Hamamatsu

I finally get a chance to visit the my host family living in Hamamatsu. If you guys don't know, I went on a homestay program in sec 3, after staying over at their house in Hamamatsu, then I got more interested in Japanese stuff. In case you all don't know, my sec 1 and sec 2 Japanese grades were C6, just one short of failing. If you wonder how come my results were so bad and yet I continued, try to think of what does the Language Center offers that TCHS don't.... please don't tell me you don't know.

Anyway, Hamamatsu is a small town about 250km outside Tokyo, the bullet train takes about 1hr 20min to cover that distance. but my ticket after student discount costs me S$200. Ouch.

Hamamtsu is famous for
1. Seafood (Best Unagi in the whole of Japan, lotsa clams and stuff)
2. Hamanako Lake 浜名湖
3. Suzuki, Honda, Yamaha (Both bikes and Piano) all started in Hamamatsu.
4. Brazilians! They have like a Braziltown (like Chinatown) where it's full of Brazillian stuff. These guys have worked at the factories of the above famous Japanese names, and have settled down in Japan for good.

After finishing my lessons on Wednesday afternoon, I heading down for the bullet train and zoomed my way down. By the time I reached their house, it was already dinner time. We talked a lot, all the way till like 11pm before I went to sleep

Thursday was exciting. My friend and I covered approx. 50km on bicycle, went around the famous lake, shopping center. Another very interesting thing was that there is a Bullet train manufacturing facility in the city, and a test track. He told me if you are willing to fork out 100,000￥ (S$1600), they will let you be the DRIVER of the train for one round around the test track, how cool is that. Then you can go brag that you have driven one of the biggest and fastest thing on ground. (360km/h max speed)

My friend, Mori, graduated from a game making course (CG,music,programming,everything) from some institute like a Poly. But his real interest and work is in Martial Arts. He goes China to take part in a annual martial arts competition. They fight with no weapons and no protection. Plain raw Martial Arts. He may look fat, but trust me, it's all muscles and he says his upper forearm can't take injections anymore. He's currently 3rd on the WORLD ranking. 1st is some 匈奴guy at about 2+ meters, 180kg of muscles. 8 matches, only ever beat him once. 2nd place: surprise! a lady from Hong Kong. So he also teaches Martial Arts at 武馆 all over Japan. He's also a part time policeman and gets assignments when there are highly skilled criminals. Finally, he also takes back game programming assignments.

The younger brother, Yuichi, is the branch head of a 100yen shop. But his real interest and target is a cameraman, so he's working pretty hard on it. The little girl, Azusa, is 11 and is still in Primary School. The mother, works as a translator for Braille. Converting Braille to words and vice versa. The old grandmother who is 90, basically stays at home, cos her legs are bad. They are all active volunteer workers, taking care of Handicapped people and blind people. Really a family with golden hearts.

They have a little farm, so I kop back some onions and leeks. Almost got some strawberries but they not really ripe yet. Their house is small and untidy and stuffed with a lot of old stuff, barely just a passage for 1 person to walk around. 6 people squeezing in a small place. I think my nice presents could be lost in the mountain of things that they have, so sad.

I took a train at about 9pm and reached back dorm at about 11 plus. So sad, but life's like this, seeing them after 8 years felt so different. The little girl was SOOOO cute when she was 2, of course she's still cute now, and she remembers me.

Back to crowded Tokyo, just when I thought half of Tokyo cleared out for overseas holidays or holidays in the rural area, it's still damn crowded, I can basically smell the lady's hair in front of me.

It's golden week in Japan, for some offices, it could be up to max 10 days of holidays. And yesterday, one of the main highways had a jam up to 40km... almost 2/3 of Singapore. (Imagine jam from Clementi to Changi Airport.) Narita International Airport headcount was at 50,000 for 1 day. Tokyo disneyland estimates 870,000 people in these 10 days, the International Expo at Aichi estimates 1.3 million people in 10 days. Oh my god, think I am just going to spend my time in Tokyo, all the tourist attractions, Trains, hotels have all inflated their prices for this season. So no way man... pay more and have to squeeze...

My Host family, the last time i was there, the little girl was 2 now she's 10... so cute hor
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More Boring Politics

Xiaobing wrote:

2. you do get to peek into gyms in singapore. e.g. california fitness and all those hamsters running treadmills at the window.

