Japan may be a little too trusting on security issues. (I use "security" in the IT sense here: keeping the bad guys from doing things they shouldn't do.) At my local 7-11, when buying a beer, I was caught off guard when the typical mumbling cashier pointed to the LCD screen facing me and mumbled something I don't usually hear in the everyday convenience store cashier transaction. I still don't know what was said, but the idea was clearly to direct my attention to the screen.

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The connection - or rather, similarity - between Nintendo and Apple is incredible.

"I think they have a lot in common with us in that we both make unique, interesting products that surprise people. I really respect and think highly of Nintendo. I myself own a Gamecube and a Wii." -Phil Schiller, 2008

Apple takes pride in its software development, bringing new experiences to its customers on the twin pillars of hardware and software. On that count, it's certainly not unlike Nintendo. [Nintendo president Satoru] Iwata himself agrees: "We want people to be surprised, and we want people to call our approach unique. That's what people say about Apple, too.

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So, the main winter break vacation post will be from Seoul, but my partner in crime Adam and I swung through Tokyo on the way back home. We had the unique pleasure of spending a full two days with my former IR/PS classmate Kentaro, and reuniting with a collection of UT/JA peeps in Roppongi as well.

In this collection:
-Amazingly delicious sushi food porn
-Fall colors still visible in Ueno Park
-People!
-The shrines and Buddhas of Kamakura
-One Yokohama shot from an automotive tour

By the by, all shots were taken with an iPhone 4. For a phone camera, I’m pretty impressed.

See the full gallery on Posterous

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The JET Program sent me to Japan. There are many ways to go to Japan these days to do entry-level work like teaching English, but this is the preferred way to go since it's the only one with Japanese government backing.

I'd predict this has a lot to do with the Japanese government's treatment of JET members as opposed to those cheaper dispatch teachers. Dispatch teachers come over to do a job. JET members, on the other hand, have their existence acknowledged by the Japanese government and often arrive in their villages as de facto government employees, which confers much greater degrees of both respect and responsibility. They're paid well, which keeps them more comfortable.

And there's an even simpler metric: look up all the Japan specialists (current and former) from top-tier international relations grad schools. You'll get a wide pool of people: business people and entrepreneurs, journalists, nonprofit managers, international institution members (ranging from obscure UN organizations on Equal Rights for Toasters to the World Bank) and yes, policy wonks who sit on self-serving conferences like CULCON. How many are JET alums? How many are Interac alums?

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I'd rather be in Japan. I can't spend a day without walking home from school thinking I'd rather be walking home from work somewhere in Japan, following my nose to good food and beer. And sumo on TV. And trying to understand the evening news immediately thereafter.

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I committed to UCSD a couple weeks ago after visiting the campus and finding that it alone, out of my selection of four potential grad schools, had the "laid-back state school" vibe I find so familiar.

Thankfully, in the last two years I came to my senses and decided against law school, and in its stead I'll be getting a Masters in international relations.

Well, technically, International Relations and Pacific Studies. It's a clever mix of MBA-ish business work, working-level economics, high-level language training, and a smattering of other courses like Globalization and policy stuff. All of it's given a strong slant toward Pacific Rim countries, which includes Japan, China, Korea, Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Long story short, it's much more my cup of tea than law school would ever be. My experience in Japan kind of slingshotted me into the gig, and most of the Japan specialists in the program are also ex-JETs like me.

It's two years of coursework with an all-but-required summer internship between the two years. There's also a chance to study abroad, which I don't know if I'll take yet, but if I do it'd be a fantastic chance to spend a semester at the University of Tokyo, which is a school for badasses.

In any case, students pick a regional specialty and a career specialty. I'll certainly be in the Japan region, but for the career stuff I'm still torn, but leaning towards International Economics. It's a pretty popular choice, and I can survive the mathematical work that seems to have plenty of people scared. Maybe I should be scared of everything else, given the lethargic pace at which I read.

