２０１４年７月４日

July 4th:

The Taipei adventure begins!!! I slept poorly on a bench barely big enough to hold the width of my body, with a scratchy wool blanket I borrowed from the information booth. I always love being at airports. I think I mentioned this a while ago. But it's just so exciting to be near my favorite airplanes for me. I don't remember the last time a boarded a plane outdoors. Perhaps it was when I lived in Zimbabwe..

The tiny Airbus A320-200. 

 Oh in case you aren't aware, I paid about $160 round trip Osaka-Taipei with Peach Airlines. They are reputable for their great summer deals. So if you are traveling around Japan or to other East Asian countries on a budget, I strongly recommend flying with Peach.

Those turbine blades are some of the most intricately engineering objects on the planet. Just seeing them is so fantastic...

The plane was incredibly tight. I mean I couldn't even keep my my knees straight in front of me without cramming them into the seat in front of me. I suppose it was made for Japanese people after all. Also, the interior had leather seats alternating in pink and purple. It cracked me up. Despite this, I was so exhausted, I managed to sleep in an awkward position using the back of the seat in front of my as my pillow.. 

Finally I arrived in Taipei. Such a beautiful terminal. 

And I was finally reunited with Maika! We had some Taiwanese-influenced burritos with boba, and proceeded to take the bus into Taipei. After a brief nap in the hotel, we hit the streets to grab some burritos. That's right, I haven't eaten Mexican food in so long, and Taipei had a great knock-off Chipotle. On the way, I was so fascinated with the architecture, particularly the crazy tangles of exposed wire sticking out randomly of buildings. I couldn't imagine being an electrician in Taipei. The poor guys must come home from work twitching with electricity from getting shocked so often... Also, I loved the random trees and plants that seemed to grow straight out of building walls. I guess with such a tropical climate, plants sprout anywhere the sunlight reaches..
Anyways, here are pictures:

See the roof covered in trees? That was probably intentional..

Lol see? A tree growing out of a building.

Yes!! Heaven. It didn't quite do the Californian burrito justice, but certainly tided my craving.

Every store was either an overly bright, colorful sport apparel store, a boba store, or a dumpling/pork bun store. 

A typical Taipei alleyway. Really captures the city image. (and it's mo-ped gangs)

The tropical greenery in the middle of the city. Taipei 101 is in the skyline from pretty much anywhere in the city. It's so massive compared to every other skyscraper.

Store signs everywhere. I was able to read some of them with my Japanese 漢字 Kanji (Chinese-borrowed characters) knowledge.

Seeing it was the 4th of July, Maika and I met up with her other USC friends and headed to TGIF. A 4th of July Friday in Taipei. This was as American as it could get in Taipei. We ate modestly because we wanted to visit the night market for more food after. Maika's friends were interesting people, and the dinner together was enjoyable.

Maika and her two friend from USC enjoying burgers. America!

Other two friends from USC enjoying more burgers. 

And off we went to the night market. This was a really cool experience. First of all, the night was hot and humid and the place was packed. The rank smell of Taiwan's infamous "Stinky Tofu" (its fried fermented tofu) lingered in the air. Honestly, the smell was nearly unbearable. It actually smelled like animal feces to me. I hope that didn't sound too offensive. It's just my opinion... The atmosphere was awesome though. And we managed to eat pork buns (the best), pork sandwiches, pork dumplings and of course drink boba before the night was through. I had such a great time marveling at the scene. The picture's might be a bit blurry, but you'll get the basic idea:

Just getting into it.

This is what I'm talking about... 

Here's Maika in front of some food stands. This scenery went on for blocks. 

They even had a bunch of clothing stores.

A true Taiwanese dinner.

The style of wall behind the chef was so common to Taipei. I feel like this picture caught a great "end of the night closing" feel. These people work so hard for so little money. It must be such a tiring lifestyle.

Last but not least, the awesome boba guy. I had my first Thai tea in months, and check out how it was mixed. Awesome!

The first day was wonderful. From the delicious boba I had missed so much, to the efficient subway system the city is great. And above all, it was so nice to spend some time with Maika again. Long distance is tough, but every time its worth the wait.

２０１４年７月１日ー３日

July 1st:

I had submitted this schedule via email to my professor the day before:

This is more or less the schedule that I have followed the whole month. 

