Fugu

Hello there,

weee, I'm almost through my first month in Tokyo. Didn't get to blog as often as i wanted to, sorry. Will let you know more once i get to do it (already started to write more posts).

For now, two pictures will have to do.

You might've heard of fugu. Or at least seen the early Simpsons episode where Homer eats fugu and is told that he has only 24 hours left to live. Obviously you can get fugu here in Japan. But it's expensive and 'just for the thrill of it' not worth it for me. Nevertheless i consumed some unexpected fugu: fugu Sake. Some colleagues from my research lab at the university had it and shared it with me and the other labmates last Thursday. As you can see it has a comic little fugu painted on top of it. Of course there was a bottle inside this carton box, but the box was more interesting so i took a photo of that. As for the taste: well, it was Sake that tasted a little fishy. Won't become one of my favourites :-P

Another pic from university: taken at last friday's edition of the weekly International Friday Lounge where i am helping out as one of the official language assitants. Since Halloween stuff can be bought here same as in Europe - meaning there is no tradition of Halloween but thanks to global commericalization they have it, too - the theme of the day was Halloween and ghosts in general/in your home country. The sensei brought some Halloween decorations including this hat, which she asked me to wear.
"Silly Hats ONLY!"

That's it for today, so I'll leave you with this:
I'm a banana!

ps: if you don't know what the last lines were about, watch this. But be advised, it might be a little disturbing. And funny.

General hints about Japan

Hello there,

some general hints for your next time in Japan:

• ATM: if you plan on using a Maestro card to withdraw money, good luck :-P your best bet is to find a 7-Eleven and use its ATM (they all have one inside) or a Citibank. Not common. If you don't see a Maestro logo on, it won't give you money. Really nice how many unwanted receipts i got printed from ATMs telling me that my card is not valid with that particular machine. In short, have a back-up plan.
• public garbage bins: they (almost) don't exist. Get used to it. Your best chance might be looking for a kombini=convenience store, they're everywhere and most of them have garbage bins in front - for their customers, assuming they buy stuff and eat it in front of the store hence the bins.
• take your shoes off when you enter someone's home. Most likely there will be a place to put them, and a little step after entering marking the 'starting line' of the no-shoe area. Oh, and home can also mean someone's car, or the plastic blanket they bring for sitting upon while picnicking :)
  
• if it looks like cheese in its package, it most likely isn't. Experiences so far:

1. looks like Feta: Tofu (that was easy to guess, even without anything in English on it)
2. looks like processed cheese packed in little sausage-form-thingies and right next to the little snack-sausages in the supermarket: some kind of fish-paste. Bäh.

• public toilets: when in need, and somewhere inside the metro, use the toilets down there. I wouldn't do or recommend that back home in Europe, but here in Tokyo public metro toilets are clean, safe and available (once you're in the metro system, mostly not accessible outside of the ticket-area). In case you need to take a dump, you might have to squat, though.
  
• if you simply want to go for a beer with the lads, find an izakaya. They even like tapas with their drinks. Well, not the same kind as the Spanish have. But good as well. Don't forget to try Edamame.
• if you want to know what it's like to live in Tokyo and wander through the city, and you understand French: i highly recommend you the book Tokyo sanpo by French graphic artist Florent Chavouet.
• go left. I mean, they drive on the left side, but you should also tend to go on the left side while walking. Like, when someone comes straight at you while walking in the street, go a bit to the left. And on stairs, stay on the left to let people pass on the other side. That's generally also true when you're inside the metro system, but there are exceptions. When down there, simply keep your eyes open for arrows on the ground or signs on the wall and you'll know on which side you should walk.
  
• be sorry all the time. Really. It's ok to say "sorry", if you want to do it more Japanese say "sumimasen". No matter what happens, be sorry before, after, and during it. Or at least say so. No matter if it's your fault, someone else's fault, or there is no fault at all (out of your view of the world).
  
• don't worry too much - Japan is a safe and clean place. And people are generally friendly towards foreigners, even trying to help you if you look lost and they don't speak anything but Japanese. Respect them.
  

