July 27th:
To cap off a weekend full of festivals, we decided to hold a huge barbecue on Sunday. It was also sort of a farewell party for the residents moving out August 1st. As usual, we did it big. Felix and Pramod went to the local 業務 Gyoumu Supermarket to buy dozens of kilograms of meat and other goodies. This time, Pramod even marinated half the chicken in a delicious tandoori sauce. Off the grill, it was unreal... Here's what the food looks like:
Lierally buckets of meat. This isn't even half of it... And check out all that inari on the top table...
Gotta get in those greens.
People enjoying.
July 28th:
My final presentation was on August 1st. And my powerpoint was finished, but I needed to practice/perfect it. I was able to work with my sensei 1 on 1 for an hour on my presentation. He advised me on what to remove from the slides, and what not to talk about. It was great practice and useful advice. I would try to remove all the super sciency stuff that would bore people and talk about the main concepts behind my research. After all, the audience comprised of scientists from all fields, not just materials scientists.
A highlight, I saw this juvenile praying mantis in the hall after lab.
Pretty chall sunglasses.
July 29th:
The day of my goodbye party. I got to lab as usual, except today was my last monthly meeting. Instead of doing a detailed rundown of my research for the past month, my professor told me to just practice for the final presentation. I had cut down some material and was being timed again. I cut off about 2 minutes, but was still a minute over the 8 minute speaking time limit.. My professor gave me his last bit of advice and we proceeded to lunch recess. Instead of going back to the meeting however, Umeda Sensei, Kariya Senpai and I left to go shopping for my goodbye party. They wanted to know exactly what I wanted, so they took me to the market and I helped fill the basket. 40 dollar whiskey, at least 200 dollars of meat from the butcher, tons of beer, and ton of vegetables. Afterwards, Umeda Sensei treated us to an udon lunch. Here are pics from the day:
The restaurant had a house with private rooms built inside a house
Even a fake little water well. Really traditional Japanese feel.
For dinner, everyone helped to prepare the scene. The newspaper was there to prevent the meat scent from seeping into the computers, walls, and chairs.
At its prime. There was pizza, sushi, meat, noodles, beer, anything I could possibly want. Haha!
Even a big-ass watermelon.
Received tons of presents from my lab mates. Gave none... Nice going Franco. I wrote them all letters in the end so its ok.
These are my closest friends from the lab. It was fun hanging out late with them after the dinner feast and chit chatting.
The weekend of 祭り matsuri (festivals). Started out on Thursday with an office party. The joining and welding research institute, all 5 floors of it put together a nice festival in which each lab sells something different. Our lab was in charge of making hot dogs and we did a pretty fine job. It was interesting talking to the other foreigners in the building. There were only about 5 of total. They were all long term masters or PhD students and talked about the social problems with living in Japan as the 1%. We agreed there is a serious 外人 gaijin (foreigner) bubble in social groups, and it is typically really difficult to merge with the locals if you don't speak any Japanese. Fortunately, I had a few years of Japanese under my belt which allowed me to break through this barrier. Still, I had to agree with them. Other than that, I enjoyed incredible food, met a bunch of people, played bingo in Japanese and enjoyed the festivities.
Our booth
The people next to us. It was basically a big feast on the parking lot.
An image of our lab team.
Japanese bingo.
People setting off fireworks after the bingo.
Check out the massive bag my friend of my favorite chips Onishi won.
July 25th:
Another day for a festival! But first I got through a day of lab work. During lunchtime, my labmates and I conjured up the leftovers from the office party and made some bomb hot dogs.
Cooking on the lab desks...
Lol! Not very appetizing looking here maybe, but it taste great.
I got off work relatively early, which was nice considering how hard I had been working all week. Also, there was a festival to catch, one of Japan's 3 biggest festivals called 天神祭 Tenjinmatsuri. The night was pretty enchanting. Another beautiful sunset, lots of people, fireworks everywhere, tons of vendors on the streets, and all sorts of show boats floating down the rivers. Here are some pictures.
Guy relaxing in the park. Nice shot I thought.
Fireworks from the bridge with cool lighting.
Get an idea for how packed the streets were.
Another shot that shows how crowded it was.
Great atmosphere.
A boat with a 太鼓 Taiko Japanese style drum show.
Here's a video of it:
Pretty great night. The next day would be crazy too.
July 26th:
After two nights of festivals, we were a little exhausted. But my friend Felix was still adventurous enough to join me for the 取り人間 Toriningen Birdman Rally. To clarify, this is a competition held annually in Hikone in which people build gliders or human powered airplanes for fly them off a platform over lake to see who can fly the furthest. If you have every seen Red Bull's Flugtag, it's something similar but more serious. These gliders were awesome. But to get there, Felix and I got up early, biked to a station about 3 miles away to meet my labmate who was joining us as well, and rode a train for 2 hours into the northeast direction from Osaka. Into the rice-pad-ridden countryside. Here are pictures to help explain the day:
A famous samurai from the area posted outside the station. It was a HOT day!
Can you see all the airplanes being assembled on the platform? 2 teams in line, and one getting ready to fly off the platform.
