J177 Tuesday October 16th
Nothing much to report. Standard Monday, not too many classes. Updated my paper journal. Went for a run. Did laundry. One of my Japanese coworkers gave me a packet of chamomile tea, which was nice of her.
J178 Wednesday October 17th
Many students impressed with hiking stories. I'm getting closer to registering for the G.R.E. I managed to track down the correct agency to call, Thomson Prometric, a testing agency that handles a ton of standardized tests. I called their English language help line and talked to a flesh-and-blood human. He told me of their setup: tests were registered online or by phone. You could register for a test every month, but no more than 5 tests in a 6-month period. The next available seats were for December.
I thanked him for the clear instructions, something I'd been having difficulty with online, and plotted my test time. Asking for a day off is a tricky business at my company, but I was lucky in that Thomson offers G.R.E.s on the weekends.
J179 Thursday October 18th
I finally registered for the G.R.E.! Before work I hopped on Thomson's website and registered. December 16th, 2007, in Kayabacho Tower, Shinkawa Ward Tokyo, at 1PM, I will take the G.R.E. It was a bit pricey, $170, but it couldn't be helped.
Please note, if it could be helped, let me know :)
The rest of the day was in class. My break time was spent with more math review. I'm slowly getting it all back. I'm a little faster, able to see around the corners a little further. It's like relearning the rules to an old game I played as a kid, except now I'm applying a lot more brainpower to it.
J180 Friday October 19th
Many of my lessons have common themes. Business expressions, travel, that sort of stuff. Another big one is food. My first lesson today was, in part, about ramen, and I was beset with an intense craving for the hot noodle soup. I had an hour for lunch, so I hopped on my bike and sped east to Kumamoto Ramen, a ramen joint of excellent quality.
An anecdote: Tom Culpepper, fraternity brother of mine and all-around swell guy, was a teacher in Japan for a while before I came here. He worked in a little town called Ota. I visited him when I first got here, and he took me around. While eating at his favorite ramen place, he imparted a gem of wisdom. "Ramen joints are like BBQ joints; the dirtier they are, the better the food."
Kumamoto isn't quite on the level of that place Tom and I went to, but it certainly is good. It's cozy and friendly. My dad and I went here when he visited, so it's familiar territory. I hadn't been there in a while, actually, but the chef on duty greeted me with "Been a while, eh?" The day was a cool, but the ramen warmed (and filled) me up.
The rest of the day was without incident. Sometime in the past week my 360 headset started working, and I put in some more Halo 3 multiplayer at night. I wanted to test out the single player coop mode with Peter or Stickman. I had beaten Halo 3 on Hard mode, but the most difficult setting, Legendary, is quite the controller-cracker. I needed some help to barrel past the stickier spots I found myself mired in, and both Peter and Stick were gifted Halo enthusiasts.
Also in the evening, two of my D&D players bowed out for the scheduled session. Masaki was feeling ill, and Josh was going to be busy. I decided to postpone the game for a week, which was met with agreement by the party.
J181 Saturday October 20th
7 Classes today, but it wasn't a killer. Greg, the teacher I replaced, turned 27 today. M-sensei and I went to Ito Yokado to buy his birthday cake. There will be a dinner party at Tsuki Uma, an izukaiya (think tapas restaurant) tonight after work. Genie was there in the grocery store, and she informed us that no one had been paid that month. Furthermore, NOVA's Japanese staff haven't been paid in nearly 4 months. Crazy. A new deadline was given by the parent company, the 25th, but Genie and the rest of the Hitachi NOVAs aren't holding their breath.
After work I headed home and got cleaned up. I had some time before the party started, so for giggles I pulled up the Forest of Doors website. For those of you who have no idea why a forest deserves to be capitalized, or why there are doors there, I shall enlighten you. One of my Fraternity brothers, a Chris Tang (accidentally spelled "Christ" there...that's kinda funny) is an avid roleplayer. He and some of his friends decided to make their own rules and setting for a LARP, a Live Action Role Playing Game. I caught wind of it, and attended the first game. I've been an avid attendee ever since.
My absence from the game has been one of the few genuinely negative aspects of my year here in Japan. I would very much like to go back and play. I poked around the site and the forums, reading up on the exploits of my old friends. I saw new players begin their characters and mature quickly, from eager newbies to seasoned veterans in a matter of months. The character manager software was finally up and running, and I set about working through the math to have a comprehensive list of my character's experience points and resulting expenditures. I also fired off an email to one of the Marshals, one of the people who run the game, to begin discussing my character's whereabouts during my year and a half of absence.
My RPG fun had, I noticed it was time to head out to the party. I pedaled to Tsuki Uma and proceeded to get down with a delightful gang of students and friends. Some of them I still teach, while others I'd never met before. Some of my coworkers were there, M-sensei and his girlfriend, along with S-sensei and M-san, a part time teacher and the administrative assistant of my school, respectively.
I learned many things at this party. M-sensei and I educated the gathered in a veritable rainbow of English slang, whilst our audience did their best do reciprocate. I tried out a few Japanese jokes I'd learned over the years, and to my delight I managed to pull them off.
I also learned of the Japanese custom of sharing one's food. I am a bit of a vacuum when it comes to food. I have a big appetite, and I can eat a fair amount of consumables. This makes my ongoing struggle with weight loss...interesting. It also means that when it comes time to eat, I chow down with the best of 'em. I ordered a few different dishes, and proceeded to tuck into the main course, a mini-pizza (Japanese style). As I neared the end of my modest meal, I noticed my tablemates looking at me. In that way...the one that says you've committed the social equivalent of knifing someone in broad daylight.
They informed me that it is the custom in Japan to share one's food, or at the very least offer to do so, when eating at an izukaiya. Upon realizing my error, I offered apologies, but was assured that I'd done no harm. I was merely unawares. I now know the proper etiquette for Japanese dining.
The party was fun. Cake was had, and merry was made. I left at the end, biking home full of Japanese food. I played Halo until 4AM. Huzzah, slack!
J182 Sunday October 21st
I woke up at 5:30AM. I am not kidding. I couldn't get to sleep again, so I just got up. I logged on to Halo 3 again and teamed up with Peter. Together we beat the game on Legendary, the toughest difficulty setting, and secured a plethora of points for my Gamerscore. Afterwards, I decided to put in some exercise time.
