"Camera Returned!" Story, Pt 1

A couple posts ago, I announced the birth of a new camera. Today, I'm delighted to announce the ressurection of the original one!

It was returned!!... Only in Japan. (I think--post your opinion below!)

It was over 2 weeks ago that I lost my camera. That night was slightly rainy, and I was running to catch the last train... ...and somehow the camera (in it's black case) must have jostled out of my pocket. The next day I went back to the station, and with the help of a Japanese friend, I reported it lost.

By all accounts, this camera was gone, and I mean "bye bye" (to use a direct quote). We all knew it: the gruffy police man (who barked instructions about the lost item form), my Japanese friend, and even me.. we all figured it was gone. Heck, I even bought a new camera that day!

But lo and behold, I got a call from the police station yesterday. The camera was found! Come to the station!


We Are Serious Police Figures


I gathered my Japan Foreigner ID, passport, and the original box that the camera came in, with serial number, as instructed by the original gruffy policeman. But through the front door of the Yotsuya police station, past the plastic "police people" figures with moving LED banner sash, the lady behind the "Lost items" desk seemed ready to give it to me without all that. I guess my long description was detailed enough that they KNEW it was mine.

It's great to have it back--especially the photos! But who knows what they thought when they looked through the memory. Intermixed amidst typical snapshots--sunsets, friend's new baby, blurry party shots--were some of my quasi-artistic moments like the ones below. I wouldn't be surprised if they thought "What was he thinking?" "Does he really need this back?"


Semi-Artistic Subway Photo #1


Semi-Artistic Subway Photo #2

Anyway, I'm very pleased. We're all one happy family again. I'm abundently outfitted with cameras; my backpack floweth over.


My Camera Family: Older brother (left) and Younger brother (right).

Soon to come, Part 2: "O-REI." That's when I contact & thank the guy who returned it. Along with the camera, the police station gave me a form with his name & info. Apparently, in Japan the tradition in this case is that I give him a gift, worth 10% of the item returned. Cool eh?


Question: Would you expect this to happen where you live? I might expect it in a real real small town in the US, but not a big city!

31 with a bang

With a summer birthday in Tokyo, I decided to invite a bunch of friends for a fireworks picnic party last night. Although there were a few tense raindrop moments, it turned out to be a very nice evening! (Thanks to all of you who attended!)

Of course, with the new camera, I HAD to take some photos. Looking over the photos this morning, I've discovered a few cardinal rules about fireworks. What follows is the result of a careful analysis.

Why You Shouldn't Photograph Fireworks

1. Fireworks happen at night. You didn't buy that $5000 reconnaissance camera, so you can't take photos at night. Remember that flash that always comes on? Well you can't use that for fireworks.
2. Photos don't move. No expansion, no fast-then-slow, no glittery falling things, no wandering after-effect spinny bits (which are my favorites)
3. They're far away. You're a sane person, and you elected not to sit directly underneath kilogram upon kilogram of speeding, fiery, gunpowder boom-ness for a reason. Sure, you can try the zoom, but I refer you to item #1.
   

4. Your hand shakes. For fuzzy bits, (above) it might look OK, but in general it looks weird (below). On the plus side, you're still alive, 'cause the leading cause for camera jitter is your heart beating.
   

5. You don't want to be one of those geeks who carries a huge tripod around. You're quite satisfied to be an entirely different kind of geek. (Namely, a type of geek who isn't strong enough to carry around said tripod.)
   

6. The tripod you ARE geeky enough to carry is too small. Still, the above was the best photo I got of the fireworks. After a while I kinda like the look of the people in silhouette at the bottom. If only I knew who those people where...
   

7. Everyone else is enjoying a pleasant outdoor experience, and you're staring at a small TV screen in front of your face.

...But, I wasn't the only one staring at a screen: a shot I didn't have time to grab was at 30 degrees to the right or left. You could see a sea of dim lights, as people tried to capture the moment on their cell phones or digital cameras. In Japan it's become second nature to grab the camera any time there's a touching moment. But in hind sight, I wonder if some things are better enjoyed with the electronic equipment turned off. Especially for something as difficult to capture as fireworks..

stork visited me

Happy Birthday, everyone! As a gift to myself for finally going senile, I lost my camera and bought a new one. The camera is dead, long live the camera, and therefore we hereby announce a new family member. The differences are black and white.



And no, when I say "black and white" I'm not making a clever reference to the kind of pictures they take. I literally mean the color of the camera. Other than that, it's almost the same camera. ...But hopefully white is harder to loose. Same logic applies to the yellow case.

