Makiko Itoh : Not a nameless cat.

Links for 2009-07-04 [del.icio.us]

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 00:00:00 PDT

U-B Bento Article, published June 30, 2009
Nice article about bento lunches from the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin. Just Bento is mentioned!

Links for 2009-06-30 [del.icio.us]

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 PDT

GOOD.is | Transparency
an awesome transparency of the layout of the White House vegetable garden

Links for 2009-06-27 [del.icio.us]

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 00:00:00 PDT

Postcard from Provence
I keep forgetting to bookmark this. Wonderful little paintings from Provence.

Links for 2009-06-24 [del.icio.us]

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 00:00:00 PDT

Ichiban Kan Blog: Important Message
Oh dear, Ichiban Kan is closing their online store.

Links for 2009-06-07 [del.icio.us]

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 00:00:00 PDT

Men turn to 'bento' as pocket change grows scarcer | The Japan Times Online
Another bad economy = more homemade bento story, plus an insight into mens' "kozukai" (allowances) in Japan. (thanks Frank!)

Links for 2009-06-02 [del.icio.us]

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:00:00 PDT

HelloCanvas - Home
service that prints photos onto canvas.

Links for 2009-05-11 [del.icio.us]

Tue, 12 May 2009 00:00:00 PDT

Results of the 3rd Annual Anpanman Charaben Contest by Youchien-net
Click on the banners at the bottom of the page (there are three of them) to get to the Grand Prix, Semi-Grand Prix and Other winners. Youchien-net is a website for the parents of kindergarten age children.
L'EDITO, meubles et mobilier design sur mesure en bois provenant de forêts gérées durablement
Cool looking French furniture site

Star Trek, and movie watching in France vs. Switzerland

maki — Sun, 10 May 2009 11:45:49 +0000

I've only mentioned this on my About page, but I am a long time Star Trek fan. At one point in my life I even was the type of Trek fan (Trekkie, Trekker, whatever) that went to conventions (though I never got into Trek cosplay). For what it's worth, I have autographed photos of all of the captains except for Jonathan Frakes/Scott Bakula. Yipes.

My Trek fandom started at an early age, when I used to watch the original series in repeat on British television, then later, dubbed (!) on Japanese TV. I was especially fond of the mythological references, since I was also deeply into Greek and Roman mythology at the time too (Who Mourns For Adonais? is one of my favorites from the original series). Later on, I became a fan of The Next Generation, though the first couple of seasons were a bit hard to get through if I recall. I love and still love DS9, and Voyager - well, even though the series itself had its ups and downs, it indirectly lead me to a very interesting period of my life, which I may talk about some time.

I lost my Star Trek obsession though somewhere around season 2 or 3 of Enterprise. I can't quite put my finger on why, but that series just didn't grab me. I still haven't watched the whole series yet. Still, it was sad to see it cancelled. And in the following years, the Star Trek franchise itself seemed to be dying slowly. They shut down the Star Trek Experience at the Las Vegas Hilton last year (yep, been there too). Star Trek fandom seemed to be relegated to the handful of diehard fans that the general public sneer at.

The general public would scoff at this too probably, but I firmly believe that a world without Star Trek going on somewhere is a world that is a bit less optimistic about the future. There are plenty of other great scifi franchises, from Star Wars to Stargate to Battlestar Galactica and more of course. Star Trek is the one that seems to have the most faith in humankind. That's the main reason why I've always loved its universe.

So, the new Star Trek movie.

I resisted reading too much about the new J.J. Abrams-helmed Star Trek movie beforehand - whether they were faithful to the 'canon' or not, whether this actor was suited to the roles they were taking over. What's the use of worrying about a movie before you actually see it anyway?

I saw the movie yesterday, and, as an old school Star Trek fan, I loved it. Forget about the nitpicky things like casting and how close they adhere to the established canon and so on; what I really appreciated about this movie is that, while adding a lot of modern things, it really did stay true to the spirit, the philosophy if you will, of this particular fictional universe. This is a universe where Starfleet is a force for good, with flawed yet ultimately fine, upstanding and heroic humanoids (no insect-like species or so on seen yet in Starfleet, only two-leggged ones) as officers.

I also liked that the cool-whizzy CGI/visual parts did not overwhelm the narrative. They were there of course, and very impressive indeed (I especially liked the robot-cops chasing after the young Kirk in one of the opening sequences) but they were definitely not the stars. The characters are.

And, not to spoil things, but I think overall the new bunch of actors taking over these by now mythic roles did a great job, both in terms of keeping the gist of the original characters and updating them. Zachary Quinto as Spock looks uncannily like a young Leonard Nimoy - as he might have looked about 10 years before he was Spock on the original series. This is a great achievement by both the actor and the makeup department. Actually, just about all of the characters are plausible, more or less, as younger versions of the original series' crew.

