January 2013

Transit

Dogenzaka, pre-snow

Making my way from Shibuya back to Atwater Village is time travel. It’s distorting and confusing and exhausting, but somehow it works. This is how my day played out, which isn’t too different than many of Japan->US travel days.

Saturday
7am Wake up, Shibuya.
7:30am shower, email, etc.. My original flight had been cancelled since it was on a 787 and they seem to have this “bursting into flames” problem, so United rebooked me on a new flight. I double check to make sure it’s confirmed and see they’ve assigned me a bulkhead seat which is nice because of the legroom but crappy because you can’t keep your carry on with you during take off and landing. Also no way to confirm at this late hour if they’ve processed my vegan meal on the new flight – Oh well.
8am Breakfast at hotel
9am Walk to train station and buy day-of Narita Express tickets, then back to the hotel to pack bags. Often I’ll buy round trip tickets from the airport when I arrive but if the JR office is closed when I arrive that isn’t possible.
10am Checkout of hotel, but leave bags at hotel desk. This trip, like many others, I have one small roller board suitcase and my backpack – everything fits in those two.
11am Last minute errands. Today that included helping Naim and Levi and Noa see a little of Tokyo besides the Safecast office. We walked through Shibuya to Tokyu Hands then up Cat Street making our way to Omote Sando for food.
12:30pm Lunch at Brown Rice Cafe
1:30pm Jump on the train back to Shibuya, then rush out to the hotel to pick up bags, then turn right around and go back to the train station to catch the 2:16pm NE’X to the airport.
2:16pm Get on the NE’X. Trains in Japan are on time to the second, so if you don’t get there early you miss it. I usually try and get to the platform 15 minutes early to be safe. Today I got there 3 minutes early, with elevated heart rate. The trip from Shibuya to Narita Airport is about an hour and a half.
3:47pm Arrive at NRT, get out of train station, return the WiFi hotspot I rented last week then make my way to the 4F departure floor where I’m lucky enough to have airline status that gets me an express line to pick up my boarding pass and then head to security. Laptop out, keep shoes on – That’s how they do it in Japan. No pornoscanners so no worries.
4:00pm Clear passport control and head to the airport lounge to get everything in order for the flight.
4:10pm Arrive at ANA/Star Alliance Gold lounge. This is a serious protip here- the United lounge at Narita is a piece of shit. They have no food, crappy drinks and barely a power outlet in the whole place. At the far end of the terminal is the ANA lounge and being Star Alliance Gold gets you into it – it’s a walk but it’s worth it. They have a noodle bar in the lounge, endless Inari sushi and CC Lemon on tap. As well as many other options. This lounge rocks, and usually it’s empty. Today it was packed and I had to stand for 10 minutes or so until a seat opened up. I get some food and catch my breath.
5:00pm Leave the lounge and head back to my gate. Lounge is near gate 47 and I’m flying out of 37, boarding is scheduled for 5:05 but today it’s delayed a little and everyone stands around WTFing until about 5:20.
5:20pm board the plane with first batch of folks. Head to the bulkhead seat and get settled.
5:25pm Dude sits down next to me and immediately starts chatting me up. Was I on that other cancelled flight too? Was LA my final destination? How long had I been in Japan? Business?
5:30pm Another dude shows up and has a boarding pass for the seat I’m in. I check mine and see that sometime between when I looked this morning and when I got to the airport I had been moved 2 rows back. YES! Dodged that bullet. I leave Mr. Chatty pants and go back to a totally empty row.
5:50pm I’m in the window seat and a guy sits down in the isle seat and immediately falls asleep. Flight crew announce all passengers are seated and we’re about to take off. Awesome, middle seat is empty.
6:25pm Take off!
6:45pm I confirm that United fucked up my meal request and they only have beef or salmon to offer me. I’m annoyed but I should have known and I kick myself for not grabbing some snacks earlier in the day.

The next 9 hours are a blur of short naps, light reading and watching movies I’ve already seen on the tiny screen built into the back of the seat in front of me. At some point I remember that I also have a few episodes of something on my laptop and pull that out, a much more rewarding experience.

Saturday
10:29am land at LAX. Yes, I’ve just landed about 8 hours earlier than I took off on the same day. Time travel!
10:45am get to the gate and get off the plane
10:55am skip the customs line and head to the Global Entry kiosk and scan my passport, then hand the print out to the CBP dude. Get waved through.
11:05 jump in an Uber Taxi outside the airport and head home
11:29 Arrive home. Possibly a new record time.

I spend the next few hours playing with Ripley and telling him I missed him, then he says he’s tired and I am too so we snuggle up and take a nap.

6pm wake up, think about how long the day has been. Welcome Tara home from work, wrangle up some food, hang on the couch with the family for a while.
9pm The family crashes, I try to catch up on some work that I might have missed during the epicly long day I just had.
11:00pm Remember I need to blog today and tell this story. Then head to sleep.

