Huh! Orientalism!

SA and I spent a cultural night tonight by seeing the opera, "Madama Butterfly." Man, this is the only opera that I can understand. The good thing was that there was subtitles too. That helped me understood a lot.

By the way, I was glad SA has a car to get there. It was raining so hard tonight.

The opera was good even though I think seeing operas played in Italy (Come on, E&L! Let's go to see operas in Verona!) must be much better, and I know it reflects pure Orientalism. I thought, "Geez, man, Japanese people, especially women, look like that to Western people's eyes?! I'm not like that." Well, if I'm like that, I wouldn't have been here as a student this old.

More than anything, I enjoyed the night away from school. Well, I know I can't totally forget about concerns about papers, research and other things related to school. Damn, I remember I have to rewrite one paper.

After the opera, well, before the opera too, SA bought me a couple of drink as my b-day presents. Thanks SA for drinks and giving me rides!

It's Just a Beach Ball

There was the second session with the counselor this morning. I told him a couple of things which I try not to think but come back to my mind on and off by distracting me from concentrating on things. Then, the counselor suggested me to try to think it's just a beach ball running down the river.

His theory goes, a beach ball is running down the river, it comes by you, you try to sink it because you get rid of it from your sight, but the beach ball pops up when you release it. So, he told me not to fight with the beach ball but to try to be an observer. The beach ball is not dangerous (it's just annoying), and therefore, I don't have to fight with it. Instead of fighting, observe it coming and going. Then, you will pay attention to the beach ball less and less.

Mm, that's interesting. And I thought, it is very important to have someone who gives you different perspectives to see things.

Bash Again

Thank GM for throwing a party for me, collecting people who I feel comfortable to be with. I feel blessed and belonging to their circle, hugging and kissing each other. I didn't expect that I would be given birthday cards by them, that GM would buy me a birthday cake, or that they would sing me the birthday song. Oh man, I was really moved. I was almost to cry. Thanks a bunch, guys!

B-day Wish at the Dental Clinic

I was scared of seeing a dentist here because I heard a lot about how expensive dental treatment are in the States. I don't feel comfortable at a dental clinic, in the first place, regardless of countries.

I'm lucky to have a good health insurance which covers even dental treatment. Thank Buddha. So, I asked CM if there's a good dentist around here, and she recommended to see Dr. Dexter. So, I made an appointment and went to his clinic.

My problem is not cavities, but I feel something sticky in my mouth all the time. Even I brush my teeth, it never disappears. I tried to ignore it for the last couple of months, but I couldn't stand it anymore.

At the clinic, I filled out the form before I saw the dentist because I was the first-time patient. I wrote down my personal information such as my address, phone number, birthday, and so forth. After a while, I was sent to the operatory. An assistant came, and late the dentist came. They checked the form that I filled out, and said to me, "Happy Birthday tomorrow!" Oh man, I like America. I fell in love with this dentist and assistant on the spot. Yeah, I'm a simple person.

Anyhow, the dentist didn't give me a clear explanation of what causes sticky stuff in my mouth today. Instead, he told me he would check out causes by the next session because there are many possibilities to my symptom. OK, I will come back in a week, and actually I enjoyed talking with them and felt comfortable at the clinic. So, no problemo.

When I left the operatory, the dentist said to me once more time, "Again, Happy Birthday!" Oh man, I like America.

Evolution vs Intelligent Design

I joined GL to watch a free movie on campus this evening. It was "Flock of Dodos," which is about Darwin's evolution and Intelligent Design. Well, for people like me who grew up with Darwin's evolution, the idea of Intelligent Design sounds ridiculous. And this movie makes fun of it with a very good sense of humor. Though it deals with academic theme (Well, in terms of evolution. Intelligent Design is not scientific at all), it is hilarious! You have a good laugh from it.

One very good thing that the movie pointed out is a huge gap between scientific scholars and ordinary people. Because intelligent scholars are not sincere to teach ordinary people with understandable words about evolution (the movie says biologists tend to simply ignore Intelligent Design, and they don't try to face it), ordinary people are easily inclined to things which are not necessarily scientifically proved but much easier to understand. Yeah, that makes sense. And the mass media is a source of trouble. They keep providing fragmented information without analyses to wide range of people. Well, so true.

