fantastic failures forged into fantabulous fun!

Well, here's my last post from Japan. I leave for the delightfully cheddar filled Wisconsin in a little more than 12 hours. My plan is to stay up all night, blogging, reading the crappy Baldur's Gate novel that is my only reading material, and packing, so that when I get on the plane I'll actually sleep and maybe be on something of a normal sleep schedule when I get home.

My time in Tokyo was pretty much a series of fantastic failures.

Failure #1 - Shinjuku
Jennie (my Mat Sci friend from Berkeley) who now works for a semiconductor wafer characterization company, was going to meet me on Thursday. She got sent to Japan to install their company's machine, and was supposed to have Thursday night off before she left. Too bad at the very last minute, her boss told her she had to work more. Double too bad with knobs on that I didn't find this out until after waiting and searching for her at Shinjuku for an hour or so.

Fantabulous Fun #1
After going to the hotel she was supposed to stay at and confirming that she didn't even have a reservation, I realized that I was next to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Buildings. They're 45 stories tall, and you can go to the top for free, as opposed to Tokyo Tower, which costs 2,000 yen (~$20). Boo yeah.

Fantastic Failure #2 Roppongi
Roppongi is supposed to be a posh shopping district. It is. I do not have a posh spending budget, so it was depressing. I spent the whole day drooling over thousand dollar purses, 500 dollar shoes, and the perfect coat. It's Dolce and Gabbana, and only costs $3,000. My new goal in life is to become a Dolce and Gabbana wearing professor/mother.

Fantabulous Fun #2
This was the best mall I have ever been in. The fantastic architecture somehow made the whole place (which was huge) seem like a series of small neighborhoods, but it still had really large, beautiful spaces with waterfalls or skylights or patios. There was some sort of live concert that night, and I found a new favorite artist, Yoshitomo Nara. He's sort of a modern, Japanese Edward Gorey.

Fantastic Failure #3 Ueno Park Museums
On Monday I intended to go to the Tokyo National Museum. I'd been to the one in Kyoto, which was amazing, and my guide book recommended this one as well. I was going to spend most of the day there and then meet Sachiko-san in the late afternoon.

Turns out that in Japan, the museums are all closed on Mondays. So is the zoo, so I didn't even get to see Ling-ling or whatever the panda here is named. Stupid zoo. Stupid museum.

Fantabulous Fun #3
While aimlessly wandering around the park, trying to decide what to do, I ran across a couple temples which were pretty, and then found a couple guys playing music in the park. They were all dressed up in the traditional Japanese guy's clothing and playing some sort of banjo-like affair. It was so awesome! They were really great musicians, and very funny as well. For the last number their violin friend joined in and, shoot, that was some nice music.

That night I stopped for sushi at some random place near the station. I ended up talking to a Texan lawyer for Motorola who does semiconductor chip patent law. I really didn't expect to end up talking about non-volatile RAM (the main application for my material, bismuth ferrite) over sushi in Tokyo. I ate about $20 worth of sushi, and was soooooo full. I gotta stuff some more in tomorrow, even if it is just 7-11 sushi. I trust Japanese convenience store raw fish more than I do than Wisconsin's. It's just something about being more than a thousand miles away from the ocean that puts me off.
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There was one thing that should have been spectacular failure, but turned out pretty well.

Nikko

Today I went to the Yosemite of Japan, Nikko. My first recommendation to go here came from a fabric saleswoman in Asakusa, who told me that "You be able to enjoy the harmony with nature and beauty." It's a resort town with lots of hot spring spas, World Heritage temples, and amazing waterfalls. It's advertised as being "The real Japan" and they're not kidding. This is rural as touristy rural gets. For instance, the train station didn't have turnstiles, just a guy who took your ticket. No one spoke any English. There were only 2 lane streets, but mostly 1 way only. The local specialty is soy milk skin. You know how if you boil regular milk too long, it gets that gross skin? Well, same with soy milk. Then they eat it.

Anyway, I left early this morning at about 6am. I knew which train I had to take to get to the Nikko station, but that was it. Literally. I had no map, no bus schedule, and only knew that there were waterfalls and something called Rinnoji temple. (for more information than you could ever possibly want, go here. For a quick taste, here's one of the gates.)

