Here we are in our dining room just about to sit down and eat our Thanksgiving dinner. It was a very warm day (70 degrees!) and so we were able to barbecue our turkey outside, which turned out great. Besides the turkey, we had green bean casserole, wild rice, glazed carrots, stuffing with smoked oysters, sweet potato hash browns, cranberry sauce (whole cranberry sauce AND jellied cranberry sauce (with lines!)) pumpkin pie made with a pumpkin from the garden, American sparkling wine (méthode champagnoise) and, in honor of Sarah, with a nod to France, Beaujolais Nouveau, 2007. Well, we always have Beaujolais Nouveau, but anyway... We followed dinner with a viewing of Saturday Night Live commercial parodies and a showing of "Slacker".
Sandy was very grateful for the nice turkey scraps she got. Whitey appreciated a small serving of whipped cream. Olive
was grateful because she had a choice among three warm and very immobile laps for her post-dinner nap.
We elected not to get up for the 5 a.m. Black Friday opening at Boscov's.
Friday, November 23, 2007
Thanksgiving
Here we are in our dining room just about to sit down and eat our Thanksgiving dinner. It was a very warm day (70 degrees!) and so we were able to barbecue our turkey outside, which turned out great. Besides the turkey, we had green bean casserole, wild rice, glazed carrots, stuffing with smoked oysters, sweet potato hash browns, cranberry sauce (whole cranberry sauce AND jellied cranberry sauce (with lines!)) pumpkin pie made with a pumpkin from the garden, American sparkling wine (méthode champagnoise) and, in honor of Sarah, with a nod to France, Beaujolais Nouveau, 2007. Well, we always have Beaujolais Nouveau, but anyway... We followed dinner with a viewing of Saturday Night Live commercial parodies and a showing of "Slacker".
Sandy was very grateful for the nice turkey scraps she got. Whitey appreciated a small serving of whipped cream. Olive
was grateful because she had a choice among three warm and very immobile laps for her post-dinner nap.
We elected not to get up for the 5 a.m. Black Friday opening at Boscov's.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Japan Update
On Saturday night after the meeting, we visited a Shinto temple on Enoshima Island, which was very pretty.
It seemed to have some Buddhist elements, too, because there was a big statue of what could only have been a Buddha. The big ceramic bag in the picture is for donations.
There were supposed to be some interesting shops on Enoshima Island, but they were closed by the time we got there. There's also a famous lighthouse,but I think that was closed, too. After Enoshima Island, we went to Fujisawa for dinner, and ate in a nice Japanese restaurant. I was sitting with a Finnish professor from the University of Tampere (Kristina) who had lived in Japan at one time. She introduced us to "Shabu Shabu", which is a kind of Japanese fondue or hot pot, where several people cook their food together in a communal pot. The picture shows Kristina and Doug at work on the Shabu
Shabu.
Our pot had fish and some vegetables in it, along with some soy sauce kind of thing and some peanut sauce for dipping the cooked pieces. It was pretty tasty, but kind of plain, because the cooking liquid was just plain water. The room was a traditional Japanese dining room, with low tables and a recess in the floor under the table to put your feet. They also had little cubbyholes outside the room for your shoes, which you don't wear in the room. After dinner, we were going to go back to our respective hotels. Unfortunately the train to Yokohama, where Kristina was staying, had stopped running (this is about 11:30), and Kristina didn't have any way to get back. Luckily, my room was a double with only me in it, so she came back with me and
stayed in my room. She even happened to have her toothbrush with her, which was a piece of good luck. She was a handy person to have around because she could speak and even read Japanese.
In the morning, on the way to the train station, I finally caught a glimpse of Mout Fuji! It looked
just like its pictures,and was extremely beautiful, with a nice snowcap. Unfortunatly I didn't have time to take a picture, because I was a little late for the train, so I didn't want to stop. I tried taking a picture later from the train, but I don't think it turned out. Ok, I didn't take this picture, but this is pretty much what it looked like.
