Archive for Reflection
January 14, 2008 at 9:26 am · Filed under In the Kitchen and Foodstuff, Reflection
A weekend beginning in new year celebration with the karate club. We went to Sakura, a Japanese restaurant in Richmond. The food felt closer to common izakaya fare in Japan when compared to the “fashionable” izakayas like Zakkushi and Kingyo. Although I really like those places, the food is still given enough twist to be different and foreign.
I ate the onigiri to the right and it was yummy, as was everything else and the sake.
Then I woke up the next day and I was a year older. What do I think about that?
As usual, conflicted over the extent that I should acknowledge it. But in the end, it will never not be acknowledge so I shouldn’t try to hide from self-reflection. This year’s theme was of course the need to finish school and find a job. Then there was the consideration that a year from now my life will be completely different. That brings up a mixture of: fear – what will it be?, urgency – I need to make it something, and excitement – there are so many possibilities.
This morning I had a dream where I returned to Japan to continue work at NTT. The office room was darker, people were busy. I sat down at my desk and it was somewhat cleaned up since the time I left. I wished that I was wearing new clothes. I tried to work but couldn’t find the motivation. It actually felt like I was going backwards.
I woke up knowing I have to move forward.
January 11, 2008 at 11:01 am · Filed under On the Train / Bus, Reflection
I guess one reason for writing is that it makes you take note of things that make each day different. Maybe only with the motivation to write about them but ultimately, the meaning lasts longer than the motivation.
My special event of yesterday:
On the way home from UBC at night I transferred to the number 7. Walking to the back of the bus I took a second glance at a woman sitting to the right and realized that I knew her. I continued on taking two steps further, then had second thoughts and turned back around to say hello.
I had worked with this woman at a coffee house in Regina for a short time. Then after I moved here I ran into her within the first few months. Her daughter was living here and she was visiting and I think, planning on moving to Vancouver. I continued to run into her in Vancouver, Regina, and flights in between.
I had forgotten about her after moving to Japan. I think I forgot about a lot of things. But then a few months ago, I was standing on Dunbar, waiting for the 25, and the 7 drove by. I was pretty sure that I saw her in the window.
Last night, I almost let it go. So that I could relax in my tiredness after karate practice, so that I could sit alone and have space around me to hold my drenched umbrella, so that I could eat my blackberry twizzlator in peace. (Is that the right spelling? I tried to Google twizzlator but with no results except now the word twizzler is nails on chalkboard.) But really, how could I when, here is a person that it seems I am meant to run into at all unexpected times.
We exchanged some life stories in the five minutes before my stop. Four blocks to go and I was scribbling my email address onto a notebook page so that maybe one day we can meet but not by accident.
I got off the bus and I felt really happy.
Maybe it is just coincidence that we always run into each other. Maybe there is a reason that I am yet to find out. Either way, it makes me happy to see this person and that was something I almost gave up because I was seeking my natural comforts. On the bus – being alone and having space.
It made me think about what we, what I give up just to be comfortable.
October 12, 2007 at 12:29 pm · Filed under Reflection
When I was a kid I would collect rocks and pretend that they were precious gemstones. Finding myself in a gravel pit near the Shadey Vale Resort it occurred to me that I may have not been so inclined to bring home jewels if I had grown up somewhere else.
Rocks in Saskatchewan are colourful as the land is fairly high in an assortment of minerals. I’ll leave the research about what sorts of minerals to you but…I just didn’t realize this until I had the chance to spend a substantial period of time away from the province.
Speaking of small rocks, the new karate group is hard but really satisfying and I feel eager to get to the next practice. Last night after a bit of stretching the sensei started exercises by asking us, according to [insert name of famous martial arts dude here], what is the best martial art? Somebody answered, “kung fu??” No…”running”. So he took us for a run outside and around the student union building. He and some others went barefoot. I only had my flats with me but still wore them for fear of lacerating my foot. I had confidence at first because I jog regularly but this was running, not jogging. It was a little tough for me. Then on return to the SUB, we went up and down the stairs a few times…running down, hopping up. I also learned that I really don’t know how to jump/hop. I will have to practice that – I don’t know how to get my feet off the ground unless there is a horizontal plane to put the rest of my body on.