If this movie ends up rebooting the franchise and making a whole new generation fans of the Star Trek universe, as an old timer I'd be very happy. Live long and prosper, Star Trek!

Movies in France vs. Switzerland

I went to see the Star Trek movie in Lyon, which is about a 2 and a half hour drive away from where I am living at the moment, in the Provence area. Why such a long drive? All the theatres playing it nearer here had it (shudder) dubbed. Finding a version originale was difficult. Original language with subtitles is the norm in Zürich, not to mention the Geneva-Lausanne area too (we often took a trip out there to catch movies that were released much earlier in French-speaking areas than in German-speaking areas), but apparently not so in most of France, with the exception of central Paris. (This is the case in Germany too.)

This could end up being a serious strike against the idea of moving to France. I don't go out to the movies every week or anything, but when I do I certainly want the original version. To me it's hard to fathom why anyone would prefer a dubbed version to the original, but apparently this is preferred by most people. (When we bought the tickets at the theatre in Lyon, the ticket seller warned us that it was version originale, I suppose to ward off complaints.)

Right now, I'm pondering whether a 2+ hour drive to Lyon, or even a 4+ hour drive to Geneva, would be worth doing on a semi-regular basis, should I decide to settle in this area. Living somewhere permanently is so different from going there on vacation, as I'm finding out in so many ways right now.

If there was ever an incentive to plan for the future

maki — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:01:49 +0000

My mother called me about something from Japan, and in the course of our conversation she mentions that she has a cleaning lady come in for 3 hours a week. I teased her a bit about it and how well off she must be to be able to afford that. (My mother is a cleaning fanatic who says that cleaning is one her hobbies, but she hasn't been doing well health-wise recently; still, it's the first time she's ever hired anyone to clean in her life.)

"Oh, but I don't really pay much at all." she said. "Actually I feel bad about how cheap it is."

"How much do you pay?" I asked.

"Just 600 yen an hour." (That's about US$6.60 at the moment.)

"Wow, that's cheap. Is it some school kid?" I said. (Which would be very unusual, come to think of it. School kids in Japan rarely have part time jobs - they are deemed to be too busy studying.)

"No, she's a 72 year old lady" said my mother.

72 years old, and cleaning other people's houses for 600 yen an hour. It seems that this lady, who divorced her husband decades ago, doesn't have an adequate pension to fall back on; she lives alone in a tiny cheap rented apartment, and must support herself.

This just knocked me over. She is a very spritely and cheerful 72 year old according to my mother. But still. It just seems incredibly sad, to reach that age and have to work a physical job like that for such a cheap wage. (Thank goodness that she can get health care for almost free at least in Japan.) It seems that she had two grown kids in their 40s, but they don't support her financially at all.

There but for the grace of God go I, in a few decades? Perhaps not. But still, it's really made me think about planning for the future financially. 2009 would be a good time to start. And I am so grateful that both my parents did have good jobs while they worked, and now that both are retired they each (since they are divorced also) have enough reserves to live a life of leisure. I visited my father in New York last month, who has a busy, active life of volunteering at his church, going to the gym and physiotherapy regularly, and socializing. My mother and my stepfather (who's still working 3 days a week) are ok financially too. If I were in that cleaning lady's kids' position, I wouldn't be able to support my parents financially either.

Well, forget that

maki — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 02:17:35 +0000

Well, forget the last post. Just Stuff I Like hasn't worked out at all, because other things have gotten higher priority now. For the moment Twitter is where I spout my short thoughts, and I'm back here for longer stuff, eventually.

My blog (and life) compartments

maki — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 12:59:31 +0000

Some people can keep all the diverse aspects of their lives together in one big container. I am the opposite: I prefer to compartmentalize my different interests into smaller chunks. I think my lifelong fascination with old typeface trays is related to this.

I find dealing with small chunks of information first, then looking at the whole (and back and forth) to be easier to handle than a whole-at-once approach. I also realize that I tend to like to only present parts of myself to other people, and hold back on others. Some people know sections D, F and G of Makiko while other might know sections E, J and N. I'm not sure if this is a problem or not, but it's just how I am. There are only a handful - less than a handful - of people who know the whole me, or something close to it. I may not even know the whole me.

Anyway, so I think this is why I rarely blog here at makikoitoh.com anymore, though I think I will reserve any really long essays and such for here. I usually swoosh any ideas that I want to write publicly about elsewhere. You can find my compartments to the left, under 'elsewhere'. The newest addition is Just Stuff I like, which is a Tumblr blog (Tumblog? Tumblrlog?): it's more or less a link and 'hey I found this on the internets) place with a nice minimal layout.