So, be humble and thankful. And come prepared. And don't forget to smile and nod a lot :)

Note: so far i haven't seen much more than Tokyo and its surroundings.

Cheers.

Earthquakes (and other disasters)

From my first guidance for new students session, which i had during my first week here in Tokyo: what to do in case of an earthquake:

1. protect yourself (0-2min)
2. prevent fires (2-5min)
3. secure safety of family (5-10min)
4. cooperate with neighbours&non-Japanese friends (10min-12hrs)
5. be prepared to survive on your own (water, food, shelter etc.) (12hrs-2weeks)

Time in () is time after the earthquake.
ad 1.: e.g. get under a table.
There are places where emergency supplies are stored in each community, but one should also prepare supplies oneself. I'm also attending a lecture called "Earthquake Engineering", quite interesting.
After one of the big quakes, it took them only three days to get electricity back, but sewage system took two weeks. Fortunately there was a river near which was used as a temporary, uhm, disposal of personal excrements facility :)

Just had a session here where my research mates introduced us to Japanese geography. Some facts:

• Japan has 6852 islands, out of which about 400 are inhabited
• its area is about the same as Germany, and about 1/10 of China
• 2/3 of land is forest, 3/4 is mountain
• "Nihon alps" are similar to European alps :)

If the earthquake introduction didn't scare you, there's more:

• volcanic activity: lots and lots, same reason as for quakes. Saw a nice pic of gas/ash cloud coming down a mountain. >1000 degC, moving with 700 km/h. Blaster!
• if Fuji-san explodes, Tokyo will be in deep, deep trouble...
• floods: 98% of all Japanese cities have had more than 10 floods. In the last 10 years!

All in all, a great place to study disasters ;) and now i also understand better why disaster management is emphasized a lot in the lectures here at the civil engineering department that i am a part of now.

Japan: Interesting place, that much's for sure!

Pelicula

Hello there,

yesterday I've done something quite Japanese. And promised to blog about it ;)

Met friends of mine at Shibuya station. And they told me they would take me to pelicula because they thought after my last blog entry that might be a funny thing to do, completely Japanese. Got me curious. Especially since pelicula means movie in Spanish. So, after some strolling around we went into an establishment, how to say, unlike things we have in Austria. Very colourful and filled with strange music, or actually more a cacophony of many different machines. In the entrance area all of those were these thingies where you can control this kind of robotic arm that after putting it into some position it will drop down and grab with its three fingers. And if you're lucky it will grab some item for you. Looks like this:


But back to the actual purpose of my visit there: movie-pelicula. Those are machines mainly for schoolgirls. But as a foreigner nobody stops you from using them. You go inside a bright white box to make pictures of you. All the while having to make decisions on a big touchscreens for all kind of backgrounds with crazy environments. No idea what the difference between the different machines is, but they had around 20 of them. And at all of them there were people (girls) queueing. My friends selected one and the three of us got in after some waiting. Our Japanese teammember did the selecting, and we made a lot of funny faces for the camera.
I thought that was it, but you move on into the box next of the first, to edit the pictures. They have algorithms in place who will make your eyes ridiculously large, you know, enlarge your pupils like you were an anime character. But you can add all kind of stuff to the pictures, like stars, hearts, kana writings...

In the end you can load it to your mobile phone - if it's a Japanese one and have this kind of bluetooth they have here - and print the pics on photo paper. Here's what i got: one third of that photo paper.


Hehe, now i have a truly Japanese bookmark.

Oh, one more random Shibuya shot, with a bit more people crossing then on the last pic i posted. Still not many, though.

Tokyo (and around), 1st 24 hours

Hello there,

so, i have arrived in Japan. Some of my first impressions, quite random:

• waiting at the gate at VIE, the usual crowd. 1st Japanese experience on board: when i was already seated in the plane, an old couple entered, with their street shoes in their hands, wearing slippers. Like when entering somebody's home. They put their shoes on again in front of me. Dunno why (peer pressure?). Fortunately there was lots of space in front of me during the flight ("fußfrei") thanks to using a good airline changing my seat last minute - when boarding - because i had asked for an aisle seat at check in (at that time all of those were full).
• 1st Japanese experience on the ground, i.e., Narita Airport:

The buttons read something like "spray" and "stop" and at the wall there was explanatory text. English version starting with "Equipment to cleansing the buttocks with warm water". Whatever, i thought it funny at the time, after one or two days without really sleeping.

