• Thaipusam: Masochistic Mayhem

    Thaipusam: Masochistic Mayhem

    Warning This post contains some graphic images. If blood makes you queasy, you may want to skip it. I’ve mentioned a few times how, although I do travel mostly without plans, I also do so […]

  • Kyoto Drift

    Kyoto Drift

    You know how I’m always seeking out new and interesting experiences? Well last weekend I went drift racing. One of my coworkers, Miki, is extremely into cars. He has a Limited Edition Impreza (one of […]

  • Into the Lion's Den

    Into the Lion’s Den

    How many of you have heard the name “Transdniestr?” Not too many, I’m guessing. Transdniester – also known as Pridnestrovie in Russian – is a small rogue nation occupying a narrow strip of land along […]

  • Huashan: The Danger Trail

    Huashan: The Danger Trail

    On December 20th of 2006, I received an e-mail from my dad. It contained this Powerpoint file. The forwarding messages all included such phrases as: “I CANT EVEN LOOK AT THE PICTURES WITHOUT GETTING DIZZY!!” […]

  • The Mega Trip Part 9 (The Great Wall)

    The Mega Trip Part 9 (The Great Wall)

    With the land-based portion of my adventure through China nearly over, I realized that I was still missing a significant piece of what I wanted to see before returning to Japan. Kung Fu. So, after […]

  • A Different Experience

    A Different Experience

    I’m here. In Tokyo. Finally. During my idle time on the flight over I kept on thinking, “what am I going to write to everyone once I finally get to Japan?” Most of you already […]

I was last seen 5 months ago in Los Angeles, .

Peace, Man

 Japan, Public  3 Responses »
Dec 102005
 
Kitayama Dori, Kyoto’s most northern main street, in the early morning sun. Kitayama Dori, Kyoto’s most northern main street, in the early morning sun.

You know you’ve been in Asia too long when you not only recognize that the Chinese classical song you’re listening to is a cover, but can name the Japanese song that it’s a cover of. For those of you whose computers can display Asian characters, 女子十二楽坊’s song “flower” is a cover of SMAP’s 世界に一つだけの花. You know, just in case you were wondering.

I was pretty pleased with myself when I pulled out that little piece of useless trivia.

The train passes by me on my way up the mountain The train passes by me on my way up the mountain

Today’s post is actually about something that happened just over two weeks ago, on November 23rd. A school-organized day trip to Kurama for a front-row seat in the national “pray for peace” ceremony.

The day started bright and early at 6:30am. Everyone in Ritsumeikan’s Study in Kyoto Program was supposed to gather at the Demachiyangi train station across town at 9:00, but I told the teacher not to wait up. I couldn’t turn down such a perfect opportunity for an early-morning mountain bikeride under the bright red fall leaves during their best week of the year.
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The Test in Gifu and other short stories

 Japan, Public  6 Responses »
Dec 052005
 
The intersection at Oike and Kawaramachi (Downtown, Kyoto) The intersection at Oike and Kawaramachi (Downtown, Kyoto)

Humorous Event #1: Justin is walking along Kawaramachi Doori in Downtown Kyoto on his way to get a quick bite to eat. After a short time, he hears a strange slapping noise coming from his left foot and assumes that his three-year-old pair of shoes (that have carried him through China, Japan, and a large portion of Europe) have at long last kicked the bucket.

He attempts to adjust his step to lessen the clearly audible noise, and finds that his foot does not respond to his brain’s command. He seems to have little control below the left knee! He stops walking and attempts to lift the front of his foot off of the ground while leaving the heel where it is. He fails.

Our Tea Ceremony Master and his lackey Our Tea Ceremony Master and his lackey

After a few moment of thought, it hits him: 正座！

“Seiza” is the traditional way of kneeling on a tatami-matted floor in Japan. Few are aware of how painful it becomes after only a very short period of time. In my tea ceremony class, the teacher regularly gives us pitiful foreigners breaks to allow the blood to re-enter our legs as he continues to relax casually with his ankles folded beneath him. But this Thursday was no regular class.

