Photos from St. Kitts!

Hi Friends,

Sorry I've been really bad at keeping up with my blog since my last job started in May, but I'm currently residing in New York's Upper West Side, and am going to start my new part-time job as a Specialist at the Fifth Avenue Apple Store.


The application process was pretty intense. After getting a recommendation from my friend's fiancee who works at the Apple Store in San Francisco, it was 2 weeks before getting an email to attend a recruiting workshop at a Residence Inn Hotel conference room. After about 2 hours of group activities, lectures, and questions, I was left to wait another two weeks before hearing that I got another individual interview with the folks at the corporate headquarters. That interview was one-on-one with one of the HR managers, and he said he'd let me know by the next Friday.

Next Friday I was anxiously awaiting a phone call, and when Saturday morning came, I assumed I didn't get it. The following Monday, I got a call for another interview the next day. Talk about short notice, but I was just happy that I made it for another interview, especially after not hearing from them last Friday.

That third interview was with a manager from the Fifth Avenue Store, and he said they'd let me know tomorrow. Once more, tomorrow came and went without hearing back from Apple. Thursday came, and I busied myself with another important interview I had that day for a well-paying job with good benefits and a perfect work-life balance, but doing mindless work with no opportunities for advancement. Walking home that afternoon, I checked my messages to find that one of the HR managers left me a voice mail to call him back with "exciting news". Arriving in my apartment, I called him back to hear that I got the Specialist Position! I was psyched about the possibility of working for Apple, arguably the most successful company of the past ten years. He asked if I was available to start that Saturday, November 20th, but I already had plans set to go to St. Kitts on a photography gig (more about that later). The alternative was to start on December 11, well after the Thanksgiving Holidays and the week after my trip to the Caribbean.

Now I'm back in New York after my little work trip as a photographer. I went to photograph some shots for an upcoming Newsweek article that one of my college room mates, Jerry Guo, will be writing soon. Here are a couple of pictures from the trip:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2213155&id=310721&l=b93a42737a

We stayed in a former sugar plantation the first night, and then in bungalows on the beach for the rest of the trip. We also learned how to sail Hobie Cats and did some great snorkeling. The food was, of course, amazing, and I ate lobster and conch at least once every day. Check out the pictures, and hopefully I'll write a bit more in the days to come.

Photos from Morocco!

Check out the new facebook album I posted of my Morocco pics!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2207621&id=310721&l=6ddda8ab46

Tokyo Trends

Parading protesters in Harajuku

Today I woke up and made apple pancakes for breakfast (and for a few more days). Then I met Alex, a friend from KCJS, in Harajuku where we walked around and people watched for a while. I ate a tremendous doner kebab for lunch with DOUBLE MEAT and it blew my mind. Whilst eating we observed a student protest against the government for more education support. The protest oddly resembled a Halloween parade as students were dressed up in Power Ranger outfits, Mickey Mouse suits, and carried various models of government buildings pierced with little flags of protest. It was the first protest I've seen of young people around my age and I was shocked at their political activity because I've never seen anything like that by young people in America. I do suppose the Japanese have a lot to protest about, but it was refreshing to see that kind of (somewhat facetious) activism.


Voyeurism at it best

Harajuku was insanity as always as a slow viscous flow of people trickled along Takeshita Dori. Gaijin tourists and locals alike wandered about (うろうろ）not really buying anything, just watching each other watch themselves. I present here a typical example of a weekend Harajukuite at some sort of Mad Hatter tea party where there is clearly more being distributed than your average cup of Earl Grey.

Mad Deals

Following a brief stroll towards Meiji Shrine and an impromptu text from Sarah (another KCJS-er) detailing a festival at Akasaka Shrine. Alex and I made our way to the end of the Ginza line to Akasaka station and emerged from the subway to find all the streets in the area closed. Despite the boundless pedestrian paradise, there was still a curious lack of strolling space as people streamed down the omiyage (souvenir) gauntlet towards the main gate. The main hall of the temple was unfortunately under renovation, but throughout the temple grounds hoardes of food stands were set up to cater (swindle?) festival observers and participants. I'm not sure exactly what the festival was for, but there were three omikoshi (portable hand-carried shrines), each representing either a company or some part of the neighborhood. Packs of men and women in Hapi Coats tromped around the block and down the main shopping street before arriving (some 45 minutes later) in front of the main hall where there was some shouting about working towards a "splendid Tokyo for all". Mobs of people observing the procession tried to capture the scene on whatever digital device they had on hand. Everyone lifted their cameras and cellphones above the people in front of them trying to capture a shot. Digital eyes craned about searching blindly for their festival targets. The crowd became a sea of cold blue displays and reminded me of our generation's dependency on technology and obsession with recording.

