deadline, which was not a good practice at all. And what happened last year was not just that.

To add up to the list: I showed up late in several party where I’ve been invited; rose late at the day of mount Fuji hiking (glad I was still able to catch the train); and forgot that I had already promised to see Star Wars 3 with Yanagita (we finally moved it to another day). Well, if I sometimes put off my works ‘till the last moment, it’s not big issue. Procrastination is nothing new for me; I sometimes exhibit that kind of habit when I get bored, and the things that I need to do is just getting new air and everything will come back normal soon. But if I forget to watch Star Wars, and that didn't happen only for once or twice, there must be a problem.

Anyway, it all had passed, and I won’t blame anything or anybody for what happened last year; it was all from me and it is me who has to do something about it (I even need to say thanks to those around me who supporting me the whole year thru’). I think it’ll be a good resolution for this new year: ‘To make last year the sloppiest year of my life’ (i.e. ‘To make the years to come far better than last year...’). All I need to do now is to find a way to make it come true, and I hope I’ll find it.

By the way, happy new year, and I hope your year will last as you wish it to be, just like I wish mine will too.

What You Can See When You Sit on Water Closet

2006-01-01T17:36:00.000+09:00

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I was invited to the year end party at Ali and Kiki’s, and not long after arriving, Tita, who was also invited, told me that Kiki using her picture to decorate the toilet (?). I went there instantly, and found the wall inside being covered with lots of pictures (I also found my picture there). While Tita protesting to Kiki (not because her picture was there, but because “it won’t come out” for she’s too busy to look at all the picture while she’s inside :-) ), I think I could understand why Kiki doing that.

Even though I do “the thing that we do in toilet” fairly fast (I will call it “you know what” in the rest of this writing :-) ), my sister takes time to do it. That’s why she often brings book(s) with her inside the toilet, to kill time. Similar with my sister, Kiki decorated her toiler to help her spending the time required to do “you know what” (I also found some books there to support this 'hypothesis'). Since it seems that Tita used to do “you know what” fast, the picture seems to distract her ‘concentration’.

By the way, just curious: do you also decorate your toilet like the way Kiki did? :-)

Cat in Winter

2005-12-28T17:12:00.000+09:00

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May be because it’s winter so either I need to hibernate (am I a bear? :-) ) or my pen’s ink got frozen, anyway, in these last few weeks I found that it hard for me to write again (not only for this blog, but also for my master thesis, and I’ll be in big trouble if I can find no way to get round it really soon...). That’s why today I grabbed my muffler, gloves, and warm cap, and then took Aurora for a walk (Aurora is the name of my bike, and her full name is Aurora Borealis. Why I chose so, because it’s my first bike in northern hemisphere, and you can only find Aurora Borealis in northern hemisphere - if you find it in southern hemisphere, it would be called Aurora Australis instead. Anyway enough for astronomy class now...). We headed nowhere in particular; I just want to find some new air to refresh my felling. When I took a roll in Nakahara-kaido, I saw this cat (you can see it in the picture above) lying casually on top of car.

I must admit that there’s nothing special with the cat, but it could make me laugh to see him posing there like the king of the world. It’s not the cat that made me laughed; it’s because of other thing. The mechanism was like this: I saw the cat, and I remember Ari once told me that cats think they’re Gods (and this cat might think so). That piece of memory opened up the lock of other memories, because Ari told that thing on the very night when Bonggo borrowed the car of a friend of a friend of a girlfriend of his friend, and what happened on that night filled up my mind. This particular memory that made me laughed then (I hope the explanation doesn’t confuse you... :-) ).

You might think that the way I thought and finally laughed was strange (or not, since sometimes you think the way I think... I don’t know); however, it’s no matter to me. It helped me change the air that surrounded me, and before I realize it, I found that my pen is not frozen anymore. Well, I better use it to write my thesis now, before it get frozen again... (anyway, Yanagida and Chou-san just visited my bench and quite impressed because they thought I was writing hard for my research - but then laughing when they saw that I was writing for this blog...)

One Rainy Day

2005-12-05T10:40:00.000+09:00

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I’ve just arrived back from Vietnam yesterday, and today I had to take JLPT test. Despite I sleep all day after arrival (oversea recreation… oops, I mean conference, could drain up your energy, since there’re a lot of sessions to attend - as well as a lot of interesting place to see :-) ), I still could not wake up on time and had to run to catch my train, left me with no time for breakfast, left alone for preparing lunch (the test was scheduled until about 3 o’clock in the afternoon, so I needed to bring my lunch with me).

The first part of the test - Kanji and Vocabulary (漢字・語彙) - was close to catastrophe. Out of 20 opening questions, I could only answer 3 with a ‘slight’ confidence, and I even felt that I never seen some of the kanji in the test before (either the main usage of the kanji is merely to make dictionary thicker, or my trip to Vietnam had erased them from my memory :-) ). And to add up all troubles, I also almost fell from stair in the afternoon, and even though I successfully kept my balance, I sprained my ankle and it hurt to walk now, specially when I have to use stair (I hope it’ll be better tomorrow).

Anyway, despite some problems ‘greeted’ me today, there’re still several things that could cheer me up. When I check my mailbox on the way to test site, I found one small basket filled with cake there (Seada had put it the night before), so at least I can have it for my lunch. Furthermore, I met Dhita on the test site (we were taking the test at the same room), and she offered me to share her lunch. Thus, instead of skipping lunch like what I (unwillingly) planned before, I ended up having a proper lunch plus some dessert (we ate Seada’s cake as dessert :-) ). The merry lunch seemed to influence the progress of the test (at least the session after lunch, Reading and Grammar (読解・文法), was far more better than the first one, and the second session of Listening (聴解) wasn’t bad either). Even though the Kanji session seemed to had done enough damage that the two other sessions cannot make up, there’s still hope left that I will pass the test (with one condition: I have to be very lucky and most of my wildly guessed answers turn out to be right :-) ). Either way, the result of the test won’t make a big consequence to me (I think Panasonic won’t mind if I can’t pass it this time, furthermore after knowing that I went to Vietnam up to the day before the test :-) ).

To sum up the day, some of my friends help me out to otherwise a terrible day, and I think tomorrow I need to do the same to my other friends, to keep the cycle on...

How Many TITech Students Does It Takes to Bake Gyouza?

2005-11-10T09:48:00.000+09:00

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The answer is three, and the gyouza was still overcooked. That was based on the party at Vashek and Klara’s home. Go was bringing gyouza for us to eat (some of them was even made special for me because I can’t eat meat), but none of us had the experience of baking gyouza. It ended up with Go, Kazue, and Klara experimenting with them, and even though the result wasn’t perfect, it was still good enough to enjoy as we talk about all kind of things.

Actually, if you ask the question somewhere else, the answer could be different. If you happen to be lucky enough and land in my lab, the answer would be one, and the gyouza would be professionally cooked. However, if you’re not, there’s a probability that the answer might reach infinity and all you can get is some USO (unidentified smoking object :-) ).

So, what is the thing that set the difference between my lab, party at Vashek and Klara’s, and ‘somewhere unknown’ that can only produce USO? Well, my lab has several ‘semi-professional’ chef (most of my lab mates are either like cooking or ever work part-time in a restaurant); at Vashek and Klara’s we have some experienced ‘cooker’, but no one experienced in gyouza baking; while ‘somewhere unknown’ doesn’t have any single person experienced in cooking.

I think the message is clear enough: it is often dangerous if you’re daring something that you know nothing about. At least a little bit preparation will do the trick (and escape you from the likelihood of having USO :-) ).