I went for a run around noon time. The shortening day makes the world seem kind of strange; you never really see day anymore. The sun gets up only so high on the horizon, so by the time midday comes around, it looks like dusk is beginning already. I don't mind twilight edging closer and closer to 4PM, but it's freaking weird.
I went shopping after my run, picking up some badly-needed groceries. I whipped up a delicious, healthy meal upon my triumphant return, and settled down for an afternoon nap. Minutes hadn't gone by when I was called back to my computer to chat with a very drunk Peter. There was, as I recall, a party of no minor magnitude happening at Psi U that day, and Peter was having, as they say in academic terms "a great f****** time". Overjoyed, yet again unable to sleep, I packed away my futon and played more Halo.
I tried my hand at ranked games, games in which one's actual play style is input into some arcane series of equations. The result of these formulae being a 'rank' that somehow displays your overall awesomeness at the game. I put in an hour or three of effort, and was rewarded with a healthy starting rank of 5. Go me! Realize that there are those who have ranks over 50. I was finally able to sleep at the auspicious hour of midnight.
J183 Monday October 22nd
I was up at 11. 11 hours of sleep! An unheard number! Today was amazingly productive, probably because I intended to study, yet did everything possible to avoid that singular activity.
I did laundry, taking in my very dry stuff and running and hanging a load of not-so-clean stuff. I found that my inquiry regarding my FoD character had been replied to, and thus did some more planning and scheming for that game. I played a bit of Halo, but the past two day's worth of gaming did much to quench my overall desire for FPS glory.
I posted an entry to this blog, an event that is becoming more and more rare. It's not that I don't like to post, far from it. I really do love letting you all know about my activities. It's just a lengthy process that often slips my mind. I am often distracted, as many of you know, and I find it difficult to focus on any one thing for a long period of time. Except video games. That's kind of strange to experience, really. Toward the end of the day, I received an email from K stating that he couldn't make it to the D&D game. Which I'd postponed. Two days ago. I chalked his lack of receipt of the email to witchcraft, and left it at that.
Showing posts with label halo 3. Show all posts
Showing posts with label halo 3. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
*blurble*
J159 Friday September 28th
Thursday night, after work, I played Halo 3 until 4AM. It is sweet, like candy. A cup for my game-thirsty soul. It is, in a word, awesome. To further underscore the sheer awesomeness of the day, though, I ran for a solid 15 minutes before playing. It's the beginning of what will be a renewed exercise regime.
Friday itself was uneventful. I ran again, in the evening. I took many a twist and turn through the grid of back streets that Hitachi is shot through with. While I ran I passed a few barkers, advertisers for a snack bar. The man of the couple shouted a heart-felt "Ganbate!" or "Do your best!/Right on!/You go girl!" (take your pick). Another few hours of Halo 3 awaited me when I got back, after a wonderfully cold shower.
J160 Saturday September 29th
Saturdays. Ugh. If there is one thing I will not miss about this job, it is a Saturday schedule. 7 classes awaited me, and 7 classes I taught. One after the other after the other. After work I felt extraordinarily drained of my energies, though I mustered the strength to do some grocery shopping at Ito Yokado. I made dinner at home and pedaled to G-Bros. A few drinks were had, but I was literally nodding off at the table.
I biked home and had a few hours more of Halo 3, though before long I fell asleep.
J161 Sunday September 30th
The telltale patter of rain on my window, and the even more telltale swoosh of tires on rain-glazed roads told me of the day's weather before I had fully awakened. The day was gray and dreary. Perfect gaming weather.
I watched the final episode of Gurren Lagann today. It was very appropriate, somewhat bittersweet. I'll watch it translated, eventually, but for now I'm content with the bits that I could glean. You don't need much translation skill when the show is about beating the crap out of successively bigger (and boy is that ever an understatement for this show) bad guys.
The rest of my day, quite literally, was spent playing Halo 3. I ducked, sniped, and shot my way through almost a dozen levels of alien-filled genius. The environments ranged from the familiar to the fantastic. The ruined splendor of southern Africa, the alien majesty of Forerunner installations, the claustrophobic biology of Flood infestation. The music was a surprisingly pleasant mix of old and new themes. The gameplay was solid, with good A.I. and plenty of challenging, yet ultimately surmountable, odds.
The story I will not expose here, save that it was very satisfying to me. Halo 2 was a great disappointment, story-wise, for me. Halo 3 delivered with a truly epic narrative of hope, valor, and sacrifice. The action was fast-paced and thrilling. It was freaking sweet. The ending I saw was moving.
After beating the game, an act I will surely relish many times, I took a break and hopped on the Internet. I talked with Peter, one of my fraternity brothers, and another big Halo fan. He and I share similar views on the overall story of the Halo universe, though until now have had little interaction with one another on the subject. He had beaten the game, too. I told him my thoughts on the ending, to which he requested I beat it once more. I had missed a cut scene, apparently, one at the very end of the credits. I had quit those, on accident, when I had beaten the game the first time.
Once again I took up my controller, and once again I threw down. I saw the other half of the ending, and was uplifted. I had thought the ending I'd first seen to be good. This was spectacular.
After beating it a second time, I sought to try my hand at multiplayer Halo 3, using XBox Live. I connected my 360 to my DSL modem using the pack-in LAN cable. It's a healthy 6 meters in length, enough to stretch around my room without getting in the way of anything.
I was distressed to find that I could not migrate my offline Xbox profile, brimming with hard-to-earn in-game achievements, to XBL. I had to create a new one, much to my chagrin, but it is not an impossibility to redo what I had already done. Merely a pain.
My Halo skills, honed on the first version of the game, were never spectacular. I was adequately skilled, and didn't seek to sharpen them against my friends. Halo 2's non-ending put me very cross against Bungie in general, so I patently refused to play multiplayer using that game. As a result, what little skill I had had atrophied in the interim. In layman's terms, I sucked. BUT, and this is the cool part, I was relearning them quickly.
At midnight, after a long day of alien killing, world-saving, and multiplayer-sucking, I called it a night. At midnight. Crazy, I know.
J162 Monday October 1st
Oh, I quite forgot. I had to get up at 3 to go Scuba diving. That's right, I'm going to go scuba diving. Wish me luck!