Return

Bird, Shibuya

I’m flying back to Los Angeles tomorrow (though not on the 787 I was initially booked on thanks to the whole “bursting into flames” thing). I haven’t wanted to go home this much in a very long time. I’ve been away for almost 2 months at this point with the exception of a few stop overs to do laundry and change luggage for climate appropriate garb and then off to my next destination. Especially difficult was the drastic change of being with Tara and Ripley basically every waking hour of every day in December and then the moment we got home turning around and flying solo to Japan where I only get to see them for a few minutes a day via skype or facetime. I’ve missed my family. I’ve missed my home and my bed and my friends.

Ripley starts preschool shortly and his development has become super obvious to me during this trip, even though (or maybe because) my interaction with him has been sparse. Used to be that Tara would show him the video chat and he’d say hi and maybe blow kisses but generally just nod and smile. I haven’t been away from him for any stretch in 4 months or so, and this time he’s got lots to say. Telling me about his day, showing me stuff through the camera, telling me he misses me. I was not prepared for the grip this little guy has on my heart. So yeah, I’m looking forward to getting home soon.

That said, this trip was very productive. I’ve got a lot more to write about it in the coming days, but need to process my thoughts and notes first. Completely exhausting 20 hour days back to back, but really productive and beneficial for a number of reasons. I took a ton of photos as well, and have been posting them a few at a time on flickr in case you care to check those out. Almost 2am, so I’m calling it a night.

Fear

While I try not to anticipate the reaction anything I write will get, I can’t help but know that certain topics will attract the attention of certain people. Yesterday’s post about quitting your job for example, I have a group of friends who I’ve had this discussion with in person for a long time. Some who already knew it and some who had recently come to that same conclusion. It’s a challenging position on a challenging topic, but I knew these people would be supportive.

I hoped there would be some others who might have been thinking along those lines but had been to afraid to make a move and seeing a post like that might encourage them to make a change in their lives for the better.

I’ve talked about this topic before and I had an idea what reactions I might expect. The haters were new, though perhaps shouldn’t have been surprising. That post, like this one is about fear. It’s about identifying that fear, addressing it and pushing past it. That’s the ideal anyway, some people are afraid and rather than face that they lash out.

Some people think that quitting their job means they will be broke and then homeless and then starve. When I hear someone use that argument – and I’ve heard it a lot – what is really clear is that those people are afraid that they have no worth. They think they are lucky to have the job they have and if they walked away they’d never be able to get another job. Because they aren’t good enough. They are afraid. Some of them might be right. But this argument says more about the person making it than the opportunities available. And my point is that many opportunities don’t present themselves until you are in a position to take advantage of them.

Self worth is a huge piece of this, because if you think you have some value in this world, then you have to trust that someone else might agree you have value, and if someone else agrees you have value then you can always find a job because you are a valuable person. So if you leave one job, the possibility that you will never get another job isn’t even something to consider. You are trying to get a better job, and if you can’t, you can always get one just the one you already had. If you think you can’t get a job like the one you have now, then you think you aren’t worthy of the job you currently have.

Some people think it’s crazy to take a step until they know exactly where that step will land. I can’t agree. I think planning out every single step prevents you from taking chances, and if you don’t take chances then you can’t ever expect to have a chance work in your favor. Some people are afraid of taking chances. I can’t imagine living under that kind of fear. I just don’t think that lowly of myself.

Whoever you are, I think you can do something awesome. And I want your life to be awesome. That’s why I keep pushing. And I don’t plan on stopping.

Quit your job. Today.

If you are standing on the ledge looking over and need a little push I’m here to kick you square in the ass and push you the hell off the roof. You’ll learn to fly or you die at the bottom, but you know that I’m right when I tell you that either of those options are better than just standing on that ledge forever. At least they are action.

Here’s the thing, you only get one life. And in the big scope of things it’s pretty short. So why would you waste a single moment of it doing something that isn’t awesome? If you love your job and can barely tell the difference between when you are working or not then I’m not talking to you. But if you dread going to work every day and count the seconds until you are finished for the day I might as well have put your name in the title of this post.

Yes you.

What are you waiting for?

There’s never going to be a right time. There will never be a safety net. It will never be comfortable. It will never be easy. But change and growth isn’t supposed to be. It’s scary. It’s nerve wracking. It’s terrifying. It’s also the only option you have if you don’t want to look back and think you wasted your life. It’s the only option you have if you want to be happy. It’s the only option you have if you want to do anything besides just sit still being depressed. And it’s the most rewarding thing you will ever do. Really, what are you waiting for?

You know full well you don’t like what you are doing. So do something else. The worst thing that can happen is that you won’t like it. In which case you are exactly where you are right now. Every other potential out come puts you in a better position. I know this, because the people who can’t do something else, the people with no vision to do something else, the people with no dreams to do something else don’t ever consider it. They don’t even know there is a ledge they could be looking off of. They are clueless to the better options laid out before them. But you know about the ledge, you know about the options, you are just scared to reach for them.