Lift Up of The Day

2005-11-10T09:40:00.000+09:00

I got this Captain Hook from Wendy on my first week in Japan (She said that he looks a lot like me :-) ). The captain has a knob on his back, and by turning the knob, he will swing his arm around. Simple thing, but by watching the swing, sometimes it can help me lift my mood up...
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Do you ever feel that your mood influences your day? May be not all of you ever feel that way, but at least I, and some of the people that I know, do. Here’s one story from my lab (at first it might not look directly related to the topic, though...):

One afternoon several weeks ago. The fifth game of Hawks vs. Marines in Pacific division of Japan Baseball league, and the winner would go to the Japan series. Makii (one of my junior), as one of Hawks’ fans, became restless all afternoon and kept on checking the internet for the preview of the game. By the way you saw her at that time, you’d believe that she herself who would play for the game (or, as she then corrected: “as if my own kids who’ll play for the game”). Tan who sits next to her couldn’t help asking whether the game was really that important.

Well, perhaps most of normal people - who have good sense and can cope with their feeling well - would not understand it, and would think that it’s silly to get carried away for something so trifling like that. However, I could understand it very well (which actually implies that I’m not normal and don’t have good sense :-) ). And I’m clearly not alone here. Yanagita (my other lab-pal, who’s like me, a little bit abnormal and doesn’t have good sense :-) ) was supporting Makii by saying, “It’s sure important. It’ll help giving you some spirit in doing research the next day if your team wins”. (By the way, if you’re thinking that it’s only happen in my lab, you’re wrong. You can check it in Harry Potter 5 and see that Harry and Hermione once argued about Harry and Weasley’s twin’s care about the next Quidditch game, and the argument was ended by Hermoine’s saying that at least her happiness didn't depend on Ron's goalkeeping ability).

Back to the topic - and as Yanagita mentioned - some of us do have problem dealing with mood. When your team loses the game, or when your plan doesn’t go as you wish, it can turn you blue and consequently the next thing that you do also tends to go awry (may be that’s why they say “It never rains but it pours”; it’s not the problems themselves that come in group, it’s the mood that makes everything looks wrong). If you happen to be this sort of people, well, I can’t tell you ways to control your mood yourself (since we’re in the same ship :-) ), but fortunately, because our (yes, it’s our) moods are easily influenced, we can use those around us to turn the day around. For us mood is contagious: when the people around us are happy, they tend to lift us up with them, and when they’re feeling down, we tend to feel for them too. So, whenever your mood lets you down, just look around and find someone who can hook you up. It can be your lab mate who’s yell ‘ohayou’ when they enter the room. It can be just a cheerful dove that lost his way into your lab (it did happen once in my lab). It can also be some people from across the street that beaming around despite the cloudy weather. It’s just everything, everywhere.

Anyway, may be it’s better if I scream ‘ohayou’ when I step in my lab today. Someone might need a little bit lift up. Who knows?

Is It Not The Right Time?

2005-11-10T09:31:00.000+09:00

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The next research report meeting is looming ahead and you have thrown all of your data in the previous presentation. It means that you have to start get busy or you’ll end up reporting a blank sheet. (Sounds familiar?)

While some might advise that it’s not the right moment to waste time by doing trivial things (such as filling up blog :-) ), I even feel the temptation to write here more than usual. Should I discard the lure and keep strict with my research, or should I follow the feeling? Well, it might look like the choices are left between the two, but if I give it a second glance, actually there’s a third choice (and perhaps also the fourth, the fifth, and the options can still grow): I can do both (or not doing either, or etc, etc - you can make an complete laundry list here).

Sometimes the question is not on the matter of ‘which left to choose’, but more to on ‘what else that can be chosen’...

Visions of Memories

2005-10-01T17:47:00.000+09:00

I wrote this for the foreword of gp96 gallery. As it might be replaced by new version of foreword in the future (I don't know when :-) ), I also put it here for online archive. Some of the content is similar to my other blog here.
Thanks for Ratna for some of the ideas...
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... old pictures are always pleasing to behold, for episodes portrayed by them could swing the pendulum of moment to the nearly forgotten hours. It doesn’t matter if those images start to fade away - eroded by the passing hours - the memories sheltered within your heart will help redrawing the lines, refresh it into a crystal vista as clear as it ever be. Those passions, those laughter, and those tears will emerge and embrace you, make you think that there’s no way those days had already passed you by.

Seeing things came and went - some events that went as planned, while other went astray; some promises that be said and done, while other will never come true - make you see that there’re lot of good times and bad times standing between you now and you then. It is amazing to see that the naïve, unseasoned you back there could past all the hardship to become the present you, sitting there right now. It was not the experience back there, but the hope and the spirit, and also the enheartening from those friends of yours, which help you through all the hurdles looming on your way. You don’t need to wonder where all of those hope and spirit had gone, for as you flip thru’ all those framed memories, you can still feel them scintillating through the layer of dust precipitated by the flowing days. Nor you need to wonder where all those friends had gone; they might not always have a glimpse of you in their mind, but be sure that you have a special place, right in the heart of their soul. Just don’t let the flame burn out, and when they flip thru’ these vision of memories just as you do right now, an image of a special friend will fill up their mind. An image of you...

The Man in the Silly Red Sheet

2005-09-30T11:21:00.000+09:00

Picture taken from http://www.darkhorizons.com/
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I was trying to find new song from Foo Fighters (well, it’s not new anymore now), when I ran across a file titled “It’s not easy to be me” by Foo Fighters. I never heard such a song from Foo Fighters before, so I checked the song, and later realized that ‘twas not a song by Foo Fighters at all (lucky me that I didn’t have to do a lyric search in Google since Ari gave me the song when I left for Japan, so I had heard it before). It was actually a song by a group called Five for Fighting, and the actual title of the song was “Superman”.

Perhaps many of you had heard the song before, but anyway, I’ll tell you the content (It’s not bloopers, isn’t it?). It tells about Superman (as the title suggest, I think you should have been able to figure it out without having me telling you :-) ). However, the song doesn’t tell us about how great superman is, who can jump over tall skyscrapers in a single bound, neither tell about any other superman clichés. No. It tells that Superman also has problems and sorrows, has dreams and wishes. After all, he just a human (or an alien that looks like human - at least a living being), and it is normal for him to have problems like any other human (besides regular problem of Lex Luthor trying to rule the world and such...).

So, for superman that possesses all the superpower that you’d fancy to have, superman that be adored by Lana and Lois whose mere smile would make the sun seems to shine your universe all day thru’ (if you happened to be a boy, you might envy him for the second reason rather than the first one though :-) ), everything is not always going as he wishes. Even sometimes he has to worry about problems that won’t sweat a normal human (i.e.: us). It might sound trivial, but it’s true that nobody’s perfect, and each has different things that make him/her worried.

Anyway, if you read the lyric thru’, you’ll reckon that most of its contents also fit with most of us. We’re all more than a bird (except if you’re a bird and happen to read this blog. On the second thought, if you indeed a bird and you can read and understand this, you are more than a bird!). We’re clearly more than a plane (I’m sure about this one). And we’re also more than some pretty faces beside a train (except if you wish to be considered as just some pretty faces beside a train, it’s your choice then... :-) ). What I wanna say here is that we’re all special in our own sort of way. And of course with that specialness, each of us also has our own special kryptonite that made us worried. However, it shouldn’t keep us worried all the time, because that’s just the way life is. God gives us our kryptonite, so we can learn to face it, and grow much stronger from it.

By the way, I put the lyric here for your perusal. No matter how tough the going for you right now, just don’t give up fighting and dreaming. As the song suggests, even a hero has the right to dream, and you’re the hero of your own story.

