The Wall Less Traveled

So lately life has begun to feel like the road less traveled. Which, in my opinion, is a good thing. I mean, isn't life about maximizing your potential, pushing the boundaries, escaping your comfort zone? Well, I have been, for, I guess, 9 months now since I've joined Rakuten. And the closest metaphor I could conjure up is "walking along the wall".

Haven't we all tried that? Found a broken down wall, forgotten by time, a discarded piece of history, where, if you're careful and nimble enough, you could climb yourself, like a staircase, up into somewhere no one's been before, somewhere incredible. Because, God knows, unless you're in China, walls aren't normally made for walking. So, it is special in the sense that it is simply not done. Not done, because the stakes are high--literally high. At every moment, with every step, you titter-totter on the brink, as you go higher, and higher.

The allure, in my opinion, is the risk. Something so risky must be rewarding, right? Even if the result is inconsequential, taking risks is a test of our capacity to achieve. And in that essence, is a test of character.

And I've been testing myself these last few months, taking this lone walk along the wall. And in my journey, I keep asking myself, "What was it? What was it?" What was it that made me take the road not taken? What was it that brought this fierce unrest? What was it that made me walk out one evening, to bring me here?

But I am here, and the view is wonderful. And someday, the wall will end. And on that day, I'll have to choose which side to land on. Hopefully, it won't be a humpty-dumpty kind of ending.

Photo Credit: Wall in Intramuros from The Asian Network of Youth Volunteers

into winter

You get used to the cold, the longer you stay in it. However awful it gets. They weren't mincing words when they coined the phrase "numb from the cold." Fighting it, complaining about it, isn't going to clear the skies and usher the warmth back.

So I've gotten used to this bleak life I've found myself in: clock-in at work, clock-out from work, eat, sleep, pay the rent, get laid, get away, go far, and come back to the same dusty apartment where the calendar is inexorably running out of pages.

It's been great, I guess, to be where one would want to be. But damn, those guys who said, "Be careful what you wish for." Did they have to be so spot on? Why is it, that now that I've managed to win the one thing I've always coveted, must everything turn so damn difficult.

Because always and forever, I've always dreamt of freedom.

Since I was a kid, I've been afflicted with illusions of grandeur. Lofty dreams visit me at night, and contrast so starkly with vivid reality, the very real aspect of my quite average life. Food on the table, roof above my head, a bed to sleep in, and a family within arms reach were here for me, and yet I am stricken with this mad wish to escape.

I yearned it, the deep end of the pool, I wanted to be put to the test, to test my mettle, to stand outside and feel the light of the sun draw a long shadow upon the laborious trail that has now led me here.

Instead, it seems I've been left in the cold.

Photo credit: Winter landscape with a lamp-post and a distant view of haarlem by Jacob Van Ruisdael

a Sense of Distance

Far away is a feeling. It's a feeling not measured in feet nor footsteps, not in leagues nor landmarks; no, it is gauged in trifles. I measure it in the lengthy sentences crammed in every blank inch of a postcard; in the gap of words left unsaid to friends who are close enough to listen, yet too distant to hear; in every meaningfully clicked Like; in the density and brevity of a sent message made succinct in its request, reassurance, and regards.

Far away for me is expression with the volume down, and I fear the last bars left until I am struck mute.

But it's not like other feelings. Far away is not sad; it doesn't render remorse nor cause heavy drinking; and yet it pulls me aside to question what is missing, and how far is there left to go. Far away isn't happy either; it isn't comforting nor something to strive for; and yet it is inspiring and motivates me to go further.

Far away, unlike other emotions, isn't a shade or hue that life paints across the canvas of our days with every coincidence and happenstance. I feel like it's the realization that my actions have left me in-between.

