Barefoot in Nagoya

Resources

2011-03-21T06:15:00.000+09:00

How to contact friends and loved ones in Japan

Like with any major disaster, the first thing many people thought of when they heard about the quake was "Oh no, I hope ____ is alright, how can I get a hold of them?" With that there came a torrent of messages on Twitter, Facebook, Email, Skype, Phones and any other method of communication. With this demand many companies have stepped up to the plate and provided free services for finding friends and loved ones in Japan. Below are some signifigant examples.

1) Locating people
Google: the Google Person Finder, set up in the hours after the quake, has enabled many people to network to locate friends and loved ones, or to assure those friends and loved ones that they are fine.

By Phone:
Missing persons phone lines (Japanese language)

Iwate: 0120-801-471
Miyagi: 022-221-2000
Fukushima: 0120-510-186 / 090-8424-4207 / 090-8424-4208
2) Phoning Japan for free*
AT&T: Until March 31st, International texts from the US to Japan are free, for those looking for more information, click here to see the news release from AT&T.
Sprint: Until April 10th, Sprint will be waiving fees for calls and texts into Japan for those on Sprint's network, click here to see the news release from Sprint.
Verizon: Until April 10th, Verizon will be waiving fees for calls and texts into Japan, in addition to support on other Verizon services, click here to see the news release from Verizon.

*As with all "free" deals, it is always best to examine the fine print, as there have been suggestions that these companies may take advantage of the influx in demand to profit.

How to choose and donate to a cause
Within hours of the initial shock of the quake and subsequent tsunami, a huge outpouring of donations began to flood into aid agencies for the support of survivors. Equally fast was the speed at which scammers began to develop ways to trick people into donating to fake agencies that were set up overnight to accept donations with no intention for any of the money to go to relief efforts. Another problem is finding the right agency, since so many large agencies may claim to be assisting Japan directly, but under closer inspection have stated that they will use the funds for other projects as well. While the later is far more altruism then the former, it is still true that when you donate you expect your money to go to the cause you are donating to, and thus I've drawn up a few simple rules for donation you might want to consider.

1) How established is the agency?
Red Cross is a name everyone knows, but what about Architecture for Humanity? There are a lot of smaller agencies out there that are providing much needed support where the larger agencies cannot pick up the slack or do not ahve the expertiese. Make sure to research the agency and see when they were established, what they have done in the past, etc, before you write the check.

2) Do they have a written donation policy? What is it?
I mentioned above about wanting your money to go to the cause you support, but this is only a call for transparency in the language used to garner donations. There have actually been a few articles about why it might not be a good idea to donate directly to Japan, and to let the agency decide how to use the funds, I leave this up to you. In all cases, however, make sure there is a written donation policy and that you understand what you are signing.

3) Will your donation go towards something that is truly needed?
There is a trend among smaller aid organizations to try and dominate a niche of aid for a certain disaster and to concentrate singularly on that niche. This can be incredibly useful as it encourages an agency to invest in the expertise to truly understand what the demands for a certain resource are in any situation. However some causes are more popular then others, and this raises the issue where large aid agencies cannot afford to concentrate on one issue for fear of neglecting others and the damage overwhelming any benefit. Again, if you want to make sure your aid is targeted at the cause you wish it to be then do your research on what is needed and who is providing that. I'm going to put a spotlight on Charity Navigator here as it has been incredibly useful in deciding how the funds we at Green Mountain are raising will be spent, but I encourage you to search out others if you do not find one you like.

News resources for staying up-to-date on current developments
There are many ways to stay up to date with issues going on in the world, and in response to the crisis many news agencies have created dedicated sections of their sites for the issue. A few of these are included below, and I encourage you to seek out more.

Wall Street Journal
The Guardian
Al Jazeera
BBC
Reuters
Twitter

I hope these resources are helpful to you, no matter what your level of interest or ability to give aid I hope you will keep the people of Japan in your thoughts.

- Dan

Farewell Nagoya

2010-08-14T07:51:00.000+09:00

Ah yes, travel...the joys will never cease.

Good evening everyone! Welcome to the last “Barefoot” I will actually be posting from Nagoya! A sad statement, truly, but you do what you have to do. My year here is over, and these last few days have been a whirlwind of activity, goodbyes, and reminiscing that hitherto has been unparalleled in my experience.

Now, at the end of the day, I sit here slowly being driven insane by an escalator and thinking about the Governator of California. Hmm... I seem to be getting ahead of myself.

Well then, where to begin, and how to sew in a few lessons about Japan in the process... Ah, I know, chronological order! An improbable and unorthodox way to order a story, but I think I can risk it. (I might want to point out at this point that if my writing seems choppy or broken up it is because I am being dive-bombed by a rather confused looking bat. Yes, I am in the airport lobby. Fending off a bat with a rolled up poster of Maralyn Monroe. Japan has lost none of its ability to make me question what is “normal”) OK, so, for the past few days I've been essentially packed and ready to go. I finished my research paper on Tuesday after essentially doing a slash and burn through the thing, reducing if from 23 pages of essay and another 20 pages of “hey, wouldn't it be cool to mention X? I think I should fit that in somehow” into a hardened 20 pages of somewhat presentable essay. Since that moment of completion I have been brain-dead. The fact that I was packed and ready to go did not on the whole help the fact that I still had a week to go, and aside from a mix-up and miscommunication regarding my leaving time being reported as a few days too early, this week has been on the whole rather uneventful aside from the farewells.

This morning I woke up as usual at 6, and started final preparations, which essentially consisted of me throwing away some item from my luggage, pestering the people who work in the Ohmeikan to let me use their scale, having a few choice words on the meager reduction in weight, and going back to trying to figure out what else to get rid of. This process repeated itself from 10 in the morning until 6 in the afternoon, at which time I said a few more choice words, deciding that maybe I could slip by with one or two kilos over weight if I was polite and dressed well. I was/am wearing my suit anyway, as it is the heaviest piece of clothing that I own, so this seemed, and still seems, fairly plausible. It was at this point that I bid my final farewell to most of the Ohmeikan, and accompanied by a few choice friends headed my way here to the airport.

(Gah! Is there a window open or something? How am I inside and being dive-bombed by a bat and being eaten alive by mosquitoes?)

By the time we reached the airport my group had shrunk to Martin from Germany, Pritpal from the UK, and myself. Given that the airport is essentially a combination of international travel hub and mega-mall, we managed to spend a grand evening just sitting and talking about the year that was.Eventually all things come to an end, and so did our time. My friend helped me to the now mysteriously vacant check-in counter area, and we said our goodbyes. As they walked away, the lights went out, and I stand bewildered in the black of a closed airport.

...

Possibly after the break (my first flight) ; now to learn something about this wonderful country, lets turn to the subject of closing times(Why am I surrounded by metal bars?!).

(Arg! It almost hit me that time!)

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!

English: Bat

Japanese: こうもり

Pronunciation: koo-moh-rii

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Best wishes,

Dan

Worth a thousand words

2010-08-04T20:32:00.000+09:00

This photo was taken this past sunday, during a hike me and Martin took in the foothills surrounding Nagoya. While I would really rather tell this story to you in person, I'd like to take this opportunity to briefly demonstrate how one picture can say so much.

This is my good friend Martin, from Germany.

Martin is obviously thrilled to go the direction the sign is pointing.
What we didn't know when we first passed this sign was the translation.
Rough translation: "This way is extremely dangerous for anyone who is not a experienced and well equipped rock climber"

This hike was supposed to take two hours.
It didn't.

Ah yes...getting stranded on top of a mountain for 2 hours...one of the finer things in life.

Oh, the stories we can tell...

****

Japanese Time!
English: Rock Climbers
Japanese:ロッククライマー
Pronunciation: roh-ku-ku-rah-ii-mah

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Best Wishes,
Dan

My first Japanese earthquake, Fuji, and fools

2010-08-03T00:10:00.000+09:00

As usual I woke up around 6am a few days ago, gazed around the room for a few moments, and then figured I should probably get up.

Then the angle from which I saw the world changed.

No, I didn't discover nirvana or the meaning of life. The angle from which I saw the world actually changed, then changed the other way, righted itself, then seemed to think that the best thing to do was just make a kind of shaky circle for a few seconds that almost toppled my Brita filter.

Ah yes...Being woken up by an earthquake...My day was off to a great start.

It's been a while folks, I admit it whole heartedly. Since the last post I made I've pretty much finished up with finals though I still have one 40 page essay to complete, climbed Mount Fuji not once but twice, attended a sumo tournament, got lost in the hills of Nagoya, practiced my wilderness EMT training on a German friend of mine while trying to make it off a mountain alive, and attempted to talk my computer out of its decision to reset to factory settings and erase all my data. On this last point I failed miserably, but oh well, what can you do.

Anyway, onto the main topic of today's post:

“He who climbs Mount Fuji once is a wise man,

he who climbs it twice is a fool”

Actual Japanese saying

Oops...

Well, (un)luckily for me, all the proof that I went up Fuji the first time was erased with all my data, so all the photos I do have are of the second time I went up. One of the things about not having a computer anymore is that, well, you don't have a computer anymore, and so I will ask your forgiveness for not having a fancy slideshow or anything. My way of making up for it? Incredible views.

Hmm...and people wonder why I wanted to climb it twice...

If you would like more photos, let me direct you to the flickr streams of me and one of my friends, Kira, who accompanied us.
Me
Kira
(Kira also has a blog, located here)

OK, thats the main thing, sure, but I have been gone for a whole month, and certainly I have more to show you. Yes, yes I do, and I look forward to telling all of you the stories of these photos when I return, but for now I ask that you let a poor college student get some shut-eye before resuming his study of the Constitution and Article III standing requirements.
Here they are, and I'll see you tomorrow.

Oh, the stories I will tell from this year are many and varied in their content, original language, and age appropriateness....and I'm not even done yet...

last two weeks everyone! eleven more posts and I'll be to the hundred post mark, and a few more new faces reading and I'll have reached three thousand people around the world. What a world, what a world.

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Japanese time!
English: Souvenir
Japanese: お土産
Pronunciation: oh me-yah-geh

****

Best wishes,

Dan

P.S. To all my friends at camp... Thank you for the well wishes! I hope the summer is going great, and I know Alex, Terry and the gang will make sure you have an awesome rest of the summer!

The 4th of July in Nagoya

2010-07-07T00:40:00.000+09:00

You might think, after considering some of the interesting costumes that regularly roam the streets of this country, that a guy in a two foot tall sequined American flag hat might be able to go unnoticed as he went about his business on a sunny Sunday afternoon. You would be drastically off-base in such thoughts, as I discovered this past Sunday when I went shopping for the Nagoya version of the 4th of July. Children stared, parents laughed, and some poor fellow had to endure what I assume was his girlfriend asking for my picture on the street. I didn't mind at all, as long as the extra attention did not make me late for the festivities which I had planned.

Festivities indeed.

So what makes it a 4th of July if you're on the other side of the planet then the rest of the people celebrating it?

Well, obviously good friends are a big part of it, and it doesn't really matter where they are from.

Then of course there is food, which came in the forms of steaks and later grilled vegetables and chicken.

Mmmm, grilled mushrooms

So yea, food and friends, the only things you need for the 4th of July.

Yep, nothing else happens on the 4th.

It would be great, wouldn't it? If there was some common activity, some spectacle that everyone could gather around at the end of the day to end this day of celebration.

Oh right! Fireworks!

Well, unfortunately we were informed that despite the fact that they are sold in every convenience store nearby we would be unable to fire any off as we had not gone through the process of reserving a space to fire them in a proper area.

We did not fire any fireworks.

*Cough*

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Japanese Time!
English: Fireworks
Japanese: はなび　(花火)
Pronunciation: hah-nah-bee

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Best wishes!
Dan

Taku-yaki

2010-06-29T06:49:00.000+09:00

Evening world, I join you today freshly disinterested in a certain sports contest, and therefore my evenings are again filled with Mozart, blogging, and finding new and inventive ways to either injure myself during cooking or setting the kitchen aflame. I've been here for almost 10 months now, and it still surprises me the ways an ordinary egg, when imbued with a few spices, a little cooking oil, and a lot of heat can calculate down to the millisecond the exact time to hop out of the pan and latch onto my leg.

Note to self: Regrow eyebrows.

Moving on, the topic for today is a favorite food of the Japanese that you can find whenever you might be walking around a park on a hot summer day or at a festival of any size. This food is called tako-yaki(たこ焼).

So what is tako-yaki anyway? Well, the basic premise is much like an omelet, but with a unique Japanese twist! (Warning: Unique Japanese twists have been known to contain fish products, byproducts, bylaws, in-laws, and the occasional surprised boot). The Japanese usually don't seem to care what kind of fish goes into their tako-yaki, I've had everything from squid to asparagus, but one staple is the octopus. These little balls of batter and octopus are typically piping hot when you pop them in your mouth, and with a little mayo and bacon shavings they are just the thing for those lazy spring or summer afternoons in the park.

Now, like the last time I did a specialized food post, at this point I'd like to give you the recipe for this delicious Japanese snack, and then show you some pictures of the food itself before I end for the day.

While I'm not actually making taku-yaki at this moment, I am seriously considering dreaming about it on my pillow which is sitting about two feet away, and as you will see from the photos, I've already had some experience with the cooking of it. So first, what you will need:

Main Ingredients

200g chopped boiled octopus

cooking oil

benishoga (pickled ginger)

chopped negi (or scallions)

tenkasu (or rice crispies)

Batter

450cc water

1 piece konbu (kelp), 10cm square

15g powdered katsuo-bushi (shaved dried bonito)

200g flour

2 eggs

Sauce

commercial takoyaki sauce

or worcestershire sauce

or mayonnaise

Cooking time: 10-20 minutes

Servings: 50-60 pieces (4-5 persons)

Preparations

1. Clean the konbu by wiping it lightly with a cloth.

2. Cut the konbu into 2-centimeter-wide partial strips against the grain, but don't cut all the way to the edge -- see illustration.

3. Add the water and konbu to a pot, and cook uncovered over a slow fire.

4. Just before the water starts to boil, remove the konbu from the pot. The liquid should be a light yellowish or greenish color.

5. Add shaved katsuobushi to the water as it starts to boil.

6. After the liquid has been boiling a minute or two, turn off the heat.

7. Quickly remove the shaved katsuobushi from the liquid with a filter or strainer or cloth. Try to remove the katsuobushi while it's still floating on the surface, before it has a chance to sink.

8. Allow the liquid to cool, then add the liquid, flour and eggs to a bowl and mix.

9. Oil the takoyaki pan

10. Add pieces of chopped octopus to each cup.

11. Pour in the batter.

12. Add benishoga, negi and tenkasu to taste.

13. Cook the takoyaki pieces until they achieve the desired degree of firmness, turning them over frequently.

14. Remove from the pan and serve with sauce and/or mayonnaise.

15. Enjoy!

So, as I said before, I'm not making these now, but I have made them and I have included below pictures from when I was invited to help create them for lunch one day. It was a blast and I was happy to have been able to do it, so if you are reading this, thank you very much.

Thank you again to the wonderful family who showed me how to make this delicious treat, and to those who would venture to make it on their own; Good Luck!

Good night.

****

Japanese Time!

English: To cook

Japanese: 作ります

Pronunciation: Tsu-koo-rii-mas

Example: 今日はたこ焼を作りました!

Translation: Today I cooked tako-yaki!

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Best wishes,

Dan

Meidai Topics

2010-06-18T19:03:00.001+09:00

Hey everyone, Nagoya has entered the vital phase of alternating between raining so hard umbrellas need umbrellas to so hot the coolest place to be is...anywhere not in Nagoya. Mostly its been work-work-work, but today I received a rather unique reminder of when the weather was somewhat sane in the form of some pictures.
See, a while back two friends and I received an offer to be photographed for the university magazine, Meidai Topics, as part of their issue supposedly talking about the international exchange program. It was fun, just walking around the campus on a sunny day talking with each other while in the back ground there was this skinny Japanese guy taking photographs and clearly struggling with this camera case as large as him. At the end we were asked to write a sentence that described the way we viewed the opportunity, and then told that someone would be in contact with us when the magazine came out. Well, the magazine is out, and there we are, slap dab on the cover.
I've included below the extra photos that they sent with our copies of the magazine.

Hmm, I just realized I have just committed my first act of product placement, with my shameless endorsement of my college on my shirt.

Ah well, gotta start sometime, right?
Night.

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: Magazine
Japanese: ざっし
Pronunciation: zasshi

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Photos and friends

2010-06-17T02:11:00.000+09:00

Evening everyone! I hope you have all been enjoying the world cup as much as we have here. While watching the cup I've had some free time to go through some of the things I've been meaning to add to Barefoot in Nagoya. One of the things a good chunk of new photos newly updated to the old Flikr stream. I've uploaded about 40 so far and over the next day or so I'll be uploading more and adding descriptions. some other things is that I've expanded my list of friend's blogs a bit, there are now almost ten blogs there, so feel free to check them out, even those ones in languages you don't understand. If you're reading this and you have a blog let me know and I'll post it up. I have to say I love the reading and I'm always happy to help a friend get some well deserved attention. Thats about it for now, don't forget to keep watching the world cup and root for your country or America. (How'd that goal feel England?)
Night.
****
Japanese time!
English: Picture (photograph)
Japanese: しゃしん (写真)
Pronunciation: shya-sheen
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Best wishes,
Dan

World Cup!

2010-06-14T22:51:00.000+09:00

Hey everyone! Here in Nagoya everyone has become excited over the World Cup; a brand new way to propagate our barely suppressed patriotism! Huzzah! For those who are near a TV or a computer in the next 30 minutes I highly suggest you turn it on and watch Japan vs. Cameroon. I've been looking for the past 20 minutes for a way to stream it online, but I believe those motivated enough can find it. OK, back downstairs to root for Japan! Go! Go! Go!

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Japanese Time!
English: Go! Go! Go!
Japanese: ゴ! ゴ! ゴ!
Pronunciation: Go! Go! Go!