The movie was followed by a discussion. The facilitator was one of anthropology professors this university. He looked an interesting, approachable person to me who is not familiar with anthropology at all. His explanations and answers were easy to understand and full of humor. That was fun overall!

Bash

Oh man, I'm so blessed to have these people who celebrate my B-day. They arranged the party for me, collecting birthday things such as a birthday cake and birthday balloons. Well, birthday balloons make you feel like you being a 3-year-old :)

It is always fun to hang out with them even though they are far younger than me. They are intelligent young guys, and I'm impressed by their knowledge, firm will and sense of humor, of course.

Thanks a bunch, guys. Sharing some time with me was a very nice birthday present to me.

B-Day Present!

I'm sooooooo fortunate in having good friends like YO! She sent me a box for my birthday which is this Saturday. I don't have enough words to express my feeling. I'm overjoyed at what she did to me, and I'm almost crying for joy.

Hearing knocking on the door, I opened the door and found a mail person standing with a box in her arms. "Duck?" "Yes, I am." "Here's a box from ... Japan." First, I thought, "Well, did I ask my mom to send anything, mmm???" Then, I noticed it was from YO by seeing her tidy handwriting on the box!

The box was full of Japanese stuff: bags of seaweed, noodles, etc., and her sweet message, of course. She included a (Japanese style) painting pen this time! I will draw something from now on, especially when I'm stressed out. That's gonna be a great pastime to me. Thaaaaaanks, YO, for your thoughtfulness!

Yakiudon

Ooooooh, tongiht's dinner was yakiudon, or fried Japanese noodles, with tons of seaweed flakes! Of course, the main and precious ingredients, noodles and seaweed, are from YO. It tasted very good, good enough to remind me of the food court of a shopping mall in Japan, kidding.

Sunshine

It was soooooooo beautiful today with the sunshine, and what is more, it was warm! Oh, I appreciate this weather. In order to enjoy the sunshine, I biked to the nearest park, and I took photos. The sunshine was almost sacred, well, I'm Japanese who still believes in animism. And I think the nature is respectable. Yeah, I know I'm kind of old-fashioned :(

Weird Tradition

Well, I know this hippie town is kind of weird, but I found out that it is really weird tonight. I was at the library as usual (Don't laught, it is my life here.). Suddenly, noise came from somewhere outside. People in the library were also curious about the noise, and they came to flock to the window to see outside. I asked someone what was going on. He explained that it's kind of tradition in the hippie town: the zombie parade on St. Velentine's Day. What?! Zombies on St. Valentine's Day?! What kind of relationship between the two?!

Anyhow, I joined them to flock to the window to look down the street to see what is going on. And I saw tons of people (not in zombie costumes but in plain clothes, though) walking down the street with their arms on the air, shouting and roaring mumbo jumbo. It's really weird and funny, but it was a nice pastime to distract me from books, grading, or whatever.

A Dollar Movie

It's fantastic to be able to see a mvoie for $1! It's much cheaper than renting a DVD. Thank SA, he has a car. The $1 theater is a little far, in the distance that you can't bike. So, he drove me to the $1 theater, and we saw "Charlie Wilson's War" ... at 10:10 p.m. Phew, I'm glad that I don't have class in the morning tomorrow. But in a sense, it's nice to hang out at night, especially after you grade undergrads' "uncodable" essays. You need to cut loose.

Well, as you know, I don't like Julia Roberts because she doesn't look elegant, sophisticated, gorgeous, or whatever. And Tom Hanks ... he might be a good actor, but I'm kind of tired of the "Tom Hanks." The good thing is, Philip Seymour Hoffman is in. Oh, he's good.

The story is all about that America did something terribly stupid, and you learn from the movie that America is still doing something terribly stupid.

Mini Me?!

Damn, my sweater shrunk! Look at the photo. I spread my shrunk sweater over a my-size sweater (it means my regular size). My sweater is now the size of 8 years olds or something :(

Music to the Ears

A girl from my GTF class spoke to me in the library this afternoon.

"I'm working on my paper now, and I found you like, 'Ah, my GTF!,' so I want to ask you questions about my paper ..."

