The Regular

Another one of those Saturdays .. you know how they are by now, but this one was particularly memorable so I'd like to record it. For the record.

Got home in the morning at 5ish after the first mixing day for the new Jungle Mic tracks, two out of three of which are now as good as finished, with the last one scheduled for next Thursday. Listened to the tracks at home for about an hour, then crashed around 7ish. Woke up at 12 to go teach dance at Ego. Which was fun! The team of beginners is really good with remembering moves, and they're all very excited. So intense dancing until 5, and then straight to Sanjo: another street jam with Jungle Mic. Jodie (percussion) and Saitou (tenor sax), our two recent support members (and on the new recordings as well) were there too, which always fills the band out nicely and makes the sessions that much more fun. But today was an exceptional day in many ways.

First, I've started calling it summer since a week or two ago, and today was a great, cloudy, warm day. LOTS of people out, and I mean LOTS. They even made the bicycle parking legal now at Sanjo! Wtf!? Though I think there is zero correlation, there was a HUGE load of bikes as well. More than that: as opposed to most of the time, many people weren't just there for meeting up with their groups before heading out, but tons of people were really there for the chillin'. Sitting & listening, dancing, singing along to our songs and jams, the vibe was great. But that wasn't all! Today we had an extraordinary amount of people join us in sessions as well. I just wanna list this because it was so sweet and I can't imagine this happening in, say, Amsterdam.

The random people that we jammed with today:

- A tapdancer from New York in the funkiest outfit ever, with afro and everything
- The chick who played sax on 'Party People' on a previous Jungle Mic recording (so we had 2 saxes today, pretty cool)
- some chick playing some gloomy blues/jazz on the keys
- a dude with a Kaossilator..fuck, that is one SWEET toy. Oh and he also played bass with us.
- a group of 5 MCs who were quite good and totally pumped up the atmosphere; all the chillin people loved it
- a chick with a beautiful rough, deep voice; did some standards with her.
- MOMO!!! Jungle Mic's substitute bassist from when Kim was injured, and who was the bassist at the time I joined Jungle Mic. He has a killer groove, and his technique is sweeeet ... we had a long session with him and I was completely lost in it ... I forgot about everything else in the world and was just rolling along on the groove with my clav.

Seriously, I haven't rolled this hard in a looooong time. I was running around between my keyboard & mic, the drum kit, Jodie's sample pad & percussion table, dancing with Ikeyan & a buddy of his who was over from Chiba for the weekend, and making all the people sitting/standing around join in (the 3-year old boy gave the djembe one hell of a beating! Lol that was hilarious). Just BEING! No thoughts, just oneness with the world...and FONK.

Also got to chat with the youngest Jungle Mic fan around, a 3ish-year old extremely cute girl who apparently follows our activities (together with her mom) like crazy! Checking the website, going to gigs (they were apparently there on my first gig with JM, back in the days when Tetchan was also still in the band and we did dance battles in the middle of each gig...wow, those were the days), etc.! Sooooo cute ... I totally hope to meet her again.

At 23:30 then, the generator ran out of gas just when I'd finished singing/rapping the first verse of my Saturday Morning Blues, and we called it a day, though we stuck around for a couple of hours more.

Tomorrow we have a gig in Shiga, so I'm off to sleep!

I love it here.

Happiness

Jack Johnson - Sleep Through the Static (the song)

Today, a public holiday! *checks* The day of Showa (the previous emperor).

I just got home from Nagisa festival, where I went with Ikeyan and a work buddy of his from Kyuushuu, Nonchan and Reggae. What a day! Gorgeous weather, extremely colorful people, music spanning the spectrum from punk to techno, rock to jazz and even afrobeat, can you believe it!? 13 Japanese (including 3 percussionists) playing Fela Kuti covers as well as original material (which sounds identical!). Japan is a wonderful place. Good food, non-stop dancing and the festival atmosphere I hadn't seen for quite a while. Jodie told me he'd performed there once with Eric and the Tribe, so if he and I work on our two-person dance music fest, we might be able to perform there next October or next April. It seems the perfect venue for our kind of project, and I'd love to perform at this festival, so I'm all pumped to continue with it.