And I'll be sure and tell you when I do loose this one, so we can keep accurate records. Let's see.. I wrote about the previous camera on October 16, and I lost it 3 days ago. So it lasted 9 months. ... eh.. *gack* Even the euphoria from buying new toys can't quell that one. Well, one can hope that it turns up, but..

Since no camera is actually useful out of the box, I also picked up a SD Memory card. But this time I got a snazzy one which folds in half so you can read it in a standard USB drive. (In the see-through case, just left of the camera above.) All-in-one, multi-compatible stuff like that really geeks me out. ..In a warm and fuzzy good way, that is.



And, like last time, I also purchased a clear plastic sticker to protect the screen from scratches. The above shot is me applying the "PU-RO-TE-KU-TAA" to the camera. Ya see, when I loose my camera, I want the person who finds it to be able to peel off the protector and have a scratch-free surface. I'm just considerate like that.

...

In all seriousness, normally I wouldn't buy a camera so soon after loosing the last one, but tomorrow bright and early I'm going on a trip to the foothills near Mt. Fuji. Photo op! So I need a camera. .. Look forward to a picture-filled post next time! Cheers

オノマトペー, Japanese onomatopoeia

If you know the green t-shirt I have (and love) with the above "hi jou guchi" emergency exit sign, then you know something I bought from a cool online store. It's a company run by an entrepreneurial American that imports wacky Japanese stuff to Japan fanatics, mostly back to the US. He's actually a good writer, and I was reminded by the influence he had on my image of Japan after reading the "store news" email that's sent to customers. Here's a snippet:

I've always been fascinated with onomatopoeia in Japanese, with the differences in how "sound words" work between Japanese and English. Animal noises like "woof woof" (in Japanese: wan wan) are different, of course, but the mechanisms are the same, as with other words, like "twinkle twinkle" (kira kira) or "drip drop" (potsun potsun). The Japanese also assign sounds to odd actions, which we would never think of creating. The "sound" of eyes looking left and right is "kyoro kyoro," and this term is applied to a guy who is being unfaithful to his girlfriend by looking at other girls. The sound of snow falling has a sound word, too, "shin shin" ("sheen sheen") which summons up pleasant images of whiteness outside a frosty window. There is a "sound of silence" in Japanese, too, which is "shiiin" ("sheen," with a lengthened vowel). When someone makes a joke that isn't funny, it's common for someone to crack wise by saying "Shiiin!" to highlight the lack of laughter from the first person's joke. It takes time to get used to concepts such as these, but it's all part of the wonderful mystery that is Japan.

The company is J-Box, and they have lots of interesting-to-strange stuff. But a word of warning: J-Box's parent site is J-List, which is aimed at foaming-at-the-mouth college boys. It's hard to find a T-shirt without some kind of sexual connotation. If you surf J-Box long enough you may be inadvertently switched to J-List.

Interestingly, because of the "over 18" content there, J-List is blocked to me from here in Japan, even though I can walk 100 yards to any convienence store and find worse! Still, J-Box is highly recommended. Especially when it comes to buying me gifts. :)

World Cup = OVER

For me, the fact that it's over is more important than who won. :) Well, sort of.


Italians cheer, Frenchmen leer

I've been watching the world cup (especially the first round games, when the US Men's National Team still had a [theoretical] chance) at an English pub near my apartment. And because 1) the USA and Italia were in the same first round group, 2) I'm the only American strange enough to be a soccer fan, 3) my Italian officemate is a soccer NUT (like 90% of Italians), it's been a fun few weeks.

However, it's wrecked havoc on my sleep schedule. Today/Yesterday/Whatever, I slept from 10:30pm - 3:30am. That's a problem, because the game started at 3. My alarm was apparently sounding (loudly) for an hour from 2:30, but I was totally oblivious to it. For most of the games I would simply stay up without sleeping, but I was tired today from having played... soccer.

The final game tonight was OK, but not excellent. I missed the first half, which apparently was better. They got tired. We were tired, being 4am, so it was understandable. Eventually, with the score at 1:1, and the French star Zidane going insane (what a way to be remembered: responding to provocation with a blatant head-butt-to-a-tall-guy's-sternum), Italia won on free kicks. We were all celebrating Italia style (above picture).

But what was interesting to me was the below picture.


Photos with Italian Flag: 100Yen

Many Japanese were equally as enthusiastic as the Italians, and many people wanted to have photos with the Italian flags that instantaneously appeared after the last shot.

I'm not surprised by the desire to join the crowd, because after all I was rooting for Italia as well. (Why? They beat us in the first round. So now my claims that we had a hard group are justified--I can say "We lost to the world champions!!" I guess that's kind of like getting 5th or 6th place.)

