Journies

It has been five months to the day that I have set foot in Japan. It sure doesn’t feel like it has been that long. Twice today I stopped in my daily comings and goings to reflect on the fact that I am, still, in Japan.

Aside from the obviousness of this daily epiphany, I am beginning to see and recognizes changes to myself and my worldview that are probably a direct result of my time abroad. Even more striking, is understanding that there are probably other changes that I am not conscious of and will only be pointed out by friend or family upon my return to home. I am calling these changes in character and personality the “unintended consequences.”

With an enormous change in environment it should be no surprise that different external pressures can mold people into something new physically and emotionally. The changes can sometimes be subtle and sometimes dramatic. It is hard to say what in particular about Japan is having an effect on me emotionally. Physically, however, the changes are quite apparent (as they usually are for Westerners – specifically weight loss – more on that in a different post). But what I can say is this, Japan is giving me a time to reflect on what I believe has come to define me and what I want out of the very short and precious time we all have in life. More to the point, I have come to actually believe in the very thing I had been preaching for so long: ultimately, the goal in life is to be happy. How I or anyone should go about achieving this is difficult to fully characterize and quite frankly, elusive. But I do know this, for me, I need to stop dreaming about the future potential for free time to do what I want and instead, start making it happen now. To use the cliché, a bus could run me over tomorrow and that is that (and there are lots of busses here in Japan!). Or worse, I could still be run over by that very bus but be forever a quadriplegic, forever entrapped and incapable of accomplishing the goals I once dreamed of. I would be instead doomed to watch from a window as other people set out and strive for those goals I forever lost.

So, what is it going to take to make me happy? That is much harder to figure out. However, thinking back on the times that I was the happiest, they almost always come from when I am outside. And I mean, really outside – away from the concrete and asphalt and surrounded by open sky, thin air, and poor cell phone reception. I think you might know where this is going… A recent inspiration for my renewed interest in the outdoors in a country famed for its urbanity has been my recent listenings to a particular podcast, “The Dirtbag Diaries.” Every time I listen to one of these, I begin to crave that sense of escape and un-encumbrance that comes from leaving the daily drudgery. What is beautiful about this passion is that the desire for it can never be satiated. There will always be something new to experience or explore. This world is too enormous to ever become bored. The natural world is just awesome. I need to return to that as quickly as I can muster. And if I can make it happen while studying here in Japan, all the better. I sincerely hope that whatever desk I return to when all of this education is complete does not critically limit or hinder my pursuit of the fresh air and heavy pack.

I’ve still got some soul searching to do in the meantime. Heck, I’d still love to put rubber on the road and pedal my way around this country and wherever I travel. This is just another extension to being out of doors. I’ll post about the dreams of cycling around in another post. Nonetheless, I think I am seeing a theme here. The World is so big and great that I don’t want to waste every moment sitting behind a glowing rectangle tapping away at a bunch of lettered chiclets just to pay bills I don’t necessarily want to pay.

I promise not to go vagabond or bohemian on you.

It’s been quite a while since the last post. There are some good reasons and there are some poor ones too. Probably, the best explanation would be that I became a victim of sloth and found it easier to neglect the blog outright when my daily routine seemed uninteresting to write about. However, the next week will usher in the next major phase of my stay in Japan. Let me elaborate a little…

The past five months have been primarily spent toiling away at learning Japanese. The only engineering work to speak of was taking and passing my entrance exam to the PhD program. In these short five months I have learned much, but the figurative Japanese “mountain” is mighty and high and I am still stuck somewhere in the foothills. Some say that understanding precedes speaking ability. That is a fairly accurate assessment of where I am at now. Hopefully, with my advising professor’s blessing, I will continue my formal Japanese classes to continue improving upon all that I have learned. Honestly, however, I need a really good tutor of sorts to initiate conversation and force me to utilize all that I (should) have learned. Some argue that this person should be a Japanese girlfriend, but I am not convinced that is wise nor am I ready for that stereotype commonly placed with all foreign men in Japan.

