Hard to believe that i was in kobe just this morning, and now i'm back in kochi, fresh out of the bath, and feeling relaxed. i did a lot of things and had a lot of thoughts over the past 4 days. time to break out the 10 sentences per point rule. there's a twist this time, in that i'm going to list out the major bullet points first, then go down the list and fill them out one by one. i figure that this will help me stay on track better.

- driving

as you may know, i like driving. that's why i thought it would be a fun challenge to drive to osaka and kobe, instead of taking a plane. i drove 795km in this past week alone, the bulk of which was just getting to and from osaka. i quite enjoyed myself! although it's a pity that the quality of the roads in rural japan aren't as good as in the more urban areas. i found myself thinking, multiple times on the journey, 'i wish i was doing this road trip in my civic'. it's hard to go fast (and to look cool) in a kei car.

- osaka

i didn't do much in osaka, just stayed a night and collected my passport. the hotel room i booked turned out to be a cubicle/capsule in an onsen resort. i should have guessed that rooms don't go for 2999 yen! it wasn't bad, by any means...just not what i was expecting. not sure that i would dare to book such accommodations if it weren't japan. the bath facilities were amazing, though! there is this electric seat in the bath where you can feel an electric current. i didn't dare sit down there - probably because mixing electricity with water sounds like a really bad idea. i actually would visit (and maybe stay over) again, if i had business in the vicinity.

- passport collection

the process was fairly straightforward; i was in and out in about 10 minutes. the difficulty is finding the place. turns out that the singapore consulate-general in osaka is a small office located in a building owned by shimano. yes, the bicycle gear company. so you have to clear shimano security before going in. it seems like a one-person operation. lucky i remembered to bring my passport!

- kobe (general)

kobe is probably the biggest and most famous city in hyogo prefecture. side note: it annoys me, that the prefecture names don't always match up with the names of their capitals. there is a strong chinese influence, probably because it was one of the places where chinese immigrants were first allowed to settle. the city wasn't that crowded, but i felt a vibrancy and life that is missing from my rural neck of the woods.

- kobe (food)

due to the chinese influence, there were many chinese dishes available. from dim sum like xiao long bao to bak zhang, and even full-blown chinese restaurants! i didn't eat much though. somehow, i found myself a little reluctant to eat in public. i don't know why, either; perhaps i haven't done it in such a long time, it feels foreign and weird now. i did try kobe beef sushi, which was nice but expensive. there was also an abura soba (dry ramen) shop, which is only the second or third one i've seen so far. i also learnt that kobe is famous for chocolate. i went to visit a famous chocolatier's shop and bought ruby chocolate-coated raisins. they were good, but not super special.

- parking prices

whenever i go to the city, i always feel so grateful that parking literally anywhere in my town is free. the city parking rates are scary too - the worst i saw was 300 yen per 10 minutes, no upper limit to the fee. that translates to $18 an hour, by the way. to think that i used to balk at parking prices in singapore! well, for balance, parking in the city is more expensive in japan than in singapore, but the reverse is true for suburbs and rural areas - as rural as you get in singapore, anyway. so i guess it just depends on where you live in japan.

- meeting my professor

originally, my mission was just to collect my passport and go back. but my professor mentioned that he'd be in kobe for a conference around this period. since it was on my route anyway, we arranged a dinner. that was yesterday, and apart from him and me, my russian postdoc (who's now a professor in another university), my junior (who's now a postdoc in the lab), and a current phd student (who joined the lab after i left) also joined us. we caught each other up on the last 2 years over a nice steak dinner. in a strange parallel, he's also been baking - but pandan cake instead of bread. that's something i've been wanting to try! my former postdoc is now married, and she gave birth not too long ago. the meeting left me with a full stomach, and an even fuller heart. i hope the next time we catch up won't be after another 2 years.

- an interesting encounter

on my second night in kobe, i went to this yaki udon place for dinner. the main draw for me wasn't the noodles, but the fact that organ meats were offered as mix-ins. i tried beef liver and either stomach or intestine, i forget which. the liver is not something i'd go for again, but yes to the stomach/intestine. so while i was there, i uncharacteristically struck up a conversation with a salaryman who was a regular customer. he helped translate the menu for me, and we had some nice/funny conversation with the other patrons too. nobody offered to buy me dinner or take me on a road trip, like scary JC friend has experienced, but i figure baby steps. i can't remember whose quote this is, but someone said, "a stranger is just a friend you haven't made yet". i'll try to live by that more, within common-sensical limits, of course.

