Bowling With the Senseis

 

Finals

 

I still can’t decide whether my ending up in one team with super sensei after the practice game did me good or bad.  One thing I’m sure of, I was conscious of his presence all the time.  And I mean, ALL the time.  I could feel his eyes looking intently the moment I stepped on the lane, perhaps judging my every move.  He would shake his head everytime I missed but be the first one to nod and smile whenever I threw a good one.

Bowling With the Senseis

 

Preliminaries

 

When Takaki, the labmate in charge of scheduling our lab’s recreational nonscholastic activities, announced that for this spring semester, we would revive the bowling tournaments, a lab tradition mysteriously ignored and forgotten since the series of semi-annual tournaments ended six years ago, I was pretty sure I heard "Hallelujah" playing in the background.  Not only was I excited to participate in my first "real" bowling tournament, the prospect of playing against my labmates and senseis also aroused my dormant combative tendencies.  Two weeks before the competition, I eagerly made plans of doing a lot of biking and stretching, practising my footwork and follow-through, and making clandestine trips to the nearby bowling alleys.  Naturally, as with my other undertakings, these were put off for a day, then a week, and were eventually abandoned.  Not one was realised, unless of course you’d count the few trips to the Irish pub downtown as exercise.

 

First, let it be known that we have two senseis – "super sensei," and his associate, "associate sensei."  Although the left-handed associate sensei is quite good himself and has actually finished at the top in previous tournaments, it was super sensei who was most feared and was the favorite to win before the games began.

 

The eighteen participants in The 7^th Bowling Optimization Problem [Optimize the bowling!] were randomly divided into four groups – two groups of four and two groups of five – for the first game.  The first game, initially meant to be a practice game, doubled as the basis for determining the final grouping.  The foreigners – me, Mend, Rhoda, Dashan and Hedar – started in one group.  The senseis also started in the same group, together with the Japanese post docs.

 

Practice games have always been crucial to my actual performance.  It would be the time for me to decide on which ball to use, experiment with the four-step and the three-step approaches, try spins and possibly, hooks, and determine where and when to release the ball.  Having been forewarned that there would only be one practice game, however, I decided to go less on the experimenting and focus more on the getting used to.

 

To say that I did bad on the practice game would be an understatement.  Despite my effort and concentration, the ball kept going way off to the left.  After four frames, I realized that the problem was with the ball so I switched from ten pounds to eleven.  Yet the problem persisted.  As I stepped on the lane to begin my seventh frame, however, I experienced an epiphany.  All the while, I’ve been throwing straight balls from the second dot from the right, right before the foul line.  Willing the ball to go left, I must have been giving it too much direction.  I assumed my stance and decided to release the ball between the second and the third dots from the right, giving it just enough direction to hit the right pocket.  The moment the ball left my hand, I knew I was getting a strike.  I did, and the spares that followed salvaged my pathetic score and helped me finish on the sixth spot, surprisingly two notches ahead of associate sensei, who might have had similar adjustment troubles, but way behind super sensei, who placed among the top.

An E-mail to Theang, Who Had to Go Away*

 

From: Me

To: Theang

Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2006 1:44 AM

Subject: Hey…

 

Theang,

 

I know it’s sad for you to leave Japan.  As for me, I thought I would be okay.  I didn’t expect it to be this sad for me, too!

 

Maybe we shouldn’t have spent so much time together.  It was your fault, you had to do a lot of shopping.  And see, what did I get from it?  Nothing but sadness, now that you’re leaving and I’m left without a shopping partner anymore.

 

Soon after you left the lab, I left too and because I was feeling sad, I thought of writing you a long e-mail.  But don’t you think that would be corny?  So, no, this won’t be long.  And besides, I have a baito at 8am tomorrow.  I need to sleep and gain much energy so that I would be able to face tomorrow’s stupid questions from stupid fourteen-year-olds.

 

I didn’t want to say goodbye.  I hate goodbyes.  I didn’t want to see you sad, I didn’t want you to see me sad, either.  For the rest of the year, I want to remember you as this jolly, smiling kid, always joking and laughing, and most of the time feeling so full of himself, claiming that he’s the eighth wonder of the world.  I hope you’ll remember me as a cheerful friend, too, not one whom you’ve made sad because of your leaving.

