The Mysterious Universe

Today I found that I ran out of shampoo while taking a shower. Then I looked into the inside of shampoo's bottle, there's the small mysterious space made by shampoo babbles. It seems like a neuron network, but also seems like the small universe!

So I ran to my desk to get a camera and back to the bathroom in naked to take a photo of it. (Because I could not wait any moments since the babbles get disappered by seconds!!!) But I found "what the hell am I doing in naked!?" "Damn, I need to be cool down." So I took a shower again.

I don't want to be hit by earthquake while taking a shower, seriously.

Henry and James

I'm not talking about Prince Harry nor James Heneghan, and neither is a novelist, Henry James. But these are unique VACUME CLEANERS!!!

Numatic is one of the world’s largest and best-selling producers of cleaning machines since 1974. The upper blue one who has a house is called Henry produced by Numatic. Henry's name and its special features come from the british butlers. Do they often wear the black cricket hat to go out?

Yes, he has family; James is yellow and Henry's brother. He is a smaller, more compact and cheaper version of Henry according to this company. Then there’s Charles. He’s blue, and he is a wet and dry vacuum cleaner. Then we come to George. He is Green and has the ability to shampoo carpets and upholstery. Nuvac is fasionable french version which customers can make their own Nuvac's face by affixing its face seal or stecker by themselves!!! Surprise! More surprising thing was that those are not only cute but also super poweful and are used at Hotel or Office in the world!!! Huh very international!

When I see the kids patients on the dental chair, some kids really scare of dental vacuming noise with crying and it makes it hard to give a dental treatment. So I often recommend their parents to have a training with vacume clearners at home for kids to get used to the noise before they sit on the dental chair. If they have Henry or James machine, I'm sure more kids don't scare of dental vacuming but also get to like cleaning their room with lovey machine!!! What do you think?

One month later

This morning at 6:11 am, we had the most biggest aftershock since 20th March in Fukuoka. It was really big noisy shaking and scared again. Fortunately this time, I haven't replace all the staffs and make them in the safety place since last month, so nothing were dropped or broken. Only some furnitures moved ahead. Normally I love to be in the high place, like buildings, mountains, bridges, flight, and so on. But I don't want to live in 12F anymore!!! Unfortunately my parents house is also in 13F. Agh......no place to escape for me.

Sakura Fallen

Graduation/Entrance ceremony and new starting day at school, the smell of new goods, new school uniform, new meeting, hope, wish, challenging, being nervous at the new surroundings......these are my images of Spring and Sakura!

This beautiful season of Sakura, especially when they have fallen at the mercy of the wind, it reminds me of the song "桜の花の咲く頃に” "SAKURANO HANA NO SAKU KORO NI". This is the song of Watanabe Misato (渡辺美里). Yes! Cherry blossams are now falling and young green leaves are coming out. Some says the time of full blossoms are at their best, but some other says the time of falling is more beautiful to see. I agree with the latter. The following is some of part of the song;

「覚えていてね　思い出してね　桜の花の咲くころに
　　覚えていてね　思い出してね　風の強い春の日には」

Remember me....

Con Te Partiro

This is one of my favorite songs, performed by Andrea Bocelli and it is also sung as the title "Time to Say Goodbye" by him and Sarah Brightman. Tonight we gathered at i-bar to say good-bye to good friends. Losing good firends gives an empty hole in our heart. Actually "Con Te Partiro" is not a song to say good-by at all. But this is the song something new to start. We all have own way to live. Sometimes we come across and sometimes we are apart. But I believe that we will be surely able to meet again as long as we keep wishing and hoping. Good luck to all of my friends who leave here tomorrow. Hope to see you again!

Kimono and Hakama

"KIMONO" is the traditional costume of Japan. However, even if you visit Japan you hardly would see Japanese who is wearing KIMONO. Although many Japanease have pride in KIMONO, they do not put on usually from following reasons;

1) They are so expensive.
2) They are not active clothes.
3) It is difficult to wash them. (Most of them are silk)
4) There are traditional rules to wear. (Most of ppl cannot wear by themselves and need somebody's help to put on!)

