Yo-Yo Ma

A long time admirer of Yo-Yo Ma's work, I was a little skeptical when my sister gave me an album of his work, "The Cello Suites Inspired by Bach". My reason being is simply listening to unaccompanied cello suites can give you funny effects, and usually on the darker side.
Which is why it took me 5 months until I finally get to this CD.

This morning, waking up with a resfreshed mind, I was thirsty for a new music. And having seen "Memoirs of a Geisha" kept on being replayed on my cable TV these past few weeks, I began to think of the Yo-Yo Ma CD.



I put it on. And it was... magic.

My favorite piece will always be The Cello Suite #1 in G BWV 1007 - Prelude. It has a very positive energy. The first few notes started and you will be magically transported to a land where time stands still and you can reflect, think and be at ease.

Moving right along, the suite progressed into the escalated tempo Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Menuetto and finally Gigue. It was a wholesome piece.

In my opinion, Ma is an exceptionally accomplished musician. He's got the flair in introducing the positivity of any tune he plays, regardless how dark the piece is meant to be. What I'm trying to say here is, he plays from the heart that even though the tune is sad, he excells in helping you understand the emotion in the piece, without leaving you depressed afterwards.

Yo-Yo Ma, I salute you!

Which is which?

So, today I was forwarded an article about a sheep scam in Japan. The article was a hit Australian newspapers, such as this and also in some UK newspapers such as here.

In a nutshell, the articles are saying about how nearly 2,000 Japanese people were swindled in a scam in which they were sold Australian and British sheep and told they were poodles.

A movie star stated that she was confused why her 'poodle' would not want to eat the pet food provided, and that her 'poodle' never barked.
Also in the article, it is said that the police reported that nearly 2,000 people have been affected in this scandal, which operated in Sapporo, because those people were apparently unable to distinguish a poodle from an authentic Australian sheep.


I do not know what to think when I read this article. I mean, surely they can't be that dumb not to be able to tell a cuddly pet from a cuddly meat factory.

Curious, I found another article claiming that it was a hoax, but the rationale was relatively weak.

Which is the truth, then?
I will keep my ears and eyes open for the local news.

Personally, I won't be too surprised if this actually happened. These people can believe everything they read or buy or whatever they were told.
I will not be surprised at all.

Taiko Tari reporting live from Tokyo. Have a good Golden Week, Everyone!

===
Image was excerpted from the Metro.co.uk April 26. 2007 article on the subject

Camel, anyone?

It all goes back to the month I spent in Saudi Arabia for the Hajj pilgrimage. During this period I had experienced the rare occassion of eating some camel meat.
Having mentioned this to friends, some curiosity was aroused, and many were inquiring me to describe what camel meat taste like and how you would prepare a camel dish.

This got me curious, too. I have never thought much about it, and this dish somehow just appeared in the caterer's menu (and I also bought it one time from a street vendor). The meat was already cooked and cubed, and it was served with some kind of curry seasoning. From what I remember, a camel meat tasted nothing much, it was very much on the chewy side.

So, I browsed around the internet to find a well known recipe for cooking a camel dish, only to find this fascinating article.
This article was discussing the authenticity of the proper way to cook a Whole Stuffed Camel, as published in a cookbook called "International Cuisine". I didn't realize that there was so much hyped about eating a camel, until I read the quoted recipe carefully.

Have a look at the following*:



Could this be true??!
I am utterly fascinated to think about the size of the oven to cook this stuffed camel with, and the 110 gallon enabled pot to boil the camel with. Whoa!!

In the end, I don't think this is an impossible recipe to do, and granted that it is in Saudi Arabia (hence it's hot), this explains why you can't put the hunted camel in the freezer and thaw it out before cooking. It makes most sense to deal with freshly slaughtered camel and cook it right away, stuffing it with 20 chickens, and 1 whole lamb.
Think about the amount of work need to be done to skin a whole camel, 20 chickens and 1 whole lamb. It will take a village to cook for a village.

If a restaurant or a caterer actually specializes in this dish, I'd like to go and try it out. And judging from how it's cooked and the elaborate stuffing, it seems like a very delicious dish!

I WANT TO TRY!!!


---
* Image was excerpted from http://www.snopes.com/food/prepare/camel.asp, and published without permission

For my darling brother

Goio, you just happened to be 4 years younger than me, Sweetheart.
So sometimes, when I was 4, you're not even here yet, thus not pictured.

After scrounging around, I found these. And they are for you!!!

My Afro baby brother

Can't imagine us being evil at all, can you?

Goio today (and me!)

The light!!! I see it!!!

I do have to remember that there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Last week was by far the hardest period that I had to go through in my professional history. Taking in a criticism is not easy, especially when it came as an explosion out of nowhere (my point of view, of course) and resulted in a massive shock.
I kept on thinking that I don't want to give up, but then... maybe I should?

One of the things that kept me going was something a dear friend pointed out to me during this time, "Tari, you love your job, and because you enjoy doing what you do - it seems like you're having fun and it seems that what you do is easy. This is why you are at a very prone position to be misunderstood. I am Japanese and I love my job, but I also know that I am a rare case. You have to realize that only few people actually do, especially in Japan. Here people live to work, not the other way around. This is sad, but this is the reality."

Last week I thought that I have to give up Japan, but of course that was emotion talking.
Finally after talking this through with several mentors and thinking this through myself, I'm beginning to see the light.
As much as it hurts, from this point forward it can only get better. When you are at the bottom, there is no where to go but up!

A lesson learned

In such days, you have to bow your head, think back, and reflect to what you did wrong and try to fix it for a better tomorrow.

There was a crisis at work on a project that I delegated to someone else because I had another responsibility.
The bottom line is, my client did not provide us with enough information and did not comply with my company's basic vendor procedure. For two years we had worked together and an issue had never come out.

Until yesterday.

Things that was not requested, suddenly was. Things that was not my company's responsibility, suddenly became one.
It exploded. In the middle of finishing up at the other place, I was called up to respond to this crisis. After a very long day of battle and putting out fires, everything was finally over.

Or so I thought.

I walked back to my desk and suddenly two of my team members called for a meeting. Even though the crisis was finally taken care of and we were finally off to a better ground with my selfish client; the situation is not the same with my team.
Not knowing what I had to go through on the other side battling with the client - they confronted me and letting their heart out. Fingers were being pointed, harsh words were flying all over the place. A volcano errupted.
From their perspective: I did not bother to understand how hard they had worked to help me in this project. Also that it seemed to them that I had always battled for the client and fulfilling their needs without enough consideration on the hard work that the team had to work on.
After a long conversation and heart-to-heart talk, finally we understood that both parties, myself and team members have not expressed and explained each other well enough until this time on the degree or situation of things that we do in our respective positions.

Apologies were expressed, broken hearts were mended, and off we go to a new page, a hopefully better tomorrow.

Lessons learned:
- I have to share and share and share so my team would understand that I am doing everything that I could in my power to help them and protect them. This was something that they never see directly, and thus uninformed.
- I also have to spend more time to listen to them and revisit my approach when speaking to them, so they know for sure I am with them at every step of the way.


This was a lesson that I had to learn the hard way. However it is also something I am determined to use as a stepping stone to make better decisions in the future.

Onwards, upwards!