31 May 2004
The rain finally came at about 1pm. Pretty uneventful day overall. Before the rain started I dropped some packages off at the post office. Two for friends of Kumiko, and one for our friend Jonathan in Austin, who won prizes from us at my friend Mike's Academy Awards party (which we attended via webcam). We just got around to mailing them. After that I came home and watched an episode of The Avengers, called "The Hidden Tiger", then went to the post office in Osaka to get a money order to replenish my US bank account. When I got home I watched another Avengers episode "Death at Bargain Prices", which was excellent. By popular demand (one person asked me) I decided to make a new page with pictures of the garden. You can now see the difference a month makes to a vegetable garden. Hey! Kumiko just came home!30 May 2004
I have to say the weather prediction guys are stupid idiots. Even at 9 o'clock this morning, the forecast was still saying thunderstorms all day. But there was nothing approaching that. There were a few clouds in the morning, then it cleared up around 10, then it was intensely sunny and cloudless for the rest of the day. I'm not angry. It was a good day for planting corn and scrubbing the balcony clean and rigging up climbing trellises for the morning glories. I planted seven corn plants across row 3, after moving the herbs that were there into pots. Those are on the balcony now. I don't know how they'll adjust. It doesn't matter, because the corn was just more important. My goal is to eat fresh corn twice a week once they start cranking out the ears. Kumiko and I are watching the Japan/Iceland friendly soccer match now. Japan is leading 2-1. Kumiko met up with some friends today, while I did all the aforementioned stuff. We went to dinner at a kaiten sushi place in Shonai (two stations away). It was really tasty and cheap, except for the beer, which was expensive. That's where they get you! We had already ordered our second apiece before we realized the price. Next time we'll know, and it will be cheap overall.29 May 2004
Sweet, sweet weekend. But thunderstorms are forecast both days (and rain for the next 5 days). The garden is going to become an impassible swamp. I'll have to find some indoor entertainment. Or maybe I'll take some rain photos. There aren't many of those taken in the world. Think how disparate that ratio must be (sunny day photos:rainy day photos). I think a guy who learns to take interesting rainy day action shots could win a lot of photo contests. Speaking of photos: NYC pics from the digital camera are available now from the photos page. A lot of the photo credits go to Kumiko for that gallery. That was her camera for the trip. Oh, and for real excitement I've added pictures of my cameras to the bottom of the cameras page too.27 May 2004
I'm eating curry bread and hopped up on "genki drinks". I've had a cold the last two days. "Genki drinks" are these little bottles of concentrated liquid vitamins (and nicotine). They're sold in convenience stores and really popular. There are a million brands. Last night I discovered the amazing restorative power of one of these drinks, called "Solmack". I've tried a few of these things, and this one tastes the worst, so you know it must have other qualities that keep it on the shelf. As soon as I choked it down, I felt my breathing get easier, and my snot stopped bothering me. Far as I can tell, this one doesn't have any nicotine either. I planted twenty five morning glory seeds (one full seed tray (thanks to my friend Ryan for the correct terminology)) last month. I could only use 9 of the plants on our balcony, so I decided to take some in to the office for people to take home. Apparently, "morning glory" has a really lude interpretation in Australia and England, so the plant exchange caused a lot of snickering and domino-effect jokes. Hopefully there won't be any problems when I advertise "Shitzu bitches" for sale next week.24 May 2004
Last night after work, I rode over to the garden for a long time no see look. Everything looked pretty healthy, especially the radishes, which are bigger than I ever expected them to get. When I arrived I saw one of my old students there, or actually a whole family of them. I tought the father and the son (about three years old at the time) before, and I think the mother too. They just started their garden yesterday. I gave them some radishes, and they promised me some potatoes when they're ready. Nice family. I also met another family last night - a mom and three kids (two girls and a boy). The older daughter (Natsumi) was twelve years old and really sweet. She was interested in my gardening (picking, washing, etc), and she would get really close and stare wide-eyed at the "action". I gave her and her little sister radishes. I don't think they liked them, but they seemed fascinated to have radishes of their own. The boy was older (maybe 16) and he was too cool to show any interest, or I suppose it's more likely he just had no interest in pulling roots out of mud. Not exactly entertainment for a teenager. I really felt the "community" feeling last night at the community garden. When the sunlight started to fade, I rode home with a bunch of radishes (the supply is never-ending), picked out the best of the bunch, and took them over to Kumiko's parents. Only her father was home, and he was surprised to see me, since I rarely just show up on my own. He gave me a beer, and we arranged to meet at the garden this morning at 9 to plant carrots. So, this morning, I went out there and improved my cucumber/bean trellis, and Kumiko came along a bit later and brought me a Coke before she went to work. Eventually my father-in-law showed up, and I planted the carrots down row 4, while he watered everything else. Now it's 5pm and I've been sitting in front of the computer forever, and feel the need to get out of the house again.By the way, here's the final installment of the New York City diary...
