A great resource for gap years

Wanna take a gap year like me (and you do, trust me)?

http://www.makeitbetter.net/education/details.asp?C=3&ST=2&SST=215

Lots of great information there!

Saigo da (In English: This is the final post)

I'm all packed up and tomorrow I begin the long journey home. First up is an extended detour in Kauai and the west coast, which I am not complaining about. Then I'm home for a couple of weeks. I've enjoyed my stay here tremendously and cannot wait to come back, although the break from studying will be glorious, and there are definitely many things I look forward to doing in back in Chicago. Here's a top 5 list, in no particular order of importance:

1. Eating at Chuck Wagon
2. Eating at Sarkis
3. Eating at Buff Joe's
4. Eating at Pete Miller's
5. Seeing my friends

I'm down about 20 pounds in 3 months. So the question now, of course, is, How much can I gain back in 2 weeks? Place your bets, ladies and gentleman.

In case you hadn't noticed, this blog is basically dead now. I haven't done a real update in forever, and that's basically because updating is now more a hassle than a pleasure, seeing as I'm not much of the journaling type, and the further I got into my stay, the busier I was, and the less time I had at my computer. I feel no need to continue updating at this point. I hope you enjoyed my thoughts, and got a small sense of what my adventure time party was like. Though I'm only half-way done, everything cool, important, and generally worth sharing that happens in the future, you can hear from me in person once it's all over.

So thank you all for taking time to read all that I had to say, it truly meant a lot to me. And feel free to keep coming back to reread your favorite posts and click on the ads that appear at the top of the page.






おわり

Everyone click on this link, please

www.lost.eu/f750

Smiley

Every time we go to karaoke, someone picks this song. As bad as the song may be, I don't complain, because that video is a joy to watch.

Yakuza (pronounced YAHkuzah)

So today Chris, Albert and I were doing the onsen thing, and I noticed in the showers that there was a guy with elababorate tattoos on his shoulders. I was curious as to whether this was just for show or if he was the real deal. Then, about a half-hour later, we were relaxing on the outdoor bath, when in walks a 40-50-ish man with a big and elaborate tattoo of a tiger on his back. "You don't want to mess with that guy," Chris noted. As we walked back in, I noticed a couple of more guys with full-back tattoos, and a couple more with shoulder tattoos. By the time we left, probably half of the guys there had either full-back, partial-back, or shoulder tattoos. Badass.

Life in Japan

Keen readers will recall a post I made long ago describing what my average day was like thus far in Japan. Less keen readers can get a refresher here:

http://japanadventuretimepartygo.blogspot.com/2006/10/that-was-fast.html

A few posts ago, I mentioned that I had an ambitious idea for a post. Behold my ambitions, excusing Google video's automatic quality downgrade:



Warning: Long, rambling, run-on sentences ahead.

Okay, so obviously this is very much an extension of that post I made so long ago. It occured to me that I should really have something like this to show everyone when I got home, but that it would be better to get video from the middle of my stay, as opposed to the end, when everything is all weird and bittersweet. So, over a period of 4 days or so last week, I set out with my digital camera and it's miserable video-taking abilities. Eventually, with footage obtained to a satisfactory, I put everything into iMovie, which comes packed-in with my computer.

I would now like to take the time to express my extreme hatred towards iMovie. What has made Apple so successful, aside from a little thing called the iPod*, is the incredible ease-of-use of it's software for the average computer user. iMovie is part of a suite of programs that are supposed to be one of the Big Reasons To Own A Mac. Unfortunately, this program, and it's sibling, iPhoto, sucks a lot. It is slow, limited, a bit confusing, and generally nowhere near as user-friendly as it should be. Obviously, it shouldn't compare in terms of abilities to Adobe Premier or other professional-level programs, but I at least expected it to be like Pinnacle, only more functional. Instead, the amount of detail you are allowed to edit at is limited, the editing features are themselves far to limited, not to mention hard to find and implement, any edits ruin sound, forcing you to extract the sound to another track, which means you cannot put something else, such as narration or effects, in the same spot. and the program is in general really not convenient for anything other than just lining up clips together as if just transfering a home video tape to computer and that's it.

In the previous paragraph, I mentioned that I figured iMovie would at least be at Pinnacle's level. Pinnacle is the program I used to put together my Meaning of Life project, and those who have seen it know that I really put a lot of time in it and strove for a high level of quality. Pinnacle is intended for the amateur user, like iMovie, only it is way easier to use and figure out, and has more and better features all around. The one big issue is that it crashes all the time (iMovie only crashed once on me), which lengthed my already 100+ hours of time spent on my Meaning of Life video probably by 25%. This crashing was incredibly annoying, but the usability of the program makes it far more desirable than my new enemy, iMovie.