I had to make a train connection to get from the local train to the Narita Airport Express, which I was deathly afraid of screwing up. I even got my courage together to ask a Japanese gentleman if this was the train to Narita -- my first foray into Japanese other than "hello" and "thank you". It actually was the train to Narita, so I got to the airport safely.
Side note: Cultural observation about many Japanese people -- I don't think they understand the concept of "person who doesn't speak your language", because they would often keep chatting merrily away to me and the other people in my group, while receiving back only blank, clueless stares. They never seemed disappointed that I wasn't understanding them, though.
The flight from Tokyo to Dallas was pretty uneventful, except that my in-seat entertainment system didn't work and I finished my book (a novel about Cleopatra) before we even took off. I started out by memorizing the Sky Mall catalog,(the extra-thick Christmas edition). I'm always amazed at the stuff you don't need that's offered for sale in the Sky Mall catalog. For example, a pet dish with a cover that automatically lifts up when the pet approaches, which is supposed to keep the pet food fresher ($34.99). Another example would be a copy of Harry Potter's wand for $35. Last but certainly not least, the One Ring (just a copy!) was available for sale for $129. Thank goodness Sauron didn't have a Sky Mall catalog.
After finishing the SkyMall catalog, the only thing left to do was sleep, which I did more or less
successfully. My new earphones did an incredible job at blocking out the airplane noise and they also sounded great. I was even able to watch part of "The Fellowship of the Ring" on Packy (my PDA) and hear everything perfectly.
It turned out that my flight was the pilot's last flight before retiring. Apparently there's an
aviation tradition that when a pilot lands for the last time before retirement, fire trucks come out and spray arcs over the plane, which was pretty cool. By the way, the landing was probably the smoothest I've ever experienced. It seems that thirty years of practice helps.
We landed in Dallas and I went through customs and immigration without any problems. While I was waiting for my suitcase I was visited by a very cute drug-sniffing dog. He smelled my bag, seemed to notice my package of green tea rice balls (labeled "for your happy tea time"), took another sniff, and then moved on. It must be hard work for a dog to ignore interesting smells that aren't what they're trained to look for.
After we got on the plane to Philadelphia, the captain came on the loudspeaker and told us that we would be delayed by an hour and twenty minutes because of bad weather in New York. We actually ended up with a slightly shorter delay, and got to Philadelphia around 6. It's nice to be back!
It seemed to have some Buddhist elements, too, because there was a big statue of what could only have been a Buddha. The big ceramic bag in the picture is for donations.
There were supposed to be some interesting shops on Enoshima Island, but they were closed by the time we got there. There's also a famous lighthouse,but I think that was closed, too. After Enoshima Island, we went to Fujisawa for dinner, and ate in a nice Japanese restaurant. I was sitting with a Finnish professor from the University of Tampere (Kristina) who had lived in Japan at one time. She introduced us to "Shabu Shabu", which is a kind of Japanese fondue or hot pot, where several people cook their food together in a communal pot. The picture shows Kristina and Doug at work on the Shabu
Shabu.
Our pot had fish and some vegetables in it, along with some soy sauce kind of thing and some peanut sauce for dipping the cooked pieces. It was pretty tasty, but kind of plain, because the cooking liquid was just plain water. The room was a traditional Japanese dining room, with low tables and a recess in the floor under the table to put your feet. They also had little cubbyholes outside the room for your shoes, which you don't wear in the room. After dinner, we were going to go back to our respective hotels. Unfortunately the train to Yokohama, where Kristina was staying, had stopped running (this is about 11:30), and Kristina didn't have any way to get back. Luckily, my room was a double with only me in it, so she came back with me and
stayed in my room. She even happened to have her toothbrush with her, which was a piece of good luck. She was a handy person to have around because she could speak and even read Japanese.
In the morning, on the way to the train station, I finally caught a glimpse of Mout Fuji! It looked
just like its pictures,and was extremely beautiful, with a nice snowcap. Unfortunatly I didn't have time to take a picture, because I was a little late for the train, so I didn't want to stop. I tried taking a picture later from the train, but I don't think it turned out. Ok, I didn't take this picture, but this is pretty much what it looked like.
