perpetual student
(Continuing from Part 1 of the Summit Tour.) All conventions are divided into three parts: the exhibition hall, the sessions, and the hallways. And in my experience, the hallways are what it’s all about. That’s where you meet people, renew acquaintances, and make plans. And take selfies. At the Summit, the hallway experience promises to …
Continue reading “Summit Tour, The Hillclimb and the Garden Terrace”
Here’s the first in a series of posts sharing my impressions and photos of the new Seattle Convention Center Summit, from the Public Open House last Thursday, January 26, 2023. Highlights of the Exhibition Hall (Lower Level): Why I care: My career as a journalist and writer has taken me to conference venues around the …
For writer and translator Polly Barton, you’ll find “the beating heart of Japanese” in onomatopoeia, mimetic language that sounds like what the words signify. Bow-wow. Woof-woof. ワンワン. (Wan-wan, rhymes with “bonbon.”) Japanese has a massive onomatopoeic vocabulary second only to Korean, claims Barton, who set out to master this essential aspect of the language: “I …
Third time’s the charm. The first iteration of my blog (My Yale Years) consisted of reflections and essays related to a series of online courses. The blog reboot (IVAN: A HALF-LIFE) was episodic memoir. For both, I got off to a fast start but then hit challenging material, whether courses outside of my comfort zone …
Some people have a knack for chatting people up, turning on the charm, getting phone numbers. Me, I’m an introvert. If I’m on a bus or airplane or a train, I’ll be listening to music while reading a book or a newspaper. But sometimes you just have to take off the headphones. She was an …
Tell a story about a man riding the bus from New Jersey to New York, in the style of a KGB report The subject, identified as John Smith, boarded the bus in New Jersey at approximately 8:00am on the morning of January 12th, 2023. He was observed to be carrying a black backpack and wearing …
I was in debt, living with my parents in New Jersey, and I needed a job. In the help-wanted section, I saw that the NYC Department of Corrections was hiring a Statistician. To be working for the city, that’s not bad. In an office, I would think. I had taken some advanced statistics, knew enough …
Doshite nihongo o benkyo-saretan desu ka? どうして日本語を勉強されたのですか。 Why are you studying Japanese? It all started in 1995 with a lightly used copy of Japanese for Busy People and a Kanji workbook, gifts from a good friend who had briefly attempted, and then abandoned, the project of learning Japanese. I became fascinated by the dual syllabaries, …
Competitrack had racks of VHS machines set up to record the top broadcast and cable channels in dozens of US cities. Someone would swap in new tapes and box up the old ones for shipment to New York. The team of TV “coders” would receive the tapes and scan through each one to find and …
At 25, I didn’t realize how wealthy I was, or how free. I had a good job and no debt, living in Manhattan at the beginning of a tech boom. My hometown banker told me I had over $6,000 in cash. “What do you want to do with it?”“Well, I may need that money next …
