I’m guessing that this will pretty much be the last blog entry on this website of mine, at least, in its current form. I’ll still keep the domain and one of these days, if you stumble by, you may notice big changes. Until then, consider this blog on permanent “Under Construction”.

So, as farewell of sorts to my wonderful little diary on the internet, I guess I will end with an overview of how my year was. 2011 has been the most dramatic year in my life and I don’t expect to top it any time soon.

Enter 2011

This year started great. I had finished my first year in a new job and the momentum seemed unstoppable. My kung fu was progressing at a slow clip, but any progression was welcomed. The biggest news was that we found out in November that Eri was pregnant. 2011, the Year of the Rabbit, would see our first child!

3/11 Tohoku Earthquake

The massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami had a tremendous impact in Japan. Yes, that’s stating the obvious but for the first time in my life, a disaster like that had struck closer to home than ever before.

On March 11, I was enjoying a cup of tea in the breakroom at work when the building started swaying slightly. It was nothing surprising – quakes happen all the time in Japan. The minor swaying led me to suspect a moderate earthquake around the Kansai area. When some coworkers checked some news sites, we were all astounded by the level of the earthquake and then the terrifying footage of the tsunami as it swept inland. As close as the Tohoku area is to Kansai, we were still very far removed.

Enter the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors. They would remove any isolation and put us into the (perceived) terror. Firstly, it’s pronounced FOO-KOO-SHE-MA DIE-E-CHI. I heard some media broadcasters butcher this. When the cooling systems failed and explosions were reported at Daiichi, the news jumped all over it. It instantly became a nuclear disaster. For the next six weeks or so, nothing except for footage of the reactor and the tsunami-affected cities would be aired on television. Even the commercial selection became instantly limited to things like insurance, and other risk-management services. (Sidenote: people actually got so sick of certain commercials that they called up those companies and made death threats. They were taken off air soon after.)

I just want to point out right now that nothing I went through could even begin to compare to the suffering that the people who lived in the Tohoku area went through. Many thousands lost loved ones and all their earthly possessions. They, to this very day, may not have any prospects of ever rebuilding what they lost. I’m definitely not going to complain about anything that happened to me. I’m merely recording this as the experiences I went through this year.

I didn’t really begin to worry until I started hearing about flocks of foreigners leaving Japan for fear of the radiation. One of our Saudi students in Kung Fu was flown out by his government. At work, we lost many teachers because their families worried about their safety. My own family called and asked me to come home. Hearing all this, and considering my unborn child, it was very difficult not to feel affected. I was quite stressed out by all this.

Thankfully, Kansai was not swept over by radioactive winds and no one mutated in any fancy way, at least, not in a way that we are currently aware. The following months saw a Japan trying to rebuild and return to some semblance of normalcy.

As fears subsided, attention turned to power consumption and saving energy. Daiichi supplied a big percentage of the Tokyo area’s power needs. Without it, rolling blackouts were instated – stores ran out of items like flashlights, batteries, bottled water, and any other perishable that people hoard in the face of danger. Even in Kansai, with no major power dip, corporations were asked to cut power by 15%.

All in all, this focus on saving energy will be seen as a positive start to this country heading towards being more eco-friendly.

7/31 Birth

The hot summer months only added to the anxiety of waiting for my son to be born. Finally, he was born but not in a smooth, easy fashion. We headed to the hospital early Thursday morning (2am ish) but were turned back as being a false alarm. Nary 24 hours later, we were back in the hospital. So, Friday 2am ish we were there. Neal was born on Sunday around 5am. What a looooong ordeal that was.

Thankfully, he was healthy, everything was where it should be, and the next few months were spent learning how to be a dad. It’s amazing how green we were despite all the attempts to learn as much as we could beforehand. To this day, we still panic over the smallest of things only to be reassured by more experienced parents that in fact, what we are scared of is actually fairly normal.

Neal also made my family make their way over to Japan to visit their first grandchild/nephew. What a riot that turned out to be.

And so it has come to be, that I became a father this year. Without any exaggeration, he is the greatest thing to have happened in my life and I can’t remember how things were without him.

Photography

I’ve always liked taking pictures but never got fully into it. This year, I decided to take it up a notch and learn more. My goal was to take beautiful pictures of my beautiful baby. To that end, I bought my first single lens reflex camera and am still learning and experimenting. It’s paying off in spades – I have some amazing shots that I could have not taken with my beloved point & shoot.