3. i dun quite want to talk politics but since you brought it up, just some of my views. maybe not all of the chinese and koreans protesting have seen the controversial textbook, but some people have and tt's enough. in law it might be called hearsay but this is not a legal issue and you dun have to prove beyond all reasonable doubt.

you call visiting the shrine a domestic affair of japan, but that would be the case only if they are not honouring the war criminals. about taiwan problem and etc, does it involve any other country? no right? so tt can be called domestic affair. but in the case of the shrine visiting, it is involves other countries, namely those evaded by japan. singapore may not be bothered but others do.

you may want to ask why the visiting of shrine affects other countries. it is a problem about principle. by moral standard, evasion is wrong. and once u've done sth wrong, you should apologize. just like if you commit murder you should be convicted and sentenced and punished. the chinese is not asking a lot, they are just asking for an apology to make it fair and square. it may not be something practical in your eyes thus useless but to them it is important. tt's where the cultures differ you see? and what is an apology. i tot it's easily understood. firstly it has to be formal. for the leader of a country to say 'paiseh' don't you think it's a bit the...? and it has to be a public statement. your kowtow and serving tea idea is purely sarcasm lor and i dun quite appreciate that sarcasm.

and another thing is chinese goverment has nothing to do with the protest k? it's purely from 民间. so how could u say it's agressive? china is also not building 1 battalion of gundams to shoot at japan lor.

i m not saying i totally agree the protest is a good idea. some actions are too drastic. but i can understand the sentiment. and i dun quite agree that politics and economy should mix that much...

My reply:

2. I mean peek into them WHILE I am IN the train, not walking along the streets, so this experience is not really available in Singapore, cos' Singaporeans wanna do things near the MRT station but not that near to say hi to the passengers.

3. That's why I don't like lawyers.

Yeah I know what u mean, I also think Koizumi just trying to play punk and keep visiting every year.

Apologies wise, it's better to state a more specific term, cos' over here, the Japanese say they don't know what the Chinese want. Some think that Koizumi and the Emperor has already apologised, some even say that both of them apologised many times.

Even the wise man MM Lee also said that the recent apology from Koizumi would do good to the region. And then China says that they don't see that as an apology.

So like Singapore's law, you premeditate a kidnap, murder or traffick certain amount of drugs, the SPECIFIC punishment is death. So they might need something specific.

Well the rest of the world saw the recent protests as the Chinese Govt didn't try to keep it peaceful as possible. It looks aggressive from a neutral point of view. Since what's happening in the 民间 reflects the country's wishes. Some really seem to want to kick Japan ass.Japan is more cunning in a way. A simple visit to the shrine, a seemingly peaceful act, but deeply offending.

International politics can't realyy separate with Economics. US owes the world freaking a lot of money, nobody seems to care. They say they want this they want that, even UN finding it hard to stop them. WHY? They are the biggest economy, anything happens to it, half the world would become much poorer. So if China comes up within the next 50 years, I won't be surprised if many countries help them pressure Japanese for apologies or stop visits to the shrine.

Japanese used to hate the Americans, after the Americans "helped" Japan to rebuild, even the older generation are taking it easy. China is Japan's largest trade partner, Japanese firms employ millions of people in China. That's one the largest reason why there isn't a more direct and fiery confrontation. The power of economic ties. Hope as Japan partners China to more economic prosperity, these bad things would be forgiven. Let's just also remember that Japan also needlessly lost few hundred thousands of civilian lives to the Americans.

As to why Singaporeans are less demanding, like my Grandpa said, when they came over, they were prepared for a non-Chinese Govt, living under the rule of other people. Since they were relatively new to the land, they didn't feel as much for it, even when the Japanese took over, the feeling was "change of rule" and not "they invaded us".

Ginza

Finally went to Ginza today to get a gift for my host family when i visit them in Hamamatsu on Wednesday... Don't know if anyone of you Villeroy & Boch... it's a Luxembourg founded company since 1748 and they are not bothering to sell those in Singapore... the only place in Asia where you can find them is Japan. Makes top grade porcelain and even 马桶 and bath tub... Hope my host family can appreciate such stuff...

Ginza is really a very expensive place.... it's only for buying gifts... i don't see myself going there to buy stuff for my own use.

And then I just realised today that "Shall We Dance" was originally a Japanese Film... some people say that the original version in '96 is a better show than the Hollywooded one... it is more relevant in Japanese Context, cos the main guy saw the dance class on the train. It's true, I peek into gyms, boxing gyms, dance classes, offices and shopping centers on my way to school and back. But I don't think that happens in USA and Singapore. I haven't watched the Hollywooded version yet, and I don't think I would have the chance to see it in the cinemas anymore. Now I know why Japan even bothered to bring this show and translate it and bring it to the Japanese audience. Cos it was originally their story.

Back to the Chinese and Japanese problem, Alvin was like telling me about maybe those Chinese and Koreans protesting have never seen the "controversial textbook" before but are protesting because everyone is doing so. And if u ask me... Visiting Yasukuni shrine is Japanese Domestic affairs, just as China hates people interfering with it's Domestic Affairs (Which includes the Taiwan Problem), probably they should stop interfering with Japan's internal affairs.

