Stop Japan Stop

Internationalising in Japan - the best of a bad world?

2010-01-08T14:27:00.005Z

A week never seems to pass by and I am spammed by constant Mixi messages and e-mails about joining some sort of International Party （国際交流会）or 'Event' in Shibuya and Roppongi every weekend. Normally the events are billed at the whopping cost of 2000 yen (about 500 yen more than some club nights in Pongi) and are often swamped in a see of English.

The offennding site that gained my ire this week was;

http://internationalparty.p-kit.com/

2000円？高そうな！詐欺だ！そういうことは全般的に自由だと思った。

And if you don't speak Japanese, I'm saying (or is it writing?) 2000 yen is a bloody con and I thought that such things as networking were free in this world.

I appreciate such gestures now and again but I have a few pertinent questions that need answering whenever I receive such mails. Firstly, who actually makes money off this? And secondly is who stupid enough to want to go to these things anyway? This might seem blunt but I simply can't comprehend the answers for either of them.

I thought such things as social networking were free? I can understand if you market this as some type of speed dating thing but its clearly a social mixer for gaijin and Japanese people. I suppose if you want a quickie, there is always Gas-Panic and if you want a language exchange there are practically tons of ways to engineer this (such as various internet sites and newspaper ads.) But this seems to fall into a grey area of not knowing where to fall (or even stand.)

The problem I have is that I am struggling to know if such things exist because of foreigners in Japan who refuse or struggle to integrate or whether it is the problem of the Japanese in not accepting foreigners into their own country. Why do we need to have these things? Surely if we were active enough, everything would fall into place.

Oddly the Japanese are exactly like the British. Perversely obsessed with what goes on outside our little island but as soon as it dirfts upon their shore they hide away and universally double-think it to death. It'd be cool to have a [Japanese/gaijin/American] friend but I am sure as hell not going to go up and make the first move.

On an initial front, especially from my own experiences the Japanese can be very cold and very awkward when it comes to dealing with foreigners. Foreigners or 'gaijin' represent the concept of 'uchi' and 'soto' basically the ins and outs of Japan. For the most part Japan is punctuated by plenty of social groups which range from what school you represent and where you grew up. It explains why Tokoyites remain slightly aversive to people from Osaka and how a Waseda student will never fraternise with a student from Keio university. Gaijin are eternally 'uchi' to the Japanese 'soto'. As much as any dreamer will try and have you believe the Japanese will never fully accept a foreigner no matter how 'jouzu' their Japanese is or how well they bow and slurp their noodles.

Such markets represent something of a growing danger for Japan, one which stems from the mass commercialisation of 'foreignhood' in Japan and also of the apparent holes within Japanese society.

Firstly, by making money of such events you are allowing it to be corrupted by those ignorant enough to abuse the system for their own ends. Thus you can get a nefarious cocktail of any number of 'eigo-bandits', 'eigo-leeches', 'ounetsudansei' and 'gold diggers'. Worse of all comes from the fact that although some companies and NPO's will make tireless efforts with good intentions and in immense faith it can be turned over to money making machines who see no interest in fostering some type of international relations but merely to make as much money as possible.

Secondly, and slightly more crucially to the main point of my article, is that the mere existence of such 'events', especially those on a wider, mass-scale expose a certain level of failure within the Japanese system. It becomes more apparent that such issues as internationalisation and cross-cultural boundaries are failing - in part to such issues as 'uchi' and 'soto'.

Unfortunately many people in Japan, and it goes without saying this applies to a lot more countries as well, are still fairly ignorant when it comes to foreign countries and cultures. We still live in a world where the boundaries are scribbled in with a pencil and coloured in with blotchy ink. We still think of the Japanese in a certain way as industrious sexually repressed technocrats and they still think of us as those blonde haired Hollywood types with funny noses. Sadly this is continued more so whenever these international events are advertised and sold to semi-gullible twats in Japan. Replace the word International with the word 'America' and the gerund 'meeting' with 'speaking English' and you have a fine summary of what a lot of Japanese half expect at such events. I will draw from personal experience my time in Osaka and Himeji when me and my friend Chris were constantly mistaken for Americans despite the fact we spoke British English and ironically self-depricting ourselves every six seconds. (the above site avoids this misconception but there are worse ones out there which flow down this line.)

Unfortunately, for the Japanese foreign countries extend far beyond America. Believe or not, if someone has white skin, there is great statistical possibilities they will not be American. America itself is not even as close to being totally Caucasian if you compare to countries such as the UK and France - even with the number of immigrants and those descended from immigrants.

Its perhaps this startlingly high level of ignorance, along with the fact I have absolutely no interest in speaking English that I tend to avoid these events like a man covered in honey next to a swarm of killer bees.

However, something is changing inside me and believe it or not I am starting to understand even with my massive reservations and criticism why such events must or even have to take place in Japan. For one thing, the Japanese will never ever take it upon themselves to attempt to make conversation or break from their structural norms in daily life. Unlike the British who can be quite reserved in daily life, we have our places for social interaction and areas where one can forgot the norms of society and vent free (often for most places this is the local pub) for the Japanese even the most open izakaya and liberal ramen shop in the world will never change the spirit of the nation.

Lastly and probably more pertinently to the whole discussion of the issue, is that of language, both for the Japanese and for the foreigners themselves. As the vast majority both share a sense of reservation about their abilities and connections. No-one is willing to guess that all Japanese can speak fluent English as much as a foreigner can speak some level of Japanese. Here in Tokyo, you are branched into two main categories; either you are a foreigner able to speak Japanese or you are a foreigner that can speak none at all. Such events actually tear down this presupposition and presume parity on both sides upon which there is a common consensus and language to be shared; be that Japanese or English and be that from a zero to basic level to practically fluent.

It is with these deep considerations that whilst I freely look upon such events with some type of annoyance and confusion, I have been borne with being able to see some new found value. I feel now I am able to understand to a certain extent why these events exist in Japan and why they will probably still exist for the foreseeable future. I just really wish they would stop using my e-mail for the purposes of international communication.

sirusimo

2009-12-22T08:27:00.005Z

sirusimo (aka Moritz Friedrich) is an awesome little DJ from Berlin. Fresh from remixing fellow electroheads Boys Noize (also from Germany) sirusimo is a creation of various samples and beats to bring you some really addictive tunes. The track 'High Together' recently appeared on the latest Kitsune Maison Compilation.

Sadly though I felt zed album was a bit of a sad let down compared to the previous versions which has gone more from electro into a slightly more 'alternative' rock feel. The use of 'High Together' which in itself is a wonderful track doesn't do sirusimo justice and now I am completely addicted to his other work, namely the superb "Diskosau"

The EP "The Invited Guest" is available somewhere on the internet (namely here) and if that doesn't get your fancy then check out the remix of fellow German DJ Ben Mono's "Perfection" which is right below;

Earthquake

2009-12-20T14:42:00.005Z

On Friday morning I was rudely awoken by an earthquake. How cheeky? What on earth does it think it is doing waking up an Englishman who only went to bed a few hours before it decided to strike. It measured 5.1 on the Richter scale and centered around Tochigi prefecture.

Oddly this was not the first earthquake of the night, as one had hit the Izu peninsula a few hours before sending some of the news stations into mild panic. The news reports served as some ominous foretelling as the rest of Tokyo and the surrounding areas were to be jolted into the early morning a few hours later.

Anyway, it was a highly surreal, comical and a slightly scary moment all rolled into one. I woke up at around quarter to 6 local time here in Kawasaki and had a weird sensation of 'why have I just woken up'? I then rested my head and then felt my bed start to shake, like someone was at the other end shaking the foot of it. My head-rest rattled and I felt the windows shaking.

Because I was half asleep it was only about a few seconds into it, I realised that this was an earthquake. It never really got going and lasted for about ten seconds at the most. None of my stuff fell over and to be honest the thunderstorm I had a few months ago felt a lot worse. But the most frightening experience of it all was actually when it ended. I was thinking to myself, is this is? What now? I sat lying in bed trying to go bck to bed, but couldn't due to a sense of fear and a strange curiosity.

This was my first earthquake experience in japan and although it was a fairly mild one (5.1 on the Richter scale) it still left me feeling slightly shocked for a few hours. Because the place I live in is staffed mostly by Japanese and the odd Indonesian - those guys being fairly used to having earthquakes so the majority of the 'relaying' came from my fellow exchange students, which ranged from 'couldn't give a toss and I went back to bed' to 'I hid next to the door'.

Last year in Sheffield we experienced a similar earthquake which hit 5.1 on the Richter scale and produced similar results (i.e. no real major damage but slightly mild panic.) I also vaguely remember experiencing one in Cyprus as a small child, although that was so long ago the memory has faded. In many ways after experiencing a typhoon in October and now an earthquake I feel as I am really enjoying the Japanese experience, albeit a slightly obscure one.

All this pails into insignificance and stupid ramblings though, as Taiwan - which suffered an absolutely devastating quake in 1999 has just had a much stronger earthquake hit. And likewise the typhoon I experienced (which really was more of a tropical depression) was nothing to the one that hit the Philippines weeks earlier.

The day of the tracksuit

2009-12-17T11:03:00.008Z

What a curious day. It started with a crush and ended with one. And although the meaning differs there was a stroke of genius and several train tickets bought in between.

Firstly I somehow managed to wake up late and end up ten minutes early to my grammar class at 9am. God bless the wonderful 'commuter express'.

The trains over here during the main rush hour periods are something of a joke and if you are unfortunate to take the more earlier ones between 8.15 and 8.30 you are in for a squash. Oddly the ones after that are ridiculous as well but not as bad as the 'real' one which I boarded today at 8.30. Eeep.

Another curious thing is that the Japanese generally are ridiculously polite and are very mindful of other's personal space. But during a train journey it simply can't be helped that you are gonna squash someone and get in their way. This is simple a process of 'shou ga nai' ('nothing can be done', but more poignantly 'just get on with it'.) Therefore on the trains you tend to see Japanese at their worst. So far I've seen several drunk salary men, one whom decided to sleep length-ways across the 'priority seating' and a few very loud schoolkids. The very worse though tends to come during these rush hour journeys when the Japanese seem to leave their little polite world behind and its a basic free for all. Getting dibs on seats is a must - hence the mad rush by the obaachans once the door opens. The second is getting off the train. Basically you can push people out of the way and it is not always necessary to say 'suimasen' (although obviously it would be nice.)

Today was one of those days where I ditched being the nice English gentleman and decided to do as the Romans do. Its becoming a recurring thing as I get used to life over here. So despite being stood fairly central to the exits I managed to push about three people aside, stepped on a old geezer's foot and then just casually strode off the train with a sense of guilt that would be to evaporate the moment I climbed the escalator.

It still doesn't pail the experience of last week though, when I simply 'guided' an old lady off the train because she was a little stuck at one end and then decided to grab my short tail and hang on for dear life as a I made a parting of the suits like Moses in a business conference making way to the coffee table. It was also the same day that when I arrived at campus I was said 'hello' to by a quaint looking Japanese fellow. It was very surreal as its the only time I have ever had this. Just a complete random stranger say something to me in English. It was actually rather uplifting after the monotony of Tokyo life in the morning. Like a small petal that floated up from somewhere and danced in front of my eyes.

There are always two ways when riding the train. The way into Shinjuku and the way out of it. Pretty much 90% of the time, the train heading into central Tokyo is a pain in the arse and relatively squashed up until you hit Shimokitazawa (the gateway to Shibuya) or Yoyogiuehara (the gateway to Asasaka, Roppongi and Ginza.)

The ride back is in complete contrast (bar the last train home and rush hour) when its just as bad as going there, if not worse. It becomes a lottery of getting the cute schoolgirl to be squashed up against or the ojiisan with halitosis. I just stand there, restraining my loins and think of England whilst my Ipod blasts out electro.

So after a mild squash into Shinjuku, I headed into the local Midori no satsuguchi (basically a ticket desk) and bought my Seishun 18 kippu. The wonder of this ticket is pretty much simple; you pay 11,000 yen during the holidays periods to have 5 free days of unlimited travel in Japan. Whilst this sounds great, there is one huge drawback in that you are not permitted to travel on trains which require advanced booking (such as the limited express and Shinkansen.) Therefore what should be a relatively simple 2 hour journey to Osaka from Tokyo is turning into a 9 hour marathon from my digs here in northern Kawasaki to Osaka station involving about 7 transfers at various stations. Cue Christmas Eve I say... I can't wait for this little journey.

However the added bonus is that having the ticket has allowed me to travel to Himeji for a day - which is awesome, as its been on my 'to see' list for a while since I got here.

Ultimately though, it may be long journey but you get to see the countryside of Japan and actually get to witness what this place is like outside the big cities which is sadly lost when you are hurtling down a track at 200km per hour.

Trying to expunge these thoughts of trains for a moment brings me onto my second focus of the day as I headed on over to the amazingly wonderful store named Don Quixote (ドンキホーテ) in Shinjuku.

Don Quixote is pretty much hard to describe. Its like the offspring of a department store and a hundred yen shop, where you can buy some really quality goods at low prices as well as some absolute bargains. And the most important thing is that they are freaking everywhere in Japan. The main idiosyncrasy of the store is its narrow little aisles with everything squashed up together tightly as you have to weave in and out of customers coming and going. The products line the shelves up to the ceiling and there is no such thing as a floor map. Quite frankly its like a labyrinth of the tacky and cheap.

Although that sounds like a really bad thing, its actually not - because if you root around the store for a bit you will find some killer products available. They have some awesome t-shirts and some really quality niche items like jewelry, belts and trainers. But above all, its the little things like Keroro-Gunso hats or some sort of Purin toy.

At first I entered to buy myself a really cheap Santa hat for Christmas but in the end I bought myself what can only describe as a ridiclous impulse buy, one of those things you see and say to yourself "I must have that!" Probably the greatest tracksuit I will ever have the fortune of buying over here.

Genius. For those of you who are not adept at Japanese or seeing the blurry image. The front says ナンパ師 which means something like 'pulling/flirting teacher' whilst the back says すいません、ナンパです！ - sorta like 'excuse me, but I'm pulling/flirting here! or I'm gonna start to pull you'

I simply have decided I must wear it when and if I ever decide to go to nanpa.

As well as that, I bought myself the aforementioned Santa hat as well as a cool red t--shirt which I clocked and thought was pretty smart. I don't have any red t-shirts in Japan and apparently its a lucky colour, which might help my nanpa in conjugation with the tracksuit. *ahem*

On the way back to Seijo, which as you would image was relatively 'ojiisan with halitosis squash free' I bought my new commuter ticket, only to discover that upon going back to the exchange office at the university I needed a fancy receipt so I could I get the rebate back from them. D'oh.

During these two visits I was introduced to a student who was interested in going to Sheffield next year as an exchange student from Seijo. I think her main concern was the fact she has learned American English even though she spoke with what I considered quite a British accent. Weird. Any ways I have no idea who is coming to Seijo next year and who indeed from Seijo is going to Sheffield!

Funny times. Oh on the way back home I stopped off at OK supermarket and saw what shall be known as from now on as 'Supermarket Girl', which is a funny little story I shall relay in due course. Needless to say it pretty much sums up my love life and is one of tragic romance tales I am desperate to make into realtiy, by either nanpa with my spiffy new tracksuit or by turning it into a slushy Japanese TV drama.

Cinnamon Chasers

2009-12-16T14:13:00.005Z

Currently I have accidentally stumbled upon the wonderfully titled Cinnamon Chasers.

I was drawn initially to the wonderful video produced for the track 'Luv Delux' and then the found myself to download the album onto my new 160GB ipod (shameless self plug for a Mac owner like myself.) Wasn't disappointed at all, the album is wonderfully crafted a lovely listen on the morning commutes back and forth from home to campus. I advise you take a listen, to watch the amazing video below and then download their album entitled "A Million Miles from Home."

Its creativity and sounds like this that makes me really excited for the future of music.

Living in a Mac Japan

2009-12-16T13:16:00.004Z

I have had two major accidents befall me in Japan recently. One is self-imposed and the other, more damningly was thrust upon me.

Firstly is the rather sad news that my Ipod was stolen in the gym two weeks ago. If I could choose a place to inadvertently place down my Ipod I would have choose the gym for many reasons but namely because it is in my university, it is in the gym and the people there are less likely to steal something. My emotions ranged from shock, horror and then a sense of outright pity.

To be honest, I know in many ways this type of thing would never happen in the UK and the fact that Seijo has only 4000 or so students and even less who go to the gym, and even less who were there that hour it had got knicked I feel nothing but pity. I feel safe that any Japanese person who uses the student gym at Sheffield will be much more safer than the other way around. Of that I am sure. It certainly offers me new light to these claims of a 'crimeless' Japan from moronic chinless gap-year pseudo-wunderkinds. The feeling of being relatively safe everywhere you go is a bit of a myth to be fair, you still have to keep an eye out for sneaky bastards. Japan may be a good country but it is not perfect. Put your guide-book down for once and smell the natto. True as some claims about Japan may be, once you live here and experience the reality of the place - your trite claims are nothing. I take your three week vacation to Shinjuku and piss all over it.

I am glad that I have since calmed down and mellowed out since last week, but there is no denying I feel a little bit ashamed that Seijo have taken me in and had this happen. I think they must be feeling very very embarrassed at the manner of one of their students. Like I say, my university reputation is being enhanced here whilst the process is being inverting the other way. Very sad indeed.

What makes me even more sad is the hours and hours of music that I had placed on the Ipod which were now lost to the ages. Thankfully, I recovered most of the good stuff later on.

The second such cock-up of the week involved an accident between a small amount of Chuu-hai, a screw-driver and twenty thousands milligrams of rage. With that, I destroyed my laptop. Me not being the technical person I was unsure if it was the BIOS that failed, the disk-drive itself or possibly the large whack I gave it once it decided to crash upon for the umpteenth time.

After being constantly fed up with Vista I decided to take the plunge into the unknown and purchase a rather spiffy looking Macbook Pro. I am considering an early Christmas present slash scholarship stipend splurge.

Admittedly not the most cost effective product you are gonna see on the market, after scouring the internet I used a popular online purchasing and selling site and managed to bag a brand new Macbook Pro, 2GB, 250gb HD for just over 700 quid, well to precise it was 1,110 dollars US. The sweetener came in the fact the shipper offered free worldwide delivery and in only 5 working days too!

So after a week of waiting and watching Japanese TV to kill the boredom of a week without a computer (which incidentally after the last time I went with internet in mt flat hasn't relented on the abhorrent quality it produces) I came home last Thursday to discover DHL had been, gone and left a giant sticker hanging outside my door telling me in California Governer stylee that they'll return. Although this being Japan you have to ring the company up and tell them when to deliver it. Because I live in a mansion (no not that type of place, but a sort of post-apoocalytic ferile concrete block to house single people in Japan) they have to come when you are around and can smell the noodles from your kitchen.

After lots of keigo (polite Japanese) and apologies for being a foreigner, I waited patiently last Friday for it to arrive. In order to kill the boredom, I relented my soul, released my sphincter and sat through the most nauseating shite Japan has to offer on its crappy analogue TV services, waiting patiently until it arrived like a misbehaving six year old who sits in the corner trying not to do something bad as he wants Santa to give him that Scaletrix replica of Le Mans.

6pm arrived... some shite about food and a cute girl getting excited over a boiled sandwich dipped with egg.

Still no Macbook....

Unsettling.

7pm... some equally disturbing shite on the news about a dead woman, a kid being hit by a train and the world's love affair with Barack Obama.

Still no Macbook....

Urge to kill being to surface.

But just after the news from Copenhagen that the world will end under a cloud of sulfuric acid and before I managed to destory yet another electrical appliance the doorbell rang and in the pissing rain and freezing cold stood an equally looking disheveled looking woman who was carrying my Macbook with a towel to stop the rain from melting through. She looked really flustered after probably trying to find my room in the cold and rain and so me being the English gentleman I had no other instainct but to kindly offer her a hot beverage from my bacteria infested kitchen.

However this being Japan and me not having internet porn for 10 days I simply signed the form, slammed the door in her face and unwrapped the box like a kid on Christmas day. And just like that kid waiting for those toy cars, you can fuck being a good boy now and let your emotion of excitement pour forward

Even though I knew the contents of the box, I still had the awe inspired gasp of being totally gobsmacked by some silver brushed metal, a few clumps of wires, and a CD.

The thing itself is completely free of painstaking installation and although it had trouble recognising my internet connection I was able to start using it in a matter of minutes. First impressions are that I was impressed. The next few hours, sorry the following 9 hours - I would spend re-downloading my entire music collection that was on my stole Ipod and which would go on my new one bought from Shinjuku. I use a nifty little programme called Transmission, which basically acts as a torrent downloader compatible with most of the torrent sites online at the minute.

Although I don't wish to be one of those beaming self-styled "Macbook" aficionados who whine incessantly about how great their little toy is and how Vista sucks, I must admit I really am happy with the purchase I made and it seems to suit my needs perfectly. Although I'm not close to marrying the damn thing, I think we are on about second base right about now.

Still its not all love and romance though, the only annoying thing that I have really discovered on the system is the annoying process of finding compatible software and having to learn the "mac" way of things such as taking screenshots, using the little touch-pad at the bottom and having to run various things. Overall though, my Mac experience is about 98% positive!

Want to see it in action? Well how's about this post-modernist photo of me writing out this blog post ON my new Macbook Pro. Take that dada-surrealism!

So with a new Macbook and a new Ipod the bank account is not looking great. This is basically my scholarship for this month, although sadly as Crimbo now approaches I have several other big things that need paying such as the gas bill (which has been burning 24-7 since the weather got cold here) my commuter ticket renewal (which gets reimbursed but still has to come out of my wallet) and also my ticket to Osaka!

Yes that's right! I'm going to Osaka/Kobe for Christmas and I'm gonna visit Himeji castle as well! All thanks to the wonderful Seishun 18 kippu, which I'll hopefully blog about later.

PS: Hisashiburi ne? Guess I have must have been studying hard... Or not at all. Most likely the latter. Those kanji are not going to learn themselves sadly.

The return! Thou hast the internet!

2009-10-08T14:46:00.004+01:00

Wow. Well sadly the blog was supposed to be updated regularly during my first few weeks in Japan. But sadly to my horror I discovered my flat wasn't equipped with the internet, meaning a three week stay of execution from the world wide web. Well anyways, I am now in the swing of things at uni here in Japan and have a great 100mb fibre-optic line into my room. So I'll just give a quick rundown of my previous three weeks in a general summise.

Where I'm living.

I am living in the pleasantry comfort of a place called Ikuta, in northern Kawasaki just a little under 15 mins away by train from my university in Setagaya. The place is basic as hell and so far I've had two cockroach attacks (one on my first night!) The town itself is pretty small but home to lots of students, as its situated near to one of Meiji University's campuses. In fact I can see one of the buildings from across my balcony.

Its also pretty cool as most of the people living in my little appartment/guest-house are mostly Japanese. There are a few Taiwanese and one Indonesian I think.

Seijo

So far the experience has been a little awkward, especially given that I am one of four, yes FOUR exchange students here. This means that many people know me, but I sure as hell don't know them. Whilst its nice have some form of minor celeb status its really annoying and sometimes a bit off-putting. One thing I'm slowly having to get used to is the constant staring when I'm walking to class, eating lunch or basically doing the most mundane, banal crap imaginable.

Every Monday and Thursday at lunch-time we have these little language/cultural exchange things with our Japanese teacher, where obviously we get together and speak Japanese and chat with Japanese people. Whilst this is good, again its a little awkward because there are so few exchange students. Last week, it was me fielding rapid-fire questions from four girls. It was kinda embarassing, especially when your Japanese fails you.

This was the same for our orientation three weeks ago, when some of the students showed us around the campus and Seijo itself. it was like 4 people to say something like 20 people. Argh. But I seriously can't fault them, they were fantastic, I just felt sorry that all their hardwork and preparation was for just four people.

The students you meet here are completely fascinated by you though. You end up wanting to do something else and suddenly it turns into a conversation about what Japanese food you like and where you want to visit in Japan. Yesterday, whilst i was at our exchange office, I was randomnly introduced to a girl who was interested in going to Sheffield next year as a exchange student. After about a minute, the conversation veered from Sheffield and suddenly became about me and what my hobbies are.

Whilst I am on the subject of that, the academic staff here at Seijo are just unbelievable. They will go completely out of their way to help you. They'll help you sign up for societies, help you sign any tricky forms in Japanese and show you around campus and help you out with absolutely any problems you have as a forienger in Japan. Although the uni here is small (something like 5,000 students) one of the benefits is that the staff know you pretty well.

As for the whole 'international bubble' that some people maybe having as a student in Japan, I can safely say that is not the case at Seijo. With the exception of one of my teachers, two of the exchange staff and select bunch of cute girls in one of my classes - practically no-one speaks English here. And that is not an understatement. They just don't speak it and when they do, its kinda basic - although I am finding that they are very reluctant to speak it, even when their English is really good.

Its great for me though to practice Japanese, although it is very, very tiring sometimes.

The classes

So far I am taking four classes, 日本語Ｂ (Nihongo B), 日本語コミュ二ケーション (Nihongo Communication), Contemporary Society and Anthropology of Japan.

Nihongo B is basically our grammar classes, hosted by Toyama-sensei, who is really lively and makes the classes at least half interesting despite the easy content. Because there are no placement tests at Seijo we are pretty much doing first year grammar which is really annoying, because its painfully easy. However the stuff like speaking Japanese in class and to the staff, students etc kinda makes up for that. Seijo is a really good place if you wanna improve your spoken Japanese.

This is highlighted in Nihongo Communication, which unlike Nihongo B, is really fecking hard. We get tons of vocab for this and are expected to start speaking in Japanese throughout the class, discussing various topics and commenting on things. Its a really rewarding class but its such a pain due to its intensity and the content.

The other two classes are sorta special modules which we have to do and are kinda pointless. The only good thing is that they are with regular Japanese students. One is in English and the class there (which is full of Japanese girls - yes I know what you are thinking, but please don't say it) is more about learning about our various cultures and acts as a sorta cultural exchange thing. Sad thing is, only three of the four exchange students take it. The other girl who is French doesn't have to do it, meaning again its about four Japanese to one foreigner. Last week I didn't go because of a prior engagement and one of the remaining two exchange students was sick, meaning that only one turned up! All that cultural exchange nonsense for nothing. Honestly, the module is kinda crap and I'm only taking it because there are hot girls there. What? Oh shut the fuck up...!

The remaning module is kinda cool and I've made some friends in that class already. The only problem is the content. Its mostly what I did for Contemporary Japanese Society at Sheffield last year. Its a bilingual class meaning we talk in English and Japanese and is chaired by Toyama-sensei, our incredible driving force in Seijo so far.

To add to all this, our classes are 90 minutes long, and we do two back to back, meaning I do three hours of consecutive Japanese every morning except Wednesday. Quite frankly it just kills you and makes the 50 minute lectures I get in Sheffield, child-like in comparison.

The Japanese

I can't faul them really. They are really great. But the only annoying things are the out-right xenophobic/annoying stuff tends to come from my two greatest enemies, school-girls and old people. Generally, schoolgirls think of you like some type of hilarious doll to look at and giggle whereas old people have mixed opinions but mostly seem to stare through you with a glare of steel that suggests "get the hell out of my country!" whenever you make a culutral faux-pas. ouch!

Fyi though: The girls here in Tokyo are smoking hot. But that's not the reason I'm here. *ahem*

Food

Taking a while to get used to. So far I'm liking the food in Seijo cafeteria, its really good value and really yummy. Plus the rice in Tokyo is smoking hot. But that's not the reason I'm here. *ahem*

I've managed to lose about 4 kilos in weight so far, thanks to Japanese food which is a lot less lighter in terms of fat content, plus the fact I am sweating out the remaining energy through walking everywhere and this stupid humidity.

Typhoons

Well, Typhoon Melor, or 'number 18' if you are the boring Japanese has just passed after battering its way across the main island of Honshu. It was fairly scary but nothing encroaching a major disaster zone similar to the one in the Phillipines recently. The amount of rain that fell was more worrying than the wind, which was most violent at about 7am this morning once the rain had subsided. Thankfully, my classes were cancelled today so I was spared from having a treachous journey into campus. Sadly the puddle outside my door is still there, although I really don't know how the hell my room did not get flooded. Japanese houses are really built for this type of weather though, meaning that as a British person I wasn't fearing a disaster like whenever the UK gets any strong weather.