If I were to draw all the new friends I have in my life as circles, they'd mostly be exclusive of each other. My friends each separately know the side of me that yearns for adventure in winding streets or forest paths, that hungers for much-delayed movies and helpings of cheese, or that part of me that won't get married anytime soon, and that side of me that writes. They see facets but never the whole, and far away is the distance between the intervening spaces.

So I am far away, somewhere between the place I have left, and the place that is left to be found. I am exactly were I need to be, but not exactly where I would like to stay. It's a personal journey, but it doesn't feel lonely. I may be travelling still, but I find stillness in this one thought: I am not lost, I am searching.

Photo credit: Iceberg Gaps by Mark J. Carter

somber straits

Like earthbound stars, shimmering on the surface of glass, a thousand shards of electric blue light floated freely in Sumida river. It was quite pretty. In a gentle way, they swayed to the quiet waltz of the water. Floating among the reflected clouds and above the deep, dark sky, they sloshed past.

It was to remember the fireflies, they said. There were thousands in the Spring, when the weather shifted and shrugged off the cold, and opened its arms to the warm sun. And in Edo-era tradition, they made a sport of catching fireflies here. They'd catch one or two in a lantern, to light the way home.

It's quite dreamy, isn't it? Even though I knew about the chemical reactions that yielded they're intriguing luminescence, there was a magical quality about this unworldly glow that teetered in the darkness. And I thought, it's good to know these things. The real world may, for the most part, be a harsh, no-nonsense kind of place, but there are glimpses through the fog.

There is more to the world. There is mystery in every quiet street, intrigue in every worn path, and promise in the shifting currents of the river. And though sometimes we may lose our way, stumble off the trail, or sink in the murky darkness, we simply need to hold on to the memory of light.

I like to think that life is the attempt to fill the heart with bright things. Like a lantern in the darkness, like a bouy in the turbulent sea, if you fill your heart with simple joy and simple kindness, the journey grows easier; the burden, lighter.

Like fireflies, from their light comes a lightness of being, and perhaps, like me, they dream to one day earn the serenity of the stars.

Photo Credit: Catching Fireflies by the Sumida River by Utagawa Kunisada I

Work, Work, Work

I guess it's about time I said something about the new place, the culmination of months of careful planning, and the final resting place of my (latest) hopes and dreams.

Well, it's great.

That's what I tell everyone who asks at least, then I swiftly distract them with a story of how everyone in my department are all [swarthy] men from America, Europe, and elsewhere, which to me is both encouraging and invigorating all at the same time, except when they wear shorts, and I end up mentally halting mid-line-of-code and thinking, "Ho- shi-, I'm such a lucky basta~rd!"

But the truth that lurks behind the wall of small talk and entertaining banter is that I am so terribly in love with my job. I am so genuinely happy to have landed this job where I get to work on projects that, from the perspective of someone who's been making little, quiet applications hidden away in some forlorn server on the dark side of the earth, has more screen time  has more far-reaching impact, has more fancy buttons and slick animations to complement every user twitch and twiddle. A big upgrade, I'd say, from the mangled hex digits, encoded dates and obscure toggles that were as intellectually challenging as they were obscure.

Where before my canvas were the pedestrian crossings and bike lanes of forgotten country roads, now I can paint frescoes on basilica walls. The beauty of mobile applications is their [prevalence]. For the humble app developer, his stage is the palm of your hand.

There're other things to consider at work, though. Like, as I mentioned, the manly colleagues, who are clever, intuitive engineers one second, and a rambunctious gang the next. They're like the brothers I never had, who have grown together, have so gotten used to each other, to a point that, from the uninitiated ears of an interloper, their varied interactions would come temperamental and brash. But they are all quite kind, the silly, boyish, lot of 'em, and are also quite human, prone to mistakes that in a team such as ours just manages to mix and dissolve together into a brew of stumbling, raving, genius.

What I initially saw as excessively vocal, was actually frank honesty. I've come to deeply respect this. What better company is there, than with those we trust?