 

I wanted to write a little bit more, but this e-mail is making me even sadder.  So I guess I’ll just let you go on with your packing.  I wish you a pleasant trip and an eventful stay in Belgium, so you wouldn’t think too much about Japan.

 

As for me, I’m going to sleep and hope that I’d feel better tomorrow.

 

Take care of yourself.  Goodbye.  See you next year.

 

Me

 

---

 *posted with permission from the eighth wonder of the world himself

Night of the Fireflies

Wednesday night, we went to see the fireflies. I was about to catch the last bus home when, three minutes before it arrived, Fabien, a French friend from my dormitory, e-mailed me, saying it could be the last night the fireflies were out. So I walked back to the university, got my bike, met him in front of the clock tower and off we went to watch the insects’ struggle for their last chance at sex and procreation.

  

We found the fireflies by the creek a few meters away and parallel to Kamogawa, between Nijo and Marutamachi. Although not overwhelmingly many, they were flying everywhere – in and out of the bushes, on the small concrete bridge over the creek, even over the silently creeping water.

Looking at the insects flutter about, I was overcome with a deep feeling of sadness. I thought aloud, “I pity these fireflies. Each is mustering up the last of his energy to light his bum, trying to get some female to notice him and he’s not even sure if he can get his goodbye shag. Some may die trying, and much worse, virgin.”

  

Fabien was sympathetic. He looked up from where he was petting a fly and smiled. “Don’t worry. Who knows, they derive some sexual satisfaction from having fire on their butts.”  Oh, well. Who knows?

Almost, but Not Quite

 

Four hours later, at dinner, when Mend, a Mongolian labmate, asked me, "So, what were you thinking during your presentation?  And how would you assess it?" I tried to come up with an accurate and honest reply but I found out that I couldn’t.

 

God knows I’ve done everything I could to kill nine-tenths of the time on the introduction and bullshit my way through the rest of the paper.  The introduction, I was pretty familiar with.  There was no doubt in my mind that I could sail through it with firm self-assurance and commanding authority.  True enough, after overcoming the initial diffidence and the jitters, I was overwhelmed by this sudden surge of confidence, I felt like Fletcher himself presenting his very own publication.  Now and then, I would speak in a louder, more solid voice, emphasizing each essential point with a quick bang of my clenched fist on the board.  You see, it’s like this.  Nothing fancy, just a plain and simple manipulation of the inequalities.  Why the hell don’t you get it?  

 

The moment of certainty, however, ended soon after it began.  By the time I was wrapping up the introduction, I threw a glance at the wall clock, only to find out that I hadn’t consumed even half of the alloted time.  Gazing at the expectant faces of my sensei and labmates while mumbling some incoherent declarations, I realized that I had to move on.  And so I had no choice but to deliver a droning, mechanical demonstration of the algorithm, all the while thinking about how to go about the succeeding analyses and proofs.  This would go on for the rest of the presentation – I would absently discuss the present subject while plotting my strategy on attacking the next.  Fortunately, this was also the time when everybody, including the sensei and the presenter himself, would start losing interest on the topic being presented.  Usually at this point, the presentation would feel like an interesting speech unnecessarily prolonged.  An "overplayed" number one song.  A promising relationship that suddenly felt wrong. 

 

Long story short, due to my audience’s lack of interest in the second half of my presentation, I was able to elicit quite a few complimentary remarks and nods of agreement by the end of my performance.  Just when I thought I had gotten off the hook, however, sensei had to remind me that getting away couldn’t be that easy.  "So, were you able to completely understand the proof?"  His question was supposed to catch me unawares, but somehow, at the back of my mind I had second-guessed it so it didn’t come as a surprise at all.  Instead, I took it as my cue.  The one I had been waiting for.  I stood up straight, put one foot forward, took a deep breath. But when I opened my mouth, not a single note came out.  I completely forgot the lyrics, couldn’t decide on the pitch.  My throat had gone dry.  Had she been watching, my opera teacher would have cringed in shame.  I must have made some stupid confession instead, for the next thing I knew, someone at the back was snickering and sensei was shaking his head in disapproval and utter disbelief.

 

So, how would I assess it, you ask.  I honestly don’t know.  I guess I’m supposed to feel contented, even proud.  After all, since the seminar, one labmate has approached me to ask for advice as regards his own presentation.  But I’m not contented.  Neither am I proud.  I had my chance, but I lost it.  All I ever wanted was to sing my song.