I saw her in the library a few weeks ago, too. Then, she called me, "Hi my GTF." She is a cute, friendly girl. And she seems to be stufying hard because each time I see her, she is in the library. Oh, well, it's only twice. Am I overestimating her?

Anyhow, I like her calling me "my GTF," which sounds cozy to my ears :)

Hanging Out

I joined GL and her friend, MM, to see "I'm Not There" at Bijou this afternoon. The movie is supposed to be a biography of Bob Dylan, but it' really complicated. I was totally lost.

So, I asked GL and MM what it was all about while having dinner at Bel Ami. Oh, this restaurant is really nice and cozy, and a little bit fashionable (for this hippie town).

Anyhow, MM told that she was also lost because the structure of the movie is chronologically, geographically distractive. According to GL, the movie is based on lyrics of Bob Dylan songs, and therefore, it's not strictly a biography of Bob Dylan. That means, some parts of the movie are his illusions which don't make sense to the others. Mm, I see.

I have admired Cate Blanchett, but I thought today again she's really good. Though the story is complicated and confusing, it's worth to see the movie because of her performance.

Small World

MM is a professor of Japanese art, and she's been to Japan several times. So, we talked about Japan, and found that we have someone in common. It's my ex-coworker in Japan. She was a high school teacher of my ex-coworker in East Coast. What a small world we live!

Lunch with Professor

IA, one of my professor, took all her students to Evergreen to have lunch together. Well, "all her students" means a group of four including me. It's such a small class. Anyhow, I'm so glad to be in the small class to get to know each other and feel close to each other. And IA is approachable person even though she is a great professor with two Ph.Ds. Two Ph.Ds! Can you believe it?

OK, now, after enjoying free lunch (Thank, IA!), I have to get back to grading. Geez, it would take the whole weekend.

Girls' Night

I'm so glad that LF took me out tonight. She has been helping a veteran student organization to organize a performance. The performance is called "Telling," which was premiered tonight. So, LF took me there.

The performance was played by students who have experienced wars (Gulf War, Iraqi War, etc.) and the military life. I thought it'd be a daunting story, but in fact, it was not. It is well balanced with fun parts of military life and dreadful experiences in battle fields. The actors are all amatuers, but they did a good job. It was fun, but at the same time, it was really informative and sad, and you would see how those soldiers feel about the military. It's almost like love and hate relationship. They love the community feeling in the military, but they are plagued by what they see in battle fields.

LF also did a good job. She worked as a PR person for them, contacting with the media, organizing press kits, sending them to the media, and so forth. Thanks to her contribution, the venue was filled up. LF was so excited about it. She's a energetic, superwoman as I repeatedly say.

Chinese Dinner Party

ZY invited me for dinner at her apartment. Because it is Chinese New Year today (or yesterday? never mind), she cooked mainly dumplings and other Chinese dishes to celebrate. Well, actually, her husband cooked. She has a good, supportive, sweet husband.

There were other Chinese students who I know. One of them taught me how to make dumpling wraps! He made them easily and rhythmically, but I realized when I tried to make them that seeing and doing was a different story. It's really hard to make them round and thin! After making awkward-shape dumpling wraps, I gave up, and focused on observing their cooking.

It was such a fun night, eating good food, talking and joking around. I appreciate ZY and her husband's hospitality. Now, I really want to share an apartment with someone to have some fun.

The End of Diet

It's funny, my appetite is coming back. I have skipped meals a lot for the last couple of weeks, but now, my stomach urges me to feed it. Fukumame, or lucky beans, worked! It got rid of grief from my mind, not completely though, and helped me out of the breakup diet. I believe in fukumame now :)

Late Setsubun

What a nice surprise! YY sent me a box of snacks and ... what is it called? A relaxation item? Anyhow, after five hours in the library, finding something which gives you a feeling you are loved is terrific. I'm very lucky to have friends such as YY and YO and DF and DM and CM ... the list lasts forever ... who think of and care about me. I'm emotional now ... sob.

As soon as I found fukumame, or lucky beans, in the package, I munched some partly because I was hungry (I hadn't eaten since 2:00 p.m.!) and mostly because I wanted to remove evil from my body. I have been going through the hardest time since I came here. I need to ward off pain from my stomach and heartbreaking experience from my mind. I hope fukumame exerts its lucky spell very well.