Once the typhoon had passed about 12pm JST, the skies brightened up and brought with it those lovely gusts of warm air that had greeted me when I first arrived in Japan. The foreceast now looks really good for the rest of the week, although there is still a little bit of intermitment shittiness in the skies.

Overall, the weather is a lot nicer than the UK. Especially on a night, when you can walk around in a t-shirt and not feel really cold. But I will not hear any comments from a Japanese person that it rains too much in the UK!

Conclusion

My first few weeks in Japan have been pretty eye-opening and much of it getting into the swing of things and doing various mundane things, like registrating as a foreigner and sorting my phone and banking out. I've not had much chance to visit any of the real touristy places yet, mainly due to time constraints and not getting my scholarship until November. So far I've been to Yokohama, Shibuya, Shinjuku and Akihabara. I'm really finding it hard to find the time to actually STUDY japanese despite the fact I am using it every day know. I think my grammar has hit a top-level now and right now I just want to cram vocab like there is no tomorrow as it is the one thing escaping me right now. So whilst, being in Japan is certainly cool, especially being just a 20 minute train ride away from Shinjuku, its a little bit of balancing the books between asobi and study. So far, its something which I'm trying to work out and perfect in the coming weeks. I still feel a little bit like a tourist rather than a student. Despite what my passport says...

In Japan! Part I

2009-09-15T00:01:00.002+01:00

Yes I'm in Japan!

Its come as a bit of a shock really as the time has flown by and I can't believe I'm here. No more than three days ago my world was shook upside down by the story that I was getting a JASSO scholarship of around 80,000 yen a month (albeit half of last year's figure due to the recession) and then because of this, I got told I would be relocating to Kawasaki instead of Setagaya. This, THREE days before I was supposed to leave. Not the best of timing really.

And thus the Friday that news was broken came Sunday - the day I leave this beautiful country to say hello to a country I am being told I should love.

Well it started with a bang really and I can't believe its so soon since I said goodbye to my parents and I am here now in Tokyo - the fair capital of Japan. What the hell happened? How did it happen. Is this a dream?

The day started with me getting on a domestic flight from Newcastle to London Heathrow and then onto Tokyo-Narita. The first leg started off well as I went through without any hassle. The guy didn't even bother to check my passport because it was a British one. More worrying is that this was a case and not even the real passport. Oh well.

Once we landed in Terminal 5, I decided to try and craftily go through some lifts meant for security personnel. Oops and then almost took the wrong train to terminal 3. Double oops. However the triple oops and the unbelievable strike-out for dumbness came when I tried to check into the JAL flight and couldn't find my passport. 5 minutes of frantic searching and pure embarrassment, I forgot I had hidden in the many layers of my laptop case. These layers and the notorious passport grab will come to haunt me through the entire procedure of Japan so far.

So after some quick beers and a stroll around Heathrow - which might I add was absolutely boring, I boarded a 11 and 45 minute flight. Yes an 11 and 45 minute flight. Let me just say this, there is no way in hell I'm doing that again - with that leg room. Fine for a small Japanese person. But I'm lanky gaijin twat so there is no way I'm doing that again for fear of my legs becoming crippled by a lack of blood. This thing is getting upgraded to premium economy the moment I fly back. I don't know how I survived. It felt like I was on the flight for days just getting to Estonia, let alone the middle of Siberia.

I ended up watching the new Wolverine film, which was shit, and then Night at the Museum 2, which was equally as shit and then Angels and Demons which started off alright but then descended into the realms of shitness. Thankfully only back to the future 2 (with Japanese subtitles saved the day) but sadly it was too late. I was about to land in Tokyo, well Chiba which is bloody miles away.

I don't know why, but you think once you reach the eastern edge of Russian you think you should be there in Japan in no-time, which is a load of bollocks really. It takes bloody ages, although actually flying over the island of Japan, from Niigata to Chiba is really really short - sometimes you forget how small the island is in terms of width.

Once you land in Japan, the Japanese efficiency machine kicks in and let me tell you it fires off like an electro beam of smiles and 'okayusama' (honoured customers.) If only I wasn't so stupid not to fill the customs and entry forms out I would have been through even quicker. Firstly, was the infra-red scan to check for swine-flu with plenty of Japanese staff on board wearing masks, handing out their own little masks and generally striking the living fear of god into your lungs. Then onwards to the immigration check, and IF you fill out your card properly it takes about seven seconds even with a student visa. One fingerprint check, one photo of my ugly mug and a nice 'thank you come again'. Then, you go to the customs deck and IF, you fill out the card properly it takes about seven seconds even with a few bottles of vodka. *hic* This process was complicated by me, putting my passport away as some sort of bizarre security reflex only to have it removed again at every single check-point.

By this time of fannying about with the patented passport reflex, I was busting and then burst into the nearest lavs right across from my baggage claim area. The odd thing is, Narita provided the standard western toilet and the good ol' squat and thrust methods you see outta of the early Meiji period or the rural areas of France. I was busting, but I was not busting to go whole hog on the whole cultural experience of shitting in a traditional loo on my first few seconds in the country.

So after releasing a gigantic camel-style 11 hour 45 minute piss collection out of my bladder, I hurried out to the baggage claim to see that I was one of the lucky few to have had their bags singaled out for the "IS THIS YOUR LUCKY BAG?" draw. Yes! I must have won something. Well no in fact, the dreams of a nice 50,000 yen cash reward or even two weeks in Okinawa was simply a JAL company point of telling you that you were too bloody slow to collect your baggage, otherwise we will sell it off as a cash prize. Cue lots of shouting by the staff in keigo. Wonderful stuff.

Out of the arrivals and you head straight into the main area where you can buy Narita express tickets. Narita Express is great, not only is it relatively quick and easy, but its air-conditoned and it heads straight to the major stations in Tokyo. Not bad for around 20 quid (2900 yen-ish) It also passes quickly over the Shibuya crossing, which sent my heart a flutter after the rows and rows of the grimey Chiba landscape. True that's Japan but you want something a bit of a 'wow' factor once you get to Tokyo. The experience of landing at Narita is kinda underwhelming really as you don't pass over Tokyo and you don't see jack from the airplane. You may as well be landing in Shizuoka really, sorry Shizuoka.

Its all a bit surreal really. Shinjuku. Just walking through Shinjuku station is mental. The amount of people, the amount of young girls wanting me to buy anki-pan. The amount of mobile-phones. The amount of trains and exits. After a while I did find my way out after traversing what seemed like endless streets and shops. Shinjuku is not really a mind-blowing district of Japan but it is very very Japanese with its endless little shops and restaurants, large scale buildings and lots of hustle and bustle - but no way near Shibuya levels, which is where every single young person goes on their nights out.

The hotel I'm staying at is not far from the Hanazono shrine, but the thing is there are two problems to getting to my hotel successfully. Firstly, there is the distance, which although appears small on the map is bloody mind-numbingly quite far in Tokyo. And secondly, there is the fact that muggins here is carrying a giant fucking laptop, several items of electrical equipment, a 15kg rucksack and some duty free. Its just a bit of a disaster really. Argh. Anyways, I found my hotel, because thankfully they have a gigantic sign which you see right from the other end of the Meiji-dori. You really cannot miss it. The joys of booking with a decent hotel has paid dividends. But don't let that fool you, its as the Japanese say 'taihen kurushii' (bloody painful)

So I checked in and once again had to the gaijin-thing of registering my passport number and then had to go through the process of juggling bottles of alcohol and paperwork but by this time the passport reflex was at a much higher level and I managed to whip out my bad boy and sign the forms.

The room I'm staying at is pretty small, very small by western standards. However this is probably a private condominium in Japan. Its just a bed and as all you sad bastards are aware of, a fucking creepy toilet too. So I set down my things and within two seconds I had managed to select the porn channels on the TV, completely unintentional mind you. *ahem* I just farted around with trying to find the volume and instead hit the 'yuu-ryou' (pay per view channels.) Thankfully I didn't decide to go further and pay some extra yen to see some pixelated blurbs spit roasting a Japanese girl. They give you one free minute and after that it tells you to pay. Incidentally if you do want to pay, you have to go out back and put your money into a vending machine to get a card which allows you to watch it. I'm not joking btw... and no I did not do this.

Because it was really late I headed up for a small ten minute walk to the konbini I passed, which is sort of a midget konbini really as it just stocks small little items and is dwarfish to a regular Lawson you see dotted around Japan. Anyhoo, I ended buying two bottles of coke which came to a pound each (welcome to Tokyo Rich) and some bizarre snacks and treats which altogether came to about £7.50. I can't be arsed getting a meal. Its about 7pm local time and I'm just tired and a bit thirsty. Shinjuku will be there for a while at least.

Weather-wise I can't see the fuss. It is eaxctly like the UK. Its humid but not killer humid. It was a cool 24 last night and it stays this way most of the night and without the sun you can hang around with a t-shirt watching men stroll out of izakaya's across the road for some cafty cigs as the hordes of keitai-toting girls line the streets. Its not hot, but its not cold either. Its just ideal strolling weather.

Well tommorrow is an even bigger day. I have to locate the Odawara line in Shinjuku station, which is not part of the JR line and hence a bastard to find and then head out to Ikuta and ring up my Japanese hosts who will accomodate me in a nice little mansion (aka: flat) in the outskirts of Kawasaki, which is about 6km from my university in Japan (about 20 minutes on the train) and about 30 minutes from Yokohama, again a city I know little about, was promised something there and so far have been shot in the stomach by a certain little miss ignoremelots over there. I hope to good I run into her in her place of work, I hope I make it look catastrpophic as well - especially if she refuses to acknowledge I exists. For I am okaykusama now. Haha. Oh well, that's another story for another day.

26 hours and no sleep, so I'm off to bed to nurse a bit of this jet-lag. Jaa ne.

All change in Japan. Or is it?

2009-08-30T17:42:00.009+01:00

Well today (or tonight) Japan has decided to shoot themselves in the foot by electing Yukio Hatoyama as the new Prime Minister. The news is impressive because it ousts the LDP (Liberal Democratic Party) after over 60 years in power. The DJP (the democratic party of Japan) has won with a land-slide victory, ushering a rather uneasy change and shift in political power.

I don't think foreigners need worry though, if anything the new party is going to bend over backwards to make sure Japan gets ruined by foreign influence in Japan, especially from China and Korea.

The BBC however decided to report the party as 'young' and 'vibrant'. A significant change in power, even going as far to compare it to New Labour's election in 1997 and Obama in the US.

I almost choked....

What? Am I reading and understanding this the same way? 'Young' - Hatoyama is in his 60's. 'Vibrant' - Hatoyama is the stiffest most wooden person in the world. A plank has more charisma than he does. So maybe they are 'fresh'. Fresh? Hatoyama's grandfather was a prime minister in the 1950's and he comes from the same political back-scratching background as the staid and corrupt politicians from the dying oligrachy he claims he wants to oust. He studied at the most prestigious university in Japan and holds a PhD from Stanford. Yes, a real socialist, a man of the people.

Hatoyama represents a real worry for Japan, because he is an alternative purely because he is an alternative and nothing more. Embittered and battled current PM, Taro Aso probably offers no answers to Hatoyama's questions but does it not discount the fact that Hatoyama doesn't really know what the correct questions are in the first place. Only late into the election process did the DJP ramp up their own manifesto than simply billing themselves as 'seiken koudai' (a change in government.)

I think Hatoyama's policies are brilliantly shown here (albeit in a LDP advert) where Hatoyama is serving patrons in a ramen restaurant. If you don't know the context, ramen is a highly popular noodle dish that contains many different types of things with many local variants. Japanese people are very proud of their local ramen and what goes into their ramen.

Woman: Excuse me.
Hatoyama: Ah welcome. Its been a long-time. You know, I'm not just some mouth-piece, I'm working on some policies.
Woman: Well, can you please show me them?
Hatoyama: This restaurant's specialty! Which is my manifesto!　It is the one thing that will win me the election. *shows her a giant ramen dish*
First customer: Ah, there's not enough oil in this! (a reference to his attitude to potential dwindling fuel imports from the Middle-east)
Hatoyama: Don't worry, I'll add some oil.
Second customer: Err, excuse me. Should you being use that much oil?
Hatoyama: Ah okay. I'll stop adding oil.
Third customer: This is has no local flavour to it? (reference to the decentralisation of the government in rural areas.)
Hatoyama: Ah here you go, look. *adds various vegetables*
Fourth customer: There is no taste to this don't ya think?
Hatoyama: Ah, here you go look. *adds salt and soy-sauce*
Fifth customer: Please make this easier even for a child to understand.
Hatoyama: Well then.... I'll just sprinkle 26,000 yen's worth of furikake onto this. (furikake is a type of dried seaweed that you sprinkle as condiment. 26,000 refers to the potential tax increases as result of increasing child benefit costs)
Woman: Wait a minute. Isn't that a completely different dish from the beginning?
Hatoyama: No, no. This is the thing I showed you at the beginning.
Woman: Really?

Slogan: Just opposing the opposition, makes nobody happy.

Policies that do not sway. The LDP.

Adventures in Edinburgh

2009-08-22T22:28:00.004+01:00

And thus it begins. Three weeks to go and I guess I should really get going and start to obtain the holy-grail for Japan. My student visa. I had my certificate of eligibility ready and was primed to turn it into a visa. To do this I had to visit the consulate in Edinburgh rather than the fancy one in London like everyone else because I am true northerner.

Edinburgh was a place of what might have been, given the fact that I once applied there to study Japanese but got rejected. (I still maintain that I would be a Manchester student had they not decided to reject me without interview.) So given this fact, it was curious to see what I would make of Edinburgh proper in all its glory.

The first day that welcomed me however wouldn't leave me with an overwhelming positive initial impression as it pissed it down in true British summer style with the run slewing down the cobbled streets and bouncing of the pavement. It was also pretty cool with the wind not biting off the Firth of Forth but leaving the air with a clear mild chill about it, the weather itself lacking the sort of mild summer heat you get in England.

Overall, Edinburgh seemed like a rather grey and drab Victorian city, that slopes up and down (although as a Sheffield student - these hills seemed rather tame.) True, the views from the top of the castle were stunning as you look out onto the Firth but I was constantly thinking about the relative size of the city. Admittedly, I was going on the basis of central Edinburgh but on a whole it appeared rather small as a capital city, and is dwarfish to somewhere like Glasgow.

Edinburgh castle (d'oh!)

At this time of year, the city is overran by summer tourism plus the onslaught of those coming to the annual festival. Perhaps I'm being a little harsh in hindsight, given the circumstances of when I went, but it was pretty fecking busy and very annoying when you are trying to find the Japanese consulate only having to stop in the middle of a street because a large group of Indian tourists want to take a picture.

Seriously... tourists, especially those from abroad are just annoying. I don't mind fellow Scots and other Brits doing the tourist thang there, because they at least know how to handle the rule of the land - which is don't get the way of other people. The tourist scene would haunt me for quite a while as I seldom heard a Scottish accent for the first few hours I was in the city.

So onwards to my hotel, which was located just North of Princes street (the main street in Edinburgh) and situated rather conveniently in a quite plush area of the city. My hotel had the advantage of being next door to a Russian greengrocers, a Dutch art-museum and a Korean restaurant. Ideal if you wake up the middle of the night wanting some kimchee and have an urge to view Van Gough whilst chewing on some spitting tobacco from Murmansk.

Because I had arrived pretty late due to a combination of a train-delay and waiting for the absolutely shocking weather to subside, I decided to get my visa at the consulate the following morning once my house was in order and I had located where I needed to go. Nothing worse that routing around for a place you don't know in the middle of Scottish rain. If for whatever reason you live in God's country (aka the North) and you need to go to the Japanese consulate in Edinburgh (for JET interview); you would do best to follow my advice.

1. Head out from Edinburgh Waverly station taking the exit out onto Princes Street.
2. Climb the monstrously large stairs that takes you up to the road, avoiding the hoard of American tourists with those annoying small hand luggage that could house a Chihuahua.
3. Turn left following the tram-line that should be on your left-hand side (or what is currently the tram-line being constructed)
4. Keep going past the JD sports, Boots and tacky tourist shops.
5. Soon, the road should diverge into three ways, there is a street called Queensberry Road which is the middle of all these three roads. Take this road.
6. Head up this road and pass a Clydesdale Bank on your left.
7. Soon you will come to a road that leads to the left, which is called Melville Street.
8. Turn left down this road. You'll know if its the right road because its full of embassies and consulates. The Taiwanese one is the first one you should see. There is also the Italian and Russians ones down here to.
9 Carry on down this road passing the classy law-firms. You should see a giant Church in the distance.
10. The consulate is to the right of the church, and obviously has a large Japanese flag outside.
11. Cross the road and ring the door-ball to get in.
12. Get your visa. Its like going to the bank and making a withdrawal.

Well the entire process of getting a visa took me all but 5 minutes. I arrived at 9.30am and there was only me and a security guard for company. It was all rather amusing tbh. The place is tiny and like I say is just a small bank with loads of Japanese writing. It has the stiffy air of Japanese beaucracy about it.

Well I now lose my passport for 5 working days and paid £10.80 for the processing and postage of my passport with visa. So I am now on tenderhooks until the passport comes back. It shold be back by Next Monday, which leaves only 13 days before I actually leave!

After the antics of the night before I was slightly worried that I would miss getting to the consulate on time. I actually 'ran into' my ex-girlfriend, well this is a bit of mis-story. I dated for her about 2 months sometime after leaving my serious girlfriend of two and half years and was probably the last romantic interest of note until girlwhohappenstoignoremeonadailybasis showed up. Plus, it wasn't an accident, I knew from a friend she would be in Edinburgh and decided it would be nice to meet up. Anyways, she was in Edinburgh due to the festival and has been working for a theatre company since she graduated from York Uni last year. We went to a few bars, caught up, talked about the past three years since we last saw each other (!) and I avoided getting terribly drunk and saying something stupid (normally do that when I'm sober tbh.) I did however, make a promise to see her show, which I horribly agreed to in that pastiche English way and then tumbled back to my digs down the famed Edinburgh slope and past the Russian 'magazheen' and into my bed. Rather weirdly despite the five pints I consumed I didn't feel drunk or dizzy but one thing was for certain I could not sleep on that bed at all. I'm a stickler when it comes to new sleeping environments they are a pain. Upon waking up and going to the consulate, I felt fine but upon returning home the hangover kicked in, in some weird delayed Scottish reaction.

It was a shame because I couldn't use my gift. A nice Celtic designed hip-flask and a bottle of Glenfiddich. Oh yes! That baby is going to do me well in Tokyo when I need to kill a few braincells due to the crushing weight of expectation.

Overall the experience of Edinburgh has actually taught me some curious things.

1. Edinburgh was clearly not better than Sheffield. Screw you UCAS.

2. I hate tourists and crowds but then I'm going to Tokyo... let's just hope that there aren't that many annoying tourists there. I guess the distance would mean I'm less likely to run into Spanish or French teenagers talking really loud and cutting past you on the street.

3. Its going to take a while to adjust to sleeping on a really shitty bed.

4. Alcohol is not my best friend. But then again its probably my closest friend.

5. Meeting ex-girlfriends can be fun.

6. I actually don't give two shits about women anymore. Especially ones from Japan.

7. They actually ID you in Edinburgh city centre. They ID'ed my ex (she is pretty petite though) and then a couple of girls got refused service for not being able to prove their age.

8. Alcohol can affect you 24 hours later. Possibly just Scottish alcohol though.

9. Japanese visas are easy to get; provided you filled out all the forms correctly (I failed to fill one section right and had to put 'n/a' on the form. (!)

10. Edinburgh is still ridiculously far from Middlesbrough. Just under 3 hours.

Gaijin Invasion

2009-08-19T16:25:00.004+01:00

Yes its been overused by the lovable internet community and those going to or living in Japan. But I don't care. I remember watching this the first time it came out as a BBC three launch programme (!) and laughed myself silly.

So altogether now;

We'll I've been to a lot places in this big ol' world but I've never seen a place like this,

The buildings are kinda tall and the people are kinda small
And everybody eats a lot of fish

The streets are pretty busy, it can make you awful dizzy
When you're trying to find your way around

So here's a little rhyme, You can use it all the time
When you're lost in Tokyo town

[※ Wakarimashita
Wakarimasen
Wakarimasu ka?

Ah, doko desu ka?
Itsu desu ka
Nani desu ka?]

Its a fascinating city but it looks a little shitty
When its raining and its grey

When the sun's gone sinking and the lights are all a blinking
And baby it looks okay

Well they say its futuristic but its also innovistic
Its a contradictory place

When I'm walking through Shibuya, feel like singing Hallelujah
Even though theres limited space

※ Repeat

Omotesando!
Ikebukuro!
Shinjuku!
Harajuku!
Meguro!
Hibiya!
Roppongi!
Ginza!
Ebisu!
Mita!
Ueno!
Akebanebashi!

※ Repeat

Suimiiiiiimaaaaasseeeeeen!

Why I love Japan

2009-08-19T01:13:00.007+01:00

Recently I keep getting asked or often yelled at people "Why do you hate Japan", normally after that a "OMG" is added. These people often have no chin and tend to have no soul or sense of humour as well.

Now whilst I do enjoy a good ol' rant against Japan and Japanese related things now and again, I never said I hated Japan - so that's a clear illusion. I mean why spent all those ten minutes of life creating a blog with the word Japan in the title and rag on Japan, unless I was some sort of Chinese historical revisionist site.

To lighten the mood a bit against my previous no-holds bar rant against something Japan related here's why I actually like Japan and Japanese and why I am spending so much of my life doing what I do (even though it kills me somedays.)

1. Japan is actually quite a nice country. yes it has its bad-points but its one of the more advanced nations on the planet and is theoretically westernised. Its got a great eco-system and has nice weather compared to the UK.

2. Japanese people are very patient towards people like me who stumble around the language and culture despite a greta urge to learn more from it. They respond deeply to the inner souls and harmony of the group in Japan and have deeper respect other people because of it - unlike the UK with tends to shit over everyone else for the sake one big-headed twat. They do customer service as an art-form.

3. The language fascinates me. I find the language perplexing difficult and somedays I wish God hadn't invented keigo or kanji - but on somedays I just find myself wanting to learn new kanji and vocab and really start learning new stuff about the language, i find delving into the roots and backgrounds of words utterly fascinating.

4. The culture and history fascinates me. Japan is an enigma. One giant question mark that makes us want to keep asking questions. We never find the answers of course, but that's not the point. Its seeing the cultural and social idiosynracries work that makes you want to know more, but without ever the desire to completely understand it.

5. Japan offers me a future. Or at least a gateway to a wider world. It has offered me a large social life, both here and in Japan, it has increased my job-prospects and given me a much wider view of the world. by appreciating Japan, I can appreictae myself more.

6. Japan is the home of the zany, cool and the future of the world's technolgical advancements. Its home of the PS3, the Sony, the Panasonics of the world. Its leading the way foward with robotics and is a home for the world of tomorrow. To be a part of the technoligical future is exciting.

7. Japanese people are awesome. Yes the girls are cute and the guys are laidback crazy but you won't find any more insane people in the world. They are diverse mix of rock-dudes, fashion chicks, smart guys and gals and the absolute originals in this world. In short, they are really friendly and nice people.

8. The public transport system kicks arse! Its nearly always on time, and the trains go everywhere and anywhere. Well compared to the UK, its actually decent!

9. The food is the best in the world. Katsudon? Sushi? Ramen? Udon?

10. Japan, despite its flaws and everything else is still something so far from home. It is my academic love and my social interest and bond. And that is why I love it.

For everything I moan about Japan, there is just enough that keeps me wanting more. there are far too many things I could list about Japan that I really like. I never got the whole 'hate' thing though. Sure I can rant, but that's not hate, that's vicious scorn. Hating is like hating a child, you sure as hell can't say you favour it over your other children and you love it in equal measure as everything else. Its all about balance in my life, a balance that Japan is apart of; not simply a formation of.

I ♥ 日本

PS: there is not bit of sarcasm in this post.

Do not let me into your kitchen.

2009-08-19T00:53:00.005+01:00

Normally on a Tuesday night, I'm sat in my local furrowing my brow over questions about the length of the Gold Gate bridge or other such nonense. However this Tuesday, for the first time in 6 weeks was slightly different as I spent it cold and alone by myself watching my football team try and beat Scunthorpe United. We succeeded btw. 2-0.

Now even though I am currently seeking a compassionate loving girlfriend, yes I know its hard to believe that a stud like me is semi-single; but I do think I would make someone a good boyfriend, husband, whatever. I can take care of myself, I can cook, clean (just about) and can pay the bills on time (well almost.)

To increase my international standing in the world of the culinary art-form, I decided to cook myself a spicy keema and wild rice (I forget the name, but it sounded damn exotic and would have been sure fire bonus if I had a girlfriend.)

Despite the wonder that cooking shall bring, it begin with a bit of a disaster as I discovered some idiot had accidentally frozen my lamb mince, meaning I had to hack it to pieces and fry to solid baked heaven in the frying pan by chiseling it pieces with a small knife.

Soon after 10 minutes my furious stabbing techniques had allowed me to break up the mince and get the stuff cooking. Add a little bit of chickpeas and vegetables and then some spice-mix and water and then shazam… we are cooking. I then decided to make myself some wild-rice to go with this spicy mincey little concoction but on a quick discovery in the cupboards some idiot (presumably the same idiot who stuck my mince in the freezer) decided to use all the small pans. So there I am using a gigantic pan to shove my tiny segement of rice into. I felt sorry for these small portions of rice all huddled together in this large brooding metallic cavern of a pot.

As the rice was cooking, I prepared some roti bread to go with my meal. Creating bread brings back those childhood memories of getting stuck in, creating a load of mess with the dough and rolling it around and having a laugh. But when you are an adult, the prospect of mess in a kitchen usually brings you out in a cold rash. I preceded to roll the mixture with the water until it was nice and gooey but then unconsciously started rolling it out onto the kitchen top, which I then noticed was covered with small semi-frozen molecules of lamb mince that I had been chiseling from minutes earlier. Oh dear. A quick flick of the wrists and small pinch and all this food hygiene business is swept under the table.

Once I had made a giant ball of dough, I then separated it out into 4 balls and left them on the side. My rice was done. On closer inspection, the rice had absorbed up most of the water but was still a bit too gooey rather than fluffy. However any excess moisture was to be soaked up the keema sauce

I rolled out the balls on a hastily cleaned chopping board but then forget the basic rule of dough: You gotta flour. Yep the frigging thing kept sticking and even though I laboriously chucked several tons of flour on the dough, rolling pin and board it continued to stick. Ah nuts to this. I kneaded it out in my hand creating a small palm shaped mini-pitta bread sized blob of dough and throw it on my second frying pan.

Now I discovered another problem. The pan I used to cook the keema in is pretty big and takes up half of the hob, so I ended up with trying to squeeze two frying pans together onto the hobs, which covered up the buttons, leaving me to anxiously dip my fingers under one of the pans to turn up/down the heat. Thankfully, I avoided burning off my finger-tips.

The results were the following;

Looks alright doesn't it?

In hindsight the keema came out slightly too thick and it congealed on the side of the frying pan, leaving really strong burnt bits of sauce stuck to the bits of keema. it passed the taste test however - it didn't taste of rotting lamb arse or frozen sheep turd.

The rota oth, ended up being small doughy bread but it still tasted good.

Hmmm. Well even this scruffy bearded sonofabitch likes it;

Overall it was an edible meal and one which I won’t be making again. Not least because of the inevitable food poisoning I will contract tomorrow. I think I'll stick my chosen classics in the future and not stray to far from what I know best. Still its good to increase my knowledge of world food and new techniques for poisoning my enemies.

Shindokuo - my new enemy

2009-08-15T00:07:00.014+01:00

"Narrow minds devoid of imagination. Intolerance, theories cut off from reality, empty terminology, usurped ideals, inflexible systems. Those are the things that really frighten me. What I absolutely fear and loathe."

