The Other Side of The Plague Year

This picture is taken from the cover of the Economist magazine published on March 27th 2021

 The year 2020 has been a gloomy year for all of us. The pandemic has been regarded as a once-in-a-century event and has caused much suffering to the world. Since the first case of SARS-COV-2 was found, more than one million people have died from the virus and its complication. Almost entire industries have ground to a halt, the stock market crashed, the world’s leading economies are in recession, and the inequality in our society widened. 

With all the agony that it has caused, it is easy to overlook the other side of what the pandemic has brought us. The pandemic forces profound changes in almost all aspects of our society and has been the most significant global disruption since World War 2. The sense of urgency for survival has enabled us to look for solutions that might not seem to be appetizing under normal circumstances. While it has destroyed many businesses, especially small-scale businesses that operate around customer service, it has also created many business opportunities and spurred innovations in some of the most conservative industries.

Remote-working seemed to be an unviable option before the pandemic. Still, more and more people consider it an efficient alternative as it eliminates commuting time and transportation costs. The public health crisis has also motivated healthcare institutions and governments in many countries to adopt the digitalization of their database, eliminating the long bureaucracy of the paper-based system and enabling quick access to information. More and more customers are moving into cashless payments, which minimize the spread of the virus via cash and can be an efficient transaction method in the long run. The adoption of many digital tools in the education sector also enables teachers to automate many administrative tasks and spend more time creating creative content for their classroom lectures. Several innovations in the pharmaceuticals and biotech sector have allowed us to reduce the time it takes to produce a vaccine significantly. 

All of these changes would typically take at least 5 years hadn’t the pandemic hit. In other words, we could say that the covid pandemic also acts as a catalyst for digital transformation. Without denying the grief it has caused, now is the time for us to embrace the change and consider it as an opportunity to innovate. 

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Learning to be an Amateur Cook

The history of cooking dates back to around 250,000 years ago when our ancestors had just recently discovered the energy source for cooking, the holy fire, and began tossing a piece of raw meat into it. What cooking does is, it denatures the protein molecule available in the meat and allows us to digest and flesh out more absorbable nutrition in foods, opening the gate for our highly functional brain to develop.  Cooking also helps us to preserve nutrition in food, like pickles, cheese, butter that we love so much, leaving us no worries when the food source is at scarcity. Furthermore, Cooking requires good coordination between the cooks, from cutting the meat, roasting the meat, and serving it, taking our social communication to the next level. Thus, in another way, cooking provided the way for us to evolve to the society we are in nowadays.

From then on, cooking techniques have been evolving so far and inextricably tied to our cultures. Each part of the world has its own cooking techniques, cooking utensils, and its unique ingredients present locally. This vast diversity results in a huge array of cuisines available nowadays. And as our understanding of Science behind foods has been evolving as well, it elevated our cuisine to perfection. Technology also provided us some foolproof methods to pursue perfection that no single cook back then could imagine. One of them would be sous-vide. I knew this cooking method when I was watching a movie starring Bradley Cooper,  Burnt(2015). The word is taken from French, which means under-vacuum in English. This is a method of cooking in which food is placed in a plastic pouch or a glass jar and cooked in a water bath for longer than normal cooking times (taken from Wikipedia). This technique ensures the inner side of the food is cooked perfectly without overcooking the outside while retaining the moisture, by regulating the temperature with the help of the machine. Cooking a perfect medium rare steak could have never been easier than this. For a better idea, I can give you how the sous-vide cooking technique looks like below.

Taken from Wikipedia as well

And now, how did I discover my passion for cooking? Did my passion for cooking come from my family? Hmm, not really. Even though my mom isn't really a great cook (she even admitted it), but she works neatly and well-organized in the kitchen. My father occasionally cooks at the weekend, and his foods are quite delicious in comparison to my Mom's. But whenever he works in the kitchen, the kitchen turns into a mess which my mom would often be angry at him.  There was no single time they asked me to help them in the kitchen. And why should I? I can just sit, watching TV without doing anything and the foods would come later. That is why I didn't develop an interest in cooking. I wasn't really into cooking until I watched a reality show of cooking competition for amateurs. Yap, you guessed it right, Master Chef. For the first time, I realized that there is so much more in cooking. The science, the technique, the creativity, the background, and the upbringing every contestant showed during the show left me stunned.

Taken from Google

For the first time, I thought deeper about cooking. Every ingredient has its own property and combining those ingredients into harmony with different cooking styles that exploit the science behind its property. The limitation is your imagination. Don't you think it's awesome? I DO!!! For the first time, I was willing to try out things in the kitchen. Time to explore the uncharted me. If I am not mistaken, my first dish (it's not like I had never cooked before, I could cook instant noodle and fried eggs. But other than that, I hadn't tried anything) was kind of roasted garlic cream sauce fettuccine. And, it was ...... barely edible. And I stupidly cooked several batches at once. So yea, the first experience wasn't that great. The second time I tried to cook, it was lumpia with chicken filling. And the result was, you would be tired of the endless chewing. It was tough as hell. It made me think that maybe I am not destined to cook. And I was afraid to waste the ingredients as well, so yeah I decided that probably cooking is not my cup of tea. I enjoyed watching others cooking, but never really enjoyed cooking by myself.

