Retrospective

It feels like every time I post here it's about looking back at old posts and reminiscing. I would have made this entry in my livejournal (I still have one!) except it wasn't letting me log in to the point where it temporarily banned my IP.

So there's that.

But one of the blogs (! lol) that I had talked about how maybe I'll return to happiness when I'm older... in my twenties haha. It should be noted that this particular entry came from 2004, before I graduated from high school.

It was slightly painful to read how I wrote. I thought it was so cool and edgy back then. Hah.

Good thing things on the Internet never die, amirite?

I will probably regret typing that sentence in another five to ten years.

But as I sit here in my high school bedroom, I do have to wonder. Am I mis-remembering wrong? Was I happy? Back then in high school. I wrote about yearning to return to being happy and carefree prior to when I went to Japan. About how maybe, melancholy was inextricably linked to responsible, and growing up meant that you could no longer be carefree and happy because you had to be ~responsible~ instead.

Was I happy and carefree back then? I guess "carefree" is one way to classify the style of writing I used to have.

The posts made me remember how much fun I had with my online friends in our guilds and chatrooms. The days we spent collaboratively writing stories together, playing games together, chatting and connecting on a human level together. But teenage me also wondered if part of life was moving on from things you used to find fun and enjoyable, but had simply lost interest in. Though perhaps I think, some part losing interest, but more part finding other things to be interested in.

I don't really keep in contact with many people from my online high school days, sadly. Ramsey. Eon I follow on facebook. Same with Dylan. Still talk to Keith. Haven't talked to his brother. But digi, PN, France, Fantasy - haven't heard from them (or if I'm being honest, remembered much about them until I re-read those posts and saw the amazing layout my friend had made me).

I tend to post more thought piece writings on my private journal space.

But it's funny.

Sitting here during shelter in place (day 49?) kind of makes you thoughtful. Being here in high school room makes me remember more things. Opening up and turning on my personal laptop for the first time in at least two or maybe three years... there are a lot of memories to unpack. Pictures and screenshots that were casually left on the desktop. Old conversations from the last time iMessage was open, texts from people I no longer talk to.

I have been so incredibly fortunate during this pandemic. I am able to afford rent, even if I'm not really living in my apartment. I have a job still. I have a job still! It pays well, even if I did get a 4.something% decrease in order to help my company avoid furloughing more workers. I am quarantined with family, so I am not 100% alone. My family's house has a washing machine and more than one bathroom. It also has a desk! And I have a work station set up. And there is food I don't have to worry about buying because my mother wants to do all the shopping.

But I am uncertain about the future of my job. Originally, my intentions were to work in this position for a yearish, then go back to doing program management. With the current job market though, that has changed. That is, assuming that I can find enough work to justify my position staying on. It's hard when so much of what I was hired to do (keep track of deals and budgets) will have its workload so drastically cut.

It feels like I'm walking around in a bit of a fog. Which, if I were myself speaking to a friend, I would say is perfectly acceptable given the time that we're in and the stress of living back at home.

Normally, my patience for staying at home caps at a max of like, a week and a half, maybe two weeks.

But with this situation?

I don't know. And it's scary. I know that this is better so long as I have to shelter in place and WFH. My current apartment is, quite simply, terrible for that. Plus there's no washer/dryer.

I was planning on moving anyways, even before this whole pandemic. I had looked for houses. Almost said yes to a place with some people. But I didn't want to move before my Paris trip. Which oh man. Feels like last year even though it was a month and a half ago.

I mean, I guess I'll just have to see what life throws at me and where life leads.

One of the quotes from my old blogs I liked a lot. And something to keep in mind these days.

"The most wasted day is that in which we do not smile."

Truly, there is a lot to be grateful for.

It feels wonderful to write again this much. I've missed it.

But does it spark joy?

I never thought I would be out of practice for writing. Or struggle to figure out what exactly to write about.

I was looking through my older entries - they're kind of all over the place. A lot of them have to do with traveling and just kind of any ol' randomass thought I happen to have. Some of them talk about a thing in a place. Some of them talk about just a place. Some of them talk about just a thing. But here I find myself struggling.

To be sure, there are some really cool things in the Peninsula and greater Bay Area that I've been trying to explore little by little, or some things that I've stumbled on. Like the fancy Taco Bell in Pacifica that opens onto the beach. A Taco Bell. On the beach.

Can you say heaven?

It's definitely something that sparks joy. Like many many people, my roommate was watching Marie Kondo's tidying up Netflix show (which was so incredibly wholesome and just overall feel good so long as you're not like... reading it as a personal attack on how much crap you have aha) and I... I can't tear myself away from the tv if something remotely interesting is on. So I ended up watching it too.

It was an interesting idea, that of "sparking joy" and the original Japanese phrase it came from. But as I was searching for something to write about, and then started to think about things in the bay area that I've found that bring about this small sort of joy, well, I think it's pretty easy to tell at what point I actually found something to write about.

Other things that have sparked joy recently in my life:

1. Finding the Georgian Street Food truck on Independence near the InNOut/McDonald's/behind Costco. Oh man. The food. So good. Meat skewer. Cooked over an open grill. Georgian soup dumpling. I had it cold so I imagine it was probably a lot better... but it was still really tasty. Definitely going back there. I have a date with a bread filled with cheese and an egg.

1.5 Eating a brisket sandwich on the beach. The brisket was delicious. The bbq ssauce was delicious. The sandwich bread was garlic bread which, if it were real garlic bread, I would only give like, a 4/10 but because it was my sandwich bread I give a 9/10. Even more excitingly, I only ate half the sandwich and was full.

2. Stumbling upon the S.S. Palo Alto. I picked a beach at random to eat on, and by random, I mean the closest beach. That beach ended up being Seacliff State Beach, and I think there was free parking on the street and you could walk down to the beach using nifty stairs. The toll booth was closed when I drove through. But then randomly, on the beach, at the end of the pier, I was like, "wait is that... a ship?" "Are those... treads?" "No wait that part is definitely bark but I'm pretty sure those are treads" "...that is a ship right and not just a rock. Is that also a rock?" I didn't think to check google until after I left, and then when I was trying to find of the name of the beach I stumbled upon the name of the ship and was like "ohhhhh."

I mean it was a Monday....

Actually the ship is really cool. Read more about it here: https://www.californiabeaches.com/ss-palo-alto-concrete-ship/ But it used to be an oil tanker and then an entertainment ship. And apparently is made of concrete. And apparently is the most famous concrete ship on the west coast. Also, appparently, it used to be signifcantly more ship-like and has sunk a fair bit due to storms and the waves. There's a really interesting gallery here: http://photos.santacruzsentinel.com/2017/01/24/cement-ship-through-the-years/#21

Guess that means I'll have to go back sometime soon before it sinks completely. Thankfully Aptos isn't too far and I've received word of another BBQ place I need to try.

Joe Hisaishi... in concert!

So somehow, luckily, I had found these tickets for Joe Hisaishi Symphonic Concert: the Studio Ghibli Films of Joe Hisaishi just as they had opened another showing on Sunday evening so naturally, I bought two tickets. I mean, Hisaishi's music is some of my favorite in movies and I've been to Zelda concerts, video game concerts, etc, before, so of course I would get tickets to hear them do it with a live symphony.

I didn't realize that it was actually Joe Hisaishi conducting the concert until he walked out on stage. Before he came out, the current Consulate General of Japan gave a speech, which I thought was a little strange.

"What is the Consulate General doing down here in San Jose at a concert?" I was confused. Then this gentleman walked on stage to a roaring applause and I was like oh. shit. I had to turn to my sister.

"IS THAT JOE HISAISHI???" I said in my loudest whisper.

"YES," she whispered back.

"HOLY SHIT." I lost my shit a little bit.

Joe Hisaishi is the cutest effing Japanese grandpa conductor. The venue had cameras that captured his facial expressions and gave us an actual view of the frontside of the conductor - not something commonly done at the concerts I've been to, so this was even more amazing because it was Joe mothherfucking Hisaishi. He got super into what he was conducting and would every so often crack into this brilliant and kindly smile that just melted your heart. Definitely one of the more animated conductors I've seen! Like, he was actually a lot of fun to watch to the point where they would show videos from the movies on the big screen but I would be watching him bounce around and cue in different sections.

The most amazing thing though, was how he transitioned back and forth between playing piano (I GOT TO SEE JOE HISAISHI PLAY THE PIANO OMG) and conducting. It was so ridiculously smooth that I can only hope to one day attain a level of being able to switch back and forth between tasks in the kitchen like stir frying something and washing the dishes the same way he, seemingly effortlessly, switched from playing this piano bit (memorized of course) to waving in another cue and then back again to the piano.

There was just something about him playing piano that made the whole thing seem kind of special. It felt like he was adding in flourishes here and there to parts of songs; these were listening experiences that you couldn't hear just from the movie.

