Fish in a Pond

Japanese version posted on April 25^th, 2011

We have decided that Dai, our pet goldfish is to be enrolled to an elementary school in Tokyo. When purchased 6 years ago, she was only 6 cm (2 in.), but is now 24 cm (10 in.) and is ready to take over the pond. One problem is that she is not the best swimmer, as she has been kept in a small tank for all her life. Hunting for food is not her strength either, and has no friends. We now regret about spoiling her but it is too late.

The pond is located in a courtyard of an elementary school, and there are large Koi fish and goldfish swimming around. This school may not suit her… What if she is bullied around…

We pushed her out of the plastic bag, and she slowly floats into the pond. Her gold/red body is glowing and is easy to be spotted. She settled herself at the bottom of the pond, but in the next second, she was being chased by other fish, swimming as fast as she could for the first time.

We were later told by one of the faculties that she spends most of the day quietly by the wall of the pond. I guess getting use to a bigger world may not come in a day. 

Dust in the Wind

Japanese version posted on April 24th

I spent a decent amount of the week taking apart furniture. Desk, shelves, bed, all had to be cut into smaller than 50cm (a bit less than 2ft), so it was a demolition bash for the power tools. Snowing saw dust didn’t help Sahe's breathing, who is already suffering from pollen allergy, and so the door to my room had to be shut airtight. at all time When large furniture leaves the sight, it starts to have a feel of moving out. Our lifestyle is adjusted according to what we have left, and sleeping bags become our new futon.

When taken apart, these furniture look so small...

The Demolition Man

Japanese version posted on April 20^th, 2011

Taking apart furniture and appliances became my daily routine.

The courage to face challenges

Japanese version posted on Apr. 18th

“Man cannot discover a new land unless one has the courage to lose sight of the shore.” 

-André Paul Guillaume Gide

When I informed my former boss who now is in charge of the Beijing branch about leaving the work, he sent me the quote above by the Nobel literature award recipient, André Paul Guillaume Gide (1869-1951). Words of the French writer appeared fitting to our situation, and immediately became my favorite quote. Since I enjoyed it so much, I decided to look for similar quotes in other culture, and I came across following:

You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs  

-American proverb

It is very American to state such simple message through simple food. It also is very much macaroni-western to say that tearing down is necessary in order to build something new.

Only those who have the courage to take a penalty miss them  

-Roberto Baggio

The former Italian soccer player who has won both Ballon d'Or and the FIFA World Player of the Year, is often regarded as one of the finest soccer player of all time. After his retirement, he is now known to have devoted himself in various famine awarenesses, including the nominated role of Goodwill Ambassador of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. And in 2010, he received the World Peace Award, an annual award bestowed by Nobel Peace Prize laureates. However, the most memorable moment of Baggio for the soccer fan is moment after his missed penalty shot that cost Italian team the world cup of 1994. He still was a hero.

Step 2 (cont'd): Which Way to America?

Japanese version posted on April 15th

22 months after the initial discussion with a lawyer, all procedure has been completed for the permanent resident application. At the end of the interview at the embassy, they handed me a letter stating, “You have completed the interview portion of your application and you visa has been approved”, but this still does not put me at ease, as they still have my passport for the next 1 – 2 weeks. Anyway, following numbers are what it took for us to apply for the “green card”.

2            number of visit to the lawyer’s office

55          emails sent to and received from the lawyer

44          pages of documents prepared for the application

42          corrections on documents we requested to the lawyer

3            corrections the interviewer had pointed out to us

2            number of visit to the embassy

823        total of application fees in US dollars (lawyer fee not included)

7-8         number of questions asked to Sahe during the first interview

7-8         number of questions asked to Yoshi during the final interview

7            days took to receive my passport back from the embasy

2            years I will be considered as a conditional resident

45          minutes took to pass the customs at JFK without a green card

15          minutes likely to take to pass the customs at JFK with a green card

Upon completing the second step, we are finally able to move onto the final stage, which is to enter the US. The limit for the entry is within 6 months of physical examination, which gives us until mid-August. We wanted to make sure that this final procedure is taken care of before taking off for the journey, and so it will likely be after the “golden-week” holidays in mid-May. That gives us about 3 weeks before the departure, and we still have so much to take care of. Packing, applications to remove ourselves from the residency, pension and healthcare, choose the shipping agent, apply for visas for the countries to visit, vaccines...

Japan vs. the US: lifestyle

Japanese version posted on Mar. 22nd

11 days have passed since the first earthquake. Food, electricity, fuel, and consideration have suddenly disappeared from our convenience store-dependent city lives. People sway along with overwhelming amount of information, and dance against their will with records of magnitudes and micro-sieverts. In such crisis, the true characteristic of human beings becomes visible. People buying out stores, not considering about others, and is sad to see such self-centered, irresponsible and inhumane action among our people.