The turning point when I had to embrace myself with cooking is when I started to study abroad in Japan. Since I am a Muslim and have to eat halal food, I have no choice but to cook everything by my own self as most of the foods that I can find here tend to incorporate pork. Even though Japan is notoriously known for its seafood, but seafood isn't that cheap here. Regardless of halal foods and pricy seafood, cooking is the skill that allows you to eat healthy, delicious but affordable meals. In my opinion, everyone should at least know the most basic way how to cook. It doesn't have to be fancy dishes, any simple meals would do the work. It is teaching your self how to feed your own body. Now, one can argue that in these modern days, you don't have to be able to cook, restaurants are plenty, and take-outs are cheap as well. Here is the thing, can you guarantee that what you eat from take-outs or restaurant are healthy for you? Are you sure you're not going to regret your lifestyle later in the future when you hit your 40's? You have the total control in the ingredients you put if you cook the meal by yourself. If you have more money, sure you can definitely eat in 'healthier' restaurants that provide fresh ingredients. But we don't know if your financial situation will always be able to afford those restaurants. So, being able to cook will definitely not hurt. 

The cooking skills that I can confidently say I pretty much know a thing or two about it are cooking chicken and pasta. Because I've been cooking it plenty times LoL. Chicken is a versatile, cheap, delicious protein that you can't really go wrong with it. The parts that I usually use are boneless chicken thigh and breast. You can cook it in various ways, but my personal favorite would be pan seared chicken breast. 

Chicken Breast (left), Boneless Chicken Thigh (Right)

When you pan-sear chicken, there are several things you need to pay attention to. First, apply Gordon Ramsay's rule, no color no flavor. Make sure you get those nice brown color on the surface as it is the source of the flavor. The brow color is called the Maillard reaction (here we go science nerds!). The Maillard reaction is a chemical reaction between an amino acid and a reducing sugar that sort of form those caramelized color on the surface (not precisely a caramelization process). During the process, these compounds break down and deepen its flavor depending on the type of the amino acids. That is the reason why each protein has its own distinct flavor after undergoing this reaction. This reaction requires heat, so preheat your pan and add a little bit of oil on it. As your pan is sizzling and hot enough, you want to make sure that the surface is dry enough as water prevents this reaction from happening until all the water evaporates. 

Now for seasoning, there are three holy seasonings that I always use whenever I cook my protein. 

American-mix seasoning (left), Himalayan Pink Salt (middle), Black pepper (right)

American-mix seasoning is comprised of pepper (red and black), coriander and garlic. The main purpose of using this is to give the nice, fragrant smell to the chicken as smell plays an essential part in creating flavor experience aside from taste (believe me!!!).  Then, why do I use Himalayan pink salt? Himalayan pink salt contains less sodium and more well-balanced minerals such as potassium, calcium, and magnesium. And you only need just a pinch of it to season your kitchen as somehow it is saltier than table salt (correct me if I'm wrong, but that is according to my palate). And lastly, black pepper, c'mon you can't really pan-sear anything without black pepper, can you? When you put seasoning on the surface, it's better to wait at least three minutes before putting it on the pan. Why? Salt draws out water, and you don't want to get wet chicken as I mentioned earlier to make sure the surface is dry. It takes time until the water is reabsorbed back to the cells.  So be patient. 

Lastly, the texture. You want the chicken to cook all through, but you want to keep the inside to be moist and juicy. So it all comes down to heat and temperature. Even many chefs at restaurants admit that this is a tricky problem. Many factors come into play, the type of the protein, the thickness of the protein, heat intensity, heat distribution, and method of cooking. For chicken thigh, you will hardly make it overcooked as it contains a lot of fat. Just put it on medium heat (skin side down if you don't remove the skin) for 5 minutes each side, you will pretty much get juicy and cooked chicken thigh. In contrast, chicken breast tends to dry out quickly as it is mainly protein. I have to admit that I don't always nail a perfect juicy chicken breast.

That is quite tender, isn't it?

You can tell whether you cooked a perfect chicken breast when you can chew it effortlessly, there you nailed a perfect chicken breast. For me, the thicker the chicken breast is, the easier I get a moist and juicy chicken breast. I normally crank up the heat for four minutes to get the Maillard reaction and set it down to small heat to let the chicken breast cook through. You can also add butter, thyme rosemary or any herbs to finish it as when you pan sear steak. And lastly, let it rest for 5 minutes, don't touch it, don't poke it, just don't do anything. You don't want to lose all the good chicken juice that makes it succulent and tender. And also, even after taking it from pan, the cooking process doesn't necessarily stop,  so you don't make it well done on the pan. If you make it well done on the pan, you are going to get overcooked chicken breast as the cooking process still continuous. 