- Murakami Haruki - Kafka on the shore.

Recently I'm getting slightly sick of these dreamers with narrow minds who think they can waltz into Japan and change it in someway. They are invariably the hapless idealists, a loose mashing of the wapanese and those nonsense do-gooders who like scratching around the floor on their backside, sticking their failed sociology degree nose up the rectum of other people's business. Japan seems to be suffering from a tremendous bout of illness which has manifested itself as 'Ignorance of Japan' - which for today's analysis I am labelling 'Japgornace' for nothing more but stylistic effect.

You see Japgornace is a disease, borne out of the remnants of nihonjinron which has worked its way across the continent and mutated alongside a distorted ideology of self-hate, loathing and anger towards ones own culture and way of life which itself is borne out of our own British colonial values and opinions.

We (and by we I mean British, sorry Americans, Australians and whoever) have longed for centuries to escape our rainy grey and sodden island and seek pleasurable avenues elsewhere. It surprises me somewhat why people would choose Japan as the vehicle for self-fulfilment and discovery. Out of all the wonderful little micro-nations and despotic tin-pot states across the globe; Mautirius, Suriname, Hong Kong - they sound unbelievably decadent, warm, exotic and so distant from this little place we call home in the UK. Japan has become the new 'popstar destination' for many travellers and academics purely for its low crime levels and isolated history and culture.

The sad fact is those who choose to leave the UK and undertake their cathartic lovespan to Japan, do so without ever realising the harsh realities of what this undertakes. Those who have undertaken the academic path to Japan travel on the err of cynicism, but do so with some level grounding in culture. Those that go on the blind romantic whim can always be turned loose but can fall on solid ground. But these are not my enemies, these are not the persona non gratis that are boiling my stomach bile. These are my friends, these are my pals, my buddies, my classmates, my nakama. My vehicle of hate is driven by the passengers of 'Japgornace'.

Recently, it is something I take with relish to abash these shamelessly wild of the mark proclamations about Japan and the Japanese. Its a nauseating whirl of sickness from people who are genetically engineered from the bones of otaku who seem to believe every Japanese girl looks like an anime character and wrapped around the meaty fleshy statements that the Japanese are the most wackiest and sexual obfuscated people in the world because they once stumbled upon a youtube link of a man inserting a probe shaped like a daikon upon a Labrador's anus. Its the same crass banality spouted from people with the intelligence of a grape and who think "Mock the Week" is the funniest thing on TV. Its not even nauseating. Nausea makes you sick. But my stomach is full of a sticky translucent glop of hate and anger that all I can do is perpetually choke on for hours on end.

Its not as if, I truly despise these people to the point of recruiting a lynch-mob, after all they can be contained, studied and frequently laughed at by a snobbish elite made up of myself and my imaginary Japanese friend called Takao. They are not the 'enemie totale' as they pose no risk or disturbance to Japan from a security level point of view. It is the new breed of nipponfilia, the so called "Shindokuo （新独男）" who actually intend to come to Japan, settle here, learn Japanese yet all the while believe and propogate these nonsense ideas about Japan to be true that is the biggest worry for the security of Japan's future.

I now seem to spend my darkest nights roaming the Internet, like a one-man crusade promoting the tyranny of the 'real' world to these people. Defending my corner against theories that believe Japan is one giant melting pot of fortune and wealth, where a foreigner can earn a shit load of money by teaching English, live in a three storey condominium in central Tokyo and have every piece of J-girl dousing themselves on their knees just to suck your fat juicy western cock.

If you have read up this point with no register of humour in your frontal lobe or shred of irony coursing its way through your veins, let me kill a few million illusions for you in a para second.

1. Thousands of soulless folks go to Japan every year and teach (read: 'speak' English.) You are not new, you are not different, you are not 'significant'. You are a stamp, you are a gaijin card, you are nothing but a katakana name with many individual hopes and desires but absolutely no outside reality. You are not different, you are not special. Everyone does not have a right to love you.

2. Tatemae and honne are essential in Japan to explaining why everyone can hate you. Japanese politeness is far firmer than British sensibilities but it still doesn't absolve a Japanese person for hating you, especially because you are either a 'shindokuo', 'gaijin' or simply 'an absolute wanker'. Just because the Japanese act polite doesn't mean they do so because they like you and are naturally attracted to you in someway.

3. Japan is hitting a recession. Japan is not in 1982. You cannot come to Japan with no qualifications, speak English and expect a fat pay-check. You are not a member of the Japanese Diet with an expense account.

4. Japanese is a hard language. I don't care if you've done JLPT level 4 and know 50 kanji and the kana and then think its easy. Congratulations, you are now at the level of a Japanese toddler. And the toddler probably has better bladder function than you do.

5. You don't need to speak Japanese to live/work in Japan. Maybe, maybe not. It all boils down to laziness, and if you are a shindokuo, you probably too critical to think of Japan as being a foreign country where they speak an entirely different language. You have probably never ventured to any country besides your own and have absolutely no understanding of the wider world. Japan is not an English speaking country believe it or not.

6. You don't need a degree to work in Japan. Well neither does a Filipino prostitute or a Korean labourer. And if you have this attitude, I really hope you spend the rest of your nights in Japan, sucking up salaryman cum in Kabukicho and working on a farm fertilising sheep in the middle of pile of a cow-shit on a Toyama farm in the summer heat.

It doesn't surprise me in many ways that shindokuo are mostly stereotypical obese wapanese/otaku who work in a petrol station convenience store spending their dreary nights reading some nondescript lolicon manga and opining for the dream day when all that hard-earned cash they have saved up, they can go to Japan and find a Japanese wife to translate their latest Shonen-Jump for them. They mostly don't have a degree, have no understanding of Japanese culture, history, society or more saliently; the language and ultimately they have no desire to climb the social moblity ladder, except in Japan - which offers that free of charge to every foreigner who comes through Narita immigration. In short, they know as much about Japan and the outside world as I do about the history of the Vanuatu's economic policies before the second world war. They wish to change Japan for the better, somehow believe that Japan is in need of a rigorous overhaul that they have the ultimate answer to and to which can only be resolved by the industrious economic input of someone who has spent their natural lives taking stock of the Mars bar collection.

Get a life, get a degree, and grow the fuck up. Japan owes you nothing, and you owe it diddly squat.

To shamelessly use the words of a famous art-exhibition in Scotland;

Kill your timid notion.

Mstrkrft has saved my sex-life!

2009-08-13T01:17:00.004+01:00

Please follow these instructions, if you are feeling sad, lonely, depressed or isolated;

1. Turn the volume and bass up on your speakers as loud as you can.

2. Prepare some vodka and mixer ready to drink. Put in a whiskey glass for effect. Get lots of ice too.

3. If possible find a nice girl to dance with, its okay to dance on your own though. We all know we are all sad lonely bastards on the internet.

4. Play the following video

5. Dance

6. If anyone asks you to turn it down. Tell them to shut the fuck up and dance.

Its fair to say Mstrkrft have saved my life in many ways. I'm torn twisted by the inactivity of this curious little girl in Japan - who said these wonderful things about missing me and now can't even be bothered to let me know she is okay after 3 earthquakes in a week in Japan. Oh well. At least I'll always have Mstrkrft. They'll never abandon me. Japan or no Japan.

Flights to Japan

2009-08-07T00:50:00.002+01:00

You may notice one of the link on the side of my blog:

http://www.his-euro.co.uk

HIS Europe are a Japanese travel agents who for want of a better word are 'awesome'. If anyone is thinking of going to Japan for a year to study/teach/sodomise young girls then I would recommend the above company. I booked a return flight for Japan for £499 with that company. Far cheaper than anywhere else I looked and they were lighting quick to respond to my request.

Beats STA travel by about some margin. So check them out.

Okay, shameless plug end.

year abroad update (pt. 634a)

2009-08-07T00:25:00.005+01:00

This week I've been having something of a recurring dream. I am sat alone in a windowless room, my arms tied behind my back and my legs strapped to a wooden chair and my mouth gagged with an oily rag. The chair is moist and the room smells of an acrid ammonia. I look upwards and see a gigantic chrysanthemum staring back me.

As I look closely, my eyes squinting due to this overpowering smell of ammonia, I notice that it has a nose, in fact I can make out two eyes and even a mouth. Slowly but surely a see a gap form amongst the small twiny little flower petals. And yes indeed, suddenly, a mouth forms and begins to speak to me. Yet nothing actually comes out from under its little gap of a mouth. It lets out a sigh, a sort of distempered little outtake of breath and with a slight adjustment its rotund flowery little face turns into disappointment and suddenly becomes distorted turning into a clear frowning face. The once neutral expression of this giant chrysanthemum has suddenly turned very sad. Once again its mouth opens and the little sides of its mouth open slighter wider and it draws itself in to my oily stained mouth and sweating forehead.

As it leans over, examining my curious sweating forehead, sat alone tied to this chair in this windowless room it looks as its about to whisper something into my ear;

Wake..... up.....
Its...... time.....

And that is when my dream ends. I return to normality and recover my consciousness and discover that I am in bed having suffered yet another giant chrysanthemum related dream.

Things have hit the ground running since Monday after I finally, yes finally received my certificate of eligibility from Japan. I've now booked the time off in 2 weeks to go to Edinburgh to turn this tiny bit of paper into my magical Visa that allows me into Japan.

Things are mostly a go now. All my flights are booked and barring any mishaps I should be in Tokyo in the 14th of September. I'm flying from Newcastle to Heathrow on the 13th and then on from Heathrow to Japan. I'll then be staying a hotel close to Shinjuku and then the next day I'm ready to head down to Seijo - to start my life as an exchange student there.

Thankfully Seijo have spared me the indignity of being poor in Japan, and barring me going to the stripclubs and soaplands on a regular basis, I should be okay for money. My rent works out at around £140 a month. Which is just fantastic really. Especially for Tokyo. My classes start on the 24th and I begin life as a foreigner on the 18th when I register as a fully fledged gaijin.

I'm pretty scared now, because its less than 6 weeks away and I am lost in a torrent of emotions and chrysanthemum related dreams. This year is going to be insane, and I mean that in various literal and non-literal senses.

PS: if you are confused by the chrysanthemum - its one of the national symbols of the Japanese state.

More woes and 6 weeks to go.

2009-07-28T13:47:00.003+01:00

Still no Certificate of Eligibility. At this rate I could create a dramatic symposium about its life story. What is deeply worrying me is the fact that it takes around a week to process the visa and then I need to book various things like plane tickets and travel insurance. This would be fine, if only if it wasn't for the nagging dates creeping up on me. I leave the UK in 6 weeks and so far I have done nothing. I can't do anything. How can I book my plane tickets, if I don't have the document that says I am entitled to be in Japan? It would be a waste of 600 quid. I've been told, don't book unless you have this golden ticket and so far I don't. I even don't know where I'm going to be living....

.....in 6 WEEKS!

I'm tempted to see if I can actually enroll in classes in Japan as an exchange student with the bizarre addendum of not actually residing in Japan.

Hoo-de-fucking-hum

Still no news...

2009-07-27T19:58:00.003+01:00

.. and yet the world keeps on turning. Yes it just keeps on turning.

Still no Certificate of Eligibility (*grumble* *grumble*) If it doesn't arrive tomorrow, I'm going to go medieval and send off some e-mails.

So to liven up my mood a little here's another one of my favourite little niche bands at the minute. The utterly pick up and listen: "Two Door Cinema Club"

year abroad update

2009-07-26T17:28:00.002+01:00

Its been a while since I blogged about my year abroad in Japan (some 6 to 7 weeks away I reckon.)

To show how completely unprepared I am, here's how Project Year Abroad Japan stands at the moment.

Certificate of Eligibitly? Nope.
Student Visa? Nope
Plane tickets? Nope
Accommodation in Japan sorted? Nope
Travel Insurance? Nope
Shipping costs evaluated? Nope
Extra Japanese studying done? Nope

So there we go, I've done nothing so far to contribute to the Year Abroad. Quite frankly, I can't be arsed booking plane tickets and possible hostels at the minute. As I've said over and over again it just seems like one big pain in the logistical arse.

If things do go to plane and I can be bothered then I will possibly fly out on either the 6th or 13th of September. Hopefully the CoE will arrive tomorrow, meaning I have to get up early. I'm still a bit annoyed at the uni I'm going to. I still haven't had explicit info on when we can arrive in Japan (thankfully the girl I'm going with had the hindsight to ask and has now booked her plane tickets.) I also don't know where I'm going to be living next year. Its all quite frustrating giving the fact it takes 5 working days to send documents to and from Japan. Time is not our side. Admittedly they only have a few international students, but that doesn't mean they can leave us in the lurch like this.

Anyways, I'll reserve criticism and/or judgement until I get there. It still hasn't sunk in yet. I haven't made any plans whatsoever. I honestly don't know what I want to do or see. This is partly due to the entire experience waining somewhat since the two years I started this course. yawnage. I just want to eat some good ramen again, you know?

We Have Band

2009-07-26T16:21:00.008+01:00

My favourite new sound at the minute is coming from a fantastic little trio called 'We Have Band' - sounds like a kitsch English punk band with a love of Japlish, but sadly its not, its something a bit more hopeful for my future Ipod playlist.

I thought the comparisons with 'Hot Chip' are a little off the mark, as they certainly have their own unique little identity to them. I can't quite put my mark on where on the electro-rock scale they fall and if I was hastily drawn into making a definition, they would probably fall flat into the centre of 'electro-rock band' or 'rock-electro-band'.

I can't think of too many bands that are happy to throw in bizarre Russian lyrics into their songs (as was the case with the brilliant 'Time After Time' which featured the vocals of Yulia B. and the remixing of Pavel Khvaleev.)

The killer off their upcoming eponymous album (due to be released on the 15th of September) is the amazing 'Hear it in the Cans' which just about sums up the complex dilemma of this rock-electro scaling system in the music industry today. Finally, the song 'Oh!' - exactly as it sounds, will leave you with a feeling of being chased down a large spiral staircase by a floating ghost to this haunting yet subtle melody.

The icing on the cake is their fantastic dub remix of Bloc Party's Halo (kudos to Cannibal Cheerleader.)

Mercury Music Prize 2009 nominations

2009-07-21T17:26:00.004+01:00

The Mercury Music Prize nominations are out today.

I'm really happy that Bat for Lashes got some recognition, as I'm a big fan of her work. Her music reminds me of the Chromatics, which isn't exactly a bad thing at all. She'll also be appearing in Sheffield in October.

Bat for Lashes - Daniel

Friendly Fires, I'm not such a great fan of, although I certainly don't hate their stuff. I've heard a few of their songs remixed, which do sound a lot better than the originals. Their stuff has seemingly been around for ages (or maybe that's just me.)

Kasabian are probably the biggest name out of the list. And they have been around for ages. "West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum" is their third studio album after their quite disappointing 2nd album "Empire". I think the new album is a welcome return to their old stuff which is kinda good.

My vote is however torn between two artists:

The Invisible and La Roux.

The Invisible are probably the lesser of these two artists but without a doubt one of the biggest sounds out there. Its like a marvelous melange of electro, pop, funk, jazz and RnB. I am just in love with their stuff at the minute.

The Invisible - London Girl

Following on is the enigmatic La Roux, whom I first discovered on the Kitsune Maison volumes with their track 'Quicksand' remixed by the electro-magicians Autokratz. Listening to their stuff unremixed sounds a little snoozy Sunday waltz through the shores of elctropop-ville with a bottle of cognac and some valium. I thought that 'Quicksand' without Autokratz shifting the vocals and composition around was a little flat, but I have been reasonably impressed with her other stuff suck as the brilliant tune 'Bulletproof'. La Roux seems to be the bookies favourite at the moment, and in most years it tends to go to the more renowned artists (Elbow, Arctic Monkeys, Klaxons.) So potentially Kasabian could steal in here. However there is nothing to suggest an unlikely winner from Speech Debelle or Sweet Billy Pilgrim.

So there we go. My heart wants it to be The Invisible - purely just so they get some short-lived recognition (although, I would far want them to stay a bit esoteric) whereas La Roux is the more natural choice. I am however, completely biased towards my preference to electro music however.

シンプソンズだ！

2009-07-21T05:07:00.004+01:00

At the moment, I'm watching the Simpsons, yes the Simpsons in Japanese, yes that's right... Japanese. *ahem* Anyway, it sounds strange, but it really really helps when you can recite the lines in English ad verbatim and then see how they fit into the Japanese style translation. Its also useful for vocab as I'm picking up words through known context of the episodes.

Anyways, its really strange hearing the voices of Marge, Homer, Bart et al done in Japanese. In many ways, the Japanese voices are eerily similar to that of the voices in English. You see in Japan, voice-actors (声優 - seiyuu) are artists next to major movie stars, authors and sports-stars. With the massive proliferation of the animated art-form, people who provide voices for a cartoon are simply not niche actors - they make a tidy profit out of the business.

Chief Wiggum's voice is typically nasal (not unlike the robust deep gravelly accent in the French syndication) and Krusty's is neigh on spot on. Even in japanese, you can also hear the clear Mr Burns intonation in the voices. But Marge's voice is so damn highpitched and squeaky in the Japanese version of the show. If you are a fan of the show, you'll know that Marge is anything but high-pitched and squeaky. She sounds like she's just smoked a packet of several Marlborough cigarettes. That's my one main gripe with the Japanese version so far. The rest is well done. The seiyuu working on the Simpsons have done a fine job. They have taken the original and attempted to rework the original sounds of the characters albeit suited more to a Japanese eardrum.

Given the fact that the Simpsons is an American comedy, many of the jokes can't cross over well - this is more so in the latter seasons where the cultural references are far more explicit than in the earlier works (which are some of the finest TV programming in history imho.) Even some of the jokes still fall on deaf ears towards us British viewers who need a slightly more in-depth working of American pop culture - but for these misses it delivers mostly quality hits we can laugh at. Although we obviously don't share these same references we do of course get the added bonus of the language - in which we get to hear the Simpsons in its truest form. That is to say the English language and the wonderful voices of Dan Castanella, Hank Azaria and co.

I always think its interesting how TV programmes in Japan are often repackaging and sold off to the west and horribly misconstrued and badly translated. One of my favourites is a show called Crayon Sin-chan (クレヨンしんちゃん) which is about a little boy living in Japan who always gets up to crazy hijinks. (Trust me its a killer.) Unfortunately, this show has been shown several times in the west as Shin Chan, and the dubbing is simply horrendous. In the English version, several jokes play on the fact of Shin Chan's crude behaviour rather than his very clever wordplay. Many of those who would encounter this programme would think it to be a very banal and basic Japanese cartoon about a rude little boy. But sadly its anything but. It has some funny gags in it, based entirely around the comedic use of wordplay in Japanese. For example, one episode sees Shin-Chan playing junior football at his school. In arguing with the opposing keeper about how Shin-Chan can't score past him, the goalie remarks about his tetsu no kabe - lit. 'the wall of steel.' However, Shin-chan mistakenly hears this as ketsu no kabe - lit. 'a wall of butt-cheeks.' and promptly imagines the keeper mooning every shot that gets fired at him, much to the goalie's chagrin.

You see this is how Shin-chan works. He is an essential master of the word-pay and cultural misrepresentations purely associated with Japan and the Japanese language. I think its impossible to translate and doing so just gives the show an entire kick in the balls, because it loses the magic of why it is so great in Japan. Can you image the Simpsons being mutated into something that deviated from the original intentions of the American writers?

As I've said earlier, I think they've done a good job translating it, but some of the jokes and wordplays even in Japanese fails, leaving many Japanese to become quite confused over that is happening. I suppose it becomes a difficult line to draw when you are stuck between keeping things truthful as a translator and sizing up the relevancy and accuracy of what you are translating. I don't why it is but I am drawn to watching the Simpsons in Japanese, but then horribly turned off whenever I see a game or anime dubbed into English.

I think its a clear connection of how the world works in this equation. The Japanese simply do voice-acting better than we do. And I think that is down to the rich heritage of the format in that part of the world. We simply can't compete in terms of market stakes.

However, in the land where the noble seiyuus are lauded, its not always a bed of roses. You may of course remember that the Simpsons branched out into their own little movie. I've just watched it on blu-ray and I still think its freaking hilarious. Now, you'd think if Fox decided to realise this in Japan, they would use the voice-actors who have been doing this show in Japanese for the past few years?

You'd be wrong. In fact Fox decided to switch the actors for the movie. Japan probe takes up the rest of this story.

The little clique of diehard fans (the show is very much a niche show over there, same way many anime shows are over here) were naturally outraged and thus began long standing campaigns to get the original voice actors back. Can you image if they made a movie of a long-standing TV show in the UK and then decided to replace the original cast of that TV show with celebrities in order to appeal to a wider audience on cinematic release?

Anyways, you may notice a lot of Japanese on the Simpsons from time to time. I'm thinking the one where they go to Japan and also the one where Homer phones Japan. Let me tell you, they keep it real. They don't mess about and the Japanese they speak and show is spot-on. Its fantastic attention to detail, although I think this partly due to some of the writers being Japanese-American. (Ken Tsumara who worked on the earlier seasons for example as well producer Richard Sakai.) You'd think with such indepth knowledge and attention to detail for the English audiences, they would allow the same level of detail and continuance for the Japanese?

Have you some time for me, then I'll sing a song for you...

2009-07-19T23:34:00.005+01:00

I haven't slept for the past few days. I haven't showered for about a week either. All I can hear in my head is the sound of '99 Luftballons' and childhood memories of the Berlin Wall. I'm a nostalgic quivering wreck of nerves, a giant ball of sweaty pubic hair and alcohol fueled vitriol. I'm losing weight thanks to pure laziness and a desire to eat nothing whatsoever. I'm not even depressed. But I'm not even happy either... What the hell is wrong with me?

Hast du etwas Zeit für mich, dann singe ich ein Lied für dich...

Japan is now firmly on the horizon. My certificate of eligibility is winging its way to my doorstep sometime this week (bizarrely my Uni have decided to send it themselves rather than it coming direct from the Japanese government) and now its just up to me to finalise travel dates etc. Whilst I would love to go early, its a matter of studying and preparation. If I was to leave at the end of August or even the first few days of September - I would be going with zero preparation, both mentally and logistically. Simply put I haven't prepared much for Japan. I don't even know what I want to do when I get there. Erm yeah. The entire experience is kinda flat at the minute. Its like I don't care tbh, but at the same time I do but am powerless to change my opinions or mood. I don't know how I'm going to survive out there for a year, leaving the UK behind. I've still yet to feel excited about this. Its feeling like one giant inconvenience.

Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont, hielt man für Ufos aus dem All, darum schickte ein General

Japan is basically like one giant blur on the horizon. Something I've waited for two year but now the entire experience is leaving me with the mood of complete apathy. I'm more interested in leaving the UK and experiencing being a student elsewhere rather than experiencing Japan itself. Japan has just become a friend to me, rather than an intimate lover.

99 Kriegsminister...Streichholz und Benzinkanister.

My Japanese lnguage ability has taken a nosedive of late and I really, REALLY need to start studying again. I've simply forgotten so much and I need to get these fears out of my head. So much kanji, grammar and vocab - I've simply been to preoccupied with wasting time and have neglected the Japanese. My goals have simply not been set.

Well fuck that.

Ließen keinen Platz für Sieger, Kriegsminister gibt's nicht mehr...

That's not gonna keep me down.

Und auch keine Düsenflieger, heute zieh' ich meine Runden....

Because, tomorrow I'm back to these kanji and stomping Japanese to the curb.

Seh' die Welt in Trümmern liegen, Hab' 'nen Luftballon gefunden

You hear me Japanese? You are going to fucking die!!!!

Denk' an dich und lass' ihn fliegen

*ugh* I probably need to get some sleep and possibly a change of song.

Results and other such musings

2009-07-12T23:28:00.004+01:00

Grades are in and after thankfully staying awake until 3am on Friday night, I managed to log into our university's network before everyone else did the following morning and routinely crash the server, giving people a long anxious wait over their results. Its a common occurrence sadly. I do wish they would just e-mail our results via our departments.

Anyway, I was reasonably pleased with the grades, although I felt my score for Classical Japanese was a little poor, but considering I didn't do much work for it and missed a ton of lectures post-Easter, it was more than a justified 2.1, albeit a low one. 2.1 was also my grade for Contemporary Society, again quite surprised but I normally okay on these types of things now. I also somehow managed to pass Japanese Language IV fairly successfully with no major hiccups. So now there is officially nothing stopping me going to Japan next year and then progressing onto my final year of uni.

I just hope in that final year, I can boost my grades somewhat because I am still so close to obtaining a 2.1 overall and need to push myself a little harder on all my subjects on return from Japan. I guess now that the YA looms, I've just gotta hope that I push my Japanese on and improve on my return to Sheffield, one year and a bit from now.

I've calculated that I have about 40 to 50 days until the dreaded Year Abroad, which is absolutely nothing really. The moment July ends, the shit will really hit the fan as then I know that from a month from then, Japan will seem very close. Anyways, I'm still having some huge reservations about the year abroad, some good some bad. The major ones is the lack of info surrounding where I will be living in Japan and secondly the whole rent payment procedures etc. Simply put, I have organised nothing for Japan yet, aside from buying clothes etc. The other little niggly ones are basically about the whole orientating myself in Japan and meeting many new and old friends again.

I'm a little sick of being back home at the moment. Basically because I miss my personal space and time a lot. Its just a compendium of small little things that are slowly building up and irritating me. I just want to do my own things and am annoyed at various little things getting in my way. I'm a person who often just likes to be left alone to get on with things and don't always like the incessant protrusion into my activities throughout the course of the day (and night!)

In many ways, I would love to the leave the UK right now. But I know with nothing planned and with nothing revised (my kanji and vocab list builds up by the day) it would be a pointless endeavour. Ultimately I want my Japanese to reflect the two years worth of hard work I've put in and not just the past 3 months I've wasted.

Mentally I feel a lot more stable, thanks in no part to regular exercise and a medium-to-good diet. This becoming an important process of my summer so far because it is helping keep my mind focused off other things that are causing me a little distress (women, japan, money, my language ability etc.) One of the great paradoxes of life is that we seek some type of end-goal but are less willing to take that journey that allows us to get to that goal. Like a incredibly long run, a huge marathon that we take, its always the final few steps, those final few miles that are the hardest. Right now, I'm about 2 miles away from the finishing line, I've come so far so I can't possibly quit now but these 2 miles seem like 2,000 and I'm fraught with how to deal with them.

However compared to last year, the summer seems to be flying by so far thanks in part to this routine which is keeping me more active and less brain-dead on the computer speaking to some random Japanese girls on MSN. I think coming back late from Sheffield and moving all my stuff out has had a good impact on me, as it was the 14th of June I came back last time and by about late July, I was becoming bored rigid.

Anyways, I'm just waiting for my wonderous certificate of eligiblty to arrive soon - which will allow to get my visa in Edinburgh. Hopefully that should arrive in about 2 weeks from now. And the fun of planning my journey begins!

Jaa ne.

Tesla Boy

2009-07-10T21:47:00.002+01:00

I'm loving this band at the minute. They are an electro-pop band from Russia and are probably going to be cutting it up on dancefloors and radio stations very soon. They are called Telsa Boy and you should probably check them out.

Spirit of the Night

Electric Lady

Why is the 80's electro-funk type stuff so popular these days? Still, you gotta love it! *dances*

Results tomorrow

2009-07-10T15:59:00.006+01:00

Exam results are out tomorrow and to celebrate, I think I am now officially single again. Huzzah! Or at least by default I'm single again. *shrug*

I'm not looking forward to the results quite frankly, and more to the point - I don't care one jot. Not one little bit. Nada. Nothing. In fact, I might not even bother looking up the grades. Its pointless. I've probably failed or possibly scraped a pass. Meh, its only Japanese. I mean its not even that important a language or culture. There I said it. I want to go on a big rant against Japan but I really couldn't be arsed, because I'm still feeling a little sick and a bit sad now that singlehood is back on me. Oh well, should have some fun in Japan. NOT. :-p

laters folks.

In sickness and in health ¬_¬

2009-07-09T14:38:00.003+01:00

I'm typing this message at the minute and feeling like utter shite. My throat is red raw, my sinuses feel all blocked up, my lungs feel tired and my joints are swelling. Its fair to say I'm under the weather.

