2003.12.26 Happy Holidays! This month I went to China. I met my old friend Andrew in Beijing where he was visiting his brother Matt who lives there. I traveled around Beijing and some sights west of the city. It was all very interesting. I am slowly putting up some pictures from the trip.
2003.11.25 I am going to stop apologizing for my infrequent updates, and all of you out there on the edges of your seats will just have to put up with this situation. Last week I went to Tokyo and took this photo standing on one of the windows in the floor of the Tokyo Tower observation deck. Tokyo Tower looks a little bit like the Eiffel Tower except it is orange and ugly.
2003.10.21 OK, I know I have really slacked on these updates, but I had nothing earth shattering (like my usual updates, ahem) to write about. Recently I have been doing a lot of hiking. The Rokko Mountains in Kobe have many hiking trails where you can see waterfalls, wildlife, wide-open views and also wrestle with wild boars. After a long day of hiking you can go down the north side of Mt. Rokko to the town of Arima which is famous for hot springs. There you can cook your sore muscles in the scalding water while old Japanese men stare at your naked gaijin body. One of the hot springs even boasts of the radium in its water, which supposedly heals many aliments. Read more about your friend, radium.
2003.09.09 Oops! Somehow a whole month slipped by there. First, let me tell all of you who have asked, that webpage featuring pictures from Arashiyama's monkey park (see old news below) is not my webpage, nor is it anyone I know. I just did a Google search for some pictures and made the link.
I just got back from a trip to Kyushu. This little shot from my cell phone shows the still active volcano in Aso. This volcano is in the middle of an ancient crater about 20 km in diameter that rings the whole area. I recommend you go to Google and search for "Kyushu Aso" for more beautiful pictures.
In Kyushu there is an interesting playing card museum. Their website is only in Japanese but there are some pictures, and you can find some good information in English at Andy's Playing Cards.
2003.08.13 Last weekend Typhoon No. 10 swept through Japan. Here in Osaka this meant just a little rain and wind despite the doomsday weather reports on TV. After that anti-climax dribbled past I went to Arashiyama, a pretty town near Kyoto. Besides the usual temples and shrines, there is Monkey Park where you can hike up a small mountain to see hundreds of wild monkeys. Monkeys can be dangerous in Japan. Some towns are pillaged by gangs of monkeys that raid supermarkets or tear food from people's hands. Unfortunately I did not witness any acts of monkey violence. The monkeys of Monkey Park are pretty laid back, as long as you don't stare into their eyes as the many signs strongly warn. You can safely feed them from inside a house, which looks amusingly like a Planet of The Apes zoo, with the people in the cages and the monkeys observing from the outside. Here is another homepage with photos.
This morning I saw a very funny report on TV about new styles of gravestones in Japan. Japanese people are usually cremated, but the ashes are still buried in cemeteries under gravestones. One guy recreated his living room with stone replicas of his sofas and coffee table, so his family can sit and relax there next to his grave and feel at home. Another Go enthusiast has a Go board as a gravestone. He isn't dead yet, and plays the game with his granddaughter there enjoying the last years of his life before ending up under the board forever. The girl says she enjoys playing on the grave, because she is able to play more seriously than at home. Another woman recreated her husband's favorite thing after he died, a stone replica of a box of cigarettes, complete with the brand name carved on the front. There is also a large stone ashtray and a stone cigarette with fake smoke rising from it. Next to that is a big stone lighter, with a candle for the flame. Unlike the other men, he did not build this unique gravestone before his death. It was all his wife's idea after he died. I wonder how he died?
2003.08.05 Last Friday I saw the PL fireworks show which is the largest one in the world. I paid to get a seat very close to the action, and it was worth it. The finale was so huge and loud I almost wanted to "duck and cover". PL stands for "Perfect Liberty" which is one of the new religions in Japan. Although they don't seem as cultish as other groups, such as Aum Shinrikyo which nerve gassed the Tokyo subway a few years back, PL does have its odd points. Check out their Peace Tower located near where I saw the fireworks in the south of Osaka. Now that is bizarre! It looks like a cheesy prop where the evil wizard lurks in some low budget movie. But it is very real, and very big. The PL website brags that it can be seen all the way from Kobe. Could this tower be even weirder than the "Tower of the Sun" which can be seen in my photo section?
2003.07.28 "Tadaima!" is the Japanese expression you say when you come home. So yes I am back in Japan after two weeks in Thailand. I met my old college buddy in Bangkok and from there we traveled to Chiang Mai and Krabi. Krabi has some beautiful beaches. There we visited the island where they filmed the movie, The Beach. Sorry no pictures for you, unless someone buys me a scanner. But you all know how to use Google, and there are plenty of pictures of the places I went out there already.