Skipping back to last night, I had dinner with Manchan (the flamenco guitarist that looks like an Italian pirate), after which I went to a house practice session in Fly dance studio and ended up crashing at Ikeyan's place, with 3 hours of sleep before waking up for the festival today. Some twelve hours of dancing in two days - exhausted but it feels great!

Coming home in a great mood, I also found out that U-T-A finally posted the next Jungle Lifestyle episode. Haha, I love these guys. To quickly recap the Jungle Mic activity of the past week and a half: a gig at Doushisha University south campus in the middle of nowhere on a beautiful sunny day; three days later, rainy, a gig at Big Cat, a very respectable live house concert hall in Osaka. That evening a certain lady from a certain company came to see our gig and have a chat with us, hinting at a very bright future for Jungle Mic !! So in order to make that happen, we're totally psyched for the recordings next month (three songs, 2 of which are uptempo and one a true ballad .. I'm sure you can find pieces of them scattered around the video blog). This time, I'll be adding lots of cool keyboard parts to fill the space, there will be percussion, raps by me and vocals by me and Yuuki, and even the sax player who I met on the riverside last Friday because I was attracted by his sound will probably make a presence in some or all of the songs (we jammed in the studio this week and it was good stuff)!! Wow, things really couldn't be more exciting.

Of course school is well under way as well, and it's not strange for me to be in the lab around 2 am lately, calculating propagators for the antifermions of quantum field theory. Tomorrow morning I have a presentation, and I'm kinda behind on my Anki reviews (and quite hungry besides), so I'll stop now.

A very happy day indeed.

P.S. Pics coming soon, I promise!!!

Taxi Driver, Slovakian Drummer

Word of the week: hebereke. Equals drunkard/untrustworthy person. Say it out loud with me: Hebereke. Hebereke. HEBEREKE!!! It's awesome. (How do you think it's pronounced?)

Went to my first Hiromi show in Japan today. Holy shit, she's famous here - a totally different story from Marian's Jazzroom. Meaning no chit-chat with the band (they did wave at me though), different sound, different performance, different atmosphere. But I must say I was positively surprised by the energy and support level of the Japanese crowd. The band had a different guitarist than the fantastic Fuze come along for this tour leg: John Shannon. Though he's a respectable musician and I dig the stuff he does with Waking Vision, I can't help but think he's not suited for Hiromi's compositions. Basically, Hiromi, Tony and Martin blow him out of the water - with all due respect, it seems like it's all he can do to keep up. And though Fuze made mistakes as well (come on, the songs are ridiculously difficult), his personality has the right kind of unique power that Hiromi's band is all about.

Which is not to say I had a bad time. On the contrary, it was fantastic - another one of those pieces-coming-together experiences with the transcontinental connection, gulping it down from the largest fountain of inspiration I've come across so far, and, now that I'm so busy with Jungle Mic, a slowly crystallizing perspective on the musician's future (which, as of now, is still something I am seriously considering, and, as before, not without having a strong alternative..thus the physics).

I particularly enjoyed the drum solos: in one, the downright coolest syncopation (and I love syncopation) I've ever seen, where very full beats were broken down to whisper-level hits at completely irregular intervals but you're still grooving along. In another, an experiment with the extreme dedication Japanese have of doing certain things - in this case, clapping one's hands on the 2s and 4s of every measure. They're the best in the world at it without a doubt, and indeed, it took Martin at least two minutes of bouncing through a wide spectrum of tempos and time signatures before the audience lost track of the original 2s and 4s. Finally, though it might seem like trivial entertainment, I was quite moved by the last hits of XYG (a completely nuts drum fest, even more so live than on the CD), which were on imaginary drums in the air beside the floor tom.