• general impression after my first hour in Japan: everything feels very clean and well organised - not surprisingly. And friendly including customs officers. Not sure if he asked me for my major (study field) out of curiosity or to check if I'm a student for real (age!).
• I missed one bus and had to wait one more hour to leave the airport thanks to ATM complications - but they also gave me friendly receipts for not giving me money :-P
• waiting for the airport bus a guy came up to me, speaking only Japanese, looked at my bus ticket and took my luggage. Trusting Japanese i rightfully assumed that he was personnel for 'check-in luggage' for the bus, with number ticket and all.
• bus into Tokyo cost more than 30 Euros, 2h10min drive to my station. I felt very much like sleeping but kept my eyes open to see everything. Felt fresh. I also felt like having a shower really soon (was going to happen) and sleeping a lot (was not happening too soon). I saw three baseball fields with people playing and watching - it was Sunday morning and the Japanese love baseball - and quite some interesting bridges. Then i got off at the wrong station (five minutes after my station) but managed to walk back to my meeting point. Already had three people asking if they could help me, some of them not speaking any English :D
• 1st big faux pas: when entering my friend's flat, i stepped in two steps, without taking my shoes off! Realised it immediately, stepped back, took my shoes off :)
  

Some more random impressions from my first day, with pictures:

• the national sport in the metro: sleeping. My first metro ride here (technically not metro), me still very tired, but not that much:
  

• all restaurants have the food they offer on display, all in plastic replicas that already look delicious:

• first local meal: raw fish. In Enoshima, at the seaside (I'm from a landlocked country, sunshine and seaside always wonderful for me!). Lots of very tiny little fish, my raw fish bowl being the one on the right - the left one is the same, just that the fish is cooked and not part of my meal. All other things belonged to my meal.

• got off the train at "HA SE" station, haha. That means bunny/rabbit in German.
  

On to see a big Buddha:
Great Buddha - Daibutsu in Japanese - near Kamakura. Not the biggest Buddha statue I've seen in Asia, but the most impressive: still huge, and: almost 900 years old!!!

• my first dinner in Japan: small and quite original BBQ place. Raw meat might look unusual for your usual European, but was really yummy! After bbq-ing it, of course.
  

That's the enthusiastic owner of the place. She loves Gaijin and made us teach her some words in our mother tongues (French and German) and wrote it down to remember it.
During our meal we even got a free beer, "because the barrel was about to end anyways". That's quite unusual, I've been told, with one "Krügerl" costing more than five Euros. Not that i needed more sleep encouragement at that moment, jet-lag and all. But the Sapporo from the tap was good :)

• first morning, in the metro: luckily i could avoid the rush hour by one hour, carrying my luggage and all. Metro was just "pretty full" according to Austrian standards. Right next to me was this guy:
  

Drawing caricatures off other passengers with a pen. For his own enjoyment. After a couple of stations he started talking to me in perfect English, asking if i was travelling (because of the luggage). Since i had shown interest in his drawings he took out another notebook, showing me how he coloured his drawings later on. Nice!

• after the cartoonist had left i noticed a young guy next to me reading a book. Training my Katakana reading i read the author's name: To-MaSu BeRuNHaRuTo. Holy shit! My first morning metro ride in Tokyo, and a guy next to me reads a Japanese translation of my favourite Austrian author: Thomas Bernhard! After realising this i saw that next to the Japanese title it said "Alte Meister" in small type. Hehe. Couldn't help but telling the guy that i was also Austrian like the author of his book :)
• during my first full day here i passed through Shibuya crossing about five times.There are better pics and videos off people walking all over the place after the cars stop. Google it or watch a recent movie playing in Tokyo :)
• on my way to registering:
  

• 1st lunch inside Tokyo:
  

• DoN KiHo-Ra (Don Quijote). A big shopping house with all things needed to start your household
  

including these pillows, directly next to the ones with comic motives for the kids:
(not Japan-specific, just surprised me)

• Tommy Lee Jones is right now on every second or third drink vending machine - and there's lots of them everywhere - advertising some kind of coffee (and yes, they sell closed cans of hot coffee!)
  