Okay, that is enough for chicken. Now let's talk about pasta.

glistening and gorgeous

I am not talking about home-made pasta that you make it from scratch. It the mass-produced cheap instant pasta that you can always get in any supermarket (I am a student and I need to live a frugal live haha). When you want to boil pasta, you want to make sure that the water reaches its boiling point before you dump the pasta. If you put before bringing the water into a boil, the starch will start to disintegrate before the water cooks the pasta and you can end up with soggy pasta, not great. And when you buy an instant pasta, there is usually an instruction telling you how long you should boil the pasta. Do not follow it! If it says to boil it for 7 minutes, do it for 6 minutes. If it says 5 minutes, boil it 4 minutes. Why? Because YOU ALWAYS FINISH PASTA ON THE PAN WITH THE SAUCE.

Finishing Garlic Prawn Linguine

You add the pasta into the sauce, not the sauce into the pasta, and that is a must, at least that is what an Italian chef would say. That makes a perfect sense to me though. You want the sauce to be distributed evenly and coat all every single tiny bit of pasta. And also, do not forget to add the leftover pasta water as it contains starch, it will help to thicken and emulsify the sauce resulting in creamier pasta. This is even on point for an oil-based sauce such as Aglio e olio which is basically just garlic and olive oil. You want to taste the pasta together with the sauce in every single bite of it. Pasta water helps the sauce to adhere to the pasta; otherwise, it will just sort of slip from the pasta. 

Wow, all of those sound complicated for relatively simple dishes. Well, It's up to you whether you want to follow it or not. After all, you are cooking for yourself. But, It's going to be a different story if you cook for somebody else. See, a lot of science is involved, and cooking techniques are fundamentally developed by exploiting the underlying science behind. Now it's up to your imagination how you utilize all of those cooking technique, and combine various ingredients to create a harmonious, well balance delicious dish. And that what makes cooking is an art. It involves your creative side as to how art is supposed to be. Furthermore, how the dish look is also critical. At least if you want to make money out of it. It should have the finesse presented on the plate.

Sashimi

Look at how astonishingly beautiful how the sashimi is plated. The chef tries to incorporate various colors into the dish creating a palette on the plate as the canvas. At this point, foods step to the next level, not only does it serve a purpose to fuel your body, but also it gives you a unique experience that engages three of your senses. The Look, the smell, and the taste. One may argue that the appearance is not important as long as the taste is good. That is true to some extent, depending on what you are looking for, As previously mentioned, if you go to a restaurant where the art aspect is considered, you do not go there to satiate your hunger, but you want to have the experience of eating it.  In my opinion, the pinnacle of cooking as a combination of science and art would be desserts. It needs precise measuring on every single ingredient, you can't just free-pour as you may usually do in cooking savory dishes. Moreover, the technique should be done flawlessly. It is either 1 or 0, an impeccable dish or a total mess. And for desserts, finesse is a must. A pile mud-resembling chocolate cake would be unappetizing. But again, this only matters when you want to serve it to somebody else.

Personally, I haven't delved deeper into the art aspect. All I did just reading and following the recipe, and gaining a deeper understanding of the science behind the techniques. I want to try things out, but most of the time, I just don't have the leisure time. Or, ingredients are too expensive to be wasted (LoL). Especially baking, I haven't baked anything even once. I'll probably try it later when I have time and money to waste. (LoL)

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A (Naive) Smart Restaurant System

The fact that some people around the globe are facing hunger, while the others are indulging themselves with a humongous amount of food reflects that our source is not appropriately managed. This concern came to me when I attended parties, or when I went to an 'All You Can Eat' restaurants where people straight up throw edible foods to the garbage cans. It pains me considering that people in some poor countries are literally suffering to death for not being able to fill their stomachs. When I surfed on Google, I found mind-blowing facts about food wasting that our generation should be ashamed of. Roughly one-third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year (approx. 1.3 billion tones) gets lost or wasted. UN estimates that wasted food can feed an extra 3 billion people which exceed the number of people who face food scarcity. The point is, we grow enough food, but our food management system is way too inefficient.  Food waste is a climate change issue as well, as it generates 3.3 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases.

Furthermore, there are many indirect consequences such as exacerbating biodiversity loss, degrading soils, destroying ocean, depleting fish stocks, and so on. We can contribute individually to fixing these problems with only a small act, by not wasting our food. But It is not as easy as it sounds. Most people, usually in a developed country, often overestimate their daily calory needs. Restaurant, big supermarket chains, even small food shops also provide food way more than the demands backed with the fear of losing profit. The imperfection of human hands also results in wasted products in the production lines and restaurants. I can understand, from the perspective of the owner, it is better to provide way more than providing less. One more policy that also contributes to food wasting is they would instead throw an unfit product rather than to offer unpresentable products to customers. If it is not fixed soon, Our earth will probably run out its resources in the near future. I am majoring mechanical engineering specified in robotics. At first glance, It may seem it is not related at all to the problems that I have mentioned before. But robotics is actually way broader that one may think. And I somehow have the passion for cooking as well. By combining the two of my interests, I can think (imagine more precisely)  several abstract hypothetical ideas that may help reducing food wasting toward a sustainable society.

