Roy Berman – Page 13 – Mutantfrog Travelogue

Oh hell yeah

I don’t know who had the insane idea to make a Japanese live-action version of Spiderman, but I’m just glad that it exists. And glad that Marvel has, for some reason, decided to stream episodes for free on their web site. There’s also a very odd Spiderman manga I’ve read a bit of, which may or may not be based on the plot of this show.

Good morning

I was awoken at around 6 or 7 this morning by a brief earthquake, and then again at about 8:30 as a series of monks, in their straw sandals and wide-brimmed woven-reed conish hats, starting wandering back and forth down the road, chanting at the top of their lungs. I wonder perhaps if there was a causal relationship, some sort of special prayer or spell given in the wake of an earthquake to calm the restless earth dragons. Even some of the Japanese neighbors seemed startled and amused by this curious occurance, and the entire family in the house just across and over from mine got out to watch in mild wonder this anachronistic scene, and one monk stopped to give a personal blessing to their little girl.

Travel fail

So I just missed my flight by a few minutes due to some dumbness, and after some messing around managed to get in touch with the booking office in Manila and reschedule for Sunday’s flight. There is a penalty/rebooking fee but only around $100, which basically cancels out the discount I’d gotten when I first ordered it. I suppose once I get to Manila I’ll stop by the airline office and see if I can also delay my return flight and make up for the lost time, which I think will only cost around $50 since it’s just rebooking and not late cancellation/missed flight penalty. So I’m pretty annoyed, but no significant harm done, although wasting my entire day and a moderate amount of money is pretty damn irritating.

Travel time

I”m heading to Manila today and will be in the Philippines until March 24. On this trip I bring the following items:

Asus eeePC 1000 (40GB flash, 10″ screen)
Canon EOS 50D with sundry batteries and memory cards
50mm 1.8F lens for above
17-85 EF-S IS lens for above
11-16mm 2.8F Tokina lens for above
Several changes of underwear, socks, t shirts
One leather-bound journal style notebook, found entirely blank on a street a couple of years back. previously used on my Taiwan trip last summer
The cheapest Nokia GSM phone sold in Taiwan as of last summer, to be used with locally purchased SIM card (my last trip there was a vending machine in the airport, I hope there still is)
Monies, cards of credit, and other documents as being necessary for the execution of commerce
Osprey brand hiking backpack
And other divers items of minor importance

My exact plans are still rather vague, but definitely involve spending some time in Manila, visiting the Banaue Rice Terraces, and probably riding the Philippines’ single long distance train line from Manila to the its terminus in the SE corner of Luzon and seeing what’s on the other end.

I will hopefully find some internet along the way and do a bit of blogging, and there will be an extensive visual record upon my return.

Frogopocalypse strikes Japan

From JT:

Thousands of frogs were found dead in a pond last fall in Japan’s first confirmed case of the amphibian-destroying ranavirus, a researcher said Friday.

The death of American Bullfrogs occurred in a man-made pond in September and October, said Yumi Une, associate professor of veterinary science at Azabu University in Kanagawa Prefecture.

The dead frogs had symptoms unique to a ranavirus infection, such as bleeding on the surface of the skin and loss or deformity of toes or webs, Une said, adding that the virus was detected in their cells.

Une did not reveal the location of the pond but said more than 10,000 frogs are believed to have died there.

[…]

A new type of ranavirus was found in American Frogs in Taiwan last year, and a gene in the virus found in the dead frogs in Japan resembles one from the virus in Taiwan, Une said.

Doesn’t “American Frogs in Taiwan” sound like the name of a community association or ethnic activist organization? I suppose they’re banding together to lobby for increased government spending on anti-frog plague research.

Gay politics in Taiwan vs. Japan

I had been vaguely aware that gays are more open in Taiwan than in Japan (more active gay pride festival, spotting a very cleary labeled gay bookstore near Taiwan University), but hadn’t consciously realized quite how different things are before reading this article from yesterday’s Taipei Times.

Gay rights activists yesterday announced that they would form a voting bloc to support gay-friendly candidates in the upcoming legislative by-election in Taipei City’s Da-an District (大安).

“We’ve had six gay pride parades in Taipei in the past six years and more than 18,000 people took part in last year’s event — that’s where the voters are,” chief coordinator of last year’s gay pride parade, Lee Ming-chao (李明照), told a news conference.

“In the process of mobilizing the gay and lesbian community in Taipei, we estimated that around 10 percent of voters in Da-an District are gay — including myself. We can surely become a deciding minority if we stand together.”

He predicted that the turnout for the by-election would be lower than the 60.47 percent for last year’s legislative election.

This whole concept seems to me utterly inconceivable in Japan. While there is not much in the way of active discrimination against gays in Japan (like there is in most Muslim countries and some Christian ones, even including much of the US until recently) I get the impression that homosexuality and related issues are still generally more taboo here than anywhere else in all of East and Southeast Asia. Yes, there is a transgender politician in Tokyo, but Kamikawa Aya is said to be the only openly LGBT politician in the entire country of over 120 million people. Compared with Taipei’s apparently increasingly popular gay pride parade, Tokyo’s has been cancelled for this year due to lack of interest/resources.

Crazy Car Crash

I was biking home when I saw the aftermath of a car accident which had left a small car standing perfectly on its side. I happened to have my brand new Canon 50D digital SLR in my bag and decided to grab a quick night shot to test out exactly how vastly improved the low-light high-ISO performance is compared with my antiquated 300D. The visual quality is not fantastic, with a fair amount of noise and much loss of fine detail due to noise reduction, but keep in mind that these photos were taken at ISO 12,800. Even at such an extreme ISO, the noise levels are approximately the same as what my old camera got at ISO 1600, and with far, far higher resolution, more accurate auto-focus, faster performance, etc.

So, I thought I would just get an amusing photo of the car on its side (note: the occupants didn’t look to be badly hurt, so it’s ok to laugh) but then it got a lot more amusing when the police pushed the car over back onto its wheels, and one got in and drove it away.

[Update: Link to Flickr page so you can find full resolution images.]

[Update 2: Here is an example of a super high ISO file with no noise reduction. Not very usable.]

Continue reading Crazy Car Crash

Heads up

I’ll be flying to the Philippines next Thursday (March 5) and staying until March 24. I don’t have a clear travel plan yet, aside from spending a bit of time in Manila with some friends I haven’t seen in a while, but I’m definitely going to check out the famous rice terraces farther north in Luzon. Are there any readers in the Philippines, particularly Metro Manila? Any readers with particular recommendations on places to visit?

What IS this?

Any guesses? One hint only: it is several meters tall.

Upgraded campaign posters

OK, I did the first one here over the weekend. (As a riff on this real poster.)

まずはケーキだ

Curzon posted it here (currently on page 2 at time of posting) to this Japanese funny pics board, where it sits between some racist anti-Korean pics (NOT posted by Curzon) and uhh this.

Next, Ben’s friend BigJohn passed along this variation on the idea. aso-keiki And finally, regular poster Jade OC tried his own variant on the cake theme, which I think came out very well. This cake is no lie.

f_keiki1m_ec239b5 Come on people. Aso’s approval rating is working on a new record low and the LDP is on the slow train to dumpsville. The least you can do is help out with a new campaign poster. Send it in at an attachment or post a link and it’ll be added to the collection.