However, many Japanese possess some kind of KIMONO and are wearing them in special occasion: wedding ceremony, coming-of-age ceremony, New Year, graduation ceremony, Japanease tea ceremony, summer festival etc. Today was a good chance for me to wear Kimono and Hakama to attend the graduation ceremony!

Taken by James Heneghan.

"Hakama" is a long pleated skirt worn over the kimono, and it is very populer with the students.This style had been populer In the Meiji era and in the Taishou era before. An interesting thing is its footwear. In most of cases, we wear a zori for Kimono. but only in Hakama case, we often wear Western Boots!!! Because of those era, our life had been dramatically westernized since opening country. The style is called "HAIKARA" There're some Japanese Manga called "Haikara san ga to-ru". The story about the woman wearing Hakama and always riding a bike!!! What do you think of Haikara women???

36hrs later

I flew to Yokohama to attend the conference the day after earthquake. Honestly I thought I could be relaxed without thinking my disaster room and suffering from aftershocks at 12F of the building, but it was not true. The hotel in front of Yokohama station gave me a room on the 19th floor and the TV says that next big possibility of earthquake in Japan may be in Yokohama or Shizuoka where has a Mt. Fuji!!! Agh............No relaxzation wherever I am.

Any small sounds and shakings by subway or trains scared me now. So many passengers and many cabs at Yokohama station are busy and crossing street. And beautiful lighted up Rainbow Bridge in Tokyo bay can be seen through the big window of my room. But where can I seek for a peace?

Earthquake

As you already know, we had a big earthquake which had a magnitude of 7.0 and damaged buildings and utility supplies, at 10:53 a.m. on Suday here. I was on the ground and just about to get on the lift to go back to my room 12F at that moment. All of a sudden, I felt a big shaking with incredible noisy sound from the bottom of the earth, and the sound was more bigger than one by a train's passing under the ground. There's something pieces falling down from the ceiling. It was really scared and there's no place to hide by myself. I had to run away immediately and to escape from the shaking and chaose entrance hall of my apartment to the outside road. The escape was like a hell under the big sound and earth shaking. We still have several strong aftershocks here.

My room had no space to walk in, but I had to leave them for a while. Because I had a friends' wedding party to attend on that day and had to leave for it in 10 minutes. It was amazing that wedding party was kept going while we're having aftershocks every 20 min. I played the piano and sang two songs for them even in such a situation. We usually have the second party and third party after the wedding party, but all shops and restaurants were closed by this earthquake. so all the other parties were canceled. Anyway it was an unforgettable wedding party.

Now I have a slight PTSD; Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, by this earthquake. I have no idea how many and how long people are/have been suffering from PTSD after the big earth quake in the world. The only thing I can say now is that it wouldn't disappear easily.

A Mystery of Japanese Academic Year

Why we start a new term at school in April in Japan? This was a question by Ms.Albury who's a traveller from Britain. Well it's a good question actually. In Japan, the academic year starts in April, and ends in March of the following year. It's not only academic system but also it happens to the office or companies in most of cases. Some says because our traditional. Since when? Some says because we care of each four seasons so much. Plants and animals get to start to live actively in Spring. All right, who decided spring is the best season to start everything?

Japan started Westernizing during the Meiji era (1868-1912). The idea of school system also came from western countries. Until 1872, there's no new term for the reason there's no grade at school. In 1873, at some school (pre Tokyo University) academic year started in September, and ended in July of the following year influenced by western system. After all, most of shool followed this academic calender. Most of professors at university or college were also from western countries in those periods, so it's very convenient for them to come to Japan to teach.

In 1887, high school started in April. Until 1921, in every (primary, junior high, college) school in Japan, academic year starts in April. Why did they change the system??? According to some historical information, it seems there's a reason for the budget fiscal year in our country in March-April. At that time, all the school expenses were controled by government, so it seemed more convenient and reasonable to do the start of work period as well as the budget siscal year in our country. Since then, Cherry blossam season is the best to say good-bye and start new life!