The level of enthusiasm was surprising. Through the series, I noticed a lot of Japanese rooting for whoever was winning--the mood of the moment, and especially the passion of the Europeans watching was the main thing. I suspect "feeling the moment" was the reason that most of the Japanese kids there chose to watch at an English Pub. Japanese soccer nuts are moderately few, greatly outnumbered by baseball nuts and equal in number as F1 nuts, golf nuts, and tennis nuts. For my American audience, think hockey fans. (Diehard but not the biggest group.)

..anyway, the World Cup ended on a good note: the silver lining from being late for the game is that I'm awake. I'm off to work. Ciao

3 Tokyo Snapshots

Indoor World Cup Mock-Field TV cafe

Wish I'd known about this before today! Also, wish it was closer to home for that dazed 6am shuffle back home.



Where's Japan-ish?

Zoom in to count how many "Only in Japan" items are pictured here. I count at least 4. (And no, it's not raining!) (... or even sunny.)



Green breath

And lastly, another Engrish gem. I found this one on the back of a restaurant's point card. (Very popular with new restaurants and hair salons, to cultivate steady customers.) Interestingly, the restaurant is about 1 month old, and not named "The Leaf"

push the button

To stray slightly from Tokyo/Japan topics, I just wanted to express how much this bbc article reminded me of the "Space Madness" episode from Ren and Stimpy. (Stimpy is pictured above.)

And yes, I do have that episode on DVD.

What's your pulse pressure?

At the post office they have a free blood pressure machine. But this one gave me a print out!! With a bonus graph--I love graphs!! I know there are nurses in the audience--zoom in to the graph part. Do you think my numbers are actually a bit higher than where the arrows (at the bottom) are? And what are the factors leading to high pulse pressure (pulse pressure = systolic minus diastolic)? I guess it's not high--and I'm not worried.. I just wonder if being tall and thin = high pulse pressure.

Maybe I have a small heart. Like the Grinch. Hee hee.

When it's not raining in Tokyo these days, the weather is nice for taking pictures..

Photogenic Kyoto (again)

What year is this again?


Nice hotel, nice hotel parking lot


Hotel Room Shot

Photos of hotel rooms are almost as thrilling as photos of food. YOU weren't there, YOU didn't stay there, YOU didn't eat it, so probably: YOU don't care. Sorry about that.


Hotel Room Shot 2


The Internet That Almost Worked


Hello Granite


Conference Fees Were High For A Reason


Kyoto's Beautiful River Restaurants


Sweets Store Window


Temple Roof Plants

Not sure why my eye automatically finds plants that grow out of roofs.


San-ju sangenjou

For religious reasons, they ask that you don't take photos of the 1000 Buddhas inside. But I thought the outside, where they have an annual archery endurance contest, was rather photo-worthy itself..


Ginkakuji 1

Ginkakuji is the "silver temple", to complement Kinkakuji, the golden temple. Apparently the couldn't find enough silver to plate it. Compared to Kinkakuji, Ginkakuji is smaller, less religious, and more tea-drinkin-time-feeling. It's a Kyoto top-4 attraction.


Ginkakuji 2


Ginkakuji 3


Ginkakuji 4


Ginkakuji 5


Shinkansen bullet train "Nozomi" back to Tokyo

Kyoto sidewalk sign

What do you think it means?

• "Please go up stairs"
• "Please steer yourself upstairs"
• "You'lls tear if you don't steer upstairs"
  

...

Unrelated rant: My Windows port of GIMP 2.0 won't draw straight lines with shift. *bleh*

The cure

Cure for what ails you.

I made a mid-spring resolution to start cooking for myself more often. The arrival of an colleague from Italia has helped that goal drastically. He even taught me how to make a big mess in my kitchen, as pictured below:


der paster in der pan goin flipper flipper!

I discovered that one of the following is a cure for canker sores (inside of the mouth):

• Fresh cooked pasta with broccoli and extra virgin oil
• Spending all day at home cooking and eating (and jogging)
• Fresh veggies

All Carrots Look Alike

I also happened upon a new mystery: Why do all carrots in Japan look like this one? Huge, triangular, and without skin.. It's bizzare. I just can't find a normal carrot. But the good thing is that mutant clone carrots are fairly cheap--by far the cheapest ingredient in the $5 salad pictured above!

umbrella condom +alpha

Umbrella Condom: n. a plastic cover that fits over an umbrella, as to protect the inside of a building from drippy bits.

Umbrella condom dispensers are often located near the entry of buildings and moved to a place of prominence by the building staff whenever it's raining. Next to the free "kasa condoms" is the obligatory "kasa condom rubbish bin."



+alpha: adj. [Japanese marketing] a standalone suffix that designates "more than you normally expect."

