Markku´s Eurovision Special! pt.1

This by a pretty intesting phenomen of late.

Markku from Finland, he speaks English with the perfect Finnish Accent and basically represents the stereotypical Finnish countrysider. More funny than it sounds :)

Here he is talking about the Finnish traditions during May Day (1st of May, Vappu). Around the middle he interviews a french guy whose International Tutor I am here at Helsinki Uni of Technology. Vince!

日本人のこう君も居たみたいだが、写っていない。

B'z LIVE Koi No Summer Session 恋のサマーセッション

Let's do some more blogging trough YouTube.

Here is a video I uploaded myself.

The song is so-so, but the dancing school girls more than make up for it :D

Could Helsinki, Finland fit inside Yamanote-sen, Tokyo?

So I started wondering with my beloved Google Maps.
How would my beloved birthplace Helsinki fit inside Tokyo's Yamanote line.

Not the whole Helsinki though, downtown Helsinki is where the buildings are so I'm comparing that :)

(For the informed downtown Helsinki in this case is something that starts from Pasila and continues until you hit the sea)

So here's what we work with:
On the left, Tokyo Yamanote-line highlighted, and on the right the Helsinki downtown highlighted (Notice the difference in the amount of greenery). The scale should be the same and the sizes of the pictures are the same (Note how downtown tokyo is made of more concrete and less sea than Helsinki).

Well, we can already see that apparently downtown Helsinki will fit inside without a problem.




And here, the result (Helsinki=red part):



Not a suprising result, but interesting for me to see how the scales compare. Although area-wise Helsinki can fit inside roughly probably two times, it also tells that the area inside Yamanote-line that actually feels humongous is actually quite tightly packed. The fact that it's not such a huge area after all is not all that suprising as there have been rumours that only the Japanese Emperor can afford to live inside the Yamanote-line and Tokyo has alot of people to accomodate ;)

Playing with Google Maps

Google is really crazy lately.

They are buying internet companies left and right (most notably YouTube) and providing some of the best services (Gmail, This Blog, Google Analyst, Google Documents etc.) I've seen and mostly for free.

Companies like Microsoft and lately also Nokia (which in it's new organizational structure also plans to become an internet company) will have a fair challenge catching up with the superb quality and seamless integration Google has in it's products.

Most of you probably know of Google Earth, which is fun and great.
But in fact the browser based Google Maps is better in my opinion. It's more robust and allows for easier sharing of maps and a much better search function.

Here, a map I made: MyJAPAN

見てみな！（クリック！）

Japanese stuff

This is a funny (albeit a bit worrying) commercial from a Japanese social networking site mixi (invitation only). It's for some company that helps people lose weight. The translation goes:
"I want to eat, but I want to lose weight"
"I hate self control!"
Obviously she is a perfectly thin and quite a cute model...
I couldn't find it again but I also saw another commercial on the lines of:
"My boyfriend said: Ah if you just were thinner you'd be cute" - this also featured a picture of a cute (thin) Japanese model..

This is how marketers portray women in Japan? And it works too?
Wow...


This was on the blog of a Finnish researcher in Tokyo, but I'll post it here too ;)
Apparently it showed up on her postbox one morning. It's saying:

"Private Detective - Advice
Is your LOVE real?
We help you bring back happy life by revealing the truth"

AND IT'S A CUTE BEAR DETECTIVE. ON THE BACKGROUND A DADDY BEAR IS TAKING A GIRL BEAR TO A LOVE HOTEL!
Oh boy...


So let's end with a more comforting picture:
The elderly in Japan are very healthy (and live the longest in the world)
In fact they are so healthy that they take up SKATEBOARDING even if prescribed walking sticks!!

Tokyo Institute of Technology - YSEP (Young Scientist Exchange Program) Application Process up until this point

I'll write down relating to the application process for Tokyo Institute of Technology (henceforth: Toukoudai) YSEP-program. It's boring but hopefully will bring comfort for future applicants. As I remember searching the internet for information on "how it really happened", so I would know better than just "how the school says it will happen"

At my school the application process takes almost a whole year before the actual date to leave to Japan comes (I'm still not there). In other schools it might start during the spring of the year you go to exchange.

One cloudy morning I went to my schools International Office and I told I would like to go to exchange to Japan. I was told to fill in forms for my schools internal selection process, which will most probably differ from university to university. My Universitys process included making letters of motivations, a study plan which had to be approven by a professor and all the necessary documents like study records etc. The University's internal process was very fast, I got the answer in less than two weeks that I will be recommended for Toukoudai's YSEP-program. Some other(s) also applied, but only I was accepted to this program. This was apparently to maximize chances of people getting to an exchange program at least somewhere. Luckily the ones who applied to YSEP and didnt make it, got places to study in other Uni's in Japan.

After getting acceptance from my Uni I was given the YSEP Application Forms to fill. These included a recommendation letter from a professor. A Letter of Motivation. Application for Certificate of Eligibility (Probably the most confusing form of these all) and the Toukoudai application papers with some fairly basic questions.

Then I started the wait for Toukoudai's confirmation, all I had to go with was my Uni's study offices "around summer next year" and the YSEP-webpage "Before the end of April next year"
All I knew is I had a looong wait ahead of me. And I'm not good at waiting. And if I were to fail my plans would be scrapped for a much loooonger time.

So time passed, I was occupied and motivated with my studies, all the time hoping for a year in Japan starting from next spring.