I can’t stand to fly, I’m not that naive
I’m just out to find, the better part of me

I’m more than a bird, I’m more than a plane
I’m more than some pretty face beside a train
And it’s not easy to be me

Wish that I could cry, fall upon my knees
Find a way to lie, about a home I’ll never see

It may sound absurd, but don’t be naive
Even heroes have the right to plead
I may be disturbed, but won’t you concede
Even heroes have the right to dream
and it’s not easy to be me

Up, up and away...away from me
It’s all right...you can all sleep sound tonight
I’m not crazy...or anything...

I can’t stand to fly, I’m not that naive
Men weren’t meant to ride, with clouds between their knees

I’m only a man in a silly red sheet, digging for kryptonite on this one way street
Only a man in a funny red sheet, looking for special things inside of me
I’m only a man in a funny red sheet, I’m only a man looking for a dream
I’m only a man in a funny red sheet, and it’s not easy to be me

(Superman, Five for Fighting)

Getting A Little Bit ‘Ecchi’

2005-09-30T11:10:00.000+09:00

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I think most of us realize how communicating using two different languages sometimes can result in misunderstanding. Well, I’ll tell one of the problems that can arise between Japanese and Indonesian this time (if you think that this is related to the word ‘ring’: it’s not that one!).

Like perhaps I’ve already told you a hundred times before, I often receive an invitation related to the word “eat” (he he he…) from my friends in Japan. This time Ali and Kiki, friends from Korea, invited me and several other people from Hippo for a dinner party at their home. The dinner was great (I quickly realized that I can live happily ever after in Korea if it’s only a matter of food :-), well, that’s probably simply because Kiki can cook very well... ), and while eating, we talked about lots of things.

Since people from Hippo always like to learn languages, they didn’t forget to ask me to teach them some Indonesian words. All was going well, until they asked me about the Indonesian word for “study”.

Well, the Indonesian word for study is ‘belajar’. However, when it’s spelled, it sounds like brajaru for Japanese (they don’t have the character for L in their kana), and in Japanese, barajaru means (sorry!) bra (actually, it came from the word brassiere). Most of us laugh after knowing the fact, and although I was worried that the dinner would turn a little bit awkward after that, it wasn’t (thanks to the openness of most Japanese to such a thing). That “study” thing even make the party become more lively (later Ali even wondered whether the word for not studying in Indonesian would be no*** (you guess those three stars yourself :-) ), but Ani quickly cut him by menacingly saying「アワン君に何を教えてるの！」(And what are you trying to tell Awan-kun!) - so the conversation was quickly switched into other topics...

So, one important advice: be careful with what you’re saying...

* If you don’t know the meaning of Ecchi, it’s actually means ‘H’ in Japan, and ‘H’ is more or less equal to ‘x-rated’ in English. If you still don’t know what it’s meant by it, you better consult your encyclopedia, because I don’t want my blog to be banned for underage :-).

When There’s Someone That Care More Than You Do...

2005-09-30T10:56:00.000+09:00

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There were several moments in my life when I just let go everything and just followed where the destiny took me. I’m not saying that I gave up and quit the fight. I still kept on fighting, but I did it without any passion at all. I was just feeling empty at those times, and thinking that anything that might come surely would be enough for me. (And one of those let go’s landed me here in Japan. I’m not complaining at all, I’m more than happy that I can be here, and it’s not just a lip service...).

And recently the same kind of feeling came again. With about 6 months left, I was still undecided about where to go after finishing my master. I was thinking that I just do what I used to do: do everything properly, not more and not less, and just take anything that will come from it

Anyway, something that happened yesterday changed my vision a bit. One of my junior gave me a luck charm, and she also wished me the best for my doctoral study plan. Well, it was just a simple thing (and I also don’t believe in charm since my religion forbid it), but the fact that someone cared about my future more than me myself really got in me. I think I’ll change the way I think a bit and try to consider about what I’m gonna do more seriously. Well, I’m not trying to say that I’ve already got in my mind what I fancy to do after graduation; I am still undecided about it, but now I’ll try all the chances that I shall come across with all my passion. I’m not trying to say that I’ll only seriously think about the future; I’ll try to take every single chance to laugh and have fun, since it is pointless to do something if I couldn’t enjoy it.

And about the charm, I think I’ll keep it. It’s not that I believe about the power that it has. I’ll keep it because it will remind me that there’s someone around me (and I also believe there’re several others out there) that cares about my future more than I do, and it should help me be more grateful for all the gifts that God has blessed on me...

The Things That Will Happen If You Borrow the Car of A Friend of A Friend of A Girlfriend of Your Friend

2005-09-01T00:51:00.000+09:00

My mother used to make us birthday cake on our birthday, but ever since I went to university, I never had it anymore (because I never home on my birthday - and birthday with my friends always enough only with pizza). However, this year Seada made me one (my first in 10 years) and it really brought back the memories of old days...
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There was indeed something special that happened on my birthday this year, and some of my friends had asked me ‘to disclose’ it in details. I’d like to do that, however, for the sake of protecting the innocent (singular - without ‘s’ to be exact :-) ), with much regret I have to refuse the request :-). Yet, to indemnify the disgruntlement that it may cause, (Why do I sound so formal? Anyway all I want to say is: To make up if you’re feeling upset with me, ...) I’ll write something that happened on my other birthday (Lucky me, there’s almost always something unique or strange that happens on my birthday, which worth to remember).

It was in 2001. Ari had planned to celebrate Bonggo’s, Lisya’s, and my birthday at muara karang (MK) (additional fact: three of us were born on the same day, only differed by hours). I was planning to ask Irma too, but because I’m a very shy type of person (okay, I can hear you tripped off your chair and start to throw up, but I’m indeed a shy boy :-) ), and that we were still just friends at that time (so I didn’t know for sure whether she would be fancy to go or not), I put off asking her until the D-day. I also didn’t tell the others about my intention, and planned to tell them later when I had already got the ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer (to be exact: I would only tell them if I got a ‘yes’ answer :-) ).

The MK plan was on the night, and I went to Irma’s place in the afternoon (she knew that it was my birthday and I had told her that I would come). To make it short, she gave me present and wished me a happy birthday. We then went out, originally for dining, but since it was too early to eat, we went to Gramedia (I think Ari would say “You two went dating in bookstore?” when he knew about it :-) ). The sky had turned deep grey by the time our stomachs screamed starving, and Irma said that it might be better to go back to her place and tried to find something to eat nearby. So, we went back.

It was not long when the drop of water started to fall, and soon it was raining cats and dogs. By the time we reached her place, it was almost impossible to get out without getting wet, even with an umbrella. It was then when the lady that owns the home that Irma rented came and said that she worried about the roof of the house. There was some problem with it before, and she worried that water had sipped inside the house through it. Irma went to her room (it was in the 2nd floor), and found that almost everything had turned wet.

We spent the next half an hour to clean the room. She said sorry countless of time and said that it was no fun way to spend a birthday. But anyway, it was fun for me. Well, at least because of that I came to know that she had a pokemon poster in her room (she picked the poster merely because she like the color) and that she had our picture on top of one short cupboard (that made me know that it wasn’t one way love back there :-) ).

Ari called not long after we finished cleaning the room, and I realized that I had not asked her about the MK plan at all. Thus, I told Ari to hold on a sec and quickly asked her. Like I had already said, I’m a very shy type of person (I hope you didn’t trip off this time :-) ), but I can asked her quickly that time without any hesitation. (I think that was because I had seen our picture in her room - it made the odds of having her saying ‘yes’ higher :-). Furthermore, the “pokemon effect” also had created a big impact. You can safely guess that someone is fun if she doesn’t mind having pikachu face hanging on her wall :-) ). To my delight (and as you may have guessed), she said that she’d like to, so the next moment I told Ari that I would bring someone with me. He said that ‘twas okay (but I think he hid his laughter that time :-) ), and asked where he could pick us up.