So, I briefly mentioned that I passed the entrance exam to the PhD program. While this is true, I wouldn’t really say it was a traditional exam in the literal sense. It was more of an oral presentation with a follow-on question and answer session with faculty from the graduate school. Thanks to a certain professor I know from my previous employer, my final question of the exam was simply, “what about sake?” For those of you that know my personal affinity for nihonshu and my “work-experience” with it in Osaka, will understand this question. However, for the faculty present, it certainly was a bewildering moment for most. Thankfully, my response was met warmly and the atmosphere was quick to change from the serious and uptight to welcoming. It’s hard to believe nihonshu played a role in my acceptance to a PhD program about material science. But, hey, I am not gonna complain…

Returning to the topic of the next few weeks…

This coming Thursday will mark the beginning of my stay in a private apartment and not the much despised dormitory. I look forward to a little more privacy, peace, quiet, and cleanliness (and ironically, more space). In about a month I start my official enrollment at Osaka University and begin the formal research effort. I’ve still yet to narrow my research focus, but because there is so much to choose from I find it difficult to settle on any one topic. Thankfully, I still have time to settle – the pressure has not yet been turned on.

This is probably a good place to end the post. I have plenty
Ore to write about that will come in future posts. So, if you actually read this far, I am impressed (and grateful).

And as somewhat of a post-script, I want to thank someone who will remain unnamed for indirectly nudging me to return to writing here. Thank you.

Just two months ago I started to actually learn Japanese. It is really amazing to see how far and how quickly I have progressed. From knowing nothing at all to being a “fly-on-the-wall” to daily conversation of the public at large. I may not understand everything said, but with every passing week of education, I am more capable of following a conversation I once heard as nothing more than noise. To me, now, it’s actually a language of communication. Within the immersive environment around me, I sincerely believe this language acquisition would not have been possible. It would have taken years back home to arrive at the same level of comprehension I am at now. What is equally exciting is that it has only been two months. There are still three (or more) years to come on this path. My laboratory colleagues no longer sound so foreign to me, the lady at the convenience counter makes a little more sense, and my fear of asking for instructions at the train station have begun to erode. It is really an exciting time.

Sadly, I don’t think I will be posting in Japanese on the site. I am still having trouble configuring the WordPress publication software on my server to display the Japanese characters properly.

I have to admit, even only two months in, this adventure to Japan has been a life-changing experience. Before I left, my living environment was fairly comfortable. A decent salary kept me fed, warm, and supplied enough for luxuries that I enjoyed. Casting that aside, I’ve come back to academia, but in an entirely different environment from one I could ever find in my own country. Take away that security net and it’s amazing the kinds of decisions you make when faced with the reality and gravity of your new existence.

Probably the largest shift in my mental attitude since arrival has been one of frugality. My limited stipend from the Japanese government, while generous in its own right, does not permit me to live the life I once enjoyed while working full-time. Everything I brought with me and everything I acquire while living here is looked upon differently. “I need to make these things last,” is the only thought that comes to mind. I cannot simply discard what I don’t want or like anymore. A perfect example is with food. In the past I would discard bananas that had been unsightly bruised into mush. Now, they are viewed upon as equally healthy sources of nutrition as their pristine brethren; I paid good money for that banana and I’ll be damned if I don’t eat it. Additionally, the tools of my education and livelihood must go that extra mile and be useful to the end. It is for this reason that I am beginning to really appreciate quality rather than inexpensiveness. Too often people walk the path of consumerism and only pay attention to the price tag. I am now willing to pay more now for the items I own in order to ensure that they will last and remain useful far longer than the inexpensive variety. Similarly, the things I have already must be good enough for the long-haul.

Part of this has been a change in environment (as aforementioned above). Another external stimulus to change my way of thinking has been seeing Patagonia’s advertisement in the New York Times on “Black Friday.” I am a big fan of that company’s products and truly believe in their corporate message. However, I use to get sucked into buying way too much *new* clothing every season when bedazzled by their new designs and styles. No longer can I do this. No longer can I afford to be so hungry for products.

While this mental shift is extremely applicable and useful now, I am very excited for the future. When I finish my education here, I know that I will return to a world of comfort with a steady paycheck. However, I am sincerely excited to see this improvement in my worldview be applied to my daily life when it is a consequence of choice and not necessity.

If you’ve ever wondered where my tag-line under the title Journies came from, it’s a slight modification on a simple phrase spoken by Carl Sagan. I found the inspiration from this awesome mash-up of Sagan recordings and videos that capture the adventurer’s spirit perfectly. I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve watched this clip over and over and over.

I am proud of the fact that I have learned so much Japanese in the span of six-ish weeks, that I was ready to start writing a bit here in the blog posts. However, I need to figure out how to make the WordPress software and database on the server recognize and properly display the Japanese characters. Right now it’s replacing all the Japanese with question marks. And no, it’s not my computer because I can easily type in Japanese on the Mac. So, I’ll spare all 99% of you out there that cannot read the Japanese and not post any for a while… until at least I can figure out how to make WordPress behave properly.