This is all magnified by the horrors of Swine Flu that is hanging around the world at the minute. If indeed, I am one person in a million to have contracted it, perhaps I should feel slightly lucky that I have been bestowed as one of the first thousand odd sufferers in the UK.

In all honesty, I think I have contracted what my Japanese flatmate had last week and its only just kicked in. The most annoying thing is, is that I'm trying to hit the gym three times a week and study Japanese at the library and this goddamn cold/flu/virus whatever is preventing me from keeping to my schedule. It might be God's way of telling me that I should be overweight and not be studying Japanese during my 'time off'. Well whichever way theologians and philosophers wish to mewl about it, I feel like absolute crap right now. I hope to this comedian up in the sky that it clears up soon. Thank God, I'm not feeling like this two months down the line, otherwise it may be quarantine in Narita airport time.

Good things must come to an end... (Pt. 3 - Hard Boiled Sheffield and the end of a chapter)

2009-07-03T20:37:00.008+01:00

I would love to know how one surives in Sheffield without a laptop, an Ipod, a book to read or quite litterally in the case of me - absolutely nothing in my room.

This is the harsh reality facing me at the moment, as I sit all alone in Sheffield, flatmates deserted in a room that has been stripped clean, waiting for the soul-filling journey that will take me from the City of Steel to the City of Donny and then onwards onto Darlington, then home-sweet-home. The past 22 months or so have been the greatest and most emotionally challenging of my life and it is one to which I close a chapter to with thanks to the people who have made this possible, and then onto writing a new chapter with the large emblazoned headline of Japan, which will become the starting point of the next 14 months or so of my life.

Its very sad to leave the people I care about in Sheffield; close and random friends, inspirational guides, well-wishers, my teachers and lecturers and everyone else who has supported me in making this small dream become a big reality. What I am facing at the moment is a huge pivot in my life, the turning point not just for the here and now, but possibly for the rest of my life. I enter the tunnel as one man and will leave it as another - for better or for worse.

I start my life again at ground zero (albeit with a few friends and classmates in Japan to help me if I get stuck) and enter a mystical world which I do not see as the glittery lights of Shinjuku or the hazy sunsets of a cherry-blossom spring in Yoyogi Koen. I see this chapter as representing anything but Japan. Japan is merely a by-word, something that is environmental to my changing state of being, a changing state of my inner-self from one form to the next.

This change is confronting me with tons of emotions that range from dangerous interpretation and cynicism to childhood excitement and anxiety. Every single one feels like a sharp prickly pin-drop that pierces into my sweaty, clamoured body. It keeps me awake at night. Its all I ever think about. Not the journey of simply going to Japan - but the journey that will awaken me spiritually and emotionally. I hope that this journey brings me fortune, and helps me discover myself and what I want to do - because right now I am unsure of what the future brings to the table and whether or not I want to eat what is front of me regardless of how juicy it may seem to the person standing next to me.

Yes, I will miss Sheffield. I will miss everyone who has had a part in my life for the past 22 months. But ultimately, I am going to miss the person who is sitting here typing this and who leave the UK in the next 2 months. I will miss him. Because I don't know if 14 months from now, he will be the same person.

I am being told that Sheffield will not be quite the same without me, but I think it is me who will not be quite the same without Sheffield.

And it is that closing comment that ends this rather turbulent chapter in my life. Thank you Sheffield for all the memories, onwards Japan and the potential wonders it may bring.

Whitby

2009-07-01T22:38:00.005+01:00

Today was Canada Day (what do you mean you didn't know?) so to celebrate, I donned my Toronto Maple Leafs top and headed off to Whitby for some sun, sand and ~~sex~~ sunburn.

Whitby is a cracking little town. It takes about 1 hour on the train from my hometown - which is only because of all the little scenic stops along the way across the stunning Esk Valley. Its an beautiful added inconvenience in a sunny day such as today.

The photos are now on Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24695970@N04/sets/72157620826086386/

The weather was baking hot, even though the day started off pretty cloudy. The entire UK is being slowly oven-roasted at the minute, with temperatures in the capital expected to hit around 35 degrees (!!!) Oh well, this gives me good preparation for Japan, albeit without the raging humidity. The UK gets about 50 to 60% relative humidity, whereas Tokyo averages slightly higher at around 60 to 70% - and trust me that extra 10% adds even more to the heat.

At the moment, I am planning more routinely for Tokyo now - given that its going to be slightly warmer than the UK. I won't be needing any winter wear most of the time, so big stuffy coats are a no-no as of now. I would imagine even in January, Tokyo doesn't get as cold as the UK does or can do. But still, I think am going on the basis of it will be like the UK + 5, the extra 5 accounting for temperature throughout the year.

Anyways, enough of that. I'm back off to Sheffield tomorrow to clean the flat, my room, get my deposit back, buy a backpack, possibly get some nandos, have some beer and then say my teary goodbyes. ;-(

Back on Saturday and into the 'routine' of using my summer productively, as of July 6th. Argh! These kanji and vocab are killing me.

Finances for Japan

2009-06-28T17:55:00.003+01:00

I've just got my finances back from Middlesbrough LEA regarding my year abroad in Japan. Basically I've got £300 and then my parents must supply around £1000 and anything on top of that will be refunded back.

So therefore shipping, visa costs, travel insurance will all come to around that amount but things like shipping back from Japan and return flights during the year will probably be refunded back. Its all a little too embarrassing, given the fact I am left with no other option to seek financial compensation from my parents.

This all leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Had I not been altogether too hasty in going to uni and waited one year - my LEA would be paying for everything because I will be over 25. This sucks when I'm getting no scholarship monies and will have to look for work in Japan. Fuck whatever immigration and my uni are saying - if they don't want me to physically fucking starve to death in Japan they should have gave me a scholarship. I'm also slightly worried about my accommodation in Japan. Unless the rent is below 30,000 yen a month I am fucking screwed. In the odd case that Seijo decide to screw me over with the accommodation costs I've found a decent gaijin guest house in Suginami, which works out a bit cheaper than Sheffield.

Bah! My only salvation is that NEXT year will be awesome, because I'll be getting the full amount plus a huge non-repayable amount of £1000 for being an old duffer. That money is going direct on a trans-Siberian journey to Singapore. Quite frankly Japan and the whole year abroad is looking like a pain in the arse financially. Altogether its seeming more of a one year inconvenience and less of this wondrous 'journey of a lifetime' that is opined by some and preached to by many.

Michael Jackson (1958 - 2009)

2009-06-28T15:18:00.006+01:00

As always, I'm slow to blog about these things, but quite frankly I hate to write my feelings on the matter before the dust has settled and I get a more clearer view of things.

The internet has practically swelled at the news of Michael Jackson's early death. Google is reporting 40% of its hits are MJ related, whilst on youtube, the majority of Michael Jackson videos (both anarchic and loving tributes) have seen an explosion in the number of views.

Also with Jackson's untimely death, the relevance of twitter has yet again provided an interesting focal point for the media. It was estimated as the news broke, around 100,000 tweets per hour about the death were published. Last week the explosive political situation in Iran provided such western media outlets with a rich source of first-hand information from local Iranians, as well allowing the Iranians themselves to be able to access unrestricted information from behind Iran's politically electronic firewall. It was probably the first major event where Twitter has become a major source for the media to scour for both information of the riots as well portraying the interactivity of the young Iranians.

It is this reporting of Twitter's tweets in the midst of Jackson's death that has completely replaced the standard 'vox populi' (the general opinion of the general public.) For the first time ever, one does not need to go out onto the streets, camera in tow, and seek out individuals to thrust a microphone into. The internet and twitter and has now proven a more able and actually most cost effective way of gauging public sentiment and reporting information. Quotes can be used ad-verbatim from the thoughts and feelings from anyone in the world on any emotional cataclysmic event such as this. Sky News were the prime purveyors of this 'nouvelle vague' of media journalism by listing the 'tweets' of celebrities' updates when the news broke.

It was the latter news broadcaster who erroneously reported British Foreign Secretary David Miliband's message on twitter - which turned out to be false, as Mr. Miliband does not have a twitter account. A hasty backtrack after some clarification from other news outlets then ensued. So despite the modern technological revival of journalism in the shape of twitter, there are clearly some faults in this system.

However sifting through these hundreds of 'tweets' regarding Jackson's death is like reading an corpus of human suffering and misery. But more so on a wider-scale. Hollywood C-listers and random no-mark celebrities champing at the bit to pronounce their 'grief' as it turns up on all media outlets. It seems as if Michael Jackson's death could well be the turning point for all future events that requires mass opinion in so very little time upon when the story breaks.

My 'tweet' was not poetic or gushy but merely one of shock. I think for most people, it came as a shock given the star's pop cultural relevancy, anything else is tautological emotion for the sake of respite. Growing up in the UK and even small spells abroad during the 80's and 90's - Michael Jackson's music and persona were known everywhere by everyone. I think he is held in such esteem that his aurora went far and beyond that of most state figures.

Jackon's music was quite earth-shattering at the time, and it was his attention to the music video that elevated him beyond other recording artists. Without a doubt Thriller - which has become an iconic symbol of the modern pop video, remains one of my favourite music songs of all time. It is a song that is often parodied, honoured and ridiculed but still remains a symbol of the early days of "pop video operas" that Jackson helped to create.

As one soars so greatly, the ascent down is often great too. One cannot fly so high and hope to achieve this level of success. The stories of his morbid personal life, are probably no more lurid than that of most music celebrities today. It is however, sadly the state most people will remember Jackson, in that post-Thriller era where the physical and emotional changes began to haunt the man and his beloved fan-base. Jackson's legacy as a ground-breaking music artist would soon be whitewashed by some, due in part to the allegations surrounding the child molestation charges. It was these final days, during these infamous trials and accusations that began to take the final toll on Jackson's physical and emotional health. It appears that the people who bought into Jackson's music, his bizarre social upbringings and moral takes on the world were the ones who were first ones to recoil backwards and spring upwards whenever his name was sounded out.

Although I would count myself as a fan of Jackson's work, I see myself highly cynical of his personal life. So much money squandered through lifestyle of the boy that never grew up. It seemed all too much horribly pastiche of Hollywood, especially during his final few years on this planet. It is however undoubtedly wrong of me to criticise a dead man's actions during the time he was alive without knowing all of the murky facts. I, just like the rest of the vengeful critics of his lifestyle - should simply judge the man by his musical ability and talent. Of which there was plenty.

new style

2009-06-27T18:46:00.002+01:00

I hope people enjoy the new look to my blog. Its been a year since I started it, so I really need to have it changed. I toyed with various ideas but I felt that it was better to revert to a two column affair. It looks a lot nicer now anyway. The only things I need to change are the links on the side and also some icons on the bottom of the page. Hopefully I'll get these done soon. At the moment, the contact page is not functioning but you can still access my twitter feed and flickr account.

Good things must come to an end... (Pt. 2 - Doushisha's revenge and the half-blood Year Abroad)

2009-06-27T02:11:00.004+01:00

I'm sitting here typing this and the temperature in my bedroom in my parent's house is now a lovely 38 degrees Celsius. I don't know what it is, but the combination of no ventilation and the plethora of electronic equipment running (hi-fi, decks, PS3, laptop, lamp...) the room gets baking hot. I'm not kidding, its like walking into a tropical heatwave. The good news is that this will help me recover when I go to Japan and have to deal with the hideous humidity.

At the moment, I've been sent an electronic exam to do for Seijo (my uni that I will be going to from September.) It all looks a bit easy and is comparable to first year Japanese at my uni. The only thing I failed to actually do was some horrendous idiom that I have never come across before. お目にかかる - to meet (honorific) or to be recognised.

Its odd, because I really struggled remembering all this honorific crap. I hardly ever use it and all seems so rusty. Anyways, the 'exam' is a piece of piss and all it does is show I can master what they actually expect of me. According to the e-mail, classes start on the 24th of September and we will be using this.

The funny thing is, I've never used a textbook to learn Japanese and I don't think I have ever used one inside an actual academic class. For sure, I use them outside of class for grammar revision and vocab, maybe even reading practice - but not for actual learning inside the classroom. This is going to seem odd. Also, I can't quite decide where my actual level is - I mean, I have mastered nearly all of the JLPT level 2 grammar and kanji - the only thing that is letting me down is vocab. Pure and simple. I feel sorry for the teacher sending the forms out, because we are asked what textbooks we have used - and I simply have to say 'none'. Although, I would love to add 'because they suck... that's why!'

The wonderful thing about Sheffield is that all the material we use in class are produced by the language staff and as such its far easier to understand. Most textbooks that teach you Japanese presume that you are either a) American or b) a businessman. When you are neither it becomes really tedious having to seep through American English expressions and words and then learn some kanji for 'principle agreement'. Waste. of. time. Looking at internet copies of the above book, it seems I have pretty much mastered everything in it. Wow, this is going to be fun!

The suckiest thing about Seijo is that because there are very few international students, there are no groupings - its just one class. Hence if everyone is at a much lower level you have to sit through that level. That said, if everyone is at a higher level, I have to sit through that. But I would prefer the latter over the former anyday. Still, I need to go over the stuff I have done, because I'm forgetting some simple stuff. I also need to go back over first year kanji again. Overall, my aim at Seijo is speaking Japanese - I don't give two twiddly fucks about learning the same shit I've been doing in Sheffield. So balls to that quite frankly.

The best thing about these forms was a question that read 'Why do you want to study Japanese?'

Hmmm... just give me five years to answer that one. You really don't want to open that pandora's box and discover what has been lurking inside there for the past 24 years.

As for the whole year abroad, things are really stalling. I've done nothing for it so far. No studying, no booking, no insurance, no travel plans, train tickets, shipping costs etc. Nothing. Nada.

Despite this lack of energy and scholarship monies and anything resembling a sexlife I just thank myself a little that I haven't been enrolled at Doushisha. Basically, the University of Sheffield have formed a partnership with Doushisha university in Kyoto. Every year 10 people are sent there on an academic exchange (literally our year abroad as part of Japanese Studies.) The amusing thing about it, is that it seems to have developed a curse, with the people being assigned there, dropping off the course like flies. I just know, had I not selected Tokyo on my list of choices, I may have been sent there and would have been contemplating my Japanese future. I think out of the 10 that were assigned there, only 3 are definitely going. o_O

Right I've got forms to fill and stuff to unpack tomorrow. The spare room in our house is full of my crap and I need to sort it out.

Anyways, I have to go now. My chair has just melted into the ground.

Jaa ne.

Good things must come to an end... (Pt. 1)

2009-06-24T21:49:00.003+01:00

A long time has passed since my last blog, so I'll try and be quick. Well firstly the good news is that I am confident that I have passed all my exams, as I have had no threatening e-mails sent to me (normally when we screw the exams up, we are given an e-mail from our head of year demanding, sorry requesting a chat to discuss what happens next.) So thankfully that hasn't happened, and I am freaking happy that there are no new e-mails in my e-mail box.

However one message I would like in my e-mail box is one from my university in Japan. The last time I had contact with them was back in Easter when I sent my stuff off about my finances. So far, I have no idea where I will be living in Japan next year or when or if I can come to Japan. Right now, I am waiting for the Certificate of Eligibility, a piece of paper that allows me to apply for a student visa at my local consulate - which incidentally is in Edinburgh. It seems out of the 30 odd of us going to Japan, only three of us have to apply for our visas there. After the horror stories of the embassy in London as well as having to potentially wake up at 5am and drive for 6 hours - its a welcome relief I only have a 2 hour drive to Scotland. I've also heard the entire procedure at Edinburgh runs a lot smoothly given the smaller numbers of applicants for Visas up there.

If all goes to schedule (so far Seijo have been really quick and easy with any queries and paperwork) then I should have my certificate sometime in about 3 weeks.

Currently my short-term goals are to lose weight for Japan and also to get cracking on this vocab and kanji. My vocab has gotten increasingly shit as the 2nd year has trudged on and its something that is going to pull me down in Japan.

At the moment Sheffield is a picture of slow death. Nobody is here except international students, postgraduates, people who have failed and are studying for resists and then of course an usual hybrid of International postgraduates who are resitting. (!) So basically the whole student lifestyle and running into random people you know is probably gone for a while. Sadly its going to be gone for quite a bit. A sad fact of life is many of my friends outside my course will probably have graduated by the time I come back, meaning that for Year IV of my degree in Sheffield will probably be ground-zero again. Oh well, its been two years of fun in Sheffield, a time of fun coming to an end and a time that I probably will never get again. I just can't describe how fun its been and how much I've really enjoyed it in a disappointing yet rewarding kinda way. I suppose all of these sad emotions is the price I pay for going to Japan for a year. And that is something most people would probably give their right testicle for (I know my flatmate would!)

Anyways, Japan is something like 70 odd days away and I have a wide-open summer ahead of me. I just want to get back to my hometown, get on my bike and think about other things now. My mind is slowly leaving the life of Sheffield now, even though my body is still here.

Wagon Christ

2009-06-24T21:37:00.003+01:00

At the moment, I am currently absorbed into a collaboration of two of the most enigmatic and often visually spasmodic artists, Fizzy Eye productions - who are responsible for an absolute ton of material (such as sketches on Monkey Dust and advertisements for the Honda Jazz..) together with the beautiful electronica of Wagon Christ (aka: British DJ Luke Vilbert.)

'Sorry I make you lush' which came out on the Ninja Tune label way back in 2004 is probably one of my favourite underrated albums within that genre and most definitely one of the better CD's to bear the label Ninja Tune.

Sit back, listen and enjoy with a nice coffee and a good feeling of the world...

'Shadows'

'Receiver'

mad dog englishman

2009-06-14T03:42:00.004+01:00

On Friday, I ventured out into Crookesmoor Park in Sheffield to have an end of year BBQ. The result was slightly catastrophic as I managed to get severe sun-burn and then get very drunk. Although I managed to avoid making a complete asshat of myself.

Roll on the next day and with arms looking like a fire hydrants, I managed 12 hours of sleeping off an hangover, a few hours pissing around on the internet and then a few more hours of sleep.

Right now, Sheffield is dying. The people are leaving and its suddenly turning into a quiet state of normality. When about 20% of the local population are students, suddenly once the exams are done, the town has a different vibe to it. What is also dying, or at least I think is dying is my relationship with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend. I think, for all intents and purposes nothing is going to come out of it. Or at least nothing at the present time. I feel quite tired trying to make an effort of it and right now I'm just giving up. Maybe someday it will work, but not now... I think its too hard to say why I don't think it will work. Perhaps it will. But at the minute I think we are both in a period of limbo. I'll see what happens when I see her before she leaves. I just don't think we are on the same wavelengths as eachother at times and I think we both really need to see where this relationship is currently at and where it is heading in the future.

I kinda like the idea of going to Japan single...or at least open to some fun. Oh well. The thing which hurts me the most is the fact that I still want to maintain some form of friendship with her, but just can't see myself doing this now. It just seems too awkward given the fact I had feelings for her. I just don't want to be in a position where I seem to focus all my energy on one thing and neglect the rest. *bah* Anyways, this will be the last post I make about my current relationship status - so you'll just have to deduce what is going on from my innane ramblings.

Anyways, its quite amazing how rapid realities change in life. Perhaps I will discover someone or something in Japan that will change my life in ways I can only ever imagine. Anyway, its 4am - I'm still a bit depressed - just need to get my head in gear and find something interesting to do.

BNP (Britain is Not Popular)

2009-06-08T20:00:00.003+01:00

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8088381.stm

Just recently, the BNP (The British National Party - in case you didn't understand) have just won two seats in the European Parliamentary elections. As you can image, the reaction from the socialist, anti-fascist hub of students I reside my life around have taken this news as a swift smack in the face for democracy. How have we arrived at such at a place, were around 600,000 of my fellow British nationals would vote in such a party? Have I, just like the rest of the political parties in this country, really badly misjudged the electorate and their incandescence towards the European Union?

The reason people have voted for the BNP is down to the fact that all the main political parties in this country are becoming far more isolated from the roots of its own people and completely nescient to the concerns of its society. The BNP, despite the faults of it being a proto-fascist party, does have genuine concerns for the British Isles, albeit fairly squinted down the barrels of a loaded shotgun towards some Somalian asylum seeker.

History has shown that when you a country is on a brink of economic and social meltdown - it will resort to voting in powers that go against the structural norm - especially when the norm is doing bugger or has done bugger all for the country. People crave change and will often rear the seedy underbelly of racism, fascism, nationalism or even anti-Semitism once mass discontent has riled people into action.

Amid the growing concerns of political party scandals and whether or not we are paying £30,000 for some Labour MP to keep a houseboat and where some MP's have decided to label us mere jealous plebs staring up at the ivory towers in Whitehall, the smell of the air is certain. It is a putrid, acrid smell of discontent. This has been stench that has wafted its way across Britain for the past 40 years since Britain joined the European Union (or then EEC 'European Economic Community' as it was called.)

Supposedly Britain was archaic, out of touch with a Europe that had recovered from the disaster of the second world war and was leading the new charge forward in a world dominated by the interests of the much larger conglomerates of the Soviet Union and the US. The French president De Gaulle, in many previous years had rejected the UK for admission due to a lack of serious political intent. And if he were alive today, he may just as well be repeating those words both to the UK and many of its Western and Northern European neighbours. For want of some better words, the European Union and its schematics will and shall always remain, in the minds of many in this country - a political plan draw up to protect Continental European interests (especially of those between Germany and France.)

It seemed almost ironic in many ways that 1973 saw the inclusion of both the UK, Ireland and the Kingdom of Denmark. In the post Oil-Shock years, Denmark opted out of the single-currency (although it will be introduced from 2011), the UK actively maintained their own opt-out cause (relying on the strength of the pound sterling) whilst most recently, the Irish people rejected the Lisbon treaty in 2008.

Going by the European parliamentary election results, it is the European sceptics, hardliners and right-wingers that have dominated the vote. UKIP (The UK Independence Party) managed to acquire 16.5% of the vote.

Should the Tories attempt to shed off the whole nice persona of 'Just call me Dave' Cameron and go with a much more tougher line on the policies of the EU and more importantly of UK domestic policies - they would marginally clean up in both the European and the general UK elections next May. We will have to wait until next year to finally see the Labour party and its dwindling and fractured factions finally split up and see what will almost certainly be a Conservative victory in the next general election. Even though, I'm a more of a Libertarian with mild socialist leanings, I would rather support a Conservative party than one which would want to see my friends repatriated out of the UK on the basis of their skin colour.

So ultimately, where does the BNP come into this? As a party that espouses a 'Britain First policy' they tap into the hugely demoralised and disenfranchised British public who are sick of inane mandates from Brussels and impositions of items that cannot be accepted into public.

However, more worryingly, is that if indeed people voted because of the above reasons, it seems that a vote for the BNP is just as easier as a vote for UKIP (who are more anti-EU and less 'look at all these foreigners' fascist) The BNP votes are perhaps more underlying of a genuine race problem in this country, which bubbles under the surface and often boils over the Daily Mail cauldron into a frothy mixture of rage and violence. The UK, for all its angles of multi-cultralism, suits many well who live outside the UK or within the hubs of ethnic mixing in London for example. But for all its idealism, the system is flawed once you venture out into the heartlands of the United Kingdom. The British people (or a proportion of them) do not believe that miscegenation from Europe and abroad is a good thing - and the blame rests squarely with the powerbrokers in Brussels and London who are allowing such people as Eastern European migrants into the country. Britain is an island. An island that was the conqueror of others rather than the subservients to others.

I am not too surprised in an age of political apathy and one of painfully acute racial problems (especially in areas that are not used to mass-immigration - the North as a prime example) has decided to turn to the BNP.

As I'm told by my friends about the horrors of fascism and the visceral machinations of evil that the BNP is, I wonder if indeed the British people themselves are infinitely more a machine of evil themselves than any political party could ever hope to be...

OVER! (^^)

2009-06-05T08:38:00.007+01:00

Exams done. Finished. Owatta.

I'm just so glad to have done them. My final exam was yesterday at Goodwin Sports centre, located in possibly the most spectacular scenery of all of central Sheffield. How, I could have just done sitting on the lake instead of being cooked up inside for 3 hours.

Basically, I'm sure I'm passed the exam - but I don't think the grade is going to be very good. Right now, I just don't give two shits. Its all about passing. Next year is where the practical skills are acquired. However it could have all been so different.

The moment I opened the page I just shat myself. I sat there thinking 'this is impossible', 'I can't do this' - it was like having a severe crisis of confidence where I was unable to think or write. I think i was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of text we had to translate into English. Thankfully, once I got going and skimmed over the first few bits of my translation - I found it okay. I spent more time on my failed section of last semester, but still feel it wasn't enough - there was a ton of stuff I thought I understood by maybe wrote a little bit too vague on the some of the answers. I also felt my summary headline was a little vague - but DID encapsulate what I believe the article was about (the increase and decrease/ push pull factor of migration from the rural to the urban environments as a result of depopulation. *gasp*) The last section was a piece of piss. A sakubun (i.e. written composition in Japanese) about the declining rate of marriage in the UK. Again, I almost fucked this bit up after forgetting to put a title on it! (This constitutes some of the marks!) I got the statistics in, I analysed the graph from this data and then I offered my opinion on the matter (which I felt was the best part - basically that married couples may indeed become a thing of the past.)

Anyways, I will be outright gutted if I fail that. Really I would. I understood maybe like 90% of that exam. Only a few kanji and a few sentences killed me - the rest I was okay with. Well, we'll wait and see. I'm now slightly worried after hearing that the Contemporary Japanese Society essays were very lowly marked - but again I should be okay. I must have been the only one in the year to write about Minamata. I've given up on grades now. They are a waste of time. I think after the hardship of doing this degree, the element is not on the grade but seeing it through to the end.

After my exam, a few of us got drunk at Bar One. I ended up drinking three pints of cider in a row, resulting in me getting slightly sloshed by 1.30pm. The rest of my classmates also carried on drinking until I saw them again at around 7 ish - completely rat arsed. Anywhoo... I couldn't have carried on because I had a date with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend at a fancy Spanish restaurant. In total, the night cost me about £50. I think she has squarely given up on attempting to pay halves with me. That's not how I roll. Its spoil the girl all the way with me.

She also got slightly drunk after I mentioned that drinking a Koppaberg doesn't come in half pints and we were forced to leave Interval at around 11.30pm, resulting in a quick downing scenario. On a petite Japanese girl that's not good. On the way back to her flat, she came out with the classic "I wanna keep drinking but I'll get sick. I'm tired... I wanna..." *stops outside a pub we passed* *long stare* I can't believe I've met a girl who happens to love alcohol more than I do. Tbh, I think after another one I would have had to carry her home. Hahaha. I'm gonna miss her when she leaves in about two weeks. *sobs*

Anyways, I'm off home tomorrow for a week to enjoy some PS3 on my HDTV, so I need to get packing and also buy a new pair of trousers after I tore coming home last night a bit drunk. Nicely played Rich, nicely played.

Final exam

2009-06-02T20:22:00.004+01:00

Exam on Thursday. 9am. Feel a bit better than last semester, as the content was a huge shock and they didn't really prepare us for it. This semester, we have been told the contents of the exam, and now its just up to us to fail it spectacularly. Its basically three sections, a translation from Jap to Eng (probably easy enough - I thought the mock one we did was easy - well easy enough until I realised we had 20 minutes to do it!!!) a newspaper comprehension about what I assume will be dying communities in Japan (so called 集落 - or is that some type of food?) and some statistics bullshit we have to write about. My penis is tingling at the very prospect! I may just cum a little when I ebb out the words (この結果から、いなぎのぼりの現象が見える。)

I still feel slightly 'tepid' about the newspaper section of the exam. However, considering I spent way too much time on other two sections and ran through the section without reading it last time, I feel a lot more prepared than in January. I know exactly what I will do this time. However, I can't shake the feeling as if I'm sitting here miswriting kanji and vocab - I'm gonna fuck something up good and proper. Hell it wouldn't be a Japanese exam if it didn't. Well, my Japanese is doing okay even if I'm forgetting words and kanji quicker than I can learn them (doing the joyo over the summer seems mildly impossible but what the hell - life is fun! lol)

Meh. I'll be so glad when I finish these stupid exams and get to spend some free time with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend (whose birthday it is tomorrow and whose going to get a lovely unexpected surprise when she wakes up tomorrow. :-p)

Well, I've been in a state of constant boredom on this course since February. Ah well. I'm not the only one. No-one is really looking forward to this exam - and those that are, deserve to commit seppuku on the stairs of the Arts Tower (see what I did there?)

