I defended my prospectus last December and passed my oral exams in March. I forgot what I have been doing since then but time flies really fast, and here I am. Back in Japan. I am starting my real, not “preliminary,” research for my dissertation.
I am starting from the 青年団報アーカイブス in Tsuruga, Fukui. I [...]
Washington DC is one of the most competitive cities for summer sublet. At any time of the year there are a large number of people watching craigslist’s new entries for housing, emailing quickly to set up appointments, and going through an interview after another with roommates. Trust me, it is not fun especially for a [...]
I made a short visit to Ireland over the New Year’s Day, and stayed with Colm’s family in Skerries, a lovely town close to Dublin. I usually travel a lot and stay for extensive periods of time in Asia, but am just a tourist in Europe and other parts of the world. The scenery of [...]
One of very important reasons to stay being a student and to work in academia is the long summer (and winter) vacation. It is not really a ‘vacation’ since we usually have lots of work, but we have a chance to become a total vagabond for three months every year.
I fully enjoyed my [...]
I just heard an incredible story about some side effects of the Special Anti-Prostitution Law put into effect in 2004 in South Korea.
My friends and I were discussing the fact that there are very few cocktail bars any more in high-end downtown areas in Seoul. My friend told me that it is because, as a [...]
I was talking with my Korean language teacher about the school uniform culture in Korea the other day. It has gone extreme in Japan, especially in Tokyo, and you see high school girls wearing extremely short uniform skirts and strutting everywhere. In Seoul, school girls wear smaller, rather than shorter, uniforms. Apparently they want to [...]
Pink and baby blue ties represent masculinity (?) in Korea.
Since I finished my semester around May 10th, I have been going back and forth between NY and DC until May 28th, when I finally packed and left NY for my summer Asia trip. My first stop was Los Angeles. Believe it or not, this is my first time, as far as I can recall, [...]
It has been more than a month since we arrived in Seoul. Michi and I slowly started to meet various people here. We have visited Michi’s colleague from Harvard, Moto, and his family a couple of times. I have started my language exchange with a poli sci graduate student of Yonsei University, and also met [...]
After my short trips to Taipei and Takarazuka, I finally flew into Seoul, my primary destination for this summer. I am studying the Korean language at Yonsei University, and the program started a week ago. Other than some stomach problems last week, everything is going fine, and finally I have gotten to point where I [...]