So after the job, the people, that leaves us with the infrastructure of the company, the policies and perks. There's free lunch at the cafeteria, and vending machines at every floor, with an ATM at the 12th if you feel like dodging the sunlight a bit longer. My personal machine is a highly-spec-ed laptop on Windows to support any corporate application requirements, and my development machine is a powerhouse of a desktop, with dual monitors. One of which, is a wide-screen 23-incher in portrait mode. Oh, the number of lines of code I can see in a glance is a coder's wet-dream.

It's great, and my only challenge is, earning my place here.

Photo credit: Spring Fresco in Santorini from Jeremy Rutter
BGM: Lovelite - Brevity

your umpteenth-first salary is a desperate thing

I've never been flat broke in my life. I owe it to parents with stable jobs, a house that doesn't run out of food, and friends that are kind enough to loan me a buck or two whenever public transportation becomes "a luxury". By some miracle, I've managed to coast along in life never knowing what it means to be desperately, abysmally, direly out of cash.

I never had to wonder how I'm going to afford my next meal. I never had to spend a sleepless night in my apartment worrying how I'm going to pay for the roof over my head. I never considered the possibility of eviction, civil claims, or even having to say no to a night out for beer. I've never been afraid of being a destitute, because I could never imagine it happening to me.

But it could, I realize now. My mom's is retired, and she along with my sisters are all leagues away. My apartment just got some amazing pots and pans (all thanks to my sister), but nothing in terms of ingredients or even cooking oil (I do have a lot of peanut butter though). And finally, all my friends now are either too far away or, like me, faring for themselves as well.

If I run out of cash here, I'm fucked, is what it is.

So I plan meticulously, with an omniscient excel file that knows on a daily basis how many coins are left in my pockets. I also budget 6 months in advance, with exorbitant buffers and plenty of cash allotted to "backup".

So the transition to the new job had a lot of that planning put in it, and then some more, with a dash of worrying to taste. With preparation, I afforded the move to the new apartment, preparing for 4 overseas friends visiting, a weekend trip home, and miscellaneous costs that come with a new job and new friends. I had to sacrifice any outrageous birthday plans, funneling all my cash to get me through that last week before the first paycheck kicks in. The last canister of fuel that'll get me through this bleak, empty, gap of penniless space, and towards home.

And today was that day. I stayed up until midnight yesterday, doing laundry, whatever, bumming around, pretending not to worry, until midnight struck and I logged onto my Japanese bank account where, rising above the sea of gnarled Japanese characters, was plainly written: 0.

I'm fucked, is what it is.

I ran through my necessary expenses: rent and utilities which will total about a 100 thousand yen. Available resources: if my family could scrounge up that amount, it'll be too late before the rent is due. I don't have friends here who I think could part with that amount of money, nor would I be comfortable at all to ask for that amount of money from a friend. Cash loans are impossible for foreigners, which I unfortunately am. My only option is to confront the HR at work and demand the cash. And I won't take no for an answer.

So I slept, restlessly. And on the next day, took my time going to work, walking casually on the street. I came in late by 10 minutes, with my head recounting every argumentative Japanese phrase I could remember, riddled with the Japanese words for "rent", "salary", and "obligation".

To make thing official, I booted my PC and checked my salary statement to see how much I should've gotten. Since I still had to translate the statement, it took me a while.  But to my most pleasant surprise, after feeding in the elegantly-written Japanese script, the online translator spat out "bank transferred". Stress on the "-ferred". I was palpitating, and could barely input the security code for my bank account to check.

Well, it ended well for me. And all I have to say at the end of the day is your first salary is a magical thing.

Photo credit: Clan Takeda

thomas

Inspiration is a fickle thing. Mine always involved the residue of coffee, darkness outside the window, and the really, deathly stillness that only visits when everyone else is passed out, everyone else sane enough to choose a night of sleep than chase flitting thoughts and the glimpse of the shadow of the truth.