As long as Japanese Government don't seem to be building 1 battalion of gundams to shoot at mainland, don't think Chinese should be so aggressive. Anyway what do they mean by apology? "Sorry ah.." or "paiseh" all sound like apology leh... Must Koizumi kowtow to Hu Jingtao and said, yeah my grandfather shouldn't have done that, and then serve tea to him? Well it would be nice to see the Chinese government suggest something specific.

I admit that I might be a bit more pro Japan, cos I don't understand China's actions so far. Flood Japanese market with Chinese goods, Make Sony and Toyota less sought after than Chinese brands, that's what smart Chinese should be aiming to do...

7 of us in the restaurant
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Finally

Last night, I met up with 3 Japanese students who are coming over to NUS next sem. Together with Mark, another Singaporean grad student studying in Keio, and Philip.
7 of us went to a buffet Shabu-shabu and sukiyaki restaurant.

Finally finally, I found a Japanese student who likes soccer. Baseball is a much bigger sport here. And the best thing is that he lives in Saitama, the place where Japan National team plays their home game. For J-league, it's the very popular Urawa Reds homeground. But nevertheless, he said he would try to get tix to some game and prob go watch together...

No more home fixtures for the Japanese National team till August, so it's a bit too late, so I might have to settle for A J-league game. Well that's better than nothing.

Install

Just realised my favourite Japanese actress's show is showing in Singapore at Cineleisure. The show is called "Install", not her best show but her acting is good and she's cute. So people go catch it if you all have the chance.. I would most probably get the DVD when it's out on release on 29th April over here. I accumulated some discount points, so the DVD isn't gonna really cost me.

Mark is going to try sell the SUPER LIMITED EDITION of Sony's latest incarnation of HD MP3 player... the Sony HD NW5H...on yahoo auctions singapore... good luck to him, there will some rich kid who wants exclusitivity... just like people are paying 500-600 for PSP cos' it's not offcially launched in Singapore yet... while it's costing less than 400 here now.

So probably for now... I might try to sell something like the Nikon S1 camera, the Sony NW-407,507, and the normal Sony NW HD5...

Had a really great class on innovation and global strategy, it's like more of an idea class, this lecturer is really great. He talks and creates a buzz in the classroom, makes people talk, and creates interaction among students. If only he could go to NUS Business School, he would be a hit. Well and obviously he's a pretty famous guy in the business world... He managed to get the President of Mattel Toys (Think Barbie and Hot Wheels and UNO) to talk to us in class sometime in the semester... Sort of regretting not joining business fac... but if only all classes were like his in NUS... we would be producing top ideas...

Some stuff that came out of class today: Wireless MP3 walkman, cosmestics for pets and a lot more that i can't remember...

High productivity...

Sorry for the high productivity for today.... I wrote a lot hor... But I love Wednesdays! Cos' tomorrow got no lessons! And the supermart has 5% off everything, so I have a lot of good food to cook on Wednesdays!~

Having steamed salmon... the salmon is so fresh, i don't put anything to steam with, just plain... Eggs with Tomato.... Stir Fry long beans with mushrooms and carrots...yummy!

As I said, going to buy the NW-5 most prob, the limited edition one.... Heard from my gf that Singapore is selling some PSPs, the only logical explanation I have is that those sellers import from US. But they are selling like at 600? It's like going for 300 here for the basic set and 400 for the value pack... after the shipping... wow check out their profit margin....

The only problem with bringing in stuff from Japan is that they use 110V... but most adaptors come universal feature... They work from 100V to 240V, so just have to find the pin converter, which is a few bucks... so tell me if u guys wan any latest state of the art equipment... It's amazing shopping here WEEE

Thinking where to go tomorrow... Thinking of going some weird Cosplay restaurant... where the staff wear cosplay costumes, and the setting is animeish.... wonder if Mark is willing to go with me....

Sony DSC-T7 Camera... less than 1cm thick.... oh my god...it's like damn cool when I was holding that thing in the shop... but don't think I would ever part with that amount of money to get this
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PSP, dunno selling for how long already.... Singapore still haven start selling yet
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Mark bought this Sony lighter-lookalike 1gb flash mp3 player
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New Sony NW-HD5 player (30gb, 130g, and all the features i said below) And I am going to give in to temptations... going to buy this most prob... and apply for the limited edition 30gb, with different colour from the usual version. So even if this ever reaches singapore shores, chances of anybody having the same player is almost 0. Cos in Japan, there won't be much people having this player since the limited edition is only produced for launching and stops forever....Weee...
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Desire

Had a long lecture on something about how religion has affected Japan. Gotta say if this kind of lecture has been held in Singapore, I would be snoring. But somehow since I had to travel 1 hour just to reach school and listen to a 1 1/2 hour lecture, before spending another hour to reach back to the dorm, I decided to be a good student and listen to the lecturer.

