On Tuesday morning I awoke to an e-mail in my inbox informing me that I had been chosen as a fellow at Columbia's Weatherhead East Asian Institute (WEAI). Apparently they will now take over my funding for this year, relieving the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of the obligation. In practical terms this doesn't actually mean a whole lot; the funding is substitutional, not additional, so I'm no better off financially. It is, however, something of an honour, looks good on a CV, and involves turning up for dinners and panel discussions, etc. with fellow scholars. That's by no means a bad thing - though it may take up some of my time, it will widen my circle of contacts and get me a little better known in the field, which may come in handy in a couple of years' time when I'm looking for a job.
By a bizarre coincidence, WEAI - pronounced as one word - is also widely used in the dialect spoken in north-east England, where I grew up. Whey aye, as it's spelt, means something like 'Of course'. Can't imagine that had much to do with it, though.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Monday, September 25, 2006
Better
Things are looking a bit better after the weekend. I got most of my work done so it won't be hanging over me this week, and K and I have basically patched things up (for now, at least). The thing is, I will be going to Japan in 2008 - so some time in the next 18 months will come a crunch point. I don't know what's going to happen then...
Saw Corin, yet another ex-JET, on Sunday, now of this parish and job hunting. I helped her out with a bit of Japanese practice, as the job is at a Japanese TV firm. I'm not sure how much help I can realistically be - one can't teach Japanese in an afternoon, after all - but one likes to do what one can for friends and acquaintances.
Had a Chinese test on Thursday and Friday, the latter half of which consisted of speaking into a microphone and recording myself, to make sure I got the tones right. I'm not 100% sure I did...it's damn hard. Luckily, the objective is not to become completely fluent in Mandarin (though that would be nice), so much as to be able to read academic Chinese and classical Chinese poetry.
I got the paper copy of my echocardiogram from a few weeks back today. Apparently I have a 'trivial mitral insufficiency' and a 'trivial tricuspid insufficiency', which terms I can make neither head nor tail of, but I think the key bit is the 'trivial'. At least, I hope so.
Saw Corin, yet another ex-JET, on Sunday, now of this parish and job hunting. I helped her out with a bit of Japanese practice, as the job is at a Japanese TV firm. I'm not sure how much help I can realistically be - one can't teach Japanese in an afternoon, after all - but one likes to do what one can for friends and acquaintances.
Had a Chinese test on Thursday and Friday, the latter half of which consisted of speaking into a microphone and recording myself, to make sure I got the tones right. I'm not 100% sure I did...it's damn hard. Luckily, the objective is not to become completely fluent in Mandarin (though that would be nice), so much as to be able to read academic Chinese and classical Chinese poetry.
I got the paper copy of my echocardiogram from a few weeks back today. Apparently I have a 'trivial mitral insufficiency' and a 'trivial tricuspid insufficiency', which terms I can make neither head nor tail of, but I think the key bit is the 'trivial'. At least, I hope so.
Friday, September 22, 2006
Nadir
Ugh. Still running around like a blue-arsed fly. Lessons to prepare, reading to do, copies to make and stuff to hand in to people, and it rarely goes like clockwork. It's been particularly bad these last couple of weeks; it should ease off a bit from now on. Fingers crossed, but predictions about workload have a horrible habit of going badly wrong.
Someone in our School of International and Public Affairs thought it would be a good idea to invite Iranian president Mahmound Ahmadinejad to come and give a speech at Columbia, seeing as he's in town anyway to posture along with his fellow loonies at the UN. As one can imagine, that idea, when revealed yesterday, went down like the proverbial lead balloon, especially considering CU's rather large Jewish presence. It was perhaps the only time the college Dems and Repubs have actually agreed with each other on something. As it happened, he did accept the invitation, but on two days' notice it wouldn't have been feasible to get the security arrangements in place. If you recall last year, John Ashcroft's visit brought out the NYPD riot squad, so Ahmadinejad would probably have needed several tank divisions and the 81st Airborne to be safe. No doubt CU are very happy to have a plausible excuse not to have him around campus. As an aside, I think they're wrong, and that the way to deal with "hate speech" is not to suppress it, but to show it to all as the ignorant rot it is. As they say, free speech makes it easier to spot the idiots.
K and I aren't in the best of shape. We went for dinner last night and it was just bad - we had nothing to say to each other, it was horribly awkward. We talked afterwards for a while about various things. I think we patched it up, but we both need to do some serious thinking about where we're going.