There were parts too, with the Totoro song, where sections were playing and I don't know, it's so moving that tears started to run down my face. I don't know what it is about that song - the nostalgia perhaps - but I get really close to losing it when I hear those songs regularly, and hearing them live just pushed it over the edge.

Oh yeah. There was also a part where this marching band came in. Hella random, but damn was I jealous of all those people who got to perform!

But now I want to watch all the Ghibli movies. There were definitely parts of movies I didn't remember at all haha. I wish I had the income and the space to pay for the blue rays with the gorgeous covers. Hell, I wish you could buy those as posters.

...time to scour the internet for posters I guess!

Questival San Jose 2018

A few months ago or so, I took part in something called Questival for a day and a half. A quest festival (get it? ha.) that the organizers put on in cities around the US. At its most basic, you have 24 hours to complete as many (or little) "quests" or tasks or challenges of some kind with a team of 2-6. The one I did yesterday was focused on San Jose, though really, it was more like the South Bay.

It was incredibly incredibly fun, if doing scavenger hunts and challenges are your thing. Basically for questival, I sort of see it as paying $20 for a pretty cool daypack (that folds up!) and $20 for these people to organize a bunch of fun things for you and some friends to run around doing.

The Questival started officially Friday evening, but in a sense it starts before that when you first pick your team name. For our team name, we eventually decided on Como se llama llama? which we were all pretty tickled about. And that's what kind of matters. Except if you're actually... going for the challenge of trying to actually *win* one of the awards (and if you're trying to finish the most events or get the most likes or whatever you're definitely in the running), your team name will probably be announced at the closing ceremony. So there's that to think about.

You also need to sign up for the App, which.... is definitely not without its faults. They sort of ran into the same problem Pokemon Go ran into when they first launched, where their servers were most definitely not equipped to handle all the racers accessing them at the same time. There were many upload failures and crashes and glitches, though, as they told us at the closing ceremony...  none of them are programmers so their app was definitely... a work in progress. I really want to look at the code of how the search function actually worked because that was absolutely terrible. It worked maybe 10% of the time, and never when you typed in the whole correct word you were looking for. Like, it's baffling what code they actually used because of how broken it seemed. But while the app was definitely a key part of the questival, it wasn't really the main part.

About 24 hours before the opening "ceremony" they release a list of the challenges, though some challenges they also add during the event itself since I definitely saw challenges that were not there before and were not on the original list. It's super nifty because you can definitely use them for planning purposes since there are way too many challenges for one team to actually do (though, man, I would be really interested to see how many you could really do).

The challenges vary widely, from doing outdoorsy-things like hiking and taking pictures of the landscapes, fitness things, to doing good in the community by volunteering or other random acts of kindness, finding locations and going there, to making things, to really random quirky things that felt kind of like dares from the organizers. Really, there was something for EVERYONE no matter what kind of things you like to do. The challenge was getting everyone else on the team to agree to the tasks you wanted to do and squish them into the time frame that you had to do them in. Every task needs to have a special totem in it that they give out at check-in though, so even if you have a team of six, it's not like you can split into squads and do the different tasks since you must have the totem in the picture, otherwise you get disqualified. But it's pretty cool because no matter what you like to do you can probably find something.

Our team was three people - myself, my boyfriend Elias, and his friend Betsy. We tried to plan a little bit before hand but that sort of... sizzled out. We thought we were going to be able to volunteer at the non-profit that Betsy used to work for but unfortunately it ended up being closed on the Saturday, but at least we were able to go to a different charity and thankfully, it was close by.

Elias was still finishing up work, so Betsy and I went to checkin without him. Check-in was pretty...underwhelming? I thought it was going to be some sort of ceremony thing but it was basically a tent with dudes running check in and then giving you a backpack and a flag-totem. Once you got those things, you were pretty good to go and leave, though there were a few challenges you could only complete at check-in, like taking pictures of your backpacks (technically you could do this anywhere) or dancing at check-in or taking a picture of your car. We almost forgot some of them.

We went back though and used some of the time that evening to talk about plans for the next day and that night, as well as some of the challenges that we didn't need to go anywhere for. We figured that since not everyone from the team needs to be in the pictures Betsy and I would do some of the challenges while Elias did work (so some people can leave if they need to or do things as needed or whatever, or I would definitely recommend sleeping in shifts if there are enough people, a late night shift and an early morning shift).

I made the mistake of volunteering to eat 1 clove of garlic, raw noodles, and 1/2 a raw onion.

The mistake was the raw onion. I was arrogant and was like "I like purple onions" so I picked a purple onion. Big. Mistake. Second mistake was not picking a smaller onion. I picked a normal sized onion.

The noodles were stupidly easy to do, and the first few bites of onion were alright. I bit into it like an apple. It was fine for a little bit, but then the burn, oh god, the burn set in. It was the same as the kind of burn from eating ridiculously spicy hot sauce. Like, painful. I started tearing up. But I tried to power through. My teammates came to help, thankfully, though I think I still ate like 2/3 of the onion to disastrous effect. It took us like, 25 minutes to eat the whole thing. The garlic clove I just popped and powered through. The noodles we ate in between bites to help alleviate the burn (it wasn't really that helpful).

I think I actually killed off or destroyed a significant number of taste buds because basically until Sunday morning, my mouth tingled every time food or liquid came into contact with it, all the way from the front of my tongue to the very very back of my tongue and throat. Brushing my teeth helped... but only for the front part of my tongue. Nothing tasted right after and everything was just a tad bit painful to eat. And then we almost couldn't get the video uploaded haha.

Betsy and I swore off onions for at least a week though. I made the mistake of thinking I was better Saturday and put some onions in my in-n-out. Regretted it immediately. So much unpleasant burning feelings.

By the time we had.... recovered, neither of us were really that hungry for dinner from all the liquid we drank in a futile attempt to stop the burn (turns out milk products and bread do not work for onion burn like they do for hot sauce). We got Elias to do the "drink something from a straw out of a bag" challenge to have him eat more and decided that that evening, we would go up to Stanford to do the cluster of challenges there since by then he had finished his work.

On the way up we stopped at CVS and knocked out the fitness challenge of doing fitness things (jumping jacks, push ups, etc) on video in the grocery store and got access to a bathroom and then headed over to Stanford and took pictures of the Gates of Hell, the cactus garden, a jade bush, and recorded a short ghost story at the masoleum in the pitch black.

Not going to lie, that was a little freaky. It helped to have a high powered light that I clutched basically the whole time. Taking pictures at night with the flag though, was a little bit of a challenge because our cameras were definitely not that great and it was sort of rainy.

We ended up skipping out on the papua new guinea statues because our team was just was too tired at that point and hungry, so we went to cheesecake factory before calling it a night. We at least managed to decide on a plan for the next morning.

We woke before sunrise to go to a park and jesus. It was early. But it was so worth it! Sunrise was AMAZING. But also the start of a ridiculously long day. By the time we finished - after 6 because they had allowed for submissions to keep going past the normal cutoff time of 6pm due to server issues - I was ridiculously exhausted. Like. So. Damn. Tired. Elias and Betsy wanted to burn things because a few of the challenges involved a campfire, but with the rain and the distinct lack of fire pits open at all hours, it was a little difficult to do that without planning beforehand.

Overall, Questival was amazing fun, and the best part about it, is that you can really scale it to however intense you want it to be. We weren't really that intense. We had something of a plan - my map, with all the destinations pinned on it so that we could do things when we were in the different areas - and I think we were trying to go for quantity. Judging was super confusing, especially since it was all sort of based on the reactions from other teams and it wasn't clear when the judging stopped, but it felt a little bit like Whose Line, where everything is made up and the points don't matter (at least, until it got to the judging but still).

Those six/4+ person teams though, definitely benefit from things like division of labor. There were a bunch of things that we definitely could have split better.

Let's talk strategy.

Of course, Questival is the kind of event that can be as intense or as chill as you want it to be.

I'm the kind of person who likes to organize things. I got a spreadsheet and google maps together before the whole thing, but that was with only a limited time. The spreadsheet was to keep track of the time during the day since there were certain check in challenges that were only at certain times and we didn't know how long they would take. After having done a Questival, I think it would have been worth the time to create a spreadsheet of the different tasks we could do together, were location agnostic, and also to build out some sort of schedule.

Questival officially starts at 7:00pm, about an hour after check in. However, this is only when the app will let you start to upload your videos or photos to the challenges. So if you really want to cram as much as you can into the short 24 hours that is Questival (after 6pm Day 2 you're not allowed to submit any more, unless the app/servers have massive problems and they extend it for another hour) (ie, if you want questival to really be 24 and not 23 hours), plan ahead. Buy materials ahead of time. Figure out what is close to what. Figure out what you want your team's strategy to be. Upload everything asap - the sooner you upload things, the higher chance you have of it getting reviewed and rated. There are also sprints - windows of time where I think they give awards out for thhe most? (or the most liked) uploads of a certain category. But either way, basically, I think it's fairly safe to assume that things that make for a worse picture/video are better off doing at the end of the competition because they're not really going to have much time for people to rank them anyways.