The lecturer then went to explain that the egoistic nature of westerners. Cos' Judist-Christianity claims something like this. This world is created by GOD, and then it would end sometime. And we happen to exist somewhere within this time frame. If you accept Christ during your lifetime, when you cease to exist as a human, you go to heaven if not you go to hell. That's the end. Simple as that. Life is a simple linear function.

While Buddhism sort of branched out under the influence of Hinduism. And the belief in karma is very strong. So everything flows in a circle, including life, what you do now has an effect in your next stage. Siddartha Gautama, founder of Buddhism, was the first person to attain Nirvana and sort of broke out from that cycle.

"I think, therefore I am" by Descartes, a Frenchi
"I want therefore I suffer" - sort of a summary of Buddhism. Since we all have desires, we suffer cos' of all these desires, in Buddhism, if you are able to put away all the desires and realise that we are just a small negligible part of all the events flowing in the world, we attain Nirvana.

That's just a very easy way of saying things. So since Asians are under Buddhist and Hindi influence for a longer time, we tend to put parents, and the whole communtity in front of personal interests. Cos' we know we belong to a larger community.

So if you ask me, I tend to believe in Buddha more than Christ, cos I like their logic more, we are just a minute part of all the events in the universe, makes more sense. More than a simple linear time line, and then if we believe in Christ, we go to heaven.

Everything has its causes and effects, if you behave badly, you are going to have a tough life your next life. Rather than I behave badly, I would still go to heaven if I embrace Christ. A very egoist thought I would say.

Sorry for the preaching session, expressing my personal thought, but I don't believe in such things. I still desire stuff, and don't see it as suffering. I haven't had mystical forces telling me that I would go to hell if I don't do something soon....
So I would still believe in we make our own way and go where we want to....

Sony

Sony has recently refound it's touch of "desire" finally making products that people see it and go wah... I really would want that.

1)PSP: selling like hot cakes here, really nice screen, see to believe. Selling at <$400... it's a portable mp3 player, avi file player, and of course, games. Heard people are making browsers and MSN for it. For <$400, it's a good deal. Creative Portable Media Center is at $700 at least, and the screen doesn't look as good.

2)Sony Cybershot DSC T7
The latest variation of the T-series. OH MY GOD, it's less than 1 cm thick, maybe the thickness of your notepad, shirt pocket,hang it round ur neck like a card. It coms with 5 megapix, and 3X optical zoom, who says small cams can't zoom?

3)Sony 1GB flash MP3 player (NW-500 series)
OLED screen, blah blah, looks like a lighter, but much more cooler, if only they had added the lighter function to it, most cool looking gadget for smokers. Worth a look, if they ever get to Singapore shores.

4)Sony 20GB HDD MP3 player (NW-5)
Interface is like a gameboy, very cute. OLED screen (means battery life is enhanced cos OLED uses little power with same effect as LED) , G-protection (Don't worry if you drop it), Position sensitive (no matter how you rotate the player, the words always appear upright to you). Beats the Ipod flat in terms of Features.... And since I think that the Ipod is ugly, nothing to comment about the styling of the NW-5. I wonder if this would ever get to Singapore shores, considering that Sony Singapore just released the NW-3...

Casino!

Yay, Singapore's gonna have a casino, and nobody needs to go to Genting anymore. But the $100 entrance fee? nah, I would still pop by my friendly neighbouring muslim country to have a go at jackpot. So the government are looking for the big fish. Well let's say that I am a salaried worker earning $3000 a month, $100 aren't really big money, but recently we have seen more than enough white collar workers doing stupid stuff when they don't have enough money or they happen to gamble it away. Even high flying top executives run away with billions of dollars.

Well, not that I am saying that it would happen, but I would not want to go near a casino if I am earning 3k a month, it's pretty suicidal. Talking about social costs and social benefits, wondered if they actually used econometrics to measure them. This point aside, I got some brilliant ideas to add on to the integrated resorts:

1)Create a central brothel (even gigolos' brothels) if we want to target the affluent ladies (or the wives of rich businessmen). This would also bring in benefits, more jobs, more money.

Tax both the pros and the customers. Have special LOVE hotels like here in Tokyo, so that the customers can hire the partners to the casino, and then have a drink at the nearby bar, and finally a great night together. Social Costs? Nil. If you can't enter the casino, you can't hire the girls (or guys). This would prevent girls from Geylang swarming to the edge of the casino where it is a perfect place to tout their services. Under the controlled environment within the resort, the pros must go for checkups, controlling the AIDS problem that Geylang might be facing now.

