An Engineer's Guide to Cats

Having been owned by many cats over my lifetime, I have to tell you that this "guide" is priceless!

How many people does it take to. . .?

OK, here's a perfect example of a very typical situation in Tokyo. Something's malfunctioning with the automatic gates in the train station. What to do? Send in eight guys--seven to watch and one to do the work. You can't see the eighth guy in the picture, but he's hunkered down on the floor in front of the four guys on the left. I see this sort of thing all the time and it really explains why everything costs so much in Japan!

Another thing you can't see in this picture is, I assume, the uniformed station master standing just out of range of my viewfinder. He saw me aiming my camera and stepped back.

Sayonara sale

Today I hauled a bunch of stuff out on a little patio adjacent to my apartment and had a Sayonara Sale. While I don't know any of my neighbors, except to bow slightly and say a quick hello, they seemed most eager to see what I had on offer.


One neighbor has a cute little 3-year-old grandchild who came to see what was going on. I had anticipated her interest and had saved a pink pig bathroom set for her (no, I didn't buy it, it was given to me by one of my zany friends) and she was thrilled. She, her grandparents, and her mom and dad took the bulk of my things. Almost everything was free but they insisted on giving me a little money nevertheless.

Then I was totally surprised when one of their other grandchildren handed me a bag with two cans of chilled beer inside! I didn't realize until much later that the grandfather had dropped a 500 yen coin inside the bag. I do remember that he beamed as he watched his grandson hand it to me. Nobody spoke much English, and of course I don't speak Japanese, but it will be one of my fondest memories of Japan.

While I've heard--and seen firsthand--that most Japanese just toss their unwanted items in the trash, it made me feel good knowing that I wasn't adding too much to the massive landfills that must exist around Japan. Everyone who walked down my street stopped to dig through items and usually found a few things to take home. One lady came back about five times, as did the grandparents and their grandchild.

All in all, I think everyone felt a little happier with the "treasures" they took home, and I know I felt a little bit of an ache in my heart as I realized that in about a week I will be leaving Japan. Today erased some of the memories of the irritating things about Tokyo, and reminded me that no matter what country or city, people can interract with kindness and friendship. And best of all, today showed me once again that language is no barrier to what the heart can feel.

Segoi! (セゴイ！)

State of the art in Japan

Here's an advertisement for a new phone one of my students just bought. You can actually watch TV on the screen that flips into a horizontal position. It can also be used for web browsing, spreadsheets, Word documents, etc.

The phones in Japan are quite advanced and have all kinds of special features. There's even a phone that you can use to buy things from vending machines, convenience stores, and other places. Just wave a specially equipped cell phone in front of a sensor and the payment goes on your phone bill.



Some of the latest technology includes a bar code feature where you can use the camera to take a picture of a URL, which will then be automatically added to your address book, thus avoiding the need to type it yourself.

There are quite a few advertisements popping up around Tokyo that include a bar code type of "mosaic" pattern that can talk to your cell phone. For a picture of one of these mosaics and a more indepth explanation of this technology, take a look at the following article in the New York Times.

"In Japan, McDonald's customers can already point their cellphones at the wrapping on their hamburgers and get nutrition information on their screens. Users there can also point their phones at magazine ads to receive insurance quotes, and board airplanes using their phones rather than paper tickets. And film promoters can send their movie trailers from billboards."

There are many more articles about this Radio Frequency ID (RFID) technolody and its applications here and here.

Whether or not this cell phone feature is anything I want to use, I can't say. Maybe it's just one more way for advertisers to snag consumers, and believe me when I say, "Nobody likes shopping more than the Japanese."

Can this be true?

Yesterday I was teaching a lesson to a Japanese business man, probably in his late 20s or early 30s. The lesson was about ordering something over the phone and we were doing a roleplay where he was buying a sweater from Land's End.