While we're on the topic of the Meaning of Life project, I'm sure there are those who watch this most recent creation of mine, and find it definitely inferior to my Meaning of Life project (or Julian's, if you happened to see that masterpiece which he and I put together using Pinnacle on my computer. In fact, the beginning of this video shamelessly rips off Julian's, and while that was unintentional seeing as the scene was almost totally improvised, I should give credit where it's due), and this makes perfect sense, since I spent way, way, way less time on this (only a few hours of my spare time on the computer), made it with a crap program, and generally took it less seriously.

That said, it ended being about 4 times longer than I originally envisioned, and much more poorly paced. That said, I like this pacing better, since it just sort of adds to the madness, and ultimately the whole video is much more entertaining and simultaneously more insightful than playing "Yattsuke Shigoto," the first and last song in the video, through it's entirety, accompanied by a barrage of footage.

If you are awesome, you will agree that all of the music in the video was amazing. That's because it was all taken from the album "Karuki Zamen Kuri no Hana" by Sheena Ringo (translation is roughly "chlorinated lime, semen, chestnut flowers"), a CD which you are likely to hear a lot if you are around, since it is amazing and has introduced me to a whole new side of music that I did not know I could like. The songs that appear on the video, in order are:

(Japanese Characters - roman characters - translation)

やっつけ仕事 - Yattsuke Shigoto - A Damned Job
とりこし苦労 - Torikoshi Kurou - Over-Anxiety
おこのみで - Okonomi de - As You Like It
とりこし苦労 - Torikoshi Kurou - Over-Anxiety
意識 - Ishiki - Consciousness
ポルターガイスト - Polutaagaisuto - Poltergeist
やっつけ仕事 - Yattsuke Shigoto - A Damned Job

It is also worth notiing that Yattsuke Shigoto is officially my theme song, and it follows me around wherever I go, whether you can hear it or not. It's certainly not the most musically stimulating song -- in fact it's just downright ridiculous -- but it's also the most upbeat, catchy, hilarious- and- happy-sounding song of all time ever, and it's impossible to listen to without at least giggling to yourself a little. Ironically, it's about how much the daily work grind sucks.

So yeah, I hope you enjoyed it, and if the quality of Google Video's version is just too awful and you for some reason desire to see a "better" version, there is a nicer-looking version that I will be keeping on my computer. I will likely burn it to a DVD, too, just to see if iDVD works any better than iMovie does.



*Okay, using a footnote like this is directly ripping off the style of Nick's extra-secret blog, but since 98% of you have never and will never read it, on account of it being extra-secret, I will use it. So, take that, or something. Anyways, the topic at hand is the iPod. It is a fine product, no? So fine, that people have been pining and speculating that it will one day be reborn as the iPhone. Well, that day appers to be nigh. It was recently leaked, from someone who has been totally accurate with his leaked Apple information in the past, that Apple is indeed planning an iPhone that will be supported by all major cell phone carriers, featuring a supposedly awesome operating system that is super easy-to-use, plus a flip-out keyboard, and two batteries, one for the phone, one for the music. All this in two models, a 4GB and an 8GB. Sounds pretty awesome, if you ask me, and I have no doubt that it will sell like umbrellas in the rain.

Here's the head-scratcher, though: It's being released in January. WTF? January is one of the slowest sales months of the year, on account of knowing having any money or needing anything after the holiday season. Why not release it one month earlier, in time for the holiday rush? This totally baffles me. Apple has not released a major upgrade to the iPod this year, meaning demand will not be as high for the product, plus Microsoft has just released their own mp3 player, the Zune. While this is brings basically nothing new that the iPod can't already do, it's supported by Microsoft and it's bottomless bank account, so it will be getting substantial attention, whether you like it or not, and it is "new," which is as good enough a reason as any for many casual consumers to pick it up. What's going on Apple? You don't have to let this happen...

CDs, Toyotas, and Movies

Due to the combination of me recording this with a digital camera and youtube being annoying, the sound in this video is waaay off. Just do your best to ignore it.


Okay, so for weeks 3-6, I had a classmate, David Ubari, who was working for Toyota in Venezuela, and spending a year in Japan for home research purposes. They sent him to Yamasa for a month to try and spice up his Japanese a bit. Anyways, he came, he saw, he did alright. When it was time to go, he promised his classmates he would set up a tour of the factory he worked at. This was extra-special, because he works at a factory that doesn't just produce Lexuses, it produces US Lexuses and happens to be the biggest Toyota factory in all of Nihon, and for that reason is very picky about giving tours.

