Checked in and ready to roll

Well, I'm at the airport, all checked in and ready to fly off to
Okinawa. I tell you, I haven't needed a break so badly in a long time.
I'm tired to my bones. Haneda is a funny old airport by the sea. It's
cool to see all the freighter ships and planes so close. We have had
biblically bad weather for the last few days: rain and wind like you
wouldn't believe. But I'm taking off on a hot, sunny day, so hopefully
it bodes well for the week on ishigaki.

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Osaka bound

I m on the bullet train on my way to Osaka. I had to get up at 5am, but I m feeling surprisingly chirpy. I guess this is because the first work event isn t until 6pm, so I ll have almost the whole day to have a look around the city. Usually the most I get to see is the inside of the train station and my hotel. Speaking of which, they have put us up in extremely swanky digs this time around. Most of the time it doesn t make a difference how nice or basic the room is as you just barely get the chance to sleep, but with all this free time i ll get to luxuriate a bit.

新緑の季節 （shinroku no kisetsu)

Blossom watch was a bit of a bust this year due to the shitty weather; it was too cold and wet to really enjoy the usual ohanami parties. And even though it still feels like winter, we have somehow moved onto 新緑の季節 （shinroku no kisetsu). This is the time when you appreciate the fresh, vivid greenery （shinroku) left behind after the blossoms departure...

I must make the most of the outdoors while I can before the grey, cloudy lashings of rainy season come to crush our souls.

Japan: A Paradise for Oldies

On Friday evening I had to go to a lecture after work. Don't worry - this isn't going to be another 'Poor me!' moan. It was actually a really interesting event, though not very related to my job in the end.

The talk was all about how the aging population is reshaping the healthcare industry in Japan. The guy who gave the lecture was a walking statistic and threw out some great useless bits of information that you will definitely hear me repeating: like how 'we Japanese' are now so old with no young ones on the way that the number of pet cats and dogs in the country is double the number of children; or that more incontinence pads are sold here now than baby nappies (diapers); or that 7,000 hospital pediatric units closed down last year due to lack of use.

The presenter spent most of the talk detailing how many new business opportunities will arise out of the Japanese philosophy to aging: people here don't just hope to live a long time, they strive for ピンピンコロリ (pin pin korori). This means to be free of serious illness, independent and up and about (pin pin) until one day you just fall down dead (korori).

Some famous Japanese companies have already come up with some great ideas to support this pinpinkorori lifestyle:

First off, my advice is to buy your shares in TOTO toilet company now, as their simple but genius idea is going to take over the world. It's the push-up-and-out toilet. Isn't it great? Just think of all the time and stress and slipped discs that carers will be saved from by this simple system that hooshes and older person up into a standing position at the touch of a button.




Even more space age is the Panasonic Robotech bed that turns you over automatically to prevent bedsores, and has a TV and telecommunications system in the canopy, and turns into a freakin' wheelchair without the old person having to get up out of bed!!!


Or for those of you living over here, take a look at how newly installed ATMs differ from the ones installed only a few years back; now the key pads are much bigger to accomodate arthritic hands; and the beeps and tones the machines emit are louder to help older ears realize a button has been pressed; and the drawers and slots light up in order to make sure you can see where to slot in your card or where to get back your money/

Actually, on the topic of ATMs I had a little adventure with one earlier on in the week, and the problem had nothing to do with my age!!!

So it was late, well after business hours, and I was on my way home and needed some cash. I go to the ATM, key in my pin code and everything trucks along as normal. Out comes my card, out comes my advice slip, but then, 'What? No money!' Yes, the little drawer containing my precious cash remained stubbornly closed.

It wasn't too difficult to sort out - I just picked up the emergency phone and got through to the ATM centre and after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing they credited my account with the money that I'd technically withdrawn but never received.

The thing that worries me though is that this is not the first time I have gone through a standard ATM operation only to have no cash come out at the end. It happened to me before - different bank, different country. Is this common? Should I be getting paranoid? Has it ever happened to anyone of you?

Anyway, that's all I've got for you today. 10 more days and I'll be in Okinawa. Woot!

Bad, bad day at work today...

It was the first time since I've been in a Japanese company that I really, deeply understood the idea of a cultural barrier.

If we'd been having the meeting in an English-speaking country, or even an English-speaking office, I would have told my boss that his idea had DISASTER spelt all over it, and that I would be the one paying the price for such poor planning two months from now.

But this being Japan, the Japanese culture and the Japanese language conspired to block me from doing so, and I feel frustrated as hell. It truly felt like a physical barrier had been put down in front of me.

I mean, I tried to use the cultural cues and signals that I'm aware of to show my dissatisfaction (long silences, staring down at a page, repeated "thinking" sounds) but none of it worked.

And so we're left with a plan that is going to cause needless work and considerable stress if it doesn't get changed. Oh, I would dearly like to kick something right about now.