QC for the pros, beef up the image of Singapore pros, not like some cannot make it one in Geylang, so that the foreigners would remember that Singapore has good pros. Thus we can avoid the problem like in Macau where the pros stand all over outside the casino. Try telling me that sex and heavy gambling don't go together... Yeah right. When those men win money in casinos, all they want is a good bang.


2)Legalise the use of party drugs within the casino. And sell them withing the boundaries of the casino. Well people are there to look for a good time. Let them use it. Tax at 200%, there would be still some rich people who wants it.

It complements gamnbling and sex and partying doesn't it? Reduces the problem of underground drugs in Singapore. Why not?

From my above recommendations, either Singapore should shut down the fucking casino, or Do everything of the above, since the social costs are already gonna be there. If people wanna go Genting to gamble, go Batam to have a bang, let them get out of Singapore, we don't really need these stuff happening right at our doorstep.

NTT DoCoMo (handphone) building, don't know if it can stand up to a major earthquake...
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Shinjuku Gyoen
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One of the nicest Sti I came across... So unbeng compared to the Singapore ones
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Swing Girls

Watched Swing girls on dvd a couple of days back, it was a good show, so please catch it on singapore cinemas while it is still showing. It's the same old cliche story of high school students from zero to hero. Just like waterboys. But somehow these Japanese are getting good at hitting the right notes and using the right music. So cliche the story as it gets, it's still pretty entertaining. Apparently there was a swing girls phenomenon early this year, but it died down already. But jazz made an impact of being young stylish and trendy now. Apparently Swing Girls is not a Tokyo film cos' the actresses were speaking in Northeastern dialect, but I remember the teachers as regular actor and actress in Tokyo Dramas. As for the school girls, some of them are pretty cute!

Another earthquake last night. This time my room just shaked for 1 second. So that was magnitude 2...getting the hang of the magnitudes already.

Went to Shinjuku Gyoen today, just to catch some remaining sakuras, it's hard to imagine such a nice place in the middle of downtown Tokyo. It seems like Tokyo people like to alternate between hell and heaven though I gotta say that the hang around hell more often.

So today I sweated like hell on the subway cos' it was so crowded. Think I sweated more than the run on Sunday... what is this world coming to?

Anyway today we (my classmates and I) were joking that Japan is a queueing country cos' Tokyo is just so densely populated, think they don't really have much of a choice either to jump queue or cut queue or join the queue.haha

Terrible...

Went for a jog around my neighbourhood and back... It was terrible. I took like 40 min to and fro, but i suspect my total distance is only around 5km. Coming back, my throat and lungs are like screaming for moisture... and I didn't really break any sweat.

It's the same feeling that you get if you try to run in an extremely air-conditioned gym and I have always hated running in a gym. I would still try to go for runs on sundays and when the weather is good. But this is a sign that my body is far from getting used to the weather and humidity here.

Masamania

Thanks Augustine!
Masamania

Plese go check this website out, it really gives you a lot of insight on the weird and dark side of Japan, the side that I am still trying very hard to explore.

CAUTION: Explicit materials inside, please consult your parents if you are under 18.
If you are going to be offended by partial nudity and explicit language, do not enter

Anyway, guess you all should be quite familiar, Japanese restaurants everywhere usually have these life like displays of food outside their restaurants. It's everywhere, even the most remote of places, even in my school canteen! Blessing or Curse? Well ask a poor homeless man and a monk....

Anyway, this site beats the shit out of what Xiaxue or Mr Brown or what have you. This website is true journalism at its best. This guy is an unhappy Tokyo journalist, unhappy with lots of social phenomenon over here. If some Singaporean tries to do this, probably he would be up in the Internal Affairs building under unlimited custody through the ISA. Anyway the only thing coming closest was the "Get Real" series that we have back home. Ok time for me to delete xiaxue's and Mr Brown's blog link, I am converting to "MasaMania".

Blog

What was this blog originally for...? To let you people how I am doing here... and to serve as an outlet of loneliness and frustration. Well work was bad today, I couldn't finish all the work till 1.30am last night. Came on, typed what I wanted to type to relax for 15 min before working on those damn Japanese sentences.

Well this blog gave me a lot of shit too, Seems better sometimes if I don't have a blog at all. Exams are coming people, work hard, wish all of you all get good grades

And yes, if I can't really reply you people on MSN, I could be cooking, washing the toilet, ironing my clothes, washing my underwear, making Japanese sentences, vacuuming the floor, and the list goes on.... So you ask what the hell you doing on MSN.... well for anyone to leave me a message....