Day Five (Monday the 10th)...was just a morning for us. We woke up early to finish packing. I went downstairs to settle the bill at about 8:30, but the desk woman told me I couldn't pay until we vacated the room. Our taxi wouldn't come until 9:10, so I gathered Kumiko, and we walked down the street for cofee (Kumiko) and orange juice (Matt). I got this unbelievably big (about 20 oz), fresh-squeezed cup of juice for only $3, which immediately reminded me of the unconscionably small juice (about 4 oz when the ice is taken away) I'd had at Itami airport on our way out of Osaka for slightly more than $3. We got our drinks to go, and sat down in the grounds of the planetarium for some final relaxing moments before our long journey. We were surrounded by spring trees, and entertained by people walking their dogs. We talked about how it would be to live in New York, how nice our New York friends are, the things we would miss, and the sorry state of customer service. Kumiko was very positively impressed by New York. She says the service doesn't bother her because that's just the way it is. Her only obstacle to living in New York would be the cold winters. I don't mind cold winters. Cold just makes cozy so much nicer. I do mind the clerks who don't say "hello" or even look at you. Even so, I was sorry to have to go so soon. It was really a great trip. We'll visit as often as we can. The flight home was tedious, not nearly as easy as the flight over. I have a dream of crossing the ocean by ship. I did some research. It takes almost forever and costs a fortune, and very few people do it. Two weeks after our trip, I'm still in the "I'm never flying coach again" state of mind, but that will change. Even business class is for lottery winners only, I know. I'm looking forward to the day when airplanes travel twice as fast as they do now. I wonder how long that will be. Any way, there's no need to go into happenings after the taxi arrived. It's all as you'd expect, except that the driver was nice this time. I'd rather leave the story on the park bench outside the museum with birds chirping, and orange juice overflowing, and squirrels foraging under the trees.
21 May 2004
I've had a couple of busy mornings and early nights (10:30 and 11:30 respectively), so I'm getting behind in journal-keeping. On Wednesday morning I went to Ishibashi to pick up New York pictures from the 473yen place that Kevin, my friend and coworker discovered. There was no problem with exposure as I had thought there might be. It turns out the 473 yen place is just a drop box outside a 100yen shop, so there was no question of asking for push-processing or anything fancy. Luckily it didn't matter. I took one roll in first to a decent lab as a test, and found there was no need to worry. In all I took 4 rolls witht he Yashica, and Kumiko and I took about 130 shots on the digital as well. So I'll weed out the crap and get a photo gallery or two up. Perhaps I'll break it into days. Yesterday morning I went into Osaka early before my Japanese lesson. First I went and exchanged leftover dollars for yen. Then I immediately went to Yaotomi camera and spent about half of it. I was so impressed with the performance of the Yashica Lynx 5000, that I decided to buy another old rangefinder (an Olympus 35 DC) to play with. This one is much smaller and lighter, and has a working light meter and automatic exposure. The disadvantage is that it has no manual controls except focus. It's a less-serious, but easier to use camera than the Lynx. I also bought a new old-stock telephoto lens for the Canon A-1. It's a 135mm/f3.5 Canon NFD lens. Very light and very cheap too. I think I'd better write up NYC Day Four before I forget what happened...Day Four (Sunday the 9th)...We were well-rested on Sunday morning since we'd had over 12 hours of sleep. I woke up at 6 and took a shower. Then at 7:30 I called my mom from the hotel, as it was Mother's Day. I woke her up, of course, and she could barely talk. But she loves me, so she gave it her best shot. Kumiko woke up while I was on the phone and she got in on the mother talking as well. Our only other plans for the day were to meet Barry and Marga and the Spanish armada in the park. That wasn't until the afternoon, however, so we had plenty of time to ourselves. We went for a walk through Central Park, east across the great lawn, north past the Guggenheim Museum, around the big reservoir. As we rounded the north bank of the reservoir we passed a middle-aged guy who was meowing. We saw lots of cute real animals too: ducks, geese, horses, and squirrels. We didn't see any real cats though, and it made me think that although we'd seen a billion dogs in the city, we hadn't seen a single cat. Are there any cats in New York City? We were starting to get pretty worn out by the time we got back down to what we thought was home. We were surprised to learn that we'd somehow come down on the east side of the park, rather than the west, where we'd started. So we rested for a bit on 5th Avenue, checked the map, and planned outr route back across the park to the west side. We set off with thoughts of breakfast and toilets dancing in our heads. We finally made it to the other side, only to discover it was the same side! There was no escape. We just ended up a few blocks down from where we checked the map. Now we were very close to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, so we thought they might have a public toilet for us and walked over. They weren't open yet. But across the street there was a hotel (the Hyatt