I went with Sonoe, as usual - damn, it's a small world - and she's trying to convince me to go to all kinds of cool stuff in December: Hiromi's show with a tapdancer in Osaka (I really wanna go to that one), Tony's show with his own band in Tokyo (awesome as well but right in the middle of the week before Bounenkai, the end-of-the-year dance meeting where I'll probably be doing 2 shows), the last Hiromi show of this tour in some huge-ass Tokyo venue...except for the tapdancing, I think I'm going to have to spend my money on blankets though, this month. It's getting cold and I don't have much to keep warm.

After the second encore, Sonoe was in a rush to get to the station, so we grabbed a cab. On the way, we talked excitedly about the gig and a bunch of stuff, also informing the driver what it was we were so excited about. When we got to Shin-Osaka after about fifteen minutes, with plenty of time left before the last Shinkansen to Tokyo would depart, the taxi driver turned around to receive our money and exclaimed: "Oh, you're a foreigner! I completely hadn't noticed!"

Despite his age and dreaminess, it was an injection of happiness that went straight to the core of my being.

PS. Had dance shows yesterday and today. Really fun, great feedback, and now gathering people and creativity for the next bout - a 10-people fun-extreme locking/funking/house fest to What Planet Is This? and a bodily interpretation of three Hiromi songs with Ikeyan. Oh, and I shook hands with Hiromi's husband, the famous clothes/shoes designer Mihara, who happened to be present tonight. Yay it's 6 am, off to sleep.

Dark Whisky Techno Geisha

Last Sunday, I had agreed to meet Ikeyan to go jacket shopping for the dance show. Though that turned out as a futile effort, he did manage to buy shoes really cheaply thanks to a friend working in ABC Shoe Mart, and I - having finally received a long-awaited piece of plastic in the mail - managed to buy my Franc-Franc sofa, though the payment only worked using 2 installments. Since I'd been reckoning with 4 installments in my recent budget calculus, this means I'll be broke until February. No problem! Sofa = happiness > money. It's being delivered on Friday morning and I don't know if it will fit through my door.

A bit later, we met up with his ex-girlfriend from a year or so ago, who was tall by Japanese standards, and I realized Mark's statement about the consequences of living in Asia for a while - you grow tall girl fetish - is an unavoidable truth. I've only been here for seven months, but it's noticeable already. Anyway, she was a nice girl and a relatively strong drinker, though not very daring in thought and speech. We went to a yakitori place (first time for me). Food and beer were good, and around 10 we decided to head to another place for drinks.

All I told Ikeyan was "small", though I emphasized that it was not actually that important. He took us to a place around Sanjo, which wasn't that small but was exactly what I'd been hoping for. Special. No sign outside, it was on the third floor of one of countless buildings with bars and/or apartments in them in the narrow streets making up that area. Though we made fun of him for getting lost a couple of times, in retrospect it's amazing he could find the place at all.

After climbing the stairs to the entrance, passing another bar on the second floor that did have a sign advertising its existence, I figured this might be interesting. Having been to tiny bars in Kobe and elsewhere before, I knew that Japanese bars are more often than not plain cool, so my hopes were high. I was in for a pleasant surprise.

The only light in the place came from a bunch of tealight-size candles spaced about two meters apart, and the music was the kind of spacey hiphop I'd ventured into a bit recently, which just begs for the consumption of hallucinogens. Since it's so dark, there's no point in having a drinks list, so there is none. The place has an oblong shape with plenty of seating, but on weekdays (this was a Sunday) there's barely a soul. There was one person besides the three of us when we entered, and we moved to a corner where I was unable to see the bar area - our own little spacecave.

I only drink whisky on relaxed, special occasions, wishing to savor the taste, and this was one of those occasions. Free popcorn, which simultaneously did and didn't fit in with the setting. It took some time for relaxed conversation to come up, since we were tired and couldn't see each other. When Ikeyan finally did mange to break the silence, it wasn't too surprising - circumstances considered - that the topic was my field of study, what with all the beginning-of-the-universe stories and other abstract space stuff. So I had another attempt at explaining in Japanese what it is I study, and I think I did a better job than last time.