Gotta go cook now, and I got laundry to do too.... and if people wants 100% attention from me, it's hard, I cook and bathe at the same time, that's how short of time I am here. And I hope you don't mind me talking to you while doing some work at the same time. I am not left with much choice here. Well I don't blame anyone when they talk to other people and talk to me at the same time, I am pretty used to that...

Why do I feel so Guai here? In Japan that is, now I know why we think that way of foreign students in Singapore. First, I don't have so much money and friends, limited things that I can do. Why do I not skip lessons and do my homework? Probably I am sort of like a Singaporean representative here, and I can't possibly just show such a bad attitude to people around me. Finally and the most important reason. My dad spent 7000 just to let me come here for 1 semester, and I can't just see myself squandering his money and go back with nothing learnt.

Olivia's "A girl meets bossanova"
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Swing Girls! Go watch this movie! It's good!
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Another Yasukuni shot
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Yasukuni Shrine...
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OLIVIA

Good to see a Singaporean singer break into the Japanese market without speaking a phrase of Japanese. Just like Mariah Carey and Diana Krall. Not that the singer I am going to mention has the same status as these 2 ladies, but at least her CDs are selling well in Japan, and is usually put at the front of the Jazz section of the major CD stores in Tokyo.

OOOHhhh so there's another good singer from Singapore other than Corrinne May and Sun Yanzi? (notice that I left out Taufik, Slyvester, Ah Du, and Huang Yide....)
Yes, her name is Olivia, (not that horizontally challenged OILivier Choi? arguably the 3rd most famous Singapore Idol)

Yes, she's Olivia, Born and grown up in Singapore, very young...(19 years old, I think), Sings Bossa Nova tunes well, and did not take part in Singapore Idol. Instead she released her CD in Japan and made it big here. So I bought her CD and decide to support some "made in Singapore" stuff. If you see it in Singapore, go download it at least... haha

well her blog and company website...
her blog
her company

Moral of the story? U can't make it big just by staying in Singapore, cos it's really too small. Like Yanzi and Corrinne May, both jumpstarted their career in Taiwan and US respectively before embracing the Singapore fans. Now Olivia is trying to capture the Japanese crowd.

Anyway 3 kinds of people who can't possibly live in Tokyo and take the subway...

1st: Obvious answer... the people who can't stand crowds...Imagine walking around Singapore's Chinatown during CNY season everyday

2nd: People who hate others to clip on their heels of their shoes. Cos it's so freaking crowded in the stations, I clip people's heels like average of 2-3 times just in the train station and I get clipped like 2-3 times too.... sux man

3rd: chio bu.... WHY???? won't that be eye candy for me? Because it's just so simply crowded... the prettier u are or the more voluptous u are, the higher the chance that u gonna get ur boobs or butt groped..... yes that happens all the time in the Tokyo subway, according to some girls....

Sakura!!!!
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Sakura in Yasukuni Shrine
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Night sakura... not really very well taken though
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Yasukuni Shrine

Welcome to the most controversial shrine in Japan! Please go shoot yourself if you never heard of Yasukuni Shrine 靖国寺. The shrine that supposedly honours the war dead, and the shrine that most Japanese PMs would go and offer prayers just to disturb the Korean and Chinese government. No I am not either there to pray nor to burn it down.

I was more interested in the tranquil surroundings and the sakura. This shrine does not only contain those A-list war criminals of WW2, it also holds most of the remains of the great military men since the 1868 Meiji Restoration. So most of the man prominent in the military scene or who have contributed greatly to the military scene in Japan would be buried there. There is also a museum exhibiting their evolution to a modern military, from swords to gunopowder.

But ignoring all that , the sakura there is pretty nice. Too bad the pictures didn't come out as nice, but I would try to get some from my friend. The moat outside the shrine "Chidorigafuchi" 千鳥が淵　has supposedly the nicest night sakura in Tokyo, but too bad the lights were not on.... sobz

Some new interesting stuff in Japanese market. They have a Fridge, Tv, Dvd player all in one. So you can have cold beer while watching tv, and there's no need to run to the kitchen to get your beer! How cool is that. Their latest Honda Legend has Night Vision abilities, so you are able to see clear sihoulettes of bicycles and pedestrians even in zero light conditions

Anyway we discussed in class again about the Sino-Japanese problem. He claims that the Japanese people are not that ethnocentric (is there such a word?) ie, Japanese do not practice discrimination and don't see themselves superior to other races. He claims that Japanese are not as proud (both a good sense and bad sense) as the Chinese. The Japanese language has adopted a lot of foreign words, for example: camera = kamela and Personal Computer = Pasokon. But the Chinese are proud of their own language, they call it 相机 and 电脑.