I'm going cook myself a nice big meal tomorrow night - some rice and chicken fajitas (yum!) washed down with some cola maybe. Yay!! Just not gotta think too much about this exam.

Jaa ne.

End of days

2009-05-29T23:55:00.003+01:00

My eyes are burning, as is my throat, as is my face, and is the skies of Sheffield. Hayfever is killing me, just as these poxy exams are. Glorious weather this weekend but sadly I can't enjoy it thanks to the constraints of my final exam of second year. On Thursday, I woke up at 7am and travelled up to Hillsborough for a 9am, 3 hour exam on Contemporary Japanese Society. Sounds interesting doesn't it?

Not really. I ended up finishing it in time and got all my questions answered, but still felt as if it was a little too much of a sociological analysis than outright debate. Tbf, I followed my lecturers advice of stating my own opinion and expressing a unique view of Japan. I didn't just glance over the lecture notes and rehash everything, I did express my own ideas on these concepts - which, in the words of my lecturer is the 'A Grade'.

I completely ran out of steam towards the end, and what started off as a nice little essays about the Japanese Constitution and the social effects of the rapid economic growth was a tainted somewhat by the final question about homogeneity - which I sorted of answered very loosely and didn't really plan out. Either it will be a work of genius or a simple crazy guy rant.

Still... I did it. And that's the most important thing. I couldn't give two shits about grades this year - there is so much I've learnt that doesn't need to be given some grade. Who cares about a 2:2 or 2:1 - its about getting the job done.

Onwards to my second and final exam - which is the big one. Japanese Language IV. How I have thought about this as being a complete useless thing. I've now reached a point where I am merely cramming vocab and grammar structures for this. I know roughly what will be on the exam (unlike Semester 1 where I rushed into it and didn't revise the topics adequately.) However, I still feel as if, something bad is lurking on that page when I open it up on Thursday. I just know - something will be there that I can't answer. The Japanese to English translation is going to be proably the hardest, as its the only one I'm not sure on how I will tackle it. I reckon no-one will get a first on this section. Our marker is a grammar pedant! Probably only professional translators could succed. The second bit, the reading comprehension is probably my worse - but again, I'm a victim more to not understanding the context, rushing through it and/or not getting the kanji/grammar etc. The final bit is a mini-sakubun on statistics, which I can sorta do, but am not 100% confident. At most it will be a very bad literal English to Japanese translation with some of my own work thrown in for good measure.

But still, the point is to do my best. I'm certainly not attempting to learn extra vocab, grammar and kanji over the summer for merely 'passing an exam' - I'm doing it for the Japanese. At most the exam seems like a huge side distraction for that and more of a pithy little bit of paper to satisfy my teachers. I really prefer doing more 'practical' Japanese - which is why next year is essential and this year is pretty naff. I guess learning statistics in Japanese is supposed to prepare us for the dissertation in year IV.

Anyways, taking last semester as a prime example - I hardly failed (it was just the one rushed section that screwed my grade up. But as I sit here looking at all this crazy grammatical nonsense, I do question my own sanity about studying Japanese.

Oh well. Its just vocab that is letting me down. I kinda know the grammar and can translate okay. As long I don't panic like last time - I'll be okay.

This summer is going to be one of study sadly. I need to do the joyo kanji and head up all the grammar I've done. I might head up to Durham during my time back home to try and meet some Japanese people who want some language exchanges or whatever. My speaking has gotten so bad - I've forgotten so many basic words in Japanese! >_<

Anyways, as the longest day comes about soon - so does the longest exam in the world. But I'll be finished next Thursday afternoon. And that is what is driving me on for these final few days.

What a waste.

2009-05-24T23:00:00.003+01:00

I've procrastinated today. I woke up at 9am, ready for an assault on the library - but suddenly felt a rush of tiredness. Fell back to sleep, woke up and then decided walk around in the sunshine in my shorts and t-shirt. It was truly glorious. Probably the best weather of the year so far. Despite that, I came back to my flat from this nonsense wondering about, ate some chicken tikka pasties and then watched my team get relegated. I'll save you the grizzly details of how and why we got relegated after 11 years in the Premiership - but if you must here you are. Interesting and sad at the same time. I am tempted to fuck my exams up just so I can stay here in Sheffield for one more year to watch us play at Hillsborough (or even Brammall Lane!)

I just can't believe I wasted today - especially considering I have an exam on Thursday. I mean, it was such a pointless waste. I could have done a ton of more interesting things to while away the time. Lie in the sun, read some interesting works of literature, write a love letter to girlwhohappenstobemyfriend - but NO. Instead I just slept, ate, pissed around on youtube and did minimal work.

The only notable thing I have done is to just glance over some notes concerning Japan's economic slide and finish up my classical Japanese translation, which is ready to hand in on Tuesday morning. That will mean I have done 1 out of 3 modules this year and go into the next ones feeling a little bemused over how well I'll do. I've severely lost some passion for this course now - and hopefully next year will rescue me (both a long and short way off at the same time.)

*ugh* I'm sitting here typing this with a ton of kanji flashcards and my grammar notes, all the while wondering when I can finish this year. It seriously can't come soon enough. I should really make up for today by working my arse off tomorrow. This time I mean it... No, I really do. I don't care how tired I feel, or how depressed.

Slight retraction

2009-05-23T23:58:00.003+01:00

I would like to make a retraction to the previous post a while back about my annoying and loud flatmate. Heat of the moment stuff and all that. Since the exams have kicked in, everyone has been a bit stressed out. Actually at the moment, its eerily quiet. In fact, I wonder if a tree fell in our flat - would it make a sound?

Anyways... I should stop using this blog as a vehicle for my personal rants (no matter how fun they fucking are sometimes!)

I am definitely going to bed soon.

Jaa ne.

:-[

2009-05-23T22:43:00.003+01:00

About time I blogged in...

Today saw me do an incredible thing. Studying on a Saturday! Why, whatever next?

Right now I have wearily said goodbye to my second year lectures and I now enter the murky waters of final year exams. I actually have only two to tangle with. The first which is this coming Thursday and the next which is the Thursday after. I feel more confident about them than I did last week, which is mainly due to the fact I am revising the shit out of them. I still think I'll fall below expectations - but given how there is very little to fail (I know I am not going to get a scholarship) then part of me is going into the exam feeling a little relieved. I just want to go in, get it done - receive my customary shoddy mark and then piss off.

At the moment, I don't really care about the grade for Jap Language. I consider it valueless, given the fact most of the Japanese I learn outside of the course is going to better use to actually improving my Japanese. I should be on course to nail the Joyo kanji (i.e. the entire main character set) before I go to Japan as well simply cram the living daylights out of vocab and speaking techniques. So far, I simply do not have the time to go over material such as that, when you have to revise these utterly pointless topics. I'm simply cramming the essential vocab and going over the grammar structures to make sure I can pass.

Anyway. I'm sacrificing what is now 11 days in order to pass these exams. Boy, I really need to get cracking on this writing practice. Well anyway, a deadly strain of swine flu is going around the uni and I have to avoid this somehow, despite spending most of my time in the Bangladeshi-sweat shop conditions of our library during exam season.

Thank you pro-plus and red-bull. It will all be worth it in the end. I guess. :-|

Right I'm off to bed, to think about all things Japan. Night night

Jaa ne

The Proxy

2009-05-16T11:48:00.007+01:00

One of the select choice of music I use to annoy my flatmate, and one which I seriously am starting to love a little bit more since I latched onto a few years ago is the wonderful Proxy from Russia.

Its very much electro at its best.

Check out it out here. Basically a remix of "Dancing in the Dark" by Schwarzkopf . But it manages to mix a ton of other elements in there as well. Just brilliant. You may have heard the tune 'Raven' being payed on a Mr Oizo set, which also featured this gem of a track.

Yes, that's right Bruce Willis is Dead!

Motherthugging Homies

2009-05-16T10:54:00.005+01:00

Living in Rockingham House is cool and all - but sadly this year has kinda been shit, because we have to share with some Nigerian, who I really can't stand the sight off. That's not racist btw. I couldn't give a toss where he comes from. If you're annoying, you're annoying. I reserve the right to call a spade, a spade and a dick a dick.

He basically goes to bed at 4, wakes up 10ish and then decides to play what they call "urban music". In short, he's just an asshat. In fact that's probably quite accurate. He's an ass who wears a hat, or possibly a hat thats made of asses. I haven't decided yet. But the smell he gives off, leads me to think its the latter.

Tbh, his music is no contest for my bass-laden electro music. Its just the sheer annoyance of his music I take a severe dislike to though. Its like being forced to listen to the most turgid music of all time through my bedroom wall. Even my brother, who listens to some quite annoying soft-rock stuff is not half as annoying.

To describe the situation its like some fat Nigerian is hovering of your bed forcing his chubby little fingers into your ears, singing the same song over and again whilst playing a game of 'Let's pin the tail on the stereotype'

(Mental note: that might have seemed racist - in which case I whole heatedly apologise and gleefully tell you to fuck off for stop being so stupid.)

I kinda love it because his speakers are so absolutely shit. Even when he tries to turn it up, I have so much volume and bass that it can just overpower them. The thing is, I just don't wish to sit in my room listening to some fucking half-intelligent 'gangsta from the hood' or cocained riddled snotbag giving me a lecture on what it means to love a woman in more ways imaginable. I'd rather just play the most hardcore annoying electro music ever.

Anyways... I've decided to play a mega-mix I've found on the internet (about an hour long) which I shall play at a time of my choosing during the hours of 5 to 7am. My other flatmate exams finish a day before mine (basically the 3rd) and the other will be in Cardiff, So Mr Smellypants better keep an open mind, and gleefully "respect my differences" (what the management of this godforesaken place tell us when we complete about his pongy smell and pig-like attitude towards hygiene.)

Oh my! I think I've just broken my speakers! Hahahaha. Take that you smelly Nigerian!

Recently my flatmate recorded some of the noise, him and his 'homies' were making a few days ago. Thank God I wasn't here. It sort of reminds me of this internet wonder.

Hopefully, if I can record some more between now and when I leave - I am tempted to turn into a remix, and turn it into a internet hit. Or at least wake up him at 6am with it. Think of it, he's merely waking himself up.

Firstly, I respect the fact he is gay (my previous two flats I lived in, had gay flatmates) and have nothing wrong with that. I mean, I assume he is gay. The RnB, the constant male company, the working out in the kitchen, the late nights in an out of the flat...

I mean... I sorta think so. I mean the rest of us have all had our g/f's round and he has nothing but men coming around and working out in makeshift flat in our gym... Makes you wonder.

Maybe he's just shy to introduce us to Julian or whatever guy he's fucking up the ass.

(Mental note: This seems homophobic, in which case I gleefully respect you to shut the fuck up and live here instead.)

Oh, only 5 days and two weeks left here in Suckingham House. Let's hope I can hold out before then eh? Or maybe I'll be bumraped by 50 cent when I'm not looking.

PS: Not a homphobic racist.

Storm chasing in Sheffield

2009-05-15T20:05:00.003+01:00

Britain is often noted by many foreigners that its always raining. This is actual not true, as some places in the UK are incredible dry. The East for example receives far less rainfall than the west of the country (in places such as Manchester) as the rain tends to hit the Pennines after rolling in off the Atlantic. Its not uncommon, in my hometown (in the North East of England) for it to go weeks and weeks with it not raining - especially in the winter months, when most of the preciptation tends to be snow.

Sheffield is kinda unique in that because it is located in the center of the country and next to the bottom ridge of the hills - the weather can turn from one day to the next quite suddenly. This tends to be more of a rounder synopsis of British weather as whole. We can have glorious t-shirt wearing weather one day, and pissing it down rain the next.

So if you are thinking of coming here, and god help you. I advise you to prepare for all weather elements. This is especially more true in the summer months when the weather can turn quite volatile. This is the season we receive most of our rain due to the large increase in humidity and alternating pressure.

Today itself was quite abymsal in terms of weather as it was, rather typically, overcast and rainy. It seemed to hold off for a while, and then around about 7pm - we got a bit of thinderstorm action. Not exactly the same type of thunderstorms you get in Asia - the ones I will most definitely be witnessing for a large protion of my trip next summer.

After farting about trying to get a good movie, I jumped into our creaky little flat balcony and kept rolling. After a while my arm got so tired that I turned the camera off. *BOMB* Maybe it was melodramatic but it sounded like someone firing a shotgun. A huge spark of light. Bollocks. The camera wasn't running and I had missed it.

After exactly 4 failed attempts, I sat for the next one and finally got something. It was completely unspectacular. Not even a loud enough roar to wake the Gods in my head for a Classical Japanese class after 7 cans of Strongbow. And then the sun started to break through, and the mini-storm floated off into the Peak District the exact same way it came.

Storms are normally so shit in the UK - but apparently we get a lot of thunderbolts hitting our fair little island. In fact, a lot of people have been killed by them - although I was brave enough to survive this one! (Can you feel this sarcasm wafting through your computer screen?)

Love in the time of Swine Flu

2009-05-13T22:15:00.003+01:00

I'd like to blog about something interesting, but the reality is that life is inherently mundane right now and I generally have nothing to talk about. I went to Tuesday Club with two of my friends last night, got a bit drunk and missed my two lectures this morning. This means, over the past few weeks I have missed more lectures than I have in the entirety of my time in Sheffield up until that point.

The fact is, there is very little new things we are doing and everything is merely exam preparation. I am finding most of the classes really, really tedious - and would prefer to sit in the library revising - seeing as I have next to no time to revise once all the lessons end.

For my classical Japanese module - I just have to finish off a translation - which I have pretty much done (about 90%) and this is due in 12 days I think. Off to the library tomorrow both to redo it (that is to say, keep going over it until it all makes sense) and then start revising for my Japanese language exam - and maybe sneak in some Contemp reading as well. With luck, I should have a very productive weekend.

But as you can imagine, its all incredibly boring - I feel both prepared and unprepared for this exam at the same time. Something tells me there is going to be a nasty little surprise when I open the paper up, 3 weeks from today. I know the material, but I think my Achilles heel (that is to say my essay writing techniques in both Japanese and English) will kill me. The very most I can do is try to remember these grammatical structures. I am aiming for a 2.1 - despite the disaster of the last one - but I will gladly take a pass beyond anything.

The driving force for me passing these exams has just increased, now that I have discovered the most amazing girl ever. It seems bizarre, but I actually have made (sorry 'we' have made) the conscious decision to not see each other for a while. Its partly due to my time constraints - but also the fact that I just want to focus on my exams and get them done - so we can be together next year. I'd sacrifice a few weeks for the sake of a relationship that could go on for years or even a lifetime, you know? Besides, when I don't see her for a while, I certainly feel more attracted to her. Also, she is leaving the country and I won't see her for just over 2 months after June - so this is going to be quite difficult and of course needs some practice to get used to.

Ah... love.... exams... stress....

Such a bizarre, schizophrenic, Kafkaesque time in Sheffield right now. Tomorrow will signal the marker of 3 weeks. Just 3 weeks, 21 days if you will. When the sky shall turn black and shall only be lightened up seeing her straight after it.

Today I lost a dear friend.

2009-05-10T22:43:00.005+01:00

I've lost something today. Actually, something has died within me today. That's not just me saying, I've lost the will to live, that's me telling you something has died inside me. I've lost it for good. A part of me died inside and I'm powerless to help it.

Well, I'm basically fed up. My course is coming to an end and at the minute all I can do is revise - which is boring. What's even more worse is that I am sick of living where I am living right now and pine for my brand spanking new 36" HDTV and Playstation 3 with Residential Evil 5. I want to go to my local, drink some cider, watch some football and just forget about studying Japanese. This year is just so dull and I can't be bothered anymore.

I'm not overly confident about one of my modules called Contemporary Japanese Society - which sort of fits in nicely with the whole "Japan is screwed" concept - but is fiendishly difficult to analyse in terms of a sociological viewpoint. There is also a ton of information I should really know about Japan that I currently don't. I expect 3 hours of bullshitting my way through this.

My other module is of course Japanese language - which is annoying because they are basically cramming in seven years worth of work into 3 months and then ask you do some extra stuff so you can be semi-fluent when we arrive in Tokyo next year. Yeah right. My Japanese has actually gotten worse this year thanks to workload this year. Next year is actually looking like a doddle compared to this year. My grammar still stinks (I overuse and misuse particles like its out of fashion) whereas my speaking is non-existent. I just can't be arsed (especially when I'm living in the UK and there is very little incentive.) I'm still at a much higher level than my current grades give me credit for - which is why when I go to Japan I will have amassed a far greater knowledge of the language than some of my contemporaries who are going to Japan. I am basically giving up June and July in order to keep focusing on this grammar and vocab and of course to finish off the dreaded kanji set (I am at about 40% - which seems ridiculous.) I am desperate in a sick, perverted kinda way to absolutely obliterate everyone one is getting a scholarship for next year - as it vindicates me. It makes me feel good about myself when I look at my ability alongside people who have either lived in Japan or have Japanese parents/spouses. I would be personally embarrassed if after one or two years there my level was the same as someone whose some total comes to around 10 days. With this in mind, I am going to force myself upon learning and speaking it everyday in Japan. Like I said, I've changed. A part of me has died today. Its dead. It will never come back.

I am very close to killing my "other" flatmate (I use inverted commas to show my contempt for him) as personally he can die in a ditch someway in a lay-by on the M40 after he hemorrhages so much blood from being beaten brutally by his own fucking gym weights and RnB CD's. Nah, I'm kidding really I wouldn't really do that.... I'd chuck him in the M1 - as its on my way home and far more convenient. Plus the ditches on the M40 aren't that suitable to dump mutilated corpses. He shall die along with the very core that has departed me today.

All this stress of the exams and my Japanese ability is putting me through absolute uncontrollable stress which is bringing back my very bad anxiety attacks - which can be absolutely crippling. So I see a doctor and he gives me some valium. What then? I'll just get some infarction from either Kanye West giving me an ebonics lecture on love through my fucking concrete wall or some hyped up bitch at Japan Society jumping around and bouncing off the wall because it seems Japan is the greatest thing in the world. Oh do fuck off. Just let me sup my beer, take my valium, and let the things inside me die in peace thank you very much. Let me console myself about what I've just lost today. I'm mourning. Let me mourn in peace.

This year has been a washout socially - mainly down to me not giving two slimey handjobs about doing the same things as last year again and also because I'd rather save up on the whole 'excitement' for next year.

But its crazy. The very things I'm depressed about should me make me feel happy right? I'm studying Japanese at one of the best universities in the country, I'm off to Japan next year to live in Tokyo for a whole year, I have a beautiful, smart and funny girlwhohappenstobemyfriend who likes me - I am at the pinnacle of my life right now.

But is this what I've lost today. My previous sense of perspective. My former sense of reality. My old hope for the future. I've become such a strong person over the past couple of years that I am incapable of doing what I would have done so long ago - and that was to give up and admit defeat and hide in the shadow of what is confronting me. I am not scared anymore. I'm not scared of the things and the people around me and whether or not I choose to accept them and let them get the better of me.

That's what I've lost today. That is what has died inside me.

Semper Fi

RIP

I'll miss you my dear friend.

Japanese masks

2009-05-04T23:33:00.002+01:00

Interesting little video on the whole Japanese mask thing. I remember seeing one show on Japanese TV in which foreigners were asked about the weird things they experience in Japan. Most certainly, wearing gas masks is one of them and came up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCI0pGgr33g&feature=channel

Different cultures I guess, but Japan is one that is obsessed with hygiene.

Cat's Cradle

2009-05-01T01:54:00.004+01:00

I'll leave you with my some of my thoughts. These thoughts amble through my brain at a million miles a second but take years to understand. Here's what I think so far, about Japan, about life, about myself and about my future in general. No.... actually that's wrong, I won't be telling you that - because I am incapable of doing so. Here's what you should do;

Go and find a copy of 'Cat's Cradle' by Kurt Vonnegut. Read it cover to cover. Done? Good.

The main protagbist of this book is a guy called John Everyman. For he is just an everyman and called John.

Upon researching the history behind the Atomic bomb and the children of Felix Hoenikker, the creator of the modern atom bomb - he discovers 'Ice-9' a chemical that can turn all the world's water supplies into ice by a process of atom crystalising from one to another. Finding himself flung ashore on San Lorenzo one of the poorest nations on earth in search of locating Hoenikker's children he discovers the relgion if Bokononism - so influential that it is banned even though everyone practices it.

The corrupt dictator of this tinpot little island, uses his sources to buy a piece of Ice-9 from one of Hoenikker's children who is living on the island. The dictator promplty drinks the chemical to commit suicide as a result of a terminal cancer and promptly infects the river source - and thus every single drop of water on earth.

As the water dries up, John seeks refuge in a bomb shelter and discovers the rest of the people on San Lorenzo who although suriving in the shelters have committed suicide by ingesting Ice-9, at the bequest of the teachings of Bokonoism.

However he finds Lionel Boyd Johnson - Bokonon, the founder of Bokononism. He is a working on a book. The greatest book on human stupidity the world has ever seen. In conclusion, Bokonon advises John to climb to the top of the highest mountain on the island, clutching his book. This book - is called Cat's Cradle. There he rests, book grasped firmly in his hands and looking straight up into the sky as all the life source around him evaporates into blocks of ice.

He swallows the last remaining Ice-9 and grins horribly still staring up into the sky, one single man, an everyman if you will, one single person holding a testament of man's utter stupidity and utterly doomed existence on this planet.

For you see. I am John. I am an everyman. I am the man carrying this book to the top of a mountain as the world turns into blocks of ice around me.

sssoooooorrrrrryyyyyyy

2009-04-25T23:10:00.003+01:00

I apologise. There I've said it. In the heat of the moment I said some things I shouldn't have. natwest and my lovely uni don't deserve to feel the wrath of my visa application. I concede defeat - it was 100% my fault. Of course, they are not dead to me - that was a silly thing to say.

I've now realised my time in Sheffield is very, and I mean very short indeed. If things go to plan, I should be finished once all my exams finish - pending girlwhohappenstobemyfriend (who finished a few days earlier than I do and whom I need to say "goodbye" to - cos I won't see her for a while.) I'm scared both how quickly this year has gone and how quickly the time will go. Before I know it, I will be spending my £500 LEA travel allowance in a Macao casino. ^^;

My exams (only two!) are on the 28th of May (Contemporary Society) and 4th of June (Japanese IV) So I should be finished in less than 6 weeks. I think its 30 odd something days. I've also noted one curious thing about the exam timetable. Because a bank holiday falls amongst the exam dates - the uni decided to shift some of the exams to a saturday. A saturday! Work... on a saturday! Whatever next...

My Japanese is still declining. I'm trying to watch some Japanese TV - as this what got me to my previous level. When you don't surround yourself with the language its just so hard. My sakubun (my daily written homework in Japanese) is practically finished, a rare first - so its off to the library tomorrow for a good ol' session of doing all the work I was supposed to do during the holidays. I've written about 80% of my contemporary society essay (due in next Tuesday) and will get my new assignment for classical Japanese soon. All in all, I'm managing the work but perhaps struggling to absorb anything effectively and use this practically for the exam. Don't even get me started on the Contemp Society exam. For that, I'm just going to hope I can wikipedia all my knowledge in the coming weeks. The stuff on homogenity is a given after I did during my minorities stuff - but the economics and constitution etc etc will need to be typed up next weekend.

Finally, I'm tempted to go to Liverpool next month to see the bloody brilliant electro-meisters from Japan, 80kidz. -_- Their new album (as you've seen by my twitter updates) is just immense.

Well, another week to go as my 6 weeks (well 5 and a bit!) of fun begin...

Jaaa ne.

Single, married, divorced - its all good!

2009-04-21T12:45:00.003+01:00

Seems my girlwhohappenstobemyfriend is ignoring me again and we are unable to do anything together in this lovely sunshine - thanks to a combination of having her sister come and visit her from Japan and me being stuck 100 odd miles away.

I've still not got any funny e-mails from Japanese people wanting English lessons yet. I should really check the inbox as some of them are riotous. On the notion of riotous, if you want a good laugh - then I recommend you check out the personal sections in metropolis.

Metropolis is basically an English language paper for the Tokyo community. my favourite section is the personal ads which range from men wanting to find the odd Korean sado-machist in Shibuya to the bored Japanese housewife - who in no uncertain terms is 'married but free' and is searching for a 'foreigner to have fun with.'

Native English speakers only btw... XD

This thing just keeps delivering quality material. I also stayed up until 5am the other night scouring through them. Its become an addiction. Maybe with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend currently occupied I can find some additional female company. ^o^ <---- That's my sexy face btw.

Jaa ne.

stay of execution

2009-04-20T14:41:00.003+01:00

I am now stuck at home in Middlesbrough. Bored. Depressed and panicking... The reason for all of this? Having Natwest as a bank. I am now relying on them to send my financial details through the post, so I can finally get my visa sorted. They send me absolute shite day after day but no bank statement. I just know... know in the pit of my stomach that the statement I receive won't be correct or will have some errors on it. Even worse, I'm doubting it will ever arrive in the post. I am now in an absolute state. I just know, that something will and no doubt, is, going wrong.

I've been screwed out of a visa application both by my uni in Sheffield and by my bank.

I am now rejecting both of them, once all this shit has been sorted out. Personally, Sheffield University can go for a long walk off a short pier. This uni is dead to me, as of today. I have four weeks of teaching and two exams left. And that's it. Natwest oth, can just die. Because I want to take my money elsewhere. They have the worse policies in the world and can just rot in hell. I do not want their custom anymore.

On a final note, I am sick of Japan right now. Sick of this language and sick of everything to do with Japan. I have six weeks of this shit left and just want it to go away. I don't give two shits about the year abroad. It just seems like a complete waste of time and effort.

ffs

2009-04-15T17:51:00.003+01:00

Turns out the forms weren't good enough. I have to get up early tomorrow, bike all the way to town, shout at my bank and then send the new forms off. If they don't write me a good enough letter, heaven knows what that is - then I just won't bother anymore. I can't be arsed. Japan is such an annoying country - full of annoying little things that grate you. I'm not even there yet and I'm still cheesed off with the entire process. I have decided indefinitely to shun any responsibility to my university here in the UK next year. Quite frankly, I don't care anymore.

Right now, I very much am not into the idea of doing a year abroad in Japan. I want to go to Japan. But an entire year out there, with no money and wasting a year where I could be doing my degree here in the UK - just seems rather pointless. Perhaps all this will change - but one thing is for certain, I am not the same person when I started this degree. And more to the point, I am a not enthusiastic about going to Japan as I once was. Sorry, I am not enthusiastic about going as an exchange student.

The whole thing seems rather turgid and stale.

I'm going back to Sheffield this weekend - as I've grown tired of the things around me here - and I'm getting no work done whatsoever.

Japanese Blog

2009-04-10T20:02:00.002+01:00

Recently for Japanese class, we have to start producing blogs, mainly to improve our Japanese and also as something cool to do when in Japan.

I have decided to keep this blog, but will use another blog for the purposes of writing in Japanese and updating my progress on this course and in Japan. I'm not sure if we will be assessed on that or not, but at the moment I have to upload it with pre-approved things about Sheffield and Japan etc.

You can see my Japanese blog (at the moment just one introduction sadly) by clicking the little 日本語 icon on the top of the page.

Hisashiburi ne..... Long Time No Read

2009-04-10T18:45:00.006+01:00

Hisashiburi doesn't really cut it does it? I've really neglected my blog recently due to a tremendous work-load and the previous three and half weeks of having no laptop. Eek! Several huge events have taken place since I last blogged. Only this simple smiley (m(_ _)m) can redeem myself for being so grossly negligent to the blogging community (aka my flatmate who ~~stalks~~ reads this blog via his Iphone.)

Well let me begin with a few things that has happened over the past few weeks, even months since I last checked in.

