Wyler and the piggly wiggly

Just to reserve this spot as a reminder for the Wyler visit yesterday in Osaka.

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"I felt like the 'P' was coming between me and my fans. We had to simplify it. It was, you know, during concerts and half the crowd saying 'P. Diddy' and half the crowd chanting 'Diddy.' Now everybody can just chant 'Diddy.'"
-- Diddy

"For everyone who thinks I have the easiest job on the planet: Have you watched Vanna White on "Wheel of Fortune" lately? She doesn't even have to turn the letters around anymore -- they light up, she walks over and touches them, and that's it. You could train a chimp to do this. And I have an easy job?"
-- TSG

"You know, they want me to get traded now because things are getting good. Same things that happened at every other team I was on. As soon as everybody started being players, then I get the boot."
-- Stephon Marbury on recent trade rumors about him.

"The sun has been there for 500, 600 years ... "
-- Mets outfielder Mike Cameron, after teammate Carlos Beltran lost a ball in the sun against the Dodgers

"You're not going to play for me if you don't put out."
-- Mets manager Willie Randolph

"I just talked to a gentleman named Jimmy, whose involved with club Jenna, you know Jenna Jameson. They said they were interested in getting me involved in that kind of business as well."
-- Mike Tyson when asked about his career options after boxing.

"Sex is great, if you are in a relationship. Otherwise, I find sex actually not so interesting. Without a relationship it is confusing."
-- Tom Cruise to Bild Magazine

"I wish all the mean people, if you want to be mean to each other, just buy a country together and blow each other up. Then we'd have no terrorists left. Like, don't kill innocent people for no reason. It's not fair. We love everybody. We'd even like them if they said they're sorry. It's not fair that innocent people are getting hurt. It makes me sad."
-- Tara Reid commenting on the London bombings

A month's worth of gibbering recall

- Fuji climb
The climb was pretty easy. 6 hours up 3 hours down, would've been faster too if the trail wasn't so congested with slow-footed climbers. The top was much colder than I was prepared for, which we reached at about 4am in the morning. It was too cloudy for the sunrise to be visible. With the loose pebbly trail, the exhilarting descent felt more like skiing. I thought I saw Jessica on the mountain but wasn't completely sure, the girl appeared skinnier than Jessica. Not until I phoned with Simona did I find out that it was indeed Jessica. I gave her my stamped climbing stick.

- Marshall
17, been a Red Sox fan from Philly since 15. Waterpolo player at a private school. Before Japan homestayed in Costa Rica for a month. Good guy, easy to hang out and watch TV with. Drank too much one night and puked on the floor. Dentist Dad and housewife Mom. Yamasa curriculum consisted of private lessons, Cooks and eats egg-bacon-cheese sandwitch twice a day on average. On arrival, lost luggage on train. On departure, lost bike at train station and cell phone on the taxi. Marshall, GET!

- Class
Mai: 22 year old from Spain. Brown hair, green eyes, usually seen in strapped tops, jeans, and push-up bras. Very friendly and warm, the tip of her nose wiggles when laughs. Speaks Spanish, Catalan, German (attended German school), some French, and some Japanese. Homestay. Did not pass her end-term exam. Plans to become German/Spanish translator.

Chris: 2nd year JET from an island in Kagoshima-ken but closer to Okinawa. Originally from London. The only other source (besides an unabashed yours truly) of spontaneity and lightheartedness in class. Good sense of humor. Usually wears soccer-related clothing. Receding hairline.

David: from Taiwan, but lived in America and Canada--nearly fluent English. Usually wears black. Heavily gelled haircu of the 80's Rod Stewart lineage. A self-proclaimed drummer. Has a habit of smacking lips before talking. Sleepy and absent-minded in class by default. Fellow resident K.

Akie: also from Taiwan, name is Japanese pronunciation of Chinese name. 26, below average attractiveness. Member of the Fuji ascend team. Worked in an accounting firm, but quit job to come to Yamasa.

Lucy: 19 from Germany. Tall (5'11"+) and lanky. Conservatively dressed. Current college student, studying biology. Speaks to Mai in German, to Taiwanese folks in Japanese, and rest of us in English. Carries self with nervous and stuttering energy bordering on uneasiness. Homestay. Plays clarinet.