After only 3 hours of sleep I woke up to my DS alarm clock. Forcing myself to have some toast and take a hot shower, I packed a small bag and biked down to Crescent, a scuba diving school owned by one of the students that comes to my school. Both M-sensei and I teach him, but it was M-Sensei who organized this excursion.
In all, the group was myself, M-sensei, Claire, K, Matt, and Dan. We six, along with my student and his three employees, Yumi, Mika, and Yuka. We were headed for Izu, a large peninsula to the south of Hitachi some 4~5 hours by car. It was past Tokyo. My van, one of two making the trip, I shared with Mika and Yuka, the drivers, and K and Dan. I slept on and off through the journey, enjoying the sights of roadside Japan in those few times I was awake.
We took many breaks for food and bathroom time, but by 10 we'd arrived at the lagoon where we would be diving. There was a small cluster of buildings that served as a rest house, a restaurant, a hotel, and a training facility for diving. Next to the parking lot was a modest swimming pool, where we would spend the next 3 hours learning how to dive.
M-sensei and I had worked with our student, T, for about a week to help him prepare for instructing us in English. He's at a high-beginner level of English; he's very good with the basics, but he's got plenty of space to improve. Luckily my Japanese skills, and those of K, allowed us to translate everything he couldn't get across in English.
We donned our wetsuits. This was my first time in the tight, neoprene garment, and it was a fun experience. The pool water was cold, but my wetsuit went to work quickly, trapping a thin layer of water against my skin. The water drew out my body heat, but since the suit prevented the water from floating away, it instead served to heat me with my own body-heat. Rather ingenious.
We learned the basics. How to recover one's mouthpiece, in case of loss or confusion. How to clear the mouthpiece before breathing. How to stick with one's buddy, as well as how to use the emergency mouthpiece that pulled from our tanks to provide air for our buddies, should they run out of air. We had to re-learn how to swim, using big flippers. We had a break for lunch, myself enjoying a nice meat pasta, with a side of thick-sliced toast.
After a quick review, we were ready for the sea. We donned our gear, our tanks topped off. Our diving gear was as follows: a wetsuit, a weight belt, a scuba backpack, containing the tank of compressed oxygen, the pressure gauge, the primary and secondary mouthpieces, and an inflatable air bladder for buoyancy. Flippers completed the ensemble, but we had to wait to put those on.
Weighted down, we waddled to the beach. The lagoon was deceptively large, a broad oval of calm water that looked out into a deep bay. We could barely see the town on the far side of the massive bay, but we would only be going as far as the lagoon's walls. It is honeycombed with passages and tunnels, and many divers come from across Japan to practice their craft here.
The beach was comprised of stones, rather than sand. We picked our way across the smooth rocks until we got to the seaside. We divided into three teams, two students and an instructor. I was with Dan, and our instructor was Yuka. We equipped our flippers, and waded into the water.
Under the surface is very different from dry land. There is a constant noise, a rasp of sand and rock as they rub against one another. The frequent gurgle of bubbles as they escape from one's mouthpiece. Finally, and most importantly, is the hiss of one's breath.
We began our decent quite slowly, everyone spread out but staying in their groups. I almost immediately began to experience discomfort in my ears. One had to equalize pressure in one's air-filled body cavities, lest pain or worse things happen. Try as I might, though, I could not equalize my ears. Yuka noticed my lagging behind, and we communicated with hand signals.
'Pain' I mimed. 'Ear'.
'Equalize' she responded.
'Pain' I mimed, after trying again. 'Ear'.
We ascended a little, the pressure lessening with the centimeter. I tried again, and got a little equalization. I descended a little more with Yuka next to me. We were down maybe 5 or 6 meters. The rest of the group were down a few more, but further ahead. As we floated, she pointed out some of the aquatic life that flitted around us. Tiny blue fish darted left and right, and miniature, gumdrop-shaped jellyfish undulated lazily. All around was a haze of particulate, life tinier than I could easily see, grit and sand.
We tried to catch up, but I was once again struck by severe discomfort in my ears. Again I signaled to Yuka, and again we tried to equalize. We descended a bit more, and that was when the dizziness hit.
I can remember little of the event itself. I felt Yuka's hand grip my arm, and I responded by holding on to her offered limb. I felt the entire world tilt sickeningly 90 degrees, according to my pressure-addled inner-ear.
'Dizzy' I mimed. 'Pain'
'Up' she mimed. I complied. The world turned upside down. Even as I write this, a phantom nausea whispers through my cochlea.
We ascended, myself too incapacitated to be of much help, but the water's buoyancy gave Yuka more than enough strength to lift me. As we surfaced I felt my ears pop, and water gushed from them. The world spun around me and nausea, until now unfelt, roiled within me like a circular wave. I found it difficult to breathe, and released the front clasp of my tank. My shoulders took the weight, and I found I could breathe again.
Yuka was calm the entire time, and for that matter I was too. She waited until I could move again, and slowly pulled me to shore. She bade me relax and breathe. When we got to the shore I shucked my gear and tugged my suit down to my waist. The air was cool, but it felt nice to have nothing tight across my chest or stomach. Yuka was smiling all the way.
I made my way back to the pool to wait for the rest of the group. I found an excellent walking stick stuck in a small fire pit, and used it to help get back to the club house. My nausea had subsided, but my stomach ached in a powerful way from the threat of it. I felt like I'd been folded in half. I got out of my wetsuit and rested in my swim trunks. I heard the group surface, far across the lagoon. After about 20 or 30 minutes they had made their way back.
We broke down at a leisurely pace, the instructors doing all of the work. The rest of us chatted and lounged in the cloud-saturated sun. Before long we were packed, and we began the long drive home. It was about 5PM.
I slept quite a bit on the ride home. The training was quite a workout, and the day's stresses had me quite wiped out. I woke a few times through the trip back home. We stopped at a seafood restaurant of some reputation. I enjoyed a tempura sampler of epic proportions, filled with many delicious, mysterious meats.
We passed through Tokyo on the way back, and were treated to a beautiful night-view of the city's bridges. The glow of the lights reflected off the choppy water, giving the city a wavy, glittering twin.