Having a strategy meeting is an absolute must. Having multiple working phones - both with cell service and at least one GPS phone - is necessary if you want to do things efficiently. Because we had to drive around a lot, whatever phone that was being used for GPS couldn't really be used to also upload things at the same time. Car time was valuable time to be uploading and captioning submissions as you ran from one place to the other. Being able to share the picture/video between multiple phones so that you could have at least two things uploading at the same time was also incredibly helpful. For this, you also need to make sure passengers in the car know what they're supposed to be doing and can help out.

I'd also highly recommend having two drivers. As the only driver in our group (since not everyone could drive my car) I was basically stuck driving the whole time and didn't really get the chance to see submissions, since all time outside the car was basically spent doing the challenge itself. At least if there are two people, you can switch things up and it's a little more fun that way for the person who has to drive IMO.

Finished.

I am finally done with my masters program. Finally! I turned in my masters thesis on Friday. I was exulted as I handed the bound 87 page paper in.

I kind of snuck something in there, as an almost easter egg for my thesis.

I have every letter from A to Z in my works cited section. I managed to somehow cite something from every single letter. I had to look up citations just for V and X... maybe that was cheating a little bit, but I legitimately worked those in too.

I am so pleased with myself, it's silly. Almost more pleased than actually having finished.

It's weird being finished. Wonderful, but kind of weird. As I was turning it in, it felt like there was so much more I could have done on it. But there's little sense in worrying about that now.

I don't know what I'm going to do with myself.

A lot of people are asking what I'm planning on doing afterwards. I fully intend on getting a job, but I don't really know what yet. I don't really know where any of my paths lead right now, but I do know one thing. All my paths lead forward. I mean, I'm going to get a job. I'm going to apply to a bunch of different places. I have no one path that's yelling my name out right now. For all I know, one of them could lead to a job in neuroscience or something. That'd be super fun. But it might also lead somewhere else. And that's the exciting part about where I am right now. I don't know where I'm going. It's kind of scary, but at the same time, kind of exciting. I know wherever I end up, I'll be able to make the best of things, and be able to make do. It's a matter of how fast I'll get to where I'm going, and what kind of sites I see along the way I suppose.

Someone jokingly, when I responded that I didn't have anywhere specific in mind (I meant mostly anywhere that would hire me, for the time being) that I didn't really have a game plan (which kind of characterizes my life right now), asked if anywhere meant McDonald's. I got super pissed. I snapped, associating it with all the "lolz non-STEM" kind of jokes people make about how we won't be able to find jobs and stuff. And this person counted himself as my friend, and I was kind of upset that he made that because we don't really have that kind of relationship.

But I was thinking, it would actually be kind of interesting to work for them in like, a waste division or something. Where you figure out how to deal with the waste from their distribution, packing, etc, or deal with making their food healthier or partnering with local communities. Because I think McDonald's has the potential to make a large impact, so just because it's fast food that the higher class people distain for organic and non-GMO slow food, doesn't mean that we should completely write it off.

Anyways, I'm getting rambley. I only meant to talk about graduating for realsies this time, and how I can finally tell people that yes, I'm 100% done now and I've finally graduated and I'm moving on to the next part of my life. (Unemployment lolololjk, I'm going to have a kickass job somewhere even if I don't know where that is yet)

Soylent

Thanks to one of my friends here at Stanford, I had the opportunity I never would have ever taken myself in a thousand years to try Soylent. Soylent is, for those who are fortunate to have never heard of it, a nutritional drink that describes itself as "open source" and boasts that all the nutrients that you need over the course of the day can be ingested in a much more convenient and cheaper form than your traditional foodstuff. Its fans claim that it takes the stress and hassle out of preparing a meal, thus freeing up more valuable time to do More Important Things.

Basically, it's a powder that you mix with water and drink so that you can get nutrients. It was created by someone in the tech industry (surprise surprise) because they wanted to use their time more efficiently, and thought that if they could make something that tastes bland enough that nobody would get bored of (which I don't buy, because you can get bored of boring things too) that you mix once at the beginning of the week and then spend maybe 5 minutes or less making (and drinking probably), you don't have to waste all that time on going out, getting food, and eating.

Unfortunately, a good friend here at Stanford drank the (powdered) Kool-Aid and has replaced about half of his meals (he still eats out socially, he says, he just has soylent on the meals he would normally spend alone) with Soylent and liked the brand name stuff so much he ordered a bunch of it to try for an event at Rains Houses. We tried two different types: the DIY version (that was made to be a 700 calorie meal) and the official Soylent version.

I was raised to believe that you can't really knock something until you've really tried it. And I tried it. And it sucked.

Seriously, it was terrible, both on the conceptual level as well as the taste level. Have you ever eaten chalk before? Or bitten into a persimmon that wasn't ripe enough? Or had Jamba Juice not mix the boosts in well enough? You know how you get that super gritty, really chalky kind of texture that makes you want to chew it because it's so thick, only to realize your mistake after the first chomp because now it's EVERYWHERE in your mouth and you can FEEL all the little grains all over? And then, after you've swallowed, the slight bitter taste from the chalky stuff lingers all over your mouth?

Very very unpleasant.

It also tasted a little like creamed corn. A little on the sweet side, actually, both the DIY version and the official one. I was actually a little surprised, because taste wise, it was better than expected. I expected it to taste like nothing. The official version was also waaay better than the DIY version, mostly because the DIY one was so incredibly viscous that it just clumped together as you drank it. It felt like you were drinking like... something with mass that wasn't actually a liquid. Perhaps that's better, because people were saying that it tasted even grainier to them, but for me it was almost... velvety, but in a very very bad way. The way that makes you kind of want to gag as you choke it down.

Some of the guys there talked about how maybe, what if, in the future, Soylent was the main form of nutrient acquisition? What if it was like a utility that was piped to each house like water, providing nutrients at low cost to poor, impovrished areas. Of course there would still be food... if you wanted to actually pay more to eat the real stuff.

Terrible, terrible ideas. That's not a future I want to be a part of. And as long as there are people in this world who love food, love the interplay of flavors and the textures as you bite into something delicious, or something with a hint of sour followed by a seductively sweet note, that future, I'm certain, will never ever happen. Food is so much more than just something we eat for nutrients. It's time to spend iwth others, to converse, to slow down, and most importantly perhaps, to enjoy. Sure, I suppose I can understand if you're a terrible cook and you hate cooking and just want something easy. For any activity, there are people who love it, and people who hate it, people who are great at it and people who are terrible at it. But there are equally tasty and cheap alternatives for those who can't cook. Trader Joe's premade food is an amazing amazing thing. And it's delicious.

One of the guys argued that it's really hard to get all the nutrients your body needs with traditional cooking. I immediately called bullshit. He countered by saying that he had a vitamin B12 deficiency when he ate his mother's cooking. However, there was a caveat in that he was vegetarian, which already presents problems with getting the proper nutrients especially because B12 comes from meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy. But seriously, it's not that hard to get a decent meal going, and if you know where to shop and have access to it (which, many people don't) it's actually fairly simple to make a meal that has enough of everything in it. You can even make things that don't actually take up that much time (though of course, putting in more time never hurts). But really? Not. That. Hard. Salad, protein, more veggies, some carb, boom. Done. Maybe have fruit too, or eat fruit some other time in the day. But reaaaallllyyyy not hard.

Oh Soylent, you silly drink.

Japan America Student Conference - Aug 12

I meant to blog more about this conference, but oops. I guess I'll post what I have for now and then fill it it later. :) It's a conference of no sleep.

San Francisco offered the chance to really have an RT focused day. As a part of the Technological Advancement and Society RT, it was ridiculously exciting to be in the San Francisco Bay Area (not just because I'm from here) and be given this opportunity, given that it's home not only to Silicon Valley's famous tech companies such as Facebook, Google, and Apple, but also because of the startup culture that's constantly pushing the boundaries of business and technology. The opportunities seemed endless. 

Unfortunately, endless choices make it extremely difficult to choose a place to visit: should we stay in San Francisco, or go down to Silicon Valley proper? Do we have enough time to go down to Stanford if we do? How much time did we really have in the first place? These questions kind of plagued our RT's discussion of where we should go. We had actually chosen two companies prior, but they hadn't really responded with the kind of firm "no" you need to properly acknowledge that they are not an option to visit, so we were still discussing various options. 

This is why, come five days prior to our actual field trip, we still had no idea where we were going and suddenly Stanford was an option (it hadn't been before because of how long it would take to get there). Unfortunately (or fortunately I suppose) as one of the two Bay Area natives (and the one with more actual contacts in the area) the majority of them were in the South Bay, which meant alternative transportation and logistics of moving from UC Berkeley to its rival Stanford; driving, it takes roughly one hour, but by public transportation it takes about two (which was why it was not an option in the first place). 