But this is where I kicked butt. I asked for directions all over the place, randomly got off the bus when other people did, and generally had a fantastic time. The waterfall at Kegon is absolutely spectacular, and the 2200 yen I spent in bus fare and 500 yen elevator ride to the bottom of the falls was probably worth it. I spent the rest of the afternoon lazing around Lake Chuzenji, wading into the water and getting suburnt after falling asleep on the shore. The place even smelled great - a lot like the Sierra Nevadas, with that clear, cool air and the hint of warm pine needles...

I think I might have to live here. There's even a church.

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Well, this was far too long a post with far too few pictures. I'll get home and post pictures from the dance festival in Harajuku, Nikko waterfalls and elephants on crack, and the giant stuffed panda at Ueno.

the stuff National Geographics are made of

It all started with a tiny spoon.

I returned to the common room of my floor at my hostel, and an overly nice person was eating salad with a tiny spoon. She smiled and said hi, so I felt obligated to make some sort of small talk. Hence, a tiny spoon comment. Something brilliant like "That's a tiny fork you've got there."

This first led to a discussion about how it was, in fact, a yogurt spoon, and ended up as a retelling of Marie's adventures around the globe. They include

• A horse race in the Egyptian desert that ended in getting mobbed by Arabian men trying to cover her up to survive a sandstorm
• Getting stuck in a boat on a rock in Thailand and having to be rescued by helicopter
• Hiring a Cambodian tour guide to take her hiking so that she wouldn't find land mines instead
• Spending six weeks in the Borneo jungle with only one tour guide, some soap, and a sleeping bag. Food came from villages that fed them in return for taking packages to the next village or just straight up hospitality. Showers occured when it rained, and consisted of stripping naked and soaping as quickly as possible. Clothes washing took place shortly thereafter.

Most recently, she's spent 6 months in southeast Asia and is climbing Mt. Fuji tomorrow, despite minor injuries. She goes home to exotic Canada on Thursday.

What I want to know is how you stop. Eventually, these amazing travelers of the world must slow down and get too old to do things like swim up the Amazon River, fighting off the crocodiles bare-handed. But how do you go from exploring abandonded Mayan temples to clipping coupons to save 20 cents on cheddar cheese? Maybe you start making adventures for yourself, like "How many wild cannibal grandchildren can I lock into one closet?" Or maybe you start drinking yourself stupid, so that even boiling your broccoli tasteless is exciting.

My plan is to keep working until I get too senile to be productive and I get forcibly retired. At that point, it'll be time to meddle in my family's lives and become a burden whose only redeeming quality is the massive amounts of wealth I will have earned from my wildly successful academic career.

In which I prove I am my mother's child and disprove a stereotype

After a rather aimless day yesterday (I met with Dr. Hwang, and then Jennie was supposed to meet me in Shinjuku but at the last minute had to work some more so all I did was buy bread and see the view of Tokyo from 45 stories up) I thought it'd be nice to actually see something today. I started off by looking around my neighborhood, Asakusa. There's a temple here that's famous for it's enormous paper lantern. It was, in fact, as enormous as reported. It's enormosity made an enormous impression on me, you might say. But it's probably better if you don't. It just sounds silly.


Surrounding the temple is a large number (but not enormous - we're done with that gag now) of small schlock stores. These alternated with shoe stores (at least 20% of all the stores in teh area were selling shoes - it was kinda wierd), kimono shops, and shops that sold the fabric for kimonos. I bought quite a bit of fabric, proving that Mom had a bit more influence on me than is necessarily good for my pocketbook.


All this wandering around had basically gotten me lost. But that was ok. Exactly at the point where I decided to start worrying and trying to find my way back, I got to another metro station. It was time to go to Shinjuku, anyway.


Indending to make a brief stop at my transfer point, Ueno, I got out to go see the park adjecent to the JR station. While wandering around the shady walkways, I pulled out my trusty new guide book (plus one point to me for swallowing my pride and buying the stupid thing - it's already been fantastically useful) and looked at all the things you can do in Ueno Park. The book said that the National Museum was worth a full day's exploration, so I decided to save that for when I had more than three hours. Plus, there was a temple (or shrine, I forgot) that was open until 6, so I thought a short trip into the National Science Museum would be nice.