We dropped one of the instructors off at a train station, which is where I think I lost one of my blue flip-flops. They'd been longtime companions in my life here in Japan, and had once belonged to E.J. When we opened the door to bid Mika farewell, one fell out, unnoticed. My student was kind enough to donate his Crocks to me for the evening, but my napping kept me occupied during our frequent breaks.
During the ride home, when I was awake, Dan, K and I talked about many subjects. I mentioned Halo 3, and expounded upon its virtues. I mentioned, though, that my TV was quite small (an economic 13 incher). K pipped up, saying that he had a large TV that he wasn't using at his place. Dan, the only member of the gang with vehicular transport that wasn't human-powered, offered to haul the TV from K's place to mine when we got back to Hitachi.
We got back to Hitachi at around 10 or 11PM. We paid at Crescent and went our separate ways. My bike had been stored at the shop, in a tiny alley between it and the building next to it. Dan and I drove to K's place while K walked (it wasn't too far away). We manhandled the TV into Dan's van, and a quick moment later we were at my place. I hauled it upstairs after bidding Dan a fond farewell.
I showered, washing the salt and sea-grit from me. I felt like I'd left my apartment years ago. After resting a bit I hooked up my new TV, which wasn't difficult in the slightest. My first levels in Nerd were of the A/V specialty class, so TV hookup I can do in my sleep. Thanks to my extensive napping in the car, my batteries were pretty well-charged. I was up until 4AM again with Halo multiplayer. The biger screen, a 25 inch model, really made the difference; I feel like I'm not squinting at a postage stamp anymore.
Thursday night, after work, I played Halo 3 until 4AM. It is sweet, like candy. A cup for my game-thirsty soul. It is, in a word, awesome. To further underscore the sheer awesomeness of the day, though, I ran for a solid 15 minutes before playing. It's the beginning of what will be a renewed exercise regime.
Friday itself was uneventful. I ran again, in the evening. I took many a twist and turn through the grid of back streets that Hitachi is shot through with. While I ran I passed a few barkers, advertisers for a snack bar. The man of the couple shouted a heart-felt "Ganbate!" or "Do your best!/Right on!/You go girl!" (take your pick). Another few hours of Halo 3 awaited me when I got back, after a wonderfully cold shower.
J160 Saturday September 29th
Saturdays. Ugh. If there is one thing I will not miss about this job, it is a Saturday schedule. 7 classes awaited me, and 7 classes I taught. One after the other after the other. After work I felt extraordinarily drained of my energies, though I mustered the strength to do some grocery shopping at Ito Yokado. I made dinner at home and pedaled to G-Bros. A few drinks were had, but I was literally nodding off at the table.
I biked home and had a few hours more of Halo 3, though before long I fell asleep.
J161 Sunday September 30th
The telltale patter of rain on my window, and the even more telltale swoosh of tires on rain-glazed roads told me of the day's weather before I had fully awakened. The day was gray and dreary. Perfect gaming weather.
I watched the final episode of Gurren Lagann today. It was very appropriate, somewhat bittersweet. I'll watch it translated, eventually, but for now I'm content with the bits that I could glean. You don't need much translation skill when the show is about beating the crap out of successively bigger (and boy is that ever an understatement for this show) bad guys.
The rest of my day, quite literally, was spent playing Halo 3. I ducked, sniped, and shot my way through almost a dozen levels of alien-filled genius. The environments ranged from the familiar to the fantastic. The ruined splendor of southern Africa, the alien majesty of Forerunner installations, the claustrophobic biology of Flood infestation. The music was a surprisingly pleasant mix of old and new themes. The gameplay was solid, with good A.I. and plenty of challenging, yet ultimately surmountable, odds.
The story I will not expose here, save that it was very satisfying to me. Halo 2 was a great disappointment, story-wise, for me. Halo 3 delivered with a truly epic narrative of hope, valor, and sacrifice. The action was fast-paced and thrilling. It was freaking sweet. The ending I saw was moving.
After beating the game, an act I will surely relish many times, I took a break and hopped on the Internet. I talked with Peter, one of my fraternity brothers, and another big Halo fan. He and I share similar views on the overall story of the Halo universe, though until now have had little interaction with one another on the subject. He had beaten the game, too. I told him my thoughts on the ending, to which he requested I beat it once more. I had missed a cut scene, apparently, one at the very end of the credits. I had quit those, on accident, when I had beaten the game the first time.
Once again I took up my controller, and once again I threw down. I saw the other half of the ending, and was uplifted. I had thought the ending I'd first seen to be good. This was spectacular.
After beating it a second time, I sought to try my hand at multiplayer Halo 3, using XBox Live. I connected my 360 to my DSL modem using the pack-in LAN cable. It's a healthy 6 meters in length, enough to stretch around my room without getting in the way of anything.
I was distressed to find that I could not migrate my offline Xbox profile, brimming with hard-to-earn in-game achievements, to XBL. I had to create a new one, much to my chagrin, but it is not an impossibility to redo what I had already done. Merely a pain.
My Halo skills, honed on the first version of the game, were never spectacular. I was adequately skilled, and didn't seek to sharpen them against my friends. Halo 2's non-ending put me very cross against Bungie in general, so I patently refused to play multiplayer using that game. As a result, what little skill I had had atrophied in the interim. In layman's terms, I sucked. BUT, and this is the cool part, I was relearning them quickly.
At midnight, after a long day of alien killing, world-saving, and multiplayer-sucking, I called it a night. At midnight. Crazy, I know.
J162 Monday October 1st
Oh, I quite forgot. I had to get up at 3 to go Scuba diving. That's right, I'm going to go scuba diving. Wish me luck!
After only 3 hours of sleep I woke up to my DS alarm clock. Forcing myself to have some toast and take a hot shower, I packed a small bag and biked down to Crescent, a scuba diving school owned by one of the students that comes to my school. Both M-sensei and I teach him, but it was M-Sensei who organized this excursion.
In all, the group was myself, M-sensei, Claire, K, Matt, and Dan. We six, along with my student and his three employees, Yumi, Mika, and Yuka. We were headed for Izu, a large peninsula to the south of Hitachi some 4~5 hours by car. It was past Tokyo. My van, one of two making the trip, I shared with Mika and Yuka, the drivers, and K and Dan. I slept on and off through the journey, enjoying the sights of roadside Japan in those few times I was awake.
