Orange juce splashing:)

Last week, when I finished my fellowship application, I was completely exhausted...I was far from a shape that I can cook dinner for myself. So I decided to go to a nearby supermarket and pick up some ready-made food and drinks. When I finished my shopping and cycled back to my house...all of a sudden, the orange juice in my shopping bag exploded, as it stucked in the wheel of my bicycle and splashed -just perfectly - into my face and the entire body:) There were a few people on the street - they were laughing at me and I was laughing at myself - I enjoyed the heatwarming welcome to the country of the orange paradise!

TV is great:)

I don't want to admit this but have to say this...TV is great:) Just like an old Carole King's song "when you are down and feel troubled, and you need some loving care...", I would say "watch TV":) Well, this is kind of a joke, but I think watching TV for half an hour or so helps ones (at least me) to release some stress when I got home.

There are around 30 channel here in Holland and this is great. There are many English cannels and they always come with Dutch subtitles, this is great too, as I can study the language at the same time. CNN, BBC, discovery channel, national geograhpy, MTV (guffy, but I missed MTV:) and others. This is almost perfect but there are two things missing that I desperately wish to have. First is a Japanese TV program (in Japanese:). I am not asking too much, just half an hour on news in Japan- but I cannot get one here. In NY, there was one channel which had a Japanese program every night between 10 and 11 pm - that was great. During this hour, I closed my door and did not answer even if my friend knocked on my door (J/K:) Not having a Japanese TV program here...I don't even know how the Japanese election went. Sure enough, I know the result of the election but don't know anything about the details...

Second is - this is something that I don't want to admit either but:) - American national broadcasting: ABC, CBS, NBC (I don't care much about the Fox channel:). I miss David Letterman, Jay Leno and Conan O'brian (correct spelling?---must be wrong:). Especially, I miss David Letterman. I was watching his late show since I was in a freshman dorm in California ---I used to watch him with American junk food - onion rings and red-colored smoothy:) When I lived in NY, I was proud that I lived in an apartment just around the corner of his theater. My friend wrote in his blog that Peter Jennings died of lung cancer...I did not even know it. He was also one of my favorite news anchors...

Issues of poverty and development

Last night, I watched the CNN's special edition on the issue of poverty and development. There was a panel discussion with , among others, Bill Clinton, Bono, the Queen of Jordan, Jeffery Sachs chaired by Christian Amanpour. In the back, I also saw the faces of the CEO of the Gramine bank from Bangladesh as well as Lester Brown who is the main author of the "status of the world".

It was a very interesting discussion. It seems that together with the current debates on the UN reform, the interests into the global subjects have been growing not only among the public policymakers but also among the general public. Will the ideas (and sympathy as a global citizen) go beyond "just a talk" and transformed this time into real tangible actions or programs? It is a difficult question...the efforts coping with the global issues have been failing over the last several decades...

Climate change is happening and there is a scientific consensus that it is happening mainly due to our economic activities. Do we still need to question about the credibility of the outcome of the scientific research?

By the way...I am very good at imitating Christian Amanpour's British accent:)

Very first moment in Holland

I arrived here in Holland in the beginning of August. In some way, it feels like I only arrived here a week ago but the reality is that I have been here for a month and half already. First, I had my Dutch intensive language course and second, I had my fellowship application to work with. Things were hectic one way or another without making much progress on my research (which is THE purpose of me coming to Holland:)

Apart from that...things have been settling down. I have my own apartment and office on campus - most importantly, I got my own bike. I now know where to shop, where to jog, where to cycle etc. I felt strange when I first came here: when I woke up, I could not figure out where I am for a moment. All my dreams were relating to my life in Tokyo: being awake from a dream about my life in Tokyo, I was confused - just for a second - about the fact that that the surroundings in my room seem completely different...In any case, I don't see these dreams any more, the dreams about my life in Tokyo - this is also a sign of me being settling down here.

How many times have I done this? The process of buying shampoo, stationary items, TV and others to start a new life in a foreign land. After all, my stay here might be another temporary one. I am still in a long journey. But, I know when and where the sequence of this journey began. It was a summer of...when I was 20, I made my first trip out of Japan. I was in San Francisco, walking along the Van Ness, heading toward the Fisherman's warf. Looking up the blue sky in California, I knew that I will spend a long time out of Japan from now on. Next year, I was on the 3rd promenade near Santa Monica in LA with a friend of mine. Completely jetlagged, did not feel well after a long trip from Tokyo. However, the excitement - being alone thousands km away from home- was overwhelming. That was the moment when my long journey started.

Setting up this blog site

After a month and half here in the Netherlands, I now started to have more time for myself - think, ponder, write about whatever comes up in my mind. I set up this site to share some of my thoughts with you. Will see how it goes...