Firstly and perhaps majorly, I won't be getting a scholarship for next year. I wasn't "considered" for the Seijo one, so instead its gone to the other girl I'm going with, and I also was disregarded for the JASSO one. In fairness, I would feel a sense of guilt taking Japanese taxpayers money for being totally inadequate when it comes to studying. I didn't deserve free money and didn't get it. I'll leave the generous gifts of cash to my parents.

Which brings me onto point two. This resulted in a late Easter scramble for a bank statement of £6000 in order to apply for the Visa. This is because I need to show I can support myself whilst I am in Japan. The reality is, I can't - and it was only the generosity of my parents that has saved me. In the past few days, I have been sending a few e-mails off to my representative at Seijo University in Japan (the uni I will be at next year) and have just sent off my statement to him yesterday. I pray to god its acceptable.

In the process of point of 2, I noticed one thing, well two things actually. Firstly the lack of proficiency in English when dialoguing with my co-coordinator in Japan and secondly how this will affect my placement next year. I was told some minor horror stories of how Seijo is a completely Japanese place with minimal international students and very few staff who speak English. Bless him, his English was good and understandable, but not of course fluent to any degree. This is going to work in my favour a lot. I know many of my colleagues on my course who are being shipped off to huge, vast universities where there are tons of English speakers and its 'oh so easy' to drift into the international bubble and never get out. Going somewhere, where there will be a handful of native speakers (sure French and Belgian speakers may speak English - but its not their first language!) will force me to speak Japanese and integrate. This got me thinking about my own psychological barriers sometimes. I am a curious fellow in that I tend to shy away when I have borders or walls that can protect me, yet when I know they are not there (for instance, if I am alone in some foreign country or place) I turn into a really friendly and confident guy. I think I internalise this as me knowing I am unable to hide behind anything I use any social fear I have to my advantage. I am now, believe or not, starting to look forward to next year. Up until recently, I was either not thinking about it or totally apathetic about the whole experience. But now, looking at some photos, watching some news, reading some random info I found about how to use Suica cards etc, I am getting really really excited. Its fast becoming a nervous excitement due to the relative time scale. The past 8 weeks, since I hastily came back and had a date with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend has flown by, just mindblowingly flown by. When I come back after this Easter break, I will have very little time left. Around 6 to 7 weeks! Thankfully, I only have to two three hour exams to pine over, so I'm feeling a bit more relaxed when I did this time during Christmas.

Where on earth has year II gone? I would like to know, seriously... >o<

Point 3 is that things are going well with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend or friendwhohappenstobeagirl which ever way you put it. We are close friends and will continue to see which way our relationship goes, especially when I go to Japan next year. Certainly, the fact I will be there and she will be within accessible distance, means that its something that can be continued. Like I said previously, its just nice to have female company - but I'm not forcing anything. I've been burnt in the past and just want to enjoy things right now. I personally think both of us are happy where are relationship is at now. I'll leave the mindless skirt chasing to the rampant yellow-fever androids that seem to encircle me at Japan Society. Honestly, I can show 'em a ton of places in Tokyo they can go to if they want a nice J-girl to sodomise for a spouse-visa. Wow... did I really say that? But more importantly, are they actually thinking that?

Aye, point 4 is that although I am increasingly besotted with the idea of going to Japan next year, something is telling me its not for me long-term. But we'll see how that plays out. At the moment, I'm focusing on the short-term and want to see this degree through to the bitter end. I would love to work somewhere more progressive in Asia other than Japan, which seems to be ridiculously expensive and most definitely overhyped in its assumptions by us gaijin. I always think the people who believe the world begins and ends in Japan are the very same who think the world is flat and have such narrowed views. There are so many different cultures and people out there - and by telling yourself studying Japanese opens your eyes to a different culture is just self delusional - because for the most part, it reaffirms a certain narrowmindedness act of self-rejection to everything else in this world. The same people I see who study Japanese, do so and seem to distance themselves from any fixed reality.

This said, there are many people in my year and who study Japanese who are really awesome and are just wonderful, amazing people - who I believe will be rewarded for seeing the reality whilst being able to live the dream. A juxtaposition of metaphysical thought that I DO believe can be achieved when the word Japan enters your head. It is not a state of mind or being. Its just a word. The happy, calm feelings that enter your head are just something that Vonnegut would have you believe as there to simply counter the bad ones.

Point 5 is that I have decided when I come back from Japan next year is to enroll on an advanced TESOL course (Teaching English as a Second or Other Language) after I graduate. This gives me the advantage or a) having a degree b) having some teaching experience during my YA and c) having an actual qualification to show for it. This gives me the chance to work teaching English anywhere in the world once I graduate! And hell, who needs Japan when the world is my oyster!

So where does this leave me?

I am now determined to do the following when in Japan.

1) Be active when in Seijo, basically because it will look really bad when they find out they didn't sponsor me! I have also concocted an evil plan which I will reveal when the time is right.
2) Get a nice teaching job.
3) Meet new J-friends
4) Improve my spoken Japanese through 3) and 1)
5) Visit Yokohama with girlwhohappenstobemyfriend
6) Finally drink some scotch with Taka in Hiroshima.
7) Improve my Karaoke skills
8) See as much as Japan as possible
9) Discover Japan, reject it and then rediscover it again.
10) BLOG MORE!!!!

I still think 7) is m favourite, but most definitely I am looking forward to 9)...

Well all that is moot - because to get to Japan - I have to study! I am have decided to give myself a week off and will be back to the grind of kanji/sakubun/translation practice next Monday. Ugh.

See you later.

Long, long, long, long, time!!!

2009-02-22T20:23:00.003Z

Wow, such a long time since I blogged last. Some good news, some bad, some middling. The good news is that I passed my medical exam for Japan, but thoroughly ballsed my Japanese language exam up. I was pushing hard for a 2.1, had a high 2.2, but then apparently, I completely bombed on one section of the exam, resulting in a 48.

Gutted.

There is nothing I can do, but I seriously think the lack of prep and how quickly I rushed through it killed me. What annoys me is that there are obviously some people who got higher than me, yet I know my other grades along the board are higher. I'm not going to say that some people didn't deserve to score higher than me - but it sucks given all the hard work I put in. If the grades were constantly low, I could have taken that, but that one section on one exam has screwed my grade up. At first I went through a range of emotions, but now I am resigned to just passing this year. I'm more concerned about gaining a 2.1 for masters purposes than obtaining a scholarship for next year. I would take in a heartbeat a PG scholarship to study abroad in Hong Kong rather than a JASSO one for next year.

Also, it appears I'm starting a blog in Japanese soon for my language classes. Oh wait... Well, let's just say there's going to be more Japanese appearing on this blog soon. I'm still not sure whether I'll seperate the English or the Japanese into different sections or not.

Finally, I think I'm truly fed up of this year now. Whether its because Japan is on the horizon or that all the women in my life have deserted me, I don't know. I have 10 weeks of lectures to go, and according to my flatmate - this time will just fly by. *ugh* I would love it to, but at the same time, I just want it to drag on and on - because in many ways I don't want it to. I will leave many things behind and many amazing and kind people as well. I just want to get my head down, eat, sleep, study, pass, open my eyes and just hope everything has turned out well.

On a truly final note: I think my laptop's hard-drive is well and truly dead now. It keeps making funny sounds and is going as slow as a snail crawling on its belly through thick tar.

Health exam

2009-02-12T22:28:00.005Z

Things are not looking good. Despite my application form for Seijo being relatively easy by other people's standards, I failed my health exam, or rather didn't pass one section on the exam. Basically my Blood Pressure is very high, mainly down to a combination of stress, anxiety and shitty lifestyle.... (maybe.) Well anyways, I wasn't able to be given a clean bill of health and now have to wait another week. And in this week, I am going to do everything in my power to reduce my anxiety and BP level. If its still high, then I am in the shit and may need to start going on the meds - which would require more fecking paperwork to fill out. I'm just thinking my BP got so high due to a lack of sleep the night-before, the stress of work and the anxiety of medical type things (which I am very VERY fearful of, I fucking hate hospitals.)

But on the plus side, I have until the 25th of March to finish my application, so plenty of time to get better. I hope... What pisses me off slightly is that I think my BP is the result of stress/anxiety rather than health, and clearly they are far more people unhealthier than me doing my course, but obviously not having the same critical thresholds for plaptations and soaring BP levels.

I've almost done week 1 of the 2nd semester and already its starting to drag. No wonder, I'm hypertensive. Pissed off with some my classmates (but you know, shou ga nai) and just want to knuckle down, do my work and make sure this semester passes quickly and easily without any hiccups. Hiccups like the one I experienced today.

Gift

2009-02-09T17:38:00.004Z

On Saturday I received a lovely gift from an equally as lovely girlwhohappenstobemyfriend on one of our first rendezvous since late December. Its some type of Japanese bag type thing that she bought in York (there is shop there that sells Japanese stuff.) She also hand wrote me a beautiful card, which was really touching. I am not going to tell you what she wrote (it wasn't that personal, and half of it was written in Japanese.)

She's also been slightly aversive to me taking her out for Valentine's day (I guess because I wanted it to remain something of a slight surprise.) I mean, what girl in her right mind would not want to be taken out by a handsome Englishman for Valentines day? I'm sure she'll come round once she realises the symbolism this date has in Western cultures.

Or maybe I've just lost her forever... *sob* *sob* Its really weird going out with someone who you seem to share so many connections with... You can understand their reactions to things but in many ways are at a complete loss at how to deal with them.

Start of semester 2...

2009-02-09T17:15:00.003Z

I am now starting the second semester of the 2nd year of my degree here in Sheffield and suffice to say is not an understatement in saying that I am being worked to the bone. Monday's are an official pain in the arse, as I have four lectures and all of them are pretty hardcore. First off I have a Japanese translation class at 10am, then a lecture on Japanese society at 12pm, and then straight after that I have back to back Japanese grammar and Classic Japanese classes.

The thing is, there is so much work given out and so much work to do; today, as you've seen in my previous post, I had to learn a lot of honorific/humble Japanese, I was thus given my mammoth reading list for Contemporary society, was given my translation (which I understand a little bit of) and I sat there struggling with Classical Japanese, as my teacher bursts through it and the rest of the class (aka the smart-arse bastards) are well versed in this.

As I pass the mid-point of my degree, I am safe in the knowledge that everyone, bar one person doing the degree has passed the first semester. (Sensei usually informs us privately if we messed up.) I know one person dropped out, but that is neither here nor there. The amount of work given plus the increasing complexity of the work as well as attempting to build on what we have already have done in semster one is starting to take a strain already. However there is something tangible in the sense that Japan is merely 6 months away and that all this work will pay off for something. I would hate to get to this stage in my degree and simply give up. Not now, when I look back at all this hard work I have done. In many ways, I am fired up for this degree, ready to rise to the challenge and really push myself to the limit.

But whilst the mind is willing - even I have my limits and perhaps its asking too much of me. However given the fact that today is my official 'life is a bitch day' - I think its normal to feel a little overwhelmed. Especially after 7 weeks of not being in classes. Luckily for us, the easter break arrives after week 7, which is probably the stage most people will be crying out for a break. Right now, I'm just geared up for this hellish ride of 18 weeks or so.

So much classical Japanese grammar to learn, so many kanji compounds to remember, so many new words to remember, so much new grammar to use, so much old grammar to remember, so much old kanji to remember, so much stuff about contemporary society to remember...

Oh and I have to start writing my personal statement for Seijo this week.

But do I regret all this hard work and stress? Do I hell...! Bring it on!

Its now 5.30pm and I'm off to the library after the Simpsons to read some of my readings for Contemporary Society this week. ^^

Tomorrow is slightly less stressful, as I have a nice writing class in the morning and a little 3 hour break to catch up all my work before my speaking class (which I have signed up to a smaller group to get more practice in.)

Honorific and Humility in Japanese

2009-02-09T16:46:00.003Z

Forming the honorific/humble forms in Japanese.

Firstly one has to make the distinction between honorific and humble. To put it simply, honorific is when one refers to someone else's actions, whereas humble is where one refers to their own. You use polite speech or 'keigo' (敬語) when addressing someone who is above the speaker (bosses, older friends, senpai etc.)

To form the honorific form, you usually use the passive form.

連絡させる - to contact.

Note that this format is also the passive and in some cases (such as Type 2 verbs) the potential.

To avoid this complexity, one can create the honorific and humble forms by the following;

Honorific = お + 'masu-stem' + になる
Humble = お + 'masu stem' + する

Let's use the verb 乗る (to ride) as an example.

日本に旅行するなら、ＪＡＬでお降りになったほうがいいです。
When you go to Japan, you should fly via JAL.

日本に旅行して行った時、ＪＡＬでお降りしました。
When I went to Japan, I flew via JAL.

Some verbs in Japanese have specific honorific and humble forms;

する　（なさる - いたす）
いる　（いらっしゃる - おる）
行く　（いらっしゃる - まいる）
来る　（いらっしゃる - まいる・伺う）
食べる　（召し上がる - 頂く）
飲む　（召し上がる - 頂く）
聞く　（伺う）
言う　（おっしゃる - 申す）
見る　（ご覧になる）
知る　（ご存知 - 存じる）
もらう　（いただく）
くれる　（くださる）
あげる　（さしあげる）

Some pronouns and nouns include their own honorific form,

どこ　＝　どちら
どう　＝　いかが
だれ　＝　どなた
これ・ここ　＝　こちら
それ・そこ　＝　そちら
あれ・あそこ　＝　あちら

リチャードの家　＝　リチャードのお宅
いい　＝　よろしい
が好き　＝　がお好き

Special words that denote belonging, such as family, money and friends (and more bizarrely, tea and alcohol) use the prefix お or ご depending on the type of word. Normally words with the Chinese reading (that is to say the on'yomi) have the prefix ご whereas the words with Japanese origin have the prefix お.

お酒を飲みになりますか？　- will you drink this alcohol?
明日、ご両親にいらっしゃいませんか？ - will your parents come tomorrow?

Back home

2009-01-31T00:00:00.002Z

I'm now back home for the week and I've already noticed one thing. Namely that that my parents haven't moved anything in my room since I left it like that on the 4th of January... o_O

Also, we are in for some nasty weather it seems as some Siberian snow blasts are on their way, and given the fact I live on the North East of England and have moved from the relative snugness of centralish England we will get the brunt of it. Sadly, I've left my camera at Sheffield so I can't take some photos of all this snow we'll be getting. I remember the last time we had really bad weather from that area of the world and it ended up laying 3 inches in an hour. The snow we get from Canada is so much civilised don't you think?

Exams = DONE!!!

2009-01-28T18:42:00.002Z

What a day, what a week... Finally the exams are done and I can breathe huge sigh of relief. I am now at the other end of that tunnel and can take a well deserved week break back home. I was in severe danger of running out of steam in the end, but I made it! In the words of the Japanese... YATA!

On Tuesday at Hillsborough, Lexicology was a bit easier than I expected. He even rehashed two of last year's questions. I only think i potentially messed up one and had a good hour and a 15 minutes to write my essay which included the now semi-legendary word "shitbags" - wonderful stuff (it was on taboo English before you question my academic integrity.) To top off how slightly silly the exam was, I noticed a mistake - the final section (section B) was supposed to have 7 questions but only had 6. I feel sorry for some people who maybe worked hard preparing for the eventuality of that mysterious question 5. I wonder in all honesty what magic words it contained and what it might tell us about our future, our destiny, our civilisation as it stands today. With any luck, we might be graded up because of that - even though it didn't throw me one bit and I only noticed the cock-up 30 minutes before the end of the exam.

Still it was nice going to Hillsborough. I love doing my exams there, because the only Chinese and non-white people you see are those taking exams there! Its basically a highly residential area and reflects more of the cities makeup as a town oop norf, well more so than living in the secluded international makeup of the city centre. I can't stress enough how many Chinese people I see everyday here. I'm sure this place should be called mini-Beijing.

Where was I? Oh yes exams. I did the final one today - Japan's Minorities - in the University Food Court and ended up questioning my sanity at times. The entire experience was like having sex for three hours with a girl you don't fancy. You have to do it, because quite frankly you should do it, but the experience itself is quite unsightly and unpleasant due to what is laid up in front of you. The problem was maybe that the answers were quite focused rather than generalised so I might lose points for waffling and maybe not answering clearly enough. Only the second one I did about the state facing problems with regards to continued migration was the one I felt most confident on. The saving grace was that the conclusions had that edgy punch that final coup-de-grace to make sure that even if 90% of what I wrote was utter bullshit, I can at least get across this point and make it seem like I know my stuff (which I genuinely do.)

Looking back over the exam period, I feel slightly annoyed by two things now.

Firstly, revising for stuff that didn't come up at all. I could have got by, simply by having a general knowledge of the subject. And secondly, I still feel my work is off a poor standard, I still feel like a 2.2 student. I don't feel strong enough in myself and in my work to think I am at the capacity whereby my work is good enough to get me those desired grades. Ultimately, although I know I have passed in some capacity, I know the standards will be nowhere near what I expect. But I can't cheat that, I can't cheat at the cards God gives me. I'm not bigger than that, nor do I possess such an overbearing ego.

Oh and two major things have happened today. One, I was woken up at 9am with the fire alarms sounding. Thought, nah fuck it, just lie in bed - its no big deal. Until I realised that it kept going and going and that perhaps it wasn't a test. Hmmm, I ended up going outside and down the stairs in a pillar of smoke. But luckily after the fire brigade came and checked for any sources of the fire, they let us back in after 10 minutes. I can only assume it was a minor electrical fire as a result of the workmen doing stuff next door. Well anyways, we survived the horror of the Rockingham House Towering Inferno and we now have this on our door to remind us of the dangers.

Check out them exclamation points to really ram home how serious this thing is. LiKe OmFG, don't stY in iTS fIRE!!!1111 lolz...

Secondly, girlwhohappenstobemyfriend hasn't texted me back after I invited her out. I'm giving up hope. I just can't be arsed chasing that up. I'm fairly sure she likes me as a friend rather than anything else and I'll leave the incessant chasing of Japanese girls to some of the rancid amoeba blobs on our course. How the hell they will manage in Japan, when there are fucking tons of beautiful women there I'll never know. *sigh*

Shame I have two beautiful women in Kansai to visit (well three actually, but she is spoken for.)

*shrug

Well hopefully if I pass, I can continue putting myself through this hell for another 6 months at least.

Jaa ne.

2 down, 2 to go (!!!)

2009-01-26T21:09:00.004Z

Oral exam. Done.

The less said about it the better. Tbf, our two Japanese teachers were really supportive, but it was just so damn hard to memorise stuff and think of a story in 5 mins. It was like having a job interview for a job you don't want. I came out giggling like a Japanese schoolgirl in the end, trying to mask the pain of how bad it was. The two Chris's (probably my closest allies on this course) both came out with the reaction of being KO'ed by Ricky Hatton.

Tomorrow, will see my penultimate exam at Sheffield Wednesday Football Club. About 20 minutes on the tram and a nice walk down to the football stadium. I think I'll stop off near the pub at the top of the ground and gain some Dutch courage before I go in. I am now approaching this Lexicology exam with caution. I could just about pass it, with the cramming of info I have done, but it all depends on what comes up - as I think my bare notes might just not make it. I guarentee some esoteric thing he mentioned during one of my memory lapses in the lectures will come back to haunt me. And to think I had a 100% attendance on that module (sames goes for Minorities as well - but I have been reading tons of crap for that module.)

Thankfully it should be the last Linguistics module I ever take in my life. Its social sciences all the way now. I have to make two appointments to make the change to switch to full time Japanese Studies. To complocate matters, I've decided to go home for next week, meaning that the change can't possibly happen until next semester - by which time the English department will be still sending me crap about fucking Drama studio whilst telling me to sign up to seminars for some module I have no interest in taking. I also might have to try and work out my timetable for semester II as the times aren't listed yet.

Wonderful, just wonderful

See you on the other side folks...

Speaking exam

2009-01-25T19:25:00.003Z

I seem to have recently discovered a few noticers of this blog, one who shall remain nameless (although let's for arguments sake say its my flatmate who has this linked up to his new I-phone) and the other is potentially my sensei.

As a result I have to tone down the language and discussion a little bit...

*sniff*

Ah fuck it. Arse, tits, bollocks, cum, shitbags.

Anyways my speaking test is up tomorrow and I have done naff all revision. I think it will go badly, but when I am in this relaxing mood of "hey I might have failed the exam and won't go to Japan next year" I feel somewhat relaxed. I am also more concerned about the other two exams on Tuesday and Wednesday, as really want to do well on those (except Lexicology.)

Also this oral exam, currently counts as 2.5% of our overall grade for the module. I say 'currently', as there is student discontent with many people expressing (rightly in my opinion) that the exam should not count for 80% of the entire module and it should be spread more evenly across all areas. The problem for me, is that I have truly neglected some of the speaking/listening classes in lieu of this - tbh, I treat them as like having some nightclasses or something. Disengage brain, hope for the best. My speaking has becoming awful, since I have been doing nothing but looking at kanji and grammar. Again, if I knew that the exam counted for less, I would have spread my revision evenly across listening, speaking and grammar/kanji etc.

Oh well. I just hope I can pull something out. Normally I can, but I haven't memorised anything. I might just go over some grammar and hope it works out. I'll use masu form and a couple of intotations to liven it up a bit. Its supposed to be a monogatari type thing (making up a story based on pictures.) I got a 2.1 for my last speaking exam, but then I had Chris to pull me up (because he really did work hard for that.)

Still, the only way I can really fail this exam is to not say anything in Japanese. The plan is as follows; Down at the union by 9am, lucozade inside me by 9.30, shitting myself outside the office by 9.45 and then by 10.30 I should be free, free.... FREE... to go downstairs and cram some more for Lexicology (which I will fail in as well.) Its just gotten to the point, where I want to learn it, but at the same time I don't. I can remember something like 500 out of the first 850 lines in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales were of French origin and something about Taboo and the usage of morphology - derivational, affixation, sense-development, extension, restriction, blah, blah, blah...

Well, see you on the other side...

Jaa ne.

1 down, 3 to go (!!!)

2009-01-23T16:08:00.006Z

I've finally finished my Japanese exam this morning. It was both harder and easier than I expected. The topics covered have been pretty much the topics we've covered in class, which has led some to believe that this semester was nothing more than something you guess at, based on what we've done in class. The exam itself was split up into three parts with another listening exam, two hours later;

Translation - This was the one which was just fiendish. To make matters truly worse, our teacher even used an idiomatic phrase we learnt in week one. In fact the entire piece was just an extension of everything we did in week one - in which we were told not to worry about too much. There was a ton of vocab and kanji I didn't know and just guessed at. Stuff like　定年 and 不動産業者 will haunt me for the rest of my life. At the end, was a monster sentence which I managed to somehow write in broken English. Terrible stuff. If he marks like a translation pedant, I am screwed.

Reading - People said this was hard, however if you bothered to take on board what Angela was teaching us in class (don't translate - interpret) you would find this quite easy. I managed to answer all the questions and understand them, but I still felt as if I screwed up one or two. Still, it went a lot better than the practice one I did in class. I did this last, and had about 30 minutes to do it. I then spent the remaining 20 odd minutes of the exam, furiously checking all my answers - especially the translation.

Writing - My sakubun was utter drivel. The only saving grace was that it had a beginning and an end. The less said about the stuff in the middle the better. Perhaps the fact I managed to sneak in some useful constructions will save me. Not a 2.1 material but easily a 2.2 depending on what mood my teacher is in when she marks it. Its definitely the same standard as most of my other pieces, although this one will be full of silly mistakes - but maybe more so than usual.

Listening - This was difficult, I understood about half of it, guessed a quarter of it and the other quarter I wrote some utter bollocks and hope it worked out for the best. That's about a 40% er right there.

Conclusion - I think I've passed but the result will not be pretty. My coursework throughout the year has been about 55% ish and I reckon I'll get a 2.2 for this module. if I've failed, I know several people who will be in the same boat as me. However, I'm just glad to have done it. I know in my heart that I am still improving, still taking aboard new grammar and kanji and working towards some tangible goal of understanding this language. Obviously its nice to have a 2.1 and be considered for a scholarship for next year. But that's never gonna happen and I'm just glad to see the back of half of this year. I hope I've passed and I hope all the people who worked so hard this semester have passed as well.

Still got my oral exam on Monday plus my Lexicology and Minorities crap. So a wonderful weekend of study for me. *sigh* See you on the other side folks.

jaa ne...

Needed: 1 Japanese brain for 9am to 10am, 23/1/09

2009-01-22T17:30:00.005Z

I need a brain transplant. Ideally from a native Japanese speaker. But they have to understand English well, or they could misread the English questions and then I'm fucked. Okay, I just want a brain-transplant for exactly one hour for the sakubun. I'll do the other two-thirds. That's more than fair...

じゃああああああああ、がんばりましょう！！！！！！ Exam in 16 hours!!!!! o_O

In a way I'm actually looking forward to this, in the same way that I look forward to watching two dogs rip each others heads off or watching someone perform kidney surgery on me whilst I am awake.

No looking back now... See you at the other end!

PANIC!!!!

2009-01-20T22:58:00.003Z

Want to press it...

2 days to go...

Oh how I hate kanji. And lexicology. So far, I'm struggling to absorb some of this Linguistics stuff, but at the minute I need some sensei love to ease my mind. I also haven't decided to pick up my essay yet, because I'm avoiding it and also because I'm in a highly strung state of mind, and getting back my 54 or something will just kill me. I'm going to pick it up after my minorities exam next Wednesday. Then, I can just take on board everything and assess how all the exams went.

Exam stress

2009-01-18T13:32:00.004Z

Revision, at least for me is like the currents of the sea. One day its calm the next day its a raging torrent of waves that is battering the shore. The latter is what I feel like now. Its not that I know nothing about this subject. Its not that I don't know the kanji or the grammar. Its the vocab and to a major extent my essay writing technique - especially under exam conditions. I am now getting to the point where I am worrying about how to start, continue and ultimately end the essay.

To all extents and purposes, a fair chunk of the sakubun is guided - in that we are given information related to the topic which we therefore use to describe the situation or event. I don't think it will be a case of the question being "What do *you* think about Japan?" and have me sat there for a good 20 minutes struggling to come up with ideas. Obviously we are being tested under exam conditions, so the use of dictionaries and grammar notes are not allowed and we don't have the relaxed attitude of being able to form complex sentences and structures. But at the same time, a large chunk of the assessment is the overall narrative of the piece (how well does it work and fit together.) This is something I've struggled with and have only received top grades when I've had some logical sequence of events that has allowed me to build up a conclusive argument. I don't think my japanese is good enough where I can just sit there and sat constructing narrative in the same way that I would do in English. I am also struggling from the issue of overcomplicated matters for the sake of grammar. Curse my love of writing technical Japanese.

And as for my second fear, I'm going into my translation with no idea about the material. At the moment I am reading in preparation for that, some highly advanced texts (albeit for a gaijin studying japanese) and I can understand about 70% of it, if it wasn't for all those bizarre kanji. Apparently we won't be tested on anything we haven't learned, but I'm not buying that anymore. There has to be a point at which one can seperate those who have studied all the material and those who have studied that little bit extra just to be complete and utter smart arse-holes. (Like me, who learnt how to use してみれば the other day.)

Anyways, needless to say without sounding like an arrogant arsehole, which I am going to anyway. If I am panicing, I know for a fact A LOT of people on our course will be. Exam is in 5 days now and they should all be finished in about 10.

Hopefully once I get this hell out of the way, I can just relax for about 10 days.

Jaa ne.