2003.07.08 No sooner back, then I am off again. I am heading for Thailand in a couple of days for two weeks. Yeah I know, I was just there in November, but my friend is going and I got some miles saved up, so why not? As before, please use my Yahoo address while I am away.
2003.06.26 I'm back! I had a great time in New York the past month visiting friends and family. But the weather was pretty bad. Unseasonably cold. And New York broke a 100 year old rainfall record for the month of June. I thought I was going to escape the rainy season of Japan, only to end up in another.
I brought my flashy cell phone with me to New York to show off and to use the built in camera. I see the US phones are starting to catch up to Japanese ones, but they are still behind. Heck, my phone purchased just a year ago is already unavailable in Japan. I didn't take many shots because I was trying to conserve battery power, and there isn't anything zany enough to put in the photo section of the web page, but here is a small shot of me and my parents, my dog, and our house. Once again you will have to forgive the blurry quality of the poor little camera. I will try to keep the updates of the page frequent as I promised earlier.
2003.05.26 I will be home in New York tomorrow until the end of June. So I won't be able to check my cell-phone e-mail, or my regular DION account e-mail for about four weeks. Please write to the Yahoo address below. Thanks!
2003.05.15 Look! So far I have updated the page once a week. I wonder how long I can keep this up. Yesterday I met a "celebrity" in the train station here. The following story will only have meaning to those people in Japan who watch the TV show "London Hearts". Click on the "Read More" link below for the full story.
I watch this show called "London Hearts" every week. It is extremely funny. They test young people's boyfriends and girlfriends to see how faithful they are, or put them in uncomfortable situations so we can enjoy watching them squirm. In some shows they try to seduce someone with a cool guy or cute girl, and of course the real boy or girlfriend is watching the whole painful scene on the hidden cameras. For example a "Stinger" playboy tries to pick up the guy's girlfriend on the street, take her out to eat, and finally back to his apartment. Guess who is waiting in the apartment? A very angry boyfriend. A recent prank they do is called "The Triangle" where the guy is on a date with his girlfriend, when suddenly the other girl he is cheating with shows up. This other girl is working for the show and has been meeting the boyfriend for maybe months! Now this actress and the real girlfriend act like they are old friends, and she joins them at the table creating the triangle. Everyone is in on the joke except for the suffering boyfriend trying to keep the other girl from revealing their secret affair.
In another show they have a group of men gather to complain about the "devil-girl" they all have been dating. The show then stalks the girl and with the help of her friend sets her up on various fake dates to see how devilish she is. A recent episode featured a girl so bad, they featured her again last week. This girl "forces" her cash strapped lovers to buy her thousands of dollars worth of brand name goods and other luxuries. One of her guys (I can't call him a boyfriend) only meets her once a year to buy her heaps of stuff on her birthday. So I met this girl with one of the boyfriends from the show. The picture is blurry but if you watch the show you can recognize them. Here they are. Usually I would not talk to celebrities, certainly not these fake celebrities, but when I spotted them on the train I e-mailed my old co-worker Kana (Hi Kana!) who is also a fan of the show. She quickly replied telling me to go talk to them. So there you go.
2003.05.08 Wow! Finally passed that 1000 mark. Who was the 1000th viewer? You can get a free t-shirt. Ha! Maybe I will change the background for a bit to commemorate. I was thinking about promising to update the page at least once a week, but that might be impossible. OK, I might give it a try, but no promises. I added one photo of a delicious food product I found in the store. I am too busy (cough) to add a link so just click around until you stumble across it.
2003.04.07 Over 900 hits! Thanks for stopping by. It is cherry blossom season in Japan. This picture I took with my phone came out suprisingly well. Everyone here is having their flower viewing picnics in parks all over the country. The legality of drinking in public adds much to the these parties. Nothing like seeing grandpa dancing around on the blue tarp singing karaoke. Nothing except the birth of Astro Boy this very day!
2003.03.18 I bought a domain name, gnbenson.com At the moment the addresse just forward you to my dion page. In other news, my friend recently saw a Japanese guy wearing a jacket that said "HAM STEAK Bumfucked Hillbilly Backwoods Gear by Yellowcorn". For more such wackiness go to engrish.com
2003.02.25 I added several new links to the
Good Links
page.
2003.02.24 With my new software and special cable I can now easily download the pictures I have
taken with my
cell-phone/camera.
Before I would attach the pictures to an e-mail on my phone and send them to my computer email account
resulting in hefty transmission fees. You can see a few of the new pictures I've added, by clicking on
"Good Things" below and then "Good Photos" or
follow this direct link.
