July 2010

There were 14 posts published in July 2010 (this is page 2 of 3).

In search of a dragon (Day 24)

Could this be a synchronicity? I saw on twitter that SQUARE ENIX is looking for some new members for Dragon Quest’s scenario writing team.

(By the way, twitter has been one of the major sources of awesomeness for me. If you haven’t signed up for twitter, you should do so now. It might take for a while to get what it’s all about, it’s great once you know how it works.)

I’ve been hardly crazy about computer games for the past 8 years or so, but I once wanted to be a game designer. That was one of my childhood dreams. I wanted to be a cartoonist as well. So, I was into making up stories; I dropped it somewhere on the road.

Applicants are asked to send 1) an entry sheet, 2) a short essay on what Dragon Quest is for them, and 3) a short story/plot about revenge, written with 4 out of 6 designated keywords.

Whether I’ll be selected for this position or not does not matter much. I just want to write something, and this opportunity gave me a good excuse… or reason to write a plot. And I did write one. I enjoyed doing it – that’s the most important part. I had forgotten how fun it was to create a world and to imagine how things would work in that world.

I feel like I’m on a rollercoaster now. It’s slowly going up and I don’t know when it reaches the top, because I’ve got a blindfold on. But I sense that it will soon hit the top. Have you ever felt like this? Or are you feeling that sense of adventure and possibility now?

Two free&beautiful spirits I met in Harajuku, Tokyo (Day 23)

On a beautiful Tuesday evening, I met Maude and Chales in Harajuku, Tokyo. Charles was playing the accordion and Maude was selling handmade accessories there. At first, I walked past them. But a few seconds later, I wondered who they were. I got curious about them.

I decided to come back and talked with Maude. She told me about herself and what they were up to–travelling around the world. I think the conventional way is this: you spend your whole life earning enough money to travel around the world when you get retired. Or, perhaps it doesn’t have to be your whole life, but you earn enough money and plan your trip ahead and all those things.

For Maude and Charles, all they needed was a one way ticket to Japan, because they’re determined to make money on the go, by busking, teaching French, or whatever that comes to them.

I loved talking with both of them and it was inspiring to listen to them. I’m glad I stopped to talk with them in this concrete jungle where most people are supposed to be busy with being busy and don’t stop at all to enjoy beautiful moments.

They were so cool that I had to record an interview with them and to share it with you all. They kindly agreed with that idea.

So, here’s my interview video with Maude.

I love what she had to say about “trusting your life”. I don’t know about you, but it resonated with me very much.

By the way, I noticed that a guy in the background wears a T-shirt that says “DEATH”. How funny, given that we were talking about life. Of course, death is an inseparable from the notion of life, but I’m rather amused by his T-shirt. Or should it be classified as one of those absurd moments that are supposed to be mentioned on this blog?

What did you think about Maude’s story? Oh, by the way, if you happen to see them outthere in the world, do talk and be nice to them!

How I learnt English (Day 22)

This post might be useful if you’re learning a foreign language. I’ll write about how I learnt English.

The way I learnt English is simple. After I decided to go to university in Australia, I started studying English with enthusiasm. To be able to study philosophy in English, one must get really good at English. That was the case for me and served as a big motivator. It helps to be clear about how much (at least for now) you want to master the language you’re studying. You may not want to read philosophy books in Japanese and just want to be able to have a decent conversation without the help of a dictionary; that’s totally fine as long as you’re aware of that. Also, it helps if you have a meaningful motivation for learning that language. What makes it ‘meaningful’ is totally up to you, but if you feel you’re obliged to study the language because you need it to pass a school exam and you don’t like it at all, you’ll probably have a hard time in learning it.

There are two things that built the foundation for me in learning English.

Here’s the first one. I focused on getting my English pronunciations right as much as possible. I didn’t aim for 100%, because you don’t need to get everything right from the beginning. If you can pronounce the vowels and consonants in English, then you’re more likely to understand what’s being said, at least to understand the phonetics of what’s being said if not the meaning. It helps to know what’s phonetically important in the language you want to learn as well. Tone, pitch, intonation, stress. I think it’s fairly safe to imitate what you hear, though.

The second one is this. I read aloud English texts. Since almost every English learning book comes with a CD or two these days, I could read the texts aloud to the recording of those texts. That was pretty neat. In addition to reading aloud, I did this exercise recommended by a prominent Japanese interpreter—reading aloud and writing down texts at the same time. Choose a page long text and do it for 3 pages per day. And do it for 3 months every day. Once you’ve done that, your linguistic intuition for that language will be sharper.

You’ll probably have to study more if you want to master the language you’re studying, but these approaches will get you a good foundation in going further.

Now it's the 21st post (Day 21)

This post is almost being a post for the sake of posting, but it still reminds me of blogging everyday. For the last 9 days, I want to write more substantial posts rather than this kind of posts!

Year of creativity (Day 20)

This year has been a year of creativity for me. It’s mostly due to Julia Cameron’s book “The Artist Way”. It’s not an easy task to define what creativity is, but I’m happy to say it’s really common and we’re all creative. It comes down to choosing to be creative as well. I’m just going to put this here as my quick thought, but just like confidence, it’s something you get after doing something anyway rather than being able to do something because you’re creative. And you can choose to do things. It doesn’t have to be big. It just needs to be something. If you can choose to do it and you actually do it, you’re already walking the path of creativity.
That’s how I feel about creativity now.