Of course, there's the fantasticness of San Diego, which seems to enchant people around me with a mere mention. UCSD does have some fabulous scenery, and the IR buildings actually sit right above the ocean. I've had more people than I can count promise to come visit me. Oddly, when I was there I wasn't blown away by any of the scenery or ocean proximity, but in all fairness I was exhausted from my travel and still getting over the ugly shock of a city that was Los Angeles.

I take off sometime in July. In the meantime I'm doing all the playing and traveling I can, so hopefully I'll be visiting you soon!

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Details:
April 9-12: Tokyo
April 12-13: Shimane (one night only! Staying in Kawamoto)
April 13-15: Tokyo, with possible stops along the San-Yo Shinkansen on the 13th (for those of you in Kyoto, for example..)

I'm going to bring my American cell, so my mail address is
blakeellison@gmail.com

and my phone number will be American. We'll have a rental keitai on hand in case we need an actual phone number.

Your good friend and mine Jason Smith will also be joining us for parts of the trip. We're hoping to have a big UT get together on April the 10th, so be ready to party!

This note is going on Facebook as well, so the Japanese version follows. Readers of my blog, you can skip this. :)

日本語

すぐ日本にまいりま〜す！　親友の友達のアダムさんと二人で行くし、彼はせっかく日本語を勉強してるからちょっと練習させたらお世話になる。：）

僕たちは４月の９日に着いて、１２日まで東京を回っていく。１０日はみんなのオースティンの人とパーティーしたいと思います！　因みに、みんなさんのいい友達のジェイソンさんも来るからぜひ来てください！

１２日の上、１２・１３日は島根県にちょっと訪問。残念ながら、川本町しか行けない。１３日に東京に帰って来て、１５日まで東京で遊ぶつもり。

僕は自分のアイフォンを持って来るから、メアッドは昔のじゃなくて、新しいのはblakeellison@gmail.com。アメリカの番号から電話があったら、私です！　別の携帯をレンタルするから日本の電話番号もあるんでしょう。

それで、また会いましょう！

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It's been that feeling - only on occasion - for the last year. Anytime I took a break from my province, I hightailed it to Tokyo and called up everyone in the crew. In retrospect, those times were the ones where I was the happiest.

I've spent the last week in such a fashion. With nothing to do other than wait for a flight, I shacked up with various members of the Tokyo crew and got very adjusted to sleeping on solid floors. At night, the crew comes out to play and I get egged into another Red Bull, another can of coffee. And I wind up awake until the sun comes up. It's of great comfort to know that the Tokyo Crew will live on and just might be here the next time I come back.

Tonight's my last night in Tokyo, and I'm honestly a little relieved to be alone. Maybe it was the constant action and poor sleep of the last week, or maybe it's the peace and quiet of staying in a decent hotel for my last night. I'm acting like an old man - slouched on some bed or couch or other, hitting the spa for the relaxation, ordering room service, the whole deal.

It's a good chance to contemplate the closing of the 'Japan' chapter of my life. The first time I left Japan, I wasn't sad at all - I could feel that I'd be back before long. Sure enough, 5 months later, I had a contract in hand to spend anywhere from 1-5 years over here. But now that the contract is up and my bags are packed, it's hard to reminisce over the last year. Honestly, it's been utterly refreshing to get out of Shimane Prefecture, to the point where I'm quickly putting most of my life there out of mind. I'm too excited to get to the new thing. I could be reverse culture-shocked, but I'm too excited to see my friends. Too excited to start my new projects. Too excited to seek out a significant other that speaks my language to the point where you start inventing new words and meanings just to keep the communication on the same page.

Still, I'm ever-so-slightly nervous about leaving Tokyo. I love this city too much. This time, I feel like I'll be back - but it'll be a while. And when I get back, I've got a whole list full of people who will get calls the instant I land.