I’ve spent quite a chunk of money this year on equipment and I’m sure I’ll be spending even more in the future. I loving this new hobby of mine and I’m going to rebrand this blog to be more of a photo gallery. Picture = 1K words, right?

Kung Fu

My other passion in life – my fu. This year didn’t have much major news in my fu. Our school continues to trot along. We’ve gained some new faces and lost some old ones. We’ve moved out of the old building and have been practicing at a rental studio for a while then at parks.

I took “paternity” leave for a few months to get to know my baby. My schedule is still too up in the air for me to commit fully to my fu classes.

At home though, I’ve done pretty well I think. I started a more intense exercise regiment. I haven’t perfectly kept it up everyday but I’m proud to say that almost everyday, I do 200 stomach crunches, 100 push ups, technique practice, and sometimes kicking practice. I break this down and do a 100 crunches in the morning and the rest at night, after Neal goes to sleep.

Summary

And that pretty much sums up 2011. 2011 – the year that saw a lot of vast changes not just in my own life but in Japan, and pretty much around the world. I don’t think the political rumblings we saw this year, i.e. the Arab Spring, and the Occupy movement will be ending anytime soon. I think we will look back at 2011 as the year it all started.

As for this blog, who knows. I think turning it into a photoblog makes more sense but I also like the idea of making it more like a travel guide for Japan for non-touristy things. Don’t stay tuned. Don’t hold your breath. Don’t come back too often. Instead, drop by after a long while and you just might be greeted with something other than, “Sorry for the lack of updates.”

Happy new year, everybody!

Be a little more patient, my dear. I have big news coming soon and I will be paying more attention to you then.

Soon, my dear blog.

Number 1
Why am I here?

Number 2
Who is God?

Number 3
How should I be living?

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

I’m thinking about the HK trip that we took earlier in the year. It was only eight months ago when I was there with my mom, dad, and sis to see her. We were told she was in bad shape then and we wanted to meet her while we could. I am now very glad that we did.

I can’t say that I knew her very well. I’ve only met her a few times in my life and talked to her on the phone when my dad called home. Still, here I am sitting here at 5:24am typing this. My sister says she feels “weird”. “Weird” just doesn’t quite cut it for me right now. I would call it a sense of unknown loss. I know I’ve lost someone close but I’m just not exactly sure what I’ve lost since I didn’t know her so well.

What I do know is that every time I’ve met her, I got the sense that she unconditionally loved me. She was a big complainer (that’s probably where I got it from) but she seemed to be protective of me, as if I needed someone to look out for me. She was always asking me if I wanted anything and offered to buy me anything. That’s the opposite of what I’m about. I enjoy being individualistic and self-sufficient above all else but it was nice to have someone who would spoil me like that given the chance.

I really don’t know much about my grandmother’s past. I know her maiden name was “Wong”. She was a daughter of a fairly successful business dude who dealt in fish or something. I know she wasn’t quite from Canton because she spoke a very different (and hard to understand) dialect.

My mind is going blank now and I’ve gotten out some emotions from this. Goodbye grandma! I’ll catch you on the other side.

It’s a strange question because only after finishing this meaningless typing will I know the answer. For example, I could write a string of non-sensical words like, “goulgooly”, “bizwuffal”, and my favorite of all, “blimlimlim”. Would these non-sensical words contribute to the overall piece or would they just act as a distraction to my brain farting?

Another possibility that has occurred often in the past is that I just dictate to you about what happened today in my life, something that no one outside of my immediate family would care. Today I went to kung fu, met a new student who is a true delight, and came home to rest up. Got an early start tomorrow so there will be no hard partying tonight, much like every other night. The new student – a 60 year old, petite Japanese man whose commute to the school is at least an hour. He’s such a great guy and I only wish I could meet more Japanese people like him.

Lastly, and this is already happening, is that I continue to narrate about how I’m trying to type. I’m typing about how I’m typing. This is some sort of compu-surrealism or meta-blogging. This is my least preferred outcome since these sentences have even less meaning than the previous.