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Tokyo week Day 4

2010-06-11T10:44:00.000+09:00

Hey everyone, so I logged onto blogger today and found that both yesterday's blog and the day before had not been posted, so today I have made sure that both are up and viewable before signing off. Anyhow, onto today's topic – Subcultures of Tokyo.

Now, when I talk about Tokyo, I'm talking about the main meat of the city, not the outlying towns that are still part of the prefecture. Even shaving off most of the outlying suburbs and such, we are still left with a sizable chunk of humanity, approximately a thirteen million person strong chunk actually. Out of these thirteen million there are of course the usual breeds of Japanese society, but those are like the usual breeds in most societies; boring. No, today's blog is about the unusual, the strange, the 面白い(For those who did not read yesterday's blog, that means interesting). I'm never one to beat around the bush, so I'll get right to the matter, I'm talking about this section of society:

And this,

And of course this,

Gyaru, cos-play, maid cafe, power ranger, whatever you want to call it, people here seem to have absolutely no issue dressing up in ridiculous outfits and making a day of it. Now, certainly I'm not saying that this is a uniquely Japanese phenomenon, but the extent to which it is prevalent in some places (especially Akihabara) simply astounds. There are shops where all the employees are dressed like cats, and there are cafes where all the customers are encouraged to come in their favorite manga(Japanese comic) outfits. It's not limited to Tokyo of course, and if you ask me when I see you about the guy with the owl I will tell you quite a story about these kinds of costumes in Nagoya, but the shear amount of people dressing up as monsters, ninjas, princesses, etc etc is simply amazing. I hope that some of my readers can explain this phenomenon a bit more when you see me, but for now I wanted to show those who are not native to Japan a little bit of the interesting costumes that you can see every day in Tokyo.

To end tonight I have found a video from one of the cos-play conventions in Akihabara to show you some of the more intricate costumes. I'm not really sure why they call it a convention, you are as likely as not to see these sorts of costumes just walking down the street in some sections of Tokyo.

For those on facebook.
Night.

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Japanese Time!
English: Early (to be)
Japanese: 早く
Pronunciation: Hah-yah-kuu

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Best wishes,
Dan

Tokyo week Day 3

2010-06-11T10:38:00.000+09:00

Evening world, so yesterday I finished travel with regards to Tokyo, now it's time to talk about some of the sights and places that might be of interest to those who are visiting.

Tokyo, as you would expect with a city so large, is like a giant ecosystem, complete with variations in weather, vegetation, and wildlife(more on wildlife tomorrow). The city is home to...

Shrines,

Electronic boutiques,

Fashion districts,

Hotels,

Motels,

Sushi restaurants,

Noodle stalls,

and...

truly terrifying contraptions.

(Japan, stuff like this is why the rest of the world thinks you have a robot army. No offense, just letting you know.)

Now, I usually like to talk about stuff that I have heard from a witness or experienced first hand, so I figure that the best way to give you an idea of the range of environments in Tokyo would be to talk about two famous extremes of Tokyo culture, the shrine sector of Asakusa and the electronic district named Akihabara.

First Asakusa.

In the middle of central Tokyo is a reminder of Japan's spiritual culture with the district of Asakusa, a group of shrines, temples, and holy places packed together by time and urbanization. Asakusa is full of old stuff, from shrines like Kaminarimon pictured above and temples like Sensou-ji pictured below, to the Hanayashiki Amusement park, the oldest amusement park in Japan, pictured below Sensou-ji.

Quite an interesting place, I wish I could spend a whole entry on it, but time presses on. I will however offer a cautionary bit of those A cautionary tale to those who would visit Asakusa and invest in a rickshaw drive; those runners are professionals, and while it is fun for the experience, make sure that you get a reasonable deal otherwise your wallet will be hit hard by "extra content" and "longer routes".

Ah, now on to Akihabara, Electric Town.

I visited Akihabara the last time I was in Tokyo, and I think if I show you the first thing I saw outside of the subway gate you can get a general feel for the area.

Yep, the very first thing out of the gate, like some tech hot dog stand, is a stall demonstrating and selling pre-orders for 3D games on the PS3.

It's said by some that if you are a gamer, a tech person, or a robot you can find anything you could possibly want in Akihabara. This is incorrect. You can find twenty different varieties of anything you could want. I've included below a few photos from my brief jaunt into Akihabara, but for the real experience it need to be seen first hand.

First thing out of the exit is a five story tech store.

Yes, Akihabara is impressive in its dedication to the electronic, but the individual responsible for the picture below deserves special appreciation. Hats off to you my friend, hats off to you.

Excellent.

And thats all for me tonight. See you tomorrow when I discuss some of the interesting...cultures that one finds in Tokyo, especially in Akihabara. The picture below is a hint.

Night.

****

Japanese Time!

English: Interesting

Japanese: 面白い

Pronunciation: Oh-moh-shii-roy

****

Best wishes,

Dan

Tokyo week Day 2

2010-06-11T10:37:00.000+09:00

Tokyo Day 2 -

Hello everyone! Today in Tokyo week I'll be doing something I have tried to avoid up till now in Barefoot in Nagoya, that is, presenting facts. I know, I know, I've done so well up until now, but you have to give in some time. Anyway, yesterday I talked about getting too Tokyo, and while the next logical step would seem to be talking a little bit about getting around Tokyo, but in response to that I present this:

This is a simplified Tokyo subway map.

But then again, logic is logic...Delicious, delicious logic.

So, to those readers who aren't here in Nagoya, here is what I'm used too with regards to subways.

Five lines, kinda looks like a turtle on some maps, simple. A map of Nagoya can be easily digested with a week or two of practice, and with a few months being here you get to the point when you have memorized the amount of time from one platform to the next and whether the next train will arrive before then (Tip for my Nagoya readers - Meijo line to Higashiyama line at Motoyama, there's about one minute to make the exchange, speed be with you unless you want to wait those extra five or ten minutes). Now let's take a look at that Tokyo map again.

OK, about twelve million lines, kinda looks like the milky way galaxy, simple. As I mentioned yesterday Tokyo is huge, so one wrong switch of the lines and you might end up going to the fish market instead of the airport. The set-up of the subways are different as well, with larger stations and more robust security measures, even native people to Japan who can read all the signs are sometimes lost. Assuming that you can find your way around, the city has many interesting sectors, a few of which will be addressed tomorrow when I take about places to see in Tokyo. OK, it's 4 in the morning again, night everyone.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the day!

English: Subway

Japanese: 地下鉄

Pronunciation: Chi-kah-teh-tsu

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Best wishes,

Dan

Tokyo week Day 1

2010-06-08T04:08:00.000+09:00

Tokyo! A city that truly deserves the term "metropolis", Tokyo is the de facto political and economic capital of Japan and, until recently, could have been considered the financial capital of east Asia. One of the things that one notices immediately about Tokyo is the size of it, one usually notices this when one attempts to escape the city limits, and at a certain point would settle for staying in the same hemisphere. Now if you use Google maps to look at Toyko's sprawl, it might look something like this...

Now if you look real closely, you might get to see some indigenous Tokyo marine life, like in the below picture.

(Above marine life may appear to only to those who, like myself, grew up watching Godzilla movies, and can't even talk about Tokyo without mentioning it's particular skill for being destroyed by symbols of western imperialism in rubber suits.)

I seem to have wandered off topic... Where was I?...

Ah, right, Tokyo.

As you may have noticed, today's blog title is "Tokyo week Day 1", this is because I have visited Tokyo a few times while being here, but haven't really spent much time talking about the city itself. While I was sorting the photos from my most recent trip there I realized that I had accumulated quite a bit of info on this city of cities, and such decided to dedicate this whole week to sharing some of these experiences with you. At the end of the week I'm thinking of going with some friends to climb Mount Fuji(Fuji-san, 富士山) , so that should be a nice end to the week.

This won't be my only opportunity to climb Fuji, and I look forward to telling you about it one day. For now though, I have still yet to get to my main topic.

Getting to Tokyo.
OK, so here's the thing, when you are living in Japan as I am, you have to revise your considerations of how to get around. Sure, in America you just hop in your car and go, but that's not necessarily practical with unfamiliar territory, in addition to entirely new ways of thinking about simple things from addresses to house numbers. So what do you do if you want to get to say, Tokyo, from a large city like Nagoya? Well, here's a very brief breakdown of the main ways:

Bus

The good: Relatively fast, very cheap, and often is overnight so you don't have to worry about spending all day in a cramped bus.
The bad: Day or night, you are still spending all day in a cramped bus.
The weird: your bus stop may very well be a strawberry.

Train:

The good: Like a bus, trains are relatively fast, cheaper or more expensive depending on the line and type of ticket, and and come with a good bit more room then a bus.

The bad: Travel is limited to the day and until midnight, so if you haven't got a place to stay where ever you have ended up, get ready to do what many Japanese people do, and sleep until the next train.

The weird: The train version of human tetris. The below was taken in Tokyo.

Shinkansen:

The good: Extremely fast, if planned correctly you can go far on relatively little money, convenient, well serviced, and plenty of room and amenities.

The bad: Imagine waking up in a plane, looking out the window, and realizing that the ground was only a few feet below. This sensation is what the combination of speed and a low profile produces when you wake up in a shinkansen.

The weird:The inside really does look like the inside of a plane.

Plane:

The good: Planes in Japan are giant robots

The bad: I'm kidding.

The weird: Things like this giant robot are a staple of the landscape of Japan.

And so ends day one of Tokyo week. See you tomorrow when I plan on not only getting distracted by Godzilla references, but adding them actively into this very blog. In addition to other things I'm sure, but those are what I'm looking forward to.

Good night!

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!

English: Eastern capital, or "Tokyo"

Japanese: 東京

Pronunciation: Toh-kyo (be careful not to pronounce it like "toh-key-oh")

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Best wishes,

Dan

So how about this weather?

2010-06-01T05:40:00.001+09:00

Now, before I begin, I have to say that as a native of New England I have long been accustomed to a variety of weather conditions. A quote attributed to Mark Twain states thusly on the subject of New England weather;

"There is a sumptuous variety about the New England weather that compels the stranger's admiration - and regret. The weather is always doing something there; always attending strictly to business; always getting up new designs and trying them on the people to see how they will go."

Indeed, while attributed to every state in the union, the common phrase, "If you don't like the weather, wait five minutes and it will change", has seemed to me to be the catchphrase of the weather in my home region.

This was until about three weeks ago.

There is a special, almost unearthly quality to the weather here nowadays. It is to be considered a fine morning when you wake up at five in the morning with a tan you didn't have when you went to bed, only to be drenched in a torrential downpour as soon as you venture out the door, and then by lunch time blown away by a wind that seems to actively engage in gorilla warfare with umbrellas. This is of course followed by a balmy afternoon. Come to think of it the weather here is rather like a five-year-old who dearly wants to do something it knows it shouldn't, not-so-craftily goes about its plan, but then realizes someone might be watching and so cobbles together the perfect look of innocence until it thinks people aren't paying attention anymore.
On the plus side, we have had some really great days here for biking, picnicking, frying eggs on the sidewalk, or any other warm weather activity you might desire. On the minus side we have the fact that it is already getting to the mid 80s during the mornings(see waking up with a tan above) and not even looking down until about ten at night. Of course, for fear that we might have neglected to rue the day we took good weather for granted, it has also been oppressively humid outside as well, to the point where you find yourself distracted during class, idly gazing out the window, wondering if investing in gills would be a productive evolutionary trait.
So what has been the effect of this weather on the good students of Nagoya University? Sloth has come to Japan. The weather seems to have had the effect of sapping everyone of their energy while managing to be just good enough that people want to do things, but can't. I've found myself seriously considering going to bed at nine at night and then being grumpy when I have to wake in the morning, probably the leading factor in my lack of updating recently. The weeks I've been away have not been without event though, and before I go have breakfast I'll say a few things about what has happened.
*Schoolwork has not let up, with a minimum of twenty credits this semester, including a TA position and research paper most likely in the region of forty pages, I've been keeping busy.

*Travel, in the next few weeks I have plans to finally top Fuji-san, so stay tuned.

*With regards to activities on campus there is a lot going on. I'll be attempting yet again to join some clubs- most likely by trying to convince the Japanese students that I'm someone famous.

*General tom-foolery

So, would I be doing back home if I were in the states for the summer? Most likely attempting to convince the summer camp I work at to replicate some of the games in this game-show:

For Facebook
Hey, I think it's a great idea...

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Japanese Time! Japanese Seasons!
English:　Spring
Japanese:　はる（春）
Pronunciation: Ha-roo

English:　Summer

Japanese:　なつ（夏）

Pronunciation: Nah-tsu

English:　Autumn

Japanese:　あき（秋）

Pronunciation: Ah-key

English:　Winter

Japanese:　ふゆ（冬）

Pronunciation: Huu-yuu

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Takayama!

2010-05-07T04:43:00.000+09:00

Hello everyone! The day I started this post was a week ago in the beautiful village of Takayama. The string of Japanese holidays referred to as Golden Week had just begun, and my mom was visiting from the states. Now, a week and thousands of pictures later, we are back in Nagoya briefly until tomorrow, when we head out to Tokyo for a little sightseeing, and mom flies off back to America on Mother's Day. Now, this would be a really boring blog if it were simply me rambling on about my life; I need something interesting to show you, some strange facts, some interesting tradition, or some unique architectural process. So...let's get on with it. Oh, before I do though, I want to mention that Ben Thomas, the guy who took those great pictures of Sakura that you all enjoyed, has finally given me the address to his blog. You can find the link along with the others on the sidebar to the right of this text.

Where was I...Right.

This is Takayama, a picturesque village that is a prime destination for tourists wanting to get away from the hustle and bustle of city centers like Tokyo, Osaka, and, of course, Nagoya. My reasoning for coming here? Trees. Many of you back home know this, but the fine folks here in Japan are as-of-yet unacquainted with my love of nature, the only way it can manifest here is in little things-like keeping plants on my balcony or occasionally feeding the birds outside my window. It was, therefore, fantastic to spend a few days out in the wonderful countryside of Japan and to see up close the side of this country many only see in blurs from the window of a shinkansen(bullet train). I won't babble on though, let me show you some of the things we saw.

This was our hotel, Oak Hills.

Blog blog blog.

In one of the scenic traditional areas of the city.

We were lucky and saw what must be the last Sakura of the season.

On one of our many rides around the city.

Part of the view outside our window.

The long line of stalls that was the morning markets.

Taken above our hotel, nature was in full bloom.

From the insect museum.

Another museum. This was about a quarter of the room, with each of these little cases telling about a unique festival celebrated in Takayama.

Working the rice fields.

These two are from the float museum in Takayama were they have literally hollowed out the side of a mountain to hold all the floats they use in their festivals.

A little bit of one of the marionette shows that goes on on top of the floats.

Takayama is covered in small private gardens and fields.

And, of course, temples.

Right next to our hotel was a wonderful maker of fine furniture and crafts called Oak Village, this company produces a wide variety of wood products, and values quality over quantity. We talked for a bit with Dan Inamoto, one of the gentlemen working at Oak Village, and he was happy to hear that I would talk about his company here, since they are trying to expand outward, beyond Japan. To those interested in seeing some excellent Japanese craftsmanship, feel free to visit their store website.

Now, Japan is full of...shall we say interesting experiences. Things happen differently here, or sometimes are simply unexpected. I think my mom realized this particularly well when she first saw what Japan had served up for her birthday cake(Friday being both her birthday and our first night in Takayama).

All it needed was frosting and a candle.

And so that brings us to the end of todays post. I have included below a short video from our walk around the rice patties at night. You can't see much, but if you turn your sound up you can hear the spring peepers singing out into the Japanese night.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word(s) of the Day!

English: Tall

Japanese:たかい（高い）

Pronunciation: Tah-kah-ii

English: Mountain

Japanese:やま　（山）

Pronunciation: Yah-mah

English: Takayama

Japanese:たかやま　（高山）

Pronunciation: tah-kah-yah-mah

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Best Wishes,

Dan

A little humor

2010-04-23T13:02:00.001+09:00

I walk by this building every day, and the comparison between the way the Japanese veil their construction work on buildings and the building in the below historical video never ceases to make me smile.

The rest of the world should know that all across Japan there are buildings just waiting to set sail...

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!
English: To be serious
Japanese:ルーバー　チ─キン
Pronunciation: roo-bah chii-key-n

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Onigiri

2010-04-22T03:13:00.000+09:00

Hello Everyone! Have you ever wondered what would happen if some foods were so complicated to open that they came with instruction manuals? You say you have never wondered that? Weird. Anyway, this being Japan(and me being hungry), I decided to indulge myself and go to a conbini(convenience store). Now, you long time readers will know that a while back I formally declared that I was quitting conbinis, and to that promise I have on the whole been true. However, I feel that in this case I can make an delicious exception for the sake of the blog(it's a sacrifice, I know). Now, why do I have to go to a conbini to cure the midnight munchies? One simple reason; they have a certain food so difficult to open, so deviously designed, so diabolically intended to make fools of the uninitiated, that they come with elaborate instructions for opening them written on most of the packaging.

What food needs a small novel written on the side in order to educate foreigners about how to eat it?

I'm sure you've heard of them, they are a kind of rice ball called onigiri.

Onigiri rolls are simple affairs, essentially made of rice, some filling, and a crunchy seaweed shell. Now, before I go further, let me tell you that this topic is not entirely arbitrary. I chose onigiri rolls for a very specific reason, namely to illustrate how much trash even the smallest things in Japan generate. In a little bit I'm going to show you a video of me opening these things, just keep an eye on how much trash is generated. We laugh here in the Ohmeikan when someone brings a box of cookies back from somewhere simply due to the amount of packaging that goes into the affair(open the box, then open the bag inside, then open the individual bags inside of that, then unwrap the cookies). I'm sure I will do a post in the future about the various ways Japan sometimes succeeds, and sometimes spectacularly fails, at living up to the new "green" identity it strives for. Another time.

But enough social commentary, here is the video. I hope you learn something.

