Miscellaneous things about Tsukuba and Japan (5)

Let's skip the intro and get on with the contents!

Abandoned bicycle check
At the beginning of this month, I've parked by bicycle at the parking lot by the cafeteria to go and eat breakfast. When I came out, I was surprised that there was a tag stuck on it? "Did I park at the wrong place?" I thought. It turns out that they periodically put up these tags to check for abandoned bicycle (which they'll remove for disposal). The text on the tag asks the owner to remove the tag from the bicycle to show that it's not abandoned.

Snack "share packs"
Many snacks in Japan comes in "share packs". That is, it's a huge pack which costs around ¥200 - 300 and has many small packs inside, which is useful for sharing with friends or eating only a little at a time. I guess this also makes it a good souvenir for classmates!

Scaring away birds
Around the Tsukuba station everyday, there will be a lot of birds flying around (which is actually kind of beautiful). There are staffs in charge of scaring away these birds by playing some kind of bird-like (I guess) sound on the megaphone.

Ramen Shop inside train stations
In some larger train stations, there are some small standing ramen shops locating inside the train station. I think this is so that people can have lunch while waiting to change trains.

Thirty-One Ice Cream
Are you familiar with the brand "Thirty-One Ice Cream"? I think most of you would be more familiar with "Baskin Robins". However, Japanese call it "Thirty-One" due to the "31" in the middle of the logo.

Baskin Robin's logo from its website. Notice the pink "31" in the middle.

Narita Gion Festival

Ricky, a researcher from Taiwan, told me about a festival at Narita and so I decided to go with him and everyone else. This festival is, of course, held in Narita and to get their by train, 3 transfers must be made.

Train route from Tsukuba to Narita on Hyperdia

Before talking about the festival, let me first tell you about the adventure everyone had trying to get there. The first connection went without any trouble. In the second connection, we were waiting on the track for the local train instead of the rapid train and lost about 10 minutes, which also made us missed the third connection. Looking at the timetable, we realized that we had to wait another 20 minutes for another train.

See the ② and ④ up there? At first, I didn't know what it meant, but later, everyone knew the meaning of it... by experience. We saw the sign that says "Platform 4 for Narita" and waited there. And when the time came... we noticed that the train didn't come and just when it's too late... we saw the train at platform 2! So, as you might have guessed, the number in the circles show the platform number. The result was that we had to wait another half an hour for the next train.

Next, let's move on to the festival. I'm not quite sure of the importance of this festival, since it's not mentioned on any of the websites I've been to. But it consists of floats being pulled by rope around the Narita area. It's somewhat hard to explain in words, so let the video and the pictures below better show you the details!

A refreshing snack is mandatory on such a hot day!

If it's too hot outside, you can also see the festival via television.
(But then, what's the point of coming!?)

One of the refreshment stands

After the parade, all the floats are gathered at the temple
(There's more outside of the frame)

Just outside the temple, there are a lot of game and food stands, similar to Thai's temple festival (งานวัด)

Luckily, on the way back, there's not really any "getting lost" incidents and we got back to Tsukuba safely and on time. For summer in Japan, there's one other event which I'll try the hardest not to miss — the fireworks festival (Hanabi Taikai)!

Recharging b-mobile data SIM

One month ago, I've activated a b-mobile SIM for mobile data in Japan. Since the initial charge is only valid for 30 days, now is the time that I need to recharge the SIM for another month. It's not as straightforward as I've expected it to be, so I'm writing this post to share my experience with anyone else who may be in the same position as I am.

The 2 options provided by b-mobile are auto-charge and manual charge. However, they are not created equal. For the 1 GB SIM, manual charge only allows for the more expensive 1 GB valid for 120 days (¥8,350), while auto-charge allows you to select between 30 days (¥3,100) and 120 days validity!

Manual charge should be straight-forward, but obviously I'd want the cheaper package since I'll only spend one more month here (and 1 GB per 3 months is not enough for me), so I'll have to enable auto-charge.

The bCharge app (as seen in the screenshot above) states that auto charge will take place 5 days before the expiration date or when your balance approaches zero, while the website states that auto charge will take place 2 days before expiry. The truth is... neither of that.

Auto-charge will take place at midnight (Japan time) and deducts the money from your credit/debit card, however, it will not take effect right away but instead becomes a "Charge Credit" in your account. The charge credit will take place when your balance reaches zero or you've reached your expiration date.

I haven't tested this, but b-mobile's website states that if you use auto-charge while your SIM is expired (within 10 days), the auto-charge will take place right away and you can continue using your data without having to wait until midnight.

And don't forget to turn off auto-charge after you've recharged, otherwise you'll be continue to be charged the next month even after you've left Japan!

Restaurant: Yukimura Tsukemen Kichiemon

Ramen restaurants is the easiest type of restaurant to find in Japan, or at least around this area. I could walk along the street at the south of AIST and find many ramen shops. Today, I will introduce you to Yukimura Tsukemen Kichiemon (if I got the name right), which is a ramen shop right beside Nakau.