I was really excited when I heard that Stanford was an option, but dismayed at the fact that this choice came at such late notice - too late actually, for any of my contacts. We started scrambling to try to figure out a place. The day of RT free time got closer. We did a home stay. The day for RT free time jumped closer by two. We still didn't have a place to go. 

Things happen for a reason though. I'm not a believer of things like "fate" or "destiny" per se, but I do think that things will find a way to work out. 

This is how Tech ended up at Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) to talk to one of their members about net neutrality and privacy on the Internet. Things just ended up falling in to place; someone's home stay actually was kind enough to get us this contact, and we spent a much needed morning to catch up on RT discussion time that had been lost in days prior as well as do an RT reflection.

RT reflection, in my opinion, really helped us grow together as a group, and grow closer. I know for me, I came out of that convinced thoroughly that I was in the best roundtable, and trace of sadness at not getting into Modern Consequences of Historical Education completely gone. Our Tech group is really close, and it just feels so incredibly safe to talk to them and know that I won't be judged when I do so, or that I can be vulnerable to them and that they - all nine other members - have my back. I don't open up easily to other people; I don't like being that vulnerable and I've gone through so much of my life fighting to minimize my vulnerability, but this has been something so unique to JASC so far, and I think a big part of my JASC experience. Really, we have the best RT, even if it means that we are last to do everything since we usually go by alphabetical order. (Woop woop Tech!)

So much happened this day for our group. Other groups probably had, no, *did* have completely different experiences. I heard one group went to Angel Island, another rode cable cars to Ghiradelli Square and Fisherman's Warf. I won't lie, but I was extremely jealous of all the fun they were having and was mildly annoyed at the fact that our RT was stuck in Berkeley most of the day (even though I'm a Bay Area native and have been to these places a ton of times) and wasn't actually doing anything fun. Looking back though, I'm grateful for the experiences we had, and wouldn't have changed it so that we had gone and just done fun stuff (which would undoubtedly be fun, but wouldn't have given us such an amazing experience). 

April, from EFF, was kind enough to talk to us relatively last minute for a really quick time. She explained to us the mission of EFF as well as some of the projects it's doing and the court cases and lawsuits it's pursuing. The big one are against the NSA and the government for breaching our constitutional rights by using cable splitters to copy data from the Internet illegally - specifically, the First Amendment (free speech) and the Fourth (due process). We also had the opportunity to ask her questions about why privacy was important, and what a sort of ideal solution looked like if the NSA was doing so many things they didn't like. I think many of us were also surprised to find out that they were also fighting TPP, the trade agreements that are being proposed between eleven (or was it twelve?) different countries in the Pacific region. TPP has actually been a topic we've touched on and debated a little bit at JASC, but the general consensus seems to be mostly positive towards this, so that EFF was so vehemently opposed to it was a bit of a shock for all of us. I think we've primarily viewed TPP from the Japan-America ties only, especially around the topic of agriculture, so intellectual property wasn't something that was on many of our radars until now. 

Overall, it was an extremely interesting (albeit short) meeting and a good chance to really hear from a different side of both TPP, net neutrality, and online privacy. It was interesting to hear their objections to TPP and their proposed solution to "fixing" the NSA. Most of their objections to TPP were that they stemmed from "secret deals made behind closed doors" and the lack of transparency; that the terms of the proposed trade alliance were not democratically chosen. 

I can't help but wonder though - isn't that how a lot of deals are made? Transparency, sure, is nice, but I am not sure everything really *should* be transparent. I'm also slightly skeptical about how democratic the process of agreeing upon the terms of TPP (and TPP itself) should be. We've chosen specific people with specializations in that area to act on our behalf and make these deals because we, as individual citizens, probably don't have the same type of knowledge or background that they do about the topic. Our choices and decisions, therefore, would be less informed. 

As to the whole "secret meetings" and things, a lot of how Japanese culture functions, the way some business is conducted, is indeed in these more "secret" meetings outside of the office proper. By the time the decision reaches the main office - the "front" side if you will - it's already been talked about to all the important actors more behind the scenes in locations the individuals could talk freely without having to worry about one side losing face to the other in front of everyone. It's not necessarily that they go to these secret places for this with the purpose of conducting secret negotiations, but in front of the press and everyone, isn't it sort of natural to need to appear to be more unyielding on your stance? In a course I took on Japanese business, this was one of the things that the professor drove home - that often times, approaching an individual through a go-between or in an "ura" setting (meaning, some place that's a little more private and not in front of others) is necessary to both preserve relationships and move things and decisions forward. Even though they're in private locations, it's out of the desire to not have to "perform" (in a sense) rather than out of a desire to deceive or to keep the conditions and deals from others. But the US side doesn't usually see things that way; these kind of deals lead to distrust and suspicion. Fundamentally though, I have a hunch that the huge opposition to this is largely founded in cultural differences. I think too though, that often we Americans forget that our governmental officials, diplomats, business people, and others in high positions are still humans despite the amount of power they wield. For me it makes a lot of sense that they would be able to talk more freely behind closed doors "in secret" and get more done when they don't have to be the face of their nation or corporation or whomever. 

I digress though. Regardless of my own stance towards the NSA and whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, our visit to EFF was both informative and interesting, but it wasn't the end of our day. 

We (Tech, though I guess I mean I really) had two and a half more interesting parts of the day. The first was right after our meeting, when we made the decision to walk back to Powell Station rather than walk to Civic center or take the bus since it probably took about the same amount of time. Except walking meant walking back through the Tenderloin - something I kind of forgot about, slash, didn't realize that it extended that far up from Civic Center area. Oops.

The Tenderloin, for those who don't know, has the reputation of the worst area in San Francisco (though in this Bay Area person's opinion, probably not as dangerous as certain parts of Oakland) mostly because of the (crazy) druggies, dealers, pimps, and transients who are out on the streets and who also tend to be sometimes kind of aggressive. The Tenderloin also houses a bunch of low-income housing units, with people who fiercely fight to keep those units as low-income housing as the tech boom drives the prices of housing in San Francisco sky high. It's not somewhere you really want to walk by yourself (especially as a woman, especially at night), though it's usually fine in groups of three or when you have a guy with you, especially during the day. But it's a place you want to have your street smart wits about you. So don't act scared. Don't act like a complete tourist. Don't mark yourself as an easy target. 

Unfortunately, I forgot that it was the Tenderloin and that we were traveling in a huge group of ten people with half of us speaking a lot of Japanese, and most of us slightly terrified because of not being used to walking through bad areas. A lot of walking through there, I think, are attitude. You gotta look like you belong, and that no, you are not an easy target and you're walking with Purpose. So that was exciting. 

The .5 exciting part was riding BART, mostly because we forgot it was rush hour and it was crowded and we had to transfer. 

The last though, was when we did large group reflection. I think we've reached a turning point in our group, because people are finally starting to share more and more as RTs have done group reflections as well. It's kind of interesting. I've noticed that our RTs really give us strength - strength to do things like talk to the larger group and open up. The whole delegation of course, is pretty cool, but it's our RT who really acts as our backbone and support. 

I'm glad I decided to stay with JASC. 

focusing is hard, thinking is easy

There are a million and one things I want to do right now.

Writing this paper is not one of them.

One of the worst things about actually living in places with nice weather like California along the coast is that the perpetually nice weather makes it exceedingly difficult to do anything, even if you're spoiled like me and used to having it pretty often. I guess that's why libraries will have the study desks deep in the darkest parts of the basement levels: so you don't know how nice of a day you're missing.

I actually prefer to study next to windows, so I can stare longingly outside at the nice weather that I'm notenjoying. Sigh. Actually, I already enjoyed the weather outside today, cause I took the advice of a website and took a nap around 1:30 because my body just... can't around that time of day. It's actually kind of weird.

I feel like I need to run around the block. :< Or do jumping jacks in this corner of the library or something. Seriously, I am ridiculously restless.

And still not writing my paper.

After this paper, I am basically a thesis away from graduating. That's quite a long road to travel, actually, but I'm aiming to be done by the summer. Aiming. There are still quite a bit of things I need to do because this quarter was the quarter where I don't know what happened, and I lost like... all of my focus. Senioritis?

It doesn't feel like I'm graduating and moving out, but I am. Really soon. My mind is just too sleep deprived to realize it. But I don't know, I think it also doesn't feel much like I'm graduating because compared to last time... there was so much pomp and circumstance. But now that I don't have my mother bugging me to fill out cards and send invitations etc etc I dooon't actually care as much so it doesn't really seem like much and I was really really bad about actually inviting people to come to my graduation.

I kind of want to do forward somersault rolls around on the floor over here. I'm that bored and restless ahaha.

One of the counselors I saw for career advice after I took the *real* Myers-Briggs test (I'm apparently ESTP) was super shocked at my results. Basically, despite getting what I did I got really really close to the center for basically... three out of four of those (I think one of the last two, either thinking/feeling or judging/perceiving I got a "moderate" score instead of the "slight preference" kind of score). I could probably most easily float between ISTP and ESTP depending on how I feel that day.