For the Facebook folks.
Upon re-watching it, I realize that my classical music station was playing in the background the entire time. Oh well, I've ingested far too much conbini origiri for the time being, so I hope you appreciate either classical music in general or humorously clashing themes in media.
Night.
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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: Rice ball
Japanese:おにぎり
Pronunciation: oh-nii-gee(like in geese)-rii
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Best Wishes,
Dan

Multimedia

2010-04-21T05:52:00.001+09:00

Good news everyone!
Over the course of yesterday barefoot in Nagoya was read by its 2000th reader. I wish I could personally thank all of you for your continued interest in Japan and my adventures, but alas all I can do is continue to try and improve Barefoot in Nagoya. Those of you who are reading this from the facebook side may not see this, but I have just updated the template of the blog with new colors, a wider main column so I can show larger photos and videos, and other cosmetic changes. I have also added a twitter feed to the blog, and will be updating regularly on my doings over here in Japan. You may have also noticed that my list of additional blogs that you might be interested in has been growing, and now includes views in four different languages(perhaps indicative of the multinational environment that I live in. The final thing, and perhaps most important, is that I have started expanding Barefoot in Nagoya from a single column to a variety of pages where you can find out more about living and studying in Japan. I have started by creating a videos page, where I will be storing links to those videos which I did not produce, but still think you will find entertainment from. I have started the collection off with three new videos that I highly suggest watching; part 1 of the much acclaimed film 5cm Per Second. I may have mentioned this film before, but it is so well done, and the title fits this time of year so perfectly(5cm per second supposedly being the speed at which sakura blossoms fall) that I wanted to share it with you directly. Later on I will be expanding the collection backwards into 2009, and then working on more pages of interesting facts, figures, and I imagine at some point godzilla references.
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Japanese time! Japanese verb of the day!
English: to read
Japanese: よみます。
Pronunciation: yoh-mii-mas
Usage:
Japanese - きょうのあさにしんぶんをよみます。(Kyou no asa ni shinbun o yomimasu.)
English - This morning I read the newspaper.
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Best Wishes,
Dan

Sakura

2010-04-20T07:43:00.000+09:00

Hello hello, today I will be talking a little bit about one of the things Japan is most famous for, the sakura(common name for Japanese cherry blossoms). Sakura have become so ingrained in the national image of Japan that they are celebrated the world over as reminders of Japanese culture at its finest. One of the most striking examples of this is the National Cherry Blossom festival in Washington DC, where thousands attend to celebrate and share the magnificent site of millions of tiny petals flying around like a sweet smelling snow flurry. Back in Japan these blossoms are a symbol of national pride, and are a very welcome sign that spring is coming.

A fun side note here before I go on is that, like in most countries, the coming of spring in Japan also means that the city gardeners are out in full force sprucing up the landscaping across the nation. Now, as you may have figured out from my former adventures, nothing in Japan is quite as it seems. The gardeners here are no exception, and I'll give you a picture for you to figure out first.

Looks normal enough, right? Sure, to the untrained eye. Now I'll show you another photo blatantly showing my point.

Yes, almost all workers in Japan wear ninja shoes called jika tabi. There can only be one logical explanation for this; all Japanese gardeners are ninjas. Well, either that or the shoes were adopted for their flexibility and added mobility, but I prefer to wildly speculate.

Anyway...where was I...

Right. Sakura.

Sakura is such a big deal that the Japanese weather service actually tracks the path of the cherry blossoms' blooming across the nation, giving every person in Japan an idea of when the optimal time to have a picnic will be.

"...to have a picnic..." was probably not the most remarkable phrase you have yet read in your travels, but the real implications of that phrase, the staggering scale that Japanese people take their sakura picnics(called hanami) is something to which I will devote the rest of my time with you here today. The term Hanami(literally "flower viewing") means that once a year around this time, people from across the country get an excuse to skip work or school to go sit under a tree and watch the cherry blossoms fall. Space in the best viewing areas is usually in such high demand that the interns of companies are often sent out the night before the company picnic to literally camp out and stake a claim around the best viewing areas like the one pictured below.

We've actually been indulging a bit with this cultural phenomenon ourselves(I would be lying if I didn't say that many an evening of the past few weeks has been spent asleep under a cherry tree, and not in front of my computer screen blogging about it), and we actually have had a few hanami of our own. I've included below, as my last bit of multimedia today, selected photos taken by my good friend Ben Thomas at one of our hanamis. I wish I had a website to direct you to to see more of Ben's fantastic photography, but he has assured me that as soon as he can he will give me the address of his blog to share with all you fine readers. Anyway, here you go.

(Ben)

A great evening all around. This last photo is of the new guy from my home university, Green Mountain. His name is Rob Lees and he seems to be settling in just fine.

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: Cherry blossom
Japanese: 桜 or 櫻 or さくら
Pronunciation: sah-koo-rah

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Back in Nagoya!

2010-03-30T10:46:00.002+09:00

Daniel Riley...The name wandered around my sleep deprived brain, desturbing the sedement of thoughts accumulated over twenty-four hours of travel like a hippo trying to get into a bird bath. The name was on a sign by a airline attendent who, upon realizing that the people she was trying to hail had just survived a flight literally around the globe, asked if "Daniel Riley" was my name. That seemed about right, so I said yes. She informed me that my luggage was not, in fact, going to go all the way to Nagoya and I needed to recheck it. This meant I had about forty minutes to dash through Narita airport(in Tokyo), through customs, security, baggage claim, and all the rest in order to make my next flight.

Great.

Needless to say I did in fact make it back, and after literally sleeping the entire weekend I have returned to Japan time. My computer, alas, has a case of the ailment called Vista, so I have no access to either photos nor any of the other shiny objects that I keep on my hard drive. All I have are memories...and a six hundred dollar paperweight, but thats a minor issue.

Memories often serve us well though, as is demonstrated in todays Japanese Time...

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Japanese Time! Kanji!
English: Year
Japanese: 年（ねん）
Pronunciation: Nen
Stroke order can be found here.
Fun Fact!　To those who happened to recieve Christmas cards from me, you may notice that the kanji I placed next to the year is slightly different from the one above, and looks a bit more like this 午. I appologize(sometimes I mix up kanji), but I seem to have wished you a happy 2010 uma, which is horse. To all those horse fans out there, your welcome!

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Update!

2010-03-18T00:04:00.003+09:00

Hey everyone! There's about a week left in my time in America and I'm going strong. In a feeble attempt to fight the massive jet lag that occurs when one moves from one side of the earth to the other I've been subsisting on pizza, real beef jerky, and some exceedingly excellent meals at various family members' houses. This weekend I will be visiting Green Mountain and meeting up the guy who is joining me as representative of GMC in Nagoya next semester, a great guy named Robert Lees. I'm sure he will have a blast. After that we are traveling northwest to visit Niagara falls for a few days and then it's back to Nagoya! In the meantime though I thought you might enjoy this excellent short satirical video on everyday life in Japan, discovered by my good friend Pritpal from the UK.

For those on Facebook.
OK, back to work.

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Japanese Time! A random Kanji from the hundreds of flash cards I travel with!
English: Winter
Japanese: 冬
Pronunciation: Hu-yu
Stroke order can be found Here.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

America

2010-03-10T18:44:00.000+09:00

Hello everyone! As many of you may know I am currently blogging from the other side of the planet now. That's right; I'm in America again. This means that, while I am still most assuredly barefoot, I cannot report the news from Nagoya as per the usual. If I have time I will of course post some of that mound of half finished topics that have been taking space in my hard drive for awhile, but I make no promises. I will return to my regular schedule in two weeks for sure when I return to Japan, but for now I am visiting friends and family. I hope to see some of you while I am here!

From my wall, where I write down tidbits of thought and smidgens of idea that strike my fancy.

"Life is a series of days where you wake up rather surprised to find out that it is no longer yesterday."

From Youtube, that infinite source of amusement.

For Facebook.

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Japanese Time!
English: I have returned to America
Japanese: 私はアメリカにかえりました。
Pronunciation: watashi wa America nii kae-rii-mashta

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Views from Yamadera

2010-03-07T13:41:00.003+09:00

Hey everyone, even back in Nagoya packing for going to America, I still think back to Yamadera. I hope this slideshow comes close to doing it justice.

For Facebook

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Japanese Time! Kanji Time!

English: Me, I

Japanese:私

Pronunciation: wa-ta-shi

Stroke order can be found here.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Yamadera(the Mountain Temple)

2010-03-06T01:10:00.009+09:00

Hey folks, yesterday was essentially spent laying around the famous onsen(hot spring) town of Ayaku, so not many photos from there. Today, however, was spent in incredible Yamadera(literally "Mountain Temple"), a mountainside temple famous for its breath-taking beauty as you climb over a thousand steps to the top. I was thinking about doing a slide show for today, but I as I looked over the photos I realized that creating a slideshow that accurately captures all that is Yamadera is close to impossible. I have thus decided to spend some time on the problem on the cruise home, which is tomorrow. in the mean time I have included a famous haiku(Japanese poetry) that describes the temple, then some modest poetry that came to me as I walked the steps.

The following haiku is by the famous 17th century Japanese poet Matsuo Bashō (松尾芭蕉).

静けさや岩にしみこむ蝉の声

Calm and serene. The sound of a cicada. Penetrates the rock

This was my interpretation.

Yamadera

The temple of a thousand stairs.

A thousand stairs, a thousand steps.

In the course of a lifetime, a trifle.

Strange,

The import we find in these things of simple grace,

These holy places,

A familiarity in foreign stones akin to candle light illuminating the face of an old friend.

I'm happy that people have been enjoying the slideshows, and I hope my next can do this place justice.

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Japanese Time! Learning Kanji.

English:　Mountain

Japanese Kanji:　山

Pronunciation:　Yah-mah

Stroke order and a demostration of the writing: Here　

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Sendai Day One

2010-03-04T11:05:00.000+09:00

Hello Everyone! Today I come to you with an account of my time at one of the most beautiful places on the planet; the island filled bay of Matsushima. Before I show the show, however, I realize now that I have neglected to tell you who my traveling companions are.

From left to right: Keisuke from Japan, Han from Myanmar, Me from the US, and Viktor from Sweden.
and now...I present to you a modest slideshow of the wonder that is Matsushima Bay.

and then...I present to you the terror that were the gulls of Matsushima bay.

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Japanese Time!
English: Today I'm going to an onsen.
Japanese: きょうはおんせんにいきます。
Pronunciation: kyo wa on-sen nii ii-key-mas-ka.

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Best Wishes,
Dan

The Cruise

2010-03-03T11:07:00.000+09:00

Hey Everyone! Here is the slideshow from the cruise! Now we are off to explore Sendai!
The show for Facebook folks!

The adventure continues!

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Japanese Time!
English: This is delicious!
Japanese: ほんとにおいしい
Pronunciation: hon-toe ni oi-ishi

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Best Wishes,
Dan

To Sendai!

2010-02-28T16:27:00.006+09:00

Hello everyone! Today I'm please to say that I am going on another trip! This time to Sendai, a small city a good bit north of Nagoya pictured here.

This trip will be interesting, since our mode of transportation is on a cruise ship, and we will essentially traveling like this.

This might not strike you as anything unusual or cause for intrigue, but then take into account my next photo, taken from my TV this morning.

This is a picture of the areas effected or soon-to-be effected by the tsunamis(Literally translated as "harbor waves") created by the recent catastrophic earthquake in Chile. Looks like we will be sailing right into the thick of it. Granted, "The thick of it" has yet to be anything more then mini tsunamis ranging from 30 cm to about a meter, but I have faith, and the Japanese government is obviously still on alert. Regardless of size, these tsunamis have been doing some pretty serious damage at many points surrounding the Pacific; pushing up boats, flooding coastal areas, and generally wreaking havoc on seaside populations. Japan has been very vigilant, and has not been taking any chances or risks. Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama even went as far as to make this announcement before the first wave made landfall, "Please do not approach the coast at any cost,", additionally the government sprang into action with evacuating tens of thousands of people, reinforcements to infrastructure, and more and more announcements regarding what to do in a tsunami. Honestly I'm not so sure what they were on about; Japan is a world leader in disaster-proof infrastructure and preparedness, and the 7.0 earthquake in Okinawa a few days ago did barely more then rattle a few windows.

What I do I wonder is what it will be like on the water. As many of you I'm sure know, tsunamis are a series of waves, not just one giant one like in the movies. This means that while the coastal areas may not have been effected all that much, the sea still has an incredible amount of energy moving through it, and can still move around docked boats, let alone those which are out at sea.

OK, it's nearly ten in the morning here in Nagoya and I'm off on this newest adventure, I make no promises that I will be able to post while I am away, but I will try.

See you under the sea.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!

English: Tsunami

Japanese:Simple Kana -> つなみ　Kanji -> 津波

Pronunciation: Tsunami

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Feedback

2010-02-24T02:57:00.004+09:00

Hello everyone! Today I come to you with a bit of a surprise, for both me and you. Apparently Blogger, the service I use to post this blog, decided to totally revamp it's template design system, making the old look of Barefoot in Nagoya somewhat painful to the eyes. It is with this in mind that I just spent an evening designing what you see before you today (I'm going to ask you facebook folks to please come on over to Barefoot in Nagoya's actual page for this post, just click here). As you can see the new template is a striking departure from the old simple one, and that is not the only change I am thinking of making. For one I would like to get you, my dear readers, involved in how I present to you. There have been over a thousand and a half of you, and I think that if those who are willing could give me some feedback on what you like about my little blog here, then I can do a much better job these next few months. Therefore I would like to direct your attention to the three brief polls right below this post, it shouldn't take more then a few minutes to do, and it will help me immensely.

Thanks for your help!

Never would I dream of leaving you without some humor, here is a selection of videos from the youtube.

A new game show for you

In the spirit of the olympics

Painful to watch, I'm not sure why they do it.

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Japanese Time!

English: Thank you very much!

Japanese: ありがとございませんでした！

Pronunciation: ah-ri-gah-toe-go-zai-ma-sen-de-shta

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Original title run over by a Toyota

2010-02-23T03:43:00.003+09:00

Hey everyone. To start off I'd like to tell those you who are first time readers that this is not a political blog in any stretch of the imagination. There exist blogs far more thought out then mine that deal with this prickly topic, one of which is the fine example authored by my friend Colin over at Tokyo Remix. No, Barefoot in Nagoya is of the aberrant nature, both in topic and posting schedule. It is with this in mind that I feel so comfortable with the smooth transition of going from noodles to political fundraisers.
Fundraisers are a key part of the political process in any country, but they hold a special place in the political landscape here in Japan. I myself have gone to quite a few of these fundraisers during my stay, to the extent that I even have my own Japanese and English business cards, or meishi(名刺), to exchange with the politicians and other fine people I meet.

Not bad eh?

This current fundraiser was for Kohei Otsuka(大塚耕平 for my Japanese readers) the man who I was told is called the "teacher of politicians". Apparently he is a something of a rising star; he is a published author, accomplished statesman, charismatic leader, and a professor at a large university. I also heard say that he has perfect hair and is one of the apparent few people who can actually get a Toyota to stop accelerating.

OK, maybe that last one was a lie, we all know that no one can stop a Toyota.

Anyway, this was the first time I got to actually volunteer at one of these events, a rather unique opportunity to see another view of the process. As I said before somewhere above the current sentence, this was not my first political fundraiser, so I figured it would be easy to just hop over to the other side of the coat check table, so-to-speak. How wrong I was.
In retrospect I think the jury is still out on this being a good idea. You see, as soon as we arrived we were handed our uniforms in the shape of green...I want to say windbreakers? So here we were, around twenty well trimmed and sharply dressed guys attempting to look dignified whilst donning semi-translucent neon green windbreakers over our suits and ties. Did I mention that they were also heat proof, thus each of us were treated to our own personal sauna inside our suits. Picture twenty penguins in radioactive green ponchos about twelve sizes too small for them, that was us.
Our first task was that of decorating the venue with the various inspirational posters and such. These posters were rather amusing, ranging from determined photographs of Mr Otsuka to humorous cartoons like the one below of Kohei towering over the bumbling politicians currently in power.

(To those interested in who the bottom three are, click for a bigger view)

At long last the deed was done, the posters were hung, and we had helped set up the big hall for people. All we needed to do now was wait...
*
Soon people began to trickle in, and as each person came in we cheerfully greeted them with a bow and a quick hello. Very quickly, however, that trickle became a stream, then a torrent, then a landslide. I honestly have no idea how they all fit in there, but they did. At one point early on one of our fellow volunteers, a fine gentleman working for Toyota(poor man) looked at me with a smile, then surveyed the seething mass of suits and fancy dresses the way a fisherman might survey a net full of the finest fish in the sea. "Hmm...How many people do you think are in this room?", he asks me in Japanese. "Well, I don't really know. Maybe... 300? 400?" I reply. "Over 500 people", he exclaims, and goes back to surveying his catch.