I walked inside the gates and was accosted by a guy in incomprehensible Japanese. Something about one or two exibits. Quickly using my Batman-like powers of observation, I saw large pictures of penguins and thought "There must be a special penguin exhibit. I like penguins." (I had obviously changed out of Batman mode, since penguins are not my archenemy.) So I said I wanted to see two. This sent me down to buy a special penguiny ticket, with a special penguiny price of 1300 yen.

The penguin exhibit turned out to be about nankyoku, or Antarctica. Penguins were involved, but they were not live. Also, lots of crazy kanjis were involved so I got to look at stuff and get super confused. I did get to see a lot of cool stuff like a propellar from one of the Japanese expeditions, a model of their current outpost, and lots of micrographs of asteroids where you can see the different grains that recrystallized (possibly during entry into the Earth's atomosphere? I just guessing here because I certainly don't know the Japanese words for crystal structure or anneal.)

I'd had about enough befuddled staring by now, so I headed out. I spotted a sign that said 'rocket launcher' so I went to go check it out. It was super big, so when I came around the corner and first saw it, I said "Oh wow!" to which the Japanese dad next to me replies "You come from America?"

Contrary to all warnings I've heard about Tokyo people's rudeness, this quick exchange led to him and his family going aroudn the entire museum with me and then taking me to rotating sushi. It was excellent Japanese practice for me, since his English was very poor, despite being able to speak nearly fluently about Begas (Las Vegas) and the Grand Canyon. Akagi-san, you rock.

Inspired by Lost in Translation (again courtesy of the guide book) I went to the Shibuya Starbucks to watch people at Hachiko, the busiest intersection in Tokyo. This is what it looked like every three minutes:

(by the way, I apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. This is likely to continue until either a) I get real inspiration or b) I get home and can upload the pictures from my camera.)

Tomorrow's either going to be the National Museum and Ueno Park part 2, or Roppongi Hills and Kabuki (if they're performing at all tomorrow.) Sunday's already pretty planned out. Go to Harajuku to watch all the crazy cosplay costumes, head back to Asakusa for the festival (maybe - this depends on what time said festival actually takes place), and then meet Sachiko-san for a delicious tofu dinner and beer and conversation. Then Nikko on Monday, the alternate plan from tomorrow for Tuesday, and that's it.

My, how Tokyo time flies.

...and we're live

Well, hello, Tokyo!

Yesterday I arrived in Shinagawa (big Tokyo transportation hub) for our final farewell party. Despite almost stealing someone else's host parents and drinking about a gallon of margaritas in the entrance of TGI Fridays (it's amazing how low you'll be willing to stoop after only two months), it was a pretty good party/farewell experience. Today I moved to my hotel.

Ok, hotel is a complete lie. I'm staying in a hostel, for 2,000 yen per night. Here's the only difference, as far as I can tell:

It's just one little s, right?

This wouldn't be such a big deal except for the fact that last night was spent in Le Pacific Maridien, a beautiful and overpriced sort of place, courtesy of JSPS. For the first time in my life, I took advantage of the many services they offer and had a box of books shipped home (my only effort was supplying the books and an address - the rest they did for me) and having my still too large suitcase sent to the airport. It'll be there at the aiport for me when I leave in a week. All of this for the modest price of less than 10,000 yen in all!

I'm not sure if it's a testament to my pathetic packing abilities, or to my poor planning skills, or to the ridiculosity of the Japanese economy, but these sesrvices were totally and completely worth every single yen. Taking the subway to the hostel was difficult enough with only a bag, backpack, and purse.

The rest of the day was typical Sitchel. After spending part of a lovely afternoon with a couple other people from the Summer Program, I had had enough and needed to be antisocial. So I got some 500 yen coffee from Starbucks and went a 100 yen shop. The alarm clock, two batteries, handtowel, lunchbox utensils, bento bag, snacks, and several adorable little dishes cost about two grande iced lattes.

After deliberately retracing my steps to two separate bookstores that I'd seen on the way and failing to find anything in English, I got fed up, tried to get back to the Metro station, got lost, and almost ran into an international bookstore that had a whole floor of books in English. As soon as I finish this, I'm going to curl up with my new purchase, since I have to read it before I go because there is approximately 2 square millimeters of spare space in my luggage. (Incidentally, said luggage is currently locked up until 11 am tomorrow morning. This means that I have to wear a subset of pajamas and today's clothing for my meeting with Dr. Hwang tomorrow morning. Fantastic.)

