Bear with me while I bear with me

Summer vacation is over as of tonight. It was a full 2 weeks, so I should feel satisfied. I went to the beach in Zushi, Kanagawa prefecture on Saturday, and spent 2 days in Nikko. I got to see some famous things, like some waterfall named after a dragon and lake Chuzenji. And Toshogu temple. There was NemuriNeko (the sleeping cat), sansaru (the three monkeys - hear no see no speak no evil), and exotic food called yuba, the skin off of tofu. The mountain air was crisp, cool and refreshing. I took some pictures with my cell phone, having forgotten my digital camera, but I don't feel like uploading them right now. Mwahahahaaaaaa!

Man have I gotten lazy about pics or what? Sorry guys. It was easy when everything here was shiny and new and I didn't have so much else on my plate.

This learning Chinese one day a week thing is certainly interesting. I go to work a few hours early (or rather the city I work in that day) to meet my teacher, and we do a language exchange. So far I have learned the general rules of thumb for reading Pinyin, "the standard system of romanized spelling for transliterating Chinese." I'd like to spend more time focusing on it, but really I practice only once a week. I hardly feel guilty or anything, since I spend so much time on Japanese.

My friend and neighbor who was in my training group has moved back to the States today. I was kind of bummed out, as this now makes zero white people or friends in my building - not that I have anything against my Japanese neighbors, but they are all really shy - and Dayn has been here for the exact same duration as me. Watching people disappear, and soon watching new people pour in, as there is a new training group starting this week, is certainly odd. I don't really know how to describe it.... maybe a dual axis. The world is spinning fast enough around me - I live in Tokyo for pete's sake - but relatively speaking everything stays still. I stay still. And people come into my sphere and leave almost haphazardly, whilst I go about my business. It's disorienting in a way, and I fail to see how anyone could get used to this.

It was quite a shock to be in Nikko, in a place where trains run only once or twice an hour. I'm used to every 3-7 minutes. I'd been thinking for a while how much of a pain this city can be, and how I subtly wished for a quieter life in the country, but this really opened my eyes to the reality of how boring country life appears to be. It looks gorgeous on the surface, but in comes the feeling of being trapped out in the countryside.

Here is where all the opportunities are. Here is where I am employed, have a band, and have a few cool friends. So I should be happy here, for the time being.

I've almost learned to write 2000 kanji. I can taste impending victory. According to Anki, my friendly flashcard study tool, I've spent 2.59 days on this deck of cards. (I have others...) 12,052 reviews, counting each time I reviewed each card. !!

My teacher noted today that I'm making less mistakes than before with my grammar practice. And I'm noticing things like comics becoming gradually easier to read, and sometimes I can go through quite a few sentences of Japanese text without needing a dictionary. It's like all I needed was this vacation and a few days off to really look at the progress I've made. Still, gotta keep the motivation up, and pass that JLPT2 test in December. Or die tryin!

There is one F.I.D. show planned, though it isn't until January. It's a long ways off, and probably there will be something before that. We are close...

I am close. Closer to comprehension of a foreign language, closer to finally playing a show, closer to breaking through this stage of my life.

"It was always worth it, that's the part I seem to hide." - Modest Mouse

"Uuugggh.... Turn that treble up!!" - Loss of Reason

"You wanna see pissed off? I'll show you pissed off like you've never f**kin seen!" - Burnt by the Sun

I won't stop screamin'

Lately I've been getting in touch with friends back home for the first time in many, many long months. My life over here has, for lack of a better term taken on a life of its own. I have made some good friends out here, but of course NY and my homies are still number 1 in my heart. Now that things have slowed down at last with vacation, it's just good to be reminded that home still exists outside this place... since living here everyday makes it rather easy to forget about the rest of the world! (At least when one is busy, as I have been)

Has my posting been melancholy, or emo or something? Well, since Ian hugged me, there is now nothing I can't accomplish. Maybe it's the beef and onions I just ate talking here, but the next few days should be really sweet. Meeting a lady friend tonight (ooOOoo), going to the beach in Zushi (an hour from Tokyo, in Kanagawa) on Saturday, and going to Nikko from Sunday to Tuesday. It sounds a bit busy but it should all be quite relaxing, I'll get to spend time with friends, and most importantly get out of this city!!!! It's so necessary to stay sane.

Other than that, my downtime has been so needed. I've been reading Haruki Murakami's "The Wind-up Bird Chronicle," and I'm totally into it. Too bad it's 600 freakin' pages, a.k.a. too fat to lug around on trains, and too long for me to finish any time soon. But I'm tryin!

Studying has become really burdensome. Maybe without mind-numbing work to balance it, it seems like more of a chore, I don't know, but I'm feeling in danger of burnout. I look at my flashcards and don't want to look at them (hence this post). It could be a result of me trying really hard but not seeing visible improvement that I want - a problem frequent at the schools I work at, where people study English full-time. But we can't expect miracles can we!

Really, I just want to be able to understand what people are saying in everyday conversations. But it takes years to get that good. My reading is actually pretty decent by the way. I read a 700-page manga monthly serial almost cover to cover, minus 3 or 4 series. I was very proud of myself. :D

Let's make this a posi-negative-posi sandwich: I am also setting up a benefit show for research about the disease my 2 sisters have, NBIA. I haven't yet mentioned much about it in the blog, although of course it's a big part of my life. You can read more about it at www.nbiadisorders.org. The only lab that does major full-time research on this rare genetic disease is in danger of shutting down, and we're trying to raise a whopping $250,000 to save the lab. It sounds near impossible, but 10,000 is already in. And I plan to get up to 5,000 more at the benefit show this December. More details coming soon, but I expect ALL my friends from back home to be there. :)

That's all folks.



"CHAPTER ONE

analyze the devices
war with thee
pieces of your destiny corrupted
rise
thriving
can you verify the lost contents

CHAPTER TWO

gravel lodged in your throat
flesh box cavity
gradual eruption probe
one that feeds
hands that caress a crooked spine
absorbing bi-products
prompt exchanges
that will deconstruct

CHAPTER THREE

move on forward
signs that will pierce like labor pains
sharp
ways of a drunkard
the dogs shall devour and lap up their blood
stains

CHAPTER FOUR

persist
the prime suspects will not restrain
with affection
recession
final effects of a broken hope
of a broken shell
of a broken yoke
walk and learn from these
deviant
loss of wealth
subservient
quarantine the divisions
the double edged sword
depth incision

CHAPTER FIVE

glutton eat your fill
divination is that of a swine babbling in their filth
beware of the things hibernating in your skull
reeking havoc
malignant cells still active
schemes that will inflict my son
schemes that run rampant

CHAPTER SIX

if the disease of self
leaves a heavy burden on your soul
it must be removed
like bricks in the belly
you will sink in to the depths" - Candiria, 300 percent Density. (still one of my favorite albums of all time)