Entries this day: Dream TJ_Bike_to_Atami To_do_today Written_today

Dream

8:01am JST Wednesday 07 December 2005

On the school bus near Kathy Lane, sitting on the right hand side of the bus about four seats from the front, and it was my turn to get off next, so I moved up to the front and stood there, but there was one more stop and I had to move for the kid in the front seat to get by. The bus driver got off at this stop to get my back pack from the back of the bus, but it was too heavy for her to lift all the way up to me.

Then it was my turn to get off at Kathy Lane and I kept asking "what time tomorrow will you be here to pick us up?" and the bus driver didn't answer, but was like, "actually, your stop is up here," (at the corner) and I was all, "what? well, what time will you pick us up there?" and she still wouldn't answer, and in fact was not stopping to let me off and was saying I would have to wait to get off last cause she went by the stop and I was like, "just stop; it's going to take me at least an hour to walk back" and she was like, "no it's not; you'll be okay."

And just then a large safari cat began to run from left to right across the street, and I was afraid we would hit it. I was like, "look out! It's a leopard, no a cheetah, no a panther!" and she goes, "it's a mountain lion" (which in my dream was not the same as a panther)... this animal was the shape of a cougar, but had the markings of a cheetah. It was in full run, but at the last moment, did a full stop, and I could see its body crunch up like an accordion as it tiried to stop.. The bus narrowly missed it, but definitely missed it. I got off to see the animal, and he panther was there and I was crouching down to take his picture, keeping him well in my camera frame as he ran underneath a fallen tree into another clearing. I kept him in my view finder and had the shutter button pressed, but the camera wouldn't take a photo for some reason. Any of the photos would have been great: they were of good lighting and full color with dark brown trunk of the fallen tree and green ferns occassionally obsuring parts of the tawny panther.

The panther turned into a cub as I was taking photos and I pet him a little bit. He was feisty, but only in a playful way, and then there was another panther cub, who was a bit more growly, but still got close enough that I could touch him some.. then there were two more from the other directions, and I kept fearing the mom panther would come up and just slice me to ribbons, but she never did.

But then this guy came up from the police academy and showed off his new holster belt. "guess who got a new belt??" he asked me and showed off the drink tumbler, still in box, and attached to the holster on his left side.. I gave him figh five and admired it a bit and then woke up.

TJ Bike to Atami

TJ Bike to Atami

Hello thrill seekers!

First, I want to mention I will be cleansing this list soon.  If you are certain
you want to be ON the list, send me an email to let me know.

My mass email plan is to send one large summary of my visit to Palestine, and then
send messages from the PB again!  I have been accepted to teach on the ship
from December 26th to March 30th, 2006, for a southern hemisphere cruise:
http://robnugen.com/travel/pb/52/itinerary.shtml

- - -

Recently, I rode TJ Bike (as in bicycle) from Tokyo to Atami, about 100 kilometers.
(I'll take a moment to mention one good thing about kilometers: they are shorter
than miles, and make bicycle rides easier, but seem more impressive!)  I planned it
to be an overnight trip on the way there, with a goal of sleeping on the beach in
Odawara.

Some of the uphill climbs were taxing; I haven't really exercised my legs in quite
a while!  I loved the downhills, zooming along with traffic on the highway can be
quite thrilling!  I would love to have a video camera mounted on my helmet; I could
post some great adrenaline rush videos!

I made the ride from my friend Jesse's house in Tokyo to Odawara (about 80 km) in
about 6 hours.  I was hungry and cold, but once I found a place on the gravel beach
(underneath an overpass towering overhead) I climbed into my sleeping bag and
almost instantly fell asleep. A spam email on my phone woke me up at which point I
turned off my phone, brushed my teeth, and settled in for the night.

I slept a few hours and then was too cold to sleep anymore.  I grabbed my tent from
TJ Bike's bags and put my sleeping bag in the tent.  I didn't actually use the tent
poles to *set up* the tent, so it was just like sleeping in a mummysack in a big
windproof bag.  It worked well, and I slept until 7am.

Once I got started again, I was really glad to have waited until morning: the first
thing to greet me was an uphill climb, followed by a relatively long bridge with
quite a narrow strip for me to ride between the wall and traffic.

In the remaining 20-few kilometers to Atami, there were two points where the
highway split into a tollway and a highway that climbed curvingly up a few hundred
meters through farming communities whose specialties were tangerines!  Really neat
to see tangerine orchards with monorails winding through the trees to carry the
fruit to the edge of the orchard!

But, the best part of those two sections of road were the downhill portions on the
other side.  Just relax and zooom down the hill with the gravity assist.

I made it into Atami with 3 hours to spare before meeting my friends, the lovely
Cheerful Dancing Fellows, my crazy class from this summer's PB voyage! 
They chatted a lot and I often tried to keep tabs on their conversations; my
Japanese is not all that great, and their Japanese ability is second to none.

We stayed overnight in a hotel with hot springs, buffet dinner, karaoke, and buffet
breakfast. After enjoying a warm bath in a rooftop hot spring and a lovely view of
the sun coming up over the ocean, we headed back to Atami station, where I was
blessed with food for my trip back to Tokyo!