At some point, Ikeyan called his ex-girlfriend over and whispered something in her ear, why I couldn't imagine. Turned out that outside my range of vision (which barely existed at all in that darkness), a geisha had just entered the bar in full traditional outfit and was sitting at the bar. Since our experience with geishas was limited to seeing them get in and out of taxis in Ishibei-Koji street in Gion (which Lonely Planet claims to be "possibly the most beautiful street in Asia"), we kept poking our heads around the corner of our spacecave to see what she was up to.

Observing her change from not speaking to anyone to speaking very openly with the bartender, all the while with perfect posture...is the guy next to her her customer? But now he's leaving... Or is she waiting for her next customer? That seems likely, since you usually don't see geishas (especially in their formal outfits) unless they're at work. ... No one seems to be coming, though, and she's awfully chattery with the bartender. Okay, here's an idea ...

And so we managed to figure out by heading past her one-by-one on restroom trips that she had, in fact, come alone.

You must realize that I have no words for describing the change in the already fascinating atmosphere that her presence invoked. But since, gyaku ni (to use a Japanese expression), words are all I have, it's up to you to use your power of imagination and enter the realm of this particular story. To recap, it was 1 am on a Sunday night, with most people off to bed for an early rise the next morning, and we were in a black spacecave whose nature was revealed only by a rough Japanese fellow rising from the darkness every once in a while to refill our drinks. And then a white-faced geisha came in and sat herself at the bar.

We wondered whether we'd be able to strike up a chat, but I was definitely not up for committing a potential social sin by approaching her directly. After all, it's well-known that the only way to meet geishas is through elaborate preparations by a mutual acquaintance, and usually there's lots of money involved. But Ikeyan, being the awesome fellow he is (I'm happy to say we're becoming good friends), headed for the bartender and asked him whether it would be possible to talk to her. As expected, but still disappointing, the answer was no. Oh well, things are interesting as they are already, so let's just enjoy our evening the three of us, we decided.

A couple of minutes later, however, the bartender made a quick appearance, disappearing before he actually appeared, leaving us the words "it's alright". Um, what exactly? And behold, the geisha graciously enters our spacecave. I move over a bit so she can sit. Next to me. The four of us start talking, though we were so flabbergasted she did most of it, while the bartender (who turned out to be a friend of hers) brings us expensive tequila and CDJs a bit in the shadows. It's still Sunday night and we're still in a black spacecave, but now we have techno, tequila and the company of a geisha.

Not just any geisha, as it turns out. Originally from Yokohama, she came to Kyoto when she was sixteen, backed by her mother and opposed by her father, and followed the traditional (and only) way up the ladder towards becoming a geisha. From fragments of information, I was able to gather that she must be around 36 now, though I'm not entirely sure. 36 is a respectable age for a geisha, and since there are so few geisha around in this day and age, I thought she might have a lot of experience. Indeed, she wasn't hesitant to tell us all about it: "You're from Holland? I've never been there .. but I go on business trips now and then, so I've been to Dubai, Los Angeles, Paris and so on." Furthermore, she regularly meets with foreign politicians: "You know the G8? [last June on Hokkaido, with a preliminary meeting of foreign ministers in Kyoto] Yeah, I was quite busy around that time."

In fact, ever since I read Memoirs of a Geisha and some semi-classical Japanese literature which included geishas, I'd been very eager to speak to one myself, since among the many arts they must master (of which tequila drinking sure as hell seems to be one these days) is the wonderful art of conversation. I love conversation, especially good conversation, and I've become very aware over the past year or two that the latter is very difficult to find. So, having imagined a scenario like this (minus the black spacecave) a number of times previously, I was probably the most 'prepared' out of the three of us, and I was eager to make the most of this fantastic opportunity. Still, the combination of being trained in the art of conversation and consuming significant amounts of tequila meant any attempt of mine at feedback or questioning was like trying to jump through a waterfall without getting wet - she was on a roll.