We took many breaks for food and bathroom time, but by 10 we'd arrived at the lagoon where we would be diving. There was a small cluster of buildings that served as a rest house, a restaurant, a hotel, and a training facility for diving. Next to the parking lot was a modest swimming pool, where we would spend the next 3 hours learning how to dive.
M-sensei and I had worked with our student, T, for about a week to help him prepare for instructing us in English. He's at a high-beginner level of English; he's very good with the basics, but he's got plenty of space to improve. Luckily my Japanese skills, and those of K, allowed us to translate everything he couldn't get across in English.
We donned our wetsuits. This was my first time in the tight, neoprene garment, and it was a fun experience. The pool water was cold, but my wetsuit went to work quickly, trapping a thin layer of water against my skin. The water drew out my body heat, but since the suit prevented the water from floating away, it instead served to heat me with my own body-heat. Rather ingenious.
We learned the basics. How to recover one's mouthpiece, in case of loss or confusion. How to clear the mouthpiece before breathing. How to stick with one's buddy, as well as how to use the emergency mouthpiece that pulled from our tanks to provide air for our buddies, should they run out of air. We had to re-learn how to swim, using big flippers. We had a break for lunch, myself enjoying a nice meat pasta, with a side of thick-sliced toast.
After a quick review, we were ready for the sea. We donned our gear, our tanks topped off. Our diving gear was as follows: a wetsuit, a weight belt, a scuba backpack, containing the tank of compressed oxygen, the pressure gauge, the primary and secondary mouthpieces, and an inflatable air bladder for buoyancy. Flippers completed the ensemble, but we had to wait to put those on.
Weighted down, we waddled to the beach. The lagoon was deceptively large, a broad oval of calm water that looked out into a deep bay. We could barely see the town on the far side of the massive bay, but we would only be going as far as the lagoon's walls. It is honeycombed with passages and tunnels, and many divers come from across Japan to practice their craft here.
The beach was comprised of stones, rather than sand. We picked our way across the smooth rocks until we got to the seaside. We divided into three teams, two students and an instructor. I was with Dan, and our instructor was Yuka. We equipped our flippers, and waded into the water.
Under the surface is very different from dry land. There is a constant noise, a rasp of sand and rock as they rub against one another. The frequent gurgle of bubbles as they escape from one's mouthpiece. Finally, and most importantly, is the hiss of one's breath.
We began our decent quite slowly, everyone spread out but staying in their groups. I almost immediately began to experience discomfort in my ears. One had to equalize pressure in one's air-filled body cavities, lest pain or worse things happen. Try as I might, though, I could not equalize my ears. Yuka noticed my lagging behind, and we communicated with hand signals.
'Pain' I mimed. 'Ear'.
'Equalize' she responded.
'Pain' I mimed, after trying again. 'Ear'.
We ascended a little, the pressure lessening with the centimeter. I tried again, and got a little equalization. I descended a little more with Yuka next to me. We were down maybe 5 or 6 meters. The rest of the group were down a few more, but further ahead. As we floated, she pointed out some of the aquatic life that flitted around us. Tiny blue fish darted left and right, and miniature, gumdrop-shaped jellyfish undulated lazily. All around was a haze of particulate, life tinier than I could easily see, grit and sand.
We tried to catch up, but I was once again struck by severe discomfort in my ears. Again I signaled to Yuka, and again we tried to equalize. We descended a bit more, and that was when the dizziness hit.
I can remember little of the event itself. I felt Yuka's hand grip my arm, and I responded by holding on to her offered limb. I felt the entire world tilt sickeningly 90 degrees, according to my pressure-addled inner-ear.
'Dizzy' I mimed. 'Pain'
'Up' she mimed. I complied. The world turned upside down. Even as I write this, a phantom nausea whispers through my cochlea.
We ascended, myself too incapacitated to be of much help, but the water's buoyancy gave Yuka more than enough strength to lift me. As we surfaced I felt my ears pop, and water gushed from them. The world spun around me and nausea, until now unfelt, roiled within me like a circular wave. I found it difficult to breathe, and released the front clasp of my tank. My shoulders took the weight, and I found I could breathe again.
Yuka was calm the entire time, and for that matter I was too. She waited until I could move again, and slowly pulled me to shore. She bade me relax and breathe. When we got to the shore I shucked my gear and tugged my suit down to my waist. The air was cool, but it felt nice to have nothing tight across my chest or stomach. Yuka was smiling all the way.
I made my way back to the pool to wait for the rest of the group. I found an excellent walking stick stuck in a small fire pit, and used it to help get back to the club house. My nausea had subsided, but my stomach ached in a powerful way from the threat of it. I felt like I'd been folded in half. I got out of my wetsuit and rested in my swim trunks. I heard the group surface, far across the lagoon. After about 20 or 30 minutes they had made their way back.
We broke down at a leisurely pace, the instructors doing all of the work. The rest of us chatted and lounged in the cloud-saturated sun. Before long we were packed, and we began the long drive home. It was about 5PM.
I slept quite a bit on the ride home. The training was quite a workout, and the day's stresses had me quite wiped out. I woke a few times through the trip back home. We stopped at a seafood restaurant of some reputation. I enjoyed a tempura sampler of epic proportions, filled with many delicious, mysterious meats.
We passed through Tokyo on the way back, and were treated to a beautiful night-view of the city's bridges. The glow of the lights reflected off the choppy water, giving the city a wavy, glittering twin.
We dropped one of the instructors off at a train station, which is where I think I lost one of my blue flip-flops. They'd been longtime companions in my life here in Japan, and had once belonged to E.J. When we opened the door to bid Mika farewell, one fell out, unnoticed. My student was kind enough to donate his Crocks to me for the evening, but my napping kept me occupied during our frequent breaks.
During the ride home, when I was awake, Dan, K and I talked about many subjects. I mentioned Halo 3, and expounded upon its virtues. I mentioned, though, that my TV was quite small (an economic 13 incher). K pipped up, saying that he had a large TV that he wasn't using at his place. Dan, the only member of the gang with vehicular transport that wasn't human-powered, offered to haul the TV from K's place to mine when we got back to Hitachi.
We got back to Hitachi at around 10 or 11PM. We paid at Crescent and went our separate ways. My bike had been stored at the shop, in a tiny alley between it and the building next to it. Dan and I drove to K's place while K walked (it wasn't too far away). We manhandled the TV into Dan's van, and a quick moment later we were at my place. I hauled it upstairs after bidding Dan a fond farewell.