For the rest of the night everything seemed to go smooth for me and Irma (The rain had stopped, and at least we didn’t have to mop somebody’s room again that night :-) ), but unfortunately not with Bonggo. Because Ari’s car was not big enough to bring us all to MK, Bonggo was borrowing the car of a friend of a friend of a girlfriend of his friend (if my memory doesn’t fail me, that was the right order :-) ). Actually everything was going as planned, until he took a prohibited turn in order to save time, and as a result had a police car followed him. Being in state of panic (because he was not driving his own car and it would be very awkward if he had to tell the police that it was the car of a friend of a friend of a girlfriend of his friend that he was driven that night), he ran the car into Ancol (one of the amusement park complex in Jakarta), and luckily the police gave up the chase. Still, he then had to awkwardly respond to our question: ‘Why the hell should he go into Ancol?’

The trip was then going with no big incidence (unless if the fact that Ari (who’s driving with Lisya) mistook the highway could be categorized as incidence). We arrived at MK very late from schedule, but MK is even better if you come late, so we weren’t complaining at all. Furthermore, Bonggo said that with all the things that happen that night, all of us then have a nice story to be told to our kids and grandkids :-).

We returned almost morning (close to 4.30), and I quickly walked Irma to her home. She said that that night was really fun and that she glad she went with us. A little bit out of the story, we started going steady four months later, and even we’ve broken up now, I’ll follow Bonggo’s advice: I won’t cry because it’s over, but I’ll smile because it happened...

And I do smile every time I recall it...

Love Inside Takoyaki: Why a Gift Clothes Feels Warmer When It’s Worn

2005-08-31T21:54:00.000+09:00

I didn’t bring much clothes when I came to Japan, but still my baggage felt quite heavy to carry. Besides books, my bag were filled with some gifts from my friends (which actually not essential for my stay in Japan). Yet, I never regret bringing them here, because they constantly remind me that there are some people that care for me, (hopefully) as much as, or even more than I care for them...
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I think you often read something like this before, but I’ll write anyway...

It always feels good to go eating with my lab friends or my home-stay family, since they are much more concerned in any ‘edible objects’ that I eat than me myself. Not only they always try ‘to feed’ me with more high-calorie food (to help me gain more weight :-) ), they also always check first whether the food contain meat or not (I refrain eating meat here in Japan for a reason related to my religion, except it is stated clearly that the meat is okay for me). Like when we bought Takoyaki (たこ焼: baked octopus) on our way back from batting center; they didn’t forget to ask first whether the Takoyaki contain meat or not. The waiter quickly replied that there was no meat there, and that they only used seafood for the ingredients. Feeling safe with the response, we proceeded to buy some, but the waiter halted us by saying that actually they added something else to the food. We started to worry that it was something that I shouldn’t eat, when the waiter told us that ‘that something else’ was aijou (愛情: love :-) ).

We couldn’t help laughing at that time, but by the time we ate it, it did taste a little bit different. Of course it should have been tasted the same as (or at least similar to) any other Takoyaki that I had eaten before. But the notion of “love inside Takoyaki” was enough to change the Takoyaki into something different. Something special (special enough to be mentioned here :-) ).

Well, by now you should have already figured out what are the words that I think would properly answer the question above (i.e. because there’s love inside it). However, it will lead to the next question: does it always feel warmer to wear gift clothes? If you don’t often buy your clothes yourself (like me... :-) ), may be you won’t feel the warmth all the time. It is because you already get used to it and often don’t think much about the fact that somebody gave it to you. Similar to the Takoyaki case: if the waiter didn’t mention about the bonus ‘love’ inside, the Takoyaki wouldn’t taste differently. No matter how much love that they put inside it, your clothes won’t feel warmer if you don’t think about the giver. It is their love to you and your love back to them that synergistically help to make it feels warmer. Without it, the love inside won’t glint, and you won’t feel the esoteric geniality lies inside. (By the way, although I mentioned the word ‘love’ quite a lot of time here, it is not only gift from your lover that I mean. Even sometimes your family or friends can love you to an extent that your lover can’t...).

And of course, clothes is just an example (I picked it up because I received clothes from lots of people :-) ). Any gift from your friends, family, or other people that cares about you is filled with their love. By knowing that they love you and having the same feeling to them, you’ll be able to sense that, however simple the gift is, it indeed something special.

Japanese Lesson in Five Minutes

2005-08-31T21:41:00.000+09:00

This is the picture of Sotetsu line, where the Futamatagawa station is located. Sorry for the small picture, but if you're really lucky enough to be able to read it, you would be able to see the Futamatagawa station (it right on the branch of the line) and Kibougaoka station right next to it.
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Last week we had party in my professor home (we have it every year), and on the subway to the party I got additional important word to my Japanese vocabulary (actually it depends on how you define the word ‘important’ :-) ). It was started with Chris and Tang-san showed me one station that we would pass on our way to the party. The station name was futamatagawa (二俣川), and when they reckoned that I didn’t find anything interesting with the name, they asked me whether I knew the meaning of ‘futamata’ (二俣, or sometimes二股).

I tried to consult my dictionary, but their explanation, added by Kim-san and Makii, was able to enlighten me more than any dictionary ever exists in this world :-). Futamata means ‘to have it both ways’, and it is also often used to express the act of having two lovers (and of course this meaning that attracted their attention :-) ).

Eventually, ‘the lecture’ developed into discussion on why a river (川: kawa or gawa: river) was given such a name. Even though the most logical explanation is that because the river forks into two directions, it seemed that everyone agreed that the river got its name because there are a lot of people with two lovers visiting the river (As an addition, the name of the station next to futamatagawa station is kibougaoka (希望が丘) station, which literally means ‘hill of hope’. And according to our ‘consensus’, this is the place where someone who wish to have two lovers go... :-) ).

Well, I think now you’re no longer wondering from what source I got my vocabulary of such words... :-)

Passage to The Past

2005-07-30T16:30:00.000+09:00

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Ari, Ratna, and I had planned to gather old pictures of gp96 (alumni of Gas Petrochemical Engineering Department, class of 96 - where three of us belong) to be put on the net. While it is their job to gather the pictures (and they did their job well so far), it is my job to find suitable space on the net where we can put them on - and I’ve just found the place recently, which make it a real delay to our work (sorry!). Anyway, for the last couple of days we finally had most of the things ready and we could start our “long-awaited” project.

During uploading files, I deliberately took some times to look at those pictures again. Even though the scene looks as if it starts to fade away - eroded by the passing hours, the episodes portrayed inside those thin rectangular frames really bring me back to the moment. It is as if I find a time portal that makes the time turns counter-clockwise, and the old scenes reveal themselves all around me again.

Seeing things came and went - some events that went as planned, while other went astray; some promises that be said and done, while other will never come true (as the person you made the promise with had passed away); some of the friends that you think will stay with you till the end of time had left with no trace at all, while some “outsiders” had proven to stay beside you through your darkest hours - make me see that there’re lot of good times and bad times standing between me and me from the past. It is amazing to see that the naïve, unseasoned me could past all the hardship to become the present me, sitting here right now. It was not the experience back there, but the hope and spirit that help me went through all the hurdles looming on my way. And those hope and spirit can still be felt up to now, scintillating through the layer of dust from those old photographs.