Right now, I can see the Tokyo skyline from my hotel room. It's gone from breathtaking (2 years ago) to feeling natural, feeling like home. With any luck, I'll see Mt. Fuji in the morning for the very first time.

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I wrote a speech that I thought was splendiferous. I translated "all good things must come to an end" into Japanese and told the kids that my own dream at their age had been to come to Japan, so they could reach out and go for their dreams too. I also mentioned in passing that it was harder than I had expected to say goodbye to a bunch of rambunctious junior high kids.

At the time, it was a lie. A pleasantry. Japanese public speaking is nothing but lies and pleasantry, so I was doing my part to fit in.

But as the day wore on, it came to be true. Girls came into the teacher's room bawling their eyes out, crying things to the effect of "I can't believe he's leaving!" One of my poorest students, yet most enthusiastic, stuck by my side at every available opportunity. Then the letters started coming. A couple students came by to give me goodbye letters, and I had happened to write a letter to one of them, because she was one of The Special Ones.

The cat was out of the bag, so now the rest of the Special Letters had to get passed out. I had written letters to my 6 best students - not necessarily grade-wise, though they were all excellent students - but to the 6 who had really gone to the effort to communicate, to befriend me, to teach me as much as I had taught them. I told them just how talented they were and implored them to keep up their English with the ultimate end of getting out of Kawamoto. "The world is a wonderful place," I told all of them, "and America would love to meet you!"

Thereafter, the letters started to pour in. One student would be seen giving me a letter and the rest scrambled to write quick notes on their cute stationery notepads saying 'thanks' and 'come visit us!' But a few had gone to some extra effort. Of the Special Six, three were boys, so they didn't write anything. But of the remaining three, two had prepared small gifts for me in advance. One was a simple 'Thank You' done in traditional calligraphy style, and another was a note accompanied by a little Beijing 2008 Olympics mascot keyring - very cute, considering the student was ethnically Chinese.

None of the boys wrote me letters, save the lone special ed student. But I received many hugs and repeated "Dont go!" cries from the boys of my best class. I was honestly pretty floored by the love and support I was receiving. I had tried to be a teacher by personality for the last year, a role model in the same sense that my older brother was for me when I was a munchkin.

On the last day, I learned that it had worked.

Lunchtime came, and I had gotten an ego boost, but the "it's hard to say goodbye to kids" line was still a lie. Lunchtime went, and it had come time to really consider saying my last sayonara for good and getting out of school. After I left, Japanese formality would dictate that I was not to come back to the school again. Delaying it, I went on one last run around the school, checking into band practice, volleyball practice, baseball practice.

It did get really hard to say goodbye right at the end. It hit me that I did have an impact here and I nearly became overwhelmed by the guilt of leaving these kids behind after just one year of having that impact. But it was the hardest when I hit the band practice room.

Rika [name changed], my absolute best student, the best of the Special Six, was in the band room, but she wasn't tuning up. She sat on the floor in a corner, her elbows propped on her knees, her face covered in her towel. While other girls had bawled all morning, she had been strong and kept her wits. But the ultimate moment of sayonara, that was too much for her to handle. She was clearly crying underneath her towel, and she was doing her absolute best to hide it.

As I left the room, I managed to stare at her intently enough to get her attention. The towel came down, revealing a tear-filled face, and I mouthed a 'sayonara' across the room directly at her as the very last thing I did before stepping out.

And that was when it became incredibly hard for me to say goodbye. The amount of power one wields as a teacher really can be unbelievable at times. I could tell I had a good effect on little Rika, especially embracing her interest in English, but the one thing that brought me to tears all day was her tears. That I could cause that much pain was something I hadn't expected even on my most self-confident of days.

From there, it was all downhill. When it came time to shake teachers' hands and say 'sayonara' to them, I really did get clouded up by the tears. It wasn't like any other time I had teared up before in my life. It was somehow less... voluntary.