Kate: another 2nd year JET from Ehime, Matsuyama or shima. Also from Great Britain (not to be confused with UK). Asked me if I had a girlfriend on the 3rd day of class, and more than once complains about the shortage of "fitties" at SILAC. Runs on a digital biological clock--easier to read. If there's a female equivalent term for blueball, she has it. Did not pass her end-term exam.

Chin, Alan, Dell and Simona: newcomers to the 2nd half of the class. Chin a college student from Taiwan, likes reading and drawing anime. Alan an English professor at Japanese uni, away from Britain for 9 years with Japanese wife. Dell runs a cell-phone search/comparison site, married Japanese from Canada--but with Oragonian demeaner. Simona is Simona.

Yoshiguchi: "Homeroom" teacher for the first 2 weeks. Pretty, loud, smoker. Enjoys to lower voice and appear theartening as a joke. Taught us "bimyou."

Kawashima: "homeroom" for 2nd 2 weeks. Also pretty but heavily powdered, very slanty eye, likes to laugh and make laugh. Simona's vote for the prettiest teacher in school.

Koto: not even sure if that's her name, but she's the concensus hottie teacher. From Marshall: former hip-hop dancer and survivor of cancer. From Jimmy: She's SO CUTE!

- Okay, the REAL class
Using Minna no nihongo, covering one lesson a day. Lessons 26-32, 35, 40, 43, 49, 50. Mornings are grammar practice, afternoons are listening and conversation. The materials are 70% stuff I had already learned from CLAIR intermediate course, but the classes really enforced the learning and usage and now I feel slightly more confident about speaking in Japanese now. Just slightly.

- Okazaki Hanabi Daikai
Jessica came in town for this one. A big showcase of this year's newest line of fireworks. Apparently most of the big purchasers of fireworks (city hall, matsuri operators, etc) come to Okazaki and stay at the Grand Hotel and scout out their purchases. 3 hours long! Went with Simona (in yukata), her Italian roommate Alexandra (in yukata), her boyfriend Yuichiro, and Jessica. We found a Yamasa teacher group who gave up their spots on the sidewalk, and their tarp, for us. Not sure how Jessica felt about the PDA. She played her gameboy through the last hour. Way, way too many people.

- Critters
An average of 2 bites every night for me. Different varieties of mosquitoes too, judging on the different coloration of the bites. Used up a whole tube of bug bite itch cream in a month. Marshal's judicial adherence to the trash separation policy has attracted swirling fruit-flies as well. Circadas (insert verb for cercada noisemaking) constantly. Our hallway is usually mysteriously lined with dead oily green beetles. Simona's apartment had cockroaches.

- Brazillians
Okazaki has an unusually large population of Brazillians or of Brazillian descent. Everywhere you walk you see someone who doesn't look, or dress, or talk like Japanese. When we went to the Brazillian pizza place, Simona was mistaken as a Brazillian and given a Portugese menu for the both of us, a welcoming role reversal.

- The one week suspension
I hate to admit it, though it was driving me insane at the time it did more good than harm for us later. Now that I'm reading the book, who know what we might do from this point on?

- Nagoya
Another big city, though I cannot distinguish any distinctly Nagoya flavors. On my visit with Simona we dined at an Arabian isakaya where you had to rub the lamp to enter the secret door. On my visit with mom we saw the Atuda Daisha and Nagoya jou.

- Banpaku
Did not visit. Too many horror stories of impossibly long lines for interesting exhibits and other exhibits that range from un-noteworthy to downright petty. Too bad for those 16 million suckers.

- Zig-Zag
The campus bar, opens on Thur and Fri nights. Run by Declan Murphy. Large assortment of bears from Guiness draft to Czech Budwiser to bottled Cimae and Hoegartten. Visited there twice. Marshall was there once too many.

- Mom
Came on the 18th, left on the 24th. Visited Nagoya, Kyoto, Diasen, Adachi. Ate at that Nagoya crab house, rotary sushi in Kyoto, Tenshin, Ginjiro, home cooking, and wagyu shabu shabu at Washington Hotel. Everything else is as noteworthy as my other mom-like encounters.

- First pool tourney in Japan
31 entrants, handicapped double elimination. Won first against the owner of the place, won second against a guy who worked there, lost the third to this tiny guy with a twitchy right eyebrow, and lost the fourth to a guy that looked like and probably was Brazillian.