In an attempt to at least see something touristy and pseudo-Japanese during the day, I headed to Akihabara, the electric town district. I carefully selected a gourmet meal at Yoshinori's (Japanese McDonald's) and wandered, moth-like, towards the brightest lights that I could see. I succeeded in discovering that Final Fantasy III is coming out tomorrow, that good J-pop does exist but costs at least 25 bucks per CD, and that I can get a duty-free electronic dictionary for about 120,000 yen from the nice Uzbeki salesgirl, but only if I come back on Friday after 2pm.

This is not what the guidebook led me to expect. I thought it'd be a ton of clubs, bars, video game parlors, pachinko, etc. In reality, it is nerd paradise.

So, in conclusion: I'm at a super-safe, super cheap hostel, minus most of my luggage as well as clean clothing for tomorrow, and spent my first day in one of the metropolitan centers of the world in coffee shops and bookstores. Go team Sitchel!

Hamburgers and diffraction (butt wait, there's more!)

Phew! It's been a busy week or so since I last posted. I've had two farewell parties, appeared in one yukata show, spent an evening with Da-kyum and Ignace, and had my first typhoon experience. Today's my last day at SPring-8, so I had to say goodbye to everyone as well. On the one hand, I'm very sad to be leaving all my new friends, but on the other, I'm also excited to be coming home to my beloved Madison. (Who ever thought that I'd enjoy anything in the Midwest? Next thing I know, I'll be saying that I like the South and enjoy the hurricanes.)

Once again, I've put off writing for far too long and I'll have to break it up into chunks. Today will be the

Hamburger Party!!

The first farewell party was at Ignace's apartment. I don't think I've properly introduced him yet:


He's a French scientist working here on the Taiwan beamline and is fluent in everyday Japanese as well as English. Freaking international people with ridiculous amounts talent. As you can see, he can also play guitar. However, without any suggestions for songs, he started making up his own. The lyrics went something like this:

Rebecca, Rebecca, Rebecca, Rebecca
She's from Wisconsum,
She made brownies-um
Rebecca!

There were similar songs for the Kobayashis (Sachiko-san and Nami-san. Completely unrelated.)

Anyway, I made an American style meal for the Japanese class peeps. This consisted of hamburgers (me), french fries (Ingace), and brownies (me). Other additions included Bangladeshi rice (Hakim) and prochutto (how do you spell that, anyway? seems like there should be an i somewhere) and camembert. This is one of the only cheeses readily available in Japan. For some reason they only like the soft ones, like Kraft cheddar slices and mozzerella. I love the serving style. Forget about sporks- chopsticks really are the universal utensil.

Anyway (#2), the hamburgers were a great success. I actually had to teach everyone how to make a hamburger - how to put it on the bun, add condiments and veggies...the whole bit. It was a very strange experience. Also, ground beef in Japan isn't ground beef. It's ground pork and beef, since our good ol'American cow (well, probably Australian, actually) is too expensive. Luckily, Ignace had accidentally bought a couple beef only patties, so I got to eat too.

In another typically Japanese incident, I had no idea who most of the people were. I mean, I'd seen all but one of them before, but I'd completely forgotten their names, so I had to use English to get their attention. Calling someone "you" in Japanese is a little rude, so I either had to look them in the eye, talk to everyone at once, or just shut up. Anyway (#3), I'd started the patties too soon, so mid-way I stopped and sat down to talk to everybody. Mystery-san arrived and started cooking my hamburgers. Apparently he's quite the chef. Not only did he cook the hamburgers perfectly, but he'd brought his own knife. He's the Japanese guy in the center. Way to go, Mystery-san!


Here's everybody. I knew Da-kyum, Ignace, Sachiko-san, and Nami-san. The rest were new. Aren't we cute? As an added bonus, this picture also serves as incentive for me to go on a serious diet as soon as I get back to Wisconsin.


On a side note, Ignace's apartment is in the complex that I'd live in if I get a post-doc at SPring-8. It's two/three rooms (one room is a sink and washing machine), small bathroom, and a living room/bedroom. It has no central heat and poor air conditioning. Apparently Japanese buildings aren't usually heated despite sub-freezing temperatures every single year.

Woo yay.