something or other), and we used their high-class marble facilities. By that time I was really hungry, and scared to try crossing the park again before eating. We found a nearby coffee shop in Kumiko's guide book and began to steer towards it. It, however, was no longer an entity. The thought of never eating again was creeping into my head, but hope sprang again. We found a place (with a "V" in the name) that was advertising a traditional Irish breakfast. I have to say, that breakfast was one of the best in memory. An Irish breakfast is apparently this: eggs served on a bed of sliced ham, with tomatoes and hashed potatoes on the side, plus three types of delicious sausage:white pudding, black pudding, and a firmer pork sausage (6 pieces total!). It was so very very good. I vowed to go to Ireland one day on a tour of breakfasts. I maintain this vow still. The only breakfast experience that currently bests it in my mind is the breakfast buffet at the Halekulani Hotel in Honolulu. That was more a matter of atmosphere though. The food was certainly delicious and fresh and abundant, but the experience of eating that abundance while looking out over green lawns to the gentle Pacific is hard to beat. Anyway, this Irish place is running a distant second, but based on food alone, because the atmosphere was nothing approaching special. After that rejuvenating experience, we followed a well-trafficked street unwaiveringly across the park to the west side of town. We decided to catch a planetarium show, since the Hayden Planetarium (I guess the best in the country) was only yards from our hotel. They have a projector made by Zeiss (the same company that makes lenses for my Contax Aria!). The show was really good, but I thought it was too short. Part of it was an amazing voyage into the Orion nebula. It was really seamless and beautiful the way they moved from telescopic images to computer generated video as you travelled closer and closer and finally into the nebula itself. I really was amazed. I saw this show (the same one?) in 2000 with my friends Ernesto, Mike, and Matt, but I don't recall being so impressed. Next time I'll watch one of the other shows. When the show was over, we took a turn through the exhibit halls of the Museum of Natural History, but only a short look, because we were ready to relax a little before going back to the park to meet Barry...
I'll finish this tonight, as I have to get ready for work now.
...OK. Back in the saddle. Just a little more information about the museum. The planetarium was built inside a giant sphere which is suspended from the ceiling and floor by beams or ca bles or something. The sphere is surrounded by exhibits which show the relative sizes of things using the sphere as a comparison, for example, if the sphere is the sun then this little marble is the size of Pluto, or if the sphere is a proton, then this speck is a quark. Pretty interesting, but we couldn't stay too long. I would have liked to check out all the animal dioramas in the main museum halls. I'm a big diorama fan. I especially like the ones with fake water viewed in cross section. Kumiko didn't care about the dioramas at all, but she humored me through half of the Hall of African Animals. After a brief respite at the hotel, we headed back over to Central Park, but this time to a section we hadn't yet seen called the Sheep's Meadow. We'd arranged to meet Barry there at 2pm, but his party was late, so we wandered around looking for them until we finally found Susan, who was doing the same thing. Luckily Sue has a cell phone, so we eventually found them through high-tech means. We met all of Barry's new in-laws, who are nice. At one point, Susan and Kumiko and I went off with Barry's frisbee for some traditional park fun. We found out that Susan is a really expert frisbee thrower, but we also had a shock. Just as Barry and his nephew came up to join the fun, I threw the disc to Susan, and when she tried to catch it, it split in two. Almost perfectly down the center. No one had ever seen anything like that. I'll never forget that frisbee as long as I live. Ahh, that famous, funny, fractured frisbee...what memories! "Hey, Barry, remember the old frisbee in the Sheep's Meadow?"...ahh, good times. Ok, anyway, we stayed around there for a while and just goofed around. Then we all went our separate ways, with promises to reunite for dinner in Brooklyn. The plan was to eat at Barry and Marga's place, but when we got there around 8, they had decided to go to a nearby Mexican restaurant instead. So Barry and Marga and Kumiko and I walked over and met Susan at the restaurant, and we drank margueritas and ate fajitas and had a good time. Barry and Marga very generously paid for the whole thing. We had to say goodbye to Barry and Marga outside the restaurant. We hope they will come visit us in Osaka. Marga studied Japanese before and has a real interest in Japanese culture. Barry is basically up for anything. He's a great appreciator of the finer things in life in any culture. We took the same train out of Brooklyn with Susan, but had to say goodbye to her too at her stop. I'm pretty sure we can get Susan and Miles over here too. Susan seemd really disappointed when the discussion at the park turned to "who Miles looks like". I suggested a younger Albert Brooks, but she didn't take kindly to that. I didn't mean anything bad by it. I like Albert Brooks. Kumiko says Susan looks like Jennifer Connolly. Anyway, after we dropped Susan off, we headed back and went to sleep, bringing a close to a lovely day four.