Me having fun with the airplanes.
Day dreaming of making my own airplanes.
Assembling a glider wing.
We ate lunch near the lake with my labmate and his Buddhist monk friend. I forgot the guy's name, but he was really easy-going. It was nice because all of us spoke enough Japanese to more or less talk Japanese the whole meal.
Some more pictures. And videos!
To give you an idea how hot it was. I had an umbrella, hat, sunscreen, and even a fan, but my arms looked like this the whole day.
In fact, at one point, the announcer said, "It has just hit 37 degrees. Please drink lots of water and be careful not to succumb to a heat stroke".
What a bad flight looks like:
What a good flight looks like:
After 17 flights, the sun was starting to come down.
What a good area of the city looks like.
My labmate and I comparing watch tans.
Honestly, the hottest day I suffered through in Japan was in Hikone. We had to drink so much water and tea to keep hydrated, but I certainly won't forget all the inspiring glider flights I saw from the participants.
And just when you thought we were all festival'ed out.... We go to another festival. That's right, on the same day and right by out dorm. Presenting, the 吹田祭りSuita Maturi, celebrating the city in which I live.
The lanterns and crowd combination never gets old.
I was pretty exhausted, so I just got some food from the super market and ate it on a blanket with my friends over some beers. Got a nice group shot at the end of the night.
July 13th:
A day of sports! Jason and I were once again invited by Suguru to go play tennis together with his friend Tsuya. Same old deal, we got on a train to 西宮 Nishinomiya to meet Suguru. From there Tsuyu San drove us to the tennis courts by car. Crazy, on the way to the courts we got pulled over by a cop. But this cop car looked like a regular civilian car. All of a sudden these sirens pop out of the roof like straight out of a James Bond movie and wail at us to pull over. I think the ticket cost a ton of money. A speeding ticket for about 400 dollars I think. His spirits seemed a little damp the rest of the day. Here are some pictures of all Suguru's friends who joined us to play. お疲れ様でした！
This is the cop car. Wtf right? Oh and Jason's peace sign.
Our tennis stomping grounds in Japan.
I don't remember all the girls names, but they were pretty freaking good.. Suguru and I barely pulled out a win against two of them in doubles.
After some 3 hours of tennis, we all decided to head to つるとんたんTsurutontan udon restaurant. The massive portions were great. And as always, Tsuya-San would pay for everything. Suguru warned us not to offer paying. He just loves seeing people happy from playing tennis, so he considers it his treat to pay for our dinner. He really knows what he likes, something I really respect about the guy. He is the guy in the orange by the way. After lots of tennis, massive servings of curry udon, and some flattering compliments about my eyes/eyelashes we all parted ways.
July 14th-23rd:
Monday meant back on the grind. Since I'd finished preparing my samples, it was time to start all my materials property tests. Over the next 2 weeks I would be collecting O, N, and C content, running Vicker's Hardness Tests, checking the grain sizes of the samples, running Ultimate Tensile Stress (UTS) tests, calculating carbon nanotube vs. TiC content by hand, and taking SEM images of the materials. Some gems of the week include:
This slightly sweetened tea. Comparable to the southern style sweet tea.
The sunset on Tuesday was unbelievable. And the temperature perfect.
Another intersection on the way home. Just great sunset color.
A little festival coming to a end right by our dorm.
The weekend had a pretty crazy drinking party where the Germans taught me their game flunkyball, which strongly resembles the American game 4-banger but on a bigger field basically. Aside from that, I rested up for the second week of intensive research. Also! There were 2 birthdays celebrated in the hall. We always liked to surprise each other for the parties, so we always got together for cake to celebrate.
Erika's birthday! Top row left to right, Kitty, Emilo, Shinji, Kevin, Reija, Me, front row left to right, Ran, Jiho, Felix, Erika, Yumin, and Delphine. For the record the nationalities in this picture include US, German, Brazilian, Finnish, Chinese, Korea, Swiss, and French. Pretty crazy huh?
Just me and the birthday girl.
Emilio's bday! We ambushed his room while he was playing computer games and dragged him out for cake. Top row left to right: James, Joon, Shinji, and Sophie. Middle left to right: Johanes, Me, Hanmo, Emilio, Duncan, Charles, Felix, Erika, Gaurav, and Ran. Front row left to right: Stevce, Pramod, and Emilio. Nationalities in this picture: Ireland, Korea, Brazil, Germany, America, Switzerland, New Zealand, Indonesian, India, China, and Macedonia.
Shinji's goodbye party on this one. Pictured in order from most left to most right: Me, Linda, Jiho, Erika, Hanmo, Shinji, Sara, Joon, Nena, Chin-hui, and Yo. Ok last time. Nationalities: France, America, Switzerland, Taiwan, Korea, Germany, Japan, Brazil, China, Thailand.
What a diverse body of residents. Anyhow. It was around this time that I realized my time in Japan is dwindling. Nostalgia was already sitting in. I realized the time in Japan is too short. The people were all so special in Tsukumodai. Almost every person spoke at least 2 languages, something I knew I would miss dearly upon my return to America. But yeah! A month and a half of awesomeness left!
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