Feel-good quote

"Why do we consider intelligence to be so important in modern life?

General intelligence is very important in modern life because our environment is almost entirely evolutionarily novel. Most of the problems that we have to solve today—how to excel in school, how to find jobs, how to do virtually everything on a computer—are evolutionarily novel. So intelligent people do well in almost every sphere of modern life, except for the most important things, like how to find a mate, how to raise a child, how to make friends. Intelligence does not confer any advantage for solving all the evolutionarily familiar problems that our ancestors encountered. More intelligent people do not have any advantage in finding mates and often have disadvantages."


From an interview by the Economist, although most of the guy's theory is crock. Reminds me of Shizen to Kagaku class at Waseda... 

Theorizing

 “Poor Mexico,” its former president Porfirio Díaz is said to have remarked. “So far from God and so close to the United States.”


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/magazine/how-a-mexican-drug-cartel-makes-its-billions.html?pagewanted=all

Food and retail desert in my home town, contributing to its suckiness and the greater wealth/education disparity in St. Louis. A vicious cycle, one I will analyze. Maybe I'll run for political office.  嗚呼 ,面倒臭い.

All in the context of diminishing generational socio-economic mobility. I hate this world, hate human nature.

Was angry but not surprised. Very sad seeing your estimate of someone fall over the years. Even more so, what is with the attempts to barely hide racism behind a few asian characters? In this age of google translate and increased amounts of foreign language study, is it merely the racial makeup of that person's online (and real-life) social network? Also raises questions about my own experiences of marginalization and otherance in being called "asian", in the minimization of any effects that perceptions of my race could have on expanding another person's worldview. It's possible that being too fluent in a language or cultural values, could have little or even a damaging effect on spreading tolerance, by being seen as an exception to the rule. Have I been outwardly, expressly complicit with this racism?

(Some day I'm going to find a response to the, you look like *insert random black guy with an afro and a beard* here, other than mildly passive-agressive putdowns to distance myself from the offender's interests; hope find the presence of mind to throw in a big FU before that, though.)

Also, interesting to note that Vietnamese speakers can write romanized without the accent marks and still be understood, completely foiling the modern-day translation tools available to non-speakers (especially and including automated language identification). Wondering about the extent Chinese/Japanese/Korean can be disguised this way, although it would seem that the hoops to jump through are much lower. Maybe that's just because I don't know anything about Vietnamese orthography though.

• Indeed, the above method was used by another in the conversation thread of the above-written offense (what really irked me was that there was a continued, shared conversation going on with these terms and nuances by a number of (ahem) asian(-american)s who are supposed to be among the most educated in the nation; one of whom is apparently gainfully employed at a governmental social assistance organization in one of the lowest income areas in the city [reminding myself here to save the offending comments in a separate location]), referring to heiren (romanized mandarin chinese meaning "black people" for those of you not in the know), something I probably would have passed over since the main offenders are of korean heritage and I'm just so baller at reading kanji.

Sigh. Enough armchair ranting for today.

"His small-talk alters foreign policy. He once ran a marathon because it was on his way... the most interesting man in the world." Don't know about that last part but interesting ad.

Also the Mike and Ike are gay campaign... interesting only because it brings up "gay divorce", what people don't mention when they are prominent for gay marriage. When I first saw the candy box I was so utterly confused and thought a stupid kid had scribbled all over the package.

New obsession

Central Asia... I know it's so romanticized here, but... *O*
aratamete the girls are so pretty...

Review of the advert

From NYT

 “By nature we are that kind of school that precludes you from clinging onto the past,” says Amy Uecke, associate dean of students for campus life at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wis. “A wise college president said: If you come to campus and you do four or five years here and find yourself leaving with only the same friends that you had in high school, we as an institution have failed you.”


(from a greater article on skype and continuing high school relationships in college)

Morning of regrets / "多年后我才醒悟，自己当时是错误的"

Today was a morning of regrets, continued from last night.

Regrets that I never listened to anyone questioning the practical side of my degree, easily gave up my ambition to become a chemist and world class translator and interpreter, never truly explored my interests in dance and graphic design and gained practical skills, wasted inordinate amounts of time on clubs and people who don't care for me and almost never took the initiative to actively seek out and communicate with those who did.

Regrets that I depended on a JET placement for two years in a row, applied for CIR twice, haven't sent in a copy of my passport or my FBI background check because I still feel slighted by the program.