But I do. It makes me feel good when I try to explain life somehow. Or how happy I am right now. Or how tired I am right now. Or how lucky I am right now.

I am a man visited daily by doubt. I doubt life. Is it any good? I heard somewhere it's a terminal condition. So I constantly ask myself is this life? Am I living enough? Have I met enough friends? Made enough money? Put enough food in the ref, clothes in the laundry hamper? Bothered enough credit companies, troubled the landlord, the neighbors enough? Have I made my mom worry enough? My sister, my brother-in-law, my nephew in his tiny bed, have I made them rethink their relations?

Have I been here all along, lo' these 27 sordid years, turning 28 soon? A triumphant, titanic, terrific twenty-eight? I am not quite young, and definitely not that old. I am in-between again.

Like my job, I am in between knowing what needs to get done, and having absolutely no fucking idea at all.

See, my job is the job I've always wanted, which was entirely unexpected, but an evidently happy thing. And I want to do good with it. Make a difference, you know? Like they kept saying in the company mission, vision, values, speed, speed, speed, speech. Us, the employees, seek to empower the masses.

We hope to show the world that the internet is not a vending machine, a soulless panel of holes and buttons you shove money into to make all the pretty lights go on. No, no, the internet is filled with people. They're there, beneath the porn, the facebooking and twittering, underneath the adult-friend finder advertisements, sulking below the surface. We hope to purge them from out of the woodwork and into the light, where they can make a spectacle of themselves, make a profit, and give us a percentage.

It's a nice dream. A dream I've had before, in a time we were empowered by innovation.

I'm wide awake now. The morning light streaks in, the alarm buzzes some feet away. The shower must be turned on. The 5 minute walk to the station, 2 minutes down to the platform, 3 minutes standing in the train, 3 minutes to the office lobby, 5 minutes to my seat, all these must be trodden, a day at a time, need be.

I doubt if I'll make it. A Japanese friend of mine just today was doubting himself, too. He messaged all of us in group chat. How come he can't find a date? Was something wrong? Must he change? Our fellow friends chided him, in the loving way friends do. I said, in my habitually awfully phrased Japanese, that I've always like him just the way he is.

This kid was young, headed to university. Smart. Bright. Sports a bright yellow tie, yellow frames to his glasses, and yellow pants. He was a statement, and he was brave enough to state it.

I'm not too young, but I'm not quite old either. And sometimes, inspiration barges in from the depths of the murky night, from the errant roar of distant cars, and the calm rumbling of train tracks. Though tomorrow I'll doubt myself anew, for tonight at least I'll be a a firm believer in the joy I've amassed so far.

Have a little faith, is what I should have said. Have a little faith in yourself.

Photo credit: Doubting Thomas - Caravaggio

tightrope

We're only afraid when the unknown touches on things that matter to us most. I get scared whenever I watch horror movies, because I think they're a little too real for comfort. When I pat my pocket, my heartbeat quickens for a second, just enough time to remember how many installments I have left to pay for my feature phone. When I ride rollercoasters, I scream because I know that it was only the safety harness that kept my body in the seat and not splattered all over the sidewalk.

I was also afraid for a long time about what life in Japan would turn out to be. It would be a massive change. I imagined it endlessly. It grew dear to me. And now, it was time to see what it was all about.

See, since I've moved to Japan a year and a half ago, I didn't feel that the transition was complete. Life was easy and I felt like I was still being coddled, that I was still in my comfort zone. There was a safety net below, and I could venture as far as I like with nary a worry, just as long as I was safely within bounds set.

But within a year, I grew to wonder what life would be beyond the borders of propriety. If I dared, would a life more challenging be just as rewarding? It scared me, to the core, taking the first step out.

But being afraid didn't hold me back, it just made me more careful. Fear put failure in a whole new light. Now, whenever I got things wrong, I knew I did all I could, that I tried to anticipate the worst. And in hindsight, that self-consciousness may not get things to work out well as I'd hoped, but it did help out just enough to keep it from getting any worse. Dread taught me to be grateful for my tiny defeats, and to appreciate progress however small.