So, the first day's HP Ci powder thing was just to test my theory that carbon nanotubes seem to re-aggregate due to the titanium powder expansion during heating. We wanted to make a Cu w/ nanotube sample with very low relative density, and then compress it while analyzing the movement of nanotubes under a microscope. The first sample of copper was heated at too low of a temperature, and there fore didn't melt together. It crumbled apart as soon as I took it out of the furnace. We more important things to be doing anyways. Preparing 8 samples of titanium. That is literally twice the amount of work I did in the first 2 months, in the span of 1 month. Here are some pic/videos.

"Don't throw rubber grove into this box" hehe. 

Presenting the fail of a copper sample:

Here is a video of me pouring 45 micron titanium powder into a capsule. It's hard to film/pour so the spilling is a little embarrassing.. But I made sure to add more powder to compensate.. Pay attention to how fluid like the powder moves. The particles are so small, you can really start to see fluid behavior. It's awesome to witness.

Anyhow, that day, I managed to get through the pure samples, while putting the nanotube samples on the rocking mill. Very productive.

June 2nd and 3rd:

Another productive two days. I spent the entire days sintering 6 samples. Here's a brief video I took of the set-up process. I got cut off because my phone memory ran out. The titanium is inside that bit black, carbon cylinder you see in the beginning. That is where the high voltage current gets pulsed through, heating up the samples.

So, incase you are wondering what the "traveling" is for in the calendar, well, it's because I went to visit my girlfriend Maika in Taipei. The journey started on Thursday night. My flight with Peach Airlines left at around (1 hour prior check in is required for international flights) 7:30 AM on Friday and it takes about an hour and a half just to get to the airport from my dorm. The first train only leaves at 5, so to catch my flight on time I ended up leaving for the airport on Thursday night and sleeping in the terminal.

２０１４年６月２７日ー３０日

June 27th:

Since the sickness didn't get any better, I decided to go visit a clinic. This ended up being a pretty useless idea. As a foreigner who speaks a pretty good amount of Japanese to other foreigners who don't, I don't advise you to visit the doc. They took a urine sample when I first got there, so I thought "ok, seems pretty thorough.." When I was called into the doc's room, he spoke only in Japanese. The only English he knew was "virus" and "bacteria".. I told him my throat is hurting really bad. As a response, he told me to open wide, flashed his light in for literally under a second. I shit you not... under 1 second. (I was under the impression I had gotten strep throat cause I took pictures of my throat and saw a little bit of white stuff towards the back). He checked my breathing, kidneys, and knee reflexes.. Anyhow. In the end he prescribed me 3 types of pills. None of them had an effect on me cause the dose was made for a tiny Japanese person. Sigh.... I was pretty frustrated.. Aside from visiting the clinic, I stayed in bed the entire day.

June 28th:

I stayed in bed the entire day, trying to sleep off the sickness. Got my spirits up a little in the evening when I watched The Rocky Horror Picture Show with a bunch of people from the hall. It was hilarious.

June 29th:

Still sick.
But at least we had a big barbecue to see off James and Eunju, who were moving out that day. It also happened to be an incredibly rainy day. We ended up moving a bunch of bikes from the roofed bike lot area, and barbecued in the heavy Japan 梅雨 Tsuyu (Rainy season) rain. Some photos:

Heavy wind, heavy rain, heavy food. It was nice and cool for a change. Great day despite being sick the whole time.

Moved the party indoors after one of the neighbors claimed her baby couldn't sleep because our noise. This is far from true since I couldn't even hear the party from the entrance to the dorm. The rain drowned it out. I suspect there are some elderly racists behind the complaints. Who knows I guess....

My tribute to my good friend James Giller, the Irishman who taught me to enjoy whiskey. Bummer he moved out, but I know I'll be seeing a lot of him still. 

June 30th:

I was still sick. At this point, I decided maybe the hospital would be a good idea. And as a failsafe, I brought Erika along with me to translate the Japanese in case the doctor didn't speak English like at the clinic. I would like to take a moment to thank Erika for her kindness. At the BBQ she was always bringing me meat from the grill/looking after me. She took the morning off from lab to help me out and I really, really appreciated it. Erika, if you read this, I value our friendship tons and am still indebted to you from this weekend. The hospital visit was way better, even though we had to wait about 1.5 hours to see the doc. It was thorough, and Erika explained to the doc that I need heavier doses, which I got. That evening I was already starting to feel better. Oh glory! Hallelujah!

