You win some, you lose some....

This morning I woke up in Portland, OR (no it was not a surprise) reflecting on my day of travel yesterday. I found that my day was a mixture of little victories and failures, variously ironic comedic, and fateful.

Over the course of the weekend Kyla's ipod had been misplaced, it was discovered after she left Princeton. I was given the ipod to bring to Portland with me so that I could return it to her. After I left Princeton yesterday morning I realized that I had left my jacket behind. Ipod - Victory. Jacket - Failure.

As I mentioned in a previous post I got really cheap tickets EWR to PDX - $115 to be exact. Of course there is a price to pay somewhere. the flight plan involved a 5 hour flight to phoenix a 45 minute layover then a 3 hour flight to PDX. I knew this when I purchased the tickets but I reasoned that if there are more than 4 hours of flying time, the whole day is wasted anyway between getting to the airport etc, I might as well conserve cash and buy the cheapest ticket. Cheap ticket - Victory, Wasted time - Failure. Actually the time wasn't entirely wasted, I did manage to study about 90 Kanji and load them into my digital flashcard program, I hope to study another ~100 today. Japaneses studies - Victory.

If you'll recall my drivers license had expired and created some fun experience mentioned in previous posts. I did get it renewed, but until the real thing comes in the mail I have the temporary - a piece of paper. Instead of being proactive and asking if it was ok like I did last week flying into NY (resulting in a thorough search) I went through security showing the expired picture ID and had no problems. Victory.

Did I mention that I was bringing my viola with me? Probably not, I don't think I have mentioned the viola at all - I will in a subsequent post. The viola is relevant here because as you might know the airlines only allow "one carry on luggage, and one personal item". Yesterday I had my roll-aboard and my backpack as well as the viola, a total of 3 pieces. My victory was that on the first flight (EWR to PHX) I managed to carry everything on. While boarding the second flight (PHX to PDX) the gate agent informed me I would have to check on item. Ultimately the first victory is insignificant because I had to wait at baggage claim for 30 minutes for my checked luggage to appear.

The best for last: Upon exiting the jet-bridge from my first flight (in PHX) I looked around found the nearest Arrival/Departure screen and headed for the gate that said Portland. As Murphy's Law might predict, it was one of the last gates on the A concourse. I leisurely strolled toward Gate A29 and got a bite to eat once nearby. I get to the gate and the screen indicates "gate closed" and had a departure to San Jose listed. Confused I went to an Arrivals/Departures Screen and realized that A29 was an arrival from Portland and that my departure to Portland was out of B9 and was now boarding. Run.... Epic Failure.

You can't have it all.

My study of Japanese

A little bit of background.

My introduction to the Japanese language came through the so called "loan words". These are English words or words of other languages that are used in the Japanese language, but the pronunciation is changed to conform the Japanese phonetic rules. I first learned certain brand names, like McDonald's becomes Ma-ku-do-na-ru-do, Ba-ga-kin-gaa, some foods: Ha-tta-do-gga, ham-ba-gaa, and other random words like su-ppo-tsu-kaa.
I was intrigued by how the pronunciation of these familiar words were so drastically changed to "Japanify" them. Soon thereafter I bought a book called "Japanese for fun" it was a phrasebook written in "Romanji". As I went through the book I encountered phrases that are very similar in English but completely different in Japanese. I assumed this was due to grammar rules and immediately purchased a grammar book. Bad move, it is completely overwhelming. Though I saw that studying the language was going to be and ever greater challenge than I ever had imagined, I was hooked enough to keep at it. I decided to look around online for peoples experiences to see how they had learned Japanese. I ran across a website www.alljapaneseallthetime.com I like his method, though I am not applying it as extremely as he prescribes. I decided to learn the Japanese writing systems first.

Here are the books that I am working through:
Lets Learn Hiragana by Yasuko Kosaka
Lets Learn Katakana by Yasuko Kosaka
Remembering the Kanji by James Heisig

There is plenty debate about which of the kana to learn first (hiragana or katakana), I went with hiragana.
Also, there are many Kanji books out there, had purchased two in an effort to get started, one listed every possible reading and meaning of the 2045 Joyou Kanji and was way too much to tackle, the second was written by Japanese authors, had an On readings in Katakana, a Kun reading in Hiraga, a basic meaning and example sentences written in hiragana with kanji already covered, the book only introduced 300 kanji, but is not useful to me at this point because it assumes a level conversational japanese (to understand the example sentences). When choosing how to tackle the Kanji I think it is important for the learner to first understand that people learn things in very different ways and it is important to know what works for you and what doesnt. I found that "Remebering the Kanji" is a book that presents things in a way that works with my way of learning things. I highly recommend reading at least the introduction (the intro and the entire first third of the book are available online in a pdf as a free sample).
If only I had the discipline to actually do the work...

Bringing you up to speed...

Welcome to my blog.

This might be a long post as I intend to let you know where I am at now so that you wont be lost as I make subsequent posts.

Back at the end of January of this year (2009) I quit my day-job in accounting to embark upon a journey in Argentine Tango Land. A "career change", some might call it, though i have come to find it more of a journey than a change of jobs. So I left NYC for Minneapolis to teach, perform, DJ, etc and thus it began - a life on the road.

Incidentally it was during my initial time in Minneapolis that I developed an interest in the Japanese language. More about my Japanese studies to come...

As I write this today I am currently in Minneapolis. I've been living out of the same suitcase since mid July. I started out in Chicago, was based there for about 2 weeks, and made weekend trips to Milwaukee and Champaign, IL. I took Amtrak down to Kansas city (12 hour ride - via Saint Louis). I spent about a week living in Lawrence, KS and the next 2 in Kansas City. While in Kansas City I got involved in Salsa Dancing. Yes, most of my tango friends said I had turned to the dark side", though my Tango Mentor, Robin, said it was a good idea, that i would learn some things that are applicable to certain types of motions in Tango. I made two weekend road trips From KC/Lawrence to Saint Louis. From Kansas city I went back to Chicago (Amtrak, 8 hours) for the weekend, before heading to Minneapolis via Megabus. I've been based out of Minneapolis since the beginning of September. I went to Madison, WI for a weekend, spent a Saturday evening in Rochester, MN and traveled back to Chicago the last two weeks spending only Monday and Tuesday there. This I think is probably the most far out thing I've done so far - spend two days a week in a city that is 8 hours away. if you know me me you know that I always say that I live in the "Tango Timezone", so it was quite a feat for me to make it to the bus Megabus stop in each city by 7am.

I am now wrapping up my stay in Minneapolis, though I expect to be back in a few weeks. Some exciting things are going on I will post accordingly.

That's all for now.