First, I would like to propose a smart restaurant system which may help reducing food wasting. In a restaurant, every ingredient should be measured precisely to create a perfect dish. But due to the limitation of time and high demands from customers, a chef has to work really fast and efficient. Mostly, they will have no time to measure every ingredient precisely one by one. One small mistake on the components may ruin the taste of the whole food, and it will likely end up in a garbage can. The cooking technique is essential as well, as it is the core of creating a delicious dish. Professional chef like Gordon Ramsay relies more on his experience which makes him able to offer perfection in every dishes He makes. However, when working in a large restaurant, even professional chefs have only two hands which won't be sufficient to complete all the cooking process alone. So professional chefs need chef assistants, and usually, each chef assistants is tasked into a specific job like cutting the vegetable, preparing the meat, boiling the pasta, grilling the chicken and so on. So they work as a team. However, most of the mistakes are made by the chef assistants who are less experienced than the chef. The reason why we often see Gordon Ramsay bursts out his anger was the imperfection done by his chef assistants, and each flaw of human's handy works contribute to wasting food.

 The smart restaurant system is coupled with a data analyst system and automation line. The automation line is comprised of two parts. One is task executing robot which will be in the form of robot arms, robots that can emulate a professional chef's handy works, functions to accomplish a specific small task such as cutting vegetable, preparing meat, etc. With the help of this chef assistant robot, we can minimize the error due to human imperfection and subsequently, reduce food wasting Another one is a delivery system which transports the ingredients from storage rooms to each task executing robots. 

 Each task executing robot is equipped with a bunch of cooking technique data which can be generated by the help of machine learning and artificial intelligence to mimic a real chef movement. And the delivery system will work pretty much the same as the one that Amazon has in their storage room. With this system, we need no one but only the head chef who controls and gives commands to the robot via a user interface. Not only this system costs less than a conventional restaurant, but it also helps to save our world by reducing the food wasted. I can't discuss much about the technical issues here, as I am talking about a hypothetical non-existent technology. The restaurant should also have some sort of data analyst system which helps them to estimate the quantity of raw ingredients they need to provide so that small to no amount of food will be wasted. The estimation may come from the data of how much they made sales on the previous days, taking account several factors that might affect the transactions such as annual event, holidays, peak hours and etc. Over a period of time, the estimation becomes more accurate as it collects more and more data.

Nowadays, even controlling robot arms to draw a circle is a strenuous work, let alone copying sophisticated moves of a professional chef. This idea just popped out of my head when I was reading an article about food wasting. It may seem so unrealistic at this moment, but as what my professor said, an engineer or a scientist has the right to imagine the most ridiculous idea that ever exists. Our imagination shouldn't be limited to the current science law as science is evolving as well. Let your imagination takes you wherever you want to and then find a way to accomplish that ;).  

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Visiting Fukushima and Ishinomaki for an 'Internship'

To be honest, I don't understand why they call it an internship. It is actually more like a field-trip rather than an internship. But anyway, I would gladly put this as an internship in my curriculum-vitae LOL. The journey of this internship was started from 27th of September. There were in total three places that we visited, first was Fukushima Renewable Energy Institute AIST (FREA), the second one was the tsunami-damaged area of Ishinomaki, and the last one was International Research Institute of Disaster Science which is located at Aobayama campus. Primarily the aim of this internship to gain experience and exposure of research from various disciplines which are collaborated to solve specific problems. That is the reason why the course is named "Multi-Interdisciplinary."

Our arrival at Fukushima was welcomed by the staff there, and they guided us to a lecture room for a short introduction about this facility. The director of the institute itself was the one who gave us the short lecture. So basically, FREA is an Institute established after Great East Japan Earthquake in Koriyama city, Fukushima under the umbrella of the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) which aims to be a global innovation hub concerning renewable energy. Several potential renewable energy sources are studied and researched intensively to ensure its global usage in the near future. In FREA, the research topic consists of 6 main issues which are, Hydrogen Energy Carrier, Heat Utilization, Wind Power, Photovoltaic Power, Geothermal Energy, Shallow Geothermal and Hydrogeology.