Nowadays, more our country is globalized and internationalized, more people tend to think this system is inconvenient. Many Japanese study abroad and many foriegn students come to Japan as well. In those situation, Japanese academic year doesn't match to other countries' one. (Or I can say their academic year doesn't fit to ours!) Some says this causes a tough situation to students who want to enter a college in overseas or who wants to enter Japanese college. On the other hands, some says it's an advantage to take a break or to prepare for something before they start college life in different country.

I heard Korean academic year starts in March and it starts in January or February in the southern hemisphere. What do you think the best to start academic year?

Music and Friends at I-bar

Recently I'm having sessions playing the piano with James Heneghan. He usually plays his songs with acoustic guitar. Tonight I joined to his live show at International Bar "James In The House" Unfortunately there's no piano so I had to bring a keyboard to play there. Inspite of electronic sound, the songs we played together seemed succeeded.
I-bar is very small and old type of bar, but the staff there and the atomsphere is good and makes you feel at home. So we're very relaxed at playing. It was also nice to see our good friends there. Thank you for all of your coming even it was late night!!! I was so happy to spend the time with you guys!

Fever got a fever -Live Report-

Tonight was the acoustic live show for FEVER feat. James Heneghan and Buck Natural at Sam & Dave. They are all my favorites so I was excited on that day.

Unfortunately a vocalist of FEVER, Havey got a sick and they canceled to sing as a group. Actually he was there and showed up his face to us, but we all undersood he was trying not to make his voice get worse for the next big show at BLUE NOTE!!! Instead of that, a guitalist Shige who's one of fantastic guitarists played and sang a few songs. Some were arranged by the songs that Havey often sings, and sung by Shige's own style, but it was still a great show.

James Heneghan always gives us a strong punch by his songs. Some of his songs are political or radical, as the titles say "WMD" (大量破壊兵器 : Weapon of Mass Destruction), "Hey Hey I'm gay" (though he's not gay at all)....but sometimes he sings out exactly what we want to speak out. His music and melody is also simple and easy to remember, so it comes to your heart touched easily, which is the most difficult in terms of composing music conversely. Do you know "Hata Yoku, a Japanese guitar Samurai"? Some friend said "James is a British guitar Samurai"!!! hahaha that makes sense.

After the knock out by British Samurai, Buck Natural gave us an energy to be recovered by their GENKI songs! Warren (G) and Jon showed a great gig at that night! We wish we could enjoy the slight fever and reverberations more after their show, but many clubbers started invading all of the floor with loud noisy club music as soon as it ends and it completely smoked away. So I had to leave there with smoky smelled cloths.

3,2,1, Action!

Tonight, I and my good friend, Kaori went to see the annual perfomance by Tiempo. Tiempo is a Latin culture center where has Spanish, Protuguese language, flamenco, Argentina tango, salsa, guitar, and art classes. They also has a spanish restaurant and a dance floor. Every Saturday night, the dance floor is filled with those who like to dance salsa!!!

The show was going on with a story of girl's dream that she wants to be a movie actress. So the movie director leads her to the art, dance, and music world showing the all activity of Tiempo. (It quite works well, not only as an artistic performance but also as an introduction of their activity at Tiempo!) In the finale, everybody including back yard staffs went up to the stage in applause. I was surprised the numbers of ppl who belong to this group of Tiempo!!! and they are all amateurs but it was really fantastic show.

These latino atomosphere and activity, actually reflects on some other festival in my town. It is called "Isla de Salsa". This salsa dance festival is hold in the end of August in a small island for two days every year. This is hot and cool festival at beach side. My friends and I had a great time there last year! Can't wait for this coming summer!

Hot Stuff!

Tonight I went to the chinese restaurant "HINABE-JO" "Fire Pot Castle" to celebrate on my friend's birthday. Why did we go to such a place for birthday party??? It was actually her request. She said "I need hot stuff"!!! All right...

As the restaurant's name says, the most of dishes are very spicy and hot. Look at this, incredible amount of hot chilipeppers! Once you eat it, your tongue and throat gets burning and your sweat gland tissues get to start working very hard! We needed to drink beers a lot!


Look at their smiles! Now you can imagine how much we enjoyed tonight! Sometimes we need spices in our life, don't you think so?

