Slowing Down

Writing an entry every day in English takes quite a lot of time, and I am actually behind schedule on my research. Additionally, the Christmas holidays is ending, and I really have to start focusing. So, I will slow this down and will write maybe once per week. I hope you all have a great happy new year.

Drawings for New Year's Cards

Hope you all are having a happy new year!  I just heard the sounds of a lot of fireworks and noticed that it's already 2013! I've been watching Japanese TV for about day and I am missing Japan bringing in the New year so badly now X(

By the way, I've been drawing pictures for the New Year from the Chinese zodiac since 2008. For this year's picture, I added three things that represent Japan when I drew the snake. Can you tell what they are? :D
*answers are at the end of this entry.

Some old pictures:

2008

2009

2010

2012

The answers for question above are:

1. Mt. Fuji

2. the red sun (the national flag)

3. the map of Japan (the snake's body!) 

Nano Block Post Card

I checked my mailbox today and found myself very happy as I received a New Year's card from my family in Japan. In Japan, the first days of the new year are the most important occasion for relatives gathering. But, since I've been outside of Japan, I've not been able to join this event for past several years. So, a postcard from my family in this season always makes me feel warm.

The card I got included a toy called "Nano block", which is a Lego-like block toy but much smaller in size. In Japan, the year 2012 is the "Year of the Dragon" and 2013 is the "Year of the Snake" based on the twelve Chinese zodiac signs. Accordingly, I got a set of Nano blocks to make a dragon last year and the one to make a snake this year :P

By the way, some people may think Nano block is a copy of the Lego block. In fact, you may find that it's not likely if looking into the history. The Nano block is a variant of a Diablock sold by a Japanese toy company Kawada. In 1955, the company was given a whole bunch of dead stocks of funnily shaped pencil tip protection caps, which has two caps connected together as the inventor thought that would be useful. The company turned the failures into into toys for kids to be locked together to build things, and they found that children really liked the toy. Following the positive feedback, the company spent years to improve the product to develop the Diablock and started selling it in 1962, which is also the year when Logo block was introduced into Japan! This is an interesting coincidence :)

Manga Culture of Japan

In Japan, Manga is everywhere. The origin can be traced back to the eighth century in the Heian period. Then, the modern style of Manga, which we see today, was firmly developed and became very popular after WWII especially as a means to entertain young people. Nowadays, more than 10,000 Manga are published annually.

Unlike other kinds of comic books, the target of Managa is not limited to children. There are Manga for boys, girls, young adults, ladies, gentlemen, etc. I think the common genres are pretty similar to those of novels, like adventure, SF, love romance, etc. But there are also many educationally oriented or intellectually stimulating manga as well. For example, I have manga of Metamorphosis by Kafka, Karamazov brothers by Dostoevsky, Biochemistry, ancient Roman history, Russo-Japanese War, etc. So, it is not at all a strange thing that even older people read manga in Japan.

I like to read books, but every once in a while, I really miss reading manga. Compared to reading books, the way you read manga is rather passive and very visual. So when I get really tired but still want some entertainment, manga is a great thing for me. I think this feeling is kind of like the feeling that other people have toward movie movies. Last night, I was in something like that mood, and so I read manga. Only the problem was, I could not really stop reading manga after I had started. When I finished reading the series of manga, it was already six in the morning. I was exhausted, but at least could sleep very well.

Croissants and Japan

One of my favorite breakfast staples are croissants. I really like to feel the texture as my teeth penetrate the soft but somewhat crunchy layers of the bread. I always enjoy the rich butter flavor coming out and filling my mouth. It goes very well with a hot dark coffee. That's perfect!

The origin of croissants, kipferl, can be found in the 13th century in Austria, and croissants were a variant of kipferl that became popular in France in the 19th century. Even though it became a breakfast staple in France at the end of the 19th century, it still had remained a luxury type of bread in other countries due to the great deal of time and effort required to bake it.

Surprisingly, the breakthrough was brought about by the Japanese company, Rheon, which was established by Mr. Torahiko Hayashi in 1963. He introduced applied science of rheological engineering into automated food production to mass produce high quality "manjuu", a traditional Japanese sweet. Later, in 1968, he established a way to apply the same technology to bake various kinds of modern complex breads like croissants, and he established branches in the US and Germany. Following the introduction of the technology, not only bakeries but also many supermarkets became able to stock croissants without needing a great deal of time and effort. The company's machinery is still very popular all over the world, and it is producing various kinds of traditional foods automatically in 112 countries today.

Sadly, nobody even in Japan would recognize his name or his success. However, I always deeply respect the silent forces behind the scenes. I hope one day, I can be someone like him, who secretly brings a lot of happiness to people all over the world.

End of the Year Parties

At the end of a year, people in Japan typically hold end-of-the-year parties called "bounenkai (忘年会)", which means "forget-the-year party". Usually, class mates or colleagues gather together to relieve their stress from the past year at the party. Today, I joined the party hosted by my Japanese friends.

A kind of hot pot, which we call "nabe", is one of the most typical Japanese winter dishes. Usually, we set a big electric pot filled with a boiling soup on a table and add various vegetables like carrots, cabbages, mushrooms, etc, and various kinds of meat like chicken, fish, sausages, etc, into the pot. We like to eat this dish, especially on a cold day, to warm our bodies up. At today's party, the host cooked "kimuchi nabe" by adding kimchi into a typical miso-based soup. I usually cannot eat spicy food, but this dish was so yummy that I could not stop myself from refilling my plate :)

Also, it was very fun to talk with other Japanese people in the university. I don't usually have a chance to talk in Japanese, as there are no other Japanese people in my lab. Even though I'm getting used to communicating in English, it still consumes a lot more of my cognitive resources than speaking in Japanese. So, this was a good and refreshing moment for me :)

Hair Cut

Just before I left Japan, I went to a barber to have my hair cut shorter than usual so that I would not have to cut my hair for a while. As a result, it had lasted for 3 months. But it was finally the time; I really needed a hair cut! Once I finally noticed this, I could not wait any longer. An annoying thing is, the growth of this feeling is not linear but rather traces something like the Sigmoid curve, of which the feeling suddenly pops up after a threshold. I started to notice that something was wrong yesterday, and I realized that I was on the threshold today. lol

The problem was that it was just right at Christmas season, and seemingly there was no barber open today. So, I had no choice but to cut my hair by myself. I've done this several times before, but this time, I did not have special scissors for hair cutting. Instead, I had to use my small toy scissors, which does not work very well even on papers and strings. I did not have a big mirror, either. But I did it.

Well done, I've just finished. It turned out to look okay from the front. Even though I have no idea about the backside, I don't care because I cannot see it, haha. Well, my mom or my girlfriend would care, but, fortunately, they are both in Japan. So I can confidently say that there is no problem at all :D