Japanese sphere and English sphere

I often refer the two worlds I belong to in terms of communication languages as Japanese sphere and English sphere. They are "spheres" as now the communication in both language are truly global. Actually, not only English, but also Japanese is one of the dominant languages on the net especially when speakers' populations are taken into accout.

Until now, English has been "a trade tool" for me and I have not been caring too much about my personality in English spare beyond my business requirements. I have tested water here but it was more like intellectual expedition.

However, recently I am feeling that I am losing "contexts" as an ordinal Japanese speaker day by day. Marooned in the ocean of Japanese sphere and sharing no realities other than the language with other Japanese. For me, English sphere is becoming more and more real. Things are quite different here and in Japan. Although Japanese sphere is still significant as my background and nature but it is now virtual rather than real.

So now I have urge to build my online identity in English sphere as strong as mine in Japanese sphere. It is a challenge I love to take on. To begin with I would update this blog daily to keep track on how I am doing myself.

Ray

Equality between men and women makes the rugby team stronger?

This week, the article on CNN.com, "Which country has the smallest gender gap?" was introduced in its Japanese site CNN.co.jp and invoked some discussions.

While New Zealand enjoys the 5th place among the Scandinavian countries dominating the top group, it is a shame that Japan is stuck at the 94th place near the bottom along with Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

As New Zealand is in the final count down to the Rugby World Cup 2011, let's look at how those teams compete in this regard:

Rankings of Equality between men and women in The Global Gender Gap Report 2010 for the RWC 2011 Teams:

1 New Zealand 5

2 Ireland 6

3 South Africa 12

4 England/Scotland/Wales 15 (as United Kingdom)

7 USA 19

8 Canada 20

9 Australia 23

10 Namibia 25

11 Argentine 29

12 Russia 45

13 France 46

14 Romania 67

15 Italy 74

16 Georgia 88

17 Japan 94

18 Fiji 108

-- Samoa (no data)

-- Tonga (no data)

It looks like that the greater a country has equality between men and women, the stronger its rugby team is.

Ray Murakami

Urge to follow the one and only right path

It may sound like a samurai or a ninja or even a Jedi from the Star Wars, many people from Japan have urge to discover the one and only right path and stick to it from the beginning to the end.

Personally I found it very difficult to shake off this tendency. I often seek "what I should do" or even "how it should be" rather than "what or how I want to do".

It may be a clue to the resilience of Japanese people when they are struck by a disaster like the one currently unfolding in the country. They won't be opportunistic to the situation but would keep themselves in order. Actually we would be far more comfortable sitting in order than acting on self interests.

However by clinging to the way initially seemed to be the right one, there is always a risk to miss the true optimal path which may arise later as an option.

So I would stick to focusing on what I want to do and keeping an open eye to better alternatives as the one and only right path :)

Ray Murakami

The child of the ocean

Tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa.

I love the sound of Te Reo Maori. I fell in love with it when I heard it for the first time. Some of you may know my mother tongue, Japanese sounds quite similar to Maori language. When Maori people welcome their guests they say "Haere Mai". Although sounds a bit antique and authoritative today, we actually say "Hairi Tamae" in place of "Haere Mai" for "Please come in."

There are many other similarities between the indigenous culture of New Zealand and Japanese culture. That naturally leads me to recognise my own roots as a descendant of the maritime worriers that ruled the Inland Sea of Japan several hundreds years ago. My family name Murakami is like an Iwi for Maori people connects me to my maritime ancestors.

They were great pilots and navigators of the sea. They mastered all the currents, tides and reefs in these important but perilous marine transportation routes. Without their instructions and protections provided in exchange for mandatory tolls, any ships would be destroyed either by the local natural hazards or by the weapons of the rulers.

After land-based Shoguns unified and ruled Japan, this maritime tradition declined until recently. Just like Maori culture, since late 20th century it has been seeing revival. Museums were built and cultural events are now held regularly.

When I look around the two harbours of Auckland from the summit of One Tree Hill, it reminds me of the scenery of the Inland Sea of Japan where my ancestors dominated with their versions of Waka, battle canoes.

To conclude, I would like to sing a song, which represents my emotions toward these wonderful connections very well. It is a folk song very popular in Japan. Of course the original lyrics is in Japanese so I tried my best to translate it into English to make sense to you all.

The title is "I'm a child of the ocean".