Someone in our School of International and Public Affairs thought it would be a good idea to invite Iranian president Mahmound Ahmadinejad to come and give a speech at Columbia, seeing as he's in town anyway to posture along with his fellow loonies at the UN. As one can imagine, that idea, when revealed yesterday, went down like the proverbial lead balloon, especially considering CU's rather large Jewish presence. It was perhaps the only time the college Dems and Repubs have actually agreed with each other on something. As it happened, he did accept the invitation, but on two days' notice it wouldn't have been feasible to get the security arrangements in place. If you recall last year, John Ashcroft's visit brought out the NYPD riot squad, so Ahmadinejad would probably have needed several tank divisions and the 81st Airborne to be safe. No doubt CU are very happy to have a plausible excuse not to have him around campus. As an aside, I think they're wrong, and that the way to deal with "hate speech" is not to suppress it, but to show it to all as the ignorant rot it is. As they say, free speech makes it easier to spot the idiots.
K and I aren't in the best of shape. We went for dinner last night and it was just bad - we had nothing to say to each other, it was horribly awkward. We talked afterwards for a while about various things. I think we patched it up, but we both need to do some serious thinking about where we're going.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
All-consuming
I wonder if I'm turning into a workaholic. I spent between twelve and fourteen hours in class and studying almost every day this week (usually from 9 a.m. til 11 p.m.). It's not that I don't enjoy it - for the most part I do, the work's stimulating and I get a lot out of it - but it seems to be affecting my social life. Went out for dinner on Friday night to a sake bar in midtown with K; she was a bit frosty, mainly cos she hadn't seen me all week. Trouble is, this is just something I have to do right now; and these couple of weeks I have to prepare to lead the discussion in our colloquium, which means doing all the reading a week in advance. Perhaps this is what they mean by work-life balance, and maybe I need a bit more of the life side of things. Still. The bar was good, reasonably authentic (apart from the massive portions - not authentically Japanese, but welcome enough), and the booze was cheap. Got fairly hammered, blowing off steam I suppose.
I'm working through a 500-page book required for the Mod. Hist. colloquium right now, entitled Memory, History, Forgetting by some Frog philosopher by the name of Paul Ricoeur. To misquote and paraphrase Hermann Goering, "whenever I hear the words 'French philosopher' I reach for my revolver". It's not as bad as some - Derrida comes to mind - and it does have some interesting ideas, but in the general tradition of many theorists it's quite spectacularly badly written, long-winded, opaque, pretentious and generally annoying. If I might be allowed to quote another German of dubious moral heritage, Friedrich Nietzsche: "Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who would like to seem profound strive for obscurity."
I'm working through a 500-page book required for the Mod. Hist. colloquium right now, entitled Memory, History, Forgetting by some Frog philosopher by the name of Paul Ricoeur. To misquote and paraphrase Hermann Goering, "whenever I hear the words 'French philosopher' I reach for my revolver". It's not as bad as some - Derrida comes to mind - and it does have some interesting ideas, but in the general tradition of many theorists it's quite spectacularly badly written, long-winded, opaque, pretentious and generally annoying. If I might be allowed to quote another German of dubious moral heritage, Friedrich Nietzsche: "Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who would like to seem profound strive for obscurity."
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
A rose by any other name...
Apparently it's standard procedure to give everyone in the Chinese class a Chinese name. Mine is
塗 英杰
pronounced Tú Yīng Jié, or, if you prefer the Japanese, To Ei Ketsu. Though not a lot of 'em would know the last one, it's rather unusual. It contains the character for England, which is also quite nifty. I think it's rather cool.
塗 英杰
pronounced Tú Yīng Jié, or, if you prefer the Japanese, To Ei Ketsu. Though not a lot of 'em would know the last one, it's rather unusual. It contains the character for England, which is also quite nifty. I think it's rather cool.
Monday, September 11, 2006
September 11th
Today, as I'm sure everyone is aware, marks the fifth anniversary of 9/11. By a strange quirk of fate, I have managed to be in the USA for three out of those possible five anniversaries, being here as a tourist in '02, and studying here in '05 (I was doing the GRE in Tokyo in 2004, and I can't remember what I was doing in 2003. So there). It feels odd to be in New York today, which in itself is rather strange, as it didn't last year, but this time round is a bit different.