I indeed can use that spirit again to light up my way through the maze of time I currently in. Like me in the past, it doesn’t matter what complication that shade my way ahead. As long as I could keep the hope alive inside, there’ll always be a way.

So, let the hope and spirit shine...

Ball on Top of the Tree

2005-07-20T23:55:00.000+09:00

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My lab peers like to play volleyball on the ground just beside our building, specially on those fine afternoon after the seminar over (sometimes it turns to dodge ball, depend on our mood - if our “sadistic” level were high enough and we fell like to have other people as a target for ball throwing, we do dodge ball :-) ). The picture above is actually the picture of us playing (even though it just looks like some rascals trying to steal mangos from their neighbors’ yard). It was when Kawatoko saying that he will do a 天井サーバー(tenjou saabaa), literally means “ceiling serve”, a hanging serve that goes high as if it would touch the ceiling of the gym (from where it has got the name); unfortunately for him, the ball ended up on top of a tree, and he had to climb it to recover the ball. Since then we use the 天井サーバー term to call every ball that (unintendedly) ends up on top of the tree :-)

Then I just realize that language can evolve that easy in just a few minutes. And so can life...

Bloom and Shine Like the Ajisai

2005-06-22T12:37:00.000+09:00

(This picture was taken several days ago, on one rainy day when Seada was half asleep in her lab :-) - well, actually I was also so sleepy that day. I’m glad she’s not protesting when I asked her to pose in front of the Ajisai...)
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I heard and use the word Ajisai before I even knew what it actually is, and later I started to like it even before I ever saw it. Well, Ajisai is a name of a flower (紫陽花 - Hydrangea, don’t ask me more about it, since I don’t know much about flowers :-) ), quite beautiful flower indeed. Although it not as striking gorgeous as the sakura, it’s simply alluring. Like I told you before, I like the flower, and even Panasonic Scholarship Office (PSO) uses Ajisai as password for one of their sites (I can’t tell you which one for the site still on today).

What’s so special with Ajisai that makes PSO chose it as password (and makes me like it too)? Well, the main reason is that Ajisai is the Japanese flower for the month of June, and June is my birth-month (well, this is my reason, but (unfortunately) not the PSO’s :-) ). Why PSO chose the flower of June as their password was based on the story behind the flower.

Mr. Saito, the president of PSO at the time I came to Japan told us about the story. He said that the month of June is the rainy season (梅雨 - tsuyu) for most parts of Japan. Rain falls down almost everyday, and when it is not raining, the air is hot and damp, make it hard to spend the day comfortably. Because of the rain, most of the blossoms are destroyed, left the gardens of Japan with almost no flower to grace them. Among the small number of flowers left, there’s one that not only can stand the wearing weather, but also able to bloom elegantly, and (you’re right) it is Ajisai.

We can simply compare Ajisai to other flowers, and we will find that there are lots of flowers that possess the charm more than Ajisai. Well, it is not the look that makes Ajisai so special, it is its ability to successfully accomplish what other beautiful flowers cannot do that define its characters. The Ajisai illuminates the gardens when the season seems to make lots of people to be on the edge their temper, help them to calm down a bit and easing the severity of the days. It is not much that Ajisai can do, but it does what it supposed to do, and that little part that it does completes the wholeness of this universe.

In his speech, Mr. Saito asked us to become like the Ajisai, who could stand the hard times and keep on shining, to carry out something that it means to complete. Be like the Ajisai, who radiate it spirit around, helping other to stand the harshness of the day, even by doing so it has to stand tiring season that could vaporize the liveliness away.

So, when you feel that the path that you take becomes rough and makes you wanna give it up, just remember the Ajisai...

The Rabbit, The Cat, and The Affection

2005-06-21T13:27:00.000+09:00

(There are lots of cats in my campus, and this is the picture of one of them (quite old picture, I took it with my cell phone) . Actually today I went around my campus to find a cat to be taken as the illustration of this writing, however, I can't find one - where the hell are they when we need them?)
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(“Rabbit” and “cat” in this writing refer to the pet that we had. Since there are lots of kinds of rabbit and cat and even each single rabbit and cat have their own characters, I don’t mean to tell that all rabbits and cats behave like ours)

When we were kids, my sister and I wanted to have dog as pet. However, our grandma didn’t like about the idea, and to make us forget about it, she bought us rabbits. Very cute, with those shiny eyes and bushy tail, those rabbits quickly charmed us, and we soon forgot about the idea of having dog.

However, our “hysteria" of having rabbits didn’t last long. After three weeks or so we’ve already got bored with them. Perhaps it was because they weren’t home pet, so we had to put them in their hutch at night and not bring them inside, leave alone to have them sleep in our bed - that’s why we didn’t fully feel that they were our pet. Moreover, even though we had already spent much time together with them, they still looked indifferent toward us. They weren’t coming when we called them (despite the fact that we also waved carrots in front of them :-) ), and even sometimes ran away when we get closer. It seems like the affection that we showed was fruitless.

About one year later, we had new pet in our house. Similarly shiny-eyed and bushy-tailed (longer, though…), this new cute little creature was cat (this time our grandma didn’t mind since she also likes cat). We didn’t bought her like we did with the rabbits, the cat just came one day in our house (at that time my father was eating fish in the veranda and I think the cat was "enchanted" by the smell :-) ). Anyway, in the next few minutes the cat already slept in my lap, and soon, the whole family also fell for her. We played with her almost everyday, and she even slept in our bed at night, where she lied on my or my sister’s knee’s bend (it was warm and felt good at the beginning, however, since my home town is a hot place and the heat from the cat quickly build up in our knee, we soon feel uncomfortable and move her some other place. Yet, when we’ve already slept again, usually the cat returned and rolled her body on our knee again, made us uncomfortable again, and the process repeated all night - no wonder we have a bad habit of sleeping... :-) )

Unlike the rabbits’ “hysteria”, this time we didn’t get bored with the cat. It’s not that we never got upset with her. My mother got mad at her because she used curtain to shone her claw (and ruined it as a result...), and I also once got really upset with her because she just jumped in my bed with mud all over her (I think she just fell into sanitary duct), lied on my knee and started to sleep, pretending nothing had happened. Anyway, there’s no relation without problems, and outside few troubles that she caused (well, it couldn’t be said few actually... :-) ), her presence really bring something new to our house, like she was just another member of the family.

And the more important thing, the cat can love us in return to our affection. Unlike rabbit that still looked uneasy after some times, the cat almost always come when we call (specially when we bring food in our hand :-) ), and often sleep in our lap when we watch tv up to late at night. The cat also seems to know when we were sad. Whenever we’re feeling blue, the cat often come to us, and we usually talked to her about our problem, pretending that she’s listening (may be she does listen...)

Well, by now most of you might have already guessed that I will told you to find a friend or lover that can love you back like the way our cat did.

Actually not.

You can still try that if you want to, but I think it would be hard to accomplish, since whether other people will pay back our affection or not is beyond our influence. What I actually wanna tell you is not to find a "cat", but to become a "cat". Pay back every single affection that you get, and it will make not only your days, but also others’ days more colorful. And not only wait for others to start, you can be the one who initiates by showing that you care. Even a smile can make a big difference - it can lift us up whenever we’re felling down and push away the sorrow that hanging in our heart.

Well, I think I ever told you that I often take my time strolling under the sakura rows in front of main building of my campus even when the blossoms already gone. May be it was not only the memory of the flowers that makes me feel good taking a walk there. There’re also some cats and "cats" (literally and figuratively) there, which fill the atmosphere with cozy felling, make it comfortable to linger there unwinding your cloudy mind...