Pixellated vision

Tokyo Life

Just a quick update for now, but I moved in to my apartment in Tokyo last week. It's probably about 11 x 7 feet with just enough space for one twin bed, a book shelf and mini fridge. I live in a shared house called Yotsuya Mayflower House and after some initial problems with the landlord I've finally settled in and managed to fit all my luggages into this cubby hole.

My internship at Atelier Bow Wow also started last week and I've spent two days working on a model. It's a really relaxed atmosphere and the other interns seem cool, but I think there's a divide between the interns and Japanese people that I will hopefully be able to cross. I haven't had too much interaction with Tsukamoto (the principal) either. Hopefully I'll be able to talk with him more, but he's hardly in the office.

This past weekend was spent applying for jobs mostly, cooking a little, and hanging out with other Yale Alums. The weather is really nice here, cooler and not too hot so it's nice to have my window open in my little apartment. Anywho, just wanted to let everyone know I was still alive after the end of KCJS and that my internship has begun.

Just a few more Sakura

So I'm writing about the Sakura/ Cherry Blossoms again but only because of how amazingly incredibly beautiful they are. My parents and their friends visited last week and the week before and lucky for them the arrived at the perfect time of year when the sakura blossoms began to fall. One of the most beautiful spots in all of Kyoto during the sakura season is the Philosopher's Path, which is lined on both sides with tons of cherry blossom trees overlooking a small canal. When the cherry blossoms fall, their petals blanket the surface of the water and make the canal flow pink. Here's a picture of me when I'm all dressed up to go to a job interview on the day I went to the Philosopher's walk.

Along the Philosopher's Path where Japan's greatest modern philosopher, Kitaro Nishida once strolled

Speaking of job interviews, one of the offers I received was for a firm in Kyoto called FOBA. It's somewhat unknown and off the architectural mainstream, but they do some interesting work. I would be all for working there except for the pay and the hours. The pay is nonexistent and the working hours are 66 per week from monday through saturday. It's pretty insane, but that seems to be the norm for architecture firms in Japan. Unpaid internships (i.e. slave labor, indentured servitude, whatever you want to call it) for really long hours have become the custom here because there is such a long line of foreign students just itching to work in their office at whatever cost. Even a smaller more obscure firm like FOBA said that they get several applications from foreigners per week, even per day asking to work there for free. Apparently this has led to an environment where foreign workers and interns aren't appreciated at all as they are very very very readily and easily replaced. So, I'm trying do decide if such an experience is worth it and I think I will probably go through with it and take the hit to my savings account as working in a Japanese architecture firm was one of the goals I had when deciding to come here on the Light Fellowship.

That little diversion aside, here's a image of one of my favorite snacks and my favorite type of mochi, Sakura Mochi. Readily available during the sakura season, sakura mochi is roughly pounded rice still coarse unlike most mochis with red bean paste in the middle and wrapped in a cherry tree leaf. The leaf is one of my favorite parts as it imbues the mochi with a slightly salty yet sweet flavor that is characteristic of the cherry tree leaves and blossoms. I often stop at every mochi store I see and sample their sakura mochi searching for the best one. This particular one was from a shop near the intersection of Shirakawa-dori and Imadegawa-dori and it was very very good.

Delicious sakura mochi near ginkakuji

Finally, here is a picture of the sakura blossoms hanging down into Ryoan-ji, the most famous zen rock garden. I had visited this temple and garden before to contemplate its serenity in the summer, but coming at spring with the cherry tree drooping over the wall was a completely different experience. Delicate flower petals fluttered gently on the wind and settled lightly to rest on the mossy rocks and dissolved into the chalky white gravel. I would highly recommend coming to Kyoto during the cherry blossom season to see this and all of the many many other beautiful sakura sights that I was unable to include in my posts.

Weeping sakura hanging into the garden of Ryoan-ji

Nostalgic Citruses

Two weekends ago was the annual KCJS group trip to Miyajima and Hiroshima. Everyone in the program left on Friday and arrived on Miyajima later that morning for an exciting day of exploring Itsukushima Shrine and hiking to the top of the island. Miyajima is a small island in the Seto Inland Sea close to Hiroshima that has one of Japan’s most famous shrines, the floating Itsukushima Shrine. But seeing as how it was probably my 4th time there I’m gonna put that aside and focus on what happened after I left Miyajima on Saturday morning.

Instead of going to the Hiroshima Peace Museum for the upteenth time my friend and I decided to go take a ferry to some random island in the Seto Inland Sea that we found in the Lonely Planet guidebook. Departing from the group (with KCJS’s permission, of course) at the train station we took a train to the ferry port and boarded a 70’s themed ferry boat for Ikuchijima. After arriving and settling in, I explored the town to find Kozanji, an ostentatious temple/ theme park complex. Kozanji was founded by an Osaka steel magnate after he accumulated enough riches to turn from a worldly to a spiritual life and when his mother got sick. He built the complex as a bricolage of famous buildings from around Japan at a reduced scale and modified to suit his own tastes. I’ve uploaded a picture of a gaudyfied Tosho-gu from Nikko, which in its original state is considered one of the highest examples of Japanese Baroque in its exuberant and excessive decoration.