It was at this point that I had a striking image pop into my head of a tuna in a tailored suit idly sipping tea and inquiring why I was staring at it. Clearly the amount of heat my radioactive windbreaker was trapping was getting to my head. Time for a green tea.
*
The fundraiser itself went well, I think someone mentioned that we raised something like 60 or 600 thousand dollars, I still can't quite get the conversion right. I can't really make many observations on this part of the day because for the most part I was talking with the other volunteers about what they did when they weren't dying of heat exhaustion for their political candidate.
*
Our jobs started again after the last speech made by Otsuka, thereafter the man decided it was a good idea to step directly off the center of the stage and start meeting and greeting. I think, perhaps, that our hero underestimated his effect on his supporters, as almost immediately there was a line six people wide stretching from the stage to the back of the room of people waiting to meet him and shake his hand. Of course, as the tenders of our courageous politician we had to make sure the poor man didn't faint from shaking so many hands, and thus it became a rather amusing task trying to get a word in edgewise to give the poor man some tea to refresh.
See, here's what would inevitably happen. A higher up volunteer would recognize that our hero needed something to revive him in between photo-ops and name dropping. This higher up would delegate his second in command to go get our hero a glass of nice cold o-cha(green tea). This lieutenant would then delegate it to a lower person, who would in turn do the same, until it hit the end of the power structure. The last person would then have to go over and attempt to hand the tea over without looking rude and interrupting. Here's the thing, there was no opening. The line to great the man literally spanned the room until almost the end of the event, each next person in line leaping up after the last one was dealt with faster then college kids at an all-you-can-eat buffet. Of course, this meant that the poor person with the tea felt too nervous to intrude, so he would hand the tea off to his superior. His superior would roll his eyes at such timidity and boldly approach the mass of grinning fans and presumably Mr Otsuka beneath. After a few seconds it would become apparent that the sea of fans was not going to magically part for this higher up volunteer any better then it would for the first, so he would then return and hand the tea off to his superior, who would then do the same thing. In this way I saw the same cup of tea go from the top of the power structure to the bottom to the top again at least two times. The cycle would only finish when some volunteer got fed up and finally tapped Mr Otsuka on the arm, whereas the good politician would look over... take the glass... take an imperceptible sip... and then put it on the table forgotten.

After the fundraiser itself we were treated to a late lunch, and I had the opportunity to talk with Mr Otsuka himself for a little while. We talked for a good bit about politics, and what makes a good politician. He had some great views, and we agreed on a lot of things. He even offered to let me work in his campaign offices if I was interested. Apparently he already has someone working there from Oxford, and he was very willing to take on another English speaker. I would jump at the opportunity of course, but unfortunately since he is one of the higher ups his office is located in Tokyo, and thus not very accessible. Great conversation though. He reminded me, while talking about what a politician has to think about, of his favorite quote from an American politician, "And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country." I can only hope that more up and coming politicians, on both sides of the pacific, are as willing to take this to heart.

Again, really seemed like a great guy, I hope he goes far. Those of you fluent in Japanese should check out his website; http://www.oh-kouhei.org/.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!
English: Politician
Japanese: せいじか ( 政治家 )
Pronunciation: Say-gee kah
Bonus! Hiragana practice for those of you who are long time readers of my blog and/or learning Japanese.
めいし
とよた
おちゃ
はな
Cheat-Sheet for Hiragana can be found here.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

The Snack

2010-02-17T13:25:00.001+09:00

Evening or afternoon to everyone, today I decided that I might share with those back home a little of what it is like to cook in Japan. Now, some of you might not know this, but I am a terrible cook. How terrible you say? Lets put it this way; I firmly believe that, if it were possible, I could burn tea. It is for this reason that I am starting easy, and what could be easier then a Japanese favorite-Udon(thick noodles). Of course I will do more food posts, but for now I want to start simple and inflammable. Now, like all Japanese food, Udon has a certain look that it should have, in this case something like the picture below;

This would be all fine and dandy, except the kitchen I am using is used daily by physics students who have never had to clean or cook for themselves in their life up until coming to college, so the kitchen looks like this;

Sparkling.
OK, so in order to get this show on the road we need some supplies. Now, I may be wrong, but my basic understanding of cooking tells me that you need two things for making noodles; a pot and noodles.

Luckily I happen to have some Udon noodles on hand, these ones given to me by Takagi Hiroshi, the governor of Aichi, the last time we met. Granted these seem special and are probably more work intensive, but I assume the concept is the same. Finding a pot, however, is slightly more difficult. My mom sent me a great sturdy stainless steel one that served me well for about five meals. The reason it only lasted five meals is simple, namely someone stole it. I'm determined to get it back, but for the time being it means I am potless. No worries though, nothing a quick trip to the stole can't fix.
*
Back, and with a little searching it looks like I am almost read to cook. Looks like this won't be too bad after all.

(Left to right; Pot, Spices, Ladle, Herbamare vegetable salt, Spoon, Udon, what I think is cooking oil.)
The first trial of course is figuring out the stove without blowing up. The stoves here at Ohmeikan are a little different then back home, or anywhere else for that matter, specifically they are both coin operated and actively trying to burn you. After a good hour of trying to operate the cursed machine, I finally got it to light and stay lit, so I guess now it's just a matter of waiting right?

While it is cooking I have included here a recipe for a special kind of udon they make in Nagoya, miso nikomi udon, feel free to try it at home.
First what you will need.
1 package of pre-boiled Udon Noodles
1 cup dashi soup stock
1 oz. chicken thigh, cut into bite sized pieces
2 slices of kamaboko (fish cake)
1/2 aburaage (deep fried tofu), sliced into strips
2 inch negi or leek, diagonally sliced
1 and a half tablespoon of red miso
2 tablespoons of sake
1 teaspoon of sugar
Preparation:
Put the dashi into a earthenware pot and bring it to a boil. mix in the miso, the sugar, and the sake. Toss in the chicken and simmer on medium heat until cooked through. Add the Udon noodles and bring it to a boil. Toss in everything else and bring to a boil again. Optional: drop in a raw egg. This apparently makes about 1 serving, so make sure to make enough. If you are a better cook then I am then it should end up looking something like this;

My udon does not look like this. BUT, it is not a charred wreck and/or on fire, so I say it isn't too bad a job, what do you think?

Itadakimasu!
(Lets eat!)

Happy cooking.

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Japanese time!
English: Let's eat!
Japanese: いただきます!
Pronunciation: ee-tah-dah-key-mas!
Bonus: Hirigana practice for you long time readers of Barefoot in Nagoya, I have included some simple words found in this post.
みそ
うどん
かまぼこ
なごや
Here's some help, the post where I outlined the hirigana can be found here.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Tōki Orinpikku (Winter Olympics)

2010-02-16T06:27:00.001+09:00

Hello everyone, I hope you are all well(to those in the mid-eastern US, how about lets settle for hoping that you have dug out?) and that you are enjoying a healthy bout of Olympic fever. The Winter Olympics, while being often referred to as the lesser of the two Olympiads, has still infected us to a rather large degree. Being essentially all from different nations, it has been common the last few nights for there to be a huddled mass of students in the lobby watching, commenting, exclaiming, and sometimes bemoaning the performance of our respective countrymen. The Japanese coverage of the Olympics has been, shall we say, interesting?
To start, there are the Olympic mascots...

Whoever thought these up should never underestimate the obsessive love of small, cute characters shared by many Japanese people. Remember Vancouver, these are the creators of Pokemon, Rilakkuma, Doreamon, and above all (Insert any Nintendo character name here), so don't be surprised when the Japanese coverage and advertising for the Olympics features almost more mascot then footage of the events. Then there is the amount of ice and ramps in the coverage of the events, probably tipped off by the now-iconic image of the event.

As I may have said before, Japanese television is not like anything in the western world. This has become glaringly apparent in the usage of animation in such a chopped up and edited event as the Olympics, which necessitates by its very nature the entertainment of the audience in-between shots. Unfortunately I do not have video of this effect happening, but I have included below a brief script of something we saw at least six times on the coverage tonight.

1. Male Host: (Introduces next segment and event)
2. Female Host:(Smiles while seeming to extend neck as far as possible)*Note: We have no idea why she kept doing this*
3. *Camera waits for an uncomfortable amount of time with them still smiling(female host still extending neck), 4. then pans left to an even more uncomfortable angle to the side of their plexiglass ice news desk surrounded by glitter, more fake ice, and animations of ramps.*
5. *Elaborate and drawn out animation of a ramp unfurling begins, ending at the desk just below the hosts, who are still smiling and staring at the wrong camera.*
6. *Ramp shatters in elaborate ice-shattering animation*

Repeat as necessary.
Now, I know that about half of my regular readers are in Japan, so I wanted to point out something for you fine people of the Japanese nationality. Have you noticed that the sets for Japanese game shows and those for the coverage of the Olympics seem to be designed in the exact same way? Go turn on the TV and check it out, it's actually kinda cool.

So what, would I say, is the best thing about these Olympics? Reverse product placement. By far the most amusing thing about these games has been the way Japanese vendors have been jumping on the band wagon for advertising. It's like Halloween, slap on some Canadian flags on everything and you got yourself an instant marketing campaign. Its gotten so bad that I was in the store today and I saw Canadian Sushi. That's correct, folks, little balls of rice and fish with a big ol' Canadian flag on the side.

I don't know about you folks, but the first thing that comes to my brain when I think Canada is sushi.

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Japanese Time!
English: That mascot is cute.
Japanese: このマスコトはかわいいね。
Pronunciation: koh-no ma-su-koh-toh wa kah-wah-ii neh.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Setsubun

2010-02-05T08:15:00.002+09:00

You can't make this stuff up, really.

Now, before I get onto the post, I have to relate a story about the writing of it. The post today is about Setsubun, the yearly festival in Japan on the third of February to usher in spring. One of the traditions of this festival that I observed and will be talking about is the tradition of monks throwing beans and other snacks to eager crowds for, from my admittedly limited understanding, good luck. Well, the festival was...I want to say yesterday but I've kind of lost track of days fairly quickly after classes ended. Anyway, the point is I had run out of mikan, which is a small orange-like fruit that I rather enjoy writing with by my side, and I decide to take a break to go grab some more and throw in a load of laundry while I was at it. This seems simple enough, yes? How wrong you would be to assume such a thing.

See, as I have said before, there are a variety of ways for people to react to seeing a foreigner here in Japan, some more comical then others. This one was particularly amusing, if only in a darkly humorous way. I got out of the Ohmeikan and started walking, bright yellow laundry bag slung across my back like Santa Claus, down to the laundromat and then to the convenience store. There is only one intersection to cross in this path of mine, and while I was getting nearer the walk light turned in my favor. This meant that I needed to walk a little bit faster to get across in time and not have to wait for the next cycle. Here enters the other actor in this play, this poor middle aged Japanese woman dressed in a Kimono(Traditional robe). This woman was waiting patiently for the walk light and only glanced at me briefly before, I thought rather hurriedly, making her way across the street at the green. I am a fairly tall and in shape guy, and my strides were those of someone wanting to get a load off his back, not the strides of one encumbered by a kimono, this meant that I quickly overtook this woman just as we were about to hit the other side. This woman stops dead in her tracks, turns to me, and looks at me square in the face with a look of sheer terror as if I were some threatening figure. Because you know folks, the only thing more threatening then this:

(Don't ask, some video game character. I assume by the way he holds that baseball bat he's friendly.)

Is this:

(Maybe she finds earth friendly clothing detergent horrifying)

Needless to say I was confused, but this wasn't the first time someone had reacted strange to seeing me or my friends, so I went along my business. Boy, gotta love some citrusy fruit.

But now of course I must steer this ship of a blog post back to the original topic with a smooth transition.

Today's post involves quite a lot of things, I hope I can get to them all;

*People firing arrows

*People wanting arrows fired at them

*Axes

*Fire

*Smoke

*People throwing things at fire

*Fire throwing things at people

*Peanuts

Know what all that makes me thing of? Spring.

Thats right folks, it's the changing of the seasons time here in Nagoya, and that means Setsubun(Bean throwing ceremony, lunar New Years eve, and literally means seasonal division for those interested in stuff like that). Setsubun kind of reminds me of the winter solstice back home, certainly with a lot more fire, but that is besides the point(and coming up soon). I was invited to come to a small "ceremony" right outside of Nagoya by Mina early in the afternoon, and despite being sick as a sick foreigner I decided to go. We got there a little early so we had time to walk around, meet some people, and for me to actually figure out what was happening. The first thing we saw was this.

No explanation was given of any of what you have just seen. What it did manage to learn was that this was Setsubun and that it was a ceremony to renew your good fortune by burning the old charms and such from the old year, a fraction of which are depicted here.

We were left to wonder how this was going to be accomplished, though, because soon it was clear that whatever ceremony was going to happen was about to happen.

First, two of the monks reenacted what I imagine was an ancient conversation. Even the people near me who knew Japanese did not know this very old form, but it was interesting to hear some familiar sounds.
Then we had "The Arrows". "The Arrows" Consisted of one of the monks walking to each of the four corners of the enclosure and, as you can see below, violently shooting an arrow at the people watching the ceremony.

We caught one of the arrows, by great personal risk of course, and I think we are keeping it for good luck.
Then came the best part, and I see that some of you have beat me to the punch in regards to this video. After the arrows it was time to light the thing in the center of the enclosure.

After liberal application of what I suppose was sacred alcohol to keep the flames burning in such wind(Did I mention that the wind is blowing so hard that alcohol on fire is having a tough time staying lit.) Well, Needless to say, they got it lit.

Truly amazing. For those of you whole chose to sit through the whole thing, isn't it amazing that that monk was chanting the entire time this video is going on. The combination of the chanting and the smoke transformed this little driveway into another world. While viewing the video I suggest keeping an eye on the snow and the shaped it's making. Also you can see some absolutely incredible shapes in the smoke when you look close.

I hope everyone has a good time smoke-spotting.

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Let's Learn Japanese! Word of the Day!
English: When will that happen?
Japanese:　いつ
Pronunciation: ii-tsu
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Best Wishes, Dan

PS(Or is it BS? If it's on a blog is it still technically "postscript"? Wouldn't it be "blogscript"? Anyway) For those of you interested, I will slowly but surely add more slide shows and commentary to my blog post before this, and you can still find it in the archives. I just needed to get on with some new material as frankly I have never been able to keep up with all the stuff this country throws at me, let alone be chronological about it.

The return of the blog

2010-02-02T06:34:00.002+09:00

Hello everyone! It's been so long but now I am back, brought to you by the fine folks at hp, the maker of my laptop who sent a replacement charger for free...to the states. Then it was conveniently up to mom to send it my way, gotta love bureaucratic customer service.

Anyway what I have for you today is a series of slideshows of the pictures from New Years. It's truly amazing how fast time flies here, and even more amazing that it is February already. It is with this in mind that I have uploaded to youtube, and presented for you here these pictures along with short descriptions. because of limited time I will be uploading the files one by one over the course of today and tomorrow so stay tuned.

Our first stop is Nara. The first big thing you need to know about Nara is that deer and deer memorabilia are everywhere. The deer here in Nara are considered sacred, and are thus treated to a life of quiet solitude, interrupted only by the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and tourists who frequent the many world heritage sites in the city limits. The pilgrims are constantly amused by the antics of aforementioned hoofed quadrupeds, specifically the fact that they bow. Here is a short video for you to see this trick in action.
Video for facebook.

Next stop, as you will see in the show, was a huge temple and world heritage site called Todai-Ji. Todai-ji is huge. How huge you say? How about... let's see... Ah, yes, Wikipedia knows the answer, "Tōdai-ji (東大寺 Tōdai-ji, Eastern Great Temple), is a Buddhist temple complex located in the city of Nara, Japan. Its Great Buddha Hall (大仏殿 Daibutsuden), the largest wooden building in the world". Now that is big. I wish I had a better word for it, but my vocab ends when I see the picture you will see in the video of a normal person(mom in the purple coat) standing next to just one of the huge doors.
Video for facebook

Amazing, isn't it? I've been here before and I still was reduced to yet another gawking tourist when I stood in front of the largest Buddha in the world and simply tried to understand the effort that went into this project so long ago. The pictures after that are of one of the large shrines on the outskirts of the city. This shire was a sea of people wanting good luck in the new year, and though we didn't get a photo of it, there were attendants literally wading through all the coins being thrown as donations. It was truly a fascinating sight and I'm glad we decided to take this day trip. It was, however, a lot of walking so we treated ourselves to a rickshaw ride back.

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Mini Japanese time! Kanji!
English: Great, Big, Very Much, Best, Greatest, Most
Japanese: 大
Pronunciation: Dai, Oh-ki
Example: 大学 = Dai-ga-ku = University (literally "big learning")

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Back now with the second slide show.
So what was next? Well, previously in the week we had noticed that there was a large flea market happening in one of the temples we had visited. Having heard about the extravagance of Japanese flea markets we decided to check it out, and were rewarded with a full day of admiring odd family heirlooms, wondering about the history of various objects, and of course making some purchases of folks back home. So, without further delay, here is the show.
Facebook folks can find it here

For those interested in a more detailed and artfully written description of the market we went to, I found this article.

Best Wishes,
Dan

Updated from the last computer on the planet

2010-01-17T14:52:00.000+09:00

Hello folks, I have some great news and some not great news. First, I have finalized my plans for returning to the states for a two week portion of spring break, specifically March 8th to the 25th. I hope to see many of you fine readers and relay to you some of the stories that I have ommitted from this blog in favor of personally telling(though I may not have time to meet all of you, Barefoot in Nagoya now has over a thousand people who have read it!). The bad news is that my computer charger fried, and I am now without a computer....during the end of the semester rush for finals.....Have I mentioned how much I love laptops?.

I digress. As for Japanese culture I actually have a very interesting point for you, a topic in the Japanese news that I feel like I witnessed first hand. For those of you who do not know Japanese politics the Japanese government just changed drastically recently with the Democratic Party of Japan winning control over the government for the first time in many decades. One of the main figures behind this win was Ichiro Ozawa, a man who many consider to be the power behind the throne in Japanese politics today. Why is this important? This week I was invited along with my tutor to the New Year`s fundraiser for the Democratic Party by the Mayor of my tutor`s town. This was essentially a political fundraiser for up and coming politicians in the party and it was very interesting. I met a lot of people in the present administration including several mayors of surrounding cities and prefectures, a former ambassador to the States, and other mid to upper government men and women. While this was very interesting and I look forward to meeting again with the many contacts I made during this fundraiser, the main attraction was Ozawa. I had really wanted to meet the man, and I almost did, but in the end I was only able to be in the front few rows as he made his speech. The interesting part came over the next few days and continues to come out as the Japanese media and prosecuters are starting to attack this man over a fundraising scandal. As the headlines first started to come out Mina commented that he won`t take the fall, his secretaries will...Sure enough, on friday three of his secretaries, two of which I had seen at this fundraiser, were arrested. If anyone is interested in politics I highly suggest that you check out what is happening over here with this man who is reportedly called the `shadow shogun` of Japanese politics.
Very interesting sufff.
So, until I get a replacement charger for my computer,

Best Wishes,
Dan

The first day cometh after the first week endeth

2010-01-08T18:08:00.007+09:00

Hello everyone! Mom is safely home in the states, and I've had a few days to regroup and get back into the same old routine, so now it is time to update you on our travels in Kyoto.