Regrets that I didn't follow through and apply to Fudan before graduating, didn't stay in Shanghai after that hard wonderful three months, have let my Chinese fall back into suck and feel conflicted when I study or interact with the language in any way.

Regrets that I didn't listen to the yearnings for emotional stability that securing my place in HNC would have given, felt conflicted fear over the role Chinese would play in my life, for thinking it would not have been such a burden after all every time I see mom has sent money.

Regrets that I find and desperately try to stop myself from thinking I've added nothing to my resume in the past few months; that "all of this" was for naught, that nothing will work out.

Regrets that, I'm stuck where I am now as who I am, with no clear path in sight except to wait and apply to schools again.

War on Marriage

Forget the questions of gay marriage and women... I want to see a war on marriage itself!
I was thinking about an argument （討論）I had with Wen about a month ago and realized that the difference in tax rate and breaks for the single and married categories might be enough to push me to the dark side :\
So mad that 1) the tax model (at least in my head/the popular imagination) is based on a traditional single-income family model in a time when so-called non-traditional families are becoming the norm, and 2) there's all these incentives in place in the US for people to marry and have children in that traditional family style, when singles  -- those without the obligations and expenditures of the married who have more time and subsequently, more ability to contribute to society -- are punished monetarily for choosing a lifestyle outside of that. (No I don't mean debauchery; I mean to maximize the ability to spend my money on books, food, games, movies, learning and travel for myself.) Gonna have to find myself an egalitarian society and learn their language and customs.

Reflections of a CIR Alternate

A few days ago I realized that I severely overestimated the number of positions that open for CIR (by a factor of 3!), thus severely overestimating my chances of getting into the program. Part of me said "Damn! I should have just swallowed my pride and applied for an ALT position,"

But the possibly stronger part of me has resigned myself to applying for some really exciting jobs instead. Got two applications sent off tonight, feel accomplished. For retrospect I've applied to a total of 6 programs/opportunities, these 2 included (haha). I heard someone complaining (or maybe it was on the internet?) about how they applied to 10 places and didn't get a job; Just thinking about shuukatsu, and the number of companies that the average person applies to... it's mindboggling, and any dedication like that in the US would be met with success. Just gotta keep my head up and keep going, things will work out.

New postings specifically related to Japan aren't popping up that frequently anymore (in particular the once-burgeoning career option of legal translation seems to have all but dried up), but I have too realized that I need to expand my search terms on that end. A lot of the same jobs seem to pop up over and over again -__-;; and some days I really am tempted to apply to one of those random hotel jobs in Hawai'i just to go to the islands...

Tomorrow's a new day, with new deadlines. Next few are on the 11th!; we'll see if I ギリギリセーフ them next time as well...

言葉遣い

From a BCF mailing, section about 言葉遣い

「馬子にも衣装」
馬子を「孫」と間違えやすいこの慣用句は、正しくは馬子のような身分が
卑しい者でも、衣装によっては立派に見える、つまらない者でも外面を飾れば
立派に見えることのたとえです。ほめ言葉ではないので注意しましょう。

Trying not to rage while figuring out where the "restore factory image" button went and hid itself...

I have some awesome friends

This is I guess one of those things that people don't really get, but I'm going to try to explain it in as short as possible; I have no interest in having sex. The things I do in life are not motivated by getting my dick wet. When I talk to a girl, I don't wonder how tight her pussy is, mostly I wonder if she thinks I'm fat."

, mostly I ______________________.

Wonder what I'd put in there....
(the double entendres just keep on coming!)

Dang.

Dang.

Someday I will get 原動力 and the skills to prioritize and get things done.

Until then I'm going to keep reminding myself to come up with a good name for make that new blog.

(And in the meantime I'll still be writing on this one; different blogs, different purposes.)

Music: How to Make it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nb8A5B7TbY

Rediscovered Nujabes

Sometimes youtube can be amazing.

In a world without words. Where we let our minds do the talking. Where our creativity is our only form of communication, expressed through the form of art, our creations, whether they be technically advanced or from the most basic instrument.

A world where our music is our form of communication.

A world where we can cross our legs, sit down on the grassy fields together, and listen to each other, in beautiful harmony.

@laharlie

Racism in Japan and Mensetsu wo furikaete miru-ing

So I had a question about dealing with racism/discrimination during my interview.