Don’t be scared. Be excited.

If you don’t try you are assured to fail. 100% guarantee that you won’t pull it off if you don’t go for it.

So go for it. Stop fucking around and talking yourself out of it. The next thing you do will be awesome. You just have to believe that, and then do it. What are you waiting for?

Acceptance

Given how quick I am to judge everyone else around me you might think I’m more comfortable being judged myself. So might I, but as I’ve gotten older I have to admit that isn’t entire accurate. Or rather, I realize there is some grey area between what judgements I care about and those I don’t. I spent a large portion of my child hood being worried that everyone was judging me all the time, and then I realized that was a waste of time and the pendulum swung hard the other direction and I spent the rest of my formative years not giving a shit. Middle age has landed me somewhere in the middle.

It turns out that I walk a razor thin line between fear of rejection and not giving a crap. The truth is I’m still pretty indifferent about most people’s feelings about me. I’m fairly comfortable with the person I am and the choices I’ve made with regards to how I live my life. Because of that I generally feel that if a person doesn’t like something about me they are welcome to fuck right off. Seriously. Right off. And this is true for almost everyone I encounter on a daily basis. But not everyone.

There’s another group of people – a very small one mind you – who I’m constantly nervous that I’m going to offend. Or maybe offend is the wrong word, I know I’m going to offend everyone at some time so I’ve given up worrying about that. I’m constantly nervous that they will think less of me. This small group of people, these are the people I genuinely care about. These are the people that I love. The ones I’d be heart broken if they weren’t in my life anymore – so to some extent I guess I’m worried I’ll do something to push them away.

The result of all this is I think I’m much more guarded around people I know than those I don’t. I don’t care what people I don’t know think about me, but I totally care about the ones I do.

In thinking about that, I don’t think that’s unusual. To care about the opinions of people you care about. But when you step back a little bit it’s actually kind of weird. Look at this math: People I don’t know or causally know + don’t care what they think of me = confident // vs // People I care about + do care what they think about me = less confident

Do I tell some guy about to back into me that he has no idea how to drive a car? Sure. Do I tell my friend that her band is unoriginal and kinda sucks? Probably not. Do I tell my wife my every dirty, sexy and freaky desire? Of course not, like a normal person I keep that shit locked up and just hope she magically reads my mind.

Doesn’t it seem like maybe that should be reversed? Am I alone on this one? What causes this? Fear? Trust, or lack of it? If the situation was reversed wouldn’t I want the guy I was about to hit with my car to keep his damn mouth shut? Wouldn’t I want to trust that my friends would give me honest opinions about my band? Wouldn’t I be excited to learn I was married to some kind of dirty, sexy freak?

Like usual I don’t have the answers here, but it’s something I’m thinking about. I should more often put on a smiley face for strangers and be more honest and forthcoming with friends? The most honest and forth coming friends I have are generally considered dicks by most everyone else, because most people don’t want honesty. Yet I very much appreciate their candidness and openness. Hrm..

Research, global citizenship

I’ve talked about this idea here and there in the past, and am working on a longer piece about it but I wanted to throw out some ideas here and get some feedback to see what people thought and what issues are the ones most likely to be stickiest. So this is obviously a continuation of some of the ideas that have come from the technomads discussions and kind of gets into the roots of what citizenship is all about. And how that all plays into the world in 2013 and beyond.

When thinking about citizenship I think it’s useful to discuss the pros and cons, as well as the past vs the present. Let’s think of the big ones.

Most obviously the major benefit of being a citizen of anywhere is the support that comes along with that. I think this is the main thing – having a government “watching your back” so to speak – at least while traveling internationally anyway. You could argue that many of the benefits you receive as a citizen inside any country are also shared by many non-citizens inside that country so classifying those as perks of citizenship are difficult. Being able to vote is a plus, at least if you want to help influence the direction of some level of politics. If you don’t live in the country you are a citizen of that becomes less important, until you start thinking about “branding.”

The “branding” (I don’t know what else to call it) that comes with being a citizen of somewhere can be positive or negative depending. In some places in the world advertising that you are an American for example could attract some unwelcome attention – people who are upset with actions the US government has taken might project those feelings onto individuals. Similarly being an American might grant you some extra freedoms in other parts of the world where there are positive relations.

In the past, being a citizen of some place related much more to where you were, since people didn’t travel as much as they do now. And there was risk of neighboring people invading you, so having a country looking out for you was a pretty good thing. These days, with much more bouncing around the world which passport you happen to have is just as likely to cause problems and headaches as it is to open doors. The argument that a citizenship reflects a culture makes sense in really small geographic countries, not so much in widely spread ones.

I’m thinking a lot about the value of “where you are from” vs “where you are” as well as “where you are going” and how these things play together – nicely or not. I have a lot of questions and not a lot of answers. Would love to hear peoples thoughts on anything that might relate to this.