By now, I’m running close to empty and I think I’m about to end this exercise in thoughtless typing. Thinking about how the ending will come about causes yet again more headaches since there are so many ending styles. I will pre-empt myself on creating a few more short lines on different endings and just end it right here.

Hi grandma! I miss you! Hope you’re doing all right over there!

Asparagus plant grows through asphalt ground in Hokkaido [Mainichi News]

There’s something I really love about getting on a bullet train. Not only does it feel like getting into an airplane but I’ve only ever ridden it when going somewhere far away. It’s always the starting point to mini-vacations in Japan. I’m a bit disappointed with Yahoo BB. I was getting a very strong signal for WiFi onboard the bullet train but it turns out JR only offers WiFi access between Shin-Osaka and Tokyo. Japan is years behind most other countries with WiFi coverage and availability.

We arrived in Hiroshima quite early and by noon we were at the Peace Park. The weather was superb and cooperative albeit a tad hot for my liking. There was a flower festival going on at the same time so the park was rather packed. We went through the Peace Memorial Museum fairly quickly. I’d have to say that I was expecting more out of it. I listened to a very interesting show on Coast to Coast AM about Hiroshima and that really set up high expectations for the museum.

Obviously the bombing and the many thousands who perished and suffer is not something to just pass over. It has got to be one of the worst manmade tragedies in our history. I was just expecting the museum to impact me on a deeper level. There is a big divide between the two wings of the museum. The first half is mainly history and politics while the second half is a much more detailed look into the personal accounts of victims and survivors.

Personally, the thing that hit me the hardest was reading accounts from mothers who lost their children. They had articles of clothing belonging to these children with a story of what happened. Pictures of Sadako Sasaki, famous for the thousand cranes story, also affected me more than the other stories. Hearing that story was probably the first time I learned about the atomic bomb when I was a child.

Sitting by the river with the Atomic Bomb right across, I had one of those sudden moments of realization. We were sitting smack at the center where, 65 years ago, thousands and thousands of people instantly died when the bomb was dropped and thousands and thousands more suffered unspeakable agony. 65 years later, looking around the bench we were sitting in, I could see a very serene place with grass, trees, and a medium-sized bustling city. At the center of all this is the Atomic Bomb Dome, hanging on the city like a skeleton, serving as a reminder of that tragic August 6.

Seeing the Atomic Bomb Dome before the museum and then after visiting the museum is very different. Passing by, it just looked like a junked out building. After visiting the museum, I felt the dome took on a personality and the dome was trying to reach out and tell people what happened. It was imploring visitors to remember what happened and to prevent other nuclear weapon use for the childrens’ sake.

By mid-afternoon we had finished going around the Peace Memorial Park. We walked around Hondori and visited Hiroshima Castle. The castle is not very interesting and the view at the top leaves much to be desired. Skip the castle. If we had more time I think I would’ve enjoyed visiting Shukkeien Garden.

We enjoyed some food that Hiroshima is famous for: okonomiyaki and oysters. Hiroshima-yaki is nice and I really enjoyed it. Maybe it’s the Osaka in me that I’ve picked up but I enjoy Osaka-style okonomiyaki more. Oysters at any place is always delicious.

So far, I’m enjoying Hiroshima. It’s a fairly small city with a lot less to do than Osaka. I’ve noticed a lot of young people just kind of hang out at different places. A lot of them just sit around and text on their phones with all their comrades. I also get the sense that young people here conform to fashion trends a lot more. It felt like you could clearly and cleanly categorize everyone into the different categories you find in fashion magazines. In Osaka, there are a lot more blurred divisions and you have the whole spectrum of fashion trends.

Day 2

Miyajima
One thing that takes a bit of getting used to in Japan is the country’s fascination with rankings and scorings. You will find Top Ten lists everywhere: countless TV programs, magazines, books, and websites. People rank everything, from food to bars, singers to flowers, and what I’ll mention today, scenic places.

Miyajima’s Itsukushima Shrine is reputably one of the best three scenic sites in all of Japan. I can’t dispute that seeing the giant orange torii gate appear is if it’s floating in the water is truly a beautiful site. The temple itself is built over the water and I hear that during high tide, the temple itself appears to be floating as well.