For one thing, the five-year mark gives a sense - perhaps a false one, but the effect remains - of completing a cycle, of somehow ending the first phase of the aftermath. I suppose this feeling is reflected in the wall-to-wall coverage that the milestone is getting on U.S. TV right now. I don't wish to downplay the enormity of what happened on that horrible day, and I can respect a nation's wish to honour its dead, but the day-long blanket coverage (starting at 5 a.m. on one channel I saw) rather recalls the grief-fest that overtook the U.K. after Diana's death in 1997. It's probably just me, but I can't help but feel that a tone of quiet reflection would have been a more fitting memorial than a day-long media junket. Oh well. I guess my personal tastes just tend towards the understated, that's all. Maybe it's for that same reason that I never visited Ground Zero itself and always thought turning it into a tourist site was really tacky.
At the other end of the scale, of course, we have the certifiably bat-shit crazy bunch. You know the ones, the tinfoil-hat brigade who think that the CIA, or the Bush Clan, or the Illuminati, or the Jews, or Tom and Jerry crashed the planes into the WTC, or used explosives to bring them down, or any of a dozen or so quarter-baked theories concocted from the flimsiest of supposition and downright lies. This wouldn't usually bother me; I would normally be inclined to class such whackjobs with UFO nuts and those who think we never went to the moon or that the NSA controls the weather.
But damned if this stuff doesn't seem to keep popping up and affecting people I know. A certain somewhat flakey Miyagi couple who shall remain nameless originally tipped me off on this strain of thought - if it can be so called - by showing me a video doing the rounds on the net a few years ago. I thought it was crap then, and still do now that I've dug around a bit and learned for a fact it's total nonsense...but the idea just won't die. On the pole in a shot from October last year you can see their sticker; there are flyers up on all the lamp-posts round Columbia right now, the secretary in the Law school was watching that same video a couple of months back, and there was even some loony in a "9/11 is a lie" t-shirt on campus today. I don't know why this sort of stuff bugs me, but it does. It's not my fight, and yet...
For one thing, the five-year mark gives a sense - perhaps a false one, but the effect remains - of completing a cycle, of somehow ending the first phase of the aftermath. I suppose this feeling is reflected in the wall-to-wall coverage that the milestone is getting on U.S. TV right now. I don't wish to downplay the enormity of what happened on that horrible day, and I can respect a nation's wish to honour its dead, but the day-long blanket coverage (starting at 5 a.m. on one channel I saw) rather recalls the grief-fest that overtook the U.K. after Diana's death in 1997. It's probably just me, but I can't help but feel that a tone of quiet reflection would have been a more fitting memorial than a day-long media junket. Oh well. I guess my personal tastes just tend towards the understated, that's all. Maybe it's for that same reason that I never visited Ground Zero itself and always thought turning it into a tourist site was really tacky.
At the other end of the scale, of course, we have the certifiably bat-shit crazy bunch. You know the ones, the tinfoil-hat brigade who think that the CIA, or the Bush Clan, or the Illuminati, or the Jews, or Tom and Jerry crashed the planes into the WTC, or used explosives to bring them down, or any of a dozen or so quarter-baked theories concocted from the flimsiest of supposition and downright lies. This wouldn't usually bother me; I would normally be inclined to class such whackjobs with UFO nuts and those who think we never went to the moon or that the NSA controls the weather.
But damned if this stuff doesn't seem to keep popping up and affecting people I know. A certain somewhat flakey Miyagi couple who shall remain nameless originally tipped me off on this strain of thought - if it can be so called - by showing me a video doing the rounds on the net a few years ago. I thought it was crap then, and still do now that I've dug around a bit and learned for a fact it's total nonsense...but the idea just won't die. On the pole in a shot from October last year you can see their sticker; there are flyers up on all the lamp-posts round Columbia right now, the secretary in the Law school was watching that same video a couple of months back, and there was even some loony in a "9/11 is a lie" t-shirt on campus today. I don't know why this sort of stuff bugs me, but it does. It's not my fight, and yet...
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Pics
Not much to add right now, just thought I'd put up some recent pictures that were floating around on my digital camera. I'd also like to add a note of congratulations to Pocket Rocket, now safely married off. Women the world over are crying themselves to sleep, mate. Though it'll probably be a while before you read this; or at least, I should hope so, you're meant to be having a honeymoon.