I was particularly interested in Hydrogen Energy Carrier.  So, the basic concept of Hydrogen Energy Carrier is to utilize hydrogen as an energy storage system. For example, energies obtained from a wind turbine, solar panel, and geothermal power are used to electrolyze water into Hydrogen and Oxygen. This Hydrogen takes a form of gas in which it is ready to use. The hydrogen is then compressed or transformed into other forms which have smaller volume such as fuel cell or ammonia. Japan aims for hydrogen society by 2020 in which Hydrogen will conquer the market of the Car industry. However, there is a catch here, the conversion energy obtained to hydrogen is pretty low up to now. And the technology itself is not cheap either, making it difficult to get into the market. Some people even being skeptical about this system. For example, Elon Musk. He thinks this system is redundant and not efficient because there is too much energy loss during the process. It would be more efficient if let say, the energy from the solar cell in the form of electricity is directly stored in a solid-state battery.  So far, in term of efficiency, solid-state battery wins. But concerning energy density and performance, fuel cell wins. So, it is a race between the two of them. I am so excited to see which one will conquer the market.

After having a short tour around the facilities, we had a small discussion, and we departed to Ishinomaki. The moment I arrived at Ishinomaki, I was a bit shocked because everything was just flat, especially nearby the coastal area. Japan seems to be effective and efficient when it comes to building something, and yet even seven years after the tsunami, the progress of rebuilding Ishinomaki is still going on. It just showed me how devastating the tsunami was. Everything was wiped out into open flat ground. It gave me chill down to my spine only by seeing that scenery,  imagining what would I do if I were in their shoes. The story of Ishinomaki was quite tragic to listen. So, two days before the tsunami happened, there had been an earthquake and evacuation alarm was delivered to everyone due to a prediction of a tsunami. Everyone successfully evacuated but the tsunami didn't happen. Two days later, an earthquake occurred again, and there was a tsunami alarm.  Ironically, everybody was skeptical, and they thought it might be a false alarm again. So everybody stayed. Sadly, that was the fateful day. The story couldn't be worse than that. By listening to the story, I felt like I was slapped right on my face. I usually was typical of the person who might ignore that kind of alarm as well considering how inaccurate the prediction is. No matter how inaccurate a disaster alarm is, I realize that it is not something to joke about. From an engineering perspective, we should learn from this incident, and strive to level up our technology into perfection. And for the countermeasures, the government in Ishinomaki does not allow any civilization exists near the coastal area, everything is moved up into the higher area. They also built a taller wall at the beachfront and close to the river bank. With a better accuracy of the prediction method, coupled with improved strength and height of the water breakers, I hope Ishinomaki becomes more resilient to any tsunami in the future. Of course, we would pray that a tsunami will never happen again, but sometimes it is just inevitable as a part of nature itself.

On the last day, we visited the International Research Institute of Disaster Science at Aobayama. The first 30 minutes was a short lecture given by a researcher from Thailand. He showed us how He simulates a tsunami in a computer and observes its consequences.  I just knew that even without an earthquake happened, a tsunami might occur as well. This usually occurs when the epicenter is located far enough from the coast, making the quake is undetectable, and there are no obstacles for the wave to travel in between.  This kind of tsunami ever happened in Japan. For that, we have to rely on our satellite technology to detect the incoming tsunami. After He finished his presentation, we had a small discussion, and we watched a documentary film about the tsunami tragedy from the perspective of Ishinomaki local citizen. The story was heart-touching. It showed us how they lost their family and relatives, how everything was destroyed at an instant.  Overall, I gained and learned a lot of things from this internship.  

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My Experience on Akagi Tsudoi

Yo yo, how are you guys doing with your summer holiday? Mine was marvelous in the August part (in fact I still have one month left of my summer holiday). Nope, It's not about me traveling around Japan. I'm gonna tell my story what I've been through from 18th of August to 23rd of August. So, the story began when I had no idea what I was gonna do to spend my summer holiday. I was thinking about having a productive and positive holiday. It can be volunteering, doing part-time, studying, or anything. But, who the fuck is gonna study during the summer holiday? Meh. And I remembered that last year there was something called Ashinaga summer camp volunteering in which I was about to apply last year but felt reluctant after seeing the prerequisites on the website. One of them says you have to be able to speak daily conversational Japanese. I was barely able to understand when a Japanese is talking to me, let alone to speak decent Japanese. So, it turned me down. But after getting my N3 level last December, I feel like 'Hey, why shouldn't you give a try? If you are not accepted, you have nothing to lose'. Then I consulted a bit with my friend, his name was Omar, and He already joined as a volunteer for several camps. He said that most of the international volunteers He met couldn't even speak beginner level of Japanese. To hear that, I was like 'It was just me being a coward I guess' haha. 