What I will have to disagree with is that it’s one of the top three sites. Firstly, who ranks these sites? Do they poll everyone in the country? What criteria do they use to judge these sites? For me, and I think you can agree, beauty is such a subjective concept that it is highly impossible to rank beauty. As much as I enjoyed Itsukushima Shrine, I don’t think I’ll place it in my top ten list. Reasons:

• It’s just a temple
  It’s my eighth year in Japan and I’ve visited too many temples to count. Each temple is distinctly different but they all share very common similarities. The torii gate on the water is really cool, but it’s still just a torii gate. I prefer walking through the thousands of torii gates at Fushimi-Inari Shrine instead.
• The tide changes the look
  I guess in a way this is a cool thing. The tide level changes how the overall site looks. In pictures with high tide, the place looks remarkable. When we went today, we timed it well so that we got there just before high tide. Unfortunately, high tide was not very high and it was kind of sad to see the water not measure up to the torii posts.
• The crowds
  This is always a concern for me while traveling in Japan. It’s Golden Week after all so crowds were expected. The ferry ride over was quite smooth but the walk from the ferry port to the temple and then back was so crowded. The shoutengai covered shopping area was filled with souvenir stores, snack stands, shops, and millions upon millions of people. One thing that really irks me is people who are walking along a crowded pathway and then suddenly stop smack in the middle of the road for some retarded reason. I always imagine what it would be like to just kick them out of the way.

… Ok, I’ve calmed down now. So, my point is, crowds always detracts from he overall site. It’s a catch-22. Beautiful sites will draw crowds. Crowds detract from the beauty. The beautiful sites will be less beautiful. I’m less likely to visit now. Anyway, I don’t think I’ll ever need to visit this place again.

Iwakuni: Kintaikyo
We were both quite pooped after Miyajima. Walking under the sun all day will do that to you. Around 4pm, we got back to Miyajima Station and decided to make our way out to Iwakuni. It would take a 5km bus ride from Iwakuni Station before we finally got to the Kintaikyo bridge. It was definitely worth it. This bridge, with three high arches and two smaller ones that connect to either side of the river, was much more of a beautiful scenic site than Itsukushima Shrine.

Surrounded by trees and the sound of running water, we relaxed next to the river and I took dozens of pictures of the bridge. It was not as crowded as Miyajima as well. Iwakuni is actually in Yamaguchi prefecture but I highly recommend making the roughly one-hour trip by train out here.

It costs \300 to cross the bridge but there’s a cheaper package that gives you bus tickets, access to the ropeway and some castle at the top of a mountain. Because it was getting late and the castle didn’t look very fun, we decided to just visit the bridge.

Day 3

Hiroshima
I got up early and took a stroll around the Peace Memorial Park by myself. I visited a few more of the monuments but the one that was interesting was the “hypocenter” of the explosion. There’s just a pretty mundane looking plaque next to some parking lot that marks where the bomb exploded (600m in the air).

The Women wasn’t feeling so well so we decided to go home early. We were originally planning to visit Kure City and the Yamato Museum. Oh well, maybe next time.

I’ve successfully completed my second month in my new job. It’s going quite well but last month was extremely busy. I’m really enjoying what I’m doing and most things are no longer “new” to me anymore. In another month or two I will be able to stop saying “I’m new” and work at a nice level of comfort. It’s a great sign that I look forward to going to work on Sunday evenings!

Yesterday was the first day of Golden Week and how golden it is. I have a full seven days off and The Wife and I will be embarking on a fun three-day trip of Hiroshima. It’s a much anticipated and long-waited trip. I’ve been wanting to go there for years now but we kept pushing it back. Until now!

D&D 4th Edition continues to be quite fun. I got in a couple of games this month and I’m looking forward to testing out a completely new character. I’m using a character that the DM created to balance out the difficulty. I was playing around with a Monk and they can get quite nasty.

Wing Chun continues to be a huge aspect of my life and this month I got in more training than I normally do. Sifu Steve gave me some encouraging words and that has pushed me to train a lot more at home. It WILL pay off.

I had a wonderful afternoon playing with my 1 year old niece yesterday. She is adorable! Yesterday was also the first time I thought that she was no longer a baby, but a child. She’s walking and communicating and just kicking my ass with her adorableness.

We had our annual hanami picnic. Photos on facebook.

I’ll leave out a lot more miniscule topics and just conclude it here. I have plans to change this website to be more of a photoblog. Hopefully this will happen not too far away in the future.