Those who know me, know that I’m not really a fan of manifestos.  I generally find them to be somewhat pompous and think that the time spent writing them could’ve almost always been better spent actually realizing the contents thereof.  And yet, here I am writing one of my own.

On top of that, I find New Years resolutions to be less than useful for a variety of reasons.  So, consider this the combination Pizza Hut/Taco Bell of manifestos/resolutions.  This is me, determining what and whom I want to become, starting in 2012, and publishing it for everyone to see, so that I might put myself at risk of incurring the manifesto nerd-rage of the entire internet, should I punk out.  (Failure is an option.  Quitting is not.)

My philosophy behind doing this is two-fold:

1. I’m writing it because I need a clear picture.
2. I’m publishing it because I want accountability.

In reading this, you may think that I’m talking to you (probably due, in no small part, to my ubiquitous use of the pronoun “you”).  But I’m not.  I’m me, giving me orders.  If you should find this the least bit useful, cool.  If not, cool.  But please keep in mind that it wasn’t written for you.

And with that, I bring you… HackerHaus Manifesto 2012: Year of the Dragon Edition

Commit.
Fear is irrelevant.  “Hard” is a cop out.  Figure out what you need to do and do it.  I recently read the following:  “Do what you need to do so you can do what you want to do.”  I don’t know who wrote it, but there it is.

Listen.
As much as possible, attempt to see and hear the world through the eyes and ears of others.  Prove yourself wrong at every possible occasion and adjust accordingly.

Be less of a dick. 
Work on recognizing when you intellectually, emotionally, and physically bully those who don’t deserve it (intentionally or not), and knock that shit off.  (However, keep the power to intimidate in reserve, just in case someone actually does need it.)  If someone asks for your opinion, dole it out sparingly.  If they don’t, zip it.  The motto:  When in doubt, shut the fuck up.

Be more awesome.
This doesn’t mean “try harder to look cool to others.”  This means “be the most awesome you you can be.”  The idea is to become the person that you, not necessarily others, would find completely awesome to be around.

Take better care of yourself. 
This extends to not only the physical, but spiritual, emotional, intellectual, nutritional, creative, and inquisitive realms as well.

Take better care of others.
‘Nuff said.

Learn at least one new human language.
Chinese, German, Arabic, Korean, and Spanish are options.  You don’t have to become fluent, nor do you have to have designs on traveling to a particular place.  Just do it for the sake of doing it.

Work on the human languages you already speak.
English, French, Russian, and Japanese.  You know your handwritten kanji blows, that your vocabulary is limited, that you’ve forgotten a lot of verb and grammar rules from Russian, and that your French has gone to crap.  You know it.  Now get to work.

Fail creatively.  And often.
Create.  Create more.  Finish things.  Spend more time with your guitar.  Write music. Finish music.  Record music.  Let people hear that music.  Write something.  Realize creative endeavors.  Creativity doesn’t mean shit if it remains trapped between your ears.

Finish school.  Start school.
Finish and defend your masters thesis, then commit to a PhD program and beat it into submission.

Learn how to plan better.

Clean your damn house.
This goes for maintaining your yard, too, smart ass.  Tackle tasks as they arise (before, if possible), not after they become monumental.

Get rid of unnecessary stuff.
Physical, emotional, mental, metaphorical.

Chop wood, carry water.
Do the practice, walk the walk, regardless of what the practice is.  Whether it’s Budo, playing scales, learning new songs, reading research papers, writing research papers, or practicing kanji.  Just shut up and do it.

Spend more time with your teachers and mentors.
And listen to them.

Get your shit together.
Look into the future career options you have been mulling over and start doing something concrete about it.  You know damned well you want to travel, experience new cultures, and learn more languages.  You’re not getting any younger… make it happen.

Spend more time with loved ones.
In the end, nothing in this world is more important.  If the measure of a man is the quality of the people who choose to share their life with you, then you’re doing pretty damned well.

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Devastation in Hachinohe, where I spent a great deal of my youth.

A massive earthquake of 8.8/8.9, depending on the source, has struck Japan.  To my knowledge, this is the largest earthquake ever measured in Japan, and among the largest world-wide in over 100 years.

