Dear America,

I'm an American citizen, but I've grown up in Singapore. And I would like to mention something with regard to your foreign policy.

Please stop telling the rest of the world to do what you think is best.

Please stop telling us that we are undemocratic.

Please stop telling us to stop censorship.

I think censorship is necessary, as I think it is a lesser evil than rampant liberality.

I feel that having a strong, one-party government makes our country more stable and flexible than having a president who is handicapped by politicians whose interests lie almost as much in altruism as in selfish gain.

I do not want your style of society, where people criticize others in a chaotic, tabloid-style manner, and where you can sue a fast food company because you got fat eating their food.

We may not be perfect, and sometimes, we may have a lack of 'human rights' (both real and imagined) but let's face it, no one is, not even you. And we don't tell you what we think you should do to your country.

We appreciate the concern you are trying to show the rest of the world, by showing us how America got to how it is. But in case you have not noticed, we are not America.

We are different from you. We have our own cultures.

You are not us, so how would you know it'll be good for us?

So thank you very much, but please, stop telling us to become more like you.

Ref: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/obama

雨

Today was a cold and rainy day. Cold as in 15 degrees cold. Rainy as in there was a bit of a drizzle, you know, the kind that makes you feel depressed. The skies were overcast, and it was kinda gray.

So of course, when Steve and I went to E-moms, and only Miyako turned up (with Au-chan of course), Steve felt kinda bummed out. It didn't help that he had been psyching himself up for today's English conversation, since he was planning on using the idea of Thanksgiving (the holiday) to talk with the ladies, and to try and give a Christian-based view on the meaning of that day.

After the E-moms, we were supposed to go with Miyako to her place to plan for kids' club stuff, but since there were so few people, Miyako suggested we just go over to her place. It would also be a lot easier to distract Au-chan in her home than at the community center.

It was true that Au-chan was a lot less noisy at home than at the community center, especially after Miyako put on a video for her to watch. Then Steve got down to discussing Kids' Club stuff with Miyako while I ended up taking care of Au-chan.

And after the discussion was over, Steve asked Miyako if she was interested in doing the study he had prepared for E-moms that day, since Au-chan wasn't disturbing them, so Steve managed to talk to her about Thanksgiving and about how we can be thankful to God and stuff (I didn't really hear what went on during the lesson), but at the end of it, Steve realized that even though E-moms had more or less been canned, he had the opportunity to really share with Miyako.

So in the end, he was happy.

And I was happy cos I got to meet Mel in the evening.

Cheerio!

Wao!

Looking through the news this morning, I read this sports article about a Saudi striker who scored just about off the first touch, 2 seconds into the game.

Talk about shades of Shaolin Soccer...



Cheerio

Piratae

I was looking around the net to check on updates on the typhoon and stuff, when I came across this piece of news abour some not-so-smart pirates operating near Somalia.

I don't know why, but I found it absolutely hilarious. It kinda reminded me of the time the two robbers from Malaysia tried to escape by boat to an island around the area, but happened to disembark on the worst possible island they could have, by going ashore on Tekong.

I can almost imagine the "oh shit" feeling the pirates must have felt when they realized the boat was not a tasty cargo vessel, but a fully armed warship.

EPIC FAIL.

Eurus

So right now, Tokorozawa is starting to feel the effects of a typhoon that's bearing down on Honshu, I think. Nothing too drastic yet, just the advance rains I guess. The train companies have started to take notice and to issue notice as well.

If you look close enough, you'll notice it says 'Typhoon' in the right most column. And it wasn't just the Kawagoe Line which was issuing the notice. The Saikyo Line, the Yokosuka Line, the Utsunomiya Line, and a whole bunch of other lines were also sending out notices.

In fact, I just heard a police car going by, I'm guessing they're saying something like "please stay indoors" or something like that. Quite rare for people to go around making announcements at 3 AM in the morning.

Anyway, E-mums, which was supposed to be on later on, has been canceled. And according to the Japan Meteorological Agency, Saitama's gonna get hit by storms, causing heavy rain and potential flooding. Still not as bad as Kanagawa Prefecture though. They're getting hit harder. And I'm not even looking at the Chūbu region. Read somewhere on the news that even the Toyota factory in Nagoya will remain closed today on orders of their top brass.