２０１４年６月２１日−２６日

June 21st:

I had a tough choice to make for this day. Option a) I could travel to Kyoto to visit the monthly Toji flea market with some friends to find a 浴衣 yukata (a summer kimono) or option b) I could go to an Indonesian party with lots of traditional Indonesian food in western Osaka with Erika and Eirene (the Indonesian girl who invited us). I was so undecided, I just flipped a coin and ended up with option b. As it would turn out later, all the people who went to Toji were disappointed with prices that were often higher than standard retailer's. Also, they did not seem to have yukatas that fit people my size.
We made our way to the party. I always enjoy visiting the west Osaka area because the smell of the sea fills the air. It truly reminds me places like Newport Beach, Redondo Beach, or Torrance where I spend so much of my time when I'm back home. The party was in a big (for Japanese standards) apartment. The parents of the girl who lived there also happened to run an Indonesian restaurant, so we were treated to some quality food. I'd never tried Indonesian food before, but I enjoyed everything from the sweet, fried tofu, to the peanuty, satay sauce. To add to the environment, everybody was in great spirits. I met a bloke from Australia who told me about his life teaching here in Japan, a Jamaican guy who was doing the same, and many more. Some pictures:

Cutting this cake made of some gelatinous, sweet material. 

Dishing out the cake. It got hot in there with so many people.

This guy seemed happy to be on camera.

The party was great. I was satisfied in many ways. In the late afternoon we decided to head home. Here is a picture a Japanese mom sleeping with her daughter curled up at her side. It was too sweet not capture.

June 22nd:

I started to get a little sick. It just hurt to swallow.

June 23rd:

So I bought a mask.

When in Rome.

This was honestly the most difficult week of my stay in Japan. My bike was beginning to break down. 3 spokes were missing on the back wheel, and it was a little unsettling to feel the back of the bike wobble violently whenever I picked up some speed (this only got worse). To make matters worse, it was time for our monthly meeting again, which meant I had a lot of things to prepare for my presentation, and not very much data because the rocking mill was broken half the month. Anyhow. I managed to make it through Monday.
That night my friend Johannes and I had planned a käsespätzle night where we would make the famous German egg noodles for our Japanese friends. So we did.

Mayuko preparing the onions. Tears of happiness cause the food is so great. 

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm. @_@

Me grating the last of the dough into the boiling water. It cost 2000 yen to feed about 8-9 people. 

 The dinner was such a great time, and the food turned out really well. Especially considering we did not have the right equipment for it. The downside was my sickness only got worse. I worked pretty hard for the food, the food wasn't the most nutritious, and the dinner prevented me from sleeping early like I should have.

June 24th:

My sickness was getting worse. It hurt more and more to swallow. And given I didn't feel too many other cold symptoms, I was worried I had gotten strep throat somehow.  Regardless, there was work to be done, selfies to be taken and shakkas to be thrown..

On the real though, I was starting to lose the mental battle that comes with every little sickness. It was all the small things that hurt the most. My bike had finally given out one me. I was now missing 10 spokes total.

Don't wanna be riding on that thing. 

Resultantly, I walked the bike to the bike store and ended up paying 5,000 yen to get all 37 spokes replaced. So now, it cost me 6,000 yen for a bike for 6 months. Not so bad still, but definitely a dent in the wallet, which is supplied by my dad right now...
To make things worse, I saw this massive thunderstorm cloud on the walk to campus.

Surely enough, this thing ended up hailing down lightning and heavy rain all afternoon.

I worked my ass off all day preparing for the presentation. Organizing data can be such a pain in the ass. I was in the lab until about 9 o'clock. By the time I was finished, I was so exhausted, hungry, and in pain from my sickness, the thought of walking home was awful. But as they say, しかたがない, it cannot be helped. I knew I wouldn't make it to the supermarket before it closed, so I swung by the only cafeteria I thought was still open. Demoralized, I made my way up the stairs and into the cafeteria. They said they were closed, but this old man (with really, really, long, thick, white eyebrows) approached me and asked if curry is ok. I worked at restaurants before, and I know that when you close, you just want to clean the place and get the hell out of there. The fact that the cafeteria ladies prepared me one last meal while cleaning meant the world to me. The Japanese really look out for each other. Even at the workplace, I was offered a variety of pills by my sensei to make me feel better. I was so miserable, their kindness managed to bring a tear to my eyes.