Adiós.

Hey, at least I can write in Spanish without trouble.

This is just downright poopy. Even the few Japanese students I know have commented on how down right crummy it’s been lately. I am not talking about the prefectural elections coming up, but the weather. For the first month of my stay, October, it was unseasonably warm. Now that things have finally cooled down, Autumn has hit. I would like to believe that the change in seasons in a country that likes to brag about its four real seasons would be gradual. Kinda like the gentle swing of a pendulum from one extreme to the other. But no.

In the span of a single week we’ve gone from the low eighties to a brisk upper fifties to low sixties. However, I can handle the cold without much trouble. My classmates from the Philippines, Ghana, South Sudan, and India, however, are not fairing so well. However, what drives me a bit nuts is that Mother Nature has decided to be cruel and rain… every… single… weekend. The weeks are wonderful. The sun shines with a gentle breeze every now and again. The leaves are turning colors (which is beautiful by the way and called “Koh-yoh” in broken English). Nevertheless, when we finally find the free time to actually get out there and enjoy it, the cold and wet descends upon the Kansai area of Japan.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the rain. I love the kind of downpour that really makes it awesome to walk around in a a waterproof shell. And those that know me, know that I have plenty of them! However, when every weekend is muddled with a dash of the wet (and in October, humid) weather, I am not a happy camper.

Despite my complaining, I need to keep in perspective the one fact that cannot be ignored: it will get worse.

Right now I am in the dry season. That’s right, dry. In the months of June, July, and August, it will rain anywhere between three and four times as much. And it will be oppressively humid. I am talking 70-90% humid almost all the time and occasionally a ridiculous 100% humidity. So, it’ll be basically raining every direction simultaneously and at the same time not. Blugh.

Alright, I need to get over it. I signed up for this tour of academia here in the sub-tropics. I can weather the figurative storm. I sincerely hope all my electronics can as well. I here that photography equipment does not take kindly to ambient moisture. That’s why second-hand lenses are so cheap here in this part of the world – they’re often infested with mould. Bummer.

The view from my seat in my Japanese Language class.

It’s now week 5 of my 15 week language course here at Osaka University. I am one of the lucky few who gets to spend a quality twenty-four hours a week under instruction to learn as much Japanese as can be crammed into those short weeks. In the short time of one month, we’ve covered everything from the basics of Hiragana and Katakana to sentence structure and the use of particles to identify grammatical objects. It’s been tough to say the least. What little studying I did before I came gave me a slight advantage over my peers in the “A” class (beginners). That has quickly eroded away and we’re all now on an equal playing field.

The nice reward for all the hard work is the continual expansion of our sphere of knowledge in the language. Every now and then I’ll catch a word or phrase from an overheard conversation from some strangers or friends. Just four weeks ago I wouldn’t have had a clue what they were talking about, but now I have a slightly better appreciation for the topic and or structure of the conversation. Knowing just that little bit more is gratifying and enough motivation to keep on going. I’ve got a long time to spend here in Japan, so I need to keep pressing my limits on the language. I would greatly like to have a casual conversation with my peers in the lab before my time is up. At the moment, I look and sound like a five-year-old – pointing and calling out vocabulary I learn in class. At the moment, the biggest hurdle to overcome is simply using the language despite my obvious limitations. If I don’t practice speaking it outside of class I will never get better. Sadly, the last thing I think my classmates want to do after class is continue speaking in Japanese. I completely understand.

I am trying really, really hard to supplement my learning with additional material from some other sources outside of class – just to mix it up a bit and get some extra stimuli that uses a different tact or introduces some new vocabulary I haven’t heard/seen yet. One of my favorites is a website called TextFugu. It’s a pay-site, but it’s a fun way to learn Japanese with a bit of inside-joke humor thrown in all over the place for the nerd in me. Another is the backlog of podcasts from JapanesePod 101. They can be subscribed to through iTunes. There is so much free content that it is hard to pass it up. I had considered joining their pay-for version of the site, but I’ll see how far I can manage with the resources already cataloged. Aside from these two notables is the enormous amount of resources on iTunes University or in the podcast section of the iTunes music store. I am sure you could make it half-way to fluency on the plethora of material online alone without ever having set foot in Japan.

Finally, my words of encouragement to all you budding language learners out there – don’t hesitate, just do. Japanese is a tough language to learn as a native English speaker, but just as learning any new language, the opportunities and the experiences that open as a result of learning that new tongue are well worth the effort.

Here are a few more photos from the empty Japanese Language classroom (on a better camera) .