But it took a while for me to get used to the feeling of constant distress. I realize, a tight-rope walker's life is harder than it looks. Not only do they have to focus on every minute shift of their body, they also have to deal with the raging emotions that shout "Get Out! Get Away! Save Yourself While You Still Can!" And yet somehow, through this balancing act of keen self-awareness and even keener self-control, he still manages to bottle-up all those feelings. He takes one step forward. He re-adjusts his footing. And then, takes one more.

I did that, a day at a time. Go to the interviews, check. Write a compelling essay, check. Prepare a load of money, check. File my resignation, check. Find legal counsel, check. Argue constructively, check. Bid my goodbyes properly, check. Find a place to live, check. Pack my things and move out, check. Start a new life, check.

The truth is, even after all this, I'm still afraid. A new life means new challenges. Life doesn't get any easier anywhere you go apparently. But if you learn to walk that thin line between panic and courage, I found out that, soon enough, you'll find yourself standing on the other side. And there will be applause.

Photo credit: Firewater - Man On The Burning Tightrope

Comfort & Security

Foreword: I wrote this the day after I settled the details of my resignation. It was the moment I glimpsed the end of a dreadful long road that involved twilight interviews, clandestine visits to government offices, and an all too sobering realization that I really was alone here on the other side of the China sea.

In my mind, comfort is a place and a time. It is a Sunday afternoon outside the family room. It is warm. The sunshine brightens the green lawn, the trimmed hedges. Then comes a rustling. A gentle breeze cuts across the lawn, slips through the open foyer, lifting white lacy curtains, and whirls among sofas, picture frames, a fruit bowl, and the flowers in their flower vase. I would be sitting in a plump reading chair, an open book in my lap, and I would want nothing more.

Security, in my mind, is a place and a time. It is twilight in suburbia. It is in the creeping darkness of twilight, a spatter of dim lamps from pre-fabricated bungalows across the skyline. It is a little chilly. It is also quiet, save for the electric hum of the neighbor's appliances, and the errant cry of a grumpy child. I would be standing out there on the front porch of a friends place, or someone familiar, maybe with a cigarette in hand, or a phone after a call. I would look up to the sky, and the stars would look down on me, and I would realize I am in the middle of nowhere, and yet feel that I am exactly where I should be.

For the next few weeks, I am allowing fate to show me a different kind of life. Comfort will be the 8-minute walk to the station, my very own bathroom, kindly old ladies who say hello, a mattress, enough space for shoes. Security will be a change of pace, the promise of constancy, a view of the sea, a tower in the night, a time to seize the world.

Photo credit: Reading Chair With Book And Cup Of Coffee by Walt Maes

garbage week

The irony is not lost on me that the week I move out of the dorm is also the week I get trash duty. I take out the burnables on Tuesday, plastics on Wednesday, paper on Friday, and on Saturday I'll be hauling my personal "garbage" out on the curb for the moving truck to pick-up.

They say when you throw stuff away, you make space for new things, and it works out since I've got a lot of new things barging into my life these coming weeks.  But I'm a still little uncomfortable talking about these new changes, because most of these changes have to do with things I'd rather keep under wraps. Why the secrecy? Well, it's a number of things.

First, it's a matter of tact: I'm not the type to brag. All the people I respect don't have a habit of bragging. I think there's really nothing to gain from gloating aside from ill will, or in some cases, a punch in the face. I'm not really the fighting type, so I'd rather not risk it, too.

Secondly, it's a matter of obedience. I was instructed to keep a lid on it. I've actually told a few people, people I hold dear enough because they're my friends and they should know what's happening in my life. I owe their constant companionship that gesture. But the truth is I wish I could just tell everyone. Life is simpler with no secrets.