From an educator's point of view, he also admits that Japan does whitewash their history a bit, but he says it's just a matter of how the events are narrated. He has doubts whether the Chinese government have blackwashed the Japanese.

While Japanese are usually not racists, they are "naive" towards the sensitivity of racial issues. For example:

A typical conversation between a Japanese and Foreigner (in this case, an Ang Moh) in a noodle restaurant.

AM (in Japanese): Do you have chopsticks?
J: Of course! Help yourself
AM: Thank You
J: Wow, you know how to use chopsticks?!
AM: Urm, yah?
J: And you speak good Japanese too!
AM: Urm yah?

I don't know if you guys find this weird. I can imagine what would happen in Singapore if this Ang Moh asks in Mandarin the first question in a hawker center

AM: 有筷子吗？
S: 有，拿



Yes, it should end there.... The Singaporean wouldn't say so much bullshit like the Japanese. Yes, the Japanese are trying to be friendly, but what's wrong with an Ang Moh speaking your language and using your utensils? I don't see my American and European dorm mates going " WOW, you can use the fork and knife! and your English is really good!"

Earthquake

So happening, my first earthquake experience today. At about 730am, I was happily eating my bread in front of this computer. Then suddenly the floor seemed to move, so I was like, hmmm, am I giddy? Or is this an earthquake. I was toasting another slice of bread, so I was thinking if I should switch off the gas and open the door and then hide under the table. After waiting for half a minute, everything was back to normal. Once on the train, I realised that it was an earthquake in Chiba-ken, aprrox 100km east of Tokyo. Somemore I was living in the West of Tokyo Metropolitan, so quite far already.

It is raining, and will keep raining for a few days, darn, just when I wanted to go out and see sakura. Miserable, cold afternoon. Really cold when I was walking back from school. Wonder if I can drag myself out of this warm and comfortable room to the cold and wet Shinjuku area to check out the sakura.

Since Mark don't wanna show his face in his blog, I would show it here...hehz... Philip, Me, Matsuo, and Mark (left to right)
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Lessons and more lessons

So sian... lessons have to start, really didn't mind the way of life until lessons started. My japanese language class has 15 people, pretty good mix of nationalities too... Turkish, Australian, Americans, French, Chinese, Taiwanese, Korean, and of course a Singaporean. But haven't really talked a lot to the rest yet, usually I talk to the Taiwanese guy, and sit next to each other in class. He's pretty amazing, He's already graduated from medical school, ie he's a qualified doctor. But only starting on his job in September, he decides to pay his own fees and come to Keio to study. There is another more amazing Taiwanese, who now lives in Venice. Since he's a Taiwanese living in Europe, he speaks Chinese, English, German, some French and of course his Japanese is about the same level as mine. Talk about being Multilingual.

And we met Miss Akane Matsuo, the girl coming from Keio to study in NUS next semester. She majors in Soci, loves ballroom dancing (esp. Latin, so Edmund, if you are reading this, you should know what to do). Mark, Philip, Matsuo and I had dinner together in this Korean restaurant near school, and Mark paid the bill, which was about 12,000 yen = 120 US$, thus Mark is a bit in the red. Matsuo asked us out again, this time with some friends who also wanna come to Singapore for exchange in the future, so this time Mark... I will give you a treat.

Sakura is finally in the full bloom now, but so sadly, it is going to rain big time tomorrow, and I think I can't get the best view in many places if I go tomorrow, so might have to wait for Tuesday, after Tuesday, the best view would be gone. So I have to hurry. And give you guys the best photos.

I really love cooking now, though sometimes the vegetables usually turn out pretty bad when i try to stir fry them, so feel free to give me some recipes, my brain is not turning very fast when it comes to what I should cook.

And for the fans of anime and Japanese drama reading my blog.... Some highly recommended new shows. Anime: Speed Grapher... a bit gory and some sex references, but overall an exciting series to follow. Drama: Takuya in ENGINE, Takuya is a F1 car test driver... (he change a lot of jobs hor, from lawyer to pilot to pro ice hockey player to now F1 test driver) but from the net survey, the most anticipated drama is ANEGO starring Shinohara Ryoko, if you don't know who she is, go do a search on the net, quite matured (abt 30) and good acting skills. Of course got my idol, Ueto Aya's ATTACK No.1! where she plays a volleball player... So too bad you people can't see it live, but just go d/l if you all can find the sources...

Lessons, lessons.... SIAN....just like that, my weekend is gone....

