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a tumblr post by jquig99 about a blog post by deirdre breakenridge:

I had a meeting last Thursday with my PR team and one of my clients. Unfortunately, I had to jump out of the meeting a little early to handle a personal matter. When I got back to the…

link to complete blog post

以前ここに書いた「たんぶらびゅーあー 」がtumblr Galleryとして機能アップされたようです。スライドショーのようにtumblr.の写真が見えるのがいいです。その他写真の表示サイズについて細かい設定もできるようになってます。

http://stone.dialog.jp/tumblr/gallery.html

It's been about three years, since I saw Brisbane but I never imagined it as green as this. It's almost as if I've been transported back to the Brisbane of my youth, except for the traffic and the development. Things are alive, growing, and the air is full of potential.

Or perhaps it's just the humidity getting to me. When I left Japan it had snowed heavily in the week before I left and was freezing as I stepped on the plane. As I stepped off the plane in Brisbane, almost a years rainfall had fallen in some parts of the state in the same time. Subtropical lows and a monsoonal trough are bringing an end to the drought here. There isn't enough rain yet to fill the state's dams, and there is heavy damage to crops in the north, but everyone I meet is saying it's a good thing.

There also seems to be plenty of work around. The resources boom in Australia is in full swing and Queensland is at the forefront of the boom. I'm looking for work in two areas, English as a second language (ESL), and software development. I'm hoping to put my Japanese skills good use use in either one of those areas.

ESL will provide some continuity and is perhaps more accessible in Brisbane, due to the high number of foreign students studying here.

Finding the right pathway back in to IT might be a little more difficult, since I've been out of the industry for about 5 years. My experience as a multimedia/web developer spanned over 7 years and 5 countries. It was top class, but now I need to work hard to update my skills, and demonstrate my ability.

I'm looking forward to the challenge.

tumblr.にポストした写真が一覧できます。使い方は簡単でたんぶらびゅーあーのURL http://nomarai.iraira.info/tumbview/ の後ろに自分のtumblr.のURLの最初のところを入れるだけ。例えば、 http://seeing-is-knowing-thyself.tumblr.com/ がtumblr.のURLであれば、以下のURLでたんぶらびゅーあーすることができます。

http://nomarai.iraira.info/tumbview/seeing-is-knowing-thyself

In Japan people will pay exorbitant prices to have you talk to them in English, in stuffy little glass cubicles, in forty minute fixes. When the venue for formal study of language school chain is gone, they will have you around for coffee.

I love coffee and it isn't very hard to convince me to have another cup. So when three of my former students wanted to make it a regular Thursday morning event I just couldn't refuse.

The pretence of course, is a lesson in daily conversation, although they the mostly speak to each other in Japanese. I'm quite happy to let them wander off on tangents, as long as they afford me the illusion of teaching them something from time to time. It's a wonderful arrangement.

I may be preaching to the converted here, but I believe coffee contributes in many untold ways to the art of conversation. Let's see how you can apply the same principles you do when enjoying a cup of coffee, to the art of conversation.

The ritual of coffee.
When you set time aside for the preparation of a fine cup of coffee, you are creating a buffer between yourself and he outside world. Which ever way you prefer to brew your coffee, your attention to the details of your chosen method allow you to focus your thoughts on a single point, the perfect cup of coffee. Elusive as it may be, this ideal is essential for perfecting your art.

So too with the art of conversation. When you give your time to someone, give them your full attention. Let them know you are listening, and that nothing will intrude into the space you have created for them. Allow time for the conversation to develop at it's own pace. Respect the conversation as if it were something in it's own right, more than the sum of it's parts. Not just a speaker and a listener, but equal participants in piece of performance art.

The space between sips.

Last week our host served coffee in these eccentric cups and saucers, each one unique. As we admired their quality and craftsmanship a little more breathing space came into the conversation. Although the cups were small, we were in no hurry to put them down.
 
Some people are more comfortable with silence than others. When it does happen don't be afraid to sit back and just observe the space it creates. When you're not the first to talk, you might hear something genuinely refreshing.

The caffeine conclusion.
A small amount of the stimulant caffeine should leave you with a buzz, bringing you to the business end of conversation. You may feel able to express yourself more freely, but don't over do it.

Having the courage to speak your mind is accompanied by the responsibility to be receptive to the opinions of others. If you can strike the right balance, while learning to express yourself positively and in a non-threatening way, then you will win the respect and admiration of your peers.

Now, I wonder how I can translate that same coffee aesthetic in to one that generates conversation on this blog? How does coffee work for you socially? What is it about the ritual that has a lubricating effect on conversation for you? I would be happy to hear your thoughts over a cup or two.