Mmmm....four degree Celsius...Brisk.

We started off our day taking a brief trip to the Philosopher's Path on our way to Ginkakuji (Temple of the Silver Pavilion), a Zen temple on the east side of Kyoto. Ginkakuji is often mistaken by people for it's more famous neighboring temple Kinkakuji(Temple of the Golden Pavilion), which is one of the most iconic sights in Japan. So iconic that, even though during my current stay here I have not been there, it is actually the icon for my blog on Green Mountain College's website.
As I mentioned before, we started our day off at the Philosopher's Path, one of my favorite places in Kyoto.

The Path was still beautiful like my last visit(many more photos there), and we moved along it quickly. Mom wanted to get to Ginkakuji on time.
When we got there we found that the Pavilion itself was under construction, and was thus not entirely photogenic, but that was not a problem, not at all. For you see, Ginkakuji is also famous for it's amazing Zen sand gardens, and these were in full majesty.

(Yes, that is sand. The pillar represents Mount Fuji)

This plateau carved out of sand stands about a foot to two feet tall, and how they made it I have no idea, let alone how they retain its shape.
We also got a rather nice view of the whole temple from the trails behind the garden.

(Click the picture for a really great view)
For those more interested in views of this amazing example of Zen gardening check out the slide-show at the end of today's post.
After we left the temple we made our way to Diamonji-yama(a large mountain in Kyoto). Diamonji is one of the mountains cradling Kyoto, and is annually set on fire. Yes, I said set on fire.

You see, during the Buddhist festival of Obon it is a tradition in Kyoto to set aflame giant Kanji on the sides of these four mountains. The flames are supposed to guide the souls of the dead into the afterlife and to grant them peace. Nobody seems to know how the idea of inscribing giant Kanji like the ones below onto mountains came into being, but I'm sure there is a completely reasonable explanation. For the sake of humorous redundancy I reiterate; every year mountains... are set on fire.... four of them.

Pretty though.
Upon reaching the trail head we made our way up.

And up.

Eventually we did make it to the top, and we were greeted with an absolutely magnificent view.

(I suggest clicking on the photo to get the real scale.)
From this picture you can see the entire valley, and if it wasn't so windy and snowing I'm sure we would have stayed longer. If you are wondering where we are in relation to the bonfires, I'll show you. The following picture shows where we were on the mountain.

Clearly I must come back here during the festival to take a compare-and-contrast photo.

Of course after viewing the sweeping vista, clouds heavily burdened with snow scurrying past us like overweight frightened pigeons, the majestic entirety of one of the most culturally rich places in this country stretched out before us...we had to climb back down.

Great.

We did eventually get down and made our slow but sure way back to the hotel, photos in cameras and memories in brains. As with my last cultural post I have made a short movie for you folks wanting to see more photos. This movie also includes some photos from a small temple we saw on the way, Nanzenji Temple.

Facebook folks can find the video on my newly modified Youtube channel.

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: I am tired!
Japanese: 私はつかれた！
Pronunciation: wah-tah-shi wa tsu-kah-reh tah!

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Priorities

2010-01-04T01:49:00.000+09:00

Hello to all you fine people reading this modest blog of mine. Me and my mom have been having a great time here in Kyoto and we wish you all well. I look forward to telling you all about our days here in Kyoto in a day or two, depending on your time zone, as I am going to postpone writing until my mom leaves. I'm sure you all know the importance of spending as much time as possible with your family during this season, many of you are my family, so I know you will understand my choice. I look forward to telling you all about Kyoto soon, take care.

You know I always want my readers laughing, so here are three series of videos from three corners of the globe which I invite you to spend some time on. As I watched them in preparation for this blog I realized just how much humor differs in what is "typical" humor in different countries, and I suppose that is the culture point for today. I hope you enjoy them, as they all come highly recommended by three friends of mine.

*Usavich: Recommended by a Japanese friend, as such be prepared for ridiculous animation combined nonsensical and outrageous abuses of the laws of physics.

*Yes Prime Minister: Recommended by a good friend from England, this series has a surprising amount of depth for those who want social commentary, but balances it well with a healthy dose of British humor.

*Look Around You: Brought to my attention today by an a friend back home in the states, this completely serious series of facts every student should know is presented in a whimsical manner that will amuse as it informs(kind of).

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Special Japanese Time! Family Addition
Family Members
Mom: お母さん - oh-āh-san
Dad: お父さん - oh-tōh-san
Aunt: おばさん - oh-bah-san
Uncle: 叔父 - oh-jii
Cousin: いとこ - ii-toh-koh
Sister: 妹 - ii-mō-to
Brother: お兄さん - oh-nii-san (humorously enough "oh-nii" is also the word for demon or ogre)
Grandma: おばあちゃん - oh-bāh-chan
Grandpa: おじいちゃん - oh-jīī-chan

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Best Wishes,
Dan

New Years Eve 2009: a Kyoto Odyssey

2010-01-02T09:25:00.001+09:00

Happy New Year Everyone! I'm blogging to you again from beautiful Kyoto, a city in the mountains an hours ride by bullet train from my home base in Nagoya. If you haven't read yesterday's blog, I'm joined in my adventures by my mom, who flew in on the 30th. I'm posting to you now a day late regrettably, but since the events of the 31st left both me and mom tired, frozen, and needing sleep, I'm sure you will understand.

But, as I've done so many times before, I digress. I've decided that the best way to give you an account of the daylight hours is through a little movie that I've put together of me and mom's photos. The music is the a selection from my collection of Koto, which is a type of traditional Japanese instrument. I hope you enjoy, and I'll see you after the movie.

The Movie

Hello again everyone! I hope you enjoyed the movie. So first, before I go on, a culture point. Kyoto is a city steeped in tradition and spirituality, with thousands of shrines and temples scattered across the valley and up into the surrounding hills. This cultural sanctity means that instead of a fireworks display to start the new year with a bang, like in other cities, the people in Kyoto prefer to use the night as an opportunity to pray at the temples and to wish for luck in the new year. As for me and mom, we had earlier decided to visit Chion-in temple, famous for having the largest bell in Japan that required seventeen monks to ring.

This is not Chion-in temple. It is, however, a shrine we were so impressed with while we were looking for Chion-in that we decided to investigate further.

Inside the shrine we found an abundance of stalls, vendors and in games like those at any country fair back in the states. We also noticed people selling bamboo ropes, which they somehow lit and swong in front of them, though we saw nobody using lighters. The answer soon became clear.

They were lighting the ropes, which turned out to symbolize good health and wellbeing, on these fires. As you might be able to see on the left side of the photograph, this monk is throwing pieces of wood onto the fire. Ordinary enough, except that every piece of wood has what looks like prayers written on it from pilgrims to the shrine, the ceremony I suppose being in order to release the prayer into the cosmos in hope for an answer.

Everywhere we went we were surrounded by these paper lanterns, their light adding a softness to the whole evening. We also saw a lot of entertainers, like the fire thrower in the below two videos. I hope you enjoy his antics as much as we did. You might have to watch the one with the apple a few times to fully appreciate what is going on, I know I did.

The Fire Thrower

The Apple

Isn't that crazy? I will never look at apples, flaming torches, or scimitars the same way again.

Eventually we realized that we should probably get to Chion-in, if we were going to make the first ringing of the bell, so we asked a guy who sold us some overpriced mangoes if he could tell us where it was. He pointed to the back of the shrine and told us to go straight, then take a left at the small lake. When we followed his instructions, we ended up here.

As you can tell the snow started to pick up at this point, what you most likely cannot tell is the fact that the wind also picked up and the temperature plummeted. We weren't too perturbed, as we had finally found Chion-in and we figured we could go see the bell then then head back for some more hot fair food to warm us up. It was with this outlook that we decided to start the trek.

We found ourselves in the above courtyard, in a queue waiting for the chance to go see the bell. We were told that we could head up to the place where the bell was at 8:30, in a half hour, so we figured we could just wait for a bit. Eventually the time came and the entire queue moved em mass through the trails laid out for us and up the hill, until eventually we all piled into a small clearing holding this enormous bell.

To give you an idea of how large this bell is, that stool underneath is about six feet tall and the pole to hit it is larger then a big telephone pole
We got into this clearing, and started to wait. And wait. And wait some more. All this time what must have been hundreds of people filed in behind us, pressing us against the railings as they tried for better views and thankfully providing some general body heat to keep us all from freezing to death. At 10:15, a little over two hours after we first arrived, a lone man came out and raked the sand beneath the bell.

Soon after, at 10:30, the monks themselves made a slow procession into the bell enclosure, and began to chant.

The Chant
Shortly after the end of this video they ceased chanting and took their places at the ropes, whereupon we were treated to the first of one hundred eighty rings until 2010.

The Bell
I hope some of you noticed that the monk closest to the bell essentially goes horizontal with his final push to get the bell struck. This was absolutely amazing and we were happy to be some of the first to see it. We were also frozen solid, and it was a good hour's walk back to the hotel. As we left the shrine the new year began, and hundreds of people rushed up to be the first ones to pray at the shrine in 2010. We were cold and exhausted, though, so we made our way back to the hotel and collapsed. I hope you all had a great New Year's Eve, and I will see you tonight.

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Japanese Time!
English: What year is it?
Japanese: ことしはなにですか？
Pronunciation: koh-toe-shi wa nah-nii des-ka?

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Best Wishes,
Dan

The ordeal that is travel

2009-12-31T02:05:00.000+09:00

To start us off, what do...

A fountain...

A cobblestone street...

and a mall's food court all have in common? I'll give you a hint.

Thats right! They are all perched atop the main check-in area of Chubu Centrair International Airport, which is where I spent my day waiting for my Mom to arrive on flight 751 Korean Air.

Who would think that picking up one oka-san(母mother) would be so difficult? The trouble started when I went with my tutor to the Shinkansen(新幹線Bullet Train) office to pick up tickets for getting to Kyoto. Turns out the last train leaves at ten o' five in the evening, and you can set your watch by Japanese trains so you know that if you are a minute late it will be a hopeless cause. This is a problem because my mother arrives in Japan ten minutes to nine...in Chubu Centrair International Airport, which is on an artificial island off the coast of Japan, roughly an hour before we have to be on the Shinkansen in Nagoya. Nagoya by regular train is an hour away. *Sigh* This means that in order to make the train I need to somehow telepathically communicate with mom that she needs to sprint through customs and pick up her baggage. Then we need to dash for the Super Limited Express train(actual name, maybe) and make it by 9:17. Then we have about thirty minutes to breath before we arrive in Nagoya, whereupon we have the pleasure of running from literally one end of the station to the other in order to catch the Shinkansen. Every ticket is bought, reservations are made, all we need is the mom. As of my writing this the ETA on said mom is a little less then four hours.

Heaven forbid I would be bored during the time I'm spending waiting, I've also been visited by the Japanese police a few times (now three, as they walked up to me again while I was typing this). Because really, what visit to the airport would be complete without being treated like a suspected terrorist, regardless of whether you are flying or not. Now, I'm not saying that they specifically sought me out because of the color of my skin or anything, but the fact that I was approached multiple times and asked for my foreigners registration is something a tad suspect. They are very polite about it of course (many Japanese will never do anything that might offend), but it is very clear what is happening. Of course I could blow up in their faces and demand to know why they chose me, with my well dressed attire and expensive looking laptop over the raggedy looking Japanese fellows next to me swapping suspicious looking parcels like they were trading cards...but what would be the point? They are simply listening to the commands from up high. On the plus side they are all very nice, and they have come with enough frequency that I'm just about to ask the information desk where the bathroom, trash, or food court is when they present themselves. If it's going to happen anyway should it be a matter of pride that by the end of the night almost all the security personnel here will probably know the name Daniel Alder Riley? I think so.

So why did I come so early do you ask? (I arrived here at one in the afternoon) Well, I wanted to get the lay of the land so-to-speak. The extra time has given me the opportunity to make sure everything is set for exactly when mom walks out of baggage claim, write up this blog, and respond another wave of messages sparked by this post. It's also given me the opportunity to brush up on my kanji and, perhaps the most important thing, to marvel at the ability for a plan so complicated and expensive to hinge on the actions of one baggage claim.

It's eight and Mom's flight has just popped up on the board! With an earlier ETA then before by four whole minutes! Hey, you're probably thinking four minutes is tiny, what can happen in four minutes? A lot. My for the next two hours is planned down to the minute, so four of them is a giant boon. If mom gets out four minutes earlier then we might be able to catch the early train and be home free. Only time will tell.

Time told me that as soon as I had made that last entry the ETA changed to ten minutes later then the original time, then fifteen. This should not have surprised me, as any well seasoned traveler instinctively suspects that there's a guy behind every display in the airport changing the numbers to see how anxious he can make the people waiting.

Well, I have no idea how we made it but we did. Mom finally emerged from baggage claim at 9:50, an hour after her plan landed. Apparently they lost her luggage in Seoul and then got confused when she showed up in Nagoya with the wrong amount of luggage. Of course forty minutes before hand the train I had hoped for had left, so I got in touch with Mina, my tutor and asked her if she could help us out. She helped out indeed, showing us that there was one last train that happened to pass through Kyoto, arriving in Nagoya station at 10:57. We immediately hopped the closest train and hoped to whatever deity looks over travelers to help this be the right train. If we had waited any longer then we would have missed the shinkansen anyway, so we might as well get on and roll the dice so-to-speak.

At Nagoya station we made it to the platform just in time, literally. Just then I realized that our hotel closed...now. Thankfully I had emailed ahead warning of this possibility, so a friend of mine who works at the hotel, Yu-ta, agreed to wait for us. It took us a bit, as the taxi we took from the station got lost, but we finally got here. Safe and sound.

Oyasumi...(good night)

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Japanese time!

English: Can I see your ID sir?

Japanese: IDを店てください？

Pronunciation: ID oh mii-seh-teh koo-dah-sai?

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Onsen

2009-12-29T15:01:00.000+09:00

Hello Everyone! I hope you are all enjoying your holidays, whatever persuasion they may be. I have been enjoying mine immensely, and can happily say that I have managed to stay unconscious for most of the time. The time I have not spent sleeping has been spent on various traditional Japanese cultural activities; Onsen(Japanese Hot Spring), rice cake parties, and million dollar public bathrooms. You know, the usual. I am pleased to announce that tomorrow my Mom will be arriving in Japan for a few days of holiday and we will be spending it based in Kyoto, with daily side trips. I will be bringing my computer of course, which means I will have been thrown roughly and unceremoniously back into my daily blogging schedule, which I hope you will enjoy. I've been meaning to start doing more actual cultural topics, but school work has until now forced me to do what I can with what I have. I also plan to make some changes around Barefoot in Nagoya and its mirror on facebook, so stay tuned.

Todays topic is Onsens. What is an onsen you might ask? An onsen is a naturally occurring hot spring used as a public bath. These baths are scattered all over Japan and are a matter of much national pride, sometimes to the extent that non-Japanese are banned for their unruly conduct.

Going to onsens is a common practice for many Japanese, as the volcanic mineral water is seen as medicinal and the setting is seen as one where you can relax. Yes, public bath means public bath, so everyone is naked, but the Japanese I have talked to don't see any problem with it. "It removes barriers, and makes people more honest." said one student I asked. While this might imply that Japanese are less modest about being naked in public, I have yet to find a Japanese person who doesn't balk at what I suppose is the American equivalent; skinny dipping. Perhaps there is a difference between settling business deals naked in a hot spring and running around then jumping naked in the river behind Green Mountain, but I don't really see it.

Recently I was lucky enough to be invited to an onsen by my tutor's family, and I jumped at the opportunity. The onsen we went to was the product of an accident in construction, the company was building the supports for a ferris wheel and they struck proverbial gold when they discovered an onsen bubbling just below the surface. So, what started as a highway stop with a ferris wheel turned into a very profitable resort of sorts, with spas, restaurants, onsen, and of course the finished ferris wheel.
We got there and the place seemed fairly packed. I of course had never been to an onsen before so my tutor's father showed me what to do. First of course is shedding your shoes and traveling to the reception desk where you pay and hand over everything aside from the clothes on your back. After this we said goodbye to my tutor and headed into the side marked 男(pronounced "otto" or "dan") for men, as at this onsen women and men were separated (at some the sexes are mixed). Through a set of curtains we were presented with lockers to deposit our clothes, leaving us with....a wash cloth. To call this a towel would be to imply that the speaker was one foot tall and very skinny. So why even bother with the wash cloth? Well, here's the deal. With bathing in Japan you are supposed to wash yourself before getting in the bath. This is supposed to conserve water and make sure the bath itself does not get dirty, as the bath is intended as relaxation, not as actual cleaning. It was with this cultural point in mind that you must consider the following picture of the cubicles we were provided to clean ourselves before actually going into the onsen.

(Of course none of these photos are from the actual place, but as the saying goes, "ask google, and you shall receive".)
After washing you are allowed to actually enter the baths. The ones we went too were fairly natural, but as you can tell from the following photos there are a variety of possibilities from natural to unnatural looking , and from very public to very private.

The thing these all have in common is the mineral water piped or channeled directly from the volcanic source. The onsen we went to most resembles the first photograph, but there were bowls like the last photograph scattered around the perimeter. I have to say that this was one of the most relaxing experiences of my life, almost akin to a really good massage. After what seemed like a fairly long time we decided that it was time to go. We went back in, rinsed off, dried ourselves, collected our clothes, and headed out the curtains from whence we came. Outside we treated ourselves to some hot drinks and headed on our way.

Some ending notes:
To any of the foreigners reading this, if you ever come to Japan, you have to visit an onsen.
To any of the Japanese reading this, invite me to more onsens.