But basically she said that was the profile that people usually work towards as they grow older so that by the time they're 80, they're not at any of the extremes. So basically, I have the soul and personality type of an 80 year old. Woo hoo. I can swing almost all ways on the chart depending a little bit on circumstance and situation, as well as on current mood. This explains a lot why I've managed to score almost every combination over the course of my (I guess short) life so far, or at least I've managed to get each category at least once. But yeah, she was shocked. It was kind of hilarious.

I also wish they made some kind of machine that captures energy from leg shaking. Crap, I bet you could make a ton of money from that and a ton of energy as well if it was something like one of those bike generators, but with leg shaking like a shake weight strapped to your leg. Or like a weight, one of those ankle weights but instead there's a sensor inside of it that somehow gets energy through the up and down motion. There'd have to be some sort of battery I guess to store the energy you got from that, but imagine, all the leg shakers of the world would actually be doing something useful to contribute to energy, all through some habit I've been trying to unsuccessfully kick since who knows when. It gets worse when I'm studying and when I'm restless like this with a ton of energy. Kinetic energy I guess it's called.

New summer project here I come.

Backstreet's Back,

(Alright!)

After failing to play at the Concord Pavilion the last time I saw them some time ago before all five Backstreet Boys were reunited, the Backstreet Boys came to the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View and played a fantastic concert with Avril Lavigne as their opener.

It was like two hours of fantastic fangirling and sing-a-longs haha.

I was actually really surprised that I saw a decent range of people (though, lots of twenty-something people) including some girls who I'm pretty sure were like... eighteen or something. They were quite drunk and quite annoying ahahaha. But I mean honestly, they were an insignificant part of the evening. Cause ommfg, the Backstreet Boys performed again.

Their visuals were actually quite fantastic as well, lots of kind of.... electronic... and sunset scenes. It was a lot of fun I thought, since they played a TON of their older songs and only a few from their newest album.

They also mentioned that the band was like... 20 years old and that their first album was in 1995. Holy crap. I was 8 then. I don't even know what grade I was in then.

Let's play a fun game called "how old was I when I was in X grade"

2001-2005 high school
2000-2001: 8th grade; 13
1999-2000: 7th
1998-1999: 6th; 11

Fun fact, Now This is Music! (the original US one) came out in 1998 in the fall.
It had "As Long as you Love Me" by the Backstreet Boys on it, which came out in 1997 as a single. Also interestingly, it does not have any Christina or Brittany or N*SYNC on it. 

1997-1998: 5th; 10

Oh, also apparently - I just looked it up now - Oops! I Did it again didn't come out until 2000, which makes sense cause that's when my basketball team decided to make a dance routine to it, much to my past self's displeasure. Genie in a Bottle also didn't come out until 1999. Huh. Baby One More Time was 1998. Dang.

Hah. Wikipedia calls the Backstreet Boys an "American vocal harmony group." Really wiki? Just call them a boy band (even though they aren't really boys anymore, but really, that's what they are. They were doing the boy band style dancing tonight which was absolutely hiLARIOUS.)

Also apparently, the last time I went to see them was like... in 2010 or 20something before Kevin rejoined the group.

Since the majority of their fans are now presumably legal now, there was a bit of hip thrusting, bare chests and booty shaking by some of the backstreet boys. Be still, my heart. I mean, not that it's stopped other bands from doing that for their underaged fans, but it feels like the backstreet boys have matured with their fan base as well lol.

At the concert they mentioned that they debuted in 1995, but honestly the first album I can remember is in 1997. So I was like... in 4th or 5th grade and I was 9 or 10. Dang. That was a long time ago.

Anyways, I'd say enough with the reminiscing but the entire concert was basically one big trip down memory lane, with singing. It's kind of amazing how many lyrics I remember from their old songs. Like... seriously, I wish I had this good of a memory for Japanese vocab. Instead, I will just be able to sing all the songs from the Backstreet Boy's first US album haha.

Their concert was definitely awesome though. Would go again.

Dear Japanese

Dear Japanese,

I have a love/hate relationship with you. I'd say it's not you, it's me, but to be honest, I think it's a little bit of you too.

I love that I can communicate to people in a place I've come to love, and that when I go back it feels like I haven't been away for so long, and that mostly I'm going back home.

I hate that you're difficult to learn, but not just because you're difficult to learn. Maybe I'm just complaining too much, but I'm in 4th year Japanese right now, and yet, I wouldn't call myself anywhere near fluent, and it's practically killing me, this Japanese class. So much of my time goes to studying you, and yet, I'm not studying you the right way or something, because I still struggle to understand the basics of what you're trying to tell me in the articles I'm reading. I hate that it's treated like any other language, when seriously, it takes something like 10 years to master (or so I'm told).

I love the way you sound, and that one of my strong points is that I can speak with only a slight accent. But I don't like the way you expect my Japanese to be perfect because of that (it's not! Far from it).

I know it's part my fault; I should immerse myself in more Japanese (I should be writing this in Japanese!) if I want to get better while I'm living outside of Japan. I should read the news more. Use subtitles less. I swear I'm trying. But it's hard to read the news when reading the articles for class takes a monumental effort of god to just get through once with a barebones understanding of meaning. Being able to recall the following class what the paragraph was about too, is nigh impossible when I'm struggling to remember the words.

Apparently, I just need to sit down and memorize vocabulary. Getting definitions in Japanese doesn't help when I have to look up the words used to define each word (doubling the amount of time it takes to understand what's going on). Also I've noticed a trend to use some of the same words (or to use the adjective form of a noun) to define things... which is incredibly unhelpful.

I also hate that sometimes, when I talk in class, I can't help but feel like the dumbest student of Japanese, like I should be back in Japanese one. And maybe I should be, but I definitely am better than starting off in first year.

I'm sorry I'm not sorry I can't remember some of the grammar structures I learned over 7 years ago (holy cow). I'm sorry I'm not sorry I don't know enough vocab to be caught up with the class.

Going to Japan was the absolute best thing for my Japanese; it restored my confidence in speaking, and it was surprising how much easier it was to speak when I wasn't worrying all the time about using the correct grammar, because who cared as long as I got my point across (that's not to say that grammar was completely unimportant, just that things flowed way easier when I stopped thinking so hard).

One of the important things I learned when I was there was from my Aunt, who told me that when she asked me "what?" it wasn't that she had misunderstood me, or didn't understand what I was saying. It was that she couldn't hear me properly, and that I needed to speak louder. Speak with more confidence. Speaking loudly = speaking with confidence, which is pretty true I suppose. That's why when you mumble, you get yelled at because a) nobody can hear you and b) it sounds like you don't really know what you're doing because you're not projecting confidence in saying the things you want to say.

Really, it's like that no matter what language you learn. The more confidence you have in speaking, the better you're going to sound and the faster (I think) you learn. Confidence was always something we were trying to get the students to cultivate by not worrying so much about their mistakes, and actually trying really hard to understand what they were saying.

I wish I was better at Japanese. One of my goals had been to get my japanese to the interpreter level, where you basically know everything and anything about vocabulary and grammar. That was probably a little ambitious of me, especially being outside of Japan. I wish I had more time to devote to Japanese, and I wish I found that perfect way to study this language of area I've come to really love. Learning this language has taught me so much, and shown me so many different things.

I think I've just needed to realize that learning 4th year Japanese is NOTHING like learning 3rd year Japanese. 4th year is hard. You're studying the academic equivalent of it. Even English words like that are hard and require vocab tests in high school and stuff.

I realize I might have made a mistake, taking fourth year Japanese. It seemed like the natural thing to do at the time. But I think I work best when I can go at a slightly slower speed (Stanford is seriously too fast and the knowledge never sinks deep enough for me to remember it long term). But what's done is done. It's not like I can quit now, though admittedly, there have been several days where I've been ready to just throw up my hands and throw in the whole towel to grad school (it's complicated, since my funding is tied to my language learning class, so quitting Japanese is kind of like saying hi I don't want your money here take it back) because of this one class. It's disheartening, to feel so stupid and to sit through class, knowing that you prepared maybe not as much as you could have, but as much as you could have given the time constraints on your life and the fact that you have other classes and need to take sanity breaks and write ridiculously long blog posts and that no, you shouldn't be working on Japanese for 4 to 5+ hours daily.

Anyways, here's my promise to you, Japanese. I won't give up on you, if you don't give up on me. Please don't give up on me, no matter how stupid I might seem at the moment, and even though it might seem like I'll never actually become fluent. I've always hated how, when I said I was interested in learning how to play the violin, the first thing everyone has ever said was "oh you're too old" meaning it was something out of my range and impossible for me to even learn how to play. Similarly, people (especially Japanese people) constantly say, "Japanese is really hard" in the sense that well, maybe you'll never master it. Despite the ridiculously long rant here about how hard Japanese is, I hate when people say that because it's always said in the context of "well you probably won't master it but it's okay because it's hard" which, sure, makes it more difficult (hence why I'm complaining) but surely if you persevere, even a foreigner can learn Japanese well, right?