• yellow area in the metro is reserved for people in need. And please turn your mobile completely off there (see sign even on the handles)
  

• the picture gives away that it might be chocolate banana milk, but the Katakana also reads Chyokobanana :) must be Donkey Kong's favourite brand...
  

• one more food pic: I'd heard of this Japanese chocolate brand, so i had to try it:
  

Manufactured by the Chiroru Bakery, cf. this.

• I also already got a commemorative brochure for the 25th birthday of Mario on my first day. Hehe. And my first Manga: my Japanese is way too poor to read it yet. I didn't buy it: these are cheaply s/w-printed, quite thick (format is almost A4!) and people (usually office folk commuting) read it on the metro. And after reading place it on top of garbage bins, so other people - like me - can pick it up. Don't know much about Manga yet, but i had already heard of the one on the cover :)
  

Puha, that's it for now. Thanks for reading my blog! More will follow (not from the first day, i promise).

Moscow, the 3rd

This August i went to Russia for the third time. Flying to Moscow. And visiting Yekaterinburg and St.Petersburg (finally!). Some random impressions:

• it was not the best time to visit Moscow :-P there was a lot of smog like you might have heard in the news. Luckily there was almost no smog in the first two days, just visible when looking far. My friends there told me that it was the least smog and least temperature in two weeks. Lucky me. Sunshine and all. But heavy smog was back on my third and last day in Moscow. So i was walking around with a mask. And left to other, less-smoggy areas of Russia on that day, fortunately.

wearing the smog mask

• as expected, i had a great time meeting old and new friends all over Russia. If you haven't experienced Russian hospitality yet, go for it.
• on my 3rd time in Russia&Moscow, i finally managed to see Lenin. Well, what they present as his preserved corpse. I paid an "idiot's tax" to see it - it should be free, but i came to Red Square relatively late. Too late to get into the queue and see it for free as it's supposed to be for everyone. But they sold access to it for 300 ruble. And since i was only passing through Moscow, i thought what the heck I'll do it to "have it off my list". Anyways. It was as expected. Little creepy, interesting to see, nothing oh-so special. No cameras etc. inside the mausoleum, and no talking allowed. AC'd room, so nice and cool on a hot summer day. The corpse behind glass, the crowd silently passing by. And he looks like he'd just died five minutes ago. Quite hard to believe that the body hasn't deteriorated at all in more than 85 years (cf. this). Looks a bit like something on display at Madame Tussauds - and my Russian friends told me that they'd rather pay for that ("because it has more than one wax puppet").

I'm the guy with the yellow t-shirt, about to enter the mausoleum.

• some sushi restaurants in Moscow advertise that they sell sushi and antisushi. Meaning 'food that's not at all like sushi', like traditional Russian dishes. Because they also want to attract customers who don't like sushi at all.

• we tried to find a restaurant with traditional Russian cuisine. Turns out it wasn't possible, so in the end went again to Mu-Mu's. Yummy again. Try one of those when you're in Moscow.
• me in Tsaritsyno Park:

• posing in front of the former KGB building, now FSB.

• Moscow Metro - always an experience. The communists wanted to build "temple for the people" or something like that. Anyways, each station is different, almost all with some kind of marble. Guess they had lots of marble in some region of the Soviet Union.
• Horses fountain near Kremlin, with water because it's not -15 degC like on my first visit there :)
  

So that's that. I hope i get to blog about the rest of my Russian summer trip, including something about going with the Trans-Siberian (planned to blog about that since my first trip in February 2009...) and the city of St.Petersburg.

Timișoara (Cultural Exchange 2010)

In the beginning of August 2010, i spent one week with friends in Timisoara. I had a great time there, it's a beautiful city worth visiting. And needless to say, my Romanian friends took good care of us.