18 May 2004
Well today was a pretty interesting day. Some stuff happened. And some things as well. I slogged out into the garden and got my reward: radishes! Today was the first harvest from the garden. I picked seven or eight red radishes, and ate the first one straight out of the ground (after a rinse). Ohnishi-san was there to celebrate with me. He cheered me on. I also pulled out all of the potted plants which I had set there while we were in New York. The sage and hot pepper got much bigger. I think I'll have to re-pot the pepper. The basil was starting to flower, so I pinched that off, as I've read you're supposed to do. My shoes were caked with mud after that, but this old dude out there showed me that this thing I hadn't figured out at the front of the gardens was actually a shoe-washing station. Very handy. I replaced the dead plants as well, so I'd better update my garden progress plotter. Now the dead tomato is a living Korean tomato, and the dead bean is a living cucumber. I need to rig up some kind of netting to get the cucumbers to climb. They really just want to meander over the ground, but there's no room for that behavior. I went home with a sunburned neck. When it was time to leave for work, I managed to forget not only my phone, but also something to read on the train. I always read on the train, and I feel lost without a book. I have no idea where to look. There are plenty of beautiful women to look at, yes, but I don't want to get in trouble. So it was a long ride. After work was nice though. There were a couple of guys playing jazz guitar in the park outside my office. I sat down to listen for a few songs. They weren't very well-rehearsed, but they were good when they were good, and they had a nice mellow sound. After a while, I decided to talk to them about playing together. They invited me to sing with them, so we went through 3 songs. I haven't sung with live music in several months (maybe a year), so it felt really nice and nostalgic. I don't know if anything will become of it, but I thanked them and told them I'd like to sing with them again. We exchanged contact information. When I came home, Kumiko was waiting for me. She made a nice salad of mixed greens, and we had radishes from the garden, and we had fetucini with tomato sauce which was nice.16 May 2004
Promises, promises. Why do I make them? Just a little more time on NYC Day 4. Today was very, very wet. We cleaned the house this morning. It was in a state. Now it's tidy, but already on the way to being messy again. We went to the theater since it was raining. A couple weeks ago, we bought advance tickets to "School of Rock", which is a vehicle movie for Jack Black. It was pretty darn funny. Some dead spots, for sure, but we really enjoyed it. I'm glad we didn't spoil this one by seeing it on the airplane when we had the chance. We were really tempted. It's hard to sit on a plane for 12 hours, and not watch the movie you've been wanting to see. In the theater it was fun. We were able to clap after the stage performance (though we were the only ones doing it). The O.S. theater in Osaka has a new concession policy which I think is revolutionary: all you can drink soft drinks for only 200 yen (cheaper than a small size regular movie drink). Of course, nobody really wants to get up and refill their cups during the movie, so it's got some flaws, but it's definately a breakthrough in terms of price. The movie made me want to start a rock band, or at least go see a few. I never go to rock shows anymore. The desire is passing quickly though. Jack Black's facial expressions are just hilarious. We've decided to have a Jack Black movie rental matsuri. We had dinner with Kumiko's parents tonight. Her mom made another fabulous dinner: pork-stuffed, deep-fried lotus root wedges, fried chicken (she always makes that when I come over), tomato and mozarella salad with basil, slaw with salmon, bamboo shoot salad, and marinated eggplant with bacon. This dinner competes pretty well with my friend Dae's mom's dinner for my friend Mike and I when we visited their home in Los Angeles in 1999. I may need to get some reminders from Mike, but it basically went like this: barbequed beef, fried jumbo shrimp, oxtail soup, a braised and baked fish of some sort, chicken wings, rice, green salad and kimchee. There were a couple of extravagant dinners there and a couple of fancy breakfasts as well, so I may have some things out of place. Please give me your input, Mike and Dae.15 May 2004
I know it's bad form, but I'm going to talk a little about work. Only because today was a special day. Today was Bad Tie Day 2.It's raining now, which is really annoying because it's going to ruin my chances of working in the garden this weekend. I don't like slogging around in the mud. It takes the enjoyment out of it. Now for day three of our NYC trip. Some people say this was the least memorable day of the trip. But I think day three is just misunderstood...