I did manage to ask her things like what she does when abroad for business, since I couldn't imagine the tea ceremony, traditional dance and conversation (she doesn't speak much English, though more than her humility made me think) going off as smoothly in Dubai as they do in Kyoto. I loved her answer: before you set off for another country, study the culture of that country. Once you arrive, deal with cultural differences by compromising between the Japanese and the foreign culture. Thinking about it a bit more, I guess she wouldn't have any other choice, but it was still a wonderful moment of globalization to hear her say that.

She spoke in the friendly Kansai dialect that permits a level of formality in between the informal and the formal of normal Japanese, which fortunately I'm getting better at every day. And she seemed as much at home in our black spacecave as she would be in a tatami-covered tea-house room, all the while maintaining perfect posture and relaxation, pouring drinks and replacing burned-out candles. It was almost like the feeling you have when you know you're close to waking up and you're waiting for your dream to end.

After an hour or so, she found an excuse to leave us and sat herself back at the bar. I had some good spacey conversation with Ikeyan while the lady in our group crashed from the tequila, and the three of us left around 3 am. On the way out, we passed our new acquaintance at the bar, who told us goodbye and made me promise to bring my mother along to the bar someday, since she wanted to meet her. Despite the snow-white make-up, her face made it clear she was well beyond soberness by now, but her presence was still awe-inspiring.

I am very satisfied. Though deeply moved by this woman's presence, I was able to have a meaningful time with her, and though I can't find the right words here, I guess I was able to appreciate her in the way I think the Japanese people, particularly geisha clients, have traditionally appreciated them. A personal experience of a unique aspect of Japanese culture.

-

Two notes: 1. The reason why she was in formal outfit was because she'd just come from a party with foreigners (who I can only assume must be powerful people) that required the outfit - even geishas dress normally, normally, when they head for drinks at their favorite bar. 2. I left out her name because I have her name card but can't read it.

P.S. I said I had a wonderful moment of globalization there, sparked by her talking about cultural compromise. Though I love the practice of cultural compromise, I can't help but think that if made into a standard, it would erode the uniqueness of cultures as it exists now. Much as I idolize it and strive to experience it, I fear my utopian version of the cultural mishmash of the future - as beautifully illustrated in my favorite anime Cowboy Bebop - might be a dream never to come true. Your thoughts and ideas are very welcome.

This will be one of the last vacation posts, since that blissful time is slowly drawing to a close. I have yet to hear the distinct call of the cicadas, who supposedly produce a very recognizable "Kids, sit down and do your summer homework, time's running out!" sound around this time of year, but my phone's calendar works in equally depressing fashion. It's not that bad, because I almost feel like I'm dumbing down by not studying for so long (besides inserting hundreds of words into Anki; my Japanese conversation skill has definitely improved this summer). So before I leave on my last trip of this summer, to Tokyo, here's a quick Previously...on to recap what's been going on.

After coming back from Shizuoka (see this previous post), it was only a couple of days until I left with Misa to go to some onsen, about 5 hours' train, cable car and bus travel from Kyoto. We only went for a night, but the town's isolation and completely different climate made it seem like longer. What a relief it was to run around in the 15-degree rain! Maybe Dutch climate isn't that bad after all, and I just need mountains and forests to make me happy...nah, actually I hate it, but it was really refreshing after hanging out for months in 35-degree, 90%+ humid places.

We stayed in a ryokan, the only thing to do in onsen towns. It was my first time for both onsen and ryokan, and both of them were very pleasing experiences - I have already recommended my Finnish grandmother to take her sister to some of them as soon as possible, since I think they'd have a fabulous time. Anyway, when we arrived at our ryokan, which we had specifically chosen for its pretty-looking outdoor bath and the possibility of mixed bathing, we received the unpleasant notice that "We are sorry, but our outdoor bath is currently broken". We were very disappointed, not knowing what could possibly be broken about a hot spring, since that bath was basically the reason why we spent the whole day traveling to get there in the first place. Fortunately, there turned out to be plenty of other pretty outdoor baths in the town (even one with the possibility of mixed bathing), all accessible for a small fee.