The end came and went before I even knew it. It was an end that I had looked forward to for at least 6 months. And my last two weeks of work had been a nightmare of Japanese passive-aggression and boredom. But seeing my own departure through my kids' eyes, I thought (and still think) how could I have looked forward to this?

I know that I have a lot to look forward to - I have fun travels ahead, followed by the promise of taking a great risk at an incredible job, not to mention rejoining the civilized world and eating Mexican food. I can only hope that one (or more) of my kids follows suit, because the matter is now unfortuately out of my hands.

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Games.

I've usually said that's my reason for studying the language, but I'd try to mute it by saying it was my dream 10 years ago, when I was a pre-teen reading gaming magazines about Japanese design luminaries, and thinking I'd like to someday pick the language up, as if on a whim.

Truth is, that dream never faded. Not for a second. Games were my encouragement when Japanese studies got difficult. They were my primary motivation to come to Japan in the first place.

Over the last year, I've gotten to live the dream. And I don't mean by buying tons of games as if I were an anime collector fresh off the train to Akihabara. My dream from 10 years ago was to play a Shigeru Miyamoto game in its original form.

If you don't know that name, you certainly know his work. He's the guy behind Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, the Wiimote, and most of the other Nintendo classics.

A little over 6 months ago, the dream had become reality: I picked up a Wii and Super Mario Galaxy. And today, I finished it.

In those several months, I learned a lot about that dream and what it meant. The game's Japanese certainly gave me a few chuckles, but I learned that over the last 10 years game translation has come a long way. Whether you're playing Mario, Gran Turismo, or Metal Gear, English ain't all that bad. I'm holding off another month on this year's big game - Metal Gear Solid 4 - for that exact reason.

And sometimes, the Nintendo magic just ain't what it used to be. Super Mario Galaxy is a wonderful game, but it's a solid 9 out of 10 that should have been a perfect 10.

It may sound like 'so far, so jaded,' but today there was a big, big upswing. The credit roll.

As soon as I got that 60th star, killed Bowser, saved Peach, and saw the game's plot resolution with those cute little star characters, the credits came down the screen.

For the first time in my life, in Japanese.

The first name in the list: under Design Director, Shigeru Miyamoto. The guy who started it all for me. The inspiration to me, countless gamers, and even a few legendary modern designers.

But when it came across the screen, it read:

宮本　茂

and that's a good thing. That name may be hieroglyphics to you. Hell, this entire post may be Greek to you. But to tell you the truth, I'm getting an ever-increasing grin at the knowledge that today I accomplished one of my life's greatest dreams.

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Kyoto is only 30 minutes from Osaka by train, so I had no excuse not to go to my friend Eri's piano contest happening on Saturday afternoon. The world of piano is a funny thing, it seems.

As this was a contest, I saw a rapid succession of several players, mostly girls, dressed mostly in black with the occasional white, who each played for 6 minutes before a small bell rang, the players stopped mid-note, and quietly walked off stage. No applause was allowed.

The players were obviously talented, but you could hear a wide disparity in skill. The less talented (or more nervous) players paused before notes that were big steps across the keyboard. Most aspired to what seemed to me to be the current fashion in piano playing: schizophrenia. I turn my TV onto the NHK Education channel pretty often at night (I only have 5 channels) and more often than not it's classical music, and there's usually a special place, front and center, for a fat pianist with an impossibly long Eastern European last name and a penchant for overacting as he plays: tender baby Jesus facial expressions for legato segments, Furious Anger for the forte. It strikes me as lame every time. Yes, I know that piano comes from pianoforte, which means 'soft' and 'strong' at once. But Mr. Nagaheekamapouliskov seems to have forgotten everything that comes in between. And yet this guy's on-off-switch style of playing is all the rage, telling by what I see on TV. And it's ugly.

But then in stepped Eri. I knew she was playing Debussy, a composer known for his expressions of smoothness and grace, but that was all I knew. She arrived for her 6 minutes dressed in a gorgeous pink dress, a pearl necklace, and meticulously done-up hair. Honestly, she'll be hard-pressed to look that classy on her own wedding day.