Local Music Live Scene

Basically I was grown up with classical music and when it comes to talk about music live, for me it's always unplugged. So I didn't like the sound through the amplifier so much.

Last year, I got a friend whose boy friend (G) was a singer of some music band, so I had a chance to go and see their live show. They are very experienced singer and guitarist and showed good perfomance. The most impressive thing was that their music was not somebody's copy but their original. Even they sometimes play other's songs, but they arranged it and played completely as their style.

Since then, I sometimes go and check some live shows in my town. They have various kind of music back ground, Rock, Soul, Blues, fusion, R&B and so on. I especially like acoustic style live show. And Early Believers (Basement) is such a place where I can feel an ideal music live.


Tonight, one of my favorite vocalists from New Zealand and G played and sang on the same stage. If I see the audience, it's easy to get to know about the musician's reputation. And in the audience, there were other local musicians who usually play there. They are all friends and come to listen to the others, talk, exchange their information, somtimes do business (EIGYO) or PR. and inspire themselves! I like this atomsphere. It also activates my music life and makes it more creative!

Daddy-Long-Legs

This photo was taken in a sunset time on a pitch after the football game on Sunday. The shadow reminds me of a childhood book, "Daddy-Long-Legs" by Jean Webster. This book is well known as the title with "ASHINAGA OJISAN" in Japan. The fact is that the name of "Daddy long-legs" is a kind of spider which has extremely long slender legs including Harvestman and the Japanese name is "ZATO MUSHI". But the Japanese title doesn't say anything about a spider at all!!! Anyway this shadow in this photo makes me look like having long legs, but not slender ones at all.

Spiderman

When I'm down, this makes me feel better.

http://freekeer.free.fr/spider.htm

Much ado about chocolates!

This year again, I was involved in this typical Japanese crooked event, St. Valentine's day in the office. I saw lots of chocolates on our professor's desk, which seems very expensive, even they are small! GODIVA, Pierre Marcolini, Jean-Paul Hevin and...... Those are given to him by my female collegues included me.

Unlike most other countries, where Valentine's Day is a time for lovers to exchange gifts, in Japan, the day of love is one where it has become customary for women to present chocolate to men they have affection for. Even those for whom the women have no particular feelings for do not miss out, though. They sometimes receive giri-choco, or duty chocolate, which the women hand over through a sense of duty. Yeah it's very commercialized but we have to admid that it's almost one of our culture.

Men do not usually give presents to women on Valentine's Day in Japan. Instead, they are supposed to return the goodwill shown to them on Valentine's Day with a reciprocal gift given on March 14, or White Day.

In my office, as always, even I don't know when and who made this rule, these silly ideas and moods make female to give a chocolate to their boss or other male collegues. It may be a good time to show our feeling to thank to him or them by this. It's only just one time a year, you know. But nowadays, lots of high quality brand chocolates are popular and even among men. And it's surprising to see all one floor is filled with variety of chocolates in the department store of Japan since February starts. I guess some girls may spend much money easily in February! I won't be the one of them next year!!!

Kinko's

Recently I've finished writing my thesis and I was looking for a bookbinder shop. 'Cause I could print out papers by my computer and printer at home, and just only needed to have them bound. So I went to the nearest Kinko's in my town.

Kinko's provides such services; copy and printing, binding, making original cards, envelope, letter head, poster, personal photo calendar, high-speed Internet access and computer usage, digital photo printing and enlargements, enterprise-level document solutions, and so on.

I thought this shop was made in Japan, because of the name! It sounds like Japanese, isn't it? But it was not true. I was surprised to get to know their history!

"In September 1970, Paul Orfalea, just out of college, borrowed enough money to open his first photocopy shop in Isla Vista, the campus community of the University of California at Santa Barbara. Instead of calling it "Paul's Copies," he called it "Kinko's" after the nickname given to him by his college buddies because of his curly, reddish hair."
-What!? The name of Kinko's comes from his curly hair!

"The first store was located in the corner of a building that also housed a taco stand (which later proved advantageous when Paul cut a hole in the connecting wall, allowing him to order lunch without leaving the store)."
-Hahaha, that's good idea! It seems he already knew how to succeed in business at that time.