At the time, I managed to break my reactions to "racism" into hostile and ignorance (=teachable moments) over the course of two questions. (Thus recovering from my first, oh I didn't really experience much! ahhhhhhhhh! moment when my response to the first question ended.)

But in my dream last night I was interviewing again, and remembered this story.

The most outward racism I ever experienced (=noticed) in Japan was not from a Japanese* person, but rather another international student.

There was one day a small, sweet-looking redheaded Korean girl wanted to check out my club. Sometime over the course of our interaction she looked at me dead in the eyes, and I realized she was very, very cute. She opened her mouth to speak.

"You're black, but you're not scary."

I was appalled and taken aback, silent until I had conquered the dissonance that told me no, those words could not possibly have been carried by such a sweet voice.

I had two options: pimp or educate.


Suppressing my natural inclinations, I chose to educate.

Soldiers on the bases in Korea would be scary, and the perceptions gathered via media certainly give that same impression for black people in general, but people are just people; seeking out the chance to interact with more people from a given culture will give you a truer and better picture, along with the realization that we are all human. Besides, there are tons of scary Koreans."

I told her, or at least something similar.*

"Oh yeah, I guess you're right."

After that I saw her a few more times, but there was never the same feeling of closeness as that day when I had the chance to pimp. In fact, I suspect she might have had some unfortunate experiences to reinforce her stereotypes. But, when I did see her she looked happy, and was definitely hanging out with a diverse group of other students.

I called it a success.

*This is with the exception of fuuzoku, of course! I just remembered in Nagoya, not only was there a district of "nightlife guides" a stone's throw away from the main station, but wandering around at night led me to a clubbing & prostitution district with "No foreigners allowed" signs pasted everywhere. I have faint recollections of asking a bouncer if they were serious, and him being like "Naaaw," but I'm sure that's just my mind playing tricks.

**Also struggling with being self-conscious about sweat and stinkyness as basically the only westerner in a dance club... and said stinkyness being attributed to my race/culture (although it is true apparently); it was still a shock during my last festival to be told that my costume stunk and should be hung outside until it could be washed haha.

***There is a bit missing from the conversation above... probably. Also, she was a new freshman international student at the time.

hmm...

Maybe I should have looked into consulting. Although you probably need a better gpa hahaha.

Also thinking about joining the PMJS ML, just to lurk and read...

Also, a grad program that sounds beast in it's course offerings but a bit scanty on the language side

Return of the Kikokushijo!!

Bad pun, I know.

But just got the idea of looking for representations of kikokushijo in anime/manga, starting with my beloved Asuka (I'm getting more and more afraid to finish the series as time goes on, so I should make some way for it to be inescapable for myself...). Although, it seems like a lot of the characters are in fact stereotypical (tropes?)m so perhaps I should say innovative portrayals.

On the same note, my ideas of ibunka komyunicke-shon also extend to the different cultures within a given culture, basically through senmon yougo (specialized vocabulary) that develops through different groups. From computer programmers and scientists to dancers and artists and farmers (another reason I like gin no saji so much, gotta write about how awesome it is (and manga in general vs jun bungaku ("real" literature) later) have to communicate with each other using modified "foreigner english". I should find out what the term for that is.

But yeah. Ugh. Train of thought interupted.

http://maki.typepad.com/justhungry/2010/03/if-you-cant-speak-english-youre-a-loser-in-life.html

Ridiculous, 伊達眼鏡

Mo Xi alcohol lake

According to Liu Xiang's book Lienü zhuan written much later, around 18 BCE, Jie was corrupted by his infatuation with his concubine Mo Xi (妹喜 or 末喜), who was beautiful, but completely lacking in virtue.^[7][8] Among other things, she liked to drink, enjoyed music, and also had a penchant for jugglers and sing-song girls. Apparently, she had King Jie order a lake of wine made.^[8] They both sailed about in the alcohol lake in an orgy of drunken naked men and women bathing and drinking.^[9] She then commanded 3,000 men to drink the lake dry, only to laugh when they all drowned.^[8][9] This event was also recorded in the Han Ying's (韓嬰) book Han Shi Wai Zhuan (韓詩外傳).^[9][10]

-Wikipedia, Jie of Xia

Baller, utter ridiculousness... and there's more if you look into that guy! Clearly people like this were an influence for the Tenryuubito of One Piece. Really need to go back and read the 400 or so chapters I skipped. Next time I'm in town, I'm clearing out Book-Off!