It’s late on a Friday night. Going out is not a good idea at the moment – it’s raining pretty heavily and week has worn me down a bit. I am content to stay in and just enjoy the torrents of rain clatter on the rooftops and asphalt down below my fourth story balcony. It’s finally starting to cool off a bit. Autumn is in the air and I am really beginning to enjoy it. The first couple of weeks were a little uncomfortable with the dreaded humidity. I am glad that summer is finally gone and I can embrace the cold of winter. The majority of the other students in my basic Japanese class all come from warmer countries. For them, the winter is to be scornfully looked upon with disapproval. I, on the other hand, am glad I can finally wear a jacket or a long sleeve.

There is a scene in the first film of the Lord of the Rings where Samwise Gamgee remarks how their journey is about to take him and Frodo the farthest out of the Shire that he has ever gone. I am rapidly approaching my temporal version of this milestone. After this coming Monday, it will be the longest I have ever been away from home in the most distant and isolated sense. Berkeley, Seattle, and Camp Kern were all within reach from home. I could come home if I really wanted to. And I suppose the same could be said here, but the enormous Pacific Ocean acts as a more significant barrier to that reassurance that home is still accessible. That familial security is not so reachable despite the convenience of modern transportation. Despite this, I am enjoying every minute. I look forward to the journey that awaits my “Samwise” moment at the three week milestone on this journey of mine.

And now that I am approaching three weeks, I believe I have finally hit some kind of stride and routine that provides a little stability to my daily activities. I am certainly pushing the boundaries of what I can do to make my time here more comfortable and enjoyable, but having a daily regimen amidst all the new stimuli is anchoring in its own way. The alarm goes off at the same time, breakfast doesn’t vary all that much, coffee is always included, and the “commute” is identical. Japanese class is roughly the same every day. We don’t stray too far from the scheduled content. Interacting with the younger instructors is fun – they love to interact with all of our quirky perspectives on the complications of the Japanese language. We all have the chimeric appearance of five-year-olds in our Japanese language ability and educated adults in our inquisitiveness and analytical approach to learning the language. It’s really fun to see all of us try to pick apart and understand the language and cultural references more so that just learning Japanese outright.

Evenings have yet to hit any kind of routine. We’ll probably be loaded with more homework as our abilities grow. But for now, I am enjoying the relative freedom that comes at the early stages of any course. I was reminded at how little free time I’ll have once I enter the laboratory for the doctoral research in the coming months. I should enjoy the luxuries of time now…

This post was a bit of ramble, but it feels good to finally take the time to write down some thoughts again. Tomorrow night is badminton with my Host Family. I think I played badminton when I was in high school. This ought to be fun… for the spectators.

This post is about a week late. I have a good excuse, honest!

Until about an hour ago I was without Internet in my dormitory. Limited to only the public machines in the international student office and my (brand new, fancy, and shiny) iPhone, I otherwise had no reliable and controlled access to the Interwebs. Now that this has been rectified, I am fully empowered to keep those of you who actually read this informed about how life is while being a graduate student in Japan. My (mis)adventures will hopefully make it up here in a timely manner. And since I doubt anyone really wants to read this sort of thing on Facebook and Twitter only has 140 characters, the blog will be the most appropriate place to talk openly and at length about everything that tickles my fancy.

More to the point, it has only been about eight days (to be exact) since passing through immigration at Narita International Airport. Frankly, the shimmer, shine, and sheen of actually being in a different country than my own has yet to wear off. I routinely say every day that “I cannot believe I am actually here;” often times aloud and occasionally in the presence of friends and acquaintances. This “little” adventure of mine is certainly one of those moments when the straight and well travelled path looks a little boring. However, the shrouded, not well defined, and curvy trail jetting off to the side lures me away. At any moment I could extricate myself, but I like where I am heading. I cannot see very far down the path. And frankly, that is a good thing. I don’t ever remember living like this until now. My largest concern in the next week or so is simply where I am going to buy a bicycle and for how much (walking 6.6 miles is a bit much every weekday). So, this day-to-day existence is certainly a luxury in less-tangible ways. I am truly fortunate to take a break from the rat race and experience something so different from everything else I have come to know and regard as the norm.

For the longest time I was both excited and afraid. Now that I am actually here, I am no longer afraid. There are still many unknowns, but the good far outweighs the bad, hidden, and obscured. Three to four years is certainly a long time. I intend to make the most of it. You only live once.

dum loquimur, fugerit invida aetas: carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.

While we speak, envious time will have {already} fled: seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future.