When we got to the part about giving his credit card information, he appeared to be baffled. I asked him to just make up a credit card number and he said, "1234." Then I said, "Well, credit cards usually have a lot more numbers," and wrote on the whiteboard to show him a long row of numbers resembling most credit cards. He looked surprised to see so many numbers.

Then I asked him for the expiration date and again, the same look of total confusion. It took what seemed like an unbelievable amount of effort and simplification to explain to him the concept of "expiration date." Finally, I said, "Let's look at one of your credit cards as an example."

"I don't have any credit cards," he said.

Curious and wondering if it was just him or if it ran in the family, I asked incredulously, "Really? What about your parents? Do they have any credit cards?"

"No," he said, "cash only."

Even though it might sound a little strange, I had to step back for a moment to take it all in. Is it really possible to live in the 21st century without a credit card?

It's actually not such a bad idea, when you stop to think about it. In America, where banks send a slew of zero-interest credit cards out in the mail to recent high school graduates, and where so many people find themselves in mountains of credit card debt, a "cash-only" society might be a wonderful thing!

Update: From my experience so far, most Japanese I've met have at least one credit card. This student was probably in the minority.

Step away from the sushi and no one will get hurt

Does the Agriculture Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka have nothing better to do with his time?

I mean, aren't there more pressing things to worry about? Like avian flu, or BSE (mad cow disease)?

Friday, Matsuoka gave the go-ahead to creating a label for "authentic" Japanese sushi. Apparently, there's been grave concern in Japan that people worldwide are eating sushi that's not, well, real Japanese sushi. They're worried about the bastardization of their cuisine, but not about the derision they face by the international community over this asinine labeling idea, most of which will be paid for by the Japanese government.



Not only are the purists worried about the authenticity of sushi ingredients, but also the atmosphere of the restaurants! I guess that means if you had a restaurant that didn't look enough like a "real" Japanese restaurant, you could not get a Japanese Seal of Sushi Restaurant Authenticity to post in your window.

I wish I were kidding, folks, but I'm not!

So, here's something to ponder: In almost any supermarket or convenience store in Japan, French red wine is sold chilled which would make a French winemaker weep. Spaghetti, one of the most popular dishes in Tokyo, is made with slices of bacon or regular ham and tastes curiously sweet. Pizzas are made with corn, tuna, mayonnaise, octopus, boiled eggs, natto, and nine million other ingredients that are definitely not "authentic" Italian cuisine. New York style cheesecake, cut into tiny rectangles, looks more like a tart than a cheesecake and has very little cream cheese. Mexican cuisine is made with almost no authentic Mexican ingredients.

Should food authenticity labels be required in "ethnic" restaurants in Japan? Or is Japanese food considered the only food so pure, so creative, or so intensely flavorful to require "protection" from those who would bastardize it?



It's an idea like food authenticity labeling that sets Japan apart from the rest of the world. To attempt to know the Japanese mind is not for the faint of heart.

And speaking of "not for the faint of heart," here's a picture of what's become my favorite sushi, even though it took me over two years of living in Tokyo before I would even try it because it looked downright scary. It reminded me of little golden-colored cat tongues. Here's uni, a sweet, buttery-soft sea urchin, that tastes like a piece of heaven, but only if it's impeccably fresh.



And finally, do you think there should be an all-out ban on things that are disguised to look like sushi, but that aren't actually sushi? There are millions of fake sushi items here in Japan, but this one is my favorite! Must look for one of these USB computer memory sticks!

Parasite singles

According to Wikipedia:

Many young Japanese adults choose to live with their parents, rather than seek a separate residence, a phenomenon known as parasite singles (パラサイトシングル). A 1998 survey by the Ministry of Health and Welfare indicated that about 60% of single Japanese men and 80% of single women between the ages of 20 and 34 lived with their parents.

That survey was taken almost 10 years ago. I wonder if it's changed any since that time. With the cost of living in Tokyo, I can imagine that the numbers are even higher now.