And it was everything I could have hoped for. With the weaker players, you could see the fear in their eyes, the fear that the piano might somehow betray them and PLONK out the wrong note. Eri didn't show a hint of it. She looked as she should: the piano was her tool, her instrument to control. And she played like it too. Weaker pianists play with their fingers. She played with her whole arms, her wrists smoothly but firmly commanding the piano to do her bidding. The resultant sound was beautiful: a full dynamic range, a smoothness that any player should aspire to play with, a sound that Debussy himself may have thought of when composing. She was the only one who didn't sound like Mr. Nagaheekamapouliskov, and that was a good thing.

Except I was wrong. The performance was a train-wreck. She spent 15 minutes being let into by her piano teacher before she could even talk to me or her own mom and sister who had come to watch. That teeny flower bouquet I brought along in the interest of tradition could wait. She had blown it.

As she finally stepped outside to talk to us, apparently she had known it all along. She had "given up right after [she] started." Wait, what? This performance that I had concluded was awesome was in fact her not cranking it to 11. It was her choking. She was too jittered to carry a regular conversation, so she sent the family and me off to have coffee together without her while she stuck around to await her 'miserable' result.

The result, according to a text the next morning, was a 'miserable' 5th out of 14 players. The top 4 were set to advance on to some other competition. For Eri, the score was some minor solace - she still did well despite totally blowing it. For me, the score made perfect sense: beautiful performance, but not what The Piano-Playing Establishment is looking for.

Eri, by the way, just accepted a job at Yamaha as an in-house piano instructor. I still don't understand why Yamaha employs them, but more importantly she's now technically a professional pianist. Take that, Establishment.

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Why did I go? Good question. Curiosity, I guess. Hint for future JET participants: don't go.

Square Enix was the only game company on hand, and I sat down at their booth to ask a question; something along the lines of, "Do you have openings in marketing? Do you do events?" This turned into a short conversation, which turned disdainful once my Square rep learned that I had only played Final Fantasy X. (Although in retrospect, I have also played 7, 8, 12, parts of Chrono Trigger and Super Mario RPG, but they didn't exactly spring to mind.)

Today I received a lovely little email from somebody in Square HR. Turns out I had interviewed with them and not known it. And been turned down for "a job" at Square. What job that would have been, I have no clue. While I generally disagree with posting private conversations or emails, this is just too good to pass up.

Dear Blake Ellison-san

Thank you for visiting the booth of SQUARE ENIX. in the finding JET employment fair for the other day.

Result of in-house examination,it became no interview to you as the next step.

I am very sorry for not rewarding your apply.

But,we are very pleased with your interest to SQUARE ENIX.

We hope that you get job worth doing.

Thank you.

SQUARE ENIX Co.,Ltd.

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The light at the end of the tunnel is now very, very bright. With only a month and a half left on my contract, it's gotten easy to stop worrying about small stuff and it's become more important to use this month and a half as best I can - it probably won't be my last time in Japan, but it could be the last for a few years.

At school, I've taken an "I don't care" approach to teaching. If the kids are acting up, let 'em. If I'm 5 minutes late, I'm still 10 minutes early for the morning meeting and here 5 minutes before the principal anyway. This approach lets me sleep better, and strangely, it's more effective in the classroom. My new motto is "What are they gonna do, send me back to America?" I don't equate this to slacking off at school - I'm still productive - but it's eliminated 99% of the stress from my daily schedule.

My generally-improving health leaves me less exhausted, so I sleep less heavily than I used to. This means I have more free time, so I play more at night and see people more.