Puttin’ his thang down Puttin’ his thang down

Instead of sitting in a row and performing the actions as a group, each student one-by-one came up and performed the ceremony alone. This meant no cheating, no relaxing, Seiza all the way. Ignoring all of my body’s pleas I pushed through to the end, limping off after class…but promptly forgetting about the experience when the pain receded. Until a few days later when I realized that I could no longer fully control my left foot.
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Rough Times

 Japan, Public  6 Responses »
Nov 292005
 
To offset the unhappy tone of this post, I’m going to devote the theme of today’s pictures to the childlike innocence of, well, children! Most of this series was taken at Takaragaike Park in Ohara, North of Kyoto To offset the unhappy tone of this post, I’m going to devote the theme of today’s pictures to the childlike innocence of, well, children! Most of this series was taken at Takaragaike Park in Ohara, North of Kyoto

Wow. You ever have one of those days when everything seems to come crashing down all at once? I have.

But first a little background. Lately, I’ve been struggling significantly in keeping up with A-Class Japanese. I was offered the option of dropping to B-level and turned it down so it’s no one’s fault but my own. Still, it bothers me that no matter how hard I try I just can’t quite seem to keep up.

Oops! I’ve been caught in the act. Oops! I’ve been caught in the act.

It reached the point that I was so busy trying to get through all of my schoolwork that I failed to complete the JET application by the deadline. I can’t say that I really would’ve ended up spending the next year doing JET, but it would’ve been nice to have the option. I’d obtained one of the two letters of recommendation and completed half of the essay by the time the deadline passed. I was pretty bummed.
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RitsFest: The Mother of All Gakuensai

 Japan, Public  4 Responses »
Nov 232005
 
The Sun God statue at UCSD. Picture stolen from the UCSD website. The Sun God statue at UCSD. Picture stolen from the UCSD website.

Every spring the University of California San Diego holds a festival they call “Sun God.” Sun God is a free-for-students concert, sporting such big-name artists as Alien Ant Farm, Bad Religion, Ice Cube, and Afro Man. I was always impressed that a University could secure famous performers for a show that their students can watch without having to pay a penny.

One of the, uh, seven or so bike parking lots at Rits. I can tell I’m in for quite a crowd today. One of the, uh, seven or so bike parking lots at Rits. I can tell I’m in for quite a crowd today.

Yet the real fun of Sun God was never really the concert at all; in fact, many students don’t even bother to attend. The fun of Sun God was always the day leading up to the evening show.

Namely, campus-wide complete and utter chaos.

Someone enjoying himself immensely in a tricycle race. Someone enjoying himself immensely in a tricycle race.

Everywhere you go students are partying, drinking, dancing, and having the time of their lives. The school invests thousands of dollars to hire extra security and try to prevent underage drinking, but everyone knows that Sun God is the day when anything goes.
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Moral Corruption

 Japan, Public  7 Responses »
Nov 192005
 
Kyoto. Typically a beautiful and peaceful town. But not for the last three days. Read on. Kyoto. Typically a beautiful and peaceful town. But not for the last three days. Read on.

While migrating everything over to my new web hosting company, I decided to take the opportunity to implement some other improvements that I’ve been putting off for awhile now:
1) Upgraded Gallery, Guestbook, and Blogging software to the latest versions
2) Implemented a guestbook spam protection “hack” which will hopefully stop all of the “buy viagra online” signatures that’ve been driving me crazy
3) Got rid of 99% of the “404: Page Not Found” errors (and made error pages that match the format of the rest of this site)
4) Placed a link to my web statistics in the navigation bar to the left
5) Added a custom address bar icon (Kiyomizu Dera, one of Kyoto’s most famous temples)

Not a rare sight in most parts of the world outside of the US. This was taken at one of the four anti-Bush rallies I’ve stumbled on over the past ten months in Kyoto. Not a rare sight in most parts of the world outside of the US. This was taken at one of the four anti-Bush rallies I’ve stumbled on over the past ten months in Kyoto.

Although everything (hopefully) looks similar to before, all of this translated into my replacing a huge chunk of the site’s functional code. I tried to test it as best as I could but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if some stuff was still broken.

For those of you who are visiting via a shortcut, please be sure that it points only to the base URL – if you’re not sure, please delete your shortcut and re-bookmark the main page. There’s a possibility that some of you are directly accessing a .PHP URL, which could not only cause you problems but also eat up quite a bit more of my bandwidth than necessary.

Moving right along, I’d like to dedicate this first entry with my new host to a happy little theme I call “Moral Corruption.” I know, I know…you’re probably all thinking “Man, this is just what I need…I came here to see pictures and stories about Japan and I’m reading another one of those political rants!” Don’t worry, I assure you that this is indeed a story about Kyoto 🙂
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