Was so happy I snapped a picture of my cross-eyed smile after I finished eating. Here I don't even look sick.

Afterwards, I made my way home. It's actually not too bad to walk home late at night. For one, despite being the most dangerous city in Japan, I feel as safe here as I do in Irvine (reputably America's safest city). Also, the summer night weather is always so comfortable. Despite the lingering humidity from the day, the temperature is a comfortable 26ish degrees. The mosquito peak at sunset has passed, so it is relatively insect-free. And the silence compared to the daytime is fantastic. Japan is so crowded, no matter where you go you are surrounded with some kind of noise. So at night, all you hear is the sound of crickets and frogs. Very peaceful. I got home and knocked out.

June 25th:

I stayed home this day. There was no purpose for me to be in the lab, and my throat ache was only getting worse.

June 26th:

It turned midnight, when I realized I hadn't started writing my handout for the presentation. I took my previous month's worksheet and basically just changed some sections. I slept 2 hours from 3-5, watched the Switzerland-Honduras (3-0 victory hat trick by Shaqiri) and headed straight to the lab to get in the zone. I managed to get this picture of the sunrise before I left. Always worth posting:

On the walk to the lab, Umeda sensei (the only woman researcher on our team) saw me from her car, and offered me a ride for the final bit of my walk. Again, looking out for me. At this point, I was feeling pretty hellish. A whole day of presentations seemed pretty daunting... And it was.. I suffered. My presentation was pretty short, and my presented theory did not have too much evidence to back it up. But I made it to lunch. After lunch, we took a brief photo shoot with the lab. I managed to get this pic with Kondoh Sensei.

Don't let the height difference fool you, he's a boss..

The second half of the presentations was even more painful, literally. As soon as they were done, I packed my stuff and headed home. The walk home was brutal. 2 miles on 2 hours of sleep, being terribly sick, without a bike in the summer heat carrying my bag. I felt like a monk on a pilgrimage, delirious from poor physical condition. To make things worse the bike shop hadn't fixed my bike even though he said he would have it done by that day, so I had to walk the last quarter of the way. I went straight to my room and slept. I slept until dinner, which was a little takoyaki dinner I had arranged with Felix and friends earlier.

My good friend Johannes enjoying his dinner.

Duncan, Shinji, and Erika enjoying their dinner.

Having my friends here while I was sick was so nice. I must be sounding pretty dramatic over this sickness, but it was honestly pretty bad. When you have to prepare for serious throat pain every time you swallow your saliva for a whole week it can get really frustrating.. Every time I was around my friends, I seemed to have less pain. So thank you Tsukumodai friends for distracting me. After dinner, I went back to sleep until midnight, at which point I prepared my face paint for the Germany vs. USA game. Check this out:

USA, USA, USA!!!!

Erika rooting for the Germans with her black red and gold ladybug.

Post-loss, pre-bed picture. It's ok because we qualified! I held it down for the Californians back home!

Finally I went to sleep for good.

２０１４年６月１６日−２０日

June 16th, 17th:

I spent the first couple of days this week consulting with my professor exactly on what procedures I will working on. I sent an email to my professor to figure out exactly what I need to do to get an A in the class, and more importantly, to ask if I will be able to publish any of the work I have done in the lab so far. The answer I received was surprising. Not only did Professor Kondoh agree to let me publish my work, he offered for me to go to the annual "The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society" (TMS) symposium next March to share my findings -- all travel expenses paid... He told me there will be representatives from big time aerospace companies like Boeing and Airbus there looking at our research. This opportunity just seems too good to be true. Of course, I couldn't pass up on it. So I am currently busting my ass.. The last 2 months, I've analyzed 3 samples. This upcoming month alone, I will be analyzing 6: half the time to do twice as much work. At least I got one thing going for me, experience. I expect cleaner and more efficient data collection this month. Anyhow, that's the big news from this week. I'm excited to get to work.
Oh also, I corrected 2 abstracts and 2 manuscripts this week for the non-native speakers in the lab. I'm starting to feel more and more useful.