I had to make a train connection to get from the local train to the Narita Airport Express, which I was deathly afraid of screwing up. I even got my courage together to ask a Japanese gentleman if this was the train to Narita -- my first foray into Japanese other than "hello" and "thank you". It actually was the train to Narita, so I got to the airport safely.
Side note: Cultural observation about many Japanese people -- I don't think they understand the concept of "person who doesn't speak your language", because they would often keep chatting merrily away to me and the other people in my group, while receiving back only blank, clueless stares. They never seemed disappointed that I wasn't understanding them, though.
The flight from Tokyo to Dallas was pretty uneventful, except that my in-seat entertainment system didn't work and I finished my book (a novel about Cleopatra) before we even took off. I started out by memorizing the Sky Mall catalog,(the extra-thick Christmas edition). I'm always amazed at the stuff you don't need that's offered for sale in the Sky Mall catalog. For example, a pet dish with a cover that automatically lifts up when the pet approaches, which is supposed to keep the pet food fresher ($34.99). Another example would be a copy of Harry Potter's wand for $35. Last but certainly not least, the One Ring (just a copy!) was available for sale for $129. Thank goodness Sauron didn't have a Sky Mall catalog.
After finishing the SkyMall catalog, the only thing left to do was sleep, which I did more or less
successfully. My new earphones did an incredible job at blocking out the airplane noise and they also sounded great. I was even able to watch part of "The Fellowship of the Ring" on Packy (my PDA) and hear everything perfectly.
It turned out that my flight was the pilot's last flight before retiring. Apparently there's an
aviation tradition that when a pilot lands for the last time before retirement, fire trucks come out and spray arcs over the plane, which was pretty cool. By the way, the landing was probably the smoothest I've ever experienced. It seems that thirty years of practice helps.
We landed in Dallas and I went through customs and immigration without any problems. While I was waiting for my suitcase I was visited by a very cute drug-sniffing dog. He smelled my bag, seemed to notice my package of green tea rice balls (labeled "for your happy tea time"), took another sniff, and then moved on. It must be hard work for a dog to ignore interesting smells that aren't what they're trained to look for.
After we got on the plane to Philadelphia, the captain came on the loudspeaker and told us that we would be delayed by an hour and twenty minutes because of bad weather in New York. We actually ended up with a slightly shorter delay, and got to Philadelphia around 6. It's nice to be back!
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Japanese Restaurant, ISO ATM
The restaurant we went to last night was interesting. I think it was supposed to be a typical casual Japanese restaurant. The menu had some unusual items, for example, it offered horse sashimi (raw horse meat), fried squid guts and squid testicles. Anthony Bourdain would have liked it. Someone ordered the horse sashimi and said that it tasted like "raw meat". I skipped that special treat. The other thing about the restaurant was that everyone there was smoking like crazy. It was impossible to enjoy eating with all the smoke.
Still no sign of Mt. Fuji, though. Every day has been too cloudy. Supposedly you can get a really good look at it on a clear day from here. That was really disappointing.
The room that we're having our meeting in is amazing -- it has three enormous screens. The big one looks like it's about 10 feet high, and it has two smaller ones on either side. I feel like I"m negotiating an international treaty or something. Here are some pictures of the building at Keio University where we're meeting,
the W3C office,
and the meeting room.
We've all been on a constant quest to find an ATM machine that accepts American bank cards. Sometimes they're closed, other times they just spit out our cards with a flurry of Japanese receipts that probably say something like "are you kidding?". I did manage to get some money at the airport, but I didn't get quite enough, so hopefully I can find an ATM and get some more. Someone said that the ATM's at 7-11 take American cards (yes, 7-11 is everywhere here). We'll see. Tonight we're supposed to go to an interesting place called "Enoshima Island".
the W3C office,
and the meeting room.
We've all been on a constant quest to find an ATM machine that accepts American bank cards. Sometimes they're closed, other times they just spit out our cards with a flurry of Japanese receipts that probably say something like "are you kidding?". I did manage to get some money at the airport, but I didn't get quite enough, so hopefully I can find an ATM and get some more. Someone said that the ATM's at 7-11 take American cards (yes, 7-11 is everywhere here). We'll see. Tonight we're supposed to go to an interesting place called "Enoshima Island".