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Science update of the day: X-ray Microdiffraction

This is the technique that I've already used at Argonne. X-ray diffraction in any form tells you what the atomic structure of the material is. The only thing that's special about microdiffraction is that rather than getting information about a large area of a particular sample, you focus the beam down to a very small spot (tens of nanometers - 10^-9 meters. This is 1000 times smaller than a human hair.) This means that you only get the structural information about that particular little area.

Why the heck would you do that? Excellent question, Johnny.

In some thin films (this is exactly what it sounds like - a very thin layer of something on a much thicker material so that you can pick it up) the film gets stretched (technical term is strained.) If it's too strained, then it starts breaking into little pieces, or domains. If these pieces are tilted in different directions, or have different structures, then you can see that with x-ray diffraction.

Why do you care about this? Susie, good job. That's another great question. 10 participation points.

If there are too many different domains, then sometimes the properties of the film start deteriorating. For instance, in a silicon transistor (the basic building block of your computer), if the quality of the silicon's structure (i.e. number of domains and imperfections in the crystal) gets to be too crappy, then electrons can't travel through the material as well. This means the transistor doesn't work as well, creates lots of heat, requires more power, etc., etc.

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And on that rather geeky note, I'm going to bed. More on recent activities as soon as I have internet access in Tokyo, although pictures may not be guaranteed, so here's a preview.

Typhoon Barbeque

The only picture of my butt that I will ever approve of.

Five for the price of one

Ok, so I realized that I am very very behind in posting. I haven't put up anything for my trip to Himeji castle or spaghetti dinner night at all, only the wonderful email from the evening at Da-kyum's, I've gotten a veritable wealth of information about how Japanese society works, and today I went on a trip to Tatsuno. That's five at least. I'm going to have to boil this down to the bare minimum.

Himeji Castle
After five weeks of planning to go to the local castle in Himeji, I finally went. I blame Kirimura-san for this. The very first week I got here, three separate groups of people offered to take me. Since Kirimura-san was the first, I felt obligated to go with him. However, he was busy that week so we planned on going the next week. For four weeks in a row something came up. Once, he had to go back to Yokohama. Another time I was busy. But my favorite was when he scheduled the trip, got everyone's ok, and completely neglected to ask me if that date was ok for me. Good job, Kiri-kun.

Anyway, a week and a half ago we finally went. Himeji Castle is the oldest and largest castle in Japan that hasn't been reconstructed in the past 400 years or so. Ooh, according to the brochure I just found again, it was originally built n 1346 and remodeled starting from 1601-1610. There's also something about The Last Samurai and a James Bond movie being filmed here, but I don't know any of the details. Since we're in condensed mode, here's the basics.

The Castle:

The inside of the Castle:

Harakiri-maru (Suicide Tower):

Of course, we had to commit suicide at Suicide Tower. Again according to the brochure, "This place is the place for Seppuku. The well near the building seems to have been used for washing a beheaded." That's Kirimura-san on the left and Tahara-san on the right.

There's also a well and a ghost story to go along with it. Tahara-san told it to me beautifully, albeit in very broken English.

Did you know you, too, can take a tour of Himeji castle from your own home? Thanks to the wonders of the Intarweb, now you can! This site will show you what this gorgeous castle looks like and probably get you lost too.

Spaghetti night
After going to the horrible Barukaino, I decided that I needed to show Tahara-san and Kirimura-san what real spaghetti was. I picked up some imported tomato sauce from America and tried to make a cream/cheese sauce. Since the cream sauce was 1) and experiment and 2) missing some ingredients (like real cheese and salt) it was ... ok. I guess. But after doctoring the tomato sauce with tons of spices from the same import store, it was really good. Also, in a blow against Japan (partially aided by the technical expertise of Kirimura-san) I made them apple crisp for dessert. This Kirimura-san's very first apple crisp ever. Internationalism marches ever onward.
Boo yeah, Japan! One point for me.