Right?

Love,
Jess

Hello Tokyo ♡

Hi Tokyo, long time no see. :D 

It's actually kind of funny because I swear it's been ages and ages (or at the very least, two years) but actually I left Japan one year and seven months ago, so just over a year and a half. I was just commenting to a friend that for me, it didn't feel as much like a big trip so much as just another trip to somewhere that feels like a second home sometimes. 

It explains why this trip was the most disorganized I've been on this far. That and the fact that school is a little crazy (or cray / cray-cray as the young people aka my sister and my former roommate for example would say). I still don't have a firm itinerary in mind. 

When immigration and customs asked me where I was staying I kind of didn't know what to put; I'm staying at my aunt's place for a couple days but I don't actually know their address. Oops. So I put my old address in Takahashi down. I wonder if that place is super run down now since I don't think anyone has been living in it for a year and a half (I'm sure there's probably a bunch of nice bug families there now though, like mukade/centipede families... That or it looks like a war zone between bugs for control of the house. If that wasn't such a disgusting image, that's be kind of amusing). 

I digress. I'm on a bus so I can't type too much; buses make me kind of carsick if I'm reading things now. I might also be unable to do that on planes now too, because I felt super queasy on the plane today. 

So uh, pictures! 

Yeah I have no idea what to even think of this, other than I'm pretty sure on a scale of 1 to inappropriate it's definitely not 1 or 2. Probably higher than 3 and 4 too. 

The fact that there's a kid with a Captain America looking backpack standing in front of him too... American god mascots are strange. This one looks kind of creepy. 

This was really cool. It shows you what the traffic conditions around Tokyo are. 

We just passed this cool looking apartment. It looked like it had steps in order to give each floor an open patio so you could actually look up and see sky. 

Yep, we just hit traffic. I should have taken the earlier bus. Oh well. At least it makes it easier to type without feeling sick. :D #silverlining? 

OMG WE'RE PASSING DISNEYLAND. How do I know? I saw the Disney hotel, and then I saw Cinderella's Castle. One of these days when I have money again... Wait for me, Disney hotel! 

This building had stairs winding up the sides. I would say I bet it's really cool to walk up but then I realized how tall it was and changed my mind. 

You can even see sky tree, AKA huge mall you can shop in for days and an observatory and aquarium and oh yeah also some tower I guess. Kidding, the view from inside is actually pretty fantastic. 

This means we're close(r) though, so until later then! 

To Japan once again!

I may or may not have a history of randomly booking a flight somewhere that I want to go without giving it a large amount of thought or planning prior to booking. 

Mostly, it's worked out fantastically - and it's not like there's ZERO planning that goes into it... there's just very little of that before the flight is actually booked. Planning comes after.

I've been procrastinating on booking a flight back to Japan for a while now. So many things have been happening (the end of the quarter and all) 

So I figured it would be a good time to revive this blog. Throw in some posts about here (Stanford) and there (places I traveled that I failed to actually write about in the past). This time I'm going to set the bar low. One post a week haha. Or maybe every other week. I like the idea of a week though, if just something. 

I'm so excited! I've been dying to go back sometime, but it's usually been a money thing... poor grad student and all. Nothing has changed really, except for the fact that I was just kind of like "screw it" and booked the flight.

~ yay ramen ~

I guess I better make sure I renew my passport quickly...

Tottori

So I realized, I don't think I ever wrote about any of my trips to Tottori, the prefecture north of Okayama where I was staying. Surprisingly, (since Tottori is considered one of the least two populated and one of the two most rural prefectures I believe?) I've actually been there several times, though all different places.

One of my friends from undergrad was posting on facebook on how she was on a train to Tottori, and I couldn't help but feel nostalgic. I actually really enjoyed Tottori, and kind of wish I had spent more time there despite our initial assessment that it was totally the perfect weekend trip spot. In theory, a weekend is enough to hit all the big "to do" spots around Tottori city, especially if you're relying on public transportation to get everywhere. That's not even including the other larger city to the west, Yonago, and the area around it. And Mount Daisen, one of the tallest (also ski-able in the winter) mountains in the region, as well as I'm-not-sure-if-it's-okayama-or-tottori-but-it's-pretty-much-in-between-Hirzuen, where all the delicious milk products come from in my area (and beef -- also, I'm still referring to the region like I live there but I can't help but feel like it's my adopted area still).


The big things to do in Tottori, anyways, are the sand dunes and the sand sculptures when they have the exhibit there. I think I always meant to post about those... and then forgot. I have those pictures somewhere. Maybe that'll be my new summer project, for the short duration of summer we have left. Upload pictures, finish reading for my independent reading course so that my adviser doesn't think I'm a slacker (so much for an actual summer vacation). Other than the sand dunes... the curry. It's a weird thing to go to a prefecture for, kind of, but Tottori has the highest per capita consumption of curry (keeping in mind as well, that Tottori has one of the lowest populations, though in my opinion, that's still pretty impressive).

I was journeying with one of my JET friends at the time specifically to see the sand dunes, and when we arrived at the station, we were perusing the information booth with the million fliers and brochures, when one caught our eye. It was something like, "the curry walk" or "curry street" or something like that. Basically, a guide to the top curry restaurants in town and places that you absolutely had to try if you were in town, as well as rankings and everything for which curry was the most popular, sweetest, etc etc.

Seriously, at that point I think I knew that Tottori was going to be a place I liked (as a kid, Japanese curry and rice was my favorite food, and only sophomore year where I consumed like, at least three packages of microwavable curry a week changed that). Actually, if I think about it, if I were to choose a place to live again in Japan, Tottori would be in my top 3 list, possibly even tied three ways for first with Kobe and Yokohama.

We ended up trying this pear curry close to the sand dunes, along with pear gelato. Oh my god. It was amazing. I was highly skeptical of putting pears (and fruit in general) into curry, which usually is pretty savory and not very sweet). Also though, by pears, really I mean nashi which we identify as "Asian pears" though my whole life I've always considered them more apple than pear. They're that kind of yellow or golden color, with the small white spots and the crunchy insides that almost snap as you eat them? They're really crisp and delicious. Also, now I totally understand why we call them Asian pears. Cause they're actually called pears in Asia.

They had a TON of pear flavored products in Tottori (as Japanese places with local flavors and specialties are wont to do). Pear cider, pear wine, pear candy, pear soda, pear curry, pear soft serve, pear... pears, and my absolute favorite, pear shaved ice. Holy. Cow. Best flavor syrup for shaved ice ever. It tasted exactly like pear, and not like some overly sweet syrup, and was also light and refreshing to taste. Paired (or "pear'd." as several of my friends would say -- also oh dear, they're rubbing off on me) with the cool yet light and almost fluffy ice, it really made the pear flavor come through more clearly than it had in the soft serve version. Also, I love shaved ice.

The sand dunes themselves were also pretty cool, while still being not quite what I had expected. In my head, when I hear "sand dunes" I think something like, "Sahara desert" or "those amazing sand dunes in Journey" (Journey is a PS3 game with an amazing soundtrack and even more amazing visuals where you go on... a journey... through this desert like world. It's really an amazing game that's not quite what you would think of as a "game"). In reality, it is much much much smaller than that, but still surprisingly energy consuming to walk across. They also had camels that you could ride around on too (and, walking back up the hill on our way back, we wished we had a camel). Running down it was surprisingly fun, and somehow, walking around to make paths and tracks never got tiring, nor was it only enjoyed by young people. They actually (they being the sand dune volunteer group thing) had a dude stationed at the bottom of the giant hill to make sure people didn't run graffiti into the side of the hill, not that people didn't try. We actually watched him stop several groups. One group was walking around in a circle. Another couple was trying to make a heart. They almost got it too, but he made them walk down. We spent a good portion of time scheming ways to distract the watchman with one group while the other completed a picture behind his back while he was busy scolding the first group. It would totally work too.

The hills were also surprisingly steep. On the way back down I ran back part of the way, and it was kind of exhilarating in the "OH MY GOD I CAN'T STOP" kind of way, though running at an angle helped.

On the other side of the giant hill though, wasn't more sand dunes. It was the ocean. Or well, the Sea of Japan (so technically not ocean, but large body of water). Tottori is actually home to a really awesome looking geopark a couple miles down from the Sand Dunes; regretfully, I ran out of time to go before we left and I never had enough time to return. The dunes overlooked a small beach, which you could run down to from the dunes at an abrupt and steep angle. Running back up however, was much more difficult. We chose to not run down to the water, choosing instead to just sit there and snack on our conbini sandwiches (and the inevitable sand that got into them) and enjoy the view. Mostly I think this is because neither of us wanted to have to walk all the way back up hahaha. We were kinda short on time as well. Buses, and all that.