The 1 yen (S$0.015) handphone
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Keitai Denwa = Handphone

I lied today. When I told the lady at the counter that I need a handphone for 4 months, she told me that she was sorry she can't sell me any phone cos' the student plan is a contract for 1 year. I told her no problem, before I leave I would pay the 3000 yen fee for ending the contract. But she said I am sorry we are not able to sell you the phone, probably you would like to try somewhere else and say that you need the phone for 1 year. Wow, how cool is that, she is asking me to lie to someone else. Anyway I did. The story carries on later in this post.

So I got into 3G class for my Japanese Language standard. There are levels 1-4. 1=You know shit about Japanese, 4 = I can write a thesis and a academic presentation in Japanese. So I am somewhere near there, hehz. But after looking through the textbooks I almost fainted. They expect me to study the culture and history of Japan in Japanese? Oh my god, I foresee a stressful semester.

Anyway, Mark and Philip (Mark's Dorm mate) decided to go take a walk at Komagome, the Rikugien park. It was beautiful, with some cherry blossoms already budding, and the landscape garden, they put a lot of effort in maintaining the place, high walls to try to keep out pollution from the roads. It's amazing that within Tokyo itself, it has this sort of a nice, big landscape garden.

So after that, we decided to go to Ikebukuro to have curry rice for dinner. The nice curry rice with the cute waitresses. To my horror, after the meal, I realised that I walked off without my bag. I walked back to the shop and the lady kindly returned me my bag, I didn't feel anxious at all, probably because I knew that I had a 80% chance of getting my bag back unscathed since this is Japan. Though I had like 15000 yen inside, and that's like S$225 and my MP3 player and some other important stuff are inside. The lady then asked me which country I am from. She knows I am not Japanese cos' I have been there 3 times since I was here, and I don't speak Japanese to the people beside me. Ahhh... I might get discounts for curry rice next time... hehz.

So then, I went to get my cellphone done. I didn't lie in the end. I just didn't say anything about how long I was going to stay. It's a pretty decent phone with all the 3g features. The net, email, video, camera, even gps! All in for 1 yen. Though the monthly subscription is about 3000 yen. Yeah I just wanna take the phone back as a momento.

Going to watch Champions league later, I hope Liverpool can beat Juve, Chelsea to get their ass kicked by Bayern. Till tomorrow!

Politics politics....

What's a Taiwanese politician doing at the Yasukuni Shrine? The controversial shrine that honours the war dead of the Japanese. The shrine that Prime minister Koizumi visits every year despite the protests it gets from its neighbours. The only reason I can think of is that the Taiwanese want to disturb the Mainland Chinese government.

Well in Chengdu, China. Protests against Japan are taking place. This is widely reported in the Japanese press. The Chinese are accusing the Japanese for not admitting to the history, and as Chinese they have the right to vent their frustrations and to pressure the Japanese. The Japanese TV then said that the Chinese were unhappy about the incident of Nanking and their woman were used as sex objects and the fact that the Japanese are trying to hide them.And guess what was the next scene that i saw? They then went to explain a bit of the events in detail. Well, think about it, maybe Japan has opened up to their past and probably are not as in a denial mode as I think they are.... There are quite a lot of Chinese in Japan. I see them in schools, see them operating restaurants. They should be a lot of Japanese businessmen and students in China, hope they can do something about this.

Kon! very cute right?
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Howl's castle
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This is a replica copy. The original copy of this drawing with the artist's signature is up for bidding from 5000 yen expect this to go up to like 60000 yen... picture from "You are under arrest!" US$1 is approx 100 yen
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Anime Expo

Got quite a lot of things done yesterday, including my bank account. People told me that Mitsubishi Tokyo was more foreigner friendly, but in the end I got my account done at Mitsui Sumitomo, it's the only bank that allows me to do my account without my permanent pass, only my temperory pass was available. And it also does not need the Hanko, a stamp that almost every japanese have. Instead my signature suffices.

Woke up super late today... I also don't know why i overslept so badly... so apologies to Mark and his friend. Supposed to meet them at 10 at the exhibition hall and I actually woke up at 10.15. So by the time I reached the exhibition hall at 11.40, he was already in there. Luckily I managed to find him in the hall so then we took a walk together. Well it was basically a promotional fair for the new animes coming up on tv for the spring season. Basically there are a few to look out for, Speed Grapher by Gonzo, it's quite adult, with some sex and gory scenes. but overall it looks good. Air series is coming out again in the summer so that's a few months away. Full metal panic is having another series "the 2nd raid" in the summer too. Naruto and Full metal alchemist are having movies again. Sadly, studio ghibli was only a small booth but at least they had the howl's castle display.

Walked for a couple of hours, then decided that it was time to pack up and go home. Super tired from all that travelling and squeezing through the crowd.... Headache...
now to think about how to settle my dinner