I'm a child of the ocean my old home was on the shore

Where the curling white waves constantly roar

The humble little hut which the pine trees shroud

With the kitchen vent trailing a long white cloud

You see? Long white cloud. Yes, Aotearoa is now my home.

No reira, tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa.

(from my first speech "The Ice Breaker" at a Toastmasters club)

Thank you my friends and my heart goes out to Christchurch

On Friday 18 February, my MacBook suddenly stopped to respond to my input. Rebooting it did not make any better. Just blank milky gray screen was there. As it turned out later its internal hard disk drive was gone.

I immediately brought it to MagnumMac New Market, the official Apple retailer conveniently on my way home from the University of Auckland Business School where the conference I attended had been held.

So I forced to be less active in cyberspace (yes, I have been VERY active in else where on the net ;) in the following week but it caused me a tidal sequence on Tuesday 22 February when the earthquake hit Christchurch again this time with devastating damages.

My friends back in Japan soon noticed I had been very quiet since I made few activities in the morning, as they little knew about, with iPod touch on home wireless LAN. (I used a USB modem with MacBook to access Japanese contents on the internet in daytime.) When I accessed the net again with iPod touch at home after the day's work, my blog, email and Twitter were all full of the messages concerning my safety. I thanked my friends very much and felt sympathy to those who concerning the people actually suffered.

I set up an information portal for Christchurch earthquake in Japanese and replied back to my friends. I started to answer questions and correct wrong impressions about the activities in Christchurch referring to reliable sources. When finally my MacBook had been repaired and I had restored its contents, the early confusion of information had been settled. So I was not well prepared in terms of the internet accessibility when it was the most needed.

Last Friday, I joined the Red and Black Day to support Christchurch by wearing a red polo shirt and black jeans. I purchased a mobile WiFi station for better access to the net in case any of my information devices broke down. My heart goes out to Christchurch and I hope that the information technology helps the people to get back on their own feet in some ways.

Casio Methex Competition

This week has been a very busy one. Last night I was setting up a system almost until midnight. An assignment from Postgraduate diploma course has been occupying my mind. Heaps of house maintenance issues have risen one after another - I am really a happy renter at the moment.

Of course there were also happy ones. Both of my children competed in Casio Mathex Competition 2010 and secured great results. Mathex? It is a combination of mathematics and exercise. Each team is formed by 4 players and 3 of them are the solvers and one is the runner. The runner runs around the designated course to fetch the problem sheets and submit the answers. The solvers work on the mathematic problem on each of the sheets and write down the answer and hand it to the runner.

My daughter and son are both solvers. The teams in my daughter's high school are formed in February and had been practising since then. The efforts paid off and her team made it to the third place after a very competitive tie break game on Wednesday.

For my son the story was totally different. He was called for the team just 2 days before the competition. The coach of his intermediate school said to him, "Relax, the whole of our school is on your shoulders!" My daughter gave the tactics to him and it was one of the reasons his team scored much higher than expected for the scarce preparation on Thursday. I was glad to witness his excellent leadership in action which I had failed to see as the youngest member of our family.

Watching the games was really exciting. The contrast of ice cold brains and burning hot muscles was making a good mixture. A great adrenaline pumping experience. I heard this is another Kiwiana, a thing typical to New Zealand but as the title sponsor Casio is unquestionable Japanese company I would like to see it to get popularity in Japan.

Is there anyone who would produce a fantastic manga or anime featuring Mathex to introduce it to Japanese?

Taken to hospital by ambulance

Well, today is Friday the 13th. I am not a superstitious person but it would be suitable to talk about a bloody story I have just experienced.

Now it was more than a week ago, I was in a hurry to pick up my son from the school. Intense shower was developing and I thought it was too severe for him to walk home. The staff car park was the opposite side of a large road from my office building in the clinical centre.

Heavy rain made visibility really bad and when I ducked to avoid a sudden gust something hit me at my head hard. I had bumped my head into a sharp edge of a street number sign which stood at the exit of the driveway to the road.

I managed to walk back to the office blooding and asked my colleagues for help. Fortunately one of them was a emergency management staff and professionally organised first aid and ambulance call. So I was taken to hospital by ambulance.

All the ambulance and emergency department staff who attended me were fabulous. A training surgeon stitched the wound under supervision. It was flawless and I was convinced that she would make herself an excellent surgeon in near future.

I got four stitches in the front head which were removed today. Yes, now the injury has completely healed. Not exactly like a Friday the 13th story!