I showered, washing the salt and sea-grit from me. I felt like I'd left my apartment years ago. After resting a bit I hooked up my new TV, which wasn't difficult in the slightest. My first levels in Nerd were of the A/V specialty class, so TV hookup I can do in my sleep. Thanks to my extensive napping in the car, my batteries were pretty well-charged. I was up until 4AM again with Halo multiplayer. The biger screen, a 25 inch model, really made the difference; I feel like I'm not squinting at a postage stamp anymore.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
off schedule, on schedule. schedule, schmedule!
J154 Sunday September 23rd
I woke up for Gurren Lagann in the morning. The series is winding to a close, and I must say it is still pretty awesome. I may write a review of it, come to think of it.
After indulging in my kidulthood, I cleaned my kitchen. Household chores have become rather fun activities for me, though I still haven't vacuumed in months. The dust bunnies are migrating to the jamb of my sliding balcony door, where it's warmer. Fall is settling around, and the temperatures are juuuust starting to fall.
I went to Ito Yokado for some much-needed groceries, and enjoyed the terribly domestic joy of cooking with fresh ingredients. As I cooked and subsequently consumed I pondered the plot of my game. My group has 4 members other than myself, only one of which has actually played a tabletop game. One has read the rules extensively, to practice his English in fact, but has not played yet. Another has RPd online, but never offline. The last is a complete virgin to the idea of tabletop RPGs.
My task in crafting this adventure, indeed the world it will take place in, is to make it comprehensive to mesh four completely different people into a well-rounded monster-slaying machine. I love this game.
I hammered out some of the basic, introductory plot. I also plotted the general scale of the world and calculated the travel times based on the rules found in the DMG. One thing I dislike about D&D's overall setup is the fact that the rules are split over three different books. Having only the DMG in dead tree format, it is difficult to quick-reference any information not found in its pages. Luckily, truly wonderful online resources exist such as the D&D Wiki and the Hypertext d20 SRD. These websites, and more, have saved my wizard hat-wearing bacon a time or two in the past.
Overall, it was a lazy day. The game was prepared for, and tomorrow would be epic. Truly epic.
J155 Monday September 24th
Game day!
I printed out a batch of character sheets, getting a little close to the wire thanks to Nick's departure time. Nick is the player who's played tabletop before, mostly Exalted and 2nd Edition D&D. Nick lives and works in Akihabara, in Tokyo. He's got quite the commute to get to the game.
I met Josh, K, and Masaki at the train station at around 3ish. Nick's train was delayed, a bike had become lodged in a guard fence and had to be cut out, so we ducked into Ito Yokado to grab lunch. K was kind enough to donate his room at Geos, his work place, for our game. There was only one other class that day at Geos, and we kept ourselves quiet. Lunch in hand, we settled in to the room and set up shop, waiting for Nick. I explained the basics of the world, going over the world file I'd created the week before and emailed out to everyone, and answered questions.
Nick finally got to Hitachi around 4. Josh picked him up outside of the building, and at long last the gaming group was fully assembled.
The next 4 hours were a blur. I wouldn't go so far as to say I was on fire, but it certainly was a performance that demonstrated my GMing skills. I invented a dozen characters out of thin air, each with a different personality and voice. A town sprang fully-formed from the dry-erase marker in my hand. A plot, sinister and laced with evil, lurched into existence, my every word another footfall of its shambling bulk.
Nick had to dash off at around 9:30 to catch the last train for Tokyo. K and Masaki went their separate ways, while Josh and I hit G-Bros for a post-game beer and some french fries. We talked about the game some, but most of our conversation centered on Halo 3's impending release. The game dropped in two days, our time, in the States, and in three days here in Japan.
I'd been giving the subject of Halo 3 quite a bit of consideration. To purchase it required a system to play it on. The Xbox 360 is available in Japan, but I would be purchasing a Japanese system. Able to play many games, but not all of them. Some 360 games are region locked, meaning they cannot play on consoles from incompatible global regions. Out of all the next-generation gaming platforms, though, the 360 is the least region-locked one.
Josh and I parted company after a few rounds. I made my way back home, basking in the glow of a game well-run. I blogged a week's worth of entries and fell into a deep sleep. I had a strange dream about a hole in my fingernail. It did not hurt, but the absence of my fingernail was very strange. Like someone had cut a square out of my finger.
J156 Tuesday September 25th
I bit the bullet. I awoke. I turned on my laptop. I found the number for the nearest WonderGoo, the one in Hitachi-Taga. I reserved an Xbox 360 and a copy of Halo 3.
Yeah, it'll be a lot of money. Yeah, I may have trouble bringing it home. But you know what? The happiness it'll bring me, the stress-relief and the reveling in the story and the sheer joy of gaming once again will vastly outweigh any difficulties I have on account of the system.
Also, before I left for work, I went for a jog. I. Me. I ran. For 11 minutes I did a brisk jog through the sunlit back streets of my neighborhood. I staggered, sweat-drenched and dizzy, back to my apartment and took the coldest, best shower in my life. I resolved that the purchase of my 360 would be coupled with raising my activity level to new heights. My run would not be a one-time thing. I was going to, and am currently, exercising more than I ever had before.
I filled my tires before I left for work, too. I brought my Camelbak water bottle, bought for my Mt. Fuji ascent, to work. I had calculated that, by eliminating drinks from my daily purchases at Lawson's and the vending machine at my workplace, I could compensate for the price of my 360 and Halo 3 in about 5 months. Math is awesome. Plus, the tap water here in Japan is quite palatable; moreso than much of the water I've drunk in the States.
I ended the day with some Final Fantasy VII. I finally got out of Midgar.
J157 Wednesday September 26th
Looooooong day. 5 classes, 4 of which were in a big block at the end of the day. From 5PM to 9PM I was on my feet, teaching. That is not an easy thing to do, and I do not boast or brag.
During the day, Wonder Goo called and informed me, via one of my coworkers translating, that they had no "Regular" copies of Halo 3 left. They did have plenty of the "Grande" copies. Or whatever they're called. Has lots of extra stuff, but isn't the one that comes with the replica helmet. They were so nice, they let me have the better version for the price of the normal version. Man, if only American stores were this nice every once in a while.