The souped up Japanese Baroque of the Tosho-gu shrine at Nikko recreated and enhanced at Kozan-ji on Ikuchijima

As I was racing around the theme-parked-themed temple engaging in one of Japan’s favourite pastimes, a stamp rally, I couldn’t help but feel that everything was familiar and that I had somehow been here before. Surely it was just the effect of a very successful replica of some other original building that I had previously visited. Yet, upon entering the last stamp rally station, I saw the unmistakably familiar sight of a white gate with two phoenixes perched on top. This was the exact same gate that I remember seeing the very first time I came to Japan in 2002 on a foreign exchange trip to Fukuyama. My high school friend, Matt Hecker, and I went with our host family to this place where I vaguely recall taking pictures of a large Kannon statue and passing this peculiar white gate with garish phoenixes. This experience is proof of my status as a Japanese neophyte eight years ago as I was completely ignorant of the significance of the buildings and their history until I saw them again on this trip. It was a pretty shocking experience to serendipitously run into a place I had been to before simply by randomly picking it from the Lonely Planet book because it looked like a quiet and relaxing island.


A view of the bridge between Ikuchijima and Innoshima. Note the citrus trees on the slope

The next morning my friend and I rented bicycles for ¥1500 and decided we would ride the 30 plus kilometers to the nearest train station. Our journey took us around Ikuchijima and through its verdant and luscious citrus slopes across a bridge to Innoshima. Innoshima was also full of citruses and we bought loads of them for only ¥800 and enjoyed a brief rest while sitting on a harbor break water. The cornucopia of citruses in this area is simply astounding and we bought a wide variety of tasty fruits. Whilst enjoying my anseikan my hand was suddenly raked by a plummeting brown mess of feathers. As I looked up and cradled my precious anseikan, I suddenly realized that the speeding feathery ball was actually a hawk that had swooped out of the sky and dive-bombed me in an attempt to steal what he probably thought was a tasty treat. I have no clue why he would be after a citrus fruit that could just as easily be found anywhere else on the island. After I recovered from the initial shock and chucked several projectiles in its direction, the hawk came back when I wasn’t looking and made another attempt to steal what was now the anseikan rind. I am still baffled by this bird’s behaviour, but after that it left me alone and I continued on my biking journey to Mukaishima. From Mukaishima, we took a ferry for ¥70 across the strait to the town of Onomichi, famous for its soy sauce ramen. When my stomach was sufficiently satiated I boarded a bullet train and made it back to Kyoto in time to finish my homework for the weekend.


CITRUSES!!! Anseikan, iyoukan, haruka, and hassaku in front of the Seto Inland Sea

Sakura Sakura Cherry Blossoms Everywhere!!

The end of March and the beginning of April heralds the Sakura (Cherry Blossom) season in Japan. Here are a few excerpts of my recent travels around Japan from Shizoka Prefecture to Hiroshima Prefecture.


This is the Cherry Blossom Road in IzuKyuuKouGen around 3/28. I traveled here with Jerry a few weekends ago on our Ryokan/Onsen trip. This random town in the middle of the Izu Peninsula was full of Cherry Blossoms that were not quite mankai (Fully Blossomed). I took a bus to the beginning of the cherry blossom road and then walked the full 3 km of cherry blossomy goodness back to the train station where we continued on to Ito.


Last weekend was the annual KCJS visit to Hiroshima on Friday and Saturday. On Saturday morning we were set free from the bonds of the program schedule and my friend and I took a ferry to Ikuchijima. There was an odd Disney-land style temple called Kosan-ji where there was an accumulation of different significant monuments from all around Japan. Pictured is a replica of the Tosho-gu from Nikko with some beautiful cherry trees in front.


Here's a picture I took of the cherry trees today when I was biking around to Kyoto.


This is a picture of one of Kyoto's oldest cherry trees. It's in Maruyama Park, one of the biggest parks in Kyoto which was chock full of Japanese people doing Hanami, watching flowers and drinking under the blossoms.


Here's the central garden at KooDaiJi with their weeping cherry tree. The checkered garden pattern was also set up for the annual late-night light up with some cheesy looking LEDs that changed colors. There were also glow-in-the-dark chunks of something scattered in the Zen Garden that only added to the tackiness.

Anyways the semester's wrapping up and I have a lot of work to do so I best get crackin. My parents are also coming on Wednesday so I have to prepare for their visit and get ahead in my work. Also happy belated Easter to everyone!