Watermelon marathon 2007

This year, we made the Misasa Okayama-Univ running team. We ran 5 km which is same distance as last year.

My time was 23 minutes 20 second for 5 km this year (rank 145 out of ~500). I have completely forgot my time last year before checking this blog. It seems that I ran by 23 minutes 30 second last year.

During the race, I forced myself to run on even pace and I thought I ran much faster than the last year. Let me say 10 second is significant and at least I maintained my running capability.

Japanese sea

Two months have passed since we (my wife and I) started to live together. There are many things that I want to do on weekend but I cannot do most of them.

What became clear is that I am happy if I see beach (sea?). It is such a nice day today. The height of the wave is relatively high. My grand parent's place is located in in-land sea and to see Japanese sea is still exciting to me.

Snow 2007

It snowed significantly. Since I purchased studless tires this winter which cost $500 and this is the first time to appreciate for them, I was sort of happy.

But, due to the snow, a flight from Tokyo was canceled and my wife cannot come and visit to Misasa on this weekend. What a disappointing! This is after a month since I saw her last.

I think about conservation of lack. I should not have felt happy about snow.

One picture is taken from my apartment and other is Glanza.

second thing in 2007

At the end of my stay in Tokyo (Jan 3rd), I got sick. Flight on 4th was terrible. After that, fever, belly, finally gut. The gut takes long to be cured.

My grand mother and parents visited me to enjoy hot sprint although really they took care of me. Too bad for them.

My preparation for the Japanese winter was not enough. I miss LA.

New year 2007

I saw relatives after five years. Do I look like them?

DeLonghi heater

It is very cold. I am not sure if this is because I am in Misasa or because this is winter after 5 years. Winter in LA was too easy. Finally I decided to spend money to heater.

I purchased an oil heater by DeLonghi because not only shop clerk but also my mom recommended me. It cost more than $400. Besides DeLonghi the only heater I had just cost $20. The cheaper heater looks 20 times warmer.

Wow! This really works. Part of reason why this makes me so warm is that I want to believe. I planned to buy cheaper heater and iPod but I cannot get the latter.

Tsuruoka

My wife and I visited Tsuruoka because my grandfather in law passed away. Tsuruoka also faces Japanese Sea. However because Japan is designed to Tokyo-centered country, I have to fly to Tokyo first and then take trains.

By the way this photo is taken at Tsuruoka railway station when we go back. Big picture with hole at the face is common in Japan. I have thought that it is stupid for long time but now I am.

Throw-in building again

Finally Kae climbed up to the throw-in building ''Nageire Doh''. I have suggested her many times but she never listened to me. She saw an article about Nageire Doh in a magazine issued by her job organization. Also her friend recommends to see it.

In fact, she was satisfied to see the "Nageire Doh" as I thought. I want her to believe and listen to me slightly more.

Certified Khumii singer

Amara (from Mongolia) and I went to Mongolian concert in Tottori. Mongolian throat singing is known as Khumii and of my interest. I have been practicing the Khumii in labs for a long time. Sound frequency of turbo pump is similar to that of Khumii sounds.

After the concert, I demonstrated my Khumii to the main singer and he told me (Amara translated) that I already passed novice-player step and need proper exercise to go next.

Chinggis Khan praise, Four season steppe, Milk god, and Altain mountain praise were pretty good.

Misasa Ekiden (team running competition)

As a part of Misasa non-scientific activity, we participated Ekiden (team running competition). We made two teams. Each consists of 8 people and runs totally 14.07 km (1.8 km for each). Photo is before and after. Although it took efforts to create two teams this year, several people already promised me to run next year.

We are 30th (1:03:51) and 31st (1:04:38 ) place out of 38 teams. 108 s and 110 s per 400 m. My time was 0:07:47 (2.01 km) which is 92 s per 400 m pace. Cheers from sidewalk and a will to catch people up (or not to be caught) helped.

It seems that a head of Misasa town was pleased for our attendance and we got testimonial from him. Our goal next year is to be in first half among all teams.

Football

We play football on Sunday in Misasa. Number of participate is getting lower and lower. Two weeks ago, there were only four people. I thought that non-academic activity is good especially for non-Japanese students. Well, we will keep playing just for fun and health. This week, we are eight, which are enough to play mini game.

Nabe (pod)

Since I do not have enough time to go out and take picutures by my new digital camera, I decided to take my dinner.

Now, I prefer cook-and-eat Japanese food called nabe (pod) as dinner. Pod and heater are set on the table and food is cooked in-situ with boiling water. Food is always hot.

The main component is celery cabbage. Bean-sprout, onion, mushroom, carrot, tofu, alimentary yam past and beef (or pork). At the very end you put udon (Japanese noodle). You can put anything you want. The cooking procedure forces conversation among family. Very common winter food in Japan.

We had this nabe dinner during our trip (this September). We were addicted and purchased an electric nabe heater. Although my wife has gone I love to keep using it. Side benefit is, I'll be full easily only by celery cabbage *with* satisfaction.

New digital camera

Since my Olympus does not work anymore, I purchased a new digital camera, Sanyo VPC-C40 (or DMX-C40). I planned to buy just a cheap digital camera which should cost $100-$150; however, once I visited an electrics shop, sky would be the limit.

I found a camera that works both as cam coder and camera, is lighter than 1 pound and costs less than $250. Since I wanted cam coder too, I purchased it. It saves movies as MPEG 4. I decided to purchase 512 MB SD memory because I want to limit movie size less than 640 MB: hi-quality 20 min and low-quality 2 hours.

http://www.sanyo.com/entertainment/cameracorder/index.cfm?productID=1237

In Japan, users are not allowed to return it but we have five years warranty. At least I can update this blog and take my running and swimming form.


This is public bath for people who work for Okayama University. It does not look nice but the water is real "radon" hot spring. They charge me $10 a month and I don't know that's a good deal or not. My shower in my apartment is out of order thus I take that bath 30 times a month. The guest house has much better "rock" hot spring.

Yasukuni

The Aug 15th is a special day for East asia. I visited Yasukuni temple at that day, 2006. It takes a while to compile what I thought.

Watermelon marathon

I ran at Hokueicho watermelon marathon festival. This is not ekiden and I just ran for myself. The distance was 5 km and my time was 23 minutes and 30 seconds. Relatively slow.

There were 3,000 people on that race. I did not know how narrow the streets are and was at the middle of the crowd at the beginning. That was a mistake; the crowd was very slow and hard to escape from it.

After the competition, Hokueicho offered us watermelon. The watermelon is their money maker (dollar bako); taste pretty good. The entry fee is 3,000 yen. I think that it is reasonable although I did not have to pay because of international program related things.

It seems that I am pretty active in Tottori (in term of running).

Ekiden

On 25th June, I ran for Misasa. Twenty three teams from Tottori area were at the 1st Nishi-Takao team-running competition (Ekiden).

Misasa had three teams a, b, and c. Each team consists of 5 runner. Each has to run 6, 3, 3, 6, 3 km, respectively. I was the third runner.

When I got a baton, Misasa-c was 22nd out of 23 teams. I was caught by 23rd runner. Thus when I handed the baton to the forth runner, our team was 23rd out of 23. Fourth runner caught 22nd runner up again, our team was finally got 22nd.

Misasa-a 19:35, 10:27, 12:52, 20:02, 10:10
Misasa-b 20:58, 11:39, 13:13, 23:03, 11:23
Misasa-c 22:57, 12:46, 12:42 (me), 23:29, 11:37

My time was 12:42. Among the third 3 km runner that is 19th out of 23. I am happy because when I was running alone on a track it took always more than 14 minutes. To run for team makes something different.