Why alpha? No-one knows. But the dispenser at my conference's building has a previously unknown feature: it dispenses condoms with a blow. Air is blown to keep the condom open, facilitating easy insertion of one's umbrella, which can often be clingy and adhesive when wet.



No idea if these HDPE condoms are recycled, how I feel about the idea of a recycled condom of any sort, and how much electricity is required to continually blow condoms. But since this is the first time I've seen the condom blow, I'm guessing it is only associated with government positions. (This is a government/community building in addition to convention center.) Non-inflated dispensers are much more common, and cheaper I'm guessing.

PS Apologies if some feel this blog humor has risen to untenable levels of sophistication. We will return to normal broadcasting shortly.

a nice photo shoot

Thought you may enjoy this photoshoot link I found. I'm going to go have my blood boiled at the roughness festival now.

Oh, lovely Engrish

I was invited to a festival. From the website, does it sound nice to you? Here's a quote:

The Sanja Matsuri counted by one 
of the Edo three major festivals boils 
Asakusa people's bloods as a roughness 
festival of the Edo the greatest, and 
gathers one million tourists or more 
now every year.

The emotion of the downtown and shouldering 
person's heat pile up the atmosphere of 
the festival, the foreigner also participates 
in portable shrine Cats at the same time 
as being known to the Japanese whole country 
as Hana in Edo recently, and it is popular 
as a global festival.

This is the scene.

I wish this had a smell-a-vision, or some way to guage the smell of this photo. It smelled like caked urine and sweat. The man's white pants were stained brown, but I think it was mud. (I hope it was mud.)

He must have been in the subway system to avoid the rain--though arguablely, the rain would have done this homeless man good. I'm guessing he'd spend just enough time in each station to avoid having the police called to remove him due to his smell. Yes, he smelled that bad.

Prior to his last-minute decision to board our train, I was sitting in the seat marked in blue. I noticed a 10Y coin on the seat, and I moved it to the side. (Not that I was expecting anyone to care if I took it, but I didn't need it, and it's kind of the Japanese style to not take things if they're not yours.) After the homeless man sat at the place marked by the green circle, I left. I lasted 5 seconds. I wasn't the only one who left. It was that bad.

The next stop, he left, and the air stirred by his motion gave us all a second wave of the stench. Definately "Ewww.. Grossness." Normally at this point, it'd be time to pity the guy and try and forget his body ordor.

But leaving the train, I thought to go back and see about the 10Y. Zoom in, and look at the red arrow. Amazingly, a man so far down in the dumps that he hadn't showered in at least a month not take the coin. I was amazed.

What do you think? Did he not see it? Was he choosing to smell like a toilette for other reaons? Would he have taken it if it was a 1000Y bill? ..Would I?

Smell like a C O W

Hair Make ROPE Sometimes there's no need to write anything. Yes, that is a cow on my triple box of soap. (The soap is kind of moist and dense, like cheese or something.) And the Hair Make Rope sign is a beauty salon: Rope, for your Hair and Make(up) needs.

I like small cars

I was doing pretty good, regular posts, and then.. Elevator-ness for two weeks. Sorry 'bout that.


night-time daihatsu love

I do like small cars. Lots of Mini Coopers here, teeny old classic kind and also the new, and these small Japanese cars.

U-Tokyo Front-Gate Smartness

Smart is a European car maker, and their 2-seater cars are very cute. If I live someplace where highway driving wasn't required, I'd get one. They are safe, but with enough speed I think they'd be little rolling bouncing balls. But at low, city speeds they should be fine. I mainly want one for parking convenience and fuel efficiency.

..Sadly, reducing the world's CO2 emissions is not on that list. Kind of pointless for developed nations to try and reduce emissions, because burning stuff is the cheapest/only viable way for undeveloped nations to stop being undeveloped. It's gonna get burned, one way or another. My reason is this: if you had to choose whether or not to use power to save a sick person, a baby or your grandma or example, even though you know that using said power will slowly put animal/plant species at risk, you're going to pick "person" every time. Anyway..

Small cars. Lots in Tokyo. Me likey.

Elevator Notice

This is the elevator at my office. Today I noticed a notice.

What does this mean to you?

Thought I'd post this because it's a good example of daily life here in Japan. Actually, it's more accurate to say, "Daily life for those who can't read." If you saw this next to the elevator, what would you do?Obviously the first part is a date. (today) From the limited kanji I know, the next part on the first line I think says "middle of the morning." The rest I can't really read.

This could mean anything from "There will be a fire drill some time, approx the middle of this morning" to "This elevator is a death trap some time in the middle of the morning" to "Hey students if you are coming for the review session come up to 313 from the middle of the morning." Choices A and C seemed harmless enough so I just ignored the sign.

Welcome to illiterate life in Japan!