So, l guess I should explain briefly what Ashinaga is. From what I know, Ashinaga is a non-profit charity organization that takes care of orphaned students. So they give scholarships for them to pursue their education and higher education. They even provide a chance for the students to study abroad if they are willing to. The form of scholarship that we are talking about is in the form of a soft loan with no interest. The students have to pay it within 20 years (but it's not that strict). What interesting from Ashinaga is, they are not just a walking ATM. Because not all problems can be solved only by money, am I right? They act like a family for the students, and they give moral support as well aside from financial aid. The purpose of this summer camp (they call it tsudoi ーつどい which literally means gathering in English) is to give a chance for the students to build a strong relationship with other students with the same background and to provide exposure to the world outside Japan with the presence of international volunteers. Based on their story that I heard, the loss of parents for young children may have traumatized some of them, to the extent that they have a difficulty to interact with people. Financial struggles also exacerbate their mental condition. Some of them even thought of giving up on their dream. And by meeting with people from the same background, and listening to the stories of others, the students can hopefully cheer each other and replenish their motivation to chase their dream. 

So yeah get back to the topic, this story should center around my experience joining tsudoi. It started from Saturday, 18th of August, I was worried at first. I mean, I was not sure if I would be able to communicate with the students. I mean, JLPT means nothing when it comes to speaking because the test doesn't include speaking test. And I rarely talked to Japanese, most of my friends are international students. But hey, I met Louise from France and Yasmin from Morocco who couldn't speak Japanese (peace :D). And they had already joined tsudoi before, so I guessed it's gonna be fine haha. The international team consisted of interns and volunteers. Most of them were interns while the volunteers were just Alwan and me. After we arrived at the place, it was basically a public facility where you can rent it, pretty much like a dormitory for athletes, we were welcomed by the leaders. What shocked me about this facility is, there isn't even a single private shower. There is only a public bath. Because the schedule was so tight, we only got the chance to take a bath in the evening. I've never been in a public bath before. So, when I went to the locker room to put my stuff with the others, they casually took off their clothes while having a chat. I was shocked. They were all naked. My jaw literally dropped. I ended up not taking a bath on the first day. On for the next days, I took a bath when everyone was not around XD. Back to the topic. So, the leaders are also Ashinaga scholarship recipients who had already joined tsudoi several times. And they are college students, the same with me, so I guess we could get along easier :/. Their job is to be the leaders and mentors for the high school students later. The first two days were leaders training; the leaders were divided into several groups with one or two international team members. International team members should tag along with their respective group aside from leaders meeting. When the leaders had their meeting, we also had our meeting. Mainly to prepare for what we were going to do on International Team Time on Wednesday. I was placed in group 4, where I met Yami san, Kensuke san, Mi san, Mitsuki san, Cikako san, Maikuru san and Marina san as the leaders. When I introduced my self in Japanese, everyone was like "Nihongo ga joozu desune" which means they praised my Japanese. C'mon, it is just an introduction where you have done it over and over to the point that you remember every single word you have to say XD. Aside from introducing myself, my Japanese is 'bara-bara' (not fluent). I thank you all for patiently listening to my broken Japanese XD. Whenever I didn't understand a word, I would check a dictionary, so the conversation was paused a bit LOL. When had group time, we would play various silly games. I shit you not, it was totally silly that you would never do that outside this camp. At least for me. There was one game that I couldn't stop laughing on. It was called aishiteru game. So basically you have to say aishiteru (in English it means I love you) to someone, while for the person who receives the aishiteru word is not allowed to laugh. In order to make your opponent laugh, you have to put your best honest expression as if you actually love her LoL. From my experience, the girls couldn't help to laugh if you stare directly into their eyes while you say the aishiteru word XD. Kensuke was good at it, I wonder if He is a playboy. The expression that He made when He said aishiteru is so ingrained in my brain that I can laugh anytime just by recalling it. Silly but hilarious. But with these stupid small games, we gradually became more open toward each other. I felt wonderful. This was my first time to burst laughter with Japanese people. Rather than training, I felt like we were having fun around eh? 

When the high school students came, we were split into two groups, leaving me in group 6 with Yami san, Kensuke san, Mi san, and Chikako san. After the opening ceremony, as usual, we must introduce ourselves once again in front of everyone in the group. In group six, there were, Monta san, Sumacchi san, sisho san, saito san, yuipi chan, haruka chan, ai chan and erika chan. Unexpectedly, they are all talkative which made me feel comfortable as soon as I met them. They talked a lot to me, and it was my first time that a Japanese proactively approached me as a foreigner to chat in Japanese. We spent time together on almost every occasion, from playing games, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and cooking together and so on. Aside from that, we had a progressive discussion starting with small talks. They asked me about my impression of Japan, future dreams, even the future of AI. What a productive summer holidays. I also told them a bit about where I come from, Indonesia. Most of them didn't really know about Indonesia, so I got to tell them a bit. Of course, with broken Japanese. 