It has been 3 days since Sahe has left for Hawaii. Our stance towards this crisis was visibly different; her belief was “better to be safe than sorry”, where mine was “stay for my final weeks at work”. We were able to agree to go separate ways for a bit while, and that was ok for us. However, it was not necessarily viewed the same by others here. They saw her action as, “escaping the scene of fire when there are others still in the building”.

Upon hearing such comment, I started to think about the characteristic of us, the sun worshipping, goldfish tenders. Then, I noticed comments mentioned by international medias about us. Words such as “patient”, “cooperative”, “have high threshold for pain”, “accepting of situation” are commonly used for our description, and I started to wonder where these myths came from.

The first thing that came to mind was the phrase often used by civilians during WWII. People chanted, “won’t want anything until the victory”, and gave up metal-ware such as pans and buckets to make weapons and ammo. This mentality of being strong as a group was commonly practiced even back in the 1940’s, but this action, sometimes was merely a reflection of a fear of being the black sheep.

Being average. This is a naturally accepted concept to this far-east Asian community. The country calculates the standard, from the physical appearance like height, weight and cholesterol level, to income, allowance, and even one’s lifespan. The public reviews these numbers to make sure you are within the boundary of the ordinary; that you are not the nail that sticks out. The comfort zone is being the same as your neighbor, and who announces the information: no other than the televised media. People are easily controlled with fixed information provided by the government through media, and a good example was making people feel guilty about escaping the country, by announcing the controlled blackout. People felt the necessity of staying and taking care of homes, and so the majority stayed, instead of rushing the airport to create chaos and panic, just like the government wanted.

It became clear, due to this crisis, that Sahe and I are a family of multi-cultural background. We both knew that she is more American, and I Japanese, but never knew how much apart we are from each other, since we both share and understand the secondary culture of our teammate’s valued as the primary. What was far more important, was that we were able to value each other’s decision based on our instincts. Self-based individualism vs. community-based dependence. We will see how the next generation reacts to such lifestyle with backwards parents.

Japan Earthquake

Japanese version posted on Mar. 14th

Friday, March 11^th, 2011. 14:46 at Heiwajima, Ota-ku, Tokyo. I was at my desk trying to sort out my previous exhibition data. In prior to departing the office in less than a month, this has become my routine work, along with actual work. Suddenly, the floor pulls to one way. I look up from the LCD display to see any object moving, and find a pull string on a blind-curtain swaying back and forth. Then a bigger push from ground upward…

The latest disaster in Tohoku and Kanto region was measured first at Magnitude 8.8, and then revised two days later to 9.0. The casualty and missing people is over 4,300. Lifelines including telephone lines overload. Controlled blackout became people’s concern, and started to buy everything in stores. Nuclear leakage crisis swept along the Pacific coast, and our proud public transportation system failed, as trains were delayed and canceled. People feared daily earthquakes, Tsunami, and radioactive the contamination. For us Japanese, earthquake disaster is not uncommon, but this one was more enormous than ever imagined.

People from all over the world are sending messages, care, and spirit towards our way. It is beautiful to see such care for one another, but unfortunately it took me an chaotic disaster to see it. These have become our strength to rise and stand again in such unbearable time. It is hard to think of a thing that one can do in such crisis, but the least we can do is to make a small contribution to show our support. So we did. It was Sahe’s idea, as it also was when the disaster occurred in Haiti.

We cannot live the same pain people are going through, but we want to make sure that our thoughts are with those people, to somehow ease from it and heal the wound.

I have been reconnected with long-lost friends. Again, it is unfortunate to think it took a natural disaster, but I am grateful of those who had kept us in mind. 

The following is the ten largest(magnitude level) earthquakes since 1900.

Chili Earthquake                      May 22, 1960　 M9.5     5,000 died

Good Friday Earthquake         Mar 28, 1964    M9.2     125 died from Tsunami in Ala.

Indian Ocean Earthquake       Dec 26, 2004    M9.1     over 226,000 died

Japan Earthquake                   Mar 11, 2011     M9.0

Kamchatka Earthquake          Nov 04, 1952    M9.0     Tsunami reached Hawaii

Chili Earthquake                      Feb 27 2010  　 M8.8      500 died from Tsunami

Great Alaska Earthquake       Feb 04 1965   　M8.7      Large Tsunami occured

Sumatra Earthquake              Mar 28 2005     M8.7      death toll about 1,300

Andreanof Island Earthquake   Mar 09 1957     M8.6      Volcano erupted in Ala.

Medog Earthquake                 Aug  15 1950     M8.6     at least 1,500 died