I’m sitting here on my couch, watching NHK (on TV Japan), scanning the internet, and praying for “無事だ” (I’m safe) messages from friends all over Japan.  My heart is in my throat.  In my 10 years in Japan, I never experienced anything like what they are going through right now.  If there is any saving grace, it is that the epicenter was off the coast.  Had it been on land…?

There aren’t just tsunami warnings.  There are “o-tsunami” (massive tsunami) warnings.  A tsunami is already massive.  I don’t even want to imagine how gigantic a tsunami has to be before they decide to call it “massive.”

Hundreds are dead.  Unknown hundreds, perhaps tens of thousands, are missing.  Relentless aftershocks.  So much destruction.  Floods.  Fires.  Collapsed buildings.  Gigantic ocean ships thrown about like toys.  Humans swept out to sea.

I’m starting to hear from some of my friends via internet messages that they are safe.  I hope to hear from everyone before this horrible day is through.

On a final note, I have contacted the U.S. Department of State and offered my services as an interpreter and translator.  On the very off chance that they should request my help, I will attempt to get a message out via Facebook and Twitter to let my family and friends know.

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Happy New Year from all of us in the HackerHaus family!

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Creepy much?

Just about everyone I know has been asking the same question lately:  “Huh?  ‘Karate’ Kid?  Shouldn’t it be ‘Kung Fu’ Kid?”

With the massive ecological disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, controversy over illegal immigration, high unemployment, the still-tanking world economy, collapsing European nations, growing government bureaucracy, multiple wars, poverty, starvation, and Lindsey Lohan, America is getting bored and needs something real to worry about.  Enter “The Karate Kid.”

Why “Karate” instead of “Kung Fu?”  It’s obvious that it was done for brand name recognition.  Hollywood normally presumes that most Americans is even stupider than they is, and don’t want to bewilder the monkeys.  Can you imagine the confusion over naming a remake of “The Dukes of Hazzard” something like “Them Crazy Rednecks?”  What would’ve happened had the writers of “The A Team” remake not inserted the line “… this Alpha Unit, or ‘A-Team’” so that the viewing public wouldn’t get uneasy with all that jargony Army stuff?

I wouldn’t be surprised if the makers of “The Karate Kid,” hip to the throngs of people asking why it isn’t “The Kung Fu Kid,” didn’t throw in some dialogue to placate the herd:

• Fresh Prince, Jr.: “Hey, you’re just like Mr. Miyagi, and I’m like the Karate Kid.”
• Jackie Chan:  “No.  Not Karate.  Kung Fu.  See, Karate comes from Okinawa.  The Japanese later adopted, Japanized, and spread the art through the world, but it’s originally an Okinawan art (which, by the way, originally came from China).  Kung Fu means ‘hard work’ in Chinese, and it is a Chinese art.  I am Chinese.  I speak Chinese.  We are filming in China.  Do you understand the words that are coming outta my mouth?”
• FPJ: “Whatever, man…  you crazy.”

Or something like that.

Here’s a history/language lesson for those who give a crap:

Karate was originally developed in Okinawa, but has strong Chinese roots.  In fact, the Chinese characters originally used to write it are 唐手, which means “China (T’ang Dynasty) Hand.”  (Interestingly, the Koreans still use this nomenclature in the form of Tang Soo Do – 唐手道 – way of the China Hand.)  In most areas in Okinawa, the art was often referred to by the name of the region in which it was practiced, e.g. Naha-Hand, Shuri-Hand, etc.  After Funakoshi Gichin brought the art to Japan, the Japanese said, “Uh… yeah… we’re not comfortable with all that ‘China’ stuff, so if you could just go ahead and change that first character, that’d be great, mmmkay?”  So, it was decided that they (the Japanese) would use another character which was (and still is) also pronounced ‘kara.’  Enter 空手 (empty hand).