I signed up for a tournament in 2 weeks. Only for the kata (forms), not the kumite (sparring). It gives me extra motivation. This morning I have been daydreaming about the movements. Still, I need to remember that daydreaming != practice.
October 4, 2007 at 11:11 pm · Filed under Flashback, In the Kitchen and Foodstuff, Reflection
Ingredients are bought for a recipe made once every 10 years. One to two teaspoons are drawn from a hand sized bottle leaving ounces left behind to wait for the next time you decide to experiment. Will it still be good the next time? How can you tell? These products are good at maintaining their look, smell, and one assumes, flavour.
It is interesting to note how a product’s packaging changes over time, and how it doesn’t. And why don’t they use this font anymore? The spacing of the letters reminds me of laying in the sun at my cabin, reading my father’s and his brother’s old comic books and wondering if the mail order ads for novelty items, the magic manual to get that beach bod, and a set of 1001 tiny little green soldiers were still applicable.
The above bottle was bought sometime in the late 70s. Below, before that. There is no UPC on the bottle. Could it have been on a box? I somehow doubt that. This bottle has history. It has the number ‘23′ which at sometime meant something to someone. Now it means nothing and the life of this bottle that has existed all my life will soon end. Should the toss happened on the 23rd at 23:23? Then the story of Brandy could be that it spent the majority of its life time marked with a symbol of its own fate.
Then the peppermint extract. This was a toy. Not a toy but an essential ingredient to many potions crafted in yogurt containers. If only I could have figured out the right combination of flour, shampoo, corn syrup and the green stuff…
This is produced or distributed by Nabob Foods Limited, Vancouver, Canada (according to back of bottle). That is the same Nabob as Nabob Coffee, before they changed their name to Nabob Coffee and long before the company was acquired by Kraft. I wonder when Nabob Foods Limited stopped existing. Could the UPC on the back help? It is only 6 digits long: 600162. Googling is fruitless.
I came back to Regina yesterday. Here over the weekend. It is good to see family and friends again, though confronting the remnants of myself in this city is hard. This time, more so than last Christmas, I feel like I’ve changed so much and I am wondering what parts of my past identities, if any, should I hold onto.
September 29, 2007 at 12:49 pm · Filed under Reflection
Thursday evening I was on my way to the student union building and I saw what looked like the remnants of a demonstration around the old bus loop.
I think it is a campaign by the Students for a Democratic Society group at UBC.
From their site:
This campaign seeks to safeguard public spaces on campus, and to liberate corporate/privatized space so that it may be accessible to all. A huge component of this campaign is to oppose the University Blvd Development Plan in its entirety and essence (since its purpose is to make the centre of campus a corporate/private space to which students only have access as customers or condo owners/renters), and to replace this plan with one that maximizes public space and green space (keeps the grassy knoll), emphasizes student controlled space, makes the centre of campus car-free, and actually increases bus-ridership across the campus community.
I like the concept of free space and I agree that the feeling of student as customer is becoming stronger and stronger.
But from a non-political / activist perspective – I wondered why there were no people using the free space. Yes, it was a bit rainy outside and I imagine that couch being too wet to sit on but still…only information about the campaign was posted on the free speech board.
I took pictures and I felt a little awkward, like people were maybe watching or noticing me and I did not want to be noticed. It made me think about the personal barriers one would need to overcome to enjoy the free space.
Then I walked into the SUB and thought about the comfort people find in being a consumer. Spending money and receiving consumables and the right to be somewhere gives one purpose. To use free spaces, you need to make your own purpose. It will not be sold to you.
Members of groups like the one who organized this have their purpose – how can that purpose be distributed to everyone? Who will accept it if it means giving up comforts.
I imagine these groups face this problem all the time. I guess I am doing some inner reflection – why have I never gotten involved? Because it means giving up my comfort…
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