Topics to talk

Recently, I often go outside to eat lunch with my colleagues. I really place value on this time to communicate each other except works in the office. This is not only for my English lesson, but also for knowing each other like topics about hobbies, status, etc. Actually it is very fun because engineers in the bay area generally have high motivations for getting better and express it openly without hesitating to say it. I like this culture here in which we can say own opinions even though their opinions are wrong. On the other hand, saying nothing is considered to be worse than saying something wrong. Of course, we have to consider it seriously before say something in formal situations like meeting with customers. In the office, any ideas are welcome regardless of whether ideas are right or wrong. Additionally, engineers here have curiosities for anything, and try to capture things logically and essentially. Therefore, it is very fun to talk, although it is not always the cases. If I had stayed in Japan, I would have never experienced this kind of opportunity.

However, a problem which I have and feel recently is that I can not say my opinion deeply because of lack of knowledge when I was asked about something. Fortunately, I can provide topics every time when I go to lunch, but I can not continue to talk about it and can not attract people, and I usually hear what my colleagues say unless topics are not related to Japan. Some people might say that I should talk about Japan every time, but it is boring not only for me but also for my colleagues. Otherwise, my colleagues would get sick of it. 

Therefore, I strongly feel that I need to be able to familiar with many topics deeply as well as I can talk deeply. If I could tell deep understanding about something during lunch, my colleague would be happier than ever before, and they would invite me more. In order to be able to do that, I have to make efforts to read news in many field and write own opinion day by day. Without doubt, online news like CNN, BBC is better to look at because they provide us many latest topic from world, domestic, politics, entertainment, technology, travel, and so on, every day. So I should check it out every day as long as time permits.


Here, I have never posted my opinion about latest news but have posted my experiences since I opened my blog. However, I try to post the former as well as the later. It is because it is obviously better to think about something and write it down a lot in order to talk about it during lunch.

X rat check on my chest

Last month, I took an annual medical check which is common in Japan as long as you are employed by a company. I got results at the end of the month, but something was not good. According to results, something shadow was found on a picture of X ray. However, a doctor told me that it was difficult to tell whether this was real one or not because a vain perpendicular to the picture sometimes comes out as a shadow, so I needed to take one more X ray check with several angles just in case. I had to make an appointment for this, but I could not do that for two weeks because I was preoccupied by an idea of what I am gonna do if this is a real cancer or a tumor. I definitely understand in my mind that an earlier check is better, but I could not until two weeks later when I did it finally. This is one of weaknesses of human that we can not do something even if we feel that we have to do it. And I got a phone call from the doctor that it turned out be nothing. I was really relieved mentally by hearing that. 

For one month, I was suffering from this mentally. So I strongly realized that living healthy is very important in our life.

Evernote

Since three weeks ago, I have been using Evernote to improve how to study my English. Every time when I come across an unknown word in daily life throughout conversation with colleagues and watching movies, I check its meaning as well as pronunciation, and write down it to my note with some example sentences. This is a basic manner which every one does, but I feel a little bit cumbersome because it takes time to do do that. On the other hand, I have heard before that writing down something to a note enhances memorizing it deeply in my head, so I have continued to do it for more than one year. At the same time, we are living in the internet world where the internet is available at many place and its cost is almost free. So I have been always wondering if typing something in PC enhances remembering process as well. Once in a while, I have seen articles in the web about Evernote which seems to allow me to do what I wanna do for my English study. So I stalled it soon and started to use it.

Evernote is amazing for my purpose because notes in Evernote is stored in local PC as well as in cloud manner, so I can look at my notes anytime and anywhere, as long as the internet and PC type devices are available. Unlike a real note, I can enlarge words and highlight words in colors to help me find new words when I review notes every morning. Additionally, I can edit sentences and add some information later.

Besides this usage, I use Evernote by clipping web pages which I wanna remember and store. You can clip entire page as well as some parts of pages by installing a Evernote clipping extension in your browser. Amazingly, the function of clipping entire page automatically excludes web advertisements.

I`m now using free version with a limitation of storage per a month like 25MB, but this is enough for my purpose for the time being. However, I possibly upgrade my account for premium later if I can find more useful usages.

One year anniversary of Japna devastating earthquake

At last March 11, It was one year since the devastating earthquake in Japan. If I look back, it began from the largest earthquake in recent years, and the large tunami devastated the coast of the north part of Japan. Finally, nuclear disaster came out soon. A lot of people died because they could not escape from the tunami. The tunami took away many life and swept out a lot of town totally. We have to keep in mind this forever for the future and have to make a strategy for next earthquake. We never be able to avoid natural disasters. U.S does not have so many earthquake, but instead of that, U.S. always suffers from hurricanes very year especially at the south part of east coast. A lot of people lose their life every year because of that. Now Japan is facing the nuclear problem caused by the earthquake. This problem is not easy to solve because spread nuclear materials stay on ground and continue to emit nuclear radiation for more than 20 years. So we have to deal with the problem for long time. The destroyed nuclear power plants are far from my hometown close to Tokyo, but non-negligible amount of radiation have been observed. So I have been thinking what I should do when I come back to Japan someday.

