Itsumo naratte imasu

So I’ve had a “natsu-kaze” (summer cold) for about two weeks now and I’m only now starting to get over it. This has unfortunately coincided with a particularly busy week in work meaning I haven’t really had time to rest up. Still as the Japanese saying goes “Baka wa kaze ga hikanai.” (Fools don’t catch colds). Guess it’s just cos I’m so smart then.

So referring to the title I think part of the reason I’ve been so drained lately is because I’m always learning something. I’ve been dropped into a new field of research, in a new country, with a different language and a different culture. I’m having to learn new things every single day so it’s no wonder I’m a bit brain drained really.

So this week what I’ve mainly been focused on is the sample preparation for CDI. This has essentially meant being stuck looking through a microscope for about 5 hours a day. It’s not particularly complicated but it is a bit fiddly and time consuming. I don’t mind really it’s good to actually understand what I’m doing for once. Also as our microscope is a digital one I don’t have to further wreck my eyes looking through a small lens all day.

The reason for this is that I’ve actually been put in charge of sample prep for the entirety of the experiment starting on Tuesday. There are three reasons for this:

1)   It frees up Daewoong to concentrate more on learning about set up and operation of his CDI system.

2)   I’m the only member of the group with a biology background and our target samples are either cells or biological molecules so I should in theory have a better idea their expected image and how to handle them.

3)   My supervisor believes it will help me be more involved in the experiments since we’ll be looking at samples I’ve prepared. The last couple of experiments whilst I was present I wasn’t all ways engaged so hopefully this time it’ll be a bit different.

Of course this means the pressure is on so I’ve been working my balls off to try and get the technique sorted before Tuesday. I think I have a good handle on it now but I’m I’ve been ending most days completely drained, going to bed at about 11pm and sleeping for 9 hours.

It’s not all been work though I’ve also been doing other things, though still learning. An important thing for me whilst I’m over here is to engage more in the Japanese way of life and at the moment the biggest barrier to that is language. As such I’ve been taking every opportunity to learn that I can. I currently have two lessons a week with Kitimura-sensei at work using the Japanese for busy people book.

Outside of this I’ve also been attending a much more informal Japanese language class with some local retired members of the community. This is really nice and laid back and also a good chance to get to know some locals. Since I don’t really speak Japanese much at work, except maybe briefly with Shimada-san this provides a great opportunity.

At the moment I’ve been learning with Teroi Saado-san. He also works here at Spring-8 and is developing a detector system for the XFEL beamline. He worked for another company in Osaka for many years but retired a couple of years ago, only to start working here at the age of 62. He really doesn’t look his age though. It has been very nice learning with him especially as his English isn’t great so he’s just as keen to learn my language, as I am to learn his.

This week he actually proposed that I should come visit him at his house and meet his family sometime. I’m really excited about this it should be a very interesting experience, I’ll just have to make sure I don’t do anything that would be considered rude. I’m not sure when it’ll be but I’d imagine sometime after my vacation. Hopefully I’ll have some nice pics to put up from that.

Another member of the class Ueda-san a rather lovely lady from Taiwan has offered to take myself and Sam out on a few trips in the local area at some point as well. The only problem is that her english is about as good as my Japanese but she is very keen. We just need to find someone with a decent grasp of Japanese and english to help her out a bit. Hopefully we'll get something arranged in the future. Last week she gave Sam and me one of these Taiwanese cakes each. It was pretty tasty, kind of like an eccles cake but without raisins.

Right only a short one this week. I’ll leave you with some photies from what I can only guess was a gardening equipment fair being held at the bottom of my road. It was a rather odd surprise and only goes to reinforce just how rural the area I live in is. Some of those lawnmowers looked like fun though.

Mata ne.