- japanese study

i finished up the remaining 2 practice papers while in kobe. the results were not exactly encouraging. there are still so many kanji that i don't know the reading of, words that i don't know the meaning of, and my reading speed is still too slow. don't have high hopes of passing. well, failing the first time isn't the end of the world, but it'd be much better to pass in one shot. i still have tomorrow for revision, so i'll use the time to brush up on my weak areas, and attempt the listening section.

- future direction

during the dinner with my professor, he asked about how long i intended to stay in japan, and what i wanted to do in the future. so i told him about the IP plan. he suggested that i look into data science and integrating it into IP work - patent searching, for example. i don't know if that's a path i want to follow, because computing is not my thing. but i figured that there's no harm in taking a look. preliminary googling has turned up that java (which is different from javascript) and python would be promising starts.

- thoughts about my kids

since they asked over dinner, i also shared a bit of what i'm currently doing. showed them the video of my favourite class doing their dance item during last year's sports day. it's going to sound weird, but i felt proud when i talked about them! if only they would allow me to choose what classes i wanted to take upon recontracting! interestingly, my former postdoc said that she couldn't imagine me interacting with or teaching primary school kids. see? i told you kids and me don't mix.

- organized chaos (the glove story)

i'm the kind of person who knows where things should be, despite the overall area looking like a mess. you should have seen my lab space! yes, i'll admit that it sometimes makes finding things more difficult than it should be, but it works for me. well, since the weather got colder, i wanted to use my thicker gloves. i must have turned my room upside down searching for them before the trip! i was sure that they were in there somewhere. while i was in kobe, i had the temptation to buy another pair at the conveniently-located uniqlo, but i resisted because i knew that they HAD to turn up. ends up i was right; they'd fallen off the shelf in the closet space, and were on the floor. it took a torchlight to see them. go me for not wasting money!

- budget woes

which leads to my budget for the trip. i've definitely blown it...i withdrew 25000 yen in cash, and have like, 5000 remaining? that's excluding the purchases made on my credit card and the tolls on the expressway, among other things. i'd say that the saving grace here is that no money was spent unnecessarily. and thankfully, i have adequate savings which can withstand a small to medium hit once or twice a year.

- superficiality

osaka and kobe are more populated, so i thought i'd give the dating app thing a try while i was there. set up a bare-bones profile (no pictures, but with real age, height, and weight) and searched for guys near me. there was one like, 80m away, so i assume he was in the same building. there was another guy further away who listed himself as looking for chats and friends, so i dropped him a message - just a simple "hi". his first (and only) reply was (translated) "aren't you way too fat?" for all the moral education that they teach in schools, all the lessons about how discrimination is bad, every human has value and is precious, to consider others' feelings, this was unexpected. and yet...not entirely so. ah well.

- 377a thoughts

didn't bother watching the debates, because it's all a big wayang. i do not, even for a second, believe that all the MPs from the ruling party suddenly grew a heart and felt compassion for LGBT individuals. it's worrying, because now their bigoted feelings will fester in silence. the opposition's decision to lift the whip (ie. not force its MPs to vote in a particular way) was brave, although it did show that some opposition MPs place more emphasis on abstract religious concepts than the actual suffering of their fellow man. disappointed, but expected. but at the end of the day, i'll take the win. i've blogged about my thoughts on gay marriage before, so not going to do the broken record thing here. but really...civil unions with benefits identical to marriage!

- comfort zone

it's only when i leave my town that i get the feeling like i should be doing more in all aspects of my life. guess it's because leaving this small town reminds me that there's a much bigger world out there. related thought...it might also be because i'm getting too comfortable here. i mean, the work is brainless, i've basically tackled all the challenges of daily living, and my stress test results always show that i'm feeling restless because my work is too easy. need to find myself a consistent challenge, something i can do semi-regularly. will have to meditate on that.

-random thought of the day: JLPT in about 36 hours!-