You will Give Up on Beautiful Girl at Third Sight

2005-06-02T18:54:00.000+09:00

This is the picture of Ivy, the girl that did homestay at Kurusu family last month. As usual, this picture actually doesn't have direct relation with the content, however, there's a reason why I chose this picture for the illustration. Click here or on the picture, then you'll get an idea about it...
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I’m taking Japanese composition class this semester, and on the first day of the class we had to write a short introduction essay. After filling the first and second paragraph with standard detail (name, where I belong, what kind of thing that I like to do on free time, and the like), I was running out of idea for what to write next. Prof. Yoshizawa who saw me puzzled tried to give me some idea: “You can write why you want to join this class or what you like and don’t like about Japan. You can even write the type of girl that you like...”

And, as you all might have guessed it correctly, I choose the last one.

The following week professor Yoshizawa handed us back our work with some correction. For my work, she commented that the last sentence of my essay was sounded a little bit unnatural in Japanese. I was trying to write ‘I prefer a cute girl to a beautiful girl because you won’t get bored on the cute one even after time has passed’, and because I never heard my Japanese friends saying something like that, I was writing a more or less literal translation of that sentence (きれいな女性より、可愛い女性の方が好きだ。まぜなら、可愛い女性は時間が経ってもつまらなくならないから). Professor Yoshizawa told me that a more Japanese-like expression of what I wanted to say was 。。。可愛い女性は時間が経ってもあきらめないから, which more or less means ‘...because you won't give up on cute girl even after time has passed’. She also told me that she didn’t have problem in understanding what I wanted to say, because there’s an old saying in Japan that says 美人は三度目にあきらめた, that means ‘You will give up on beautiful girl at third sight’ (I’m not so sure about the Japanese sentence. I’ll ask Professor Yoshizawa again next week to confirm it...).

Because of that sentence, the topic of the class that day shifted a little bit to the meaning of the old saying. Professor Yoshizawa told us (even though she wasn’t 100% sure), that the meaning of that saying is that people will soon get bored with physical appearance. It is true that everyone would easily be attracted by beauty, but as soon as the person get used to it, s/he will get bored if there’s no other attractive ‘feature’. It is different with the case of cute girl, because Japanese consider a particular girl is cute not only from the physical appearance, but also from their behavior (at least that what Professor Yoshizawa told us. I cannot guarantee that this is valid for every single Japanese here). Thus, even after people get used with the beauty of the girl, they won’t likely become bored, for they also like her from her character too.

The story above reminds me of what my sister told me when we were kids. She told me that in the ending of the Beauty and the Beast fairy tale, may be the Beast didn’t actually turn into handsome prince. It is only because the Beauty had already known him well that the Beast look more handsome in her eyes. What my sister tried to say here was that inner character will give a lasting impact comparing to physical character. (And after thinking about it again, I just realize that my sister was quite a wise kid back there... :-) )

Anyway, this just another story that tell you character is better than just beauty (well, of course it is much more better if you could have both :-) ). You might find it true or not, however, most of the time, it is easier for me to get along with a warm and affable person (well, of course it will be much much more easier if the person is warm, affable, and also beautiful :-) ).

Why I prefer Batman to Superman: To Always Aim for the Moon...

2005-05-22T02:39:00.000+09:00

The figurine in the middle is actually the figurine of Batgirl (it looks a lot like Batman, though...). I got it when I bought cocacola on my trip to Yamanashi prefecture. At the same time Ogata and Yanagita also bought cocacola, and (unfortunately) they also didn't get Batman (they got Joker and Bat-mobile), that I can't exchange the figurine with them (they know that I like Batman a lot...)
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I think most of my friends have already known that I prefer Batman to Superman, but I think little of them know the reasons behind it. Because I had promised to write about it long time ago, I think I’m gonna write it now.
(Anyway, all that I write here are just my personal opinion - no offense for Superman fans out there...)

So, why do I prefer Batman to Superman?

One: Batman’s costume is cool, while Superman looks (in my opinion) completely like a buffoon. I’m not saying that red and blue combination resembles a hick, but I wish I never have to wear red underwear - moreover if I have to wear it outside my pants (I prefer Spiderman taste of costume on this one...)

Two: There’s still possibility that I can become Batman (although maybe only for one in a googol), while it’s already certain that I’m not Superman. I wasn’t from Krypton (if the planet even ever exists). I’m not faster than a speeding bullet, neither more powerful than a speeding locomotive, and I couldn’t leap tall buildings with a single bound. Unless my parents do it very successfully, I don’t reckon them to hide any spaceship wreck in our basement (one more thing: we don’t even have basement!), and so far I never bumped into girls called Lana and Lois. On the other hands, I still can build bat-cave, fill it with load of super-sophisticated equipment to fight crime, and ask someone to make the costume for me (or just buy a cheap one :-) )... and hey! I’m Batman! (um, actually all of this can only be made real with one extremely important condition: I must be very very very rich - but still possible then...)

Three (getting a little bit serious): Batman teaches us to stick on what we believe is right, and put effort to make it come true. Actually, Bruce Wayne could use all of his fortune to have a calm and peaceful life. Instead, he used some of it to become what he wants to be: Batman. I’m not trying to say that Clark Kent isn’t a good person here - he’s also a good one because he is using his gift (his superpower) for something good. What makes me prefer Bruce in this case is that Bruce doesn’t possess the gift like Clark, but still, he pulled together his effort to make his dream comes true. Not only limited on spending his wealth to get all of those advanced gears, in countless of time he had to put out the best of him to face perils that lied ahead while he’s wearing the costume.

Like Bruce, all of us have our own “Batman” to accomplish. And unfortunately, most of us are not “Clark”, who possesses the gift to make his way less tiring. However, it’s not a reason to just abandon our dream and choose a “safer” dream to be made real. If we really want our “Batman”, it’s never wrong to stand up and make a shot. It’s okay if in the end we fail to reach it, as long as we had already put our best effort on it. Like one of my friends told me before: aim for the moon, if you miss, you’ll be among the stars.

Well, I think I still need to put some more extra effort to fulfill what seems to be a dream for me right now. It might not be easy, but I still can try. Anyway, I’m not Superman, but at least I can still become Batman (if I’m very very very rich... :-) )

"Shall We Dance" or "Shall We ダンス" ?

2005-05-04T20:53:00.000+09:00

(The title of the original version is "Shall we ダンス". If you wonder why only the word "dance" that being written in katakana, you better see the Japanese version too...)
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Last Friday, Miya had two free movie tickets for “Shall We Dance?” (starred by Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez), and she asked me whether I wanted to see it too. I always love to see movie (moreover, when it is free :-) ), so in the next few minutes we had already rushed to Kawasaki to catch the next show.

I won’t talk in details about the movie itself - since some of my friends had already mad at me for telling them some bloopers before. Anyway, to my surprise, the movie was great – it was much better than what I thought before. Well, I wasn’t expecting much from the movie, since I think it just like another romantic drama which only tell you that you may do anything you like in the name of love (you know which movie that I mean :-) ). This movie is different. It simply develops to the direction that I like, and left us (us to give emphasis - not only me!) with a warm splendid ending where (almost) everyone in the movie life happily ever after. And the most important thing, I think you can learn a lot from this movie (I won’t tell about it here, though).

After the show Miya told me that she had been looking forward for this movie since the first time she heard about it. The reason for this was not because it's starred by Richard Gere (well, she did mentioned that Richard Gere was so cool in the movie several times, tough :-) ). She wanted to see it because the movie was originated from Japan. Actually it was started from one japanese best-selling novel (with the same title) which then being brought into wide-screen about 10 years ago. She told me that the Japanese version was also as amusing as the Hollywood one, and she advise me to watch it too if I have time (Anyway, she didn’t told me to read the novel too, because I think she know that even in the most optimistic estimation, my ability to read novel in Japanese still equivalent to a 6 grade elementary school boy - thanks to all those kanji).