A Serious Dilemma

 

On Monday, four days from now, I’m gonna present Roger Fletcher and Sven Leyffer’s Filter-type Algorithms for Solving Systems of Algebraic Equations and Inequalities in our laboratory’s weekly two-and-a-half-hour paper introduction seminar.

 

With the way things are going, I’m pretty confident that I’d be able to survive so long as I could linger on the introduction for two hours and twenty minutes, thereby leaving a barely (just barely) adequate ten minutes for the presentation of the algorithms themselves, convergence proofs, solution analyses, numerical results and conclusions. 

 

For the sole purpose of saving face should anything unfortunate happen, I’ve prepared a seven-minute song.  Now, what’s troubling me is – would I be able to pull it through a cappella?  Or should I ask a labmate to bring his guitar?

Head Erasers

 

I was supposed to watch two movies the other day – Proof, and a Korean movie with the Japanese title, Watashi no Atama no Naka no Keshigomu (The Eraser Inside My Head).  I know, my English translation of the title seems funny but in Japanese, it isn’t laughable at all.  I felt obliged to go because the movie ticket which would have cost me ¥1,300 was given by a labmate, who got it as a present from our sensei’s secretary.  Had my labmate offered to sell the ticket, I guess I’d still be interested because ¥1,300 for two movies was a great deal.  A movie normally costs ¥1,500!  Well, I think the ticket was cheap because the theater, situated in the historic area of Gion, was fairly old and was not readily accessible from Kyoto’s major shopping malls and night spots.

 

Proof was supposed to start at 16:50, Eraser at 18:45.  I leave my room at four, expecting to catch a bus right away.  But no, the bus passing through Gion comes once every hour and the next one comes at four thirty, thereby making it mathematically impossible for me to get to the theater on time.  I consider taking a cab but later decide against it.  A cab would cost more than a thousand yen, the expense cancelling out the idea of enjoying two movies for free.  With head low, stooped shoulders, and hands in my pocket, I walk back to my room, kicking the imaginary stones that imaginarily block my way.  I deliberate on whether to postpone my theater day altogether or go for just the Korean movie.  I decide on the latter since I’ve had my mind set all morning.  Three hours later, as I leave the theater with a runny nose and bloodshot eyes, I will look back and compliment myself for making this decision.

 

An irresistibly cute, sprightly, big boss’ daughter who can bawl on cue.  A grave, seemingly nonchalant construction hottie, claiming to be unable to cry, having shed all his tears when his mother abandoned him at a tender age.  Make them meet fortuitously at a Family Mart.  Let it turn out that the guy is actually working at the girl’s father’s company.  Create a major conflict by making the girl’s father look down on the guy for being a mere construction worker and for not having a decent family.  And when they eventually go against the odds, fight for their love and get married, mercilessly strike her with Alzheimer’s!  And what have you got?  A perfect plot for one of the most effective tearjerkers in filmmaking history!

 

Forty-five minutes into the two-hour movie, the tears started coming.  People were uneasily shifting in their seats, some started blowing their noses, the ojiisan behind me who had been snorting at every ludicrous scene was now breathing heavily through his mouth.  I knew we were all thinking of the same thing – how to sneakily dry our wet cheeks.  As for me, I decided to blink rapidly to stop the tears from coming and was about to close my eyes and just listen to the dialogue when I realized that it was in Korean and I wouldn’t be able to understand a thing unless I kept reading the Japanese subtitles so I thought better of it, took out my handkerchief and shamelessly dried my tears.

 

You’d think that was the end of it.  No, distressing scenes and dialogue would pop every five minutes for the remaining seventy-five minutes of the movie.  There was even a commotion at the back, which unintentionally yet suitably heightened the tension, when in the middle of a heart-rending scene, a doubled up youngster came running towards the exit.  Perhaps, he had to go to the lavatory or maybe he had an important phone call but I did like to think that he wasn’t able to contain all the drama onscreen.

 

We all came out exhausted.  At the bus stop, there was still talk about the movie.  A group of schoolgirls were laughing at one another’s puffy cheeks.  A youngish couple held each other tightly, as if an imaginary meddler were trying to draw them apart.  Such was the effect of the movie.  As for me, who had nobody to cling to and no one to talk to, I let the bus go and waited for the next one, all of a sudden feeling self-conscious of my runny nose and bloodshot eyes.