Demand in China

2009-01-17T02:45:00.001Z

I believe I can satisfy this demand.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7832440.stm

Christmas Credit Crunch ( 日本語 )

2009-01-15T16:10:00.004Z

時々、イギリスは日本人にとって、おかしそうな国だと思う。日本人はイギリスに旅行したら、たくさんの相違点に気がつくはずだ。例えば、イギリスの気候や食べ物は日本と違う。しかし、日本は冬にイギリスほど寒くないが、１２月に来たら、類似点に気がつくかもしれない。クリスマスのおかげで、日本でもイギリスでも、１２月は重要な一ヶ月になった。

１２月中、特別なプレゼントを買うためにショッピングしに行きたり、カナダに住んでいる家族までカードを送ったりする人がいる。それは楽しそうだけど、クリスマスが浪費だと言う人が多い。

たしかに、クリスマスはもう宗教的な祭りではないが、何人かにとって、まだ大変なことだ。それにかかわらず、世界で色々な起こっていることので、イギリスのクリスマスは商業化のことになったと思う。イギリスのクリスマスは変化しつつある。

ところが、イギリスだけではなく、日本でもクリスマスは商業化がされた。日本は国際化しているが、クリスマス西洋と日本のクリスマスを比較すると、どちらも商業化のことと言う点で似ている。

日本では人々が友達や相手にプレゼントをあげたり、イギリス人のようにショッピングしたりする。そのうえ、クリスマスのご飯のために、ＫＦＣの食品まで食べる。しかし、それは同じ商業化にもかかわらず、クリスマスの日に日本人がフライドチキンを食べるからといって、日本のクリスマスのご飯は全くおかしいというわけではないと思う。

最近、世界中、不景気のおかげで、将来にクリスマスの日にファスト・フードのレストランで食べるしかない人が多いかもしれない。クリスマスが商業化のことにならないほうがいいと言う人もいるが、それに対して、前に述べたように、社会は変化しつつある。従って、私たちの習慣も変化しつつあるといってもいいほどである。だから、クリスマスの日に日本人がＫＦＣの食品を食べるのは珍しそうなのに、そのうち、クリスマスのためにイギリスの皆さんがマクドナルドで食るのかもしれない。

Death of a computer

2009-01-14T14:34:00.003Z

My computer is now literally dying. It is slowing down and yesterday I woke up to find that Skype wasn't working properly. For some reason it shows my friends are online but they are actually offline. As a result I was trying to contact my *ahem* friend who happens to be a girl and no response. Odd. Even the little test call thing was showing itself to be offline. New account later, and she still hasn't added me. Oh bollocks. That's all I need. Still, she only uses it on an evening and is probably busy studying - so its okay I guess.

To make matters worse, Firefox has also gone for a burden - running incredibly slow and screwing around with the BBC football site making all the fonts tiny. Its the only site I regularly read and possibly because I read it directly from the xml feed at the top of the browser it has decided to start screwing around.

As for studying. I'm starting to panic now. I have some coping strategies to deal with the exam and have planned how I will approach it - but its the actual content, the Japanese itself I'm having trouble with. If I'm not forgetting grammar, I'm forgetting kanji or basic words. *ugh* I also haven't done any listening, which is why I'm now running some Japanese radio whilst adding stuff to the one useful thing I've found this week, anki.

Oh anki is great. Its basically a flash-card programme and you can put anything, literally anything on it. I've already put on this years kanji compounds and am now going to add some facts about minorities in Japan. Brilliant!

Well I would do a 'this week' thing at the bottom of my weekly update, but you all know what I'm doing this week. Panicing like mad!

Jaa ne.

Tesco - Every little helps

2009-01-11T19:49:00.011Z

最近、Tescoという店を好むようになる。Tescoは地球を障害させると言う人が多いのに、大変便利だ思う。どこに行っても、Tescoを発見するだろうね。よく、食品や家庭品を買いたかったら、引き値品を買うものだ。「引き値品」というのは値段を下がられた品ことだ。それで、１ポンドのサンドや５０ペンスのクッキーなどが買えるよ。貧乏な大学生として、すごくすばらしいと思う！特に、今、夏の旅行ためにお金をためなくちゃね。工夫はTescoに行くのは遅ければ遅いほど、値段が安くなることだ。でも、僕が住んでいる地方は学生がたくさんいるから、安い食品買ってみにくい。:-(

次に、台所の汚い状態ので、いつも下痢に引き受けるらしい。だから、台所を掃除したほうがいいようけど、めっちゃめんどうくさいよｗ。いつも下痢に引き受けるのに！＾ぉ＾

最後に、大学Ｅメールによると、SEASの事務所でJapan’s Minoritiesエッセーが受けに行けるそうだ。本当に、こわいいよ。たいてい、エッセイーの結果を教えたら、がっかりする。なぜなら、結果はたいてい悪いからだ。毎日毎日勉強したり、たくさんの本を読んだりしても、悪い結果を受けて、勉強しないほかの人にとって、よく６０点役を受けると思う。その制度は不当だと思うが、変な想像なことだろう。実は明日事務所に行くと、６０点以上がほしいなぁ。。。が、気にしないほうがいいだろう。本当に、エッセーの結果はかなり大切だと思う。。なぜなら、６０以上点を受けたら、来週試験が落ちられるだろうからだ。でも、もし１００点を受けれた、試験に頑張るね！いい学生だよ！

もし結果は大変悪ければ、Tescoに行って、嬉しくなるように安いクッキーを買ってみる。＾＾

じゃぁね。

リチャード

New year, old problems, new dilemmas.

2009-01-06T23:22:00.012Z

I hate dieting. I hate revising. I hate the cold. But of course I know that dedication is the key and if I can maintain these (well except the cold - but you never know in the UK) I shall be rewarded with a nice grade and a nice body. The ultimate goal is fitness and Japan. But I'm ever more increased to just pass the exam and overall do my degree. Yes, if I manage to go to Japan its going to be a great experience for me - one that many will not have in their lives. But... its still a novelty, the fear factor hasn't kicked in yet and it really hasn't sunk in - aside from the forms I have to fill in and the jabs I have to receive.

Fitness wise - I've taken the drastic step to quit drinking, both from a health pov and a mental one. I'm thinking that the more I drink, even in short spells, the more I'm likely to regret it when I look at my wallet and my regime of fitness. in the long-run I need to save money in these following six months and also need to build up my fitness for travelling. Backpacking takes a lot out of you! I need to get back in shape, so that lugging a large rucksack across the continent and exploring cities across the globe won't physically kill me. *ugh* But how its such a pain. 6 months or bust. I'm really just knuckling down now. I couldn't care less about anyone else on my course. The main goal is passing. But at the same time, the very people who support me, the people who drive me on when things get low are my mates, are the people around me on this course, are the people whom I want to see next year in Japan.

Therein lies the paradox of things. I want to focus on myself and neglect certain social aspects of doing this degree but at the same time want the compassion and socialisation of people around me. Things would get incredibly dull if I studied all the time. I need a break from studying, even though studying is important. Its a matter of short-bursts rather than burning out after two days - which is what I have experienced so far in my 4 months as a ninensei...

My finances are running terrible now. I've anticipated that I'll need to spend around £50 a week (which pays for everything - laundry, food, toiletries, travel etc.) That will save me about £800 I reckon, depending on whether I stay at home or not during the holidays. I'm now deciding to stay at home for longer periods merely to save some money. This means I'll be back home for a week after all my exams have finished. 7 weeks back in Sheff. 3 weeks back home. 8 weeks back in Sheff. Home. Christ, that's only 18 weeks in Sheffield (counting these three weeks.) Considering how quickly 14 weeks passed, I should fucking savour these times not lament how I'll fail and get fat!

I've also seemingly neglected the variant in this issue - namely this girl I've discovered. I like her, I really do - and the jury is still out as to whether she likes me back in equal measures. At the moment she's a friend and at the minute I think I'm tirelessly going to play it as such. I've never had to fit in trying to juggle gym, study, women in all one go. But now I'm going to have to. It'll certainly make sure I'm not vegetating. The only problem is that women are expensive - studying and working out oth isn't. *sigh* Besides, what started as a desire to get a g/f this year has dwindled somewhat. I just can't be bothered anymore. I'll make friends and if things happen they happen. I know for certain, that the end result, will be significantly more happy than if I try and force things to happen, be that a relationship, my weight or Japanese proficiency. These things take time. And time is what I have a lot of right now - despite the dark clouds of my exam dates circling above me.

Ice-station zebra, sorry Rockingham house is fully operational and my revision is going okay. Its just the sheer amount of stuff I have to revise. Most of my Japan's Minorities is typed up and I'm in the process of just looking over extra material to see if I can shoe-in some interesting tid-bids for my exam. Lexicology - which can personally take a dive into an ocean, has to be done but I'm now in the process of merely cramming for that exam. Doing the bare minimum by learning information that I can cram and dump and not bother about again. Minorities geninuely interests me, but Linguistics can die for all I care. And it will, once I sign the paperwork next semester. None of this dual-degree nonsense. Both departments function brilliantly as two wholes but as one collective agreement, they don't function at all.

Kinda like me and my social and academic life. *sigh* Oh well..

じゃぁ、ヘルモンじゃないよ！踊れ、踊れ、踊れ、勉強しろよ！

またね。。。

This week Richard is... physically knackered after only two days back in Sheffield. Sleeping, revising, eating and typing out long-winded sluices that almost break laptop keyboards. Also is wondering how quiet and pleasant a freezing cold Sheffield is when most of the students aren't here. How it won't last.

Leading the New Year

2009-01-04T02:43:00.003Z

It was supposed to be a pleasant New Year’s Eve. It was supposed to be fun. It was supposed to be a time when we all forget the hardships of the past year, sweep them under the rug and obliterate the memory of them through copious amounts of alcohol.

I can’t remember what I was doing when the chord struck midnight to signal in the New Year, but I remember with a vivid illusion the time, the place, the exact moment when I heard the news that Israel had began bombing Gaza. It was 10pm, it was the kitchen, it was making a sandwich, it was digital radio. Not again. Just not again.

Yes. It seems as if this time of the year has come around and reminded us of the painfully poignancy of our fragile situation as human beings. The intense emotion I felt made me feel uncontrollable, practically unmovable from my hatred. I couldn’t sleep… just thinking… ruminating… concerned… truly worried about the amount of Anti-Israel ‘protests’ and ‘campaigns’ that will face me once I venture back to university next week. It was a great shame that the copious amounts of alcohol couldn’t consume from this inevitable fear.

I’ve never once understood people’s reactions and hostile emotions when it comes to the Palestine-Israeli conflict – especially over a conflict such as this, one that seems the most logical yet is fostering such illogical public hate and anger towards the Israeli government. There seems to be a lighting quick reaction that seems to presuppose Israel’s wrongdoings and supports Palestine unequivocally - regardless of the forces that surround it.

People have seemingly caught onto the conflict, without ever realising what started it, who is behind it and the necessary lead-up to the event which has helped shape the public consciousness. Israel have immediately assumed the bad-guy role in the film, purely because they are misunderstood or portrayed in such a shallow light of hate because we don’t know enough about them. This dark, brooding mysticism of hatred is partially because we never hear of Israeli actions in any positive light and partially because we are bombarded with the positive image of the lesser downtrodden man overcoming adversity. Its hard to construct a plausible Hollywood film, when the perceived bad guys are perceived to be good. I don’t blame them to be fair. Israel hasn’t always done the right thing, yet in the past decade or so, they have taken progressive steps to formulate a peace process – which have only be undermined by the extremist groups they must seemingly negotiate peace with.

Israel’s reaction once you strip away the flesh underneath the media masquerade is perfectly rational. Its citizens face fear in the form of rocket attacks from militants and Israel has the right to protect its citizens. It was the same right the British government exercised in Northern Ireland to protect its people and the same basic right should be provided to all Israelis. No-one should live in constant fear.

In the 21st century, Israel always strike me as clean, crisp and controlled. Okay, if get rid of that fancy desk and office building and remove the rational females like Livni from the situation, you’d still get the heavy handed approach of any mad-capped Middle-Eastern state waging war. But, Israel generally seems to care for its people. One life lost is one life too much seems to be the rallying call. And if you study the rhetoric of Israel over the past decade or so, it has seemingly always been this throughout the peace negotiations. Israeli would rather sacrifice its principles and politics than that of its people. Politics change – but you should always represent the people of your nation.

The elected government of Hamas on the other hand, are more than happy to sacrifice their own people, before, during and after death in a bid to propagandise its bloody conflict. You don’t defend your people by blindingly leading them into a conflict that is unwinnable on all fronts. You may win the Hollywood love story – but from all avenues of conflict – it’s a nil gain for Palestine. I don’t buy the argument of a disproportionate response, when you are waging war between matchstick men and fighter jets. Causalities such as those are not shocking, they should be expected. Israel cannot start engaging in actions that will kill one Palestinian terrorist when one Israeli citizen is killed. Warfare doesn’t work in such measures and never has done. Its certainly not a book that has been written, read and understood by such groups as Hamas anyway.

But I can understand the reason why people derive such hatred for the state of Israel. As with everything, it is a microcosm of society. It is the richer, bigger state supposedly bullying the little one into submission through persecution and occupation. However, like all societies there are harsh lessons to be learnt. You don’t bully your bigger larger more powerful brother into response and expect the outcome to be a bunch of slaps and hot air. Occupation or no occupation.

So as the people mount upon Israel, perhaps one should ask, what you would do when faced with such a crisis? You withdraw from Gaza, see the people elect a terrorist group to represent the people there, and then see them fire rockets at your citizens as a political parlay. In fact, if you get happen to see any of these celebrity campaigners on the streets of London or even Sheffield – ask them sternly in their two-car, large house and swimming pool in the country houses what they would do under this situation? Then ask them to live a day in Sderot or Ashkelon under the daily fear of some terrorist militant deciding to fire a rocket at you.

We should not rally behind Palestinians in the Gaza Strip under these conditions. They are the masters of their downfall unless they are willing to oust Hamas and take a more sensible stance for peace. I would love nothing more for the Israelis and Palestinians to find peace. But at present, when groups like Hamas are in the political fold, then there can be no time for peace.

Israel has proved its restraint both politically and militarily on many occasions. Perhaps the international community and the band of self-appointed overlords (that would be Galloway and Livingstone apparently) should show as much restraint towards the Israelis, as the Israelis themselves did in the lead-up to this conflict.

We should of course be against the loss of life. Perhaps that’s what people are against…But now If you’ll excuse me I’ll be finishing my sandwich now, downing the last of this New Year’s Eve booze and be off to the first train to London in the morning to throw shoes at the Ugandan embassy.

Laters.

2008 Review

2008-12-30T00:54:00.004Z

I am back! After what seems like a decade. Thanks to women, mild chest infestations and broken laptops my blogging progress has been hindered somewhat. So far, my Christmas holidays have been something of a washout as 3 days into my sojourn back home my laptop died on me and then my chests did. Yes. Not only did Vista descend into illness so did I. A bloody chest infection. On Christmas Day! I spent the night unable to sleep, having mild hallucinations and running cold sweats. On Boxing Day, despite feeling the worst I have ever felt, I ventured to see my beloved football team play the worst fucking 90 mins I have seen in my life. I sat there, watching a bunch of clueless footballers in freezing cold weather with a fever. Wonderful.

But this got me thinking. I've had some pretty shitty goings on throughout 2008 and it has potentially become one of the worst years I've had in living memory. Yes... I am going to say it, 2008 is the worst fucking year I've lived through. And here's why via monthly rundown of my misfortune with a handy rating system;

January: I suffer from depression, brought on by being single, having SAD and suffering from shit flatmates. 1/10

February: More depression, and exams. But on the plus side. I moved out of my previous flat with my shitty flatmates. 2/10

March: I make a complete dick out of myself at an Easter party, get drunk and lose my hat. 0/10 (Lowest of the fucking low)

April: I get into mild trouble with the English Language and Linguistics department after pissing off one of the academic staff (one of them responsible for that module was really nice, the other was a bit of a cow.) 1/10

May: I do my exams and finish all of them before everyone else and end up putting on a load of weight through doing nothing for three weeks. Also it rained heavily on the day of my Japanese exam. 5/10

June: Put on more weight and did jackshit during the holidays. Got angry with myself for not taking up that job offer in Okinawa. 4/10

July: Probably the highlight. But even then it was dull. Saw some of France and Belgium. Those are two dull countries. Nice beer though. 6/10

August: Found out I scrapped a 2.1 for my first year after my results dipped severely from the first semester. Also dumped a girl I was secretly seeing from May. 3/10

September: Finally see how bad my Japanese has gotten. But worked myself into a stupour and didn't bother going to the gym at all. Also my birthday was shit. 5/10

October: I broke my mobile phone and had to pay £60 to buy another one. 4/10

November: I worked, worked and worked some more. A truly productive month in terms of academic output, but nothing in terms of the social sadly. 4/10

December: Develop a chest infection, suffer from a broken laptop and are scared by the costs of summer travelling to Russia, China and Japan. Xmas party was also shit. 3/10

Overall 3/10. I would say 2007 was great, mainly because I made the majority of my good friends then. Everything was new for me, it was exciting and fresh. 2008 was full of depression, illness and disappointment. Only my friend Michiko's loving kindness and another special Japanese girl I have discovered kept me sane. Yes, if it wasn't for this beautiful Japanese temptress the last months of this year might have just been a washout. However there are still two more days left in 2008, so just enough time for her to tell me that I'm a creep and she wants nothing to do with me.

However, I work by the law of averages with things balancing themselves out proportionally over time. I think, I just think that 2009 will be my year given my crappy 2008. It will be a year that my goals will be complete and I might just get out of life what I wanted when I first thought about my experiences of studying Japanese at Uni. Maybe... just maybe.

Well if all that fails, I can just hope for karma in the shape of 2010, when Cappello leads England to World Cup glory in South Africa when we beat Japan 7-4 in the final. What? Okay... that will never happen. But you never know I might have some horrendous shit happen to me next year and God will definitely owe me some huge positive karma...

This week Richard is... recovering from a post-apocalyptic laptop, football, chest infection, lack of revision meltdown.

Things I've learnt so far...

2008-12-16T13:20:00.007Z

* I definitely don't understand women. But then again, I'm not supposed to.

* I need to get out my current malaise and start partying - because studying Japanese is grating my tits.

* And on the notion of that, I need to start exercising and eating right as my tits are getting bigger. Subway, KFC and McDonald's does not constitute a balanced diet.

I've also become something of a staunch anti-Japaner now. Well, I've become more crustier and bitter than I was before. Where has my joie-de-vivre gone? Am I as really self-loathing as I feel? Surely not?

In summary I need to forget about women (they aren't worth it), forget about Japanese to the extent it is giving me panic attacks (again, it isn't worth it - well it is, but you get the point) and start to rediscover my passion which has been zapped out of me in the past two months. I really want to shout "FUCK JAPAN" really loud in my room right now - but my flatmate might be in earshot and hear my evil plans to bring down his country from the inside whilst masquerading as someone who genuinely gives two shits about his country.

Oh shit, I've gone and spoilt everything now. I can hear the secret-hypocrisy police sounding their way up the stairs to come and send me to the immunisation clinic where I can be injected with some of that nauseating serum that makes me think of Japan as that wonderful candyland with gumdrop trees and pedophile rapists.

This week Richard is... attempting to form a polemic on why Chinese and Japanese people exist only to discover its mildly racist and slightly controversial. Next week, I'll be attempting to ring up beloved Tenko actor Bert Kwouk and make accusations that I slept with his granddaughter. Which I did... and it was the best sex I've ever had...

じゃまたね。。。

Well you gotta laugh i guess.

2008-12-08T21:21:00.005Z

A part of me feels really bad for not trying hard enough in Linguistics sometimes when I saw my lecturers response to my e-mail message I sent last week.

With regards to referencing and the inclusion of illustrations for my investigation :

It is good of you to be so concerned, but I have absolutely no
preference -- either as to illustrations in or out of the text, or [but don't
tell my colleagues!] which referencing convention you use!

So, basically, it's Liberty Hall!

regards,

Malcolm

Really friendly guy. hahaha. Its a shame I've decided to drop Linguistics from my degree now. But sadly the care just ain't there anymore and I'd rather focus on studying about Japan from now on. I've also gone on a slight invective against the poor sods on the Education Committee who sent a harmless generic e-mail about discussing problems with joint-honours only to have me respond back with a million suggestions and scribbled angst about my problems on doing JH.

I don't want to go fully into why I feel let down by JH - but the whole scheduling conflicts and lack of departmental communication is basically shocking. Far better to be loved by one department as a son than be the 'lonesome creepy cousin nobody talks to at family events such as weddings.'

on days like these...

2008-12-08T21:00:00.007Z

I'm normally wide awake on Mondays. However after Nagai sensei's class even the lure of warm coffee couldn't keep me awake and I ended up slumping on my bed and had a quick power nap before I woke up in a daze, believing I had slept in and then rushed off to uni to go learn about Japan's Minorities with the semi-legend that is MC Sick Riddles. Perhaps it was the fact they ran out of those delicious bacon and egg sarnies you can buy in Tesco on west street and which I seem to buy everyday as brunch alongside my morning coffee. It knocked me off my balance and the chicken sandwich was clearly not ample replacement.

Anyways, our flat at Rockingham House was subject to a mandatory inspection today to make sure we are keeping the place clean. So after hours of scrubbing and scrubbing on Sunday night (well 30 minutes.) We passed the inspection with flying colours. Well actually, I was really dishearted by the fact that we were only awarded 'OK' for the state of our kitchen desktop but 'Good' for our furniture and coffee table etc... The fact our only 'clean' flatmate is still in Reading explains the semi-derelict state of living room and kitchen in the past few weeks.

Because of my nap, I launched myself towards the Arts Tower a bit early, before buying some colour pens (more on this later) and then decided to spent 20 minutes taking photos with my mobile phone. Oh the joys too. I didn't know the quality was that good (not bad for 1.6 mega pixels!) Here is the highlight of that journey with yours truly looking really interested about his lecture on Burakumin.

Later in the day I also discovered that I need another injection before I go to Japan, bringing the grand total up to 6. (!!!!) My exam is just under 7 weeks or so away and I feel really unprepared and really shitty about my Japanese ability - especially my speaking, which has gotten worse despite the benefits of having Japanese people around me 24/7...

Oh well, onwards and upwards. My essays are done and things are going okay in my life right now. Except this vulture of japanese doom circling my head everyday I look up.

Right I'm off to memorise these kanji compounds. I've got a feeling some funny bastard is going to choose 性欲 (lust, passion etc) just to annoy me.

またね☆

文法　５

2008-12-08T11:54:00.003Z

という点で変わらない

This piece of grammar seems really pointless, but apparently I have to be aware of it. The という点 basically extenuates the difference. Generally speaking its slightly more formal and stricter than other such structures such as 同じです;

博美さんも恵子さんに似ている。
Hiromi and Keiko are similar.

博美さんも恵子さんのヘアスタイルが同じだ。
Hiromi's and Keiko's hairstyle is the same.

博美さんも恵子さんも日本人だという点で変わらないが、どちらもショッピングやファッションなどが好きだから、同じと言うわけではないよ！
Both Hiromi and Keiko are Japanese, but you can't conclude that they are the same because they both like things like shopping and fashion.

ugh this is really difficult to explain isn't it?

I think the という点で変わらない is often used alongside が to indicate the fact that its the case that they are the same, BUT there is some difference which should normally be explained.

に対して

Facing something, or against something...

イギリスでは少年犯罪の問題に対して、イギリスの警察はその問題を戦うために、色々な策を作ることになった。
Faced with the problem of juvenile crime in the UK, the British police have decided to create various policies in order to combat this problem.

しかし、タイムズ新聞によると、その政府に作られた少年犯罪に対して政策は無効そうである。
However according to the Times, these policies that are created by the government to face juvenile crime are ineffective.

The results are in...

2008-12-06T12:38:00.005Z

The results are in, the polls have been tallied and the choice of Year Abroad 2009/10 is;

Seijo

A few things that makes Seijo seem a good choice for me;

1. Its just outside of central Tokyo in the lovely residential area of Setagaya, just 15 minutes into Central Tokyo and 50 minutes ride to Yokohama. My flatmate also lived in Setagaya and I know someone in Sheffield who went to school there!!!

2. There is no standard uni accomodation at Seijo, so I'll be getting my own place at reduced rate. No goddam mongen (curfew) and no living with other international students.

3. There are hardly any international students at Seijo giving it a distinct Japanese feel to it. In fact Sheffield is the only other partner institution from the UK, the rest are from the US (about 3 I think), Australia (again just the one) and some from Belgium and France. So in short, the gaijin population is tiny. This is very good news if I want to improve my Japanese.

4. Seijo allow me to study non-Japanese language modules if I want, meaning I could improve my Japanese fairly quickly.

5. Seijo has its own internal scholarship programme, meaning if I don't get the government scholarship I will be able to apply for theirs. Fingers crossed...

HOWEVER...

The very same things that make Seijo seem appealing are the same ones that are putting me off. The lack of international students (I think I will antitipcate I will be the only British person there!) as well as the distance from Yokohama and the whole scholarship issue is scaring me...

Onwards and upwards. I can at least start to research now and harrass the few Seijo students over here at Sheffield on an exchange programme for the year.

Elsewhere some people have been unhappy about their choice of uni. I know for a fact had I chosen 'outside of Tokyo' on my form, I would have been sent somewhere like Okayama or Kanazawa. Beautiful yes, but I would get bored soooo quickly. However this year 10 people are being sent to Doushisha in Kyoto which itself is great for learning Japanese but rubbish if you want the whole experience of not hanging about with your mates all day and night. Certainly going to Seijo is going to throw me the deep end straight away.

oh yeah...

2008-12-01T14:21:00.003Z

I should also add, next week I am certain (well maybe 80-90% certain) that I will be told of my university choice for Japan for Year III (aka: Year Abroad.) Just to crank up the knob even further. If its one of the unis I want to go to, this may just give me the desire to push on, or give me the much needed hate to kill other people in my year for going to a uni or place they are so fucking apathetic over...

And besides, what happens if people drop out after they have been selected to go to one university? -_-

Actually, it might be this weekend. Oh blimey. I'm shitting myself.

Monday morning, and so it goes..

2008-12-01T10:33:00.002Z

I am now starting Week 10 of my teaching here in Sheffield and that means I have less than 3 weeks to go and 8 weeks before my exam! *eek* Christmas is just about in the air, with shops now putting up their crappy tat in the windows (including a rather festive Nandos on West Street) and the weather is goddamn freezing. All in all, winter has arrived and its being a bitch.

I woke up at 8.02am today (those two minutes past the hour are important!) and looked outside my window to see the sun just lifting its head beyond the clouds. Not today, just not today. But then I thought about my 義理 - my social obligation to go to class on time and study Japanese like a regular trooper, regardless of the time and the weather.

I shouldn't have bothered with this attitude really, as several people missed the class, some turned up late and then there was a complete carry-on with people reading sentences and forgetting rudimentary kanji. Either its just one of those mornings or my classmate's hours of partying and procrastinating is coming back to haunt them. A few weeks ago, yours truly was worried about his Japanese ability. But now it seems after this week at least I am actually beyond the curve when it comes to studying. So far I managed to finish my sakubun (handwritten and ready to hand in - ON TIME!), I 've learnt this week's kanji (to some extent), finished off my translation (well 90% of it) and also managed to almost complete my other essay!

And others seem to be moaning about having not done any of it. I suppose my complete lack of social life is bearing fruit in some ways.

Anyways, to get back to the story at hand - the class I have just this very minute finished (our lovely 9am grammar class with the wonderful Nagai-sensei) was a bit of a joke. You could well see the consternation in poor sensei's face when a good chunk of the class struggled to remember very basic kanji and make no real effort to translate sentences. To this point, I get very concerned both for the long-term prospects of some of my classmates - who are going to get a sharp and very hard lesson in Japan (things like punctuality are severly frowned upon) and also when we sit our exam in January. In many ways I both fear and am generally excited about sitting the exam - because above all, it will give me a good excuse to shine and put into practice all this hardwork I have supposedly been doing.

As I walked back from the class. I spoke to Chris, as I seemingly always do. He's probably the nicest guy you could ever meet and works unbelievably hard on this course, somehow managing to juggle all sorts of activites and part-time work in his life. Contrast that with some of the antics of my classmates sometimes and I just think how they would last if they were in his shoes. Perhaps the end of this semester will be the watershed before Japan, the final push to see who finally lasts and ultimately stays the course of the degree.

A part of me believes everyone is judged by the effort they put into the course and I am hoping my efforts will be rewarded and some other people's not so.