Day Three (Saturday the 8th)...After the blowout on the boat, we decided to sleep in a bit. Actually, there was no decision made. I woke up with all my clothes on and the TV going at about 5am. Kumiko was in a similar state, although she had at least taken a shower. I disrobed and went back to bed. By about 9:30 we were waking up. I felt very strange, like my head was full of natural gas. We eventually headed over to Zabar's for breakfast, but it was really crowded because of the weekend. We ended up sitting outside on a cold bench in the median of the road. I had a Cuban ham sandwich, which was debilitatingly delicious, and some Israeli couscous salad, which was also fantastic. Israeli couscous is much courser than the standard Moroccan-type stuff. Kumiko had turkey sandwich and 5-bean salad, which were both good, but not as good as mine. After breakfast we went back inside and bought a salad spinner for Kumiko's mom, as well as some Malaysian chili sauce and French Atlantic sea salt for ourselves. Once we'd deposited that stuff in our room, we were off to Times Square, where we bought a Yankees cap for Kumiko's dad at a sporting goods store. Then on to Toys R Us (the biggest Toys R Us ever) with a big ferris wheel inside the store. We rode the ferris wheel, sharing a car with a fun little boy (named Dante) and his mom. All of the cars were themed after different toys/characters, so there was a Mr.Potato Head car, a Toy Story car, a Barbie car, a Cabbage Patch car, a cut dog, Scooby Doo, and several others. We rode in Potato Head's car which was quite an honor. After toys, we bought cds from Virgin Records. We were pretty tired after that, so we came back uptown to relax a bit. We were halfway hungry, so we stopped for food. I had a giant pastrami sandwich and Kumiko had an omelette. Then we went to a bookstore (Barnes and Noble). It was so nice to be able to read everything in the store. I bought three books - "My Family and Other Animals" by Gerald Durrell, "Ring of Bright Water" by Gavin Maxwell, and "Last Bus to Woodstock" by Colin Dexter. When we tired of books we went back to the hotel and passed out on the bed. It was 5:30pm, and we went right to sleep. Barry called at 6:30 to make plans for Sunday in the park. I don't remember what I said to him. I was too sleepy to talk much. Back to bed, and we stayed there until 6:00 the next morning. Tomorrow: Day 4.
14 May 2004
I forgot to mention that the garden was rocking when we came back from holiday. Kumiko's folks stopped by and watered it on their daily walk. The heat really does amazing things. After a week of warm sunny Toyonaka May, the tomatoes were about twice the size they were when we left. Except one, which was completely dead. The beans also had grown tremendously, with the exception of one, which was completely dead. The eggplants were my biggest worry before. They looked kind of limp compared to other people's eggplants, but now they too are perky. I can't wait to get out there this Sunday and replace the dead tomato and bean plants, and till some gardening soil into the as of yet fallow row 4. Part of row five is still untouched as well. But row 6 is full of beans and cucumbers. Heres a diagram of the whole thing.Tonight I ate 10 takoyaki for dinner. Looks like NYC day three will have to wait until Saturday evening.
