Can You Please Stop Saying ‘Sweet’?

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

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...

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

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

(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...

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)

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...