I talked with both my Mom and my Dad thanks to the wonder that is Gmail chat. I played a bit more FFVII, finally managing to beat the Midgar Zolem, the giant freaking snake in the swamp. Go me! I went to sleep early, around midnight, due to exhaustion.
J158 Thursday September 27th
I was up so very early. I was too excited to sleep. I showered and headed out to the station. I missed my first train, given that I was still half-asleep, but I made it to Hitachi-Taga on the next one. Dark clouds had gathered in the hour I had been outside of my house, threatening to loose rain and ruin upon the world.
I marched with a purpose. A brisk walk down the straight road that led from Hitachi-Taga's train station to Wonder Goo. Nothing, not no body no way, was going to stop me from getting my console and my game. Except for the fact that I couldn't remember the Japanese word for 'reservation' (yoyaku) and the woman at the counter spoke no English.
Lots of pointing and my best attempts at Japanese later, I had in my hand an XBox 360 Premium and a copy of Halo 3. I could have kissed the cashier, but it would have caused an international incident.
I marched back in the light drizzle that had started up, covering my precious purchases with my body as best I could. Waiting for the train in the dry of the station, I cracked the case on my copy of the game, flipping through the Japanese-language guide and bonus materials. I caught the train and was back in Hitachi in less than 8 minutes. I stuffed the Xbox into my bike's basket and raced home, one hand on the handlebars, the other keeping the rain-glazed console firmly in place.
I made it home without dropping, folding, spindling, or mutilating either my console or my game. How it happened I do not honestly know. I went about setting everything up, plugging in cables and rerouting power to my various and sundry electronics that pepper my apartment like modern art.
My 360 can be switched to English, no problem. Everything shows up in good old E-go (Japanese for "English"), no problem.
I loaded Halo 3 in the tray. The CD slid in to the slot slowly, and with a reassuring click it settled in place. The rotator arm gripped the CD's spindle-hole firmly, and began to rotate it. The console's optical drive laser flicked on, converting light into data, feeding megabyte after megabyte of code into the system's RAM. Instructions piled atop one another, and processes were queued and executed in ever-complex formats. In less than 3 seconds, my 360 had ingested the Halo 3 disc, and turned it from a small circle of plastic into the physical manifestation of my gaming desires for the past 4 years.
I was holding my breath.
The intro screen faded into life. Purple and morose. Beautiful, familiar music rumbled from the deeper registers into the audible, and I closed my eyes. I savored the strings and horns, the handful of singers, raising their collective voices, instrumented and otherwise, in the mournful theme of Halo 3.
I played for the better part of an hour. The game's menus are in English, but the voice overs are in Japanese. Big cinematic sequences have subtitles, but the in situ dialog, radio chatter and in-game instructions, are not subbed. No biggie. I still get the important bits.
The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. I had a light day, as classes go. I ran again, rewarding my new exercise routine with Halo 3 until 4AM. My dinner was slowly consumed as I assumed the mantle of the Master Chief. I slept like the dead, content in a way I hadn't felt in nearly a year, perhaps more.
A few of you, maybe more, will understand when I say that I have been looking forward to Halo 3 for a very long time. It is, to me, as momentous, if not more so, as the release of a new play by Shakespeare, or perhaps a new volume of prose by Whitman or Hunter S. Thompson. I truly do enjoy video games as others do print media, or movies. To have, to finally have, the culmination, the end, of the Halo story in my hands is almost unbelievable.
I woke up for Gurren Lagann in the morning. The series is winding to a close, and I must say it is still pretty awesome. I may write a review of it, come to think of it.
After indulging in my kidulthood, I cleaned my kitchen. Household chores have become rather fun activities for me, though I still haven't vacuumed in months. The dust bunnies are migrating to the jamb of my sliding balcony door, where it's warmer. Fall is settling around, and the temperatures are juuuust starting to fall.
I went to Ito Yokado for some much-needed groceries, and enjoyed the terribly domestic joy of cooking with fresh ingredients. As I cooked and subsequently consumed I pondered the plot of my game. My group has 4 members other than myself, only one of which has actually played a tabletop game. One has read the rules extensively, to practice his English in fact, but has not played yet. Another has RPd online, but never offline. The last is a complete virgin to the idea of tabletop RPGs.
My task in crafting this adventure, indeed the world it will take place in, is to make it comprehensive to mesh four completely different people into a well-rounded monster-slaying machine. I love this game.
I hammered out some of the basic, introductory plot. I also plotted the general scale of the world and calculated the travel times based on the rules found in the DMG. One thing I dislike about D&D's overall setup is the fact that the rules are split over three different books. Having only the DMG in dead tree format, it is difficult to quick-reference any information not found in its pages. Luckily, truly wonderful online resources exist such as the D&D Wiki and the Hypertext d20 SRD. These websites, and more, have saved my wizard hat-wearing bacon a time or two in the past.
Overall, it was a lazy day. The game was prepared for, and tomorrow would be epic. Truly epic.
J155 Monday September 24th
Game day!
I printed out a batch of character sheets, getting a little close to the wire thanks to Nick's departure time. Nick is the player who's played tabletop before, mostly Exalted and 2nd Edition D&D. Nick lives and works in Akihabara, in Tokyo. He's got quite the commute to get to the game.
I met Josh, K, and Masaki at the train station at around 3ish. Nick's train was delayed, a bike had become lodged in a guard fence and had to be cut out, so we ducked into Ito Yokado to grab lunch. K was kind enough to donate his room at Geos, his work place, for our game. There was only one other class that day at Geos, and we kept ourselves quiet. Lunch in hand, we settled in to the room and set up shop, waiting for Nick. I explained the basics of the world, going over the world file I'd created the week before and emailed out to everyone, and answered questions.
Nick finally got to Hitachi around 4. Josh picked him up outside of the building, and at long last the gaming group was fully assembled.
The next 4 hours were a blur. I wouldn't go so far as to say I was on fire, but it certainly was a performance that demonstrated my GMing skills. I invented a dozen characters out of thin air, each with a different personality and voice. A town sprang fully-formed from the dry-erase marker in my hand. A plot, sinister and laced with evil, lurched into existence, my every word another footfall of its shambling bulk.
