Preoccupied with Occupation

It's been a while since I updated this blog, so rough as it is, I'm giving it the old college try.

For those of you who have seen 'Love Hina' (bareta!) the scene on campus today would have been deja vu. But not quite. Today after all was the day entrance exams are conducted for the incoming 2005 class, and for that very important reason, campus was locked down pretty securely. The big red gate 'Aka-mon' was shut, except for a slim little door to the left, where staff with official armbands checked IDs. So much to be won or lost on this day . . . But oddly enough the students (some still in their highschool uniforms) I came across seemed in rather high spirits, chatting and flirting.

Also kind of reminds me of Maison Ikkoku, which by the way is being resurrected from its original 1980s run by its publisher for one more reprint. Just in time, I'd say, for the 'PURE LOVE' boom. That term, jun'ai, has achieved vortextual status now on the heels of such sentimental dramas as 'Winter Sonata', 'Sekai no chushin de ai wo sakebu' and 'Ai ni Yukimasu'. Does the term denote a new aspect of Japanese society, or just a new way to talk about Japanese society? Here, I defer to Kaori Shoji of the Japan Times who does a remarkable job explaining the 'phenomenon' with a straight face. And yet, through her obsessive use of quotation marks for all the 'so-called' 'phrases' 'Japanese' people employ, I can't help detecting an ironic smirk behind the earnestness. Surely she must think it's silly; the quotation marks seem to put plenty of distance between what she herself thinks, and 'what people say'.

So 'pure' love is back. And so are the 1980s. Though they gave love. . . a bad name (bad name).

In other news, I'm doing some heavy-duty translating for my advisor here, who has somehow amassed a large cache of WWII Japanese propaganda. It's rather sad, and unnerving work, but at times hilarious. Makes you wonder if our own occupation of Iraq is really drawing on the correct historical metaphors. Instead of the 'successful' occupations of Germany and Japan, maybe we should contemplate the short-lived Japanese occupations of Manchuria and China as well. By the way, I've been helped a great deal by a new dictionary on the palmpilot: Plecodict. It's the only portable solution I've found that lets you enter traditional hanzi (characters) by the pen/stylus, and get pinyin romanizations (and definitions) out of it. Needless to say, that thoroughly streamlines using my big fat Xian dai han yu ci dian paper dictionary. Finally, the tools that I need. . .

You’re asking for it. . .

In the information age, you can not only give someone a knuckle sandwich [the old stand-by], you can also give’em a spam sandwich.

So, you better shut up now, or you're really asking for it. Right where it counts.

It was a '3' here

There was just an earthquake here. The floor started to jerkily shift around on me, the foundations started creaking, dogs started barking. . . and it was only a '3', though it lasted for more than 10 seconds. Apparently, someplace up north in Ibaraki experienced a 5.4, which should be more than 100 times worse than what I experienced. That's insane. And when the big one hits (on the order of 7 or so, as they predict), 30,000 people are forecasted to die in Tokyo. This is the second earthquake I've felt here in 2 weeks. I hope that's not a sign of things to come.

I want my stone back.

I just registered my first shareware since 1997. Seriously, I just paid for some software that nobody would think of paying for. That's the thing with shareware; nobody seems to pay for it. If you just distribute your software, no matter how much you limit it's functionality, people rarely bother to pay you for it. This time, I just had to do it. I registered an Apple II emulator called 'Virtual ]['. It cost me $19, but the feature that pushed me over the top (into becoming a paying customer) was the emulated disk drive noises he put into it. It just didn't feel like a real Apple ][ until then. Now, I can play Infocom's Wishbringer again, and relive those magical moments I spent with that game in the chilly basement of my home (before my parents moved. now there's no basement). But the best part of that game was the packaging; it came with a white glow-in-the-dark molded plastic trinket, the 'Wishbringer' stone from the game itself. Now, that was classy.

A long time ago, I think it was 1989, I gave that glow-in-the-dark stone, plus my signature, to a friend named Sue. I'm not in touch with her, but I hear she's a successful lawyer now. I guess the stone paid off, but hell, that also means she doesn't really need it anymore. So, Sue, if you're listening, I want my stone back.

Japan as a metaphor

I'm starting to grapple with my own (previous) fixation with Japan, and as I look out the window of the Tokyu express train to Shibuya, considering the grey sky and tightly packed buildings, I realize that I have always looked at Japan as a particularly vivid expression of human dignity/desperation. These moments come to me especially when I've got my music with me, when the shifting cityscape in front of me serendipitously harmonizes with the beat. Those are special moments to me . . . :P

At a risk of sounding obscure, I worry if I am somehow decorporealizing my Japan to a set of hazy metaphors. But at the same time, I also realize that Japan can not possibly be 'meaningful' without some romantic notions on my part. Japan used to be a fantasy-land for me, but now less and less so. And in the process, the metaphor loses meaning as well.

Vehicular Destruction/Vehicular Construction

Vehicles; they transport us, they kill us.

Last week, I noticed that my train was late twice. When that happens, and normally it isn't a common occurrence at all, the conductor announces his apologies and gives some official excuse. Both times last week (two different lines), the cause was a 'jinshin jiko'. Translated literally, the term denotes an 'accident involving a human body'. What it suggests is suicide. When people here think of trains and suicides, they immediately think of the Chuo-line, the 'suicide train', apparently because its express trains rush right up against the platform at a sufficient speed to make things quick.

But vehicles here are also a source of fanciful expression. The 'new' way to get to Odaiba is aboard the 'suijo basu' (water bus) Himiko. I took two photos of it: one two. Himiko (named after the mythical female ruler of the ancient 'Wa' kingdom, apparently one of the early civilizations in the Japanese archipelago) was designed by none other than Matsumoto Reiji, famed animator of Galaxy Express 999, and more recently, Interstella5555. By the way, you can buy figurines of the Interstella crew for a mere 55.55 euros. Anyway, suijo basu Himiko runs from Asakusa to Odaiba for double the normal price of a ferry, around 1,700 yen.

In other news, I went all the way to the top of Mori Tower, in Roppongi Hills. That thing casts a loooong shadow.

Someone asked me to post some pictures of fruit, and well, I don't have much, but this should show you what an Okayama pear is like. The large wrapped thing on the right is the pear, while on the left is a largish Okayama apple.