13 May 2004
Went out for drinks in Sannomiya (Kobe) tonight (where I ate tacos for dinner) with some of my colleagues. We quizzed eachother on 80s music. That's a popular discussion topic for my generation. My Welsh friend Mairwen just emailed me a mysterious two word message: "Echo Beach". I'm guessing that's the answer to an 80s music question that remained unanswered at the bar, but I have no idea. It's become apparent that Texas and Wales were not so musically connected in the 1980s. Here's day two of our NYC trip...Day Two (Friday the 7th)...Wedding Day. We were (at least I was) surprised to learn from Susan that the boat thing didn't start 'til evening, so we had the whole morning and afternoon to play around. We got up early and headed over to Zabar's, a supermarket/deli, for breakfast and buying. We found Zabar's the previous day, on Susan's advice, and were startled by the wide variety of cheap and delicious-looking foodstuffs. It made me mad at Japan. They had a bulk olive bar, with an incredible assortment of European, Middle Eastern and North African olives. They had wads of fresh mozerella cheese. They had salamis like you've never seen before, bean salads to fart your way around the world, soups which could drown you in untold depths of pleasure, deli meats to spawn a dedicated chapter of PETA, baked goods to make Hansel forget Gretel, sauces to swoon over, cookies to crumble, cakes to have and eat too, sandwiches to launch an island chain, beer to wreck a legion of livers, and it was all cheap, relative to the standards to which we've become accustomed. We loved Zabar's enough to go back for breakfast the next morning as well, and buy what we could reasonably transport back across a continent and an ocean. After breakfast it was time to buy clothes. We took the 1-train to 34th Street and Macy's Harold Square. I wanted to buy some work clothes and luckily everything was on sale. Kumiko helped me pick out three ties, three shirts and a pair of pants, as well as some new sunglasses. I wanted to buy new undershirts too, but they didn't have my brand (Hanes), they only had expensive, designer undershirts. As it turned out, I never found the undershirts I wanted in New York. I may have to ask Mike, my official stateside agent, to take a trip to Target (my alma mater) to pick up some Hanes A-shirts (size medium) for me. I may. We had a good time at Macy's, but we were exhausted by the end of it. The highlight was discovering the escalator made of wood. Kumiko really liked the nice clickity-clack sound it made, and we ended up taking several boring pictures of it, which failed to capture its charm. We had planned to go to Times Square after shopping, but we didn't really feel inclined, and we had to get back to meet up with Susan and Miles. We did have time to walk a few blocks to the New York Public Library. We took the standard pictures with the lions outside, rested a while on the steps, while I reloaded film, then went inside. The massive stone work and wooden panelled walls were amazing. That's one solid library. In addition to the main reading room and catalogue room, so often seen in movies, there were several cool "little" specialized reading rooms. For example, there's a whole study dedicated to Yeats (whatever he wrote). Kumiko remarked that the place made her want to study, and I too felt the urge to research stuff. Eventually we packed it up and headed back to the hotel to rest a bit, then went to Grammercy Park to meet Sue and Miles. Kumiko was really interested to see the park, since she works right outside a replica of it at USJ. It's a beautiful park, but only open to local residents. You have to have a key. We walked around it, then down to the piers to catch the wedding boat. There was free booze and food (Spanish tapas) on board, and we got drunk and stuffed pretty fast. Barry finally showed up and introduced us to his bride to be, Marga, who is lovely in every way. Barry's okay too. To make a long story short, they got married, in English and Spanish (Marga's whole family came over from Madrid), after which we set sail around Manhattan. The skyline views from the boat were incredible. Some would say "enchanting". All good things must end, however, so after five hours of that we stumbled off the boat and into a taxi, but not before I'd dropped my new digital camera onto the pier and scratched up the body. At least it didn't go into the water. I can't recall if I tipped our taxi driver that night. I hope so. He was a nice one. Tomorrow: Day 3.
