Endless Packing

I asked several companies to estimate shipping periods and fee of my baggage (totally around 300 kg!!!). And finally decided to use a Japanese moving company, Yamato, 'cause they offered me the shortest shipping periods. The period was priority for me. But wind-surfing gears were not allowed due to their large size. I had no time to find other company who can do that, then had no choice. Why? Biwa lake, which is biggest lake in Japan, and located close to my apartment in Kyoto, is Mecca of water sports….

Nice friends in UH

Went to sushi restaurant with Masaya, Marian, Thomas and Dan. Umm, did I use any perspective technique in this photo? Just kidding, Masaya. They were good friends in Hawaii. Unfortunately, I could not ask other many friends for dinner.Marian mentioned that Hawai'i is the sort of place that many people come and go, so one who lives here will always be meeting new friends but also saying many goodbyes. That’s right. Tokyo and New York may also such city where many people come and go. But difference would be that people become more open-minded person in Hawaii, and then we easily become good friends-. Thanks all!

Final field survery at Waikiki

Through the week, we were engaged in field study at Waikiki Reef. This time, finally we fabricated clod cards and deployed them throughout the reef. We’re hypothesizing that the spatial difference of water movements and disturbance would make different nutrients concentration within the algal mat, resulting in different nutrients flux into algae, different algal growth rates, and then spatial difference of algal coverage in this area. Huu, I’ve got relaxed. Finally my data logger was not stolen in Waikiki area. It seems that these equipments did not look expensive.

Good by to HIMB at Coconut Island

I visited HIMB at Coconut Island again, to join job application seminar. The applicant, F. Thomas who was from Florida, showed us interesting data. They are conducting in situ experiments to monitor flow speed dependent-nutrients uptake ratio and productivity in seagrass communities. After that, I visited lab to tell good-by and a lot of thanks to Prof. Hirano, Karen and Ichiro. Who can imagine what happened to me, what was the result of my study, if I had selected this institute for my lab?

Farewell Party at Dr. Abbott’s House with Botany people.

How many parties did I have at Dr. Abbott’s house during my stay in Hawaii? At first time when I came in Hawaii, I did not know even the word “Potluck party”. But this is one of culture (or events) which I wanna definitely bring back to Japan! Thank you for all in Botany!

Enjoy the area where we live

The area where I grew up is located on the hill, and was land even in 5000 years ago when sea level was 0 or 3.0 m higher than now. In that era, therefore, there were many villages around current my parents’ home town. So once we dug the backyard of elementary school, we could easily found earthenware and shells dumped in over 2500 or 3000 years ago. We used to go down the hill by bike to go to swimming pool in next town. It meant that we went down into “ancient ocean” by bike. What a romantic events we had there. Even in Tokyo city, there are many vestige; landform made through Holocene, slopes and bridges depicted in popular novels published in 150 or 200 years ago, and a part of buildings constructed over 300 years ago. So knowledge about the history of hometown makes us more enjoyable.
The 400-page reference book with many photos, which depicted history, culture and nature of my town, Moiliili, was published in last February (http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2006/Feb/17/il/FP602170318.html). I purchased this book soon. This book really encourages me to walk around this area thinking about the people’s life of 100 years ago. But I’m sorry that I have another 2 weeks to stay here.

EMS

Finally I came back to Honlulu. I’ve been so sleepy somehow, so I had been sleeping many hours as if I were cat or baby.
Yesterday, some police men were around my apartment and an ambulance car was also there. In Japan, “EMS” is so popular as Express Mail Service (http://www.ems-post.jp/index.php) organized in the framework of the Universal Postal Union. So at first time when I came here, I was wondering why they need to rush here just for the purpose to deliver the letters and parcels. It’s funny to think about my letters which are delivered stopping other cars. “VIP letters”.

Improved system in Tokyo

In these days, some of cell phones have function as debit card in Japan. We can go through turnstile at station touching panel with cell phone. At the day when I go back to Hawaii, I used train from Tokyo to my parents’ house located close to Narita International Airport. I was eager to take a nap in the train, but the seats in normal cars were totally occupied. So I decided to use first class car to have seat. At the platform we let our debit card or cell phone to recognize the section for using first class car, and in the car, we touch the overhead panel with those cards again.

Because the lamp turns to green from red during the section to use, we can take a nap without being disturbed by the guard. I nearly overslept…. It’s good system, isn’t it?

New position and New apartment

I went to Kyoto to attend two meetings related to my next job at “Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RIHN)”. The project members were all friendly and agreeable, though It’s first time for me to meet most of them this time. Dr. Burnett, who is professor at Florida State University, is sitting back to back with me as visiting researcher in this project. Though I was working with Henrieta, who got PhD in his laboratory, in other project at Maui, I did not imagine I would work with him in Japan. It was good surprise-.
During free time of a couple of hours, I visited real estate agent and decided my new apartment. The rent is about $600, cheaper than that in Tokyo and Honolulu, but it does not seem to be good quality compared with other rooms in this area.

It’s small studio, so called, “rabbit house”. Because April was not the period of moving in Japan, and there were not vacant room, then no choice for me. Sorry for my friends, who wanted to go around Kyoto for sightseeing based on my apartment.

Change tracks a little bit

This year, I was selected to receive a grant for my study from The Japan Science Society, and then I attended the party with other awardees. Of over 300 people, I had about 10 acquaintances in the field of Oceanography. I had chance to talk with Dr. Tsukamoto, whose study, the discovery of sea eel’s spawning spot in deep ocean, was recently featured in “Nature” (http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/enviro/EnviroRepublish_1576736.htm). Although we’d been working in same institute, we had not have chance to talk before. Surprisingly my study was highly evaluated and supplied the highest grant of all awardees. But I need to confess to the committee that I can not do my study as I applied, because I was accepted to new position in Kyoto, and I will not have enough time for the study about algal physiology in tropical areas.