Anyway, some updates before I start losing consciousness. It has been getting colder (even without the typhoon), and it is more or less autumn already. According to good friend Shion, you know it's Autumn when you have to wear your tie to work. Ties are not necessary in summer due to the heat. Kinda hard to imagine that summer's over already.

Outreach at Waseda has technically started, but so far, we've been rained out both weeks. It's just how it works: if it's raining, it's a bit hard for us in the Waseda outreach group to strike up conversations with people in the open.

Kodaira-san, who is one of the most tireless workers in the KHCN, has fallen sick recently. The dude really does a lot of work, doing ministry in 4 prefectures (ok, really 3 prefectures [Kanagawa, Saitama, Ibaraki] and a special administrative region [Tokyo]), and is also one of the main leaders in the KHCN. Do pray that he will get better soon.

And a couple of weeks ago, we were having Bible study at Hanakoganei with Rekiji and Ken. One of the passages we used was on the Prodigal Son, and since I had just done that the Saturday before for the Shinjuku HC, I felt fortunate. So we were in the midst of a serious discussion, which went something like this:

Steve: Do you see how much the father loved the son in the story? He was standing there waiting, looking out for the son.
Me: I think what was important too was that the son realized the error of his ways and went back.
S: Yes that is important too. While the father was waiting out there, he didn't go to find the son. The son had to realize his wrong and decide to go back.
Me: I agree.
Rekiji: It is a very nice picture of what God is like isn't it?
S: Yes that's how it is with God.
R: (Musing out loud) Still, I wonder what would have happened if the son came running back to the father, and the father was so glad to see the son and ran to meet him, and then the son says to him: "Dad, I need more money".

I don't know why but that sounded so funny that we laughed our heads off.

Ah well that's about it. I'm having fun using skype with friends (free comp-to-comp calls!), but I really should be sleeping. More updates soon!

Cheerio!

Srsly?

I was sorta browsing through the net and I saw an article with this news titles:

FULL MOON DOES NOT AFFECT SURGERY OUTCOME

I used to think scientists would spend time and research grants looking for important things like the cures for cancers, or how to help the world's poor, or a solution for global warming, but maybe some of them just spend hours to discover things that we already knew.

Thanks for the information, Captain Obvious.

English

I happened to see this video on youtube:



Seems funny, but I wonder, how would she feel if she saw this video?

Cheerio

Journey to the West

So I went to Osaka for a short personal holiday, just to get to see the Kansai area, but really, it was because I wanted to take the Shinkansen. Naturally enough, I was excited about leaving Tokyo to go out to another city, much like when I took the day trip south to Yokohama.

However, I started off a bit late. I had really intended to go to Tokorozawa HC in the morning, and then leave as soon as service was over to quickly get back home, pack (yes, I hadn’t packed yet), and then get out to the trains as fast as I could. After all, Tokyo station isn’t exactly near to my place, and I was pretty sure it would be crowded, and I wanted to try to get a seat on the side facing Mt. Fuji, and I was thinking that I should try and squeeze as much time at Osaka as possible.

Thing is, on Sunday, we found out that Tomoho-chan was leaving Tokyo to go back to stay with her family in Aomori. And so I felt it wouldn’t be good to quickly run off, especially since this was one of the few times she could stay around for lunch. So a few of us went to eat nearby. Of course, this meant I reached home at around 2.

It was 2.30-ish by the time I left my home, and I got to Tokyo station at about 3.30. Unfortunately, being the dope that I was, I wasn’t sure how to do the Shinkansen tickets at the turnstiles. Especially since they gave me a total of four tickets to use. So I got in, and since I didn’t want to rush for a crowded train leaving at 4, I went to the adjacent track to wait for the 4.17 train.

Making a quick assessment of the seating arrangement, I managed to get a neat window seat on the correct side of the train. That is until I realized I was sitting in the smoking section.

So of course, by the time I transferred to another car, all the window seats on the Mt. Fuji side were taken up. Fortunately, I still managed to get a window seat on the other side. I must have looked like an idiot tourist, taking photos all the time and stuff, but well whatever.

Because I was playing the tourist, I can get to take this sort of nice shots from the Shinkansen.

It was 7 by the time I reached Shin-Osaka station. And after bumbling my way around, I finally managed to reach Ishibashi station, which is where I met Philip, and later on, Ryan. Both these guys are working with Campus Crusades, and I got to know them through Yoshitaka, and I would be staying with them because they were willing to open up their spare room for poor missionaries like me who came by to visit.