I am thoroughly enjoying the Japanese public bathing experience. It makes me feel clean and reinvigorated. With saunas, hot and cold baths both indoor and outdoor, and even baths that have electric pulses sent through them periodically, there's plenty of fun to be had for the whole family. The onsen water, however, is another experience altogether, and as soon as I entered into my first onsen, I felt my limbs starting to tingle - this was the good stuff. Healing properties of the mineral-rich water, or in any case a very, very good way to relax while looking out over some uninhabited forest on the hills across the river.








On the way back from the onsen town, we took an afternoon stop for some sightseeing at a UN World Heritage site whose name I can't remember, where the main attraction was a huge graveyard in the middle of the forest. Not just any graveyard, but probably the funkiest graveyard I've ever seen. There were many graves belonging to companies instead of people, supposedly to honour the people who died while working for those companies (from accidental machinery mishap to actual honorable service - either way it's pretty weird to see graves marked by the words NISSAN, JAPAN SPACE AGENCY or YAKULT), graves for animals who died as a consequence of laboratory experiments, graves for children, a gravestone dedicated to graffiti, and many other things Misa also couldn't figure out. Most of these didn't have any actual physical remains in them, but were there for the symbolic meaning. However, there were some graves that I think contained actual physical remains, and they belonged to rather important people in Japanese history, like Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu's brother. Quite impressive to be so close to them.








One last remark about the onsen trip, for those of you who are wondering what that last picture is about. It's the latest in Japanese weeding technologies: an old-school flamethrower! I can hear the dude thinking "and STAY down!". What a job.

On to the next trip, then. The dance camp! Four days in a place more or less as isolated as the onsen town, in Hiroshima-ken (didn't get to see the city). Four days of dance, play and party. Four days, 130 dancers! Crazy fun. Great chance to make new friends and strengthen bonds with existing ones. Joined a couple of sweet workshops (funking, hiphop, locking) as well as the big battle (lost out in the second round, which is progress!) and had a blast overall. There was even a nightly ghost tour. Sweet fun.






















On the topic of dance: Yesterday was the long-awaited day of the event called Symbol (or its Kyoto version, at least - Kobe and Osaka have their own versions). Different universities from Kyoto create elaborate shows to show off their circles' prowess, and there's inter-university battles (Ego lost to Air Action, Kyoto Sangyou University's circle...it's a boring truth that b-boys win without fail in inter-genre battles). Unfortunately, I had to leave before the event was halfway through (before the really cool stuff went down), since I had agreed to meet with the band at the riverside.

Before I continue, here's a quick summary of the first gig I had with Jungle Mic, last Wednesday: it was AWESOME! The live scene is well organized here; this particular live house (Kyoto Mojo) was quite small but very cozy, with everything you need, including sound quality way beyond my expectations. Soundchecked around 1 pm, then spent most of the day hanging out with the other bands and doing nothing much, until doors opened around 18h and it was back and forth between seeing the other bands and chilling backstage. The gig itself went well, considering we had practiced the songs together just twice, I had never seen them live so didn't know what to expect in terms of show, and it was my first gig in a long time. About 100 people in the audience (including some steady fans, who happen to be cute girls), a lot of humor and most importantly, FUNK! There's a DVD, but I think I'll wait to show you all what we're made of until we're a little tighter.

Back to yesterday. Got to the river, prepared for the outside gig, and headed off to a small but cool radio studio in Sanjo belonging to a small local station broadcasting on FM and in particular to a cafe nearby, where Yuuki (the guitarist) has a half-hour show once a month. This time Yuuta (singer) and I joined him, they introduced me and we had some laughs. It was my first time to participate in a radio program, and I enjoyed it a lot, so I'm looking forward to more of it in the future.

After that we got started on the gig, which was great fun for about an hour and a half, when a policeman (unprecededently for that early hour) arrived to inform us that someone was complaining and we had better pack up and leave. He was sorry, we were sorry, the 50 people sitting by the river were sorry, since we were all having a great time and honestly not playing any abhorrent music, but that all didn't matter. Anyway, it was a good experience, and there probably won't be a problem next time (they've been playing there twice a month for about 6 months now). We headed to the rehearsal studio and recorded a rough version of a work-in-progress, after which we had gyuudon and laughs (I can laugh til tears with these guys, it's great) before they dropped me off at home and I crashed an hour or two later.