12 May 2004
It was worth it. That was the best trip I've ever had to New York City. Kumiko and I really enjoyed ourselves every day. Here's day one in a day-by-day breakdown, as much as I can remember:Day One (Thursday the 6th)... We had an easy flight there, and arrived relatively refreshed on Thursday morning. We made a point of getting up and moving around at least every two or two and a half hours on the plane, brushing teeth and washing faces (our own, of course), and sleeping as much as possible inbetween. Once we arrived, we made our way to the hotel via taxi. It's a $45 fixed fare from JFK to anywhere in Manhattan, but you also have to tip, so it comes out pretty expensive. The taxi driver looked at my cool new suitcase and said "What the hell is that?". Our first intro to "customer service" New York style. Upon getting it out of the trunk once we reached the hotel, he couldn't help but ask me if "that thing turns into a table or something". The hotel was another chapter in the same book. We arrived too early for check-in, so we dropped off Kumiko's suitcase and my portable table, and went for lunch. The hotel lobby was tiny, with one woman who spoke Spanish very well, working behind the desk. She found our reservation after several minutes of earnest searching, and bid us hasta la vista. We walked down the street to a pizza parlor called "Uno" and had some amazing Chicago-style pizza. Then we went about a block further to Central Park. It was really close to the hotel. Central Park is inspiringly beautiful. I took a dozen or so photos with my Yashica Lynx rangefinder. I really enjoy using that camera. It's old, simple, and quiet, and I learn a lot about exposure because I have to use a hand-held light meter for each exposure, and make all the settings manually on the camera. There's just one problem. When I arrived home last night, I looked at the light meter and noticed it was set for ISO800 film. I'd been shooting ISO400 film for the entire trip! The question is...When was it set to 800? If it was like that during the entire trip, perhaps I should ask the photo lab for push processing. I've never done that before, and I don't know how to ask in Japanese, and I don't know if any of the typically teenage lab technicians would know how to do it anyway. I think I'll try one roll at regular processing first as a test. It's only one f-stop from 400 to 800, so hopefully everything will be okay. I was really hoping, however, that this trip would be a critical test of that camera's performance. Oh well, next time. Back to the park. We spent a few hours walking and relaxing on benches or lying on the beautiful spring grass under ancient trees. When we came back to the hotel we were refreshed, but still fading from the long journey. There was a different person working behind the counter when we returned... an older gentleman who spoke Spanish even better than the woman before him. He had absolutely no idea what he was doing. Imagine asking your grandfather to program a VCR. You would get the same reaction as I did when I told him we wanted to check in. Eventually, someone helped him, and we made it up to room 602. It was 3 o'clock, and the room hadn't been cleaned. I can't imagine why, but I went downstairs and told the old gentleman. He understood and immediately picked up a walkie-talkie and spoke to a maid. I wonder how long he trained to use the walkie talkie. Twenty minutes later we had a clean room, and I decided to call Susan to tell her we were in. The phone, however, wasn't ready for us. Another trip downstairs to talk to the old gentleman, who, after ten minutes of desperately trying to juggle to customers in the lobby and two or three urgent phone calls, informed me that I would have to file a credit card number with him to get the phone turned on. Another trip upstairs and down again (very slow elevator) to get the credit card. Eventually he took the number and told me it would work now. He even begrudged me the use of the lobby phone to call Susan, after I argued with him about it. It turned out the next day, that he had failed in turning on the phone anyway, as it was still dead when I tried to call Barry on Friday. Glad I used the lobby phone or I might have blown a fuse. Actually he was a cute old geezer, and easy to forgive. Susan and Miles were hanging out in Central Park by that time, waiting for our call, so we asked them to give us some nap time before they came over. At 6, they knocked on the door, and we all went to an Ethiopian restaurant after a quick walking tour of the East Village area. It was good. We had a sampler with all of the vegetable dishes, plus most of the meat dishes. All of it delicious. And we washed it down with Ethiopian honey wine, which was sweet. If my highschool class had known about that stuff, it might have replaced "Boone's Farm Strawberry Hill Wine" as the party drink of choice. When I say "they" with reference to Susan, I mean Susan and her boyfriend Miles, who's just a really nice, interesting, funny guy, who shares a lot of my tastes in cars. Kumiko and I approved whole-heartedly of Susan's dude-choice. After dinner, we said temporary good-byes, and Kumiko and I got back on the subway and course, took the wrong train, an express train to Harlem. You know that Duke Ellington song "A-Train", about the train that "goes to Suger Hill in Harlem"? I'm going to write another, not-so-happy song called "D-Train", because the "D" goes there too, and let me tell you, it's not a fun, jazzy place either. It's a place you just want to leave. And that's what we did. Tomorrow: Day 2.