When I started twittering in Japanese about a year ago, I had no idea how far I would go with it, or what benefit it would bring to my study of Japanese. At times it has been a distraction, and at the height of my addiction attraction to it, kind of costly, as my international SMS bill went through the roof.

What it has helped me do is be more productive, more outwardly expressive with my inner Japanese speaker. In some respects it has helped me find my my Japanese voice, as clumsy and stilted as it still feels. Sometimes there is a dialogue maintained with other twitterers, and sometimes there is not. There is always the need to formulate thoughts into comprehensible sentences.

Just recently I have been gathering my daily twittering into the one post with the help of a service called LoudTwitter. I was hoping that it would spur me on to breaking out of the 140 character limit, and into writing more consistently in Japanese on this blog. So far only 5days of this kind of daily diary through twitter have been posted here.

Never would I have in wildest dreams thought any one would go to the bother of translating my twits into English. But , someone has. Now I'm not quite sure how I feel about this, the illusion of anonymity and privacy provided by blogging in my second language has just been erased a little further.

Blogging in my second language I feel I am far less critical of my self, perhaps blunter and less self conscious about it. In English the same expressions may come across as selfish, and ill-conceived. As a Japanese speaker I am not yet beyond the junior high school vernacular, but that's OK with me.

There are plenty of people blogging in a language that is not their first. Does it provide you with a different sense of self?  Do you feel safer presenting parts of you that you wouldn't in your mother tongue? If you could blog in another language, what would you say? Would it be different from what you already write about?

Note: As I was in the process of writing this entry, the company I was working for closed it's doors and told everyone to stay home. The Japanese staff are out of pocket two months, two weeks and a summer bonus. The foreign instructors are all out of pocket about 6 weeks. None of expect to see much of this money back. I am lucky enough to be eligible for unemployment insurance, many are not.

If this blog post seems a little unfinished, then so be it...

On Sunday, the situation in the branches is deteriorating steadily. The number of instructors not turning up is climbing and those that are turning up are being confronted by schedules filled with students trying to burn their last points and kids classes, for which some people haven't been trained. When conditions are this bad why would you bother going in to work? In some places, even if people wanted to work, their places of work are closing.
mfgrape:

"When I heard that my branch was closing its doors until further notice, I called Foreign Personnel to ask if this meant that I was being fired or let go.
They had no idea.

In the afternoon, I get a call from my staff asking me if I would still come to work if the branch closed. I think about for a second, then acquiesce, because I have a sneaking suspicion things won't last much longer. At least not as far as my scheduled date of return, the 19th of November.

I wake early Monday morning to find hurry_up_and_die has posted a fax that seems to be from the Japanese staff:

" if you read through this you will see that the staff are now mutinous, and planning legal action against the company. At the same time, they want instructors to come in and work for the same company that has screwed everyone over.

The Asahi runs a story on Monday morning, outlining three scenarios for Nova amid snowballing fiscal troubles.  Possibilities to consider; Nova goes out of business, outside investors step in or drastic restructuring takes place. OregonDuck echoes the sentiment of the thread:

"The company is spiraling into oblivion, with only a shady deal like the BVI banks having any chance of effecting the short term life of the company. Nova will never recover from this, ever.

At least some people are keeping their sense of humour.

Pabloski:

"I just called in to toppatsu at Osaka FP.
Young lady was very upbeat and friendly.
When She asked why I wasnt able to go into work, I replied "um...coz the school suddenly shut down?" She burst out laughing. Then she did the standard "okay I'll let your bran...br...b...ahhh. I'll let foreign personnel know"

Nova is the hot topic for bloggers, but hasn't yet become front page news for the Japanese press. Chris Salzberg from Global Voices online, talks about a company on the brink of collapse, and has some translations from some of Nova's students. Shinjuku Honko has closed it's doors, the flagship school, where you can "study abroad in front of the station. Shinjuku station is the busiest station in the world, and the effect of this school closing on the public psyche must be huge.

Remember Nishida, the object of much speculation last week in the forum? Well, it seems the Japanese press have decided to turn up the heat a little more. The Sankei Shimbun runs an article linking him to scams where he pumps and dumps stocks for the yakuza. Livedoor news goes one step further to suggest that authorities are setting their sights on the next big fish. The implications are clear enough when they include a familiar pink bunny in the article.

In The Know:

"The best journalism that happened during this saga was on this thread at LJ where the diligent posted faxes, translations, verified talk from the inside, shared anecdotal evidence, offered wise opinion, etc...

Shawn:

"As Nova as we know it is basically at an end, this thread is now closed, but the conversation continues on the "Supernova" thread.