Following her advice, I hunted for the movie at Tsutaya (the name of video rental house in Japan) and lucky enough to get my hand on one copy. The movie was indeed entertaining. It flows naturally, and when the Hollywood one give a western impression, this Japanese version really give an eastern impression (what I mean here is that you will think the movie can actually take place in Japan without any scene felt out of place). Since the flows of both movies are more or less the same, it is interesting to see that two different cultures can picture a similar tale - with each culture colored the story by its own characteristic - and still, yield a similar impact to their audiences. Some people might like one of the movie over the other - that's just natural. However, it's not to say that one of the cultures is better than the other. It's just that each culture has its own characteristic that can make things in life look more lively, and each single person views it differently.

Anyway, I’m here not to give you lecture on cultural difference. I just wanna tell you that if you plan to see the movie and have the chance, it is better for you to see both versions. Each has its own flair, and I believe you won’t regret to see both, regardless the fact that those movie have the same story to tell. Trust me, it's worth the dime.

When You Trapped To Do Something You Don’t Like in Japan, Buy Ginger

2005-05-04T20:24:00.000+09:00

(This picture has nothing to do with the content. It's a picture of ginger ale, and I put it here because it made from ginger (well, at least its name contains the word "ginger") and I started to drink it here in Japan, specially on party because I don't drink alcohol. Anyway, if you ever play Japanese RPG, you will find it there, and it can restore your hit point or increase your strength during battle - depends on the RPG - this also has nothing to do with the content... :-) )
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Before you actually packing ginger in your bag for your trip to Japan, you better read this first.

I’m keeping one series of riddle about how to put an elephant in a freezer, and it usually works well on a casual talk with new friends, regardless their nationality (i.e. they will laugh on it and keep on asking for the next riddle). I almost think that it is a universal riddle, when I finally found that most of my Japanese friend didn’t laugh much when they heard the riddle. (Well, may be it is because my Japanese still wasn’t good enough when I asked that question :-) ). Anyway, although that riddle doesn’t do the trick, I later found out that wordplay works well on most of my Japanese friends. And lucky me, there are a lot of homophone in Japanese words (the slight difference only on the intonation), that make it easy to do wordplay with them. For example the word hashi can mean both chopstick (箸) and bridge (橋), where ame can mean both rain (雨) and sweets (飴). (The intonations for both words are usually different for each region in Japan. For example, the intonation of hashi that suppose to mean 'bridge' in kansai (関西 - area in Japan where Osaka is located) would mean 'chopstick' in kantou (関東 - area in Japan where Tokyo is located)). And while it is usually hard to intentionally start a joke with those two words, there are other words that can be very useful for icebreaker.

Here are several wordplays that I have found work with my friends here:

しょうがない(shouganai)
The phrase above is equivalent with “there’s nothing else that we can do” in English. It is said when you get trapped into a situation that forced you to do something that you actually don’t want to do. Since shouga (生姜) can also mean ginger, the phrase above can be loosely translated into “there’s no ginger”/”we’re running out of ginger”. And the question now is: what can you do when you running out of ginger? Of course you can just buy ginger! So, when somebody tells you "しょうがない" (there’s nothing else that we can do), you can simply said "生姜買えばいいじゃん？"(Shouga kaeba ii jan? - We can just buy ginger, can’t we?)
("しょうがない" is actually a colloquial phrase. The grammatically correct sentence is "しようがない"(shiyouganai). That ginger trick won’t work on this, however, since shiyou (しよう) sounds a lot like shio (しお - 塩) which means salt, your response can be easily modified into "塩を買えばいいじゃん？"(Shio wo kaeba ii jan? - We can just buy salt, can’t we?)

憑かれる(tsukareru)
This will work when you use email (because the trick is on the kanji). When your friends ask you to go to party together and you are too tired to go, you can simply said that you are tired now (今ちょっと疲れているけど。。。- ima chotto tsukareteiru kedo...). There’s nothing wrong with the answer, however, if you switch the kanji into "今ちょっと憑かれているけど。。。"(both the kanji have the same pronunciation), it won't tell your friends that you are tired. Instead, it will tell them that you are being possessed (by ghost). If your friends have a good sense of humor, they will only laugh on it, however, if they are a serious type of person, I think they will pay you a visit soon with some psychics experienced to do exorcism.

睡眠(suimin)
You can use this for your self-introduction (自己紹介 - jiko shoukai). When you need to mention your hobby, you can just say that your hobby is suimin (私の趣味はすいみんです - watashi no shumi wa suimin desu). While it sounds a lot like swimming (Japanese sometimes using English words in daily conversation), it's actually translated into: My hobby is sleeping.

Caution: Please check whether your friends have some sense of humor or not before using them. There are times when - no matter how hard you try - they just doesn’t work, and you don’t need to push it. Just get back, relax, and try to find some other jokes... :-)

The Alchemist: Quest for What We Really Are

2005-04-24T00:27:00.000+09:00

Three 'Santiago' in Odaiba, still unsure which path to choose...
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(Written after read Nia's blog. For Nia, thanks for the idea... - hope you don't mind I composed this based on some of your thoughts)

Last week, Dito (uptown-girl from Sendai :-) ) visited Tokyo, and as good hosts, Nia and I showed her the way around. After our trip to Akihabara (standard place for Indonesian who visits Tokyo), we started to talk about The Alchemist. (The talk actually began with some ‘hiks’ that will be too long to be written here. Moreover, I only know little about those ‘hiks’ and I think Dito and Nia will skin me alive if I write it anyway :-) ).

Back to the alchemist - the story itself tells about a Spanish boy called Santiago (If you haven’t read the book and think that some of the funs of reading it will be lost if you know some of the events beforehand, you better skip these two paragraphs and start reading the third paragraph from here, or even better if you can get a copy of the book, read it, and back to this page. Finish it? Good, and back to the story...). From his childhood Santiago always wanted to travel and see new places other than his homeland, which led him to choose to become a shepherd, so he can go from place to place bringing his flocks to a new pasture. The story started when Santiago finally decided to ask for the hand of one girl that he liked and probably give up his nomadic way of life. At that time, when he was sleeping inside a ruin of church, he got a dream about treasure that he supposed to find. Unsure about the meaning of his dream, he asked a gypsy to read his dream. The gypsy told him (which cost him half of the treasure that he had not found yet) that there is treasure wait for him near the pyramids. Didn’t know what to do for quite sometimes, Santiago finally sold all of his sheep and set his quest for the treasure.

The road that he took was not at all an easy path. Got swindled to lost all of his money, caught between war in desert, it took months for Santiago to finally reach the pyramids. During his journey, he also made some new friends (one of it was the alchemist that became the title of the story), and also met Fatima, his (supposedly :-) ) true love. His journey went on, and to his surprise, once he got to the pyramids, he did not find any treasure. He even nearly beat up to death by a group of thieves. Did Santiago take his journey in vain and the story ended just like that? Of course not. Santiago got a hint from one of the thieves that there is a treasure buried under the ruin of church where he had slept and got his dream about the treasure before. The story ended with Santiago set his journey back to the ruins to claim his treasure, made the payment to the gypsy, and headed back to the desert village where Fatima waiting for him.

