littleforeigner.com life in hiroshima and beyond

Hiroshima Jin Daigaku and FEEL Hiroshima

Over the past few months I’ve been working with a bunch of great people on the Hiroshima Jin Daigaku (ひろしまジン大学) project. It is based on the Shibuya Daigaku project which received some attention from CNN a couple of years ago.

Basically, volunteer teachers will lead workshop style classes in a variety of locations – parks, streets, shops, restaurants as well as more typical meeting rooms – around the city. Anyone can become a teacher and anywhere can become a classroom.

We will be a sister “school”, but the group hopes that rather than create a carbon copy of the Shibuya project we can put something unique together. We are, of course, not actually opening a real university, but just like a university we hope that the project will become somewhere where a diverse group of people get together to learn from and teach each other, and through shared experiences greatly expand their circle of acquaintances. This, we feel, can eventually really have an impact of the city as a whole.

It is all a bit vague I know, and to be honest, I’m still struggling to imagine how the whole thing will turn out. One thing I am sure of though, is that if we can get the project off the ground and make it a success, it has great potential.

We’ve received a bit of publicity over the past few weeks, appearing in the December issue of Hiroshima Wink and in the 中国新聞 last week. An “Open Campus” is planned for March 20 and the project should kick off proper in May.

Later today (January 13), the opening party of an exhibition of the logos submitted by local designers in a logo contest will be held at Koba. It’ll be a pretty chill affair with some music, food and drinks (pay at the bar) as well as a short presentation about the project and a chance to quiz myself and the other organizers.

If you are at all interested in getting involved, slightly intrigued, or just fancy a drink, please come by from 8pm. (The logo exhibit runs for a week).

How my son sees me

My 7 year old son surprised me the other day when he presented me with this portrait he had drawn.

My palpable delight was, it must be said, by some surprise at how he sees me.

At least I’m smiling!

Christmas DJ

The week before Christmas has turned out to be quite a busy one on the DJ front. I’ll be spinning tunes at 3 events, staring tonight. The temperatures have dropped and snow is falling, but why not don your down jacket and come warm yourself in the embrace of bass.

First up, is FROIDE at the biggest little party spot in Hiroshima, Enjoynt Bar Cover. Regulars windcheater,ＲＩＮＮ, and eiji-low and ＳＡＫＡＧＵＣＨＩ from ElectrockerH will also be on, ensuring a wide range of tunes. With bonenkai end of year party season well under way, there’s a good chance it’ll be jumping. It’s free too.

Sunday night is the Hug A Speaker Xmas Edition at Mugen. Also free (plus ladies get a free drink), regular selectors are joined by Traveler’s Foundation who will be bringing the jungle sound. There’s a lot of reggae and dub at this monthly night, but you can expect breaks, bassline house, dubstep and electro too (especially from me and windcheater).

Last, on Christmas Eve’s Eve I’ll be pulling out a few vinyl classics and oddities for a short set at Aina Haina on Wednesday, December 23 from around 9pm as part of the 2 day Beggar’s Banquet event. Even if you don’t make my “set” it’s well worth thinking about checking out some of the live bands playing over the 2 nights at Aina Haina and Organza. Full details here.

Even truckers love kittens

Struggling with an injury that has put paid to this winter’s marathon plans, but unwilling to sacrifice the aerobic conditioning that I have built up through marathon (over)training, I was back on the bike last weekend.

It’s quite chilly here in Hiroshima, but with a wind jacket, some ridiculous looking cycling tights and some shiny neoprene booties I was pretty snug for the 2 hours of small cog spinning around the Ota-gawa River.

After a long time out of the saddle, I’m hoping to do a lot more cycling in 2010. It is has got noticeably colder over the past couple of days so I hope I can keep it up, at the weekends at least.

Along the route I took a pic of a truck with some striking artwork with my iPhone (Helgarized with the CameraBag App).

Just in case you get any ideas about messing with this driver, this was the design on the side.

Japan’s Running Boom

©Florence Nobuko Smith

I am quoted in this short piece on Japan’s current running boom on one of the Japan Times blogs by Jason Jenkins

With Japan’s “running boom” arguably at its peak, races around the country are filling up faster than ever. The 2009 Tokyo Marathon saw 226,378 applicants competing for 30,000 spots: a 68% increase from the year before, and this year’s Peace Marathon in Hiroshima had around 2,000 more participants than 2008. What may be most significant about these numbers is that a majority of these new applicants are first-timers and women. Japanese running clubs are also seeing their numbers swell with new runners, especially those clubs with membership fees that offer professional coaching.

Read the full article.

The Christmas sweater – Japan style

The season of Christmas sweater is almost upon us, and while these usually feature jolly Santas and portly snowmen, one of my students was sporting this one in class the other day.

Autumn

Autumn seems to have come and gone once more. It is always to my chagrin that the best weather of the Japanese year seems to coincide with the busiest weeks at work and the weekends packed with all kinds of commitments. So, once again I didn’t get much chance to indulge in the Japanese tradition of joining thousands of other people in one of several places noted for the beauty of their autumn foliage.

Early in the season, I was lucky enough to have a work free day on which I hiked up Mt. Gokurakuji-yama in Hatsukaichi. As it was a weekday the trail was pretty quiet, as was the historic Gokurakuji Temple which sits just below the peak where I took this shot.

Over the next couple of weeks I was forced to enjoy my red leaf action vicariously, mostly through the Flickr feed of Kamoda who made trips to Buttuji and Mitaki Temples, as well as Miyajima. Last Sunday, I went down to Shukkeien Garden’s “Momiji Matsuri” in the hope of getting some deep red in the flesh, but despite the warm and sunny afternoon winter was starting to close its grip.

All that was left was to take advantage of the last rays of autumn, for just about 40 winks.

Ogaki Mikan Half Marathon

I took part in the Ogaki Mikan Half Marathon on Nomi Island last Sunday. The weather was absolutely beautiful and on the ferry ride I took a few shots with the iPhone and edited them with the Best Camera App. This shot of Aki-no-ko-fuji on Ninoshima is my favorite.

As for the race. It was a harder course than I remembered, and the great weather meant it was pretty warm. Add the fact that I started off rather, shall we say, optimistically (at under 3:50/km pace) and took a wrong turn a few hundred meters from the finish I didn’t do quite as well as I’d hoped.

I ended up with a time of 1hr 26min and 16th place overall.

Hiroshima Detention Center Gets A Lick of Paint

Our local prison was getting a spring lick of paint this morning.

Building the Flower Tower

Construction workers putting up the frame for the Flower Tower in front of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park ahead of the annual Flower Festival which begins next week. The tower will look like this during the festival. The bowl in which the guy holding the cable is sitting will hold a flame lit from the cenotaph in the park.