The evergrowing List of light novels and manga to buy:

Spice and Wolf - 17 volumes

Haruhi  - 

Durarara! = 

Welcome to the NHK - 

One Piece manga - 50+ volumes

When opportunity knocks, you either answer the door, or you light up your internet connection and spank away your sorrows.

 This is from 30 Sleeps, which has some really good writing and inspirational stuff. Even talks about meeting girls, contrasting the pick-up artist methodology with a "get a life first" mode that makes a whole lot of sense.

Great articles on language learning over at Fluent in 3 Months, one very breathtaking post on comfort and tips that I need to apply to my everyday (actually resonates with the social skydiving post mentioned on 30 Sleeps), and another one that I will need to muse on, "Stop being shy!" Reminds me of all the people who introduce themselves as 人見知り over there. Entertaining thoughts of doing my first serious E->J translation since that translation class at Waseda with this.

---

Why We Procrastinate

1. Fear of success.
 Success comes with its own strings attached. Landing your dream job might involve relocating to a new city. Your promotion might alienate some of your co-workers. And dedicating yourself to the pursuit of happiness might require letting go of the people in your life that drag you down.

Definitely felt this one when it comes to job searching... and house searching... and email replying...

Procrastination is the Governor of the State of Boredom. It wants to rule you, hold you down, and keep you from reaching your potential. It feeds on your fears and encourages you to keep talking in tomorrows. But by accepting that now is never the right time, you’ll start leveraging your present circumstances for future gains. By acknowledging that you might make mistakes, even making failure a requirement, you’ll experience the benefits of imperfection. And by using action to clarify your goals, rather than ready-aim-aim-aiming, you’ll have taken the most crucial step towards living your ideal life.

-----
Reading an article from here before I go to bed.
Creating a "currently reading" list on Wordpress
Go through this blog for particle physics in Japanese
Hilarious commercial on Shuukatsu -- gotta prepare for interview in both English and Japanese though!
A couple more Japanese blogs that I wanna keep an eye on.
Collection of Japanese folk tales with interactivity! -- still gotta listen to those kids stories and pick out good ones to tell the kids! This is actually really baller!!!
Start a lang-8 account and rack up some points to trade for corrections.
Livestation apparently has around 15 Japanese tv channels!

This post from Tofugu has some interesting ideas about role-playing in language learning situations -- kind of ironic that there was just a colloquium series about this type of thing. :)

I always meant to watch this "English Teacher" series  but never got around to it. That and catching up with Wong Fu (dunno if it's worth it anymore...)

全日本コール選手権. Look this up on youtube for some interesting calls hahaha. 


Going to have to keep a better eye on the Japan Subculture Research Center and Jake Adelstein (as well as Polaris Project Japan...) 


Interesting article on development of cute writing in Japan in the 70's, and a throwback to learning to read squiggles in Classical Japanese class.... wonder what came in between and now, after them! Wonder if there's anything interesting going on at Neojaponisme...

Most days I hate how Spanish sounds, but...

at the same time have a strange (and totally explainable) attraction to it.

And I gotta give props to this guy. Sometimes amazed at the power of fandom...

Readings!

Awesome! Japanese and Chinese attitudes towards sex, summary of a paper published last year by James Farrer. So baller, I wish I had found this earlier.Hate how this makes me start to rethink my plans so easily. (And from that study I'm starting to think that that encounter with the prostitute in high school has led to an affinity? obsession? with these types of topics....At any rate, self-reflection is good and those memories are there, for the most part.) At any rate I'd like to see this guy invited to the university...

A couple other links that I will definitely come back to.

Life lessons

Fools waste their money on foolish things. Only the wise use their money to better themselves.

So many life lessons, jam packed into those pages! Gin no Saji

[Edit, 2 minutes later] The nametags on this page... I never realized how old school/common place the soudairyou check-in system was. Wonder how Nakamura-san's doing, haha.

Issho ni ryuugaku shita tomodachi no burogu wo imasaranagara hakken shita. Issho to ittemo, kaku hito no keiken ga (betsu betsu, buyiyang) chigaundanaa , to hajimete (to douji ni sai)ninshiki suru. Arata na tabi wo hajimeyou to ima shiteiru ga, Toukyou ni datte mada mada ippai michi no koto ga afureteiru akashi de atte, hotto suru