Three days passed so quickly that I didn't even realize. On the first day, I thought, 'Oh, this is gonna be a long three days.' But it turned out to be so fast because I was so invested in it. On the third day, it was the peak of the event. There was one session called 'My life story' where everyone sat around in a classroom and talked about what their life story. You were allowed to tell pretty much anything. The reason why this session was put on the third day was with the hope that each member of the group at least has become more open toward each other. So, they can comfortably share their story with everyone in the group. It was emotionally intense. The stories are confidential for each respective groups so I can't tell it here. What I can say is, these kids have gone through harsh reality. And back then, they were alone. Some students even cried. I didn't cry at the moment, but I was so sad that I couldn't utter a single word. But I was glad to be able to join this session. By knowing their past, a strong bond grew between us. At the end of the session, I tried to cheer them up and motivate them. I tried to convince them that no matter how painful their past was, a bright future awaits everyone who makes the most effort. And on the last night of tsudoi, there was something called "campfire". Every participant gathered in a field, centering a medium-size bonfire. We were having fun at first, we sang the theme song, and we danced. And then, every representative from each group moved forward. They spoke out their will and resolution loudly while holding a fire torch. Everyone was silently listening to each representative. This session is so iconic. I almost cried in this session. This was the moment that I definitely will not forget. On the last day, we had to write a message to everyone in the group on a sticky note. And later, you pasted it on a carton paper. I slept late to write all of these messages LoL. I want everyone remembers me forever, and I want everyone to feel that they are important to me. So I wrote a pretty long letter for each member of the group. You know that you become attached to a person when you feel sad if you are about to say goodbye. That was what I felt to everyone in the group. And finally, after the closing ceremony, we parted away :'). I hope we can meet again later :D. 

I would like to thank every intern for helping me as a volunteer on many occasions. Theresa, Shane, Yasmin, Louise, Winky, and Xan. You guys are awesome. And to everyone that made my experience on tsudoi unforgettable. 

These are the photos that sum up akagi tsudoi.

*Forgot that I am not allowed to upload any pictures of someone without their permission.  

Campfire

Me delivering my impression on closing ceremony with my broken Japanese

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Establishment of Tohoku University

Introduction

Tohoku University is one of the seven imperial universities in Japan and considered as one of the most prestigious universities in Japan. Established on June 22, 1907, Tohoku University has been contributing to science and technology to the world especially Japan since then. The establishment of Tohoku University was not free of obstacles. Financial difficulties almost made the establishment of Tohoku would never happen. Donation and funding have been playing an essential role in Tohoku University history and supporting Tohoku University to keep contributing to societies.

Donation on Early Establishment of Tohoku University

In the 1900s, Japan faced financial difficulties due to the Russo-Japanese War(1904-05). Therefore, the process of the establishment was hampered because the budget for Tohoku University was cut drastically. However, the process of the establishment should continue. The Minister of Education at that time, Nobuaki Makino, visited the Home Minister Takahashi Hara to talk about this problem and try to find the solution. Knowing the issue that Furukawa Family would make a public donation, they considered having Furukawa family help Japan by supporting the financial to build the building for a new university. Takashi Hara succeeded to approach Furukawa Mining Company for donations and received 1 million yen for the establishment. Prior to the donation, a tragic incident was the reason behind this. The environmental disaster which caused by Ashio copper mining led to huge destruction. Critics and protest directed to Furukawa Corporation arose from the citizen and continued for some years. Unable to escape from public critics, Furukawa had been thinking for a long time to make a public donation so that at least, it could rehabilitate Furukawa Corporation’s reputation among public. That was the first time, national university received donation from private company. Since then, more and more national university received donation and funding from private company. Despite the tragic incident, this event became a major turning point for the establishment of Tohoku University.

Donation for The Establishment and Expansion of the Library

The library first was built in a room within the College of Science. At that time, one aspect which was considered to begin the starting period of the library was purchasing Kano Bunko (The Kano Collection). To purchase those books, the first president of Tohoku University, Masataro Sawayanagi asked a Sendai businessman for donation.  From this, He got 30,000 yen which wasn’t a small amount of money at that time. From this donation, Tohoku University was able to purchase total books reaching 108,000 collections. And since then, the library keeps expanding and has more and more collection and nowadays the collection is reaching 4 million books.

Land Donation for The Establishment of The College of Medicine

The College of Medicine was established at the Seiryo area in July 1915. The Miyagi Prefectural Hospital had just been built before, also at the Seiryo area. As for donation, Tohoku University received the land and the new hospital from Miyagi prefecture in 1913. The land covered 130,000 square meter where at that time it was a huge public donation. And now, those areas become Tohoku University Hospital.

Funding for The Establishment of The Faculty of Engineering

Faculty of Engineering was established in 1919 after Sendai Special Technical School had changed its name into Special Department of Engineering. The building and facility were built in Katahira Area, and the funding came from government (national budget). The total cost was about 200 million yen. After the establishment, this faculty has contributed a lot to society through its research. For example, the Yagi-Uda Antenna which is used as a multipurpose receiving antenna such as TV and Radio.