2003.02.23 Recently many people have sent me these pictures over email and have asked if they are real. The original email claims that they are a new fashion trend in Japan, and that these are not transparent skirts, but skirts with special prints on them making them appear transparent. Of course this is not true. The skirts really are transparent! No, just kidding. These pictures are obviously skillfully made composites using imaging software. Sorry to disappoint you. I don't know who made them.
2003.02.07 About 10 minutes ago I got the results from the first level (1-kyu) Japanese Proficiency Test. Despite my pessimistic expectations I actually passed! You need 70% to pass the first level and I got a not to shabby 81.5%.
Now I should start on another language. Should I study Chinese, the language of the future super power? Or maybe German, the language of many relatives I have never met? Because of course first level Japanese means I am a perfect fluent speaker. Ha!
My old buddy from high school (and college too actually, but he was in the North side crew and a biology major, whereas I was in the South side and a physics major, making us bitter rivals in the old Geneseo gang wars. I had to gouge out my own eye from the shame of looking away from his gaze during one of our battles. Oh, wait, that was a movie. Anyway, ignoring the fact that I never put a second parenthesis, lets move on. This guy, Andrew, now has a web page where he is writing his funny 'Daily Rant.' I admire his motivation to update his page so frequently. I am lucky if I can write something once a week.
2003.01.28 Added a couple of photos.
2003.01.25 A cultural event I went to a couple of weeks ago is called "Yama-yaki"
or mountain burning. Every year they burn the grass on a small mountain in Nara city.
Last year I saw just the end of it from far away, but this year I went early to get a spot
as close as possible. I found a picture here.
This picture is a bit of an exaggeration because the fireworks happen before the burning starts. And the fire goes up the mountain in a line, so it does not all burn at once. They obviously used some tricky photography to blend it all together. But, it is still worth a look if you are ever in Nara in January.
I have been playing a lot of games recently, besides Go. I finally got the famous German board game, Settlers of Catan. I was lucky to get the Japanese version (by Try-soft) similar to the original German. The new Japanese version (by Capcom) is too small, and uses a board that is mostly fixed so has fewer variations. I have also taught some Japanese people some good card games like Hearts, Cassino, Cribbage, etc. They have cards in Japan, but they are not so popular, and most people only know one game from their childhood called "Baba Nuki". This game is almost identical to "Old Maid" except the old maid, or "baba" is a single joker placed in the deck, and not the queen of spades. "Cards" in Japanese is "Trump". This can get confusing when teaching a game that actually uses trumps. Supposedly when the Japanese first encountered card playing foreigners, they overheard the word "trump" often and assumed it was the name of the game.
There are hundreds of other words in Japanese based on English that have changed meaning. Unfortunately for all the students here learning English, many have not realized the meanings are different. For example "smart" is used in Japanese to mean "skinny". "cunning" means "cheating", "viking" means "buffet", it goes on and on. And the most confusing one recently that is appearing in newspapers is "pay off". The Japanese are using this term to refer to the policy of banks not to insure savings. So in their thinking, the bank's duty to pay their customers if the bank fails is turned "off". The meaning is almost completely reversed! Maybe the bank executives are paying off some politicians to allow this turning off of payment. And don't get me started on my recent discovery of the word "turkey" being used for a whole chicken. I guess it is cooked "turkey style"? As they might write with Japanese smiley's (@-@) (My eyes are spinning in confusion).
2003.01.06 Happy New Year! It has been over a month since my last update. Sorry for the delay. I know you are all out there waiting at the edge of your seats for what I have to say. New Year's Day is a big holiday in Japan. In Japanese, "o-shogatsu". There are lots of traditional foods and activities associated with the holiday, but you can learn all about that on some other website. Oh yeah, about that test...
The Japanese proficiency test was on December 1st. I took the first level (1-kyu) and it was very difficult. The previous week I became overconfident because the practice tests I had been taking from previous years (late 90's) were relatively easy, especially because they seemed to hit on the precise grammar points outlined in the test preparation books. Then I took the 2001 test and realized they have stopped hitting those points, which remained true for this year's 2002 test. I will find out if I passed in February. I am not optimistic. For those of you who keep asking me what I will get if I pass this test, the answer is, of course, eternal life and the power to control people's minds. Why else would anyone take this test?
At the end of the runway of the local airport here in Osaka (Itami Airport) is a viewing point to watch the planes land. I went there the other day by bicycle. There were a few other spectators suffering in the cold wind. I wasn't sure how exciting it would be as I saw the lights of a 747 approaching. Damn! The plane came right over head, very very close, and blew us all around. It was very exciting.
In other news, I saw the movie "Gangs of New York" recently. It was excellent. Daniel Day-Lewis plays a great character. Another movie that I rented recently is "Memento". Also excellent. You should watch the DVD, if possible, for the extras.