Around two months before the YSEP-websites "The End of April" I was starting to feel a bit anxious at times. I was wondering if everything is going like it should be and are the professors at Toukoudai happy with my study background and did all necessary letters reach Toukoudai safe and other this kind of useless worries. As the End of April got closer I was hoping they would send me the acceptance earlier so I can enjoy the Finnish VAPPU (1st of May) full of energy.

Then the end of April came.

The acceptance didn't come.

Then Vappu came (on top of it there is the Golden Week holidays in Japan which effectively closes all offices)

And I still enjoyed Vappu with full vigor:

(I'm on the right)

After the END OF APRIL, I had a few days of patience to wait for some message until I just wrote an e-mail to the international coordinator there (who seems to be a nice person by the way) and after a few days I got a reply that I was be accepted. The friggin long wait was over.

フォーーーーーーー！！

I had an image that Japanese will be extremely punctual on issues like this, but apparently Japanese bureaucracy is as stiff as anywhere elses. In fact I am still waiting for the official "Letter of Acceptance" that should be coming right about now... (End of June)

The process from now on will be getting the papers necessary for me to be able to apply for a student visa at a Japanese embassy here in Finland, these papers will be sent quite late in my opinion; the End of July, which effectively gives me One Month to apply and receive a visa (please be on time this time).

A really popular question seems to be, "What are the chance to get in to the program?" Well my impression is that as long as your university has an agreement with Toukoudai and you are the only one coming from that particular university (probably not feasible in Asian Uni's) your chances are close to 100% As long as you submit ALL the information that is requested, extra care should be taken on this.


If this entry will someday bring comfort to someone wondering about the situation, good.

Pictures Continued

So apparently Picasa doesn't allow for more than 4 pictures posted at a time.
Here are the last ones (see posting below)


あきちゃんと。


人がいっぱい来てくれました。


夜のタイヨウ

Farewell BBQ

Again some Picasa blogging.

There was a farewell BBQ for a total of 4 Japanese friends going back to Japan this week. (1 is coming back after one week though :/ )
A record amount of people showed up at the BBQ, this time it was not due to my effort the least bit.
Everyone seemed to have a good time.

I'm not much of a writer so I'll let the pictures do the talking.


オタニエミの信用ができるグリル、しょぼそうかも知りませんが、とてもうまく焼けるグリルである。


建築のけーご君とあやなさんが帰国しますんで、お写真を取らせてもらいました。


トシ君も帰るけど真由美さんはまだすくなくとも2年間フィンランドにいらっしゃるのではないか。

Tokyo 2006

While I'm at it let's post some pictures from Tokyo last summer 2006!
This whole b logging thing is pretty fun isnt it.


Paintings in front of a primary school


My favorite: ニッポンにいい男を。



Free "Service" at an Izakaya where my friend worked. It is Sashimi raw fish, served on a wooden miniature ship


With Imai-san + ワンカップ

Juhannus Midsummer 夏至祭

Ok, this time I'm trying the blog-function from Picasa. The HTML-formatting interface seems a bit stiff, but otherwise seems like a great tool. Picasa is a pretty great Photo management software from Google, if you have alot of pictures you might want to give it a try, it has some nice functions such as batch resizing a large or small amount of pictures, sorting your pictures by date, a great batch email tool, this blogging tool I'm trying now etc. etc.

The previous weekend (22-24.6.2007) was midsummer in Finland. Went to a trip in Åland an autonomical state of Finland, where they only speak swedish, have their own flaq, car register plates, stamps etc...Well if they really want them to be happy, let them have it. I think that's a really Finnish way of handling internal politics :)
I also made my first visit to a small distant Finnish town called turku, this is where we took the boat to Åland.


me in turku

Sunset around 22:00


Portable BBQ, the best invention since since mäyräkoira (http://www.paulilahtinen.net/images/lapinkulta_300.jpg)

Huge ships kept passing through.

Tokyo Jihen - Honnou (本能) Live

Trying out the Youtube "Post to Blog" functions.

seems pretty easy to use, how is the result?

This is another really cool live performance by Shiina Ringo, she really has balls for a japanese girl and also easy on the eyes huh.

Announcements

I don't really update this blog much do I?
Is it OK to blog at work? Well I've finished the tasks given to me for today,



Since I have been accepted as an exchange student in Tokyo Institute of Technology （東京工業大学） YSEP-program (Young Scientist Exchange Program? YSEP　短期留学特別プログラム（短期っていうか一年となります）) I plan to start updating this blog regularly, perhaps even almost daily? We'll see how that goes. Very ambitious of me I'd say.

Happened so far:

• I'm working an internship at Accenture, an ideal company for my ambitions, but unfortunately my current task is exactly what I don't plan to do in the future. Still however the first time i get to see how a global company works, and on top of that I'm working at the premises of the Most Famous Company in Finland (Can anyone guess? ;) ) So eventually I get to see two companies of interest. And on top of that get a starting point for my professional career. Perhaps this year won't be remembered because of going to exchange, but because I got a JOB....well if I were that ambitious....
• Got the date for my plane to Japan. My arrival, 5th of September 2007. I will be able to go to my dorm on the 20th. So I've got some spare time. Probably I will go travel, try some onsens and taste some fish in the north? Also would be nice to have a chance to stay at some friends place for sometime to keep the costs down.
• Got contact with my professor in Japan. He is ITOH, Kenji from a laboratory related to Cognitive Science, seemed like a very nice person and already had some good suggestion for what I could study.

最近の気に入りのYoutube

SHIINA RINGO



島歌 by Gackt :D　(he is from Okinawa)