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

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

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

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

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

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?

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...

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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...