Dinner with Da-Kyum
Da-Kyum, the Korean girl from Japanese class, invited me over to her house for dinner. Now, she doesn't speak very much English or Japanese, so our communication takes place with a mix of 200 words total (plus some place, movie, and food names) in both languages and lots of hand gestures. The dinner invitation went something like this:

Me: Hey Da-Kyum, when are you going to have the pizza party?
Satsuki: Oh, she can't right now.
Da-Kyum: Anata (you) come dinner! Tomorrow daijobu (ok)?
Me: Sure! When? Itsu? (when)
Da-Kyum: Six? Seven? Good?
Me: Seven is good!
Da-Kyum: Hanbaagaa (hamburger steak) ok? Beef, pork, ika (squid), shrimp ippai (lots) [mixing gestures].
Me: [I can't eat three out of four of those meats, so...] Ano...kore wa chotto... (umm...that's a little...)
Da-Kyum: Ok! Pizza ippai!
Me: Ok!

Let me tell you, this pizza tasted so freaking good. One was on bread, one was on a crispy style crust that had gotten a little soggy, but it was all really American tastes. There was green pepper, onion, tomato sauce (might have been ketchup, but it actually worked), and tons of mozzerella cheese. Soooo good.

And she kept on feeding me! All night! After dinner there were desserts and then drinking snacks. And the whole time we're chattering on about how we like animated movies, how she absolutely loves Shrek and Shrek II, how long she and her husband have been married (at this point he chimed in too, telling me how she letter-stalked him for two years until they got married), what she does for excersize...

All with our super-broken conversations. It was awesome and I really really really wish I didn't have to leave in a week because I had a fantastic time and I like her very much.

Today
I went to Tatsuno city with Kohmura-san and company. It was a very nice afternoon - we went to the absolutely best restaurant I've been to in Japan. It's called East of Eden. Again, go figure. The bento box was fantastic - the eggplant, Japanese-style chicken nuggets, and little beef thingies were amazingly tasty and even the pickles were good and I hate (non-green) pickles here. But the thing that put it over the top was the cafe au lait. This turned out to be a iced latte that was worthy of Strada, the bestest cafe in the world. (Maybe not a Raul-latte, but it was darn close.) Those of you who know my coffee addiciton will know that this is the highest praise that I have for coffee.

Anyway. Today also included some of the best views of the local area that I've seen yet. This doesn't include the ones I've seen while driving around valleys of rice fields surrounded by mountains and rushing rivers, because I can't take pictures of that to show you. We also went to a soy sauce museum.

Japanese society
I learned quite a bit about how Japanese society works, albeit through a foreigner's eyes, and entirely through second - to - fourth hand hearsay. This includes the fact that Japanese men may not be expected to be exclusive as long as they're discreet, if you mention that a guy and a girl are hanging out together it means they're seriously dating, you're not allowed to tease most Japanese people because they take it seriously, there's very little sarcasm (I've noticed this on my own - often my sarcastic comments get met with confused stares unless they're so obviously false or absolutely dripping with sarcasm) and that Japanese men are often very shy about dating and will rarely take any steps to initiate anything. Not to mention the whole unspoken communication thing, which I am very bad at picking up on. The best I can do is follow what everyone else does and try to figure out why we're doing what we're doing.

This is all hearsay several times over - none of it I learned on my own, thank goodness, so feel free to correct me if anyone thinks I'm wrong. If it's true, Japan's just scored several points and I will never, ever, have a Japanese boyfriend.

I do realize that I'm probably breaking several rules by talking about this, much less posting in online, but it's really bugging me and I want someone to tell me this is all wrong. If it's not, please excuse my rudeness. It's because I'm a loudmouth American who has to say everything that's on her mind and I'm sorry to be offensive.

In a small victory for me, I finally made brownies tonight. The second batch is actually acceptable and tomorrow it goes in to the Ishikawa group for taste testing.

After retallying the score, Japan lept into the lead today, 8 to 5.5 . Judges are still out on whether the natural beauty of the country and amazing kindness of it's inhabitants are points to be given to me or to Japan.

email

After spending a delightful evening with my friend from Japanese class, Da-Kyum, I got this email. It's really sweet, but a little garbled. And I guess my new name is Liebe car. Nice.

My friend Liebe car...
I was very delightful yesterday ...
I am pleased because know you ...
Let's spend our many times if become an opportunity
Have a nice tomorrow ...
I use translation machine now.
Desire that understand well.
Hello
Dagyeomi *^^*

Let this be a warning to all of you who want to use cut and paste translations. Although I have to admit, I do understand exactly what she's saying so it's not that bad.

This is also probably what I sound like in Japanese, so I really should shut up.