Some random impressions, in no particular order:

• the ubiquitous Palinca: it seems like almost everyone is producing it in his family here (i knew that before). It's funny when they tell you "no, that's not homemade. It's from my neighbour!"
• i got the impression that Romanian people eat later than Austrians. Lunch at 3PM or later was the normal time. Well, after one year in Spain i prefer eating later than most Austrians, anyway ;-)
• the Austrians brought beer to Timisoara! Ha! With Prince Eugene in 1718. (1717 according to Timi's Wikipedia page; if you feel like geeking out, find out the right date and add it to this beer- or brewery related stub). If you visit Timișoara, don't forget to drop by the Timişoreana brewery's pub. Yummy!
  
• the people also seemed quite official to me. You know, liking official stamps to let you in(to their brewery) and all.
• "Schase" means "6" (funny for German speakers)
• Polenta is a traditional dish and of course has another name: Mămăligă.
• the "Krautwickler" were delicious!
• the Romanian revolution started in Timisoara. Very close to the flat of a friend of mine.

Thanks again to my Romanian friends for the great week we had in and around Timi! I'll see you around for sure :-)

Lost in Translation

Hajimemashite.
Watashi wa [insert name here] desu.
Uiin ni sunde imasu.
Gakusei desu.
Dozo yoroshiku onegai shimasu.

Remember this blog entry? Back then i had just learned that i was going to live in China and teased you, my dear readers, about it.

So, now, guess what. Look at the title of the blog entry again. And you'll know where to find me this autum.

If the title doesn't tell you anything, go watch the movie ;-)
I just ordered the DVD.

Gran Torino

Yesterday a friend invited me to a concert, last minute, because he had a ticket left.
Jamie Cullum. Not the name of my friend, but the name of the guy who played ;)

Well, what can i say. That Jazzie stuff is not my kind of music, but the man's good. I mean, was fun, the concert and all. The guy loves the crowd and knows how to handle it.
My favourite was that he turned a sitting-concert into a standing concert. He managed by performing Cry Me A River, and whilst doing so walking into the middle of the audience with his whole band. So, obviously, people stood up to see him, first the ones around and then more or less all people. You know, game theory, like in the football stadium, the good ol' prisoner's dilemma. We all still would've seen him more or less ok if we all had remained on our seats, but just the thought 'if i get up i'll see better than the others' leads to some people standing up and then everyone has to.

Two shaky impressions from where i was sitting:


On the second one the guy's standing on his piano. Unfortunately my memory card was full when he moved into the crowd.
If you want to see a bit better what it was like, and actually the main reason for me blogging about the concert: once again, amazing how many people record concerts with their cameras, or even more so with their mobile phones. iPhones all over. So just head over to here or here to get an impression of yesterday's concert. No need that i upload any videos, youtube is already full of it, including recordings with not-even-bad microphones.

Mmmmh, technology.

Before the concert started they even projected a line on the wall asking people to upload their pics and videos to a fan section on Cullum's webpage.

And of course, since he's a Brit, they always come across sympathetic when talking. Quote: "Do whatever you feel like, jump around, throw underwear or money, talk!" or something like that.

ps: if you're wondering about the title of this blog entry: Jamie Cullum wrote the soundtrack, or at least part of it, of Gran Torino. And the title song was the last song he performed yesterday. Clint Eastwood is into Jazz, that's why he got this guy for the soundtrack.
Damn good movie. I missed it in cinemas, but now you can get the DVD for less than five Euros around here, just watched it two weeks ago. If you haven't seen it, go get it!

Cheers.

Delft

Guess where i spent my last weekend:


Yes, that's right, in the Netherlands. Visiting a friend in Delft. Lovely city, nevermind the typical cloudy/rainy weather. Go there yourself if you haven't already.

Once again i was surprised how near everything is in Holland. 15 minutes by train and you're in Rotterdam, 15 minutes into the other direction and you're in The Hague. "Different cities", yesyes.

About Dutch, the language: you might have heard that it sounds funny for us German-speakers. Oh yes it does. Last weekend i've learned that it's also the other way round, i.e., German also sounds funny for Dutch people =)

Huren?