I'm setting a travel schedule for my last bit here. Next weekend I'll be headed to Osaka to play indoor, close-quarters Airsoft with my 3 JET Airsoft buddies. It'll be a gentleman's weekend, and a fun one at that. Imagine playing Counter-Strike in real life, and that's what I'll be doing next weekend. Yeah, we're nerds, and we're paid good money for it too. After that is a weekend-long beach party with a beach bar and famous Japanese DJs, and after that my Eikaiwa class is taking me to Miyajima (known as one of Japan's 3 most beautiful places) for my last hurrah with them.

My last hurrah with my best friend out here will be a trip to Seoul at the start of August. After that, I'll be going to the places I wanted to go - Nagasaki, Nagoya, Kyoto one more time, and of course one last hurrah in Tokyo - before I catch a flight home.

Update: I'll be flying back to Texas before August 15th, and I'll take an immediate connection from Houston to DFW.

Also, a quick bit of love goes out to Mom, who has finally elected to quit her giant-stressball job, so I no longer have to worry about her mental health. If you see her, congratulate her.

Lastly, I've found a *really* good reason to come home. It's, well, me.

It's only been recently that I've realized that I've been given more than most JET people. I've got a lovely home to go to. I've got a small but awesome and stable family. Living at home doesn't even phase me, considering how symbiotically my mom and I can live. Whether or not I live at home, I've got my material needs basically covered, thanks to this year's savings. I've got an awesome, awesome, awesome network of friends who 'get' me more than I ever realized. I have a community that I belong to that shares a common interest.

I'd truly have to be insane to throw all that away.

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John, a guy from the UT Japanese program, was a die-hard Simpsons fan and *had* to see the newly-released Simpsons movie before we left. The movie had come out that day. He led an expedition from the hotel, by taxi, to Houston's Movie Tavern, where about 5 of us guys had a few drinks and were the first to see The Simpsons Movie. The already funny movie was made absolutely hilarious by the sheer escapism of it all - all 5 of us were enjoying the last night of Life As We Knew It. The next 365 days - or 730, or 3, 4, or 5 years' worth of days - could prove to be completely transformative for our lives. What if we never came back? It's a question that you at least have to acknowledge before you leave, if not confront.

Then JET turned out to be life as promised. One day after another in rural Japan, in a place you slowly but surely make into your own. I bought a big futon, tons of video games, and spent a ton of money on Hiroshima booze to feel comfortable.

Now I have to start reversing that process - shipping winter clothes to the States, trying to figure out the logistics of getting multiple suitcases home, trying to sell off all those video games and still having something to do in my last couple weeks here. Not to mention saying goodbyes - my wonderful night class is taking me to Hiroshima for a last hurrah. And I'll have to say my own goodbyes in a way that gives me closure.

And my last night here is over two months away, but I can tell you exactly what the experience will be - am I done here? I've found that I love Japan just as much as I thought I would, and the thought of not coming back is pretty hard to swallow. It's been 3 years since I did this whole thing in Spain and I haven't been back there. Did I accomplish everything I wanted to? Did I see everything I wanted? Have I learned what I came here to learn?

Long story short, the first night and the last night are the most significant of one's entire JET experience. They're the only two days where you can see the 'big picture' of your life and how the JET chapter fits into it. And the last night is equally terrifying as the first. On the way out of the country, you're paralyzed with wonder over how your life will change. On the way back, I'm going to panic with fear that I've missed something.

In a couple days I'll be informing my supervisor of my intended flight home. If that goes according to plan, I'll be arriving in Houston on August 4th and reaching Dallas between there and the 6th.

If you see me, please have a drink with me, or failing that say 'hi.' I'll be seriously in need of reminders why I left Japan - that is, reminders why I came home.

