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Here in Japan you see a lot of English being used.
Some of it in more creative and amusing ways than others.
One of my favorite things to do is to read the English
that is put onto T-shirts and other types of clothing.
Following are a sample of some that I have seen:
Thank Heavens Rock Pank Lets go to Hells
- I'm not really suer what the author was shooting for
here, but they seem to be covering their bases.
Goofy and Regular - Fun and harmless
Stinker - Funny, yet still harmless
Trustworhty...a way of thinking -
There is a good moral to this one. Either that or it
is a form of rationalization...
Slut - Simple, yet delightfully unrefined.
Especially when it is on a shirt worn by a 12 year old
girl.
Usually this "drive by" English is nothing
more than an amusing, and many times confusing distraction
for me, but just a couple of days ago I saw one such
instance of English on clothing here that gave me reason
to pause and really think.
I was on the train coming back from Shinagawa one evening
and had propped myself up in the little space between
the door and the seat and was passing the time by doing
a little people watching.
Across the door from me on the same side of the car
was a constrcution worker reading some sort of pornographic
magazine. Across from me on the opposite side of the
car next to the door was an older lady with some shoping
bags.
On the other side of the door across from the older
lady was a young girl tanned as dark as humanly possible.
Were talking melanoma city. Kind of a spinoff from the
Gungaro look of a few years back except for the fact
that her nakeup was not quite so heavy (thick?) and
instead of wearing platform shoes she had on a pair
of Ugs. (Ugs are all the rage here this winter.)
On the seat next to me was an exhausted trenchcoat
wrapped salaryman complete with battered briefcase and
combover from hell. (Here in Japan combovers are reffered
to as "bar code" hair) He was completely out
of it and had flopped over to the side, his combover
drooping ever so gracefully on the shoulder of the woman
next to him who of course ignored the whole thing. (I
think the guy could have fallen completely in her lap
and she would have still pretended that nothing had
happened)
As the train pulled into Yokosuka station I turned
myself around, facing the door. AS the door slid open
I stepped out ontp the platform and started to make
my way to the steps dopwn to teh ticket gate. AS I walked
along side of the train a mother with a small child
exited the train from a door in front of me. The boy
was wearing a grey zip up hooded athletic sweater. On
the back was printed the following:
Did you like todays yourself?
It stopped me in my tracks.
After softly apoligizing to the person who bumped into
me as I stood there transfixed I closed my eyes and
repeated it to myself a few times in order to commit
it to memory.
"Did you like todays yourself?"
What an excellent little question!
As I sit here typing this, sipping a fine Akita sake
from a cold pottery cup I have to wonder how often I
should be asking myself this very same thing.
Did I spend this day in a way that will either improve
myself, or the condition of others around me?
Could I, or should I have done anything differently?
Am I satisfied with my actions?
I wonder how much better a place the world would be
if we all took a few moments each day to ponder this
most profound little question.
It just goes to show that truth or enlightenment can
sometimes be found in the strangest of places.
--
After viewing the most excellent Flash presentation
posted by sweet dolly in the forums I was inspired
to whip up something similar.
But seeing as I am no more capable of creating something
in Macromedia Flash than I am to give birth I decided
to use Microsofts new free "Photo Story 3"
software download for XP users.
It turned out to be a pretty slick little piece of
software and the interface was very intuitive (makes
me think they must have stolen it from Apple) and I
was able to whip something together in just a few minutes.
I used some past Photo of the Day pictures and added
a soundtrack to go along with them.
While nowhere even close to being as classy and polished
as the Flash presentation posted by sweet dolly,
it was a snap to put together.
Sushicam
Photo Story 1 (4 mb .wmv file)
I apologize for only posting a .wmv version. The good
news is that Realplayer 10 has no problem playing this
type of file. I tried to encode it as an MPEG but it
resulted in a gigantic file size and my bandwidth limit
is stressed enough as it is without me going and torpedoing
myself on purpose.
--
In other news, this past month I submitted a a DVD
containing 15 sample photos to Alamy,
a very large and well known stock photo agency based
in England. I just received notification that my work
has been accepted.
Wahoo!
Now I just need to do is select a couple thousand of
my best shots and post them to Alamy and I may be able
to generate some small but steady income from selling
stock images. And the great part is that it will not
take any work on my part aside from posting the images
to Alamy.
Up to now I have sold my images directly to customers,
but going through Alamy will greatly increase my exposure.
I'll still sell stock directly to customers, but if
I sell any of my images that are also posted on Alamy
I have to give them their cut. No problem though, they
have a very generous set of terms with their photographers
and it is only fair.
Comment 33
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