"Heeren" means gentlemen, at least on toilet doors. Funny enough, to use this logo for it, as seen in a student dorm. Especially considering the fact here in Austria we say "we drink beer, we piss Hei..."

On to more Lucullan delights:

I ate what you might call Dutch sushi: fresh herring with onions. Good.
Bit slippery to eat, though.

If you're more into sweet stuff: when in Holland, put some butter on your bread and then complete it with vruchtenhagel and chocolate vlokken. Mmmh.

And now to very yummy Dutch Vla. This one comes out of its gable-top carton in stripes, like toothpaste, but tastes much better.

Vanilla-Caramel vla with hagelslag on top.

The three-coloured vla with the three-coloured vruchtenhagel on top. Mmmh.

And in the end: fresh stroopwafels from Delft's street market.

Mahlzeit!

Block Tetris

Addictive Flash games, you know? I just stumbled upon one that was inspired by this video.
Mmmh, Tetris.
Enjoy.

Perfektionierer

#German blog entry, sorry

Wie die meisten meiner Leser wissen, arbeite ich in Operations Research. Kurz gesagt, Optimierung bestimmter Prozesse. Deshalb hat mich folgender Buchtitel amüsiert:

Gesehen heute Morgen, in der Auslage eines Buchgeschäfts, das "bis auf Weiteres geschlossen" bleibt.

Warum der Optimierungswahn uns schadet - und wer davon wirklich profitiert. Sollte ich mich angesprochen fühlen?
=)

Naja, zumindest perfektioniere ich nicht. Könnte man sagen. Heuristiken werden schließlich da angewandt, wo das finden einer optimalen (perfekten?) Lösung zu aufwändig oder unmöglich ist.

Elmekc

Do you know the toothpaste Elmex? Around here - Austria - it is the one recommended by dentitsts. Well, anyways, it's a good one. If you buy it here it is produced by its inventors.
In Russia it looks like this:


Gotta love that Cyrillic spelling. I especially like their "KC" for X. Hehe.
And interestingly enough that Elmex tube also had a Colgate logo on it. So i guess they produce it in licence for that market.

Anyways.

Accessibility FAIL

Some time ago I've organised two courses for international students about accessibility and universal design (You guessed right, with my student organisation). Since then I've become a little more aware of problems/bad solutions in everyday life.
Now, last weekend i was at a cafe at Kahlenberg. It's quite a new building, you sit in there with a wonderful view of Vienna. A bit fancy, but ok, was a special occasion. Anyways. When i went to the toilet i was surprised to find this sign on top of the stairs leading down:

Ever tried the stairs with a wheelchair? First i was guessing that just the sign was messed up, and that there would be an elevator somewhere. But there wasn't. At least i couldn't find any looking around several rooms near the stairs, upstairs and downstairs. Bad. Really.
Considering that there was no way to get down to the toilets in a wheelchair, i guess it was less bad that the toilets weren't accessible for wheelchairs either :-P

ps: if you're not familiar with the term FAIL, have a look at failblog.

Snowhike

Hello there,

So, since I'm back to living in Austria already for two years, i always try to enjoy what we have here. And one of those things is Hiking. So far i haven't managed too often, but last weekend - thanks to the initiative of an old friend of mine - i managed to go snow-hiking (check this - there is only a German entry in Wikipedia). A first time for me. Borrowed some snowshoes, selected one of the nice little mountains ("Hausberge") close to Vienna, and off we went.

Enough talk, some pics: 

Me with snowshoes on. Wee-hee.

Snowshoes while walking. Quite comfortable.

Great view of aptly named Schneeberg (literally snow mountain). Also, great cloud formations.

Me posing against the sun during our lunchbreak. Note the two snowshoes taken off by my fellow hikers. They're a different type than the ones i'm wearing, with a little less surface on the snow.

All in all, we went up around 800m of height. And then down again. Great way to spend a Sunday.

In Vienna, the snow's already gone, and today i had my first sitting-in-the-sun-with-a-sandwich-lunchbreak of the year. Yippiiieee!

So, please, let the summer come to me :-)