Exam timetable

2008-11-29T23:21:00.004Z

The exam timetables are out; and they are as follows;

Friday 23rd January: Japanese Language - 9am (3 hours)
Tuesday 27th January: Lexicology - 1.30pm (2 hours)
Wednesday 28th January: Japan's Minorities - 1.30pm (3 hours)

Eep. This means my exams are tightly packed but obviously its quite nice as I can now possibly plan a nice trip for myself - or maybe just go home and get drunk (probably the latter.) I think I have 10 days off altogether. Currently my revision and exam preparation during the holidays is going to physically kill me.

I buy the most weirdest shit sometimes (II)

2008-11-24T13:34:00.004Z

美佳子ちゃんとロンドンに旅行した時に、Japan Centreに行った。Japan Centreは大きい色々な日本から食品や製品を売る店だ。レストランも本屋があるよ！また、新鮮な寿司を買えるよ！美佳子ちゃんはきつねうどんが好きで、きつねうどんのポットを買いたがったが、値段は高いから、僕はそれは買ってあげた。親切だね！

じゃぁ、それも買った。チョコレー風味だ。「風味」っていう意味は英語で「flavour」ことだ。「プチクリーム・ロール」というのは小さいまきのことだ。ボックスで好きなことはロールくんというキャラクターだ。コロコロというのは擬音語「オンマトペアの例」ことだ。例えば、ボールを転がしたら、「コロコロ」と言う。

味は？おいしかったよ！

オレの志望

2008-11-24T12:45:00.006Z

僕の志望や思想などを書くのは久しぶりね！非常に長時間だから、何も日本語でも英語でも書けないだろうなぁー。。。

最近、大学の勉強は難しくなったので、あまり友達と遊ばない。毎週十漢字を習ったり、作文を書いたり、在日についてのエッセーをしたりしなくちゃ。本当に、面倒くさいじゃん！毎水曜日にはJapan Society「日本のサークル」のエベントだ。去年、よく、勉強についてと思わずに、友達とビールを飲み行くよ。でも、今年はひまがないので、かわいそうな人のように、行って、十分の後で、出るよ。

そして、彼女ができた。じゃぁ、実は好きな女子で、気持ちがあると思う。一緒にロンドンに旅行したが、僕の気持ちをまだ表せない。時々スカイプで喋るけど、最近彼女ともっと喋るべきだと思う。クリスマスの前に、気持ちを表したほうがいいね。オレは弱虫だよ！でも、勉強だし、ひまがないから、大変難しいよ。一方、彼女にとっても、忙しいから、毎日はハンサムなイギリス人と喋るのは難しいにちがいないね。しかも、もう一度、一緒に何かしたいよ。

次に、ひげを剃ったばかりで、真面目な若者みたいだし。。。実はちかんみたいだと思う。笑☆　先日友達もリチャードさんはもっと若そうな人になったと言った。

最後、留学については確か、東京で行くが、大学はまだ決めない。立教大学に行きたいけど、結果はがっかりにするかもから、特定な行きたい大学にした。

じゃぁ、リチャードのアップデート：

彼女をできた　（女子の友達でしょう？）　＝　喋りたいんだけど。
ひげがない人になった　（また、イギリスの天気は寒くなったよ！）
日本語学力は悪くなった　（簡単な漢字が覚えられないほど）
来年東京に行くかも！　（多分？）

じゃぁまた次回ね！

リチャードより。。。

文法　４

2008-11-24T12:15:00.004Z

わけではない

The word わけ means conclusion and added with ではない means; "one can't conclude that" or in a more literal sense, "it doesn't mean that."

日本語の試験を落ちたけど、日本語が分からないわけではない。
Although I failed my Japanese exam, you can't conclude that that I don't understand Japanese.

Sometimes instead of using わけではない it is possible to say と言うわけではない。This is often a softer way of expressing the above and avoids directness and a personal opinion.

マイクさんはマンガを読んでばかりいるが、お宅と言うわけではないと思う。
Mike does nothing but read manga but I don't think you can't say he is an otaku.

かねない

かねない expresses when something or someone is capable of something, usually in a negative or extreme sense. The form is stem+かねない

ジョンさんは誰か殺しかねなかったので、警察に逮捕をされた。
Because John was capable of murdering someone, he was arrested by the police.

常にテレビを見たら、病気になって、頭痛がしかねない。
If you watch TV everyday, you are capable of becoming ill and getting headaches.

さえ

さえ is often added to the end of a noun (and sometimes verbs) to express the notion of 'even'. It is used to expresses a more than average or beyond the extent of something. However unlike まで it doesn't go to an extreme length.

日本語は三年間勉強しているのに、「こんにちは」や「ありがとう」という言葉（で）さえ、覚えられない。
Even though I have been studying Japanese for three years, I unable to remember even words like 'hello' and 'thank you'.

あれ？リチャードさんさえ、彼女をできた？！
What? Even Richard has a girlfriend?!

ものだ

ものだ expresses the 'thing that' and supplies information based on the notion that the thing which is being discussed is an inevitable eventuality.

男の人はサッカーを見たり、パブでビールを飲んだりするのが好きだことだ。
Guys like watching football and drinking beer.

For some reason, I always want to just use んだから at the end of such phrases to give it a little bit more of a punch when explaining something that is understood by the listener. A good way to translate it would be, "it is the fact that" or "its a thing that is commonly understood as". Hard to translate the exact nuance into English.

日本語は難しいものだね？

文法　３

2008-11-24T11:18:00.002Z

せいで

The word せい means act, doing or deed but in the below context it means 'fault' or 'cause'. The usage is entirely subjective and refers to the speaker's opinion about the cause or fault of something or someone. For example;

彼女とショッピング・センターに出かけたせいで、サッカー試合を見られなかったよ。
I was unable to watch the football match, because I took my girlfriend out to the shopping centre.

夕べ食べ過ぎちゃったせいで、今朝気に悪いんです。
I am unwell this morning because I ate too much last night.

Generally the indication is nearly always negative. Offering an explanation for a negative occurrence.

はもちろん

If we understand the meaning of もちろん to mean 'of course', we can understand this grammar point. For example;

日本の料理と言えば、寿司はもちろん、焼き鳥も焼きそばもとうふとがある。
If we talk about Japanese food, there is of course sushi, as well as yakitori, yakisoba and tofu.

The はもちろん starts the sentence with something expected by the reader or listener as a given example, either through context of something or something which symbolises the topic overall. To use it effectively, the first example should be something easily aware to the audience and then the use of Nも to describe other such things.

きっかけ

きっかけ can be generally translated as the 'trigger' or 'impetus' for a desired action or feeling. きっかけ is a noun.

日本語を勉強しているきっかけは、日本に行って、その経験は気持ちだった。
The reason (trigger) that I am studying Japanese is that I went to Japan and it was a pleasant experience.

ながら

When you began beginner Japanese all those many moons ago, you remembered ながら as something symbolising 'whilst doing something'. The meaning here is roughly the same and carries the same nuance in English.

イギリスは小さい国ながら（も）、色々なきれいな所があるし、歴史的な協会がある。
Whilst England is a small country, there are various beautiful places and historic churches.

The grammar is sort of similar to expressing the same thing as でも、のに、けど etc but it appears to be more of a fancy way of constructing things. The も is often included in written speech rather than spoken. I think the usage is the same in English and is perhaps a slightly formalised way of saying things. Anyway its good to know.

おかけで

Simply, 'thanks to' or 'owing to'... Again, like きっかけ it is treat as a noun. For example,

友達の支持のおかげで、お酒を飲むのをやめた。
Thanks to the support of my friends, I quit drinking alcohol.

もともと

A useful adverb and probably more helpful when you see it in kanji = 元々. This means 'originally' or 'starting from'

もともとは大学で中国語を勉強していたが、毎日アニメの番組を見たおかげで、どんどんお宅になって、日本語を勉強することにした。
Originally, I was studying Chinese at university but, thanks to watching anime programmes everyday, I steadily became an otaku and decided to study Japanese.

文法　２

2008-11-03T10:51:00.003Z

New week, new grammar:

として

として describes the situation whereby something, acts as or simply in the capacity. For example;

日本語を勉強している人として、毎日勉強するべきだ。
As a Japanese language student, you should study everyday.

日本に住んでいる時、英語の先生として、働いていた。
When I was living in Japan, I worked as an English teacher

と言えば

Breaking this down, its easy to derive its meaning. In most contexts, its meaning suggests, 'if we talk about' or 'talking about' and usually precedes when the topic has been mentioned.

A: ジョンさんは今日の日本語授業に行かなかったと聞いた。
B: うんそうだ、ジョンさんと言えば、まだ東京から来る日本人を付き合っているの？

A: I heard John didn't go to today's Japanese class.
B: Yeah, speaking of John, is he still going out with that Japanese girl from Tokyo?

と言えば always comes when the topic has been introduced and is understand by the listener. The function works very much the same way in English.

Sometimes, the actually subject of the と言えば can be substituted for それ which becomes そう; Using the above example again...

B: そう言えば、まだ東京から来る日本人を付き合っているの？

Here the そう would be understood as John. It can also be used to elicit more information from the speaker. Again, its fairly rudimentary when you compare directly to English.

Speaking of which, do you think English is harder than Japanese?

Ho-ho-ho...

ほど

The use of ほど has several meanings. Firstly you may recognise the following structure;

イギリスの冬はロシアの冬ほど、寒くないよ
English winters aren't as cold as Russian winters.

ほど can be taken to mean, 'as' or 'like' but generally we shall focus on the meaning 'to the extent of'

昨日、頭が痛くなるほど、日本語を勉強した。
Yesterday, I studied Japanese to the extent that my head hurt. (lit. becomes painful.)

If you really love/hate someone you can also use it to good effect.

会うために、東京まで歩くほど、彼女が好きだよ。
I love my girlfriend to the extent that I would walk to Tokyo in order to meet her.

いつ歩いていくるアメリカ人を見ても、道を渡るほどアメリカが大嫌いだよ。
I hate America to the extent that, whenever I see an American walking towards me, I cross the street. (Not really, I love America!)

文法　１

2008-10-27T10:56:00.004Z

After being spared one grammar point this week, there is still lots of lovely new stuff to learn.

と限らない

This little function is quite useful and expresses the limit of something. The kanji 限 literally means limit, there と限らない means something like 'that is not limited to'. In more natural English we would translate this as 'it doesn't mean that. When used as an adverb 限り expresses, 'as far as', 'as long as' etc etc... For example,

僕が知る限りでは、ジョンさんはまだ大学で日本語を勉強している。
As long as I know, John is still studying Japanese at University.

ＦａｃｅｂｏｏｋとかＳｋｙｐｅを持っている限り日本に住んでいる友達を連絡できる。
I am able to contact my friends in Japan, so long as I have facebook and Skype.

When we use the function と限らない we can express the notion of something not being the way it is, let's have a look;

僕は日本語が上手だとは限らない
It doesn't mean I'm good at Japanese.

~からと言って

This can often follow the above, to devastating effect. It literally means 'just because'. For example,

僕は日本人からと言って、日本語が上手だとは限らない。
Just because I'm Japanese, doesn't mean I'm good at Japanese language.

You can often supplement this with 必ずしも to mean 'not necessarily mean'

日本語ができるし、背が高いからと言って、必ずしも日本に行った時に、日本の彼女ができるとは限らないでしょうね。
Just because you can speak Japanese and are tall, doesn't necessarily mean when you go to Japan, you will get a Japanese girlfriend.

~ずにはいられない

To understand this grammar point, you have to break it down. The first bit '~ずには' comes from the negative form of a verb meaning 'without doing something' (i.e. 食べずには - without eating.) And the second part comes from the neagtive potential form of いる (meaning unable to exist.)

Therefore something like 食べずにはいられない- I am unable to exist without eating (lol!)

A more natural translation would be;

去年日本に行った時に、名物を食べるより、イギリスの料理を食べずにはいられなかった。
When I went to Japan last year, Rather than eating the local specialities, I couldn't help eating British food.

You can form this with になる to express the changing state of something of you becoming to the point of doing this action. For example;

いつBar Oneに行っても、お酒を飲まずにいられなくなってしまう。
Whenever I go to Bar One, I can't help drinking alcohol.

~しかない

This expresses something like 'no option of doing' or 'no alternative to doing.'

先週試験を落ちたから、今から、毎日勉強するしかないでしょう。
Because I failed my exam last week, I have no option but to study everday from now on.

I am a poet don't ya know!

2008-10-26T21:25:00.001Z

Don't it make you feel sick?
Floating, drifting, dancing
A thousand birds in the sky
Cawing their tune for you
In the lazy autumnal drift?

Don't it make you feel sick?
Clashing, clanging, creeping
The marching call of bands
Singing their joyous tune
Amongst the sodden leaves?

Don't it make you feel sick?
Splashing, drowning, pouring
The rain from the sullen skies
Glistening light off asphalt
Straight into your blurry eyes

Don't it make you feel sick?
Teetering, verging, creeping
On the brink of madness,
Remembering long lost loves
Over a bottle of the hard?

Don't it make you feel sick?
Loving, caring, emoting
With another human being.
Who equally emotes with you.
Inside a corporal fleshly shell?

Don't it make you feel sick?
Inside, outside, amongst
Your thoughts, feelings, ills
You can remember and see
Everything around you?

Don't it make you feel sick?
That you feel the way you do
Yet cannot understand why?

Another great one from the mind of me.

Ah nuts! I mean.... ah nuts!

2008-10-26T20:08:00.003Z

I still feel slightly shit, which is down to several reasons. The first is that I have done very little work over the weekend and really wasted what was supposed to be a great opportunity to get some things done (especially doing some cross-over revision from last year) and secondly, I haven't been to the gym yet (lolz?) and am still eating crap. Okay, the time starts now. This is a new leaf and I'm ditching all the crap. Maybe...

On a final note, I was deciding to take a small weekend break somewhere in Europe on the first weekend of December - but after looking at some of the prices (£148 to Lille and about £87 to Brussels) I think I will decide against it. I am not working at the minute, so its very much draining my finances. I think I might just go to London for the day and do some shopping. Which reminds of me going to York last December and walking from the train station to my previous home in Endcliffe Village - which despite its huge distance was somewhat enjoyable. I am a strange fellow.

Onwards and upwards. I just have to rote memorise these 600 kanji, learn some new grammar, type up my translations notes and lexicology notes, read some stuff on the Ainu and finish off the segement of the Japanese translation. And all this in one day. Because I couldn't be arsed to do any work this week. YAAAARRRGGH!

Credit Crunch

2008-10-24T20:07:00.003+01:00

This photo just about sums up the current credit crunch. In about 2 months, the value of the yen to the pound has gone from about 220 to 140. In short, my money is now around a quarter less valuable over there as it once was. Yet more reasons that I'm fearing this and next year.

RESURRECTION!!!!

2008-10-24T19:42:00.004+01:00

I've decided to resurrect my blog after some inactivity of about two weeks. Lolz. How time flies. The main reason has been the amount of work I've been doing and a general lack of 'can't be arsed typing out my feelings' syndrome.

At the moment things are feeling pretty shitty but at the same time they are going very well. The very things which are causing to me go insane are making me feel stronger and the things that are making me feel strong and causing me to crash down to earth with a sharp bump.

I've highlighted several things as I'm now officially back into the groove of uni.

1. I'm not going to get a g/f. I might if I try, but I just can't be arsed. There are lots of cute girls here, but I officially can't be bothered. When I try, I come off as desperate and when I don't - I end up seeming distant. Tbh, what started out as a priority for me has dwindled pretty fast. I also can't be arsed with the whole 'I'll be going to Japan next year, so see you later' type thing either. Ugh. I have decided just to make as many cool friends as possible and if things happen, then things happen. I just can't be bothered to hunt them down - as I well know, nothing good will come of that.

2. I've done 4 weeks of Japanese, and I've still not improved. For sure, I have learnt more kanji and grammar but this has pushed out all the old stuff. My listening is still bad and as for my speaking.... Its like talking with a mouth full of sodden ash sometimes. Sod it all I say.

3. I am almost 70% (well, maybe 90% certain) that I will go to Kansai for my year abroad, Kobe to be exact. After some researching and soul-searching it seems the best option for me. Hoo-dee-hum. It all depends on whether I will be allowed to go, or if I can bribe my YA co-ordinator. Our first really *big* meeting is next week, so this when the fun really begins. There seems to be a lot of apathetic people this year and maybe only a few who truly want to go to certain areas, so it would seem so utterly shit, if I wasn't nominated by my university and someone who was ambivalent about ending up at Kobe went there instead. Gyaaaarrrggh! If I can't go here, I'll try and sneak back to Tokyo somehow.

4. In contrast to no3, the whole YA (Year Abroad) seems like a cool novelty so far. As it stands, a lot of people will drop out after the exam and some people will end up getting scared off due to costs. At the minute, even yours truly is viewing next year with huge grey suspicion. Pass the first semester and you'll be fine I've been told. Yeah right.

5. I am detesting the size of my classes so far. It seems as if the guys who went before us (especially those who graduated last year and the current fourth years) had such great small groups. It seems as if we are suffering this year. Oh, and the JS newbs (japan studies freshers) have about 76 odd in their year. Christ, what a living joke.

6. Back to point 1. My friend Aya contacted me today and I was overcome with a sense of emotion. Okay, she might have been a bit humble when she told me that she doesn't think she will pass her year abroad exam, but a huge part of me is wanting her to fail - just for the completely selfish act of me being in Japan (or more to the point Kansai) when she is there. *sigh*. I really like her and she is very sweet - but the small part of my soul which is telling me to do the 'friend thing' first (that is to say, support her in what she wants to do) is coming to fore, more and more now. At the end of the day, I want what is best for her, and screw the practicalites. If we both pass our exams, our paths will cross - but we will of course still share some common bonds. Its a friendship I always want to maintain with her - because she is such a unique individual who I want to know until I'm old and grey. And I know that is trite, but she geninuely is an amazing person who makes me feel good about things...

Well in short: I love my flatmates, I love my flat, I love my course. I love my sensei, I love my classmates, I love my subject, I love the new Japanese people who come here, I love my inability in Japanese, I love my charming northern style, I love my intellect, I love being able to think about things that don't concern me, I love not giving a fuck, I love seeing the months fly away, I love everything, I love nothing, I love not havign any money, I love having student loans, I love buying drinks and getting drunk, I love people, I love me, I love YOU, but most of all I love my life at the minute - no matter how shit it feels at times.

Yaaaargh! >o<

2008-10-08T22:45:00.004+01:00

Where does the time go?

It seems like only yesterday I was lamenting about last week. The work has slowly increased and I'm now feeling the burn somewhat. Tomorrow, I have to remember 5 more kanji (woop de doo), plan my story for sensei (about reflecting back on my first year - so lot's of I should have done, or I shouldn't have done etc.) and I have to finish off my translation. But maybe, I only have to do one page of it. In short, I have to cram a alot in, because I will be verrry busy tomorrow!

Tomorrow is the first real official Japan society event thingy and I shall be donning my hachimaki and happi coat and dancing around like a prick. Hopefully I will be able to meet some more Japanese people as I have been shamelessly hanging around this Japanese girl I like, like the proverbial goldfish poo. Hopefully she will come for a few drinks at my flatmate's birthday on Friday, so its all good. Before then, I'll say hello and be making myself known to a few more people. And getting drunk. getting very drunk. Hehehe.

I have been so busy this week and there are so many things to do, but its all worth it in the end. The work and social life is coming thick and fast after a slow malaise leading up to this week. Hopefully I'll post some pictures soon.

Tomorrow, I'm up at the crack of dawn and then working from around 1pm until 5pm, typing furiously into my laptop in the IC! Please save me!!!! >o<

MAN FLU!!!!

2008-10-05T23:43:00.004+01:00

Alas, I have caught the dreaded man flu! Oh woe is me! Thankfully, this gave me a great excuse not to do any studying on Friday and Saturday. Now, as a result of my intolerable and suffering man-flu, I'm struggling to remember these kanji and am typing this while rapidly trying to cram them into my brain. I can remember 'doubt', 'omit' and 'impression'. There is also one about 'self reflection' and 'crime' which I can't remember for the life of me... hansei and hanzai? How confusing is that?

I've also completed my sakubun (which is really awful) in which I had to write about my holidays. I'll post the corrected version soon, because no doubt it will be riddled with silly mistakes, which is the hallmark of my written Japanese.

As a result of kanji uselessness, sakubun ineptitude and man-flu, my Japanese flatmate wants nothing to do with me. He's now avoiding me like the plague, even though its just a cold, sorry man-flu. *cough* *cough *splutter*. Granted, it doesn't seem as bad as last year, when my chest felt like it was melting for about 4 weeks but I'd rather get it now than when the exam/essay season rolls around. If you are gonna get sick, get sick when the work is relatively light I say...

Besides, he gave me a cold last year, so its only fair that I infect him this year as revenge.

My physical health has also seemed to be detoriating, depsite the fact I have lost some weight (that's the hills of Sheffield, fruit and veg and plenty of walks everywhere in this great slopey city of ours!) My feet are smelling thanks to some potent athelte's feet that won't go away, my nose has a huge spot on it and my man-flu is making me snivel all the time.

Great. A sniveling, spotty, overweight Englisman with smelly feet. Line up ladies.

japanese idiom of the week

2008-10-03T02:10:00.004+01:00

I'll try and do this every Friday if I have time...

金魚の糞　（きんぎょのふん）

Gold fish crap.

Delightful isn't? But kinda symbolic. It kinda means a hanger-on, someone you can't shake away, a person who trails around you like a piece of goldfish crap.

For example;

その人は金魚の糞だった。夕べ中日本の彼氏ができた日本女性を追いか廻した。

Hehe. 舞う is one of my favourite verbs in Japanese and sorta means to 'flutter or flounce around'. When you add that with 追い for 'chase' you get a delightful image of some random guy hanging around a Japanese girl who has a boyfriend in Japan, like a piece of goldfish turd.

Yay!

Deja vu... but life goes on (Goddard is dead!)

2008-10-03T01:45:00.004+01:00

Okay, the funny thing.

And it involves, me, another guy and a Japanese girl.

I kinda know the guy in question, although I've spoken to him once or twice. He's kinda very shy (maybe that's not the right word) but I think it kinda is, so let's go with that. Last year, he befriended a girl I liked (the girl was Japanese - that's important, so pay attention.)

In the end, I don't think he spoke to her again and in the end neither did I. I cut my losses and moved on. Nice girl, and tbh we have a pure academic relationship through e-mail now. Which is kinda good for my Japanese and knowledge of English Literature and environmental, eco-friendly legislature in Japan. Hopefully she'll send me some stuff, but I doubt it.

Anyways, I saw him at the Japan Society event thing, chatting to some girl (who is of course Japanese.) Me being the curious devil, sense an unusual pattern forming. Now of course, the writer in question here makes no illusion of his love for all things Japanese. Its not as if I would only date nihonjin, its more that I prefer the company of Japanese people sometimes. Well, this guy starts chatting to her, but is suddenly surpassed by the all-conquering, completely new sense of confident englishman who strolls around after meeting some people and starts saying hello and being the affable bastard. What I found most endearing was the element of surprise and copy. "Holy shit. This guy is confident. I'm screwed." Whats more amusing was that I could swear he was trying to mimick my friendly banter and mannerism. Oh bastard! There is only one me. I am unique. You can't copy me!

Before I came to Sheffield, I studied a lot about psychology and could read, quite easily I might add, this guy was very uncomfortably in social environments. He sorta looked very uneasy when I started chatting so freely and comfortably to these two (or was it three) girls whom I had just met.

Nah, tbh - I am reading too much into this. In fairness, this guy doesn't stand a chance with this girl for a few reasons;

1. He's not confident enough. Japanese girls want a confident guy. They don't want to date someone who is essentially Japanese and treats them no differently. Shy guys aren't as romantic or endearing I would argue. Do really shy guys embody everything that is stereotypical of Japanese girls perceptions of westerners?
2. He don't speak Japanese. Communication is a necessity for all relationships everyone.
3. The girl in question, whom I know again through a mutual friend at her university in Japan, has a boyfriend. Oops.

Ah well, life goes on. It could genuinely be something quite sweet and merely just friendship. We'll see. But I thought given what happened last year, things like this are very unusual. I'm so happy I ended up speaking to so many random people on Wednesday. As my friend says, if you get in early, you'll become their friend quicker and relationships are more likely to be formed in the first few weeks than later on, when they are essentially closed groups.

Fwiw, I'm playing my cards close to my chest this year. We'll see how things work out. I'm sure if I put in a repeat performance of Wednesday, I'll be alright I guess.

First week catch-up!

2008-10-03T01:17:00.004+01:00

Damn! Where does the time fly, when you are having fun eh? Let me summarise things so far...

Monday: First day excitement and something of damp squib in more ways than one. Classes started at 9am and although its an early start, I would happily get up at 4am for my grammar teacher. The grammar, was kinda pointless and very soft - thankfully she must know how much we are all feeling about our Japanese after 4 months off.

The day ended with a bit of a rush. A 5 hour interlude and then an introductory spell about Japan's Minorities. I then rushed home in the rain and then onto Las Iguanas in the rain and said a sad farewell to my friend Michiko whose birthday it was and also who is going back to Japan next month. How I'll miss her. Our relationships is so unusual, and I kinda think of her as an older sister. I tell her all kinds of crap about my relationships and social life and she in turn listens and makes me feel good about myself. If all goes to plan, I'll end up seeing her sooner than some of her other friends in Sheffield, which really brings home how long and how far some people can be apart from each other at times.

Tuesday: Tuesday is a pain in the arse, because I have three classes and have a ton of fecking work to do. It starts by having some more grammar and writing in Japanese at 10am and ends with Nic giving us a sheet to read in Japanese which half of us can't read. The size of the class also takes the proverbial with people sitting on the windowsills and ceiling. Yes, the class is that big! Before that, I get the luxury of Japan's Minorities in the same room, which also has capacity problems. Sort it out Sheffield!

Wednesday: We recieved the dreaded talk by Angela-sensei, the head of our second year, who instilled confidence in us by telling us how hard this level is. If you miss several classes, you get refered and sent a letter, then if you fail the exam, you get told to switch degrees... and its not optional. In short, YOU WILL FAIL, YOU WILL NOT GO TO JAPAN, YOU WILL BE A LONER FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!!! Tbh, although a lot of what she said was tough, I agreed with her. If you struggled with last year's Japanese you will find this very hard. Likewise, people who are struggling along will probably never improve whilst on the course, given the intensive workload placed on us poor bastards. I hope for the class size's sake at least, some people will do the honest thing and drop out (what a terrible thing to say behind the keys of a laptop overlooking a tiling shop in central Sheffield.)

Later on it was the dreaded Japan Society Intro thing. This was kinda surreal for several reasons; Firstly, I totally underestimated how many people would turn up. In the end it was a lot. And secondly I seem to undersell myself sometimes. I just randomly start chatting to Japanese and English alike after just one pint of Czech beer. I am also pondering something else, which I'll talk about later and which I think is hilarious and sad at the same time.

There was a few nice girls there (well what can I say) and I ended up walking four of them back home (I am a kind person amongst this fragile shell of a hubris.) And lastly, we found another full-time Japanese student!!! And he's from KANSAI! Brain overload. Seriously. I just can't wait until next week, when we have the big intro thing and another bout of tandem learning.

Thursday: Today? Oh today was boring. In fact, today never happened. That's how interesting it was. I had another spell of lexicology today with my lecturer reminding me of a Eddie Izzard type character with a severe bout of lexiphilia (love of words.) No actually, he just doesn't love words, he REALLY loves words. Words cannot describe his love for words. Haha. Me and my flatmate also completed Resistance Fall of Man on the PS3. And then we are waiting to for number 2, to justify the crappy ending of the first one.

Friday: Tomorrow I have just the one lesson, with the delightful Arai-sensei, whom I was so close to adding on facebook. Technically we have one mutual friend. The friend in question whose birthday it was on Monday and who is leaving Sheffield as we speak. I think I'll do the Japanese thing and keep my distance and respect the honoured gakusei-sensei hierarchy.

Plus, I don't want her to see photos of me drunk in some nightclub, before my kanji test on Monday morning. I've learnt one thing about the Japanese people in my four odd years of socialising with them - THEY TALK!

So busy right now, so...

jaa ne!