Top 10 Rants

Don't know why, but lately I've been feeling really annoyed by some of the things I experience here in Tokyo. Usually I can just brush it off, but suddenly I feel like I'm drowning in it. Everywhere I turn, I'm ready to go postal and I've got to get over this!

Rant 1
Why can't people divide the street or sidewalk in half--one half going one direction and the other half going the other direction? I mean, cars move that way, right? Why not people?!!! This rant also includes the stairs in train stations which are clearly posted with "up" and "down" arrows, yet no one pays any attention to them.

Rant 2
And, why can't people walk in a sraight line insead of meandering all over the place like they've taken up residence on an ant hill?

Rant 3
And speaking of walking, why in Hell do people have to walk while reading their keitai (cell phone)? Picture a million people walking along at a quick pace, and then suddenly the person in front of you stops with no warning as they decide at that very moment to read something of interest on their cellphone! I can't tell you the number of times this has nearly caused a chain reaction freeway-like pileup!

Rant 4
Has anyone over here ever heard of holding a door open for the person behind them? How many more times am I going to get a door released in my face? Do I need to start wearing a face guard? Now I've taken to shouting, "Thank you!" every time someone does that. The really strange thing is that no one apologizes!

Rant 5
Picture me getting to my train platform early. I get there early so I can stand at the front of the line which you would think would ensure me of a better chance of getting a seat on the train. At the last second, just as the door opens and before anyone can even get off the train, some obachan (old woman) dashes in from the side and pushes her way past everyone else to grab the only seat left on the train! Don't let those old gals fool you! They're as spry as chickens and as determined as hungry wolves!

Rant 6
Men, outside of a social situation or face-to-face meeting, are rude, rude, rude! For all that bowing and humility they show on the TV news when they've been caught falsifying their company's financial reports, their manners fly out the window once they leave the office. Men here feel it's their inalienable right to go first or be first, and what's worse is that the women here accept that! Men do not hold doors open for women, pull chairs out, help with coats, carry packages, or do anything else that sets gentlemen apart from. . .from. . .whatever is the opposite of gentlemen!

Rant 7
Bicycles are a menace and anyone riding one should be exiled to some country where there are only mountains and rocks! Bicyclists and pedestrians are two opposing forces that should never come together in a crowded city of 30 million people. I'm fed up with dodging bicycles and if I hear one more chirp from those ridiculous bicycle warning bells, I'm going to jam my umbrella into their spokes!

Rant 8
Speaking of bicycles, what size brain do you think it takes to not realize that you shouldn't park directly in front of doors to shops, banks, grocery stores, etc.? This seems so obvious, yet everywhere I go, there are those damned bicycles to climb over!

Rant 8
Double and triple bagging. Is it really necessary to put my newly purchased undies inside a small bag, seal it with tape, and then place that bag inside another larger bag which is also sealed with tape? If I buy a bottle of dish soap when I'm at the supermarket, does that need to go inside a separate bag before it goes into a larger bag? When I buy a bag of pickeled vegetables that's already factory sealed and isn't leaking on grocery shelves, why is it necessary to put them inside separate little bags before they go inside my shopping bag?

Rant 10
Do mothers here not realize that they should hold the hands of their very young children while on escalators? I nearly had a heart attack one day when I saw a little girl, about 4 years old, race up ahead of her mother and FALL TWO STEPS AWAY FROM THE TOP OF THE ESCALATOR WITH HER HANDS SPREAD OUT IN FRONT OF HER! I was too far away to quickly yank her up, but somehow she stood up at the last split second before her hands could go into the disappearing step! The mother looked oblivious to the danger. I almost never see mothers holding their children's hands, even when they're getting on and off trains. I've heard stories here enough times about small children falling between the trains and the platforms to think people would be a little more careful with their children. While infant mortality rates are among the lowest in the world at birth, the statistics shoot up frighteningly high between 2 and 4 years old.

So those are my rants. I just needed to get them off my chest. I'm really not an angry, miserable person. Really. . .