Lastly, and this one I'm still having a hard time with, I'm in denial. The move is only 1 week away, and the week after will be that day. Things are moving really quickly, to say the least. Though all the details are in place, there's still a long list of things left to be done. I'm taking it a day at a time, but it has been a rough ride so far.

But I'm proud of myself in a way. This is the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, and yet, with a little help from home and good friends, I've been managing well. Despite staying in a country with only a slip of paper keeping me away from deportation, a language that considers me illiterate, and a currency value pulling my income and assets down with it, I think I'll be alright.

Because here in Japan, there's always a way to make things work out. Someone's done the thinking and put some process in place to catch your fall. So those bags of garbage I'll take out tomorrow morning, the shelves of books I've amassed these past months , the printed photographs of friends I've been given, there's a place for everything and a home for everyone here.

And I'm on my way there.

Photo Credit: the Star

the Story in the Sea

There are stories out there that find us and touch us deeply, like an ocean wave that crests above us, slams down, engulfs our body, and recedes leaving an unsettling chill that remains long after the sea has dried off from our shivering skin.

These stories are fantastic, a trip around the limits of imagination. They take our hand and lead us out to the distant fringes of our lives, then invites us to stare into the darkness far and beyond.

I am left restless every time I find stories like this. I wonder, how a story so strange to me, so far removed from my dull life, could affect me so deeply.  How could mere words provoke me, how can it lure me out of worrying about schedules and deadlines and laundry and duty, and leave me spellbound, submerged in wonderment.

I can't help but wonder what it means. If it was meant to mean something. If it meant anything at all. Did I waste my time listening to the story, and now waste some more rationalizing it. Can a story not be purposeful and stay relevant?

And yet I feel the remnant chill of the sea, I feel the fibers of my being drenched and saturated by unfamiliar images, thoughts, and words. I am compelled to think about it, think about how something so far outside of my life, could make me feel so alive.

Photo credit: Awais Aftab

New Year Slur

I am kind of tipsy, which, in my opinion, is the best way to usher in the work week. In the same manner that we hastily tear-off bandages, and swiftly plunge syringe needles into our defenseless skin, a little fuzziness in the brain helps to muddle the concept of time. That is, before you know it, you're already manacled again to your computer desk and, by then, what's else is there to do but reply to the thousand nagging emails, and worry about the thousand things each of those emails were asking about.

But, it's not like I'll be drunk until tomorrow. No, no. I'll be on this fizzy trip for but a few hours before bed. I'll wonder what 2013 really means to me, wonder if I'd have noticed the year change if I'd have been locked up in a dark-dark cell for the past month or so.

Was there a difference? Have I grown? Have things changed? Will they ever change? And if they don't, why are we celebrating? What are all the fireworks for, aside from the vendors turning a profit on those 3 for 100peso roman candles that perform just as well as erectile dysfunction?

I believe everyone craves a fresh start. I do, too. There's nothing wrong with wanting a clean slate; a new year is equivalent to that. You buy a new calendar so you get to throw away that other one filled with stuff you managed to finish, promised to finish, forgot to finish, and a large amount of exclamation points in red-red ink for times that really mattered. You get a bonus with which you erase(and forgive) all/some/a portion/a smidgen of that credit card balance you've been racking up the whole year past. You get to greet old flames a happy new year, and get a curtly phrased reply back that tells you the cycle continues anew.

A new year is symbolic for people looking to do better, or to continue to do better. A new year is meaningful for people who haven't given up. A new year is a new cycle in the endless array of challenges life crams down our throats.

And for those of us who are brave enough to step into it with nary a drink in hand, my highest commendations to you. As for me, well, looking at the upheavals to come in 2013, I am of the impression that the days ahead may pass smoother with a bit of fire in my blood. Fire to stoke the passion, the courage, the embers of the once raging heart that made 2012 such a momentous year.

Cheers.

Photo credit: Cheers invites by YesterdayCafe