For some reason, my stomach felt a bit queasy before leaving, and it felt almost
like I was nervous or something.  I double checked all my bags and backpack and
headed out.

The downhills on the way back were fantastic.  At one point I remember specifically
pacing RIGHT behind a large dump truck with the mountain on my left and the ocean
extending to the horizon on my right. Fabulously ZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

About a different downhill, in my bicycle journal I wrote:

     Just went through SHINZENBA tunnel, reaching its entrance at
     13:56. At the apex, just inside was a man walking on the
     sidewalk. Traffic was a good 100 meters behind me in the form of
     a bus, so I slipped off the curb & zoomed past the man before the
     bus zoomed past me. Then ZOOOOOOM ZOOOM ZOOOOOO Flying down the
     hill and PASSING traffic then they all started to slow for a
     construction zone & it got too cozy for me so I stopped passing &
     had to slow down a LOT - cramming on my brakes, not knowing that
     I could slow down quickly enough.. !!!!! But I did. Blessings for
     the subsequent green lights. After the construction I passed
     traffic again and caught up to that bus. Haha!

There were a few other downhill zooms with traffic.  One was an actual traffic exit
ramp, and just as I headed down, I was passed by a rather large truck which
*totally* blocked my path as I gained speed and he was stopped by traffic.  The
gaps around the truck were all narrow and I simply couldn't get past the truck at
that speed with all the variables coming our way around the blind curve. I finally
squeezed past that truck as he actually stopped, my bags barely sliding along the
concrete barrier on my left.  I gained speed again as I zipped past cars with ample
room around them. Lots of green lights for me, but too much traffic for the cars to
move. Beautiful.

That is the kind of traffic for which I want a helmet-mounted camera to record the
adrenaline filled moments.

In the end, it took me 9 hours to ride the 100 kilometers back to Jesse's
(including an hour rain-delay).

I hope everyone has a lovely day!

     - Rob 

To do today

1:09am JST Wednesday 07 December 2005

1. * copy crontab info from shell1 to rack19

2. * wish Hitomi happy 13,000

3. * write TJ Bike to Atami story. Mention desire to clean out list.

4. * Order 6+1 postcards.

5. * Write 10 days' worth of Palestine/Tokyo thing:
   1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 (finished through 27 October)

6. * Write an update to PBPs about port information

7. * begin researching my port orientation port

   http://www2.hawaii.edu/~ogden/piir/pacific/Rapanui.html
   http://islandheritage.org/rnj.html
   http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/ioa/eisp/rapanui/rapanui.htm
   http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/islands_oceans_poles/easterisland.jpg
   
   Prospective visitors should take a jumper and rain gear at almost
   any time of the year and strong shoes to cope with the sharp volcanic
   debris.
   
   Collecting genuine artefacts is frowned upon and such exports will be
   confiscated. Luggage is inspected upon departure to enforce this
   ruling.
   

8. * Check financial situation

9. * send pictures to fellow monkeys

10. begin process of list cleansing:

    1. * make backup of in case of fuckup

       1. * data

       2. * code

    2. add date fields to names DB:

       1. * added

       2. * removed

       3. * do_not_remove_before

    3. * add status field [green / yellow / red] to names DB

    4. . write code

    5. . test code

    6. . repeat

    7. tag people who said YES

       1. Status: green

       2. do_not_remove_before: next year

11. - maybe request credit card limit increase
    (rejected thanks to Patriot Act; I don't have a US address.)

Written today

12:29pm JST Wednesday 07 December 2005

Today's blah blah blah about my adventure in Palestine:

On another occasion, my trip back from Nablus was different.  There
had just been an attack in West Bank, killing 3 Israelis.  One result
was for traffic to be stopped from going into Jerusalem.  I was in a
shared taxi with Palestinians going from Nablus to Qalandia.  However,
we kept being stopped at flying checkpoints that had been set up on
the highways.  At the time, I had no idea about the attack, and
wondered why we kept being stopped.

During the whole experience, I was most surprised by the Palestinians'
reaction to being stopped and turned around repeatedly for an hour and
a half at different checkpoints: none.  As we saw that we would be
stopped at a fourth checkpoint on the fourth highway we used to get
into the city, people started talking.  I have no idea what they were
saying, but the tone was like, "well, it looks like another
checkpoint." and "yeah; I wonder what we should do now."

Nothing like how I imagine I would have reacted, or how most Americans
would react: "what??  Whaddya mean we can't go through????  This is
the fourth !$!$!@$!@$!$ checkpoint and I've got to get through and you
can't stop us here and ...." and so on.

But, eventually we did get through, ironically at a checkpoint I had
been by before, but going the other direction.  It took 3 hours to get
from the main checkpoint outside Nablus to the main checkpoint on that
side of Jerusalem.  I was pretty angry at how long it had taken, so I
walked through the metal detector with my keys, phone, wallet, belt.
It beeped, but I didn't stop.  And no one tried to stop me.

There were plenty of soldiers who could have at least *said*
something.