Instead, I will go to yoga and try and stretch it out - it's only a job, after all.

Photos of Iwate

Four loads of my washing machine and I am still not at the end of my laundry basket. So I have decided to abandon the project and put up my photos of Iwate as promised.



The big snow was no lie. Look at this car parked near where I stayed.


You can still use the ski slopes on Mount Appi for another few weeks, and in the shaded areas, there were still some pretty big drifts.




However, the melt is definitely on.


And there is a feeling of new life. Various plants and trees starting to sprout and bloom and battle the elements.




These are 蕗の薹 (Fukinotou) that just grow at the side of the road.



They're a real forager's delight and are the first mountain vegetable to grow after the long winter. They are a bit of an acquired taste as they are fairly bitter - but I really enjoy them deep fried as tempura.

You know you're in the country when you're walking along and see signs like this one.

What I'm still trying to figure out is, if you can't use a gun, then what are you going to hunt the bears with? Fisticuffs? A stick?

This is Mount Iwate seen from two different sides. One is said to be the male side and one the female. Can you guess which is which?



On the way back to Tokyo, I met up with some colleagues and shopped for some souvenirs. The shops in Morioka are trying to promote local crafts and keep the area's artisan skills alive, one of which is the traditional iron teapot maker's craft. "I'm a little teapot...not!"


These are チャグチャグ馬コ (Chagu Chagu Uma-Ko) - souvenirs of the famous Tohoku summer festival where the local farmers bless their horses by adorning them with tonnes and tonnes of little bells that make the Chagu Chagu sound as they walk along. I love them, and if I had more room in my flat for decoration would absolutely by one of the really big ones (...to go for imaginary rides on...)


You can't really see it in my photos but the snow had a little bit of a yellow tinge this year. This was not because of dirt, as such, but rather it's due to the 黄砂（kousa）- the yellow sand carried on the winds all the way from the deserts of China and central Asia. We sometimes see the effects of this natural phenomenon in Tokyo - usually on laundry day - but it's quite rare for it to reach Iwate in the winter. Another harbinger of the messed up global weather system.

And speaking of yellow tinges, I will finish with the great gift of a really unnatural-looking photo that was taken of me on Saturday.


Seriously, I have not had surgery to make me look more Asian (though some friends will not believe me): it seems to be happening all by itself.

Yikes! I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so.

Foot in mouth disease

This is the end of my career before it has even begun!

I exaggerate of course, but I had a major case of foot-in-mouth
disease today: one of the people taking the training course today was
the director of the research facility - the biggest of the big-wigs
you can get up here. So, needless to say, I called him by the wrong
name for the first thirty minutes of the day.

And not even a close version, just a plain old different name. And I
called him it a lot. And I never got any vibe that anything was wrong
until he stopped me mid-question and said something like, "before I
answer that, I'd like you to know that my name is X, not Y!"

Ouch! How I wished the ground had just swallowed me up...

But he's a Nice guy and didn't seem to hold it against me. At least I
don't think so - I'm not eager to read the feedback forms that we give
out at the end of each training session.

We actually powered through the material today and finished up way
earlier than planned at four o'clock. I got out while the getting was
good and took the chance to take a walk before the sun went down. It
was a lovely refreshing, mind-clearing, embarrassment-suppressing hour.

I took a fee photos that I will put up when I get back to Tokyo: I
can't attach any peripherals to my work laptop in case I give it the
cyber clap. All I need after calling the boss by the wrong name all
morning is to give my computer a virus tonight.

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Sorry about the recent radio silence.

With this being the start of a new fiscal year, things have been
hectic. Welcoming all the new hires into the company and getting them
settled into their positions takes more effort and organization than I
ever would have thought. The terrible part is, as soon as you finish
one thing, you're straight on to the next: we had a meeting today
where we talked a little about 2012 recruitment!!! I mean, talk about
the years passing by without you noticing.

I will see a fair bit of the country over the next few weeks. I'm up
in the north here for four days, then I get back to Tokyo before
heading off to Osaka for two days. And sure then before I've even had
a chance to unpack, I'll be off to Okinawa for my hols.

It's at times like this that you really notice how long the bundle of
islands that make up Japan is: here in Iwate, it's still snowy enough
to go skiing; back down in the big smoke, Spring has sprung and the
cherry blossoms are out; and down in tropical Ishigaki, I can hope for
thirty degree days and sun splitting the trees. All in the same month!

Coming from a wee place like Ireland it still kind of boggles the mind.

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A preemptive strike

Seeing as how I managed to forget Saint Patrick's Day this year, I am getting in there early to wish a Happy Easter to all my family and friends all over the world.

These little chickies were a present from my folks - knitted for charity by a sister in their church. Pretty cute, eh? I think it looks like they're just chirping up a storm of Easter tidings.

They came with chocolate Easter eggs in them, but someone must have broken into my apartment when I was out and stolen them because they have been strangely empty for several weeks now.