Pretty much right next to the sand dunes was the sand sculpture museum (kinda). Every time they opened it, they invited people from around the world to create sand sculptures around a certain theme, and after they were done, they'd build walls around the sculptures. Every time. New walls. They also didn't look quite as janky as some fairs in the US that come around once a year and then close shop and come back a year later.


In 2012 (a whole year ago now), the theme was the UK. So there were a bunch of kind of medieval sand sculptures, one with the Globe and a play going on, the Tower of London, one of the Queen, one that was a scene of rainy times and people walking around with umbrellas, another of Galileo I think? And some other famous scientist, I don't remember. They were really awesome sculptures. There was also one of King Arthur and the sword in the stone... I think.



Oh wow, I just realized it's been almost a year since I've been back in the US. Technically a few days short, but wow. I haven't gone anywhere since I've been back, nor have I traveled nearly as much as when I did over there. I have, however, gone home WAY more often than when I was living in Japan. Ahem. Anyways.


Those things were all part of day one, and I want to say we went somewhere else too... but honestly, I don't really remember. We stayed at a business hotel though, I can remember that much. The day after, we decided to split up. My friend went to see a castle I think and went to the Detective Conan (a really popular manga/anime about this high schooler detective genius who gets turned into a little boy but retains his deductive genius) museum, while I, on the other hand, couldn't resist the siren call of large bodies of water and the beach, and went off to find a beach to go to, along with the other thing I couldn't resist: an aquarium called 鳥取かにっこ館 (Tottori Kanikkokan).



This aquarium though, was by far the most specialized of them all. It was a crab aquarium, and I think literally, they had over 70 species of crabs there. It was actually a pretty small aquarium, with this really awesome touch zone for small children that had a ton of those small crabs and like, hermit crabs and stuff there for people (ie: kids) to touch. There was also a couple of small tanks with examples of the wildlife found around Tottori (which honestly, is why I like to visit so many aquariums, because they all showcase the local marine life) as well of course, as the crabs that could be found in the area. Apparently, the crab was supposed to be delicious.


Right next to the aquarium, they also had a bunch of seafood restaurants as well as a fish/seafood market -- you know, just in case you started to crave the things you were looking at. I mean, I think we do that here in the states as well, but Japan takes these things to a whole new level that people here I think, would be shocked at haha.


Fortunately for me, also next to the aquarium was this amazing small beach that wasn't really that crowded, though regretfully, I had not brought along a swim suit. Instead I walked along the beach where the waves break and the sand is wet (since if you didn't you risked burning the soles of your feet because the sand was so hot), walking in and out of the water. It was super refreshing, and I really regretted not bringing a suit. The further away you got though, the fewer people were around until I was in a small, almost cove-like area by myself with the closest people a good 200-300 feet away. I think I took a nap there until it was finally time to go back and meet up with my friend so we could return to Okayama, a trip that would take at least 3 hours, if memory serves me correctly. Plus another hour+ to get back to my house from Okayama.


But just being able to reconnect to the sea again was energizing and invigorating. I felt completely recharged after that. :) I'm definitely a water kind of person haha. Walking up and down the beach is still one of my favorite activities. It's kind of therapeutic. No land locked places for me... even being here at Stanford feels like it's too far away from the ocean lol, though really, it's like a 40-1 hour drive to the ocean and even less if I'm okay with settling for a smaller body of water.



My first trip to Yonago on the other hand, could probably be classified as a disaster, but also as awesome. I swear I thought I posted about it, but I've been trying to look, and I can't find anything. The night I arrived/the day after, a typhoon decided to BLOW ON THROUGH THE CITY and it poured super hard, rendering it kind of difficult and miserable to do any sort of site seeing around the city. I did, however, the following day, take a day trip out to this place called Mizuki Shigeru Road, a like... 1.5 hour trip from Yonago by train I believe? I went because I heard there was a museum about 妖怪, yokai, which are like fantastic creatures like ghosts and goblins and supernatural spirits in Japan. They're kind of fascinating to read about, and there's a super popular comic in Japan called Ge Ge Ge Kitaro which is about, to the best of my knowledge, this kid (I think he's also a "good" spirit... maybe... I honestly am not too sure) and his interactions trying to help others and keep the bad spirits from being too evil. I think. I watched one episode, but I kind of forgot what happened. Minor details. But this city is the hometown of the author to Ge Ge Ge (Mizuki Shigeru) so they decided to honor him by commercializing the hell out of their city and installed statues all along this road complete with stamps that you could get of each of the yokai in the book (which you could stamp in this handy passport booklet they sold, which then semi-obligated you to finish and collect all the freaking stamps).

There was also a museum for the yokai and a museum-- wait. Wait. I think I remember posting about this. Because in addition to the yokai museum, there was also a museum that had "living" in its title and I thought I was going to see a real sunfish and SURPRISE it turned out it was a TAXIDERMY museum and everything, including the giant sunfish, was STUFFED and I was horrified and incredibly creeped out by it. I remember writing about that. I remember the picture I put up of this one room that had at least a hundred small tiny pufferfish that had been preserved. Hanging from the ceiling. Some of them had googly-eyes glued on them. Creepy. As. Hell. This picture:

It looks upon museum patrons with murderous eyes

I can't find the post associated with it, but google says I posted it? I can't seem to find the post though. :x Actually, that was when I was still writing my newsletter home, so it might have gotten put into that. Alas, I take way too long to write about things. As proof, I sat down to write this post an hour and a half ago, and I'm still typing. This is actually getting kind of long huh. I should probably go to bed. This is what happens when I have nothing to regulate my sleep schedule... ugh.



Oh, I also realized this now, but my astrological sign is Cancer... the crab. Hahaha. Maybe that's why I felt so relaxed and enjoyed myself so much there, both at the beach and at the crab aquarium. Coincidence? I think not!

Anyways, long story short (or the TL;DR version), Tottori was awesome, had a crab museum and pear everything and a beach in addition to sand dunes, and I want to go back some time.

Tourists at Stanford

One of the most surprising and different things about going to Stanford are the sheer number of tourists who visit the campus on a daily basis. This number, unsurprisingly, increases during the summer. I'm not talking about "knows someone who goes to Stanford so we're touring the campus since we're visiting them" or "prospective high school student who is probably not a senior but is probably a freshman, sophomore, or junior" or even "parents of a prospective student."

Oh no. I'm talking about literal tour buses (those big huge ones with a toilet in the back and cushy chairs) that arrive on campus with tour guides who wave around little flags and whatnot. A lot of them (though not all) are Asian (specifically Chinese). They walk around campus, which is kind of annoying since it's already crowded with campers for the summer and whatnot, but whatever, that's fine. They visit the big spots around campus like Hoover Tower, the Oval, Cantor Arts Center (which is admittedly pretty awesome), and Memorial Church (which I have NOT been to yet, though to be fair, I tried to go with a friend and it was CLOSED probably because someone was having a wedding in there, so I did try at least...). That's fine, whatever, those are awesome places around campus to go and among the "must see" kind of spots. Like, if you only had a limited amount of time to spend on campus, those places are the big ones. The cactus garden, masoleum, and angel of grief are really awesome, but they're also really far.

So I don't mind people going around and being tourists and looking at those things. Or well, I only get mildly annoyed when they block the entire road and make it impossible to bike through or around.

There is one thing though, that the tourists do that piss me off to no end though. And, I will say, it's primarily the Chinese tourists that do this (though I think there's a partial reason for this), which does not help the image of Chinese tourists. Our classroom is right next to memorial church. Tourists will walk by and glance into our classroom since we have the windows open for ventilation, as it can get pretty stuffy in the classroom (and it lacks an ac). What makes me want to kill someone though, is when the tourists actually stare into our classroom, and get their face super obviously close to the window and poke their head in. Um, hello? We are obviously in class. Also? WE CAN TOTALLY SEE YOU. There's no one way mirror, so we can see that you're staring at us and at our classroom and it's really really distracting and disturbing.

Like really really distracting. I can't sit on the whiteboard side of the classroom because I would seriously, probably get super pissed if I sat there since that side is the one that you can see from the window really well.

That's not even the worst of it either.

So when they stare, I just get really really annoyed. However, some tourists have pulled out cameras and taken pictures of us in our classroom while staring at us through the small gap in the window. What. The. Hell. Is wrong with these people. What corner of the planet is it okay to take pictures of students in a classroom as they're watching you without even asking if it's okay? SERIOUSLY. I mean, I think most cultures would find it rude if you went up in their home country, less than ten feet away from them, and take their damn picture while pretending like they couldn't see you.

Dear Chinese tourists: this is not okay. Dear other tourists: this is still not okay, no matter if you're in a different country or not.