4 May 2004
One more day of "work" tomorrow, then off to New York until the 12th. We're getting excited. My favorite part of a trip to the USA comes around hours 9 through 13 on the airplane. I just LOVE flying in economy class. Really feels economical! Saving money never felt so good. So that's the dread. Here's the looking forward to: seeing my New York friends (it's been 15 months) and introducing my lovely wife to them, eating strange ethnic foods (Ethiopian this time around, and possibly Ukranian), buying new undershirts, pants perhaps, and a suit if I'm feeling spendy, being the boss of language again (Kumiko is the boss over here), sales clerks that talk on the phone rather than look at you (okay, that's in the dread column), honing my American accent, a larger variety of beers, catching up on pop culture, riding trains with hard plastic seats and pictures of lower extremities scratched into the plexiglass windows (again, that's a dread), seeing great-looking architecture and "old-world craftsmanship" outside of a temple, feeling fear again,being ignored by women, big delicious cheap slices of the world's best pizza wherever you go, getting more than the gist of conversations (I'm repeating myself now.). Tonight we watched "Vanilla Sky" to get into the New York mood. It's a really compelling movie. It's got two of the main actors from "Last Samurai": Tom Cruise and that fat English guy. One of my students had a decent role in that movie (Last Samurai). His picture is even in the keepsake program. Tomorrow morning I have to make a decision. Either take all of our potted plants to the garden, where they will be watered daily by Kumiko's folks on their morning walk, or take them all to their house. At their house, they wouldn't risk drying out in too much sun, whereas at the garden they would get a lot of nourishing sun over the week. I think I'll take them to the garden, but perhaps I should go ahead and plug the smaller ones in the ground, so they don't dry out. Yes, that's a good idea.3 May 2004
Kumiko and I both decided this morning that our suitcases are unsuitable for our upcoming New York City trip. Hers is just too huge, while mine is very heavy, even empty. So Kumiko will borrow her mother's case, and I went suitcase shopping today. I went to Daiei first, which is our local supermarket/department store. I found some that were decent, but I really wanted leightweight. I checked out the official weight of the best of the cheap ones there, then went into Umeda to compare them with expensive Samsonite bags. I was looking mainly at the hard shell-type bags, but also considering soft-sided ones. At Yodobashi, I found some really nice-looking Samsonites which were just the right size, and weighed a little less than the cheap ones at Daiei (6.2 kilograms rather than 6.7). The difference in quality was noticeable, but the nice ones are just too expensive. The Daiei ones are about 10,000 yen. The Samsonites are about 30,000 yen. What I actually bought, however, is something completely different. They also had some really cool, pigskin-covered, old-fashioned types. That's what I bought. It's made in China, and on close inspection leaves out some convenient details, like interior straps and 360º swivel wheels. But it looks great and it's a good size for a 5-day trip, and it's much lighter than any of the hard shell bags. This one was only ¥19,000, but it looks like a millionaire's bag (from far away).Word is that some of my viewers are disappointed because I haven't been mentioning my dinner lately. Public opinion is pretty important for me, so I'll try to be a little more diligent. Last night some of my colleagues and I got together for another riverside barbeque. I brought a good quantity of beef and salmon, only to discover that four of the six goers were vegetarian. I'd also packed some marinated onion slices, so that satisfied them somewhat. I was a vegetarian for seven years starting in highschool. I stopped eating meat because I didn't want to kill animals. Eventually I learned that I actually did want to kill animals, especially those which could supply me with bacon. My best friend in highschool, Matt Willard, turned me on to vegetarianism. He was writing a report on animal abuse for one of his classes, which naturally resulted in his becoming a vegetarian. I thought it was an interesting choice, but I didn't want to join up. Then we went on a band trip to Washington, DC, to play in a competition. On the plane ride there, we discovered that the trip organizers had ordered the same meal for everyone on the plane. Matt Willard, like everyone, received a hamburger. Of course he couldn't eat that, and there was nothing we could do about it. He couldn't have a vegetarian meal,so he just ate the bun and lettuce. I was really outraged that they had ordered for everyone without consultation, so I discarded my meat patty out of protest, and the rest was history. Whatever meat I had eaten prior to that hamburger incident turned out to be the last meat I would eat for seven years. I wonder what it was now, the meat I mean. It could have easily been tamales. I was really into tamales from a tamale house called 'La Popular' in East Dallas at the time. You could get a dozen for $4, and they were so good! Ahh, now I want tamales. Perhaps in New York. My friend Matt Willard moved to New York after we finished university. By that time he had also finished being a vegetarian. I think he gave it up when he went to Cuba. Now he's living in Germany. Berlin, I believe. "I am a jelly donut". Eventually several of my friends moved to New York. Barry, whose wedding party we're going to attend, and Susan, who I met in highschool photography class, are living there still. Another friend, Ian, from my old jazz band in Austin, is living there too. But Ian is from New York originally. We're going to eat Ethiopian in New York. I've been craving it, so Susan is going to set it up. She's a good organizer. That's another reminder of Matt Willard, actually. We used to eat at an Ethiopian place in Dallas on occassion. Maybe only two or three occassions. We loved that funky bread that you use to pick up food. I believe the original strain of this paragraph was "what I had for dinner". Well, here it is: takoyaki.
