• 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 […]

  • Dare to Dream

    Dare to Dream

    Somewhere around six months ago, I was sitting in my apartment talking on the phone with my mom. From just outside my window I could hear Buddhist monks chanting at Ninnaji, an enormous wooden temple […]

  • 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 […]

  • A Different World

    A Different World

    Ladies and gentlemen, I’m pleased to announce that this post officially marks the first time in almost two years that I’m actually writing about the country I’m in! Welcome, at long last, to Cambodia 😀

  • Golden Week 2: Archery

    Golden Week 2: Archery

    Picture yourself looking up at a blue sky peeking through a huge canopy of leaves on a perfectly clear day in Kyoto. As the faint sound of Japanese flutes recedes softly into the background, it’s […]

  • KaZantip 2011: Black Sea Paradise

    KaZantip 2011: Black Sea Paradise

    Warning: This post contains a few NSFW photos. View only in good company 🙂 The Republic of KaZantip, the legendary Eastern European Shangri La of parties, lasts for just one month a year in a […]

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

Life at Home

 Public, USA  32 Responses »
Apr 142009
 
My little buddy keeping me company as I struggle to solve FP3D’s latest challenge. My little buddy keeping me company as I struggle to solve FP3D’s latest challenge.

Well, it’s certainly been awhile, hasn’t it?

It may come as little surprise that life back here at home is significantly less exciting, and thus significantly less interesting to write about, than life backpacking through Asia, South America, and the Middle East. But I suppose reality has to catch up with you sometime, so here I am doing my best to beat it back as quickly and thoroughly as possible 😛

So far, this bout in Los Angeles has consisted of five (main) rounds. The first of which is FP3D…

Over the past year or so, I’ve frequently referred to a coding project that Peder and I have been developing part time – interleaved with our other jobs and various international adventures. Finishing this project was one of my biggest factors in deciding to fly back from China this February; I figured it’s high time I really kick it into overdrive and push as far towards that final goal as possible.
Continue reading »

Anki: Memorization Reborn

 Public, USA  10 Responses »
Mar 212009
 

Those few of you who’ve been reading since the early days might recall way back in 2005, when I first started studying Japanese in Kyoto. It wasn’t long after my arrival that I discovered a revolutionary method for effectively learning Kanji: namely, the Heisig Method (referred to in posts here and here).

In brief, the Heisig method ditches traditional rote-memorization, instead teaching the student to utilize each character’s constituent parts along with a mnemonic device he calls “imaginative memory.” By sorting the characters in a very deliberate order, and by assigning each with a unique keyword (that approximates its scope of meaning as best as possible), a scene or story can be constructed to connect its meaning with the meanings of all the elements used to write it. Continue reading »

Ken Tanaka

 Public, USA  4 Responses »
Mar 172009
 

I stumbled on a great YouTube channel the other day.


This guy, who goes by the name of Ken Tanaka, claims to be a white American who was adopted by a Japanese family and spent his entire life growing up in Shimane prefecture. Now, in his early adulthood, he’s returned to the United States to search for his birth parents – Jonathan and Linda Smith.

At first I was skeptical – it seemed like too perfect a basis upon which to build yet another amusing YouTube narrative. But after watching a few of his clips, his extraordinary Japanese ability coupled with his perfect understanding of the Japanese-English speech disfluencies made me doubt my skepticism. After all, there really isn’t anything that implausible about his story, right?
Continue reading »

China Wrap-Up

 China, Public  5 Responses »
Mar 172009
 

After our day’s outing at Shijiazhuang Ski Park, Andy and I joined Leo and a group of family friends for a big Chinese dinner party. It turned out to be a gathering of powerful and wealthy men among Shijiazhuang’s political and economic circles – all of whom were both friendly and interesting – but more interesting to me was the opportunity to witness Leo doing something at which he truly shines. Continue reading »

Skiing…Sort Of

 China, Public  11 Responses »
Mar 132009
 

January 29th was a particularly amusing day in the recent history of my life. Leo and his family took Andy and I for a day’s outing at Shijiazhuang Ski Park. The scene could only be described as…Three (thousand) Stooges.

Let’s start from the beginning.

When we pulled up in front of the ski park, our first order of business was, of course, the procurement of rental equipment. We headed straight for the ticket counter which had surprisingly short and orderly lines. We soon learned why. No more available skiis…or boots…or poles. If we wanted equipment, we’d have to wait “over there” – in that crowd of 1000 rambunctious locals pushing-and-shoving to get ahold of a return from a retiring patron.

Since it was still very early in the morning and thus unlikely that we’d find anyone coming off the mountain, Andy and I decided to stroll around and take in the resort’s various offerings. Continue reading »

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