Inside the restaurant is clean and nicely decorated, which is pretty much the standard for restaurants here in Japan.

The menu has pictures, so it isn't very hard to order. However, the price is written in kanji, which might make it a little bit difficult for people who do not know the Chinese numbers.

Below is a list of Chinese numbers, for those interested.

1 一
2 二
3 三
4 四
5 五
6 六
7 七
8 八
9 九
0 〇

And after a little bit of waiting, my order has arrived!

After you finish eating, you have to take the bill placed on your table and pay at the counter (most Japanese restaurants work this way). After paying, I was given what I think is a ¥50 discount coupon, valid for the current month.

Typing Chinese

Today, I'm going to write about typing Chinese on the computer. Yes, you've read it right - Chinese, not Japanese. I've learned about this from Chung, a researcher from Taiwan, and I think it's kind of interesting. As you might know, Chinese has many thousand characters, so unlike Thai or English, putting all of them on the keyboard is very impractical.

Chinese Input Methods can be divided into 2 groups - phonetic-based and shape-based. I was told that most Taiwanese uses the phonetic system since it's easier to use, as you just type the sound using the English keyboard. However, since many characters can have the same sound, the user needs to choose between different characters slowing them down.

For example, wo = 我, shi = 是

Disambiguation system in Mac OSX

The other system, shape-based, decomposes a Chinese characters into small shapes which can be encoded into the English alphabet. This allows for precise input of Chinese characters without having to choose between different characters, and thus, is faster. There are many different systems such as Cangjie, Dayi, Boshiamy. Some implementation of shape-based input methods are not pre-installed and has to be purchased separately by the user.

Dayi Keyboard Layout from Wikimedia Commons

For example, to type 是 mentioned above, you must break it down into 日 (the top part) and 足 (the full form of the bottom part). So you type "d9" on your keyboard then press space bar to get 是.

Interesting, isn't it? There's actually a third input method which is drawing the actual character and the computer will recognize it, but it's very inefficient and isn't really a keyboard-based input method.

One month has passed

So one month has passed since I've came to Japan and that leaves me one more month for my internship here in Japan. For those who are wondering, I'll be leaving Japan on July 31.

Looking back, a lot of things has happened. I've learned about a lot of things, whether it is about Japanese culture or computers. I haven't had a lot of chance to meet a lot of Japanese, but the ones I've met, whether it is at the office, at a shop, at a meetup, on Ingress or just on the street, were really kind (despite me sometimes struggling to communicate). The researchers from Taiwan who came here were also great friends. I have also eaten great food and explored interesting places. There's no other way to put it except "It has really been an enjoyable and interesting month!"

For the internship, currently, I am working on porting postcopy migration to libvirt and CloudStack. Due to the relatively immature code, it might be harder and more obscure errors may occur, but it is a very good chance to learn more about the Linux kernel (and put those knowledge from Computer Architecture class into use). After that, the schedule is to wrap everything up and give a presentation to everyone else in the office before preparing a final report. I might even have some free time for additional travel towards the end!

And that's enough for my reminiscence. Looking forward to another great month!

Miscellaneous things about Tsukuba and Japan (4)

It's time to unload another set of cultural differences between Thailand and Japan again! I guess you could call these as mini "cultural shocks", but it's not shocking, just interesting.

Shop seal tapes

In Japan, every shops, whether it is convenience store, a drug store or a large supermarket, has its own seal. When you don't want a plastic bag (and many stores now will ask if you want one or not [thumbs up]), they will stick it on to the product to show that you've already paid for it. Some stores will also use the tape to (slightly) seal the top of the plastic bag.

An example seal from Kasumi

Elevator for disabled
At AIST and also other places, some elevators are equipped with special buttons which aid the disabled in using the elevator. In order to access the special elevator (since not all elevators are equipped with the special buttons), a special button is provided. Interestingly, when pressing the special buttons inside the elevator, the standard button will also light up, but the reverse is not true. My guess is that the door might stay opened longer if the special button is used. Also, the elevators here have audio floor announcement systems.

The lower button will call the elevator with aids for the disabled

The special buttons for the disabled

Gachapons Everywhere
Gachapons are machines where you insert ¥200 - ¥300 and get a random toy/figure/card out of it. Apparently, these are everywhere whether it is at a shopping mall, a restaurant and other places.

Gachapaon machines in front of a restaurant

No soap at toilets at the train station
I don't know why, but the toilets at the train station doesn't have soap provided! (And the toilets are often located past the ticket gate, so you can't use it unless you're taking the train.) When I've asked a Japanese about this, the answer I got was "because you don't need it?" Though everywhere else, soap is provided.

Heisei Year
Like Thailand, Japan has another year counting system for use in official documents. While Thailand uses the Buddhist Year (พ.ศ.), Japan uses a year system based on the current Emperor. The current era is Heisei (平成) which began in 1989 and thus the current year is the 25th year (written as 平成25年 or sometimes H25年).