Fast-forward to late November: David is on vacation, but another David from Toyota, this one South African, has taken his place at Yamasa and finished the details for us, allowing us to take the tour. So, armed with directions to the factory, in a small area called Tohara, I and 11 others set off to meet Dave on Friday, December 1st, which happens to be a holiday for us. Christian was given the instructions, so we followed his lead from Okazaki to Toyohashi, where we were supposed to switch trains to Tohara. Well, no one working in the station seemed to know where this Tohara was, and it was not on any of the train maps. So after lots of wandering and many phone calls, Christian gave up in the face of everyone else teasing him, and Albert, my 23 year old Korean American classmate, took over, swiftly discovering a different, special train station nearby that would get us to Tohara.

So in the end, it all worked out, although we were 10 or so minutes l late. Actually it's worth noting that the final leg of the journey had to be completed via taxi, so Friday marked the 3rd and 4th times that I rode a car in Japan. Seriously, I do not miss it, and I will be driving far less when I am back in the US.

Anyways, the tour itself was entirely in Japanese, but it was polite Japanese, which I understand much better than plain Japanese, so that was OK. Not that I needed someone speaking, because just watching the factory work speaks for itself. It is so incredibly awesome, it almost defies description. I've heard about how diligent Toyota is about putting their cars together well, and seeing it firsthand really gets the message across. I really can't see my first car not being a Prius or some other fuel-efficient Toyota-built machine at this point. Due to protection of trade secrets, I was not allowed to bring a camera, and I'm not sure if writing about this is all right, but hey, I'm just hapless gaijin, right?

Everything is first put together by machinery, supervised by workers moving along with the assembly line. Then, more workers come throught and check the parts. Multiple workers for each part, and often later down the line another worker might take a quick look at the same part just in case. It is an absolute wonder to watch the machines put each part together in perfect harmony with the assembly process. There is a red line dangling above the workers that emergency stops the assembly line, but apparently it rarely gets pressed. We watched this process of construction for about a half hour or so.

What really impressed me, though, was the end of the construction line. You literally watch them put on the finishing touches at one end, test the windows, radio, etc, in the middle, put a small amount of fuel in, and then at the other end someone hops in, turns the car on, and drives it away. It probably takes no more than 20 minutes for a car to start from absolutely nothing to being constructed and fully functional. Using this process, they literally produce thousands of cars a day. It's insane.

After leaving the factory, they drove us across the enormous company grounds, to a dock at a bay leading to the ocean, where there were 2 GIGANTIC monsters of ships being continuously loaded with Lexuses bound for New York, a voyage that takes 3 weeks, which is almost as long as this sentence has become. Being there by the sea made me miss Canada in a huge way, but no matter where I am, there's nothing I can do about it while Ontario is a frozen wasteland.

On the whole, though, it was an awesome once-in-a-lifetime experience that was actually way more fun and special than words on a blog could possibly convey. With nothing planned for my next 2 weekends before I return home, it may be the last such experience I have before leaving the country, and I'm not complaining.

So, after that was over, we all grabbed food in Toyohashi, since non of us had eaten all day, and hopped on the north-bound train. A handful of people, including Christian, Dale, and Dale's just-arrived wife, Cassie, got off at Okazaki, but the rest of us continued to the next station, in Anjo, the nearest town with a movie theater, because Casino Royale came out that day. From that part of the trip, I have two observations.

First, Anjo is way more lively than Okazaki, despite it's smaller size, and I wish I had discovered it and it's huge entertainment complex sooner.

Second, Casino Royale is insanely awesome. There is no doubt in my mind that it was the best James Bond movie ever, and that it will likely never be topped. It is just so good. Albert and I have already agreed that Christian needs to see, and we will happily take him and sit through every minute of the 2+hour movie, not one of which is wasted. Good lord, just thinking back on it gets me excited. What an excellent movie.

Except wait, last night Albert, using his Korean magic, downloaded The Departed, which hasn't even been released in Japan yet, and Christian and I watched it into the wee hours of the morning, and it wasn't just awesome, it was one of the best non-Miyazaki movies I've seen in a while, and when you consider the fact that we watched Howl's Moving Castle (a Miyazaki film, and quite possibly my favorite movie ever) for movie night on Thursday, I had amazing-movie-tastic weekend, plus the Toyota factory, plus multiple onsen visits.

In conclusion, I love Japan.