What I am relieved about is that people in Japan are still concerned about everything related to the earthquake because I was afraid at first that people forgot the disaster one year later.
Generally, human is a animal which gets used to anything, get less concerned, and take it for granted, but current situation is not so.Even in U.S, I could watched TV news about the earthquake in Japan, and news caster said strongly that we must not forgot this and world is flat now throughout internet, and we, human being , are connected together, and we can help each other and get through it together.

Brushing tooth tip

Do you brush your tooth just after every meal ?
I did it to prevent cavity and plaque from accumulating on my surface of tooth . However, I  have changed my way to brush my tooth since I red something article about misunderstand of when to brush tooth.

A few months back, I happened to look at an article about dental caution in Japanese which was scientifically proved. It warned us how bad it it to brush tooth just after a meal. According to the article, when you eat something food which contains acid, which is usual case, it softens our enamel which protects our tooth from cavity, and make it weak. If you brush your tooth soon, it does damage to your tooth because enamel does not works well.  This softened enamel usually harden again for around one hour, so it is good idea to wait for one hour before you brush tooth.

I tried to find a similar article about how to brushing tooth. I finally got it and put it below.
reference

A few years back, I was suffering cavity which made me awake during night because of  its strong pain. So I really take care of brushing tooth since that unforgettable incident.

Who moved my cheese ?

Do you know this book, "Who moved my cheese ".
This book is one of bestsellers which is very famous popular around the world to let us know how to deal with changes. There is a strong reason why many people love this book. It is because this book describes human behavior against changes very well, and we are strongly reminded of how people react against changes badly, but it also tells us that it is important to recognize changes of situation, react to them well, and take an action for them, otherwise situation goes worse in any case. This book teaches us with a cheese as metaphor which can be what you want, what you improve, what you keep, jobs, or important things.

This is a story about two mice and two small peoples. The story begins inside maze, and firstly they could find a big cheese for them in a cave. They built their houses close to the cave in order to commute to the cave easily every day. They spent their time there with secure mind because they believed that the cheese was theirs forever. As you can easily imagine, amount of the cheese is limited, so it got less gradually day by day. Two mice noticed its fact instinctively, and they got out of the cave to look for a next cheese before the cheese was gone. They could take an action quickly regardless of whether we can find a next one or not immediately, because a mouse typically thinks simply and does not want to consider anything seriously. On the other hand, two small people noticed something was happening to the cheese in mind, but they believed and hoped that nothing changed in mind somewhere by using complex brain, until the cheese was gone actually, even though the cheese was apparently getting less. Even after finding that the cheese was not left any more, they believed that someone just hided the cheese and returned it back finally. One of them could realize that the cheese never come back and they had to get out of the cave to look for new one, and did it finally. However, another small people still continue to think optimistically, stay there, and wait for the cheese coming back. In the story, the former small people could find new one with delightful, although I believe that it is not always so. The later small people behaved like typical human who resists to changes, do nothing for them, and finally blame someone by looking for a scapegoat, or something in wrong circumstance.  

The point is that it is very bad to do nothing even while noticing changes, and it is important that we must not resist to changes, have to accept changes at once, adapt to them positively and take an action finally to get better. This cheese story can be applied to everything of our daily life and help us to understand how to deal with changes. 

Sleeping problem

A few weeks ago, I got a visitor from Japan who came to U.S branch as a business trip. I met him after more than 1 year interval since I moved here, but I came to know that he is suffering from sleeping problem, what is called, insomnia. I am really sorry about that because he can do his jobs very well and he is one of senior engineers which I can respect. According to him, he can not fall asleep at night without sleeping pills. If he can fall asleep finally, he wakes up around twice during night. Every time when he wakes up, he has to take a pill in order to fall asleep. Generally, insomnia is one of problems which comes from stress, mental insecure. However it can not be solved totally even by recent advanced medication. Regardless to say, recent medical is getting better but it can only cure alleviate sleeping problem. In the case of him, it might be coming from mental issues, but I could not dig into it deeply. My concern about this is that his body is already used to take pills. For example, if we drink a few cups of coffee and get caffeine in order to avoid sleepiness or stay focused every day, then our body get used to caffeine and its effect get less gradually. I am afraid that same thing will happen to his case of sleeping pills. We are now working together on same project in different places, so if I can help him throughout jobs, I will do whatever I can do for him.

Regarding sleeping problem, everyone can suffer from it suddenly, so it is important to notice and sense even a little symptom of others about mental issues and talk to them. From my experiences, it is better to open and share mental issues with others than to keep them inside own mind. I have not suffered from sleeping problems, so I do not understand them totally, but I want to try to understand them from now.