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So, on to the important stuff. Here are the cars I saw while in Tokyo in just 5 days, thanks to staying in some snazzy hotels:

The entire Mercedes AMG range, including the R-class (it's still stupid)
A pair of Bentley Continental Flying Spurs
A slew of Maserati Quattroportes
Bunch of Range Rover Sports
So many Lexus LS600Lh's I lost count
An Alpina B7
A VW Touareg W12 (I didn't even know they built one)
The Frank Stella BMW 3.0CSL racer [this one] (thanks to a museum exhibit)
A Lamborghini LP640 with some custom work (car guys: anyone seen red in the intakes before?)
A Rolls-Royce Phantom (it's huuuuge)
The entire modern Ferrari range, including a silver-grey Enzo

and just one Nissan GT-R.

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Weak sauce, I say. If you want to bring down the number of entries, great, but I think few people have compelling enough reasons to stop being as expressive as they were before. It's cool that newer outlets are making people *more* expressive, too: my brother was never publicly read until he started writing Facebook notes and in just a few entries he's shown himself to be sophisticated, funny, and stylistically very talented. His stuff just screams "diamond in the rough," as if those same parts of his brain got used towards being a musician instead of honing his writing style.

I, on the other hand, have no excuse other than a job situation which is OK with me *reading* anything on a computer, but frowns upon me being communicative or expressive on work time, because that's a giveaway that I'm doing "private things" at work as far as my Japanese superiors are concerned. That alone makes me look forward to getting an American job in a certain respect.

Moral of the story: this blog ain't dead, and while I'm a bit short on epiphanies these days, I'm challenging myself to step up and be interesting.

So, in an homage to my older blogging days, here's what I'm consuming, and maybe you should be too:

What I'm listening to
Lots of hip-hop at the moment. In the last year we've had new albums from Common, Talib Kweli, and Lupe Fiasco, and they're collectively a bit darker, a bit funkier, a bit more grittier than their respective earlier records. But they're all good, so go get them.

What I'm reading
Wired.com is the best reading material I've come across in a while. It's a great mix of internet culture, tech news, and Silicon Valley Doings that's all written by a pretty accomplished collection of contributors. I especially recommend the Autopia, Gadget Lab, and Threat Level blogs within the site, and the online postings of magazine features each month.

What I'm playing
My game habits are thrown out of whack, since my multiplayer abilities are limited out here. If I were in the States, it'd be solid Super Smash Bros. Brawl. But instead, my Japanese Wii looks forlorn as I give more attention to my PS3 (and Gran Turismo 5 Prologue), and even more to my Xbox 360 (Halo 3 is still the multiplayer king). I'm looking forward to getting home so I can catch up on a lot of co-operative games and throw a gaming party or two.

In the meantime, I'm getting some rare single-player quality time. I finally finished the Halo 3 campaign. Call of Duty 4 was the best game of last year. Super Mario Galaxy is a 9 out of 10 - a massive improvement in recent Mario years, but it still doesn't outdo Super Mario 64.

Also, I did something I never do: I preordered a game. Grand Theft Auto 4, the American version, is to be delivered to my doorstep sometime in the near-ish future. I'm going to be massively sucked in.

Where I'm going
Mom's coming to visit me in Japan! It's going to be a whirlwind week and a half covering Tokyo and Kyoto, and long story short we'll basically be seeing everything that you can catch a glimpse of in Lost in Translation. We're even staying in the same hotel. At first, I was unspeakably excited about living like a rockstar with Mom for the trip. She hasn't had a vacation in something like 15 years, so it's all 5-star hotels and first-class tickets. If you know my mom, you get what's going on here. Then it hit me that it's pathetic to be excited for stuff that my mom's money is buying, and I should be much more excited that it's Mom and she's coming to see me. And I have gotten excited about it. I'm happy to be really sharing Japan with someone for once. Konnichiwhoa might be interesting to read once in a while, and the pictures might be cool, but it's a world apart from constantly having to explain things you see on the street, explaining random cultural idiosyncracies, translate everything from ads to restaurant menus to what shopkeepers say. And out of all the people who've had to put up with my Japan fascination, she's had to bear more of it than anyone - she paid for my degree in Japanese, and I had to fight for that. It's going to be an awesome, fun-filled, classy week and a half.

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