Super Bowl Sunday

I appreciate very much GM to have a Super Bowl Sunday party at his home. Thanks to his invitation, I didn't have to stay all day at home lonely.

Anyhow, my cohort got together at his home, and started watching the game. Well, TV was on, but no one cared about the game at all because they were so busy talking. Well, my cohort is a group of chatty people, except me. It was fun, actually. I think I learned a lot of things about and from my cohort. Again, I felt blessed to be a part of my cohort. They are such a nice group of people, especially LF, I admire her because she's a superwoman!

Personally, I expected something (I mean, "malfunction") happen during the half-time show, but nay, nothing happened. For a person like me who doesn't understand the rules of football, the game doesn't mean anything anyway. Then, let's enjoy beer!

Though YO reminded me that today is setsubun, I forgot to eat a piece of pizza (instead of a maki roll) served there, facing the south-southeast direction, this year's auspicious direction :( I really hope this year do not turn out to be worse for me because I have already had a hard time.

Music

I was terribly feeling alone this afternoon, partly because I spent the whole day yesterday being with someone. I know I have to get used to this feeling, but it is not easy at all.

I thumbed through a local weekly newspaper, and found there was a show in WOW Hall tonight. The show was the one for which I wrote a review (I totally forgot about it because I wrote it long time ago), and that means I would be on the guest list. Thought it was drizzling outside, I decided to go because I thought my heart would break if I stay at home at night alone. I called WOW Hall, and asked if there's anyone who lives close to me, would go to the show tonight, and woundn't mind to pick me up on the way. Unfortunately, there was no one. OK, I bike.

Luckily, the rain was not bad. When I got there, the guy who I talked on the phone was waiting with towels ready. Such a sweet old man. I chatted with him and other staff for a while, and went downstairs to grab some drink. There, I talked with a guy who was checking IDs. And I realized that I was now a chatty person, speaking to anyone. Talking erases my grief.

It was the first time to see a show at WOW Hall. Tonight's show was sold out, but the venue was not completely packed of people (mostly teenagers and early 20s). So, I could keep my space, sitting in the back. Because the venue is not big, almost like half size of a elementary school gymnasium, I could see performers on the stage clearly even from the back. I felt comfortable, sitting and listening to music in the dark and colorful gleam.

The music of Blue Scholars was good. It's different from ordinary hip-hop. Their music is more mixed with other genres such as jazz, and has strong messages in somewhat mellow tone. I like that.

It was good to go there, though I hesitated a lot before deciding to go, because I met and talked with some new people. C who let me use the towels is such a lovely person. He shaked my hands when I left the hall, saying, "I'm glad you could come." He may not have meant anything, but what he told me warmed my heart. I'm glad to come.

All of Sudden

The world seems to open suddenly to me.

I went to a workshop around noon. I was alone when I got there, but a while later, a doctoral student from a different department who I met once in class showed up. She noticed me, and sat next to me. We talked about our terms, exchanged information about courses, and whatever. When I left the workshop, I asked her to exchange phone numbers and email addresses. And we did. It was much easier and more natural than I expected. Wow. I am proud of my efforts to make "friends" (though I don't like this meaningless word).

After the workshop, I had lunch with an assistant professor from South Korea. She told me about hardships that she experienced when she was a doctoral student in Canada. Her story encouraged me a lot, and I felt like I'm not the only person who are suffering. She asked me to have lunch again and go to the movies. Her offering made me feel good because I can think that at least this person feels comfortable, being with me.

After lunch, SA from Business School and I went to buy tickets for "Madame Butterfly" which will come here later this month. SA is also a new friend to me. We met in class, and found a common interest. Anyhow, we dropped by a coffee shop and talked about an hour. Yeah, he speaks a lot. When we got back to school, he took me a tour in Business School, and introduced a Japanese doctoral student to me. I asked her to hang out sometime when she has time. She said sure, but I don't know if it means "sure" or not because she is a Japanese :) Well, it's OK. The point is I could ask her to hang out. That's important to me. And during the tour in Business School, I saw someone who I know. So, we exchanged email addresses ... on and on.

Now at home, I feel like, "Wow, I met and got to know a lot of people who could be my friends." At the same time, I'm surprised at that I'm thinking positive.