Research Funding for IPCR(Institute of Physical and Chemical Research), ISRI (Iron and Steel Research Institute and IMR(Institute for Material Research)

Basically, the first reason behind the establishment of this institute was to meet the demands for chemicals, iron and steel supplies during World War 1. Before the establishment, the 2^nd president, Tokiyuki Hojo, had some negotiations with public companies. Finally, the chemistry department received 15,000 yen donations for research funding from Sankyo Co. Ltd. While the physics department received 21,000 yen donations from Kichizaemon Sumitomo. Those companies didn’t give the donation for nothing, they expected feedback from the research’s result. They wanted to keep monopoly on the research’s result and patents so that it would benefit their companies in the future.  Later, this institute would develop into ISRI(Iron and Steel Research Institute) in 1919. The establishment was again funded by Sumitomo’s donations. This time, the donation was really huge, it reached 150,000 yen. In 1922, this institute changed its name into IMR (Institute for Materials Research) and finally, Tohoku University was able to establish research institute through government funding rather than public company donations.

Saito Foundation for Research Funding of Tohoku University

At that time, the funding for research which the university was able to receive were mainly public academic research funding such as the Ministry of Education and the others were from foundations such as Saito foundation. Saito foundation was established by Zenuemon Saito in 1923, he was the second largest landowner in Japan. While at that time, most of landowner would keep their money for their personal sake, he had a completely different way of thinking. He decided to donate his private funds to the public and established the Saito Foundation. He donated 3 million yen for the Saito Foundation. The main purpose of this foundation was to aid academic research within the Tohoku region. There wasn’t any other intention behind this donation unlike the other companies. It was simply because He was such a religious person(He was a Buddhist). He believed that the money He had got was basically a gift from God. Then those money should be used to help others people. Saito Foundation was continuously giving a large amount of donations and mainly focused on Tohoku University’s research.

Conclusion

Donation and funding, whether it comes from Government or public company, had been playing an important role in the establishment and the development of Tohoku University. Tohoku University was established and nurtured through donations. Despite the fact that behind some of the donations there were tragic incident and another intention to gain personal benefits, still those donations were really helpful even became the major turning point for Tohoku University. Since the first time the university was established, Tohoku University have been conducting research and contributing to the society in terms of science and technology.

References :

Nakagawa, M. The Foundation of Tohoku Imperial University. 2^nd Lecture Hand Out.

Nakagawa, M. Development of University 1. 7^th Lecture Hand Out.

Nakagawa, M. Development of University 2. 8^th Lecture Hand Out.

Nakagawa, M. University and Student Life during the Depression. 9^th Lecture Hand Out.

Ashio Copper Mine. Retrieved January 17, 2017, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashio_Copper_Mine

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Redefining My Goal

Wow, it's been like two years ago since I wrote anything in my blog. I somehow lost my motivation to write in the past couple of years since I felt like I didn't have any fascinating topic to write about. I regained my motivation back during this semester when I had to write a bunch of experiment reports, and I spent hours and hours writing them and eventually realized that my writing skill sucks. I decided to hone this particular writing skill by reactivating my blog. If you feel that the articles may benefit you, then go, read them.  But if you think that it is just nonsense for you, then leave it. It means the articles were written and meant to be a self-reflection of my future self for what I've been through.

And okay, let's get back to the topic, redefining my goal. The last time I wrote anything for my blog was before I came to Japan. Honestly, after getting accepted into Tohoku University and granted the MEXT scholarship, I felt like I was half done achieving my goals. I worked my ass off really hard during the last year of my school as I desperately wanted to study abroad. And finally, after getting accepted into 3 universities overseas, I thought I could get myself more leisure time to enjoy my life, and I did. I thought I had just made a tremendous achievement that I had never done in my life. And I ended up overly rewarding myself by not working hard enough in the first two years of my university life.

Most of my first year was filled with many parties (we, the Indonesian student who study here, often held our own party.  It's not the typical party that most people here do. I mean like drinking party, dance party, etc. It's more like a food party, where we cook together and eat a humongous amount of food to the point that we can't eat anymore), food experimenting, traveling around Sendai, enjoying the Japanese experience as a newcomer, and so on. In the second year, I felt no significant improvement in myself. I often asked myself what I had learned. And ended up with no answer. I mean, I got to know engineering stuff, but I feel like the pieces of information just pass through my head without me understanding the big picture. I am afraid that I am studying just for the sake of taking exams rather than for the knowledge itself. I am worried that I can't benefit society from what I've learned. The list goes on and on.

This accumulation of guilty feelings leaves me puzzled and disoriented. At this rate, I'll never make it on top. This summer holiday, I sat down on the Hirose river bank. This is the place where I seek tranquility. I questioned myself what kind of goals I should set that could drive me to unleash my potential. I always said that I wanted to study in the USA to pursue my master's degree. But that seems pretty hard from a viewpoint where I am standing now. From what I know, as a result of roaming a bit in Quora, to get accepted in MIT, Standford, and alike, You have to get a good grade, experience many projects, gain enough engineering skills and publish at least one paper.  I only get one year to prepare for everything, and it seems a bit not feasible. Should I give up on this?

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