Nick had to dash off at around 9:30 to catch the last train for Tokyo. K and Masaki went their separate ways, while Josh and I hit G-Bros for a post-game beer and some french fries. We talked about the game some, but most of our conversation centered on Halo 3's impending release. The game dropped in two days, our time, in the States, and in three days here in Japan.
I'd been giving the subject of Halo 3 quite a bit of consideration. To purchase it required a system to play it on. The Xbox 360 is available in Japan, but I would be purchasing a Japanese system. Able to play many games, but not all of them. Some 360 games are region locked, meaning they cannot play on consoles from incompatible global regions. Out of all the next-generation gaming platforms, though, the 360 is the least region-locked one.
Josh and I parted company after a few rounds. I made my way back home, basking in the glow of a game well-run. I blogged a week's worth of entries and fell into a deep sleep. I had a strange dream about a hole in my fingernail. It did not hurt, but the absence of my fingernail was very strange. Like someone had cut a square out of my finger.
J156 Tuesday September 25th
I bit the bullet. I awoke. I turned on my laptop. I found the number for the nearest WonderGoo, the one in Hitachi-Taga. I reserved an Xbox 360 and a copy of Halo 3.
Yeah, it'll be a lot of money. Yeah, I may have trouble bringing it home. But you know what? The happiness it'll bring me, the stress-relief and the reveling in the story and the sheer joy of gaming once again will vastly outweigh any difficulties I have on account of the system.
Also, before I left for work, I went for a jog. I. Me. I ran. For 11 minutes I did a brisk jog through the sunlit back streets of my neighborhood. I staggered, sweat-drenched and dizzy, back to my apartment and took the coldest, best shower in my life. I resolved that the purchase of my 360 would be coupled with raising my activity level to new heights. My run would not be a one-time thing. I was going to, and am currently, exercising more than I ever had before.
I filled my tires before I left for work, too. I brought my Camelbak water bottle, bought for my Mt. Fuji ascent, to work. I had calculated that, by eliminating drinks from my daily purchases at Lawson's and the vending machine at my workplace, I could compensate for the price of my 360 and Halo 3 in about 5 months. Math is awesome. Plus, the tap water here in Japan is quite palatable; moreso than much of the water I've drunk in the States.
I ended the day with some Final Fantasy VII. I finally got out of Midgar.
J157 Wednesday September 26th
Looooooong day. 5 classes, 4 of which were in a big block at the end of the day. From 5PM to 9PM I was on my feet, teaching. That is not an easy thing to do, and I do not boast or brag.
During the day, Wonder Goo called and informed me, via one of my coworkers translating, that they had no "Regular" copies of Halo 3 left. They did have plenty of the "Grande" copies. Or whatever they're called. Has lots of extra stuff, but isn't the one that comes with the replica helmet. They were so nice, they let me have the better version for the price of the normal version. Man, if only American stores were this nice every once in a while.
I talked with both my Mom and my Dad thanks to the wonder that is Gmail chat. I played a bit more FFVII, finally managing to beat the Midgar Zolem, the giant freaking snake in the swamp. Go me! I went to sleep early, around midnight, due to exhaustion.
J158 Thursday September 27th
I was up so very early. I was too excited to sleep. I showered and headed out to the station. I missed my first train, given that I was still half-asleep, but I made it to Hitachi-Taga on the next one. Dark clouds had gathered in the hour I had been outside of my house, threatening to loose rain and ruin upon the world.
I marched with a purpose. A brisk walk down the straight road that led from Hitachi-Taga's train station to Wonder Goo. Nothing, not no body no way, was going to stop me from getting my console and my game. Except for the fact that I couldn't remember the Japanese word for 'reservation' (yoyaku) and the woman at the counter spoke no English.
Lots of pointing and my best attempts at Japanese later, I had in my hand an XBox 360 Premium and a copy of Halo 3. I could have kissed the cashier, but it would have caused an international incident.
I marched back in the light drizzle that had started up, covering my precious purchases with my body as best I could. Waiting for the train in the dry of the station, I cracked the case on my copy of the game, flipping through the Japanese-language guide and bonus materials. I caught the train and was back in Hitachi in less than 8 minutes. I stuffed the Xbox into my bike's basket and raced home, one hand on the handlebars, the other keeping the rain-glazed console firmly in place.
I made it home without dropping, folding, spindling, or mutilating either my console or my game. How it happened I do not honestly know. I went about setting everything up, plugging in cables and rerouting power to my various and sundry electronics that pepper my apartment like modern art.
My 360 can be switched to English, no problem. Everything shows up in good old E-go (Japanese for "English"), no problem.
I loaded Halo 3 in the tray. The CD slid in to the slot slowly, and with a reassuring click it settled in place. The rotator arm gripped the CD's spindle-hole firmly, and began to rotate it. The console's optical drive laser flicked on, converting light into data, feeding megabyte after megabyte of code into the system's RAM. Instructions piled atop one another, and processes were queued and executed in ever-complex formats. In less than 3 seconds, my 360 had ingested the Halo 3 disc, and turned it from a small circle of plastic into the physical manifestation of my gaming desires for the past 4 years.
I was holding my breath.
The intro screen faded into life. Purple and morose. Beautiful, familiar music rumbled from the deeper registers into the audible, and I closed my eyes. I savored the strings and horns, the handful of singers, raising their collective voices, instrumented and otherwise, in the mournful theme of Halo 3.
I played for the better part of an hour. The game's menus are in English, but the voice overs are in Japanese. Big cinematic sequences have subtitles, but the in situ dialog, radio chatter and in-game instructions, are not subbed. No biggie. I still get the important bits.
The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. I had a light day, as classes go. I ran again, rewarding my new exercise routine with Halo 3 until 4AM. My dinner was slowly consumed as I assumed the mantle of the Master Chief. I slept like the dead, content in a way I hadn't felt in nearly a year, perhaps more.
A few of you, maybe more, will understand when I say that I have been looking forward to Halo 3 for a very long time. It is, to me, as momentous, if not more so, as the release of a new play by Shakespeare, or perhaps a new volume of prose by Whitman or Hunter S. Thompson. I truly do enjoy video games as others do print media, or movies. To have, to finally have, the culmination, the end, of the Halo story in my hands is almost unbelievable.
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