Kung Fu is written 功夫 in Chinese, and basically means something like “skill earned through hard work.”  I like to think that this name actually originated from a joke.  Imagine some white tourists shlepping around the Chinese countryside, when they happen upon some monks training in the fields.  One corpulent tourist asks the tour guide, “Hey… what’s that stuff?”  The tour guide replies, “Kung Fu (snicker).”  The tourist is so pleased with his new knowledge, that he fails the notice the tour guide elbowing the bus driver in the ribs, saying, “Did you hear that?  I told him it was ‘hard work.’  Now he thinks that’s what the art is called!  BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHA…”

Wushu is more likely what they’re doing in the movie (just speculation, as I haven’t seen it yet.)  This is where things get weird.  Wushu is written 武術 in Chinese.  (In Japanese, that word is pronounced Bujutsu.)  Wushu literally means “martial art,” but is more often used today to describe the showy, gymnastic-y, flashy stuff that came about after the Communists killed off, or drove into exile, all the truly powerful Chinese martial artists, only to later realize that they needed something culturally uniquely Chinese in nature to show the world how awesome they are.  In China, Wushu is for showing off athleticism.  In Japan, Bujutsu describes the “old school” combat systems.

I blame Mao.

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1. Enter about:config in the address bar.
2. Add a new boolean option called extensions.checkUpdateSecurity and set it to false.
3. Restart FF and hope for the best.

Caveat Emptor: I am not responsible for you screwing up your FF config.  You break it, you buy it.

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It would seem that Japan still had one more adventure in store for me on my final day here. One the way, the bus driver made an announcement that we would be needing to take a detour because of a big accident on the expressway. This required him to drive some “back” roads through the idyllic, picturesque Chiba countryside. I snapped some photos from the bus, but don’t know how they came out. I think that I’ll just wait to post them all to my Flickr photostream after I get home. Right now, I think I’d prefer to drink my Pocari Sweat and relax while waiting for my flight.

With that, I’m signing off for now to enjoy my Almond Choco and relax, pending the boarding of my flight. See y’all on the other side of the pond.

- – - – - – - – -

* The T.S.A. should be required to do their first 6 months on duty here, being trained by the staff at Narita. I think it took me a grand total of 18 seconds to pass through security. Everyone was polite and respectful to a fault. And not one single loud-mouthed jackass could be heard yelling at the herd of bread-dead traveling cattle to put their liquids in a baggie, take out their laptops, throw out bottles of water, or make sure their firearms are unloaded. These things are posted on signs… which the Japanese, apparently, read.

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All my bags are packed
I’m ready to go
I’m standin’ here in Tokyo
I hate to wake you up to say “I’m heading to Narita and should be home relatively soooooooon…”

[ahem] Sorry.

Anyhoo, I’ve been scouring the room to make sure I don’t leave anything behind, when what should I find in the desk drawer? A New Testament and Buddha Book sitting quietly side-by-side.

Is this the Japanese equivalent of “Praise Buddha and pass the katana?”

Off to take a shower, finalize packing, and drag my sleepy, sore, exhausted butt to Narita airport. See y’all soon.

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Suffice it to say that I spoke more Japanese in the last 3 hours than I have in the last 3 years. I’m finding the language very difficult to speak, which is rather frustrating. Words don’t come to mind as easily as they used to… I can’t seem to pronounce things… I trip over my own tongue. Yet, one of my conversational partners was nice enough to swear that if he had his eyes covered, he’d think I was a native Japanese.

Note: The Japanese excel at over-complimenting.

The boss made the new guy give a speech to everyone in English. (He doesn’t speak English.) It was so comical as to border on the painful. After a few seconds, the boss feigned snoring and everyone cracked up. That didn’t stop the new guy who, by then, had sufficiently filled his tank with his “gasoline,” as he put it. (In other words, he was sloshed.)

I spent several hours talking about the Japanese language, history, entertainment, contemporary culture, rural dialects, and various other random topics. I even dropped into Russian a few times with one of the guys.

I think the Tokyo office now has a better idea of who I am and what I can do. Perhaps that will give them a more solid idea of how exactly they can use me. At any rate, I made several friends I intend to keep up with. I hope to be back before long… maybe even in September. Next time, I plan to try and spend more time with some of the folks I met this time. If nothing else, it will help revitalize my Japanese.

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