googlewhack

Do you know what a googlewhack is? Wikipedia's definition: A Googlewhack is a Google search query consisting of two words--both of which must be in Google's dictionary, and without quotation marks--that returns a single result.

Anyway, a friend lent me a DVD called David Gorman's Googlewhack adventure. He was a Googlewhack and he went on a global adventure trying to create a chain of 10 other Googlewhacks- all stemming from him. It was a great story- watch it if you have a chance. Anyway, I found one myself: kavatones orchids. Try it yourself. His theory was that if you find out about it you would be hard pressed not to try it there and then.

Heading up to Tokyo tomorrow to start filming a documentary I am doing on my bamboo teacher.

a bit too sheepish

it was extremely hard not to laugh at this.

"war on journalism"

The International Press Institute has dubbed 2006 the "Most Brutal Year in the Modern Media’s History".

I want to see a "war on greed" or a "war on ignorance". There is a "war on want". As a victim of malaria I was pleased to see that some years ago Cuba began waging a "war on malaria" and I have since read that so too are Tanzania and South Africa. Papua New Guinea is waging a war on plastic bags! I want to enlist! The Chaser declared a war on everything and I highly recommend their vodcasts!

What other good wars have there been?

The old days.

A few quotes I remember from people I encountered in the mid 90s.

"I am not gay, I was just experimenting when I was younger, I was a curious lad"
An immigrant father reacting to his son using an offensive term to suggest that the father was a fan of sodomy.

"SHUT THE DOOR! We'll get mice!"
An immigrant father of another friend telling me to shut the door otherwise mice would annex the house.

Creativity

I'm currently editing a video from my recent trip to Thailand. It is a long process and I am currently in the middle of the most time consuming part. The creative process is a long one. The travelogues I write also follow a similar pattern. I probably enjoy the fine tuning the most.

If you know me, you'll know that I like a band called Rancid. The lead guitarist, Tim Armstrong, is releasing a solo album. What's unique about it, is that it will be released for free on the net. All tracks will can be downloaded for free. This must be a first (prove me wrong).

Cho Seung-Hui update: still no images available on google images (the first page of results anyway). I wonder if they take a week or so to register.

(Above) Old picture of my mullet-cut self with my brother in Canberra.

A friend brought a site to my attention today. Haven't looked deep into it yet, but I trust his judgement and it looks good- but you know what they say "never judge a website by its frontpage". Click here or on the word "deep" (above) to be linked.

Saw a great show on the idiot box tonight. A family from Papua New Guinea came over for a home stay in Japan. It was great hearing the dialogue in both Japanese and Tok Pisin. It makes me wonder how Marcel, my Ni-Vanuatu mate, is going in Brisbane doing his 3 month homestay (and intensive Aikido course) with a cafe owner.

important discovery

I just made an amazing discovery today. Channel-2! I found what appears to be the largest web forum on the world. It is Japanese too, which is even more relevant for me seeing as though I live over here. It also seems that Shift-JIS (encoding) text art is extremely popular (see picture to the right and hopefully below).

This site gives users the option to post anonymously- in a society where people have largely kept their opinions to themselves, this has opened the floodgates for raw emotions to come out. I look forward to using this as a study tool to improve my language as well as learn more about current trends and opinions over here.

An English language version has also been launched. Channel-4.

The following picture should slightly resemble Mr. T.
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Podcasts.

I don't have an i-pod. But I have a 4 year old chunky mp3 player that looks more like a walkman. It doesn't play videos, but it has 20GB worth of storage space. No complaints from me. I have recently discovered podcasts. I get most of mine from the Aussie Broadcasting Corp's homepage. Great podcasts there if you are looking for anything relevant to the lives of Australians. It has been a bit of a challenge finding decent travel podcasts though. I stumbled on a decent one the other day though.

And if you know of any good travel podcasts- not "yeah, we went to this pub and got so drunk and I spewed over the front doorstep of a little temple and the monk went ape shit chasing me with his dusty broom..." but more like: "So after I uncovered the plans for genocide I had to escape from the village, this required a swim through 15 kilometres of crocodile infested swamps with only a handful of peanuts to last me the whole journey.. I survived by eating small turnip like native plants...." That's the sort I like. Historical context, adventures, good experiences with the local people, stepping outside of one's personal comfort zone, unexpected complications etc.

Testing.

I just read a story from the Sydney Morning Herald about a community from Vanuatu who had to leave their island due to either rising sea levels or a sinking island.

I repeated the Cho Seng-hui experiment and couldn't find a single picture of him in the first 10 pages of the search results of the Google image search function. I don't think this necessarily proves anything, but it is interesting to me all the same. If you search for Bigkamo the first picture that comes up is a platypus. The reason for this is presumably that kamonohashi means platypus in Japanese.