I swear to god, if I catch someone doing that, there are two things that may or may not happen. One, I might pull out my phone and take a picture of them. This, however, disrupts the class. Two, I might get up, lose it a little bit, and tell the person to stop taking pictures because it's EFFING RUDE AND I DON'T WANT MY PICTURE TAKEN. Who takes pictures of students anyways? I mean, we're not exactly kids any more but still. It makes me feel like I'm on display in a little box; an uncomfortable feeling.

Though speaking of taking pictures of kids, maybe it is a cultural thing after all. There's a student in our class who's from China, and we were talking about how cute Japanese elementary school kids are and stuff, and somehow we were talking about them walking home and stuff and the Chinese guy casually mentioned that he would/wanted to take a picture of the elementary school kids, and justified this by saying that of course he would ask the child first.

We pointed out to him that a) they're still kids so asking them doesn't really do much b) he's a stranger and c) he's a man taking pictures with little kids and oh yeah, d) society kind of frowns upon this both in the US and in Japan because these kind of actions are things that pedophiles do. I mean, I will not disagree that those kids are really freaking cute, but to go up and ask them to be in a picture with you? SUPER SHADY. You never know with intent, and it's not the same as going up to someone with a dog and asking them if you can pet it (though I have seen times when there's a cute kid and there might be a comment of "you're kid's cute" but I feel like people generally don't ask to hold the baby, and they certainly don't go over and pick up the small child. Those kind of things get you arrested.

On a more random note, we had a pretty cool cultural event on friday. We did tea ceremony, which was super interesting to do though I think I got too embarrassed by my Japanese slash the woman didn't understand what I wanted to do slash I didn't think about passing my cup to the other person to pour slash I used the wrong form to ask and then lost confidence but whatever. Sadly though, the lunch place we were going to get bento boxes from was closed for renovation, so we had to order from a different place. I'm kind of sad now that we canceled that one culture day so people didn't have to come in and commute and blah blah. That cost me excellent free food that we missed out on two weeks in a row. But I guess I shouldn't complain, since free food is free food... but they had good tasting hamachi. Sigh.

Only two more weeks of classes. If that tourist peeping business happens again, I'm requesting to change classrooms. :x

Spiders!

It has finally happened. Japan has broken me of my deep fear and extreme dislike of spiders (but not other insects). (Or maybe other insects a tiny bit).

There was a spider in the bathroom, and while they're actually kind of small (compared to Japanese spiders) (though by my old standards it was still kind of large for a spider, like at least as big as my thumbnail) I did something I never thought I'd do in a million years.

I was actually able to trap it under a cup (which got washed very thoroughly afterwards). I got as far as sliding a piece of paper underneath the cup, but when it came to actually removing it from the floor...

yeah, I kind of failed at that. Still haven't gotten over the whole idea of being able to feel the spider through the paper. Maybe if the paper I had used was a) not flimsy and b) thicker -- like cardboard or something, or poster paper -- maybe then I could have been able to actually pick it up and take it outside to set it free (and then run away screaming).

Instead I messaged a friend who happened to be home, and he was nice enough to come over and take the trapped spider and dump it outside. I felt kind of silly having gotten that far, but hey, progress is progress right...? I never would have been able to do that. The thought occurred to me after that I should have taken a picture, cause I'm pretty sure my family won't actually believe that I was able to do something like that without picture proof.

My nails are this kind of... gaudy almost blue color that reminds me of Sailor Mercury. They're sparkly and make me feel like I'm 15 or something. Also like thrusting my hand in the air and screaming "MERCURY STAR POWERRRRR"

Really though, they're that color so that I don't go on a stress-induced rage and destroy my nails completely since I've kind of done that in the past, especially when close to tests and stuff. I always cut them way too short. This was the only nail polish I had that (probably) looks okay by themselves. Everything else I have needs both a base color and then a topcoat color/shatter thing/sparkle thing/etc. So this was just the option that took the least amount of time. Anyways, enough about nails.

There are two posts I want to make in the future when I don't have a test the next day or things due. One of them is a short one on stickers. The other is on the crazy (awesome) weekend I had this last weekend in July (with a conspicuous lack of studying). But since I have a test tomorrow, that shall have to wait. But this is a mental promise to myself to actually write about those things when I have more time stop procrastinating start using my time more effectively.

A long long long overdue post - Monitors and "studying" Japanese

So in the time between this and my last update, an entire quarter has passed by. An entire quarter. People have graduated, and semi-permanently left my life (or at least, it's immediate proximity). It's not even like I had a super crazy quarter. Or well, okay maybe I did. Especially socially. Also the fact that it was spring quarter and my macbook's backlight went out didn't help either. But yeah, those are just excuses. I've been not balancing time with what I need to do with typing and things. 

I finally got a monitor to hook up to my old macbook after trying out one of the new retina display macbooks (thank you mom and dad for the birthday present), so I can finally use my old macbook again! Hooray! I can delay the process of buying a new computer just a little bit longer now...

Having this giant monitor is super nice. :D That doesn't really change my desire to get a 15'' macbook pro; I'm not in my room often enough doing work to settle with a 13" small screen (I prefer to work in other spaces like the library or the East Asian Studies building, where there are infinitely less distractions and less of a likelihood that I'm going to get into an hour conversation with my roommate). I tasted the sweetness of having a 15" and working on it for a little bit, and I don't think I can go back to small. I mean, if I was doing purely typing things and stuff on my computer, sure. But my work habits include opening a crapton of windows and tabs (like around 80) and I do all my research on my laptop so having the ability to look at two windows at the same time is really nice.

Speaking of nice, so is this giant monitor and typing on my laptop. God I love the F1 key; when I was setting up the computer with the monitor it was on the setting that extends the display... or well, actually, I had forgotten that I had to actually log into my computer at first so I spent a good five minutes trying to figure out how to open the display settings so I could change it, and then google gave me the glorious power of mirrorring via F1 key and I felt dumb because I hadn't yet put in my password haha.

Anyways. I have been failing hardcore at any type of regular typing, both on here and something I was trying out as a kind of daily journal. Yep. I think I lasted a good... three days before I forgot and then it was all downhill from there.

Recently it's felt like I haven't had any time for doing writing outside of the reading I'm supposed to have already done and the workload for the Japanese class I'm taking. It's an intensive course, so it's four hours a day from 10-3 with an hour break for lunch... but then they expect you to do just as much work outside of class.

And like, you really need to do at least a solid four hours outside of class to be able to retain anything that class has been teaching, and to practice vocabulary (it's a LOT of vocab). I mean, you're squishing a whole year into 8 weeks, so that much work is understandable...

...except to friends who are planning things and doing things because hell, *they're* not being crazy and taking a huge courseload over the summer. Most of the grad students who are still here are doing research or something of the sort (though most the people in my program are in Beijing, and the ones who are still here are in language programs).

And I'm really grateful that people are inviting me to things, truly. But I think the largest challenge I've faced in graduate school thus far is managing my time, and managing what I do with it and balancing work with play. Because I've been playing pretty hard recently. I also got a new tv recently (thanks millions of accumulated points via credit card!) that was pretty much free. ...so I've actually been able to play my Japanese games because I can now read the kanji on the screen. Seriously, that was an actual problem, not being able to even make out what the characters were. But now... hooray, I can pass it off as Japanese studying! I mean, it kind of is right? Listening practice and then also vocabulary...

....and before you say to yourself, "Ha! Japanese practice. When is she ever going to use the words in video games? That's silly," actually, I've seen a number of vocabulary words that have shown up in class recently in the video games I've played. Never going to use the word for attack? Read an article that mentions world war II. We read one that touched on the Tokugawa shogunate's decision to close the country... and hey what do you know, the word for army 軍 showed up. Aw yeah, chalk one up for playing historical Japanese games. Well, you might say, that at least vaguely has to do with japanese history, so that might be slightly useful. But what about Pokemon? Fear not! The word used for opponent, 相手 and the word for items/tools 道具 ? Totally came up in class lat year. The inner child in me was like, BOOYAH.

But those are like, useful words and stuff right? What about games like the Hack'n'Slash Gundam version of dynasty warriors that I have recently sunk more hours than I should into? And the recent unit we've had talking about things like 期待 (hope, anticipation) and 責任 responsibility/duty? COVERED. Gundam has my back. Plus I look up words that I don't know (or at least some of them since there's a lot) and my reading speed actually seems like, at times, it's gotten better. Either way, I think I've proven to myself (and justified) the hours I've been playing these Japanese games recently ahaha...

Yeah though, more studying needs to happen on my part.

I forgot how much I like typing though. It's actually a lot of fun. I like the way the keys click on the keyboard when you type. At least, as long as you're not in a super quiet library.

I also got these sweet speakers... which I still might exchange for something like headphones since like... I live in an apartment and blasting music on my speakers probably isn't going to make me too many friends. Or put me on good relationships with my roommate.

...though I wonder what people walking by outside think when they hear Winnie the Pooh -- the DDR dance version - yes, I totally have it, and it's awesome -- blasting from this room haha.