Well, it just a story, but we can always learn something from almost anything (even the pearl from the bottom of the sea has her own glow to be shared with us). The story told us (or at least I and other fans of Coelho – the author of the alchemist), that each of us has our own role living in this world (beside the religious aims that is identical for all). It is called ‘personal legend’ in this story. Although some roles seem to be bigger (or ‘cooler’) comparing to others, every single role is of the same importance. Personally, I sometimes envy some of my friends that seems to be luckier than me (having bigger/cooler role than me), when finally I realize that may be some other people envy me for what I’ve got. There is no need to envy others, because we have our own path, which will lead us to our own ‘treasure’ (well, inevitably I still cannot help envying others sometimes...).

Other thing that I like from this story is the spirit to always follow where the path that we like took us, to fight for it, and to be patient with it (for God always be with those who are patient). Like the Santiago story, he relentlessly fought his way to the pyramids and be patient with all the hard time that he had. It is right that he didn’t find his treasure near the pyramids, but it is from his journey that he got the revelation about the actual place of the treasure. Had he decided to abandon his quest to the pyramid, he would not found his treasure (although literally he had slept on it). And equally important, he will not meet Fatima, his true love.

From personal experience: I was nearly not coming to the Panasonic scholarship’s final selection when I got the invitation. I decided to come in the final moment because I thought there would be no harm if I follow the process. When I finally got the scholarship (even only as a substitute) and it is proven that I cannot found full scholarship in other places :-), I took the offer. May be it is really my path to come here in Japan and find my ‘personal legend’. And even if I cannot find it here, it is no big deal. I had learnt a lot from the past two years here, made new friends, chanced adventures, and I believe that there are still more new things to learn, new faces to meet, and new events to taste. Anyway, much much more important, may be I am supposed to meet my Fatima here... :-)

Sakura: Beginning of New Hope

2005-04-11T23:21:00.000+09:00

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My third spring in Japan, and also my third time to see my campus be filled with blooming sakura (桜, cherry blossom, prunus). Before ‘our’ first encounter two years ago, I thought I will soon get used to the flowers and become not too excited of having the chance to see them again in the next spring (one of it because I’m not too fancy with pink). However, it proved that I was wrong. Those fine-looking flowers still could take my breath away, even now. When winter comes close to an end and the south wind starts to blow the scent of spring (in Japan, the beginning of spring is marked with the wind from the Pacific), I always look forward to see the blooming sakura again, to simply stroll below the pinkish stalks even long after the sun has set, and to have party underneath the branches with my friends and let the petal falling on us like a wedding confetti (without bride and groom :-) ). And lucky me, this time nobody (at least here in Japan) would think of me as a lunatic stranger for doing so. Lots of people hold party underneath sakura tree at these time, and it is called hanami (花見; literal meaning would be ‘flower viewing’ - hana(花): flower, mi(見): see/view; dictionarial meaning is a picnic under the cherry blossom). In early spring you can get bunch of hanami invitations (last week I had hanami in almost every single day - and one of it lasted way until close midnight, and even one of my friends got three hanami invitations in the same day).

In general, Japanese consider this season of sakura as a special one. May be this is because sakura has special meaning to them. Blooming sakura are so fragile and ephemeral (the blossom only last for about a week, and it is easily destroyed by rain or wind), and Japanese think that it is resembles life and beauty (so delicate and fleeting). Beside that symbolism, sakura also closely associated with new beginning or new hope, for they marked the beginning of a new cycle of the year. The sakura blooms after the tree seems to ‘sleep’ during the winter, and the new buds bring out new hopes for the new season. (This part reminds me of the A-bomb story in Hiroshima. It was believed that for about 5 years after the bombing nothing would ever grow in the land nearby the hypocenter of A-bomb. However, in the next spring, the grass started to grow on the site, and so did the hope of Hiroshima people to build their city again. It was not sakura back then though, but the moral of the story is quite the same).

It is the second symbolism that comes to my mind whenever I see the flowers now. I came to Japan 2 years ago with a mix of feeling. Happy, for I finally could continue ‘my quest’; Sad, for the problem in my ‘love story’; Worried and relieved, since my parents had just recovered from traffic accident. I came to Japan when all my hope started to surface, and I was ready to restart my life again and made up for the mistakes I had committed in the past. And on that very day, I walked my first steps on my campus and got astonished by the view of sakura trees in front of main building. Since then sakura always bring the meaning of new hopes to me.

Now and then during the year, I like to take my time walking past those trees, recalling the moment, and feeling my spirit rise again. When the spring comes like now, it really brings me back to the time, and reminds me that there is almost always enough hope left in this world to restart life all over again. Sometimes the path is not easy, but it’s always good to give a try, for God never forsakes any good effort that we make.

Anyway, I feel that this song always fits my feeling when I stroll below the sakura tree…

...I, I'm a new day rising
I'm a brand new sky that hangs stars upon tonight...

It's times like these you learn to live again
It's times like these you give and give again
It's times like these you learn to love again
It's times like these time and time again...

Goukon - Survival Japanese for Bonggo

2005-04-04T22:24:00.000+09:00

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(Partially dedicated for Bonggo :-) )

Whenever I hear this word, it always reminds me of Bonggo, and that’s why I write this (you can call this “Survival Japanese for Bonggo” if you wish).

Actually this word is among the earliest words that I knew after my arrival in Japan. The first time I heard this word was on my Japanese class (it was a great class to have a lecture on this word :-) ). Prof. Yoshizawa was trying to explain us about ‘。。。なきゃよかった’ phrase (it’s a phrase to express repentance - I will not explain it here, though). She was giving example about inviting her friends to a goukon and then regretting for her friends were so beautiful that the counterpart group gave more attention to them. Half way through her explanation she realized that most of us (her students) just came to Japan and thus did not know about this goukon she was talking about.

So, what is goukon? (合コンって何？). From small hint mentioned above, you should have been able to make at least a close guess. Goukon is an occasion where a group of boys and a group of girls (with same number of members) meet and have party together (this is not a dictionarial definition, I can’t find the word in my dictionary). The Japanese character of this word consists of gou (合 – kanji, means fit), and kon (コン – katakana, abbreviation of kompa (コンパ), which means party). Thus, it can be easily inferred that this goukon main objective is to find a ‘special someone’ that fit you (and here is where the word ‘Bonggo’ fits in :-) ).

Goukon can be said as one of the current Japan’s pop culture and I think most of Japanese today’s generation have experience with this goukon. Some of my lab friends have goukon sometimes (they never invite me to goukon, for they think that I still have girlfriend in Indonesia, and I still want to keep them think so). My friend from other lab even has friends that have goukon almost every week. There are also handbooks (that being sold in 100 yen shop) on how to have a smashing goukon (not so surprising since Japanese are known as one of the best to create manuals) – one edition for boys and one editions for girls, each mentions what are the things that need extra attention when having goukon with a particular types of boys or girls (our laboratory have one, and Yanagita told me to read it just in case I need it one day :-) ).

And even though this goukon is a well-known term, like any other terms, there are lots of different opinions about it. One of my friends hints me that goukon can end up into something that I better not mention here (for I don't want this sites of thing to be rated unsuitable for kids :-) ), while my other friend told me that the boldest step that you may ever do when you like someone in your goukon is asking his/her phone number.

For the closing of this “Survival Japanese for Bonggo”, here are sentences for asking to be invited in a goukon.

Will you invite me to a goukon?
合コンに誘ってくれませんか。(Goukon ni sasotte kuremasen ka?) – Polite/textbook sentence (if there is ever a textbook explaining about goukon)
合コンに誘ってくれない。(Goukon ni sasotte kurenai?) – Normal conversational sentence (recommended one)

And again, for Bonggo: ganbatte (頑張って), he he he…