Friday, September 08, 2006
And the beat goes on
Term is here, with all its gentle showers. I'm back on the treadmill of academia, polishing my mind to a keenly-honed edge with the grindstone of learning. Stop laughing at the back there.
It's good to be back in the saddle. I'm taking beginning Chinese this semester, and the first two sessions I've had so far have consisted of my comical efforts to get my tongue round the sounds of this rather esoteric language. I'm also taking three seminars, on modern Japanese history, pre-modern Japanese literature and modern Japanese cultural criticism respectively, so while a solid and demanding workload, it is unlikely to be quite as crushing as it was this time last year.
Before the grueling four-month semester kicked off, I hosted the lovely Miyagi belle Ms. Christine Ngan for a few days in New York. Having spent most of the last two years in rural Tohoku, New York must have been something of a step up, but despite her notoriously poor sense of direction she still managed to avoid getting seriously lost. I had feared that she would take my assertion that the grid system in Manhattan makes it almost impossible to lose one's bearings as some kind of challenge. But it was not to be, and we managed a few trips to Ellis Island, the Empire State building and other sundry landmarks in the few days she was here. Perhaps I'm getting a bit blase; it was my fifth visit to the Statue...
There's more to the title of this entry than merely the above would suggest. For the last couple of months or so I've been experiencing an irregular heartbeat and palpitations fairly frequently, for no obvious reason that I can discern. While I've had no other symptoms, I still thought it warranted getting checked out, and so I went to see the doc back home in Newport. She thought it was probably nothing - blood pressure, pulse etc all normal - but recommended an ECG as a precautionary measure. I learned upon my return to NYC that they had seen something there they weren't happy with, and I should get it checked out further here. I made an appointment on Tuesday, and learned that I have a heart murmur, albeit a very faint one, and should get an echo cardiogram at the hospital.
So I duly did, and thus was my first encounter with US medicine. I have no complaints; it was all done quickly and efficiently. I had some gel smeared on my chest, the readings taken, then again with the doctor present. The final result, after all the blood work and sonograms were analyzed, is...
...there's absolutely nothing wrong with me. Given the absence of any other symptoms, medical minds on both sides of the Atlantic are inclined to think that it's just one of those things. Bizarre, perhaps, but a relief nonetheless. Now I can bury myself in the library again, and hope that the only thing that'll get me flatlining is the reading list for this semester...
It's good to be back in the saddle. I'm taking beginning Chinese this semester, and the first two sessions I've had so far have consisted of my comical efforts to get my tongue round the sounds of this rather esoteric language. I'm also taking three seminars, on modern Japanese history, pre-modern Japanese literature and modern Japanese cultural criticism respectively, so while a solid and demanding workload, it is unlikely to be quite as crushing as it was this time last year.
Before the grueling four-month semester kicked off, I hosted the lovely Miyagi belle Ms. Christine Ngan for a few days in New York. Having spent most of the last two years in rural Tohoku, New York must have been something of a step up, but despite her notoriously poor sense of direction she still managed to avoid getting seriously lost. I had feared that she would take my assertion that the grid system in Manhattan makes it almost impossible to lose one's bearings as some kind of challenge. But it was not to be, and we managed a few trips to Ellis Island, the Empire State building and other sundry landmarks in the few days she was here. Perhaps I'm getting a bit blase; it was my fifth visit to the Statue...
There's more to the title of this entry than merely the above would suggest. For the last couple of months or so I've been experiencing an irregular heartbeat and palpitations fairly frequently, for no obvious reason that I can discern. While I've had no other symptoms, I still thought it warranted getting checked out, and so I went to see the doc back home in Newport. She thought it was probably nothing - blood pressure, pulse etc all normal - but recommended an ECG as a precautionary measure. I learned upon my return to NYC that they had seen something there they weren't happy with, and I should get it checked out further here. I made an appointment on Tuesday, and learned that I have a heart murmur, albeit a very faint one, and should get an echo cardiogram at the hospital.
So I duly did, and thus was my first encounter with US medicine. I have no complaints; it was all done quickly and efficiently. I had some gel smeared on my chest, the readings taken, then again with the doctor present. The final result, after all the blood work and sonograms were analyzed, is...
...there's absolutely nothing wrong with me. Given the absence of any other symptoms, medical minds on both sides of the Atlantic are inclined to think that it's just one of those things. Bizarre, perhaps, but a relief nonetheless. Now I can bury myself in the library again, and hope that the only thing that'll get me flatlining is the reading list for this semester...
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