"Now, 30 years later, Kinko's has expanded to over 1,100 branches in the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, Japan, South Korea, Australia, the United Arab Emirates, China and Great Britain."
-Wow its a long and surprising history! That's why we have Kinko's here now!

Now I'm very satisfied with my thesis book bound by Kinko's, as quick and in cheap! Thanks!

Snowboarders' life

Basically I prefer to go to snowmountains alone or with a few friends taking with my own board and to enjoy snowboarding, the fantastic view from the mountain and quiet surrounding there pretty much.

This weekend, I joined to some ski tour group with 17 ppl who come from the US, the UK, Canada, AUS, and Japan. I didn't know most of them before I joined, but spending 48 hours with them together in every moment was enough to get to know some. Though some of them are too much funny, talkative, quiet, shy, and troublesome, everybody there seems so natural and open-minded. And more ppl gather, more we get problems or happenings. But they would be a fun if you can be a part of them and I enjoyed them.

We stayed at MINSHUKU which is a Japanese private guest house in some village and it was typical Japanese style and old. But OBACHANs there who took care of us were very nice and the atmosphere was good! We chatted with KOTATSU and sweet oranges and slept on TATAMI with FUTON. Breakfast at 6:30 am were rice, miso-soup, TAMAGOYAKI, YAKIZAKANA (baked fish), NORI and TSUKEMONO including TAKUAN and HAKUSAI!!! Amazing thing was that everybody ate those breakfast with smile, and nobody complained about typical heavy Japanese breakfast!!! Can you believe they ate YAKIZAKANA and NORI with rice as a starter of all day meal???

The weather was cloudy and snowing but snow at Mt.Mizuho was great condition this weekend. It was over 2m on top, almost snow powder and no pain even if we crush, drop and roll over. I guess we're very lucky to have this condition even in CHUGOKU area.

Thanks to Hawaian Matt who brought me to a crazy steep course which needs brave and challenging spirit! And thanks to Mee, Mika and Matt C. who organized this great tour!

Fantasista Nakamura!

I know some NAKAMURAs in my life, but my favorite NAKAMURA is definitely "SHUNSUKE" who's a football player in Reggina, Serie A now. He's a MF and has a golden left foot. Today there's a match vs North Korea in the first game of the final qualifying round for the 2006 World Cup at Saitama Stadium.

"Japan scored after four minutes, the home team failed to convert numerous first-half chances. The flow of the game turned in the second half after North Korea scored in the 61st minute. A draw seemed inevitable before substitute Masashi Oguro snatched victory for Japan by slotting in a 91st minute goal. The game looked set for a disappointing draw before substitute Oguro latched on to a lose ball and drilled it home to seal an emotional victory."

Well it tends to forcus on Oguro and his goal which is worthy of praise. Yes, it is actually. But I know the second half was changed since Nakamura turned up to play on pitch! His eyes and skills were fantastic! The game with bad mood was totally cleared by a creative and aggresive style of his play. Fantastico!!! I believe he was the key person on the victory tonight. He's going back to Italy this weekend and a match vs A.C. Milan is waiting for him next Monday. What a tough guy! Buona fortuna!

Rainy days and Mondays

"Hangin' around nothing to do but frown
Rainy days and Mondays always get me down"

This is the song of Carpenters tuned in my head in such rainy days and Mondays. Today was not exceptional. I had started a blue Monday with this song since I woke up. Basically I like rain and rainy days, but going out in the rain by motor bike is not so nice. Especially it gets worse in winter!

Anyway I had to ride a motor bike to go to the office today. A 30 mins riding in the rain completely made me forget singing that song and I got so tired and exhausted when I came to work!!! However, fortunately, my work was over earlier and went well on such a terrible day! On a way back to home, the rain has stopped and the sky was clear. There's a Japanese saying, "OWARI YOKEREBA SUBETE YOSHI", means all's well that ends well. For this reason, I cannot dislike this song and it never gets me down!

My new guitar!

I bought a guitar today! I'm sure this new instrument develops my music field more!

Welcome to "La Vita e' Bella"!

Recently I've just done my big project, so now's a good time for me to reflesh myself! Hope this blog works it.