For those wanting more information on Japanese onsens I actually found a blog dedicated to the subject here.
For those wanting more humor, I offer the below video as a caution to those tempted by these Japanese resorts.

Facebook folks can find it here.

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Japanese Time!
English: Happy Holidays!
Japanese: 幸せな休日
Pronunciation: shi-ah-wah-se nah kyuu-ji-tsu

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Merry Christmas

2009-12-25T13:42:00.003+09:00

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the dorm
Many creatures were stirring, as per the norm;
No stockings were hung, our tree was electric,
To top it all off our entertainment was eclectic;
As we all huddled around the laptop with glee,
Watching Monty Python and the Charlie Brown Christmas tree;
The snow-globe danced round, playing carols of yore,
These homesick few foreigners felt closer then before,
When out on the parking lot arose such a clatter,
We sprang from the couch to see what was the matter.
Away to the windows we flew in a flash,
Tore open the shutters and gave up on the sash.
Headlights shone bright on the new-fallen rain
Cast a watery glisten to objects in the lane,
When, what to our wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature scooter, and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old driver, so lively and spry,
We thought for a moment "What an odd pizza guy".
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
"Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! on Cupid! on, Donder and Blitzen!
To the top of the shop! to the top of the mall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
As dry leaves that before the wild typhoon fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So up to the roof-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of gift cards, and Santa Claus too.
And then, for a moment, we heard not a sound
While ten floors above tiny hooves pawed the ground.
As we sat on the couch, wondering to ourselves,
Who would appear? The king of all elves.
He was dressed in fake fur, very tasteful this season,
His clothing was brand-name for sponsoring reasons;
No bundle of toys had he flung on his back,
Just a simple leather briefcase he opened with a clack.
His eyes -- how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself;
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all our wallets; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the elevator he rose;
We dashed out the doors, to hear his faint whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night."

Best Wishes,

Dan

The Command Center

2009-12-17T12:55:00.000+09:00

Now, I try to keep to my budget as much as possible, but sometimes I just have something I need to have. This urge doesn't happen a lot, but something has been bothering me a lot lately so I decided to do something about it this morning. What was it thats been bothering me for so long?

I hate laptops.

I may be old fashioned, but something about the frailty of portable computers annoys me to no small extent. If I am going to explore strange new websites, seek out new news and new bits of internet humor; to boldly change my desktop picture to something very few man have ever seen before, my work space had better be stationary. It is for this reason that I went out today and bought a real keyboard and a wireless mouse and pugged them in to my laptop, creating a "command center" in my room that I can simply leave there and not feel obliged to take with me simply because I can.

(Yes, that is XKCD on the screen.)
Of course we have the essentials; water fortified with vitamins, dual white boards for notes, laptop, wireless mouse, speakers that for no reason decided that they want to be radios, new wireless mouse, and finally the most important thing my Japanese keyboard.
Why is this the most important thing? Simply for the reason that it frightens me with it's complexity and mysteries.

OK, it doesn't look to threatening, right? Wrong. First of all the keys are set up in ways that are clearly meant to destroy the western mind. The thing hides keys for goodness sake! I've had the thing for a good four hours and I still have to go up to my laptop to put in the ", @, *, &, and / symbols. Adding to the confusion is that the thing is multilingual. You think your typing in something legible and then you find to your horror that the cursed thing has decided that you need to alternate between roman characters, kanji, and symbols for Japanese car makers. I may depend on spell check sometimes, but I know for a fact that the word 'important' is not spelled with the kanji for fire or the Starbucks symbol. Bah, I'll figure it out later, time for class.

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Japanese Time! Answers to yesterday's Japanese Time!

わたし - watashi - I

こわい - kowai - scary

たべもの - tabemono - food

こにちわ - konichiwa - good afternoon

でんわ - denwa - phone

くるま - kuruma - car

じてんしゃ - jitenshya - bike

おかね - okane - money

りょかん - ryokan - inn

からおけ - karaoke - karaoke

I hope you figured them out!

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Extra Large Japanese Time

2009-12-16T11:33:00.001+09:00

Hey everyone, no regular post today, but I have taken the time to compile an extra large "Japanese Time" for all those people who continue to enjoy them. So, without further stall tactics, here you go!

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Japanese Time!

Hiragana

Awhile back, this post specifically, I introduced you fine people to one of the Japanese alphabets, Katakana. Now, if you remember, katakana is for vital foreign words to Japanese like ノート(notebook)、アメリカ(America)、and "ワタブハロ!" ("water buffalo!"). The hiragana alphabet is the opposite, used for words native to Japan, and is the basis of the sound structure. Both alphabets combined, along with the slight variations for different sounds, number around a hundred to a hundred fifty characters. These are of course the easy ones, and many classes here expect you to memorize all of them in a week. The last alphabet, Kanji, is another animal, with over 3000 unique characters it is amazing that anyone gets any reading done.

Now that that brief introduction is over I think it's time to show you the hiragana.

"Ah" あ "Ii" い "Oo" う "Eh" え "Oh" お

"Kah" か "Kii" き "Koo" く "Keh" け "Koh" こ

"Gah" が "Gii" ぎ "Goo" ぐ "Geh" げ "Goh" ご

"Sah" さ "Shi" し "Soo" す "Seh" せ "Soh" そ

"Zah" ざ "Jii" じ "Zoo" ず "Zeh" ぜ "Zoh" ぞ

"Hah" は "Hii" ひ "Hoo" ふ "Heh" へ "Hoh" ほ

"Bah" ば "Bii" び "Boo" ぶ "Beh" べ "Boh" ぼ

"Pah" ぱ "Pii" ぴ "Poo" ぷ "Peh" ぺ "Poh" ぽ

"Tah" た "Chii" ち "Tsu" つ "Teh" て "Toh" と

"Dah" だ "Dii" ぢ "Doo" ど "Deh" で "Doh" ど

"Rah" ら "Rii" り "Roo" る "Reh" れ "Roh" ろ

"Nah" な "Nii" に "Noo" ぬ "Neh" ね "Noh" の

"Mah" ま "Mii" み "Moo" む "Meh" め "Moh" も

"Yah" や "Yoo" ゆ "Yoh" よ

"Wah" わ　　 "Woh" を

"Nnn" ん

Now that we have the materials, I think I'll make this Japanese time a bit interactive. Below I've listed some very common words in Japanese, all of which are from old Japanese Times. Tomorrow I'll post the answers at the end of the Japanese time so those of you who decided to try and figure it out can see how you did.

わたし

こわい

たべもの

こんにちは

でんわ

くるま

じてんしゃ

おかね

りょかん

からおけ

Good luck!

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Best Wishes,

Dan

What was that sound?

2009-12-15T11:31:00.001+09:00

   Hello everyone, it's the beginning of another week here in Nagoya and here I am again sitting at my computer looking out of my window into the dark, sipping nanchan(orange juice), grazing on bananas and peanut butter, and listening to National Public Radio. All the while some unholy beast rattles it's bones just beyond the construction site behind Ohmeikan.
   I've become accustomed to Japan in some aspects, but the weird noises that I hear at night is something I do not think I will become adjusted to. I've always held a special place in my heart for the sounds of the night, one of my first memories is of waddling over to the window in the house where I was born and listening to the crickets and spring peepers murmur in the dusky twilight. Then we moved to Newington, where the crickets and peepers were still there, but were now joined by the rowdy lifeblood sounds of the nearby city. Then it was off to Green Mountain, where the spring peepers and crickets reigned once again, now joined by the joyful wolf-howls of my more free-spirited comrades.
   Now, however, I'm in Japan in the middle of a port city where most people have probably never heard a cricket or a spring peeper calling out into the silence. Instead of the cooing of owls and the occasional howl of a coyote, there are sounds that I assume originate as something comprehensible, but are mutated by the canyons and valleys of the cityscape. To better explain these noises I've broken them down into three categories; the whine, the message, and the call.

Name: The Whine
Probable Place of Origin: The sheer amount of electronics that surround this place.
Description:
I may be dating myself here, but do you remember how old TVs used to make a kind of low key screech when they were starting to break down? I've owned a variety of TVs older then I am over the years and I have been starkly reminded of this sound by the periodic screeching whine that permeates my room once in a while. It's clearly originating outside of my room, it dies once I close whatever door or window is open, but I can't for the life of me figure out what it is.

Name: The Message

Probable Place of Origin: An over-exuberant promoter or politician.

Description:

Quick fact about Japan: to the best of my knowledge you can't promote yourself on television if you are a politician. This doesn't man that there is no airtime for politicians, just that they are all given the same brief standardized time to state their case, and the rest of promotion is done through posters and people driving through the streets with megaphones. Another thing of note is that these are not the best megaphones for speaking Japanese, a fairly nuanced language, into. The result is something that sounds remarkably like someone alternately saying something underwater or in a room with poor acoustics. The message is further complicated by the fact that I am in a part of japan with a lot of buildings, and the echoes seem to bounce off of buildings, careen around corners, and then clumsily fall into people's unsuspecting ears.

Name: The Call

Probable Place of Origin: A remote cavern deep under the sea.

Description:

These are the sounds that make you start to believe that the Godzilla films were a remarkably accurate series of documentaries. They start low in the distance and you don't really notice them at first. Then comes the loud exclamation, as if whatever monster was stalking downtown was suddenly frightened by a mouse. Some people I've asked have told me that it is probably a ambulance in an emergency. To that I say this, I have heard ambulances in emergencies here, Ohmeikan is right by the hospital, and I have yet to hear one that sounds like what I hear at night. It might be just me, but if I was injured the last thing I would want to hear would be something remarkably to a T-Rex assaulting a live orchestra consisting solely of the Oboe players.

The current sound is somewhere between a whale song and a building being destroyed, set to the pattern of an Obama speech...

I was rather surprised to wake up on my keyboard this morning, though I suppose that is my just reward for researching the United Nations Charter for seven hours then attempting to write a complete blog entry. Here is some multimedia for you, in the form of one particularly vehement and radical politician.

I fully support American politicians singing at the top of their lungs in order to get votes.
Facebook users can find it here.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Verb of the Day!
English: To sing.
Japanese: うたいます。
Pronunciation: uu-tai-mas.

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Best wishes,

Dan

A tale of two weekends

2009-12-12T11:17:00.001+09:00

The things I end up doing at 3am, lying in my bed, as my AC menacingly opens and closes it's maw above me spewing out hot air...never mind at 8am, before I start my day...In addition to on the subway to where I will spend my day...and now on the train platform waiting with the elementary school kids I will be teaching Christmas carols to all day...on the train...

Posting a blog with a lot of pictures is hard.

OK everyone, I have gotten quite a few questions about how the competition last weekend actually went, seeing as I have alluded to it several times in various places and have added so many photos from it to the facebook page. So here we go.
First thing's first; like with all good adventures, it was required to get up at an uncomfortably early time. So there I was, sitting at Nagoya station, at 6:50 in the morning looking for a wi-fi spot to link in and update everyone on my progress. Nothing happening in that arena, and as you know none would for the rest of the weekend, but after everything got started I barely noticed. As the early Saturday morning crawled along my little group grew by a few members at a time until the champions arrayed below were assembled.

(Right to left: Nitro, Zsolt, me, Nichi, Kanha, Mina, Mae, Japanese-guy-I-can't-remember-his-name)

We hopped on the train and were on our way to Tokyo!

The Shinkansen(You can find more photos from the ride here)

We arrived in Tokyo, a terrifying city where people have replaced good parts of their brain with video games in order to survive the insanely complex subway system.

I am not sure how someone can play two gameboys, playing different games, while listening to music...but clearly it is not a natural process. Thankfully we only had to go a few stops out of the way on this map, I don't think we would have had the supplies, oxen, or spare wagon wheels to make it the whole way across.

We arrived at Sophia University, a seemingly deserted school whose only inhabitants were "Helper Hitos(volunteers)" who had been stationed to make sure we had a great stay.

We took the place by storm.

Before the opening ceremony we grabbed some food to sustain our efforts of the day.

This is one of the guys who opened the ceremony. He get's special recognition because A: he spoke English, and B: he was one of out judges for the arbitration.

The Arbitration was interesting, to say the least. The Nagoya team consisted of me, Kanha, and Noc. We were very well prepared but the other team was essentially a team of six practicing lawyers. It wasn't a pretty sight. To those not familiar with the process of arbitration it is essentially two groups of lawyers/businessmen arguing their case to a third party for judgement. The process is usually for the resolution of disputes between two companies over international contracts/trade. Though technically you are not supposed to address the other side directly, instead appealing to the judges, both sides eventually devolved into "I'm right and you are wrong" but with more legal babble. We scored some points for being willing to compromise, but the other team was very professional and coordinated, so I think we lost this round. Not to worry, our reward was waiting for us...

After the arbitration we had the party/social mixer/sushi admiration hour. Clearly we are having the best of times following our triumphs in the Arbitration, either that or we are simply glad to have them over with, I think it's a toss-up. But then the magic was over, and we got back to work back at our hotel until three in the morning when the other teams said "Well, we'll figure it out" and my team said "You know what you are doing Daniel, you can handle the negotiation."

The Japanese teams stayed up with us as well, late into the night, I think their strategy was to sleep through the negotiation as a stall tactic and to frustrate the opposing team. As tempting as this strategy was, we were going to bed.

*Sleep*

Up bright and early and out before seven thirty! I really have no idea why we got up so early, we could have slept in all the way to eight. Then I would have had more time to practice tying my tie (something I have yet to perfect).

We cut a sharp image, what can I say? We were ready for round 2.

...And we got lost (appearing for the first time in this photo is my professor Frank Bennet. A champion among professors, not such much of one with directions)

OK, we got to the university on time, and got set up in our rooms just in time. This was the side of the competition I was excited about.

A negotiation is a event of personalities. If you have a good group of personalities then everyone will win and the negotiation is counted as a success. When you have bad or obstructive personalities then it is awkward and hostile. What negotiation consists of is two sides meeting face to face and discussing the pros and cons of a certain subject, much like a good philosophical discussion. I suppose I could, at this point, include the five page summary of our negotiation I've written up for my own reference, but I'm not sure that everyone reading this is interested in negotiation tactics. (With the exception of Sam Edwards, my Japanese professor back home, who asked for the summary for his International Negotiation Class to review, and I hope that they enjoyed what information I could provide.)

Long story short it was a great time, and both teams had a lot of fun. After the negotiation the judges had nothing but praise for both teams, though I'm pretty sure we won. We all exchanged emails after the negotiation and promised to stay in touch. Pictured below are both English teams and their opponents/turned friends.

Needless to say the negotiation went much better then the arbitration. Now all that was left was the closing ceremony...

Which took forever, but in the end the winner was announced. Tokyo University is still the defending champion of the universe. I call this an injustice of the kind where the team who isn't mine wins, the worst kind.

After the closing ceremony it was time to head home, saying goodbye to all the friends we made over the weekend and promising to stay in touch.

Best picture of Frank ever.

And so, at some point in the evening, we returned. We all went our separate ways, exhausted but happy. On the train ride back it was observed that we never really got to see Tokyo the way Tokyo is supposed to be seen, I guess that's the the price you pay for a really great time that you will never be able to explain fully in a few pages.

So what am I doing this weekend? I am working at a Winter themed camp for kids learning English, and I'm there now. I'm bringing with me some photos of me and the family in order to tell the kids about Christmas in the US of A, and I'm really looking forward to it. I hope you've enjoyed my update on Tokyo, and I will see you Monday.

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: Photograph
Japanese:　しゃしん
Pronunciation: shya-she-n

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Best Wishes,

Dan

The Christmas Spirit of almost being run over

2009-12-11T02:42:00.000+09:00

Hey everyone, a quick story before my post. It is a required to cross the street at least once on the way from here at the Ohmeikan to the campus. If you time the walk lights correctly you can get all the way to campus without having to wait at a crosswalk and I've almost gotten it down to a science so I waste no time waiting on the corner. Japanese are very courteous on the road and there is are almost never any rampant light-running or jay-walking. It was with this in mind that I was very surprised to almost bump into an kind looking elderly woman while I was half way across the street on the way here to post for you tonight. "Almost bump into" is perhaps the incorrect term, as she almost killed me with her white Prius doing what must have been 80, but I digress. Long story short this episode reminded me that I have not blogged in awhile. Don't ask me why, it just did.

So where have I been you might ask? Well, I had the best of intentions heading into the week. I had spent some time on the shinkansen(bullet train) making a list of the topics I would like to cover for you in the coming weeks. This was all quickly dashed to pieces when I realized that America is on the other side of the planet still. This is a problem, because I had not considered yet the implications for Christmas presents and I realized that I had yet to complete my shopping and send the gigantic parcel of gifts I have for my family back home. So all plans were put to the side in order to get the shopping done and the parcel sent. The main thing that help up this process was "Daniel's Rule of Last Minute Shopping". This rule states that as soon as you desperately need a thing, the only store that sells that item changes its open hours to the exact time period when you are not able to shop there. At last the thing was sent last night, bewildering the poor Japanese post service by being as large or larger then some of the people who work at the post office. I think the most amusing thing that came out of the frequent negotiations over what price would get what speed and what box they would accept would be the comment that "We get it to America in a very short time, but after that? we don't know", very reassuring. So to all my family reading this back home, rest assured your presents are on their way around the world. That's all for now, I will finally post the story of the competition tomorrow, and if possible a bonus post to make up for my somewhat lackadaisical pattern of posting this week.

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Japanese time! Japanese word of the day!

English: Post office

Japanese: ゆうびんきょく

Pronunciation: you-been-kyoh-kuu

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Best wishes,

Dan

My Weekend Ends

2009-12-07T00:49:00.000+09:00

It was such a good idea; hoping from free wi-fi spot to free wi-fi spot, giving updates and such along the way, but no such luck. The negotiation competition went great and I will add more to here once I get some sleep. I threw together this slide show of the first day's photos on the shinkansen(bullet train) home. I hope you enjoy!

Facebook folks you can find it here.

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Japanese time! Sleeping Edition!

English: (I'm) Sleepy/ To sleep

Japanese: ねます

Pronunciation: neh-mas

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My day begins

2009-12-05T06:27:00.000+09:00

*Snore*......

"Ringggggg"
"Huh?"

"Ringggggg"
"I don't want any!"
"Ringggggg"
"What!?"
"Ringggggg"
"OH! it's Tokyo time!"

Morning everyone, it's some ungodly time in the morning and I'm heading to Tokyo! I'll be posting as often as I have internet so stay tuned!

Best Wishes,
Dan

The curse of the ever expanding "To Do List"

2009-12-04T01:34:00.001+09:00

There are few things more humbling then a long to-do list. I have roughly thirteen hours left until my Japanese midterm, and I have just made the list of things to study. It's about fifteen pages long. This means that today will be one of those days without a long post. On the plus side this weekend is my International Negotiation course's Intercollegiate Negotiation and Arbitration Competition in Tokyo. Of course I'll be bringing my laptop and camera with me and will attempt to get two weekend posts for you regarding this unique event. If you are interested, the site for the competition can be found here.

Not to leave you without some multimedia, here is a rather amusing video from that audio-visual treasure trove more commonly known as youtube.

For the folks on Facebook I have included the link below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weQSLVtSIOU

OK, back to studying...

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Japanese Time!
English: Every day I study Japanese.
Japanese: わたしはまいあちにほんごをべんきょしっています。
Pronunciation: wah-ta-shi wa maya-nii-chii nii-hon-goh oh ben-kyo-shteh-ii-mas.

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Updates, of various flavors

2009-12-03T00:39:00.001+09:00

Hello everyone! Today I bring you some updates on the ever evolving animal that is this little blog of mine and some fun facts about learning Japanese in Japan.
First of all, I am happy to say that as of right now five hundred and fifty five unique individuals from across the globe have read/are current readers of this blog. As a kind of celebration of this I took a good hard look at the numbers from my visitor counter. First of all I found out that I have many more readers in Japan then I had thought, second of all I found out that somewhere out there there is a person from Singapore who is a voracious reader, and finally I found out that most of you daily readers arrive here on this blog from facebook. It was with this in mind that I sat down today and constructed a facebook page for you readers out there who have to use my profile every day to get here. I am the only Barefoot in Nagoya on facebook, so if I have not invited you yet you can easily search for it in your search bar. I have set it up so that it automatically feeds posts here to the page, so there is no lag time between me posting here and trying to figure out how to post in facebook formatting. Of course I hope you will continue to come here, the barefoot fish can't feed themselves, but I wanted to give you a gift for being such kind and supportive readers.
And now, as a byproduct of my constant Japanese study for my midterm Friday, I present this to you...

"Studying in Japan, a user's guide"

Rule No.1 Never show fear, Japanese teachers can smell an easy target. If you are called on to answer a question several light years away from your skill level, simply do what I have been tempted to do so many times, and jump onto the desk beating your chests with your fists while yelling to assert dominance.

Rule No.2 Do your homework. If there is anything wrong with grabbing a random Japanese person to help me finish my homework an hour before class, I don't want to be right.

Rule No.3 Study Kanji for several years before taking elementary level Japanese. Even if there is no possible way you could know a certain Kanji unless you had been studying the language for a decade beforehand, the teacher will ask repeatedly for you to read their cryptic scrawl; a cross between the patterns in a shattered windshield and crop circles.

Rule No.4 Do all work for the course before the semester starts. Japanese language courses are not taught by only one person. The person you get on any given day seems to be determined by the day of the week, the phase of the moon, and the condition of certain global stock exchanges. This means that in addition to them having very little interest in developing a friendly relationship with you, the student, they have no grasp of the concept of sticking to the syllabus. It is now a daily occurrence that the teacher has to run off and make photocopies of whatever hand out were were supposed to have had since the beginning of the week to study.

Rule No.5 Remember to say "thank you". This class will, at times, make you dearly wish to return to your native country that day and never speak about Japan ever again. At other times though a teacher will actually attempt to help you wade through your problems, and you might actually learn something. It is at this time that you wait until after class and then bow deeply while saying "Domo arigato gozaimashita"(Thank you very, very much).

I wouldn't trade this experience in Japan for the world, thats a good thing because nobody would trade for large portions of the process of learning the language.

Sigh, time to get back to studying.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word(s) of the day!
English: Very difficult.
Japanese: とてもむずかし
Pronunciation: toh-te-moh moo-zoo-kah-shii

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Get Lost?

2009-12-02T04:14:00.004+09:00

As I have mentioned to many people before, one of the best things you can do in this country is get lost. I usually try to get completely and utterly lost at least once a week, but since school has started to go crazy I have not had time in quite awhile. It was with this in mind that I decided that since I had a relatively sane night of homework I could afford to get really, completely, utterly lost once before midterms. My initial plan was to go to Nagoya station and see if I could get a good video for you of the light show on the side of the station, and perhaps I could get some souvenir shopping done as well. It was in this mindset that I headed out just after classes, after dropping nonessential things off at Ohmeikan and picking up my camera.

The first time I saw the light show was a week or two ago when I had a visitor from home, my cousin Chris Radke. Chris works for Boeing, and happens to come out here to Nagoya once in awhile for business. We spent a Sunday just walking around Nagoya showing each other our usual haunts. Chris, while having a limited amount of Japanese knowledge, has been coming here for many years, and has thus accrued quite a knowledge of the good places to go around Nagoya station, where his hotel is. The pictures below came from our lunch at Nagoya tower.

It was great to see a familiar face from home, and while I forgot my camera on that particular day, Chris was kind enough to send his pictures to me. Many of them are up on my Flickr feed that you can access on the top right of the screen.

Back to the story at hand. It was around 7 at night, and I expected to have quite a few side trips, so I bought an all day pass. By the time I got to Nagoya station it was dark and the light show was in full swing.

This video comes from right outside the station, and the light show itself is made of what I imagine are millions of led lights perfectly timed in order to tell a story. Chris told me that they change it every year, and considering that the pattern stretches across several floors of the station I can only guess at how long it takes to construct such an intricate pattern of light. Unfortunately the sound quality on my camera is not the best, so probably by the time you see this I will have replaced the audio in the video with one of my favorite classical pieces. I hope you do not mind.

While this was all well and good, I still had been unable to find any open shops with the souvenirs I wished to purchase. I have a suitcase to fill and send back home full of goodies for various relatives, friends, and acquaintances, but this means I need something to send them. So, after enjoying the light show a bit more I decided to try another place, Osu Kannon, a stop on the subway line that is known for it's shopping and vicious attack pidgins.
Osu Kannon is a peculiar place, especially at night. First of all, when you leave the station you are essentially placed in the dead center of a temple courtyard. This particular temple is very peaceful, very calm, and absolutely terrifying at night. If there was ever a place to be attacked by some kind of angry spirit, that creepy temple at night would be it. Upon surviving the temple courtyard you are practically thrown into the Japanese phenomenon of the shopping arcade.

A shopping arcade is a labyrinthine maze of shops and oddities. To say that this is the Osu Kannon shopping arcade would be to imply that there is more then one shopping arcade. This is false, as I firmly believe that there is only one shopping arcade in Japan, stretching for miles upon miles and inhabited by the lost souls of shoppers and perhaps a minotaur towards the center.
I arrived in the shopping center with a goal of a few things for the family and perhaps a new watch, as mine seems to have made a successful break for freedom. By the end of the first hour I would have settled for finding a store with some relevancy to anything I might possibly need in the future, and by the third hour I would consider myself lucky if I ever made it back to the station. I had gotten what I wanted, I was irrevocably lost.

Now, as some of my long-time readers may remember, one of the best things you can do in this country when you are lost is not to speak Japanese as it usually improves the way people treat you, I think I first brought up this point back in my trip to Kyoto. So, now that my expectations for the evening had been reduced to making it back before classes the next morning, I had to find someone to help me.
Half an hour after making this decision to head back I finally found the place where I could get directions, a clothing shop. These are peculiar places, as they do not really sell clothes from the looks of it. No, the real purpose of these shops seems to be the demonstration of just how weird the Japanese concept of the human form is; many of the models showing off the clothes for sale do not really resemble humans, instead favoring cartoonish versions of what a Picasso painting might look like as a sculpture.

This is not who I asked for directions. I did, however, ask the girl who was attending the shop. "Excuse me, where is the station?" I asked. She looked up at me, smiled in that way that tells me she has no idea what I am talking about, and imitates "stay-chi-on?". "Train" I say, and point out random directions in space. "Ah! Train!" my newfound guide exclaims, "(something very fast in Japanese)". I smile at her sheepishly and ask again, "Train?". She's trapped, and she knows it. The foreigner has no idea what she is talking about, but her manners keep her from simply getting rid of me. I wish I didn't have to take her away from her work, but I did indeed need to get back before the last train. She thinks for a while, then very patiently she gestures for me to follow her. I fully expected this process to take a good hour, as I had already spent about four trying to find my way out myself. Of course it stands to reason then that my guide had barely taken me a hundred feet before we were right in front of the entrance to the creepy temple. I thanked my guide profusely and scampered into the gate, hoping that whatever demons lay in wait for me had already fed.
I got back to the station in one piece, and collapsed on one of the last trains running for the night. I woke up about 20 minutes later 2 stops away from where I wanted to be, having slept right through the announcement for Nagoya Daigaku (Nagoya University). I quickly made the transfer, this time indeed catching the last train, and at long last I was back on familiar ground.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!
English: Demon/Evil Spirit
Japanese: おに
Pronunciation: Oh-nee

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Things that go beep in the night.

2009-12-01T00:27:00.001+09:00

Blog. So this weekend I was feeling great. Homework was done, studying was going great, and I had a sneaking suspicion that some of this crazy language was actually sticking in my brain. I had rearranged my room early in the day so that I actually can get back into habit of working out in the morning, and in the process had blocked up my balcony for the winter in order to preserve heat. The only trouble? There was no heat. "OK," I think to myself, "this is not a problem. While it has been good preserving electricity and all that, people here haven't really been paying all that much for heat. Plus I just got sick by some kind of flu, and pneumonia would not be a good encore act." It was this reasoning that led to the following progression of thoughts/events...

"OK, how do I turn on the thing?"
"Hmm...this remote-like device looks promising"

"Oh....it's all in Kanji...."
"Well, can't hurt to press a few buttons and see what happens"

"What!? it has TWO layers of buttons? How is this fair? Was the first panel just a test?"
"Fine....Let's see what happens when I press THIS"

"Hmm...nothing..."
"Think you're smarter then me machine? Do you know what generation I am from? I recognize a power button when I see one! Take THIS!"

"Ah... So you are smarter then me..."
"Only one logical thing to do now...press ALL the buttons rapidly in hopes of catching it off guard"

"Ah-ha! I got you now! Now do my bidding and defrost this frozen tundra of a room!"
"TAKE THIS! and a little of THIS!"

"...Uh...Why is it red? I may not know how Japanese ACs work, but I don't think it should be opening and closing it's vent like some hungry beast...What IS this machine?"

"Huh? who turned off the lights? Hey! Stop that! Bad air conditioner! Hey! What are you-argh!"

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Japanese Time!
English: My air conditioner is very scary!
Japanese: わたしのアイルコンはとてもこわい！
Pronunciation: Wah-tah-shi no air-con wa toh-teh-mo koh-wah-ii!

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T22:25:00.001+09:00

Oh, glorious health! I cannot tell you how good 12 hours of sleep felt this morning. I stumbled through yesterday in a foggy haze of tissues, tea, and vitamins. I have no idea how I got to classes, or got anything done. Today however was a brand new day, and I woke this morning feeling refreshed and much better. It's Thanksgiving here and by the time I submit this it will most likely be Thanksgiving back in the states as well, so to everyone out there regardless of timezone I wish you a very merry turkey day. The spirit of Thanksgiving was in the air from the very beginning of today, with the discovery of a package from home waiting for me in the lobby. Inside the box was an assortment of surprises, but as I needed to get to school I left the box at the dorm and only took with me these two.

Cookies and a turkey. Such simple things, but they made my day.

As soon as I got to ECIS building the cookies vanished. I have vague recollections of trying to get one cookie to one person from every continent, but I'm not sure if I succeeded. What I do know is that something about festively shaped cookies got everyone talking about the holidays. All the conversations for the rest of the day seemed to revolve around talk of what holidays people enjoyed in their home countries and what we were going to do for Thanksgiving and Christmas. turns out a lot of international people here are interested in Thanksgiving, especially the effects of this wonderful thing we call tryptophan. We have now planned a few outings for the weekend to improvised Thanksgiving feasts.

My first class was Intercultural Communications, a class that swings wildly from discussion of the roles of body language in cultural exchange settings to kindergarten level nonsense like what is pictured below.

You see before you the Global Turkeys(notice the group mascot at the bottom of the photo), an intrepid group of half-apathetic college students determined to figure out what the most important thing is for a cross-cultural exchange of ideas to be successful. Intercultural Communication is an interesting class, on the whole. I think if I had to describe it I would dub it a public speaking class mashed together with an adventure recreation seminar. This is a pleasantly futile and useless analogy of course, but it is the closest I can manage considering how odd the class can get.

Next up was Japanese language, a class I have actually started to enjoy quite a lot. While it has none of the ease of understanding that comes with my other classes, it does have a certain charm with the amount of work I need to put in to understand what is going on at any given time. It helps that I have taken to wearing a mask in the class to "ward off germs", also to disguise the times when what I am saying does not sync at all with what the class is supposed to be repeating after the teacher.
So now, at ten in the evening on Thanksgiving, you find me sitting here in the computer lab researching corruption in the United States. I am left feeling alternately patriotic and ashamed when I look from the turkey that stands proudly above the monitor to the facts I am adding to my presentation I am showing tomorrow. I think that's what this whole exchange thing is all about though, showing me different views on life. My day started off giving a cookie from Connecticut to a law student from Sweden, and I end my day explaining what a lobbyist in Washington is to a man from China. What a weird thing life is.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

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Japanese Time!
English: Today is an American holiday!
Japanese: きょうはアメリカじんのまつりです!
Pronunciation: Kyo-oo wa America-jeen no ma-tsu-rii des!

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Sick

2009-11-25T10:47:00.000+09:00

Bleh... Good morning/evening/something to you. Of course I would get sick right around finals. What other possible time would there be? No real post today. Take thirty minute presentation on Corruption in the united stated to complete and then an essay of indeterminate requirements for the same class. Pile on like five pages of kanji and Japanese aural comprehension and now something that feels like nine hundred angry samurai are chopping up my throat and head and you have me right now.

I won't leave you today without something to show for it though. Included below are some photos of a typical Saturday night in Ohmeikan on gokai(5th floor). These events are for some purpose, I think, but I have yet to ascertain that purpose aside from frying up some bacon, lettuce, beef, cabbage, and rice with a bunch of friends.

Bonus content! Aside from bacon, I can't think of any better way to spend an evening then an improvised karaoke session based around one girl's random idea that all announcements for the month are not needed, what this white board needs is the complete lyrics of "Part of your world" from the Little Mermaid.

We are a strange bunch.

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Japanese Time!
English: What are you doing this saturday?
Japanese: どよびはなにをしっていますか？
Pronunciation: doh-yoh-bee wa nah-ni oh shii-teh ii-ma-su-ka?

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Did you miss me?

2009-11-23T21:32:00.001+09:00

Hello again everyone! I come to you today a much more rested, and slightly more bilingual blogger. I've been doing a comprehensive regime of studying in order get to where I want to be in my Japanese study, and I think I can say I have at least become a professional typist in Japanese and English(my self-typed study guide is 20 pages). I also, as you may have noticed, changed some things here on Barefoot in Nagoya.

First thing's first, I have included links to some blogs that some of my friends are writing here in Japan;
*Nagoya Arcade: First mentioned in this post, this is the blog of my good friend Bob right here in Nagoya. His posts cover a variety of topics and he has attempted something I have not tried yet, a video blog. I will have to try this, as soon as I can get out of him the way he edits the video.

*From Tokyo to the World: This is a very well written blog by my friend Colin Moreshead. I have just recently started reading his blog, but I am already greatly impressed by his clarity of thought. I will admit that our styles vary greatly, I joke around on a lot here at Barefoot in Nagoya, but I admire and respect anyone who can seriously address some of the many issues in this country.

*Dieu va au Japon: This is a blog that I cannot comprehend or understand in any way. This is mostly because it is entirely in French. It is written by my French friend from my Japanese class, Dieu-Ly Le Quang, a girl who sits next to me every day and is often the person whispering the answer to me the many times the teacher babbles for five minutes then asks me a question. If any of you know French I highly suggest checking it out.

If any of you are studying in Japan as well please drop me a line and I will add your blog to the list. I always enjoy hearing another persons stories about this crazy country and I'm sure the rest of the fine people who read Barefoot in Nagoya would like to read your stories as well.

I have removed some things as well, mainly I have limited the amount of posts you see when you first come here to the most recent post. This just makes the blog look a little bit nicer, and you can of course access old posts through the archives found on the side. I have removed the twitter feed as well, seeing as I almost never update it more then once a day, and it thus might as well just be part of the regular blog entry.

Now to my favorite change, I introduce to you the "Barefoot Fish". These little koi caught my eye when I was browsing for the flickr tool, which I had accidentally deleted. They add a nice bit of color to the page and are incredibly friendly if you click on their tank and drop food. This is the closest we can have to pets here in Ohmeikan, aside from the "book" that is living quite happily in a tank in one of the common rooms and looks remarkably like a turtle.

I have also added quite a few new photos to my photo stream on Flickr. I had heard that some people had been having some trouble accessing it, so I have included an extra link to it Here.

I have other things in the works for Barefoot in Nagoya, including for those of you on facebook a page where I will post my posts in addition to here.

It's great to be back, now time for some much needed sleep.

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Japanese Time! So what am I currently studying?

English: Have you ever been to ______?

Japanese:______へいったことがありますか?

Pronunciation:______heh itta-koh-toh gah ah-ri-mas-ka?

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Best Wishes,
Dan

School

2009-11-18T12:36:00.000+09:00

Hey Everyone. From the beginning I made it clear, to those who inquired, that the running of this blog would not interfere with my school work. Fortunately up until now it has not, but projects are starting to be due and midterms are next week, so I believe that I could use a few days to gather my forces. I hope each and every you has a good week, and Barefoot in Nagoya will be back next Tuesday(GMT+9) and Monday (GMT-5) with exciting new posts like; Japan's Secret Trapdoor Obsession, Japanese Commercials(Just How Lethal Are They?), and Where is the best place to go deaf in Japan? There will be informational posts like the answer to what happens when a hundred bikes are lined up like dominoes and someone "accidentally" nudges one, and of course there will be more of the "Japanese Time!"s everyone keeps telling me they enjoy.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you will come again next week.

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Extra Large Japanese Time! Make Your Japanese Name!

Seeing as I will be gone for a little bit, I wanted to give everyone a little something to do. I've included below a guide for you to make your name out of Katakana, the alphabet used in Japanese for foreign words and names.

First: The tools you have to work with:

"Ah" ア "Ii" イ "Oo" ウ "Eh" エ "Oh" オ

"Kah" カ "Kii" キ "Koo" ク "Keh" ケ "Koh" コ

"Gah" ガ "Gii" ギ "Goo" ゴ "Geh" ゲ "Goh" ゴ

"Sah" サ "Shi" シ "Soo" ス "Seh" セ "Soh" ソ

"Zah" ザ "Jii" ジ "Zoo" ズ "Zeh" ゼ "Zoh" ゾ

"Hah" ハ "Hii" ヒ "Hoo" フ "Heh" ヘ "Hoh" ホ

"Bah" バ "Bii" バ "Boo" ブ "Beh" ベ "Boh" ボ

"Pah" パ "Pii" ピ "Poo" プ "Peh" ペ "Poh" ポ

"Tah" タ "Chii" チ "Tsu" ツ "Teh" テ "Toh" ト

"Dah" ダ "Dii" ヂ "Doo" ヅ "Deh" デ "Doh" ド

"Rah" ラ "Rii" リ "Roo" ル "Reh" レ "Roh" ロ

"Nah" ナ "Nii" ニ "Noo" ヌ "Neh" ネ "Noh" ノ

"Mah" マ "Mii" ミ "Moo" ム "Meh" メ "Moh" モ

"Yah" ヤ "Yoo" ユ "Yoh" ヨ

"Wah" ワ "Woh" ヲ

"Nnn" ン

Japanese is syllable language, so unlike English every consonant has a vowel after it. The only exception of this being that last symbol, nnn. This means that instead of "Daniel", my name in katakana is "dah" "nii" "eh" "ru" or ダニエル. It is for this reason that I have started to simply call myself Dan, as it is both easier, and the Kanji that are pronounced Dan(男 and 談) mean Man and Conversation.

Here are some examples of family, friends, and people I know.

クリス - Chris

レベカ - Rebecca

キミ - Kimmy

ペテ - Pete

ボブ - Bob

Have fun figuring out your name!

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Best Wishes,

Dan

Eating healthy

2009-11-17T11:31:00.000+09:00

A new week, a new blog, a new confession.
This is it, folks. I've been in denial too long. I know, I know, you're probably wondering, "What could this possibly be? What has he been hiding?" Well folks, I've just quit. Going cold turkey from this day on. Yes, gone are the days when I would indulge one, two, three, or even four times a day. I just needed something quick to get by. Those of you who know me here will perhaps be shocked, awed, and perhaps a few of you even will be totally indifferent. Just remember, I'm staying strong, and so can you.

OK... deep breath...

I'm quitting conbinis(Convenience stores)

Whew, that was tough.

Now, some of you might be wondering, "Why is this such a big deal?" Why is it such a big deal? I am a college student. This means that in order to be able to pay rent, Internet, and utilities, I can only afford to be sustained on the most inexpensive fare available. Occasionally I will indulge myself and have a hearty breakfast of air and sunshine, but I am on a budget, so I have to keep these big expenses to a minimum. So, up until now, I've been largely subsisting on orange juice, onigiri(rice rolls), and cheap o-cha(Green tea). That all changed the other day when I discovered La Place(It's french! maybe), an organic grocery store right by the Ohmeikan.

This discovery means I no longer have an excuse for eating unhealthy, but delicious food. Granted Japan has immensely stringent food policies, and the food on the whole is much more healthy then what is common in the states, but that doesn't mean that a cup-o-ramen is as good for me as, say, whole wheat noodles with organic seaweed.

And so ends a chapter in my adventures in Nagoya, but first I need to say a few farewells.

Oh FamilyMart, you were so convenient. All I had to do was hop on my bike from the ECIS building and gravity would carry me down the hill straight into your embrace. We had our good times, it's true, like that time I forgot my wallet back at Ohmeikan, and the girl at the counter smiled understandingly as I dashed out the door. When I had returned she had heated up my meal and had written her name and number on the receipt(unfortunately she wrote it in Kanji). FamilyMart, I will miss you.

Circle K, if that is indeed your name, I never really got to know you. Our one encounter was brief but sweet, I bought some chocolate. You were always just around the corner from the campus, literally, but now it is too late for us to get to know each other better. We might have had something special if it wasn't for the fact that your food would slowly kill me.

Lawson Station! I will always remember you, mostly because I pass by you every single day on the way to class. We had so many memories, from walking to you in the tail end of a typhoon to the dismay and continuing deep resentment of your proprietor, to the eternal struggle for survival outside your door in the little sea of bikes. You will always hold a special place in my heart, and my liver, and other assorted organs. Petrochemicals never forget.

Finally we come to the hardest goodbye of all.

Fried chicken, I'm leaving you for another source of protein.

Don't look at me with those...bread crumbs. We both knew it was never meant to be.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!
English: Food
Japanese:　たべもの
Pronunciation: Tah-beh-moh-no

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Friday nights

2009-11-13T17:30:00.000+09:00

It's going to be Friday night soon everyone, and I have a big weekend ahead of me, so I decided to take a break from writing a lot and have included below the last of The Japanese Tradition videos for your enjoyment. This time the theme is dating in Japan, and as always the knowledge you will learn from them is invaluable. Have a great weekend everyone.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!
English: Love
Japanese: アイ
Pronunciation: Aye
Japanese Time Bonus content!
Want to hear how to say these Japanese times? Click here to be directed to a useful database of Japanese sayings with an extensive library of audio recordings.

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Engrish

2009-11-13T04:30:00.000+09:00

There is a particularly wonderful phenomenon over here that has resulted out of innocent misinterpretation of the English language. This phenomenon has been termed "Engrish", due to a a certain difference in the ways eastern and western speakers pronounce certain sounds, and it is a source of much enjoyment to the average traveler in an Asian country. Today's post is a light one, I'm still spending most of my non-studying time trying to respond to all of your replies on facebook, something that is explained better in yesterday's post.
I have, for your brief amusement, selected a variety of examples of this "Engrish" phenomenon and have posted them below.
The following images come from a database of these quirks in spelling and meaning, Engrish.com.
(It should be said that some of the signs end up being rather unintentionally crude, so if you decide to look at more of these photos at this site please approach them with a none-too-serious attitude.)

Barfout in Nagoya simply does not have the same ring to it.

Found in Kyoto apparently, when I go there next I need to find this place. My brain has felt in need of some good old fashioned brain relocation.

Me and a good friend from school, Rebecca Steinhauer, had a running bet when we were here last that if we saw something weird to eat, we had to eat it. Thank god we never made it to this place.

I'm really not sure how to react to this. I'll leave it up to you.

If you can't read it, that is either because the letters are too small or they are just fine and you realize that the sign is incomprehensible.

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Japanese Time!
English: How are you?
Japanese: おげんきですか？
Pronunciation: Oh-gen-key des-ka?

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Hello there Home

2009-11-12T02:18:00.000+09:00

As you might imagine, staying in contact with home is a big thing for me here in Japan. Though I've tried to hit this experience full force it does not mean that I have given up all contact with my old friends. If anything my communication has increased, and the well wishes and inquiries after my well being pour in every day. When I say pour in I do mean pour in, and thats what today's post is about.

The electronic age has made it incredibly easy for people to contact anyone on the planet, by many means and at any time of the day. I myself have about eight different ways of reaching me at any particular time. There's the basics, with my AOL instant messenger (AIM) accounts and my three emails. These are the day to day ways to get in contact with me and they are regularly deluged with updates from all the different organizations that I'm involved in and my close friends and family. Then there's my skype account, which is a different kind of animal, since it's my one line of communication to my mom. Other people talk to me through skype, but it's special because it's the one electronic form of communication that I have helped mom master to a certain extent(Hi Mom).
Now however, there is the issue of facebook. I put facebook in a category of its own because that is exactly what it is. It's a seething, roaring mass of all that is going in all of my friend's, acquaintance's, and random other person's lives.
At this point I should say something, whenever I think of something that might be considered ridiculous there is always a small voice inside my head that says, "Why not". This voice has had a pronounced influence on my life as a reasonable individual.
Now to get back to the point. Today I was laid low by that raw egg you saw in one of the last pictures yesterday, and this resulted in me spending the entire day confined to my room. I had a lot of time on my hands, and I decided to go on facebook. As I looked at the amount of people who daily, and unintentionally for the most part, update me on their lives, I realized something. I don't know even half of these people. Here I am in Japan talking about meeting new people, and I don't even know anything about these people back home who I broadcast my life too. So that little voice kicked in, and I decided to get to know all five hundred plus people who are my contacts, or "Friends", on facebook. So if you are one of those people who I barely knew before today, and have since spent the day talking with, welcome. I hope that after our conversation on facebook has ended you will keep in touch and follow this little blog of my experiences.

As is my habit for posts not necessarily to do with Japan, here is a little piece of multimedia from Japan for you.

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Japanese Time!
English: Good night/Sweet dreams.
Japanese: おやすみなさい。
Pronunciation: Oh-yah-soo-me-na-sai!

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Best Wishes,
Dan

Cellular Phones

2009-11-11T00:49:00.001+09:00

Cellphones are a staple of modern Japanese society. Walk out onto the street and you will see that a large percentage of people have the devices glued to their ears. The rest of the people you see will most likely be watching a movie on theirs, or perhaps texting at a speed usually reserved for insane Japanese video games or hummingbirds. Back home I rarely use my cell phone, preferring to talk in person whenever possible, but I have found that it is almost impossible to function here without one. So, after this time I gave in and decided to go out and get a phone. To help me out in this venture was my new tutor, Mina. Mina is a wonderful help and I couldn't have even started without her.

Our quest started on Saturday when we walked to Motoyama to a store she had found where I could purchase my phone. As soon as we walk in I thank the patron saints of lost foreigners that I had brought along Mina, nobody in the shop spoke English. As soon as we started to discuss the contract and such matters I started to notice a curious set of circumstances that I assume arose from the way customer service representatives operate in Japan. After initial greetings and an explanation to the lady behind the counter that I didn't understand Japanese, the basic plot was this.

Lady behind counter: (Something in rapid Japanese) *Looks at me, obviously expecting a response*

Me: *Stared back at the Lady, then at Mina for an explanation*

Mina: *Doesn't see me or doesn't think it's important enough to explain* (Something equally fast in Japanese)

Lady behind counter: (Something in rapid Japanese) *Looks at me, again expecting a response*

Me: *Staring back, trying to convey through the blank, but interested expression on my face that I had no idea what was going on, but was trying to understand*

Mina: (Something fast in Japanese)

Lady behind counter: (Something in rapid Japanese) *Looks at me, perhaps I had learned her language in the five seconds her attention was drawn away*

And this was to be the pattern for our dealings with the phone people...

Eventually we figured out that I did not have the necessary paperwork in order to register for a phone, so we left. Mina invited me to her house on the outskirts of Nagoya where her family greeted me with limitless hospitality. I left fairly late at night, stuffed with good food and a profound wish to stay longer. I've been invited back, so this is not the last you will hear about this generous household.

Me, Mina, and Ryo(Her friendly but psychotic dog)

Monday me and Mina went and got the correct paperwork from the Ward Office, but the shop was closed and we had to wait another day. Today we met in the afternoon between classes and headed over to the shop. The process illustrated above repeated itself for a good two hours, but finally we triumphed.

Isn't she a beauty?

As we left it started to rain, but we bought an umbrella at a conbini(convenience store), and trudged merrily back to the university. We both had classes so we parted ways once we got back, I thanked her many times, but not nearly enough. I would have been lost and probably would have just given up, or gotten a bad deal.

Remember the Human Powered Airplane club? Well, right after classes I had the opportunity to go out to dinner with them. What an opportunity it was! Fine people indeed, but the rain had decided to go biblical on us, and the restaurant we needed to get to was a half an hours walk away. In the end though it all turned out well, and I enjoyed dinner immensely.

Fine individuals, every one.

So that's how you buy a cell phone folks. I hope this simple 4 step plan will serve you well in the future.

1. Do not, under any circumstances, do all of required paperwork when entering Japan.

2. Find a very helpful Japanese girl who is willing to help you out.

3. Remember to look interested while she does everything.

4. Finish the day with pasta and conversation about airplanes.

Remember, I aim to entertain and inform. Good night.

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Japanese time?
English: What is your(telephone) number?
Japanese: でんわばんごはなんですか？
Pronunciation: Den-wah ban-goh wa nan-des-ka?

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Best wishes,
Dan

Are YOU a New Englander in Japan?

2009-11-10T03:05:00.002+09:00

A new week, a new post. Today's consists of a list of the top five things that might let someone know that they are a New Englander in Japan. Each has it's own story from the weekend. Enjoy!

五. 5

You find yourself disappointed by any display of fall colors that don't include every hue.

The story:
New England is famous for it's fall foliage, the sweeping vistas of flame-colored forests are an iconic image that a native can sometimes take for granted. Example, this weekend I just started to notice some of the leaves are starting to change and fall off the trees. The thing is there are no grand stands of oak and maple here, there are only trees much akin to this.

(You should see the leaf blowers)
And the contest of wills between man and the leaves that carpet the ground day after day back home? The closest equivalent here is a kindly old lady who occasionally walks the sidewalks with a little dustpan and broom, occasionally sweeping a few leaves here and there.

四. 4

As the year progresses, snow starts to creep into your future planning, regardless of probability.

The story:
Whenever I'm making plans it just creeps into my mind, uninvited. Back home it would be completely reasonable to consider snow a possibility, regardless of what the weather report, almanac, or aching joints say. I seriously caught myself over the weekend factoring possible snow cover for this 60 mile bike trip with the Bike Club, then I realized that it has been 70 and sunny in Japan and here the weather doesn't change depending on what minute of the hour it is.

三. 3

Despite it being 70 and balmy, you have a keen sense of when it gets below freezing back home.

The story:
It's like a super power. I was walking back to Ohmeikan Saturday and I had to stop dead in my tracks. I smelled snow. Now, perhaps some of my Japanese friends reading this don't really know what snow smells like, or that it was even possible to smell snow. The closest I can compare it to is a pet sensing an earthquake, after a lifetime of being forced by nature to shovel slush and ice you can smell it coming. I got back to Ohmeikan and sure enough it had dropped below freezing back home and some places were forecasting frost.

二. 2

You mistake physics students for woodland animals.

The story:
Sunday night, and I had just locked up my bike when I heard something rustling in the dark recesses of the bike enclosure. Completely unthinkingly I said to myself "It's just a skunk or maybe a raccoon" and reflexively I made a shooing sound to scare the thing away. A Japanese physics student looked up quizzically and asked me what "oi! tsst!" meant. I couldn't really explain, and walked quickly away.

一. 1

You now live in New York.

The story:
In order for this point to be understood I think a crash course of United States geography is in order, and so I have to start this story with a picture.

* The Red circle is new York
* The Yellow circle is Connecticut, where that little star is is roughly where I am from.
* The Blue circle is Green Mountain College
This is the northeastern United States. I ask those of you who are from Japan to please notice the locations and names of various states. I know the folks here in Nagoya have heard me say some state and city names in explanation of where Connecticut and Green Mountain are. Of course that was before I realized most of my wild gestures and local terminology was being misunderstood. Now I just say I'm from near New York, but this has me feeling something of a need to actually know something about New York. This past weekend I just started making things up to someone who didn't understand that I was not actually from the city. Now, somewhere in this university, there is some poor biology student who believes fervently that there is actually a street paved with gold as a result of a bet someone made.

Thats about it for now. Nearly three hundred visitors! I wonder who you are?

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Japanese Time! Japanese word of the day!
English: Car
Japanese: くるま
Pronunciation: Koo-roo-mah

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Best Wishes,

Dan

I want to fly

2009-11-06T18:12:00.003+09:00

Hey everybody! I have some really cool news from over here in Nagoya. For the past month I've been trying to get in touch with this one club that I really wanted to get into. It's called the Human Powered Airplane Club, and yesterday I finally met with a representative of the club to discuss my possible membership. Now, it's not a guarantee yet that I have gotten into it, but the prospects look good. The representative told me that he would discuss with the other members and get back to me tomorrow or Sunday. I've included below a video of one of the aircraft that I might be flying in the club.
Side note here: I've tried to find a decent video without a techno theme behind it but I don't believe it exists. Whatever country these videos come from they must immediately associate being in the air with low rhythm electronic music. Feel free to mute.

The video above is of the ASK 21 glider pictured here.

These gliders have no engine, and are usually towed into the sky by another plane, after which they rely on thermals for increased altitude.

Just before coming to Japan my uncle Tom took me up with his two sons Jack and Max in a small four seater plane for an afternoon. Ever since then I've wanted to fly more, and I was unhappy to learn that there are very few opportunities to fly like that here in Japan. That's why this makes me so excited and I can't wait to hear back from the club. After the weekend I'll tell you what the results are.

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Japanese Time! Japanese Word of the Day!

English: Airplane

Japanese: ひこうき

Pronunciation: hee-koh-u-kii

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Best Wishes, Dan