June 18th-20th:

I have a presentation the week after this one, so I had to begin assimilating my data into a powerpoint. Unfortunately, I was still waiting for data to come in, so the PowerPoint would not be conclusive. Here is a video/pictures from the lab work this week. The rocking mill was finally fixed! which meant I was able to prepare the titanium samples with dispersed nanotubes again.

My corrections on a paper, and some useful equations I used from Jia Sensei's paper.

Was working with the saw, and almost cut all the way through a piece of titanium. I decided to try to break the rest of it manually by bending it. Instead, my hand slipped and the sharp edge of the titanium piece ripped into my hand. 

Here's a little tour of one of our facilities with some goofy looking machines.

Friday evening was nice. Some friends and I decided to head out to grab Conveyor Belt Sushi together. It's always a good time.

Duncan, Yo, and Erika.

Too cute. Duncan and his Japanese girlfriend. I forgot her name sorry.

After a long productive week, I went home and rested up for Saturday.

２０１４年６月１４日ー１５日

June 14th:

This was a great day because on this Saturday, the hall got together for a big BBQ outside. We found some "goliath" random grill on the third floor, and -- coupled with a massive meat order -- it ended up being fantastic time. The weather was perfect too. Unfortunately, the neighbors complained around 6 PM, saying we were being too loud. This is insane though because our volume level was no even audible from 100 feet away inside the dorm with windows open.. And even worse, its a freaking Saturday.. We are thinking that the neighbors, particularly the elderly ones, have a problem with foreigners having a little bit fun. Anyways, we didn't let that stop the party. We took it inside and some drinking games ensued. Like the game "Pterodactyl" where you have to say the word pterodactyl without showing your teeth in a clockwise direction or you can make the sound of a pterodactyl to changed the direction. It's a fun game because everyone's interperatation of a pterodactyl screech is unique. Here are pictures/a video of pterodactyl.

Great people, great times.

Here's a sample of the pterodactyl game. I kept filming Pramod (India) because his sound/face was just so priceless people wouldn't stop laughing when he did it. He was dubbed "The Pramodactyl". Nicest guy in the hall.

Erika (Germany), Ben (USA) and Anita (Hungary)

Same trio plus Johanes, who just cleaned up a broken glass Anita spilled.. Too much to drink, she was hilarious.

Sipping on scotch. My friend Erika on left. 

She wanted a picture with everyone in the hall, but didn't remember this when I showed it to her the next day. XP For the record she doesn't do this often..

I made sure to take it easy on Saturday night because the next day, I was meeting up with my friend Suguru to play tennis with some of his colleagues.

June 15th:

A day filled with exercise, Japanese treats, and a bomb dinner. My friend Jason and I set out around 11 in the morning towards Kobe to meet Suguru and his friends. We met up with three older guys, all former tennis students of Suguru's and some of them his co-workers. One of his friends (I forgot their names, but this was the "chubby one") was extremely well-off apparently. Jason and I paid about 60 yen for 1.5 liters of water, and hopped into the chubby guy's mini-van and the rest of the day was his treat. The drive seemed wasteful to me because it was back in the direction Jason and I came from by train, and it was a pretty long train ride. Anyhow, we got to a Mizuno athletics center, which I've seen plenty of, but never had the chance to enter. The indoor courts were interesting. Carpet surface makes for a lot of grip, so predicting the balls took a little getting used to. About an hour in, I played a couple tiebreakers with Suguru, my first ones with him in about a year. Things hadn't changed too much. I lost 3-10, 5-10, 4-10. So frustrating... I guess he is a tennis instructor with years of experience on me. I'm just too damn competitive. After playing with Suguru, I played some doubles with his friends. The last game was fun because it was Jason and I representing America vs two of the Japanese guys. My focus was to have a consistent second serve, and I had no double faults the whole set (but also a ton of missed first serves... -_-). Either way, we won!! 'Muricah! Here are some pics:

You can see which one is the chubby guy. He was very generous.

Good to play with him again. Repping the UC Irvine shirts. Zot zot zot!

Outdoor courts at sunset. I thought it looked nice.

Dinner at my favorite curry udon place. This sushi the chubby guy ordered was delicious.

The chubby guy paid for our dinner, and dropped us off at Osaka Station after. Overall, a great day, great exercise, great company, great food, and apparently we are doing it again soon. I'm excited.