As a final treat, some recent miscellaneous pics. Thanks for reading, and keep in touch.









P.S. An Indian girl committed suicide out of bullshit-based fear of the world ending by LHC's attempts to recreate early universe physics (LHC finally started operation last Wednesday). No comment.

I Stumbled Upon The Energy Source For The Big Bang

Okay, how should I go about this ...
I used to have a great image of Japan, but that's been shattered. Best week of my life, not unlikely?

Keywords, or short sentences. This is going to take forever otherwise. Winner of the "Most Experience In A Week" award.

Eating out is around 3 euros for cheap, 10 euros for halfway classy food. Regardless of the price, the food is AMAZING. I've never seen a country, a people, a culture that's got its food so well sorted out, nor did my dreams of Japan come close to the awesomeness of reality.

I managed to find the dancers I was hoping to find within about, uh, 2 days. Spent my first Saturday night with them, clubbing in some small gig with 10 DJs taking 50-minute spins - an experience unlike anything I'd witnessed before, where anyone and everyone goes wild, it's not about the looks but about the energy, there's more socializing with strangers than you'd find in a year of clubbing in Amsterdam, a coke costs the same as a good, strong cocktail (3 euros), and upon entering I was received by one of the first DJs with the jazzhop I'd come to love from Japanese DJs thanks to the internet, which is hardly played in actual clubs in the rest of the world I've been to.

Made about 10 friends so far, including one that's a little more than a friend. Japanese (the dancing turns out to be even more absolutely killer than I thought at getting me a circle of Japanese friends), Finnish, Argentinian .. my Spanish has improved markedly in the past couple of days (needed to balance it out with the high dose of Portuguese from last month).

The annual cherry-blossom viewing party of my lab (which is what everyone calls even non-experimental facilities here) was sweet. Lots of food and drink, stunning views and a first taste of the double relationship between colleagues: very serious and determined vs. drunk and completely hilarious. Today was a semi-formal introduction of all the new master's students during lunch seminar, and next week there's a welcome party for the new people (more drinking).

I only got to meet my professor after a week, because he was in Germany for a conference. Now I had a pretty cool image of him, but I was forced to admit that extreme formality and such would be a part of my life, especially at the lab, within a couple of days, so I was quite nervous to meet him. He turned out to be the quickest-witted, most professional, sympathetic and best English speaker I've met here so far. Off to a good start.

The plan is: focus on Japanese language first, because the entrance exams I have to take will be in Japanese (though I can answer in English), then study problems from entrance exams of past years, pass the exams (September), start being a real master's student (the greatest practical difference being that I don't get student discount on public transport as a "research student").

Kyoto is gorgeous - shrine around the corner of uni, and I haven't even been to any of the parks which supposedly rank among the best in the world. The university is gorgeous. The teacher of my first Japanese language class is, if not gorgeous, at least very cute. The class itself is cool; 3rd level out of 5, and I think it's pretty well suited for me. Speaking Japanese every day is fun! And writing messages on my cellphone is extremely satisfying - best phone tech and software in the world.

Tomorrow will be the second time I spend a day here with nothing but rain, but the other days have been sunny and reasonably warm. I have an airconditioner, which is said to be a precious commodity since summers apparently go up to around 40 degrees C!

Most of the bureaucracy has been sorted out, and in about a month all of it should be alright.
I don't get to leave Kyoto for long, because presence is obligatory at Japanese classes (5 days/week for 18 weeks) and I need to sign every month for the scholarship. Still, small trips will abound (Osaka, Nara, etc.), I see Tokyo happening within a month or two, and different parts of Japan or Korea this summer.

I think my room will have transformed from boring smelliness to super-chill-out-space within a month or so; I'm working on it. It's an hour from the campus, but it's cheap, has good facilities, and I like trains.

Pics, then! In random order, starting 2 days ago when I got my phone: