New pet?

She was on the curtain when I came home, and I have no idea where she went. She's probably hiding somewhere behind a bookshelf. Or in the closet. Or under the sofa. But not in the bed, please.

Death Note 3 - L Change the World

After getting my hair cut Sunday I hurried over to Wasada Town to catch this movie, and made it just in time for the previews (which I enjoy, although I sometimes regret that they reveal too much). I bought the book back in December on the day it came out and just haven't had time to get to it yet. I'm still impressed with how they turned the original books, primarily made up of logical arguments and deductive reasoning, into a movie. They were filled with phrases like "If this, then that. But if not that, then this." Then you have to keep those hypothetical situations in mind while reading the next 20 pages to find out what really happened. Anyhow I was impressed with how they made the movies.

Unfortunately the third movie was totally different. I was hoping for some of the wit and plot-twists that made the first two movies interesting, but this one had nothing to do with the mysterious death notes and the first half was poorly scripted. There didn't seem to be any motive behind the characters' actions, and they were violent or sad for odd reasons, or sometimes for no reason at all. The actors did a wonderful job playing their parts, but their lines were weird and the director needs to be fired.

The verdict: I should have waited for it to come out on video. And I'm hoping the book is more interesting.

At the end of a movie I usually wait until the credits finish rolling and the lights come on before I get up to leave. I know a lot of people do this, but I don't know why anyone else does. I do it because it gives me a chance to reflect on the movie and replay favorite scenes in my head while it's still dark and quiet, without any distractions. Occasionally there's an important extra scene at the end that most people miss because they're eager to leave, like in the X-Men. And this one, too.

Haircut

I generally get my haircut every three months, and it was about that time again. I wanted to try something new instead of getting the same old thing, so I've been paying attention to everyone's hair and found a style I like:

Long bangs combed to the side, with short messy hair on top.

But how to describe what I want using words? That never goes well. When you're describing what you want, I suspect the hairdresser is already imagining what to cut and only half-listening. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I found this on-line and mailed it to my cell phone:

I like how it turned out! I have to grow my bangs a bit longer to get it how I want, but here's what it looks like now:
Since I was the last customer of the evening and the only one in the shop, the staff seemed a lot more relaxed and talkative than usual. The owner saw my boots and asked where I got them. He only wears boots to work because he can't stand it when hair gets in his shoes and pokes his feet all day. Then I looked around to see what kind of footwear everyone else had on, and one guy was wearing simple sneakers. The owner was like, "This guy always comes to work in low-cut shoes, and he usually doesn't even wear socks. Can you believe it?" Apparently the feeling of hair poking his feet doesn't bother him all that much, but it totally irritates his wife when he comes home and gets hair all over the place. Hmmm... behind the scenes stuff I've never thought about before.

My new favorite song

After seeing KIDS last week, the theme song just kept replaying itself in my head so I looked it up. The refrain is totally catchy.

Makihara Noriyuki has a bunch of other songs out, but I never paid much attention to him when he appeared on music programs and stuff. It's amazing how much impact movies have on my attention. If it weren't for the movie, I probably wouldn't have even noticed this song.

I like the meaning of it. I believe the purpose of life isn't to leave our mark on the world, but to help others along on their way to doing good for themselves. The song sort of shares this sentiment. I think a lot of people enter the medical field because they have dreams of helping others, then unfortunately get caught up in the stress of life and the politics of the industry. I have no qualms about giving up that path. It might not be as hands-on as the medical field, but I love what I do now and know I'm affecting at least a few of the people I come in contact with. I can't say for sure, but I'm hoping it's in a good way!

I'm not so good at translating but roughly it says,

Fearless, I jump ahead in front of me.
I'm led by the path that I'm meant to follow;
it leads me like the dim glow of a firefly.
If I can't find a reason for myself to live,
I want to be the trigger that might bring about someone else's happiness.
That's why I will keep on living.

There were other videos on YouTube with better quality, but this one has the lyrics to follow along with.

How to eat sushi

This was linked on a friend's blog and I loved it. It's a short guide teaching foreigners the proper way to eat sushi, and I can only hope to see someone following these instructions to a T.

If you want to see it without the YouTube mark blocking the corner of the screen, you can check it out here.

28 Weeks Later

To follow with a similar title as the previous post, I've decided to review a movie I saw recently. The original film "28 Days Later" was great. After the Rage virus is released and we see a few scenes of people being attacked and torn apart, I love that the movie focussed on plot twists rather than becoming a simple horror flick with "the infected" ravaging the survivors.

The sequel 28 Weeks Later occurs after "the infected" have all died of starvation, and unfortunately is more Hollywood-esque. The first 30 minutes made me think a lot about how a country could be started from scratch, but after the virus infects the first victim the plotline becomes rather linear. Aside from the plotline, I did like how the scenes were well done and you can feel the characters' fear. If you're into horror flicks, it's worth seeing.

One Day Later

Time heals all wounds, or so they say. I feel much more relaxed than yesterday and have realized a few things. I was under the impression that the plans had changed at the last minute, but actually they had probably changed a while ago and no one had let me know, probably because they thought someone else already had. It was just a bit of miscommunication. I can't blame anyone for this because I could be equally at fault for not having confirmed what time people were coming over.

One thing still bugs me though. The person who let me know about the plan changes apologized in advance, so she knew that I'd already prepared stuff. And even after finding out that I'd taken off work and had been rushing to get things done, her attitude was a simple "oh sorry about that" whereas most people would have asked if the original plan would have been better or at least mentioned the situation to someone else. She seemed completely indifferent to how inconvenienced I was. I keep recalling yesterday in the store when I asked, "By the way when did the plans change?" Her back was turned to me as she walked away, and all she said was "Before." This answer and attitude totally irritate me.

I'm pretty sure she's the one who wanted to go to the batting cages, which makes sense why she pretended like nothing was wrong and hadn't mentioned to anyone how inconvenienced I'd been. The more I think about it, the more her actions seem deliberate.

So that's my verdict on the situation. I don't want to fill up any more blog space with negativity and won't be ranting on about this anymore... unless something else comes up and I need to vent!

The birthday party

Imagine this. Three weeks ago your friends say they want to have a pizza party at your place. The date is decided. You're quite busy and don't have much free time, so the day before the party you decide to cancel some lessons (we're imagining you have a job as a private tutor) to go home early and clean the apartment and get things ready... and in this case, taking off from work means you don't get paid.

At 11pm, you're just about to leave for the store to buy a few more things before it closes when you get a text message saying that the plan for tomorrow is to meet in downtown Oita at 1:30pm, go to the batting cages, then head over to someone else's place for dinner. What? You're confused, right?

So you send back a message asking if plans for the pizza party have been cancelled. The reply is that you always seem really busy, and with you in mind they decided to change locations, and sorry if you've already gotten stuff ready. What do you do?

You try not to get angry and casually mention that actually you had taken off work to clean the apartment and get everything ready. A half hour later the reply is, "My cell phone battery died so I'm writing from my computer account. Thanks for going so far as taking off from work to clean and stuff. I know we've been talking about having pizza at your place the whole time, but then we realized that you're pretty busy so decided to change plans. We should have let you know sooner. Sorry!" At this point, what would you be thinking?

Personally, I was pissed off. They had me in mind, so they tell me the plans have changed after I'd already gotten stuff ready? You mean to tell me that I took off of work and spent the evening rushing to get stuff ready for nothing? I was incensed. I considered not even showing up to the damn party. But I went anyway because I didn't want my anger to get the better of me.

Thankfully there was another foreigner there who I could talk to and get my mind off of how I felt. I spent my entire time talking with him because simply looking at anyone else put me in a bad mood. I really didn't want to ruin a birthday party. I shouldn't have gone in the first place.

After going to the batting cages we stopped off at a grocery store to pick up stuff to cook at our friend's house. I was standing next to one friend, and when I looked in the basket, there was a bottle of salsa sitting in it. I let it slip how I had actually bought that same bottle of salsa thinking that people were coming over. Then the words just came out... that I was pretty pissed that I'd found out the plans were cancelled after I had taken off work and had already gotten stuff ready. I could feel my blood pressure rising so I walked away.

A minute later I felt someone hug me from behind. It was a different friend. She said, "Sorry, we thought you were too busy so we changed plans." I guess word had spread that I was in a bad mood. But you know what? I don't care what the reason is that the plans were changed, I just find it extremely inconsiderate that no one bothered to tell me until the last minute. And did they really think that telling me at 11pm the night before the party would be appropriate? Any normal person would realize that this would be too late.

Everyone apologized. Sorry. We didn't know you'd already gotten stuff ready. We thought you were too busy so we decided to have the party at someone else's house.

Whatever. I put on my best happy face and said it was okay, that everything was alright. I suppressed my true feelings as best I could because I really didn't want to ruin everyone's day. But I did think about a few things. This situation came about not because of indifference towards me, but because of simple ignorance and a lack of common sense... a combination that leads to inconsiderate behavior and harsh feelings, whether or not it be unintentional. Do I really want to spend time around people who are this clueless? It's sad to say, but I really don't feel the same about this group of friends anymore. I don't feel as eager to hang out with them as I used to.

This just happened today and the irritation is still coursing through my veins. I wonder how long it will take for these bitter feelings to fade.

KIDS

Sorry for the lag in posts. Busy, busy, busy! Working morning till night with only 4 days off per month (and no national holidays) is starting to take its toll, so I've given away a class to a friend and may have to start finding replacements for the others, ignoring students' pleas to continue teaching them!

A couple friends have their birthdays this month and they decided to have their birthday get-together at my place this coming Sunday, because they want to eat home-made pizza (did I mention I bought a pizza oven on New Year's Day?) and carrot cake (which doesn't exist in Japan - unforgiveable!). Dinner preparation will have to begin after everyone arrives, so I can spend the morning cleaning.... I only have time to clean on my 4 days off, so if I spend a day hanging out with friends or whatnot this place really turns into a dump. At least I'm HOPING this is a dinner gathering. If it's for lunch we might be in for some trouble. I'll have to send out a list of ingredients for people to pick up on the way here. The power of delegation!

In order to go shopping for birthday gifts I got friends to do my evening lessons for me tonight. Shopping went wonderfully and I was done in a little over an hour! This gave me time to see a movie called KIDS that's piqued my curiosity (hence the photo and title).

I like going into a movie without knowing anything about it. Seeing a trailer is sometimes too much information. I want to be surprised and thrilled while sitting in the theater without having any expectations. I chose this movie because the three main characters are played by three of my favorite actors...

Koike Teppei who I first noticed from his playful character in the series DragonZakura. There's something about the quality of his voice and the way that he talks that I like.
Tamaki Hiroshi who a lot of people say is super hot, but I just don't see it. The way he ends his sentences in a slight sigh kind of gets on my nerves, but he plays interesting characters so that makes him alright.
Kuriyama Chiaki who played the crazy girl with the spiky ball weapon in Kill Bill, among other strange roles. The first time I saw her was in Battle Royale, where she played a Middle School student that chases down her classmate and stabs him to death. I love that scene. Such a strong character. With scary eyes.

The premise is simple, but the complicated characters make for an interesting story, which is why I liked it. (Don't read on if you're like me and don't want to know details about a movie before seeing it). Three kids happen to meet randomly and become close friends. Sounds normal so far, right? From the start you realize that they're all kind of weird, then you gradually find out how each one has some kind of psychological hangup that has prevented them from ever making friends with anyone before.

The most interesting of the three is played by Koike Teppei, who moves to the small town to be close to his mother in prison. He can move things with his mind, and shortly after meeting the other two kids realizes that he also has the ability to transfer other peoples' wounds to his own body. His extreme sense of altruism and simple naivete cause him to start absorbing wounds whenever he finds someone hurt, leaving him with bruises and cuts all over the place. He then realizes that he can also transfer wounds to other people, and is convinced to transfer them to his friend's comatose father to save himself from constant pain (and to help his friend satisfy a need for vengeance from having been abused by his father).

This ability is what makes the story interesting, and is what made me think a lot about what the movie might be trying to get at.

Moral #1: All wounds heal, and we were meant to have them because they make us stronger.
Moral #2: Scars become a part of us and we'll miss them if they disappear.
Moral #3: We shouldn't hurt others, no matter who they are.

Pretty sappy, eh?

Just wait till the ending. It's your typical Japanese ending to a film, the kind that spends the last 20 minutes trying to make the audience cry. Come to think of it, that's a Hollywood staple, too.