Ryan, Philip and me. They are two cool guys who are Campus Crusades staff in Osaka. They've been here for several years already.

I went out soon after to meet my friend Joanne at Umeda station. I knew her from my LAJ classes in NUS, and she’s here in Osaka teaching English as part of the JET program. And she was kind enough to show me around on Sunday night. Not just around Umeda station, where she introduced me to this thing called negiyaki (pancake with lotsa spring onions, tastes like chai tau kway), but also to Namba town, which is kinda considered the heart of Osaka city.

Joanne from NUS/LAJ/JET. This was after two failed self-photos I tried to do. She realized it would be better to get a passerby to help us instead.

Next day I woke up late, and after eating lunch with Philip and Ryan, I decided to go to three places that sounded interesting: the Aquarium, Osaka castle, and the Umeda Sky Garden. I got to the Kaiyukan easy enough, but didn’t really feel like paying ¥2000 to get in, so I ended up taking photos around the place.

There’s this ship there that’s also supposed to be like one of the icons of Osaka called the Santa Maria, but it didn’t unfurl it’s main sail bother it all, so I couldn’t get a very nice shot of it.

The little ship that didn't... unfurl it's sail to let me take a nice picture of it.

It was kinda a gray day at that point of time too, which is why I really didn’t feel like staying around there too long, or taking the ferris wheel. So I left and went over to the castle.

Got this picture in the park around the castle. I's a good photographer.

The original castle was built by Hideyoshi (one of the 3 unifiers of Japan), but it was pretty much razed cos his son started to rebuild the defenses, something the Tokugawa Ieyasu had forbid him to do after the Tokougawa shogunate was in power. This castle was rebuilt relatively recently, and Wikitravel describes it as a museum that was built like a castle, but whatever. It’s still really awesome. Also because when I was there, the sun came out. And we all know that having good sunlight helps make good photos, and helps make you feel happier (generally. Let’s not talk about army route marches and SOC). And I’m kinda thinking, if a Disney movie was set in Japan, you could almost imagine a scene where the castle rises out of the forest and stuff.

It radiates awesomeness!

And since I had decided not to splurge the ¥2000 on the aquarium, I thought I would go in to the castle to see the museum and stuff. Unfortunately, I decided to go in at 5 in the afternoon, which if you’re guessing, is the time they close. Bother.

Got to meet Joanne again for dinner at a curry place she said she preferred cos it actually was somewhat spicy. Then I went to the Umeda Sky Garden.

Was up there at the top

I wanted to go there because I read online that the place offers a really good view of Osaka city. It should; after all, it is 173 meters up in the air. But as I was taking the lift up, and the lift shot out from inside the building to a transparent tube, and the ground started falling away at a rather fast pace, I suddenly remembered that I am absolutely terrified of heights. Of course, since I was with another couple and a family of four in that lift, I tried to act all nonchalant and stuff, but if you had looked, you would have noticed I was gripping the handrails much tighter. It didn’t help that my brain was telling me I was suspended over several hundred feet of air only by a lift cable.

But I got to the top safely, and managed to get some really stupendous shots of the city skyline. (Once there is a proper floor under me, I feel better). Here are some of them. Didn’t stay too long, and I didn’t buy any souvenirs from there, since they were all kinda tacky. But having my pictures was enough.

Osaka at night!

So anyway, as I was preparing to leave this morning, I realized I had this “I-don’t-want-to-leave” sort of feeling. The kind of feeling I had as a kid when my family would go on holiday and we had to leave to go back.

And I guess part of it was that I was begging to settle into the place. And I got to make two great new friends, and got to know an old friend better. I had reached a point where I was starting to get comfortable with being in Osaka, but hadn’t yet fully explored everywhere. And also cos I know I probably would not be heading back to Osaka anytime soon (OMF is based mostly in Kanto-Tohoku-Hokkaido, and I can’t really take or afford that many holidays).

But in the end, I have to go, since my job is in Tokyo.

And I can take solace in the fact that in the modern age of technology, there is facebook for communication, and also, that I have found out how much better takoyaki tastes in Osaka.

I actually wanted to tabao another packet for the train, but that would have just been greedy.

Cheerio!