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Hello from Japan!
I boarded the flight to Tokyo in Chicago. Here's a nice picture of Chicago that I took from the plane.
The plane was fairly full, and unfortunately I had someone sitting next to me. She was a young American woman who was on her way back to Taipei. At first she was quite chatty, which I found alarming at the start of a 12-hour flight, but she stopped talking after a while (see the reference to "Talkative Airplane Seatmate" defined as the lowest level of companionship in the posting on "Aunt Gretchen's Visit"). She was also a little on the chubby side, but fortunately not so much as to intrude into my seat. It was also annoying that the person in front of me put his seat all the way back at the beginning of the flight and left it that way for the next twelve hours.
The flight was extremely long and boring. It was interesting because, since we just kept going west, it was light the whole time. It was also interesting because it was almost all over land, going over northern Canada, Alsaka (I think I flew right over Rachel's head in Fairbanks) and then down along the coast of Siberia for the last few hours. You wouldn't think that going to Japan would involve mostly flying over land.
I watched pretty much everything available in the way of entertainment, which there wasn't much of. I did learn to enjoy "Ugly Betty" and "Everyone Hates Chris". We had two bad meals of chicken with rice and glop; plain glop in one case and curry glop in the second case. I was kind of hoping for sushi, but there were only a couple of small sushi rolls on the side accompanying the first glop. We also had a snack of a dried up roll with ham and cheese on it.
The airport in Tokyo is nice, with plenty of English signs. It took me awhile to figure out the ATM machines. They wouldn't give me any money. I finally figured out that the problem was that I was asking for 300,000 yen, which I thought was $300, but it was really $3000.
I also encountered the traditional squatter toilet. Thank goodness Rachel had prepared me for that with her wise advice. I did notice, after it was too late, that the bathroom also provided plenty of Western toilets. I guess the squatter was just provided for the older, more traditional, Japanese lady who doesn't believe in new-fangled gadgets.
I managed to get on the correct bus to Tsujido station, where I was met by my colleage Kazuyuki. He took me to a nice casual Japanese student hangout where I had an enormous pile of sashimi, with miso soup and rice. The sashimi was fine, although it wasn't any better than what you get in America. It was, however, much bigger and much cheaper than what you get in America.
Kazuyuki is famous for his work ethic, and I was afraid he was going to make me do some work after dinner (this was about 10 p.m. after being up for 24 hours or so) but he took me back to the guest house. Well, he did try to get me to take a walking tour of Keio University, but I told him I was too tired.
Kazuyuki had done a lot of work on our workshop, so I gave him a t-shirt that registers wi-fi signals, and I think he was very impressed.
Today I got up at 8:00 for breakfast, which was a croissant and something like a dinner roll, like a French style of breakfast. Luckily I had brought an "oatmeal to go", which I ate for "second breakfast". Then I went back to sleep.
I almost had a crisis when I tried to take a shower and the water wouldn't get hot. I had already given up and washed my hair with cold water when I realized there was a separate switch for the hot water heater. There was a thermostat on the water faucet going up to 50 degrees C. I don't know how hot that is in F, but I do know it's really, really hot. I turned the temperature down to 30, and it was still really hot.
Well, that's about it for now. It's really warm here. It feels like it's well over 70. All the clothes I brought are too warm. Maybe I can find a souvenir t-shrt.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Sandy Gets the Paper
I thought you would like to see Sandy showing off her skills at getting the paper.
She's been doing this for many years, but as you can see, she hasn't lost her knack!
Thursday, November 1, 2007
Peter's accepted at Purchase!
We just saw the news last night on Peter's "My Purchase" area of the Purchase website! We're so excited! We celebrated by watching a Seinfeld rerun (the one where George refuses to give his ATM code to Susan). I guess we'll have to think of something a little more exciting for a real celebration. We'll fill in the details when we know more.
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