Author Archives: Daniel

How to Fly First Class for Free

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I have what my mother has described as “follow through issues.” No, this has nothing to do with my golf swing or the form of my jumpshot. I always find it easy to start big projects, but sometimes completing them can be an issue, and when something is a tedious task, I have trouble even getting started.

Schoolwork was never an issue, and real work hasn’t been either, but favors for friends and the little unimportant things like laundry, cleaning house, etc. always take me several tries. I’m almost never able to complete them in one go. I also find it hard to keep a budget and deal with number-based stuff. This includes joining an airline mileage program and racking up miles.

But I have seen the promised land, friends, and its name is first class on a transpacific flight. Yes, I was upgraded to first class on a LAX-NRT Delta flight when I flew in two months ago.

I’m not sure what your impression of the upgrade process is like, but I always imagined people in suits schmoozing their way from economy to business class or business to first. Well, this is a lie. The best way to get free upgrades to first class is to pick an airline, commit to it over the long term, and build up miles in the mileage plan. I wasted three years on JET by flirting with several different airlines (always the cheapest and most convenient), but not long after I moved to Tokyo, I committed to a long term relationship with Delta, and that’s been the secret. Delta has been a love-hate relationship, but she’s made up for her wrongs.

If you work long term in Japan, chances are you were like me and went home about once a year for a week or two. Tokyo to New Orleans is about 5000-6000 miles for each leg. That’s 10-12,000 miles per trip, and if you happen to take two trips in the same year, you can get close to the 25,000 miles required for Silver Medallion status.

I don’t care what Delta says, that Silver Medallion status is GOLD. Once you’re in to the medallion club, you get unlimited free upgrade requests. I’m not exactly sure if this is true for international flights, but when you purchase a domestic ticket, it will show you that your upgrade has been requested. I imagine that this enables the airline to sell more economy fares in the event that the first class fares don’t sell out; they simply bump a medallion member to first class and sell another (probably more expensive) ticket to Joe Schmoe (because he had to buy last minute).

Since last December, I’ve been upgraded to first class on four out of five domestic flights. For mathematically disadvantaged individuals, that’s 80%.

Most of these were short, one-hour flights, so the only real advantage was being first on and first off the plane. The MSY(New Orleans)-LAX flight was longer, so I got breakfast, which was great. The flight attendant came up to me and asked, “Will you be joining us for breakfast?” which absolutely killed me. Worth the price of admission to get Japanese-style attention in the U.S.

I don’t know how many of you have flown through LAX recently, but it’s a crap airport. Because of the construction and lack of speakers, I didn’t know I’d been upgraded to first class to Tokyo until shortly before I boarded. I got an email a few days before the MSY-LAX flight telling me I’d been upgraded, but the lady at the gate in LAX handed me my upgraded boarding pass a few minutes before I boarded. I didn’t have to ask for anything. It was automatic. Again, my guess is that this is because folks were flying standby and there were open seats in first class, and they start going down the list of people in the following order – medallion status, number of miles flown, price paid for ticket.

First class was great. I was used to economy where food isn’t served until an hour or two into the flight, so I had a meal at LAX before I left. Appropriately, my last American meal looked like a big, fat zit – clam chowder in a bread bowl:

In first class, they feed you immediately, and they take your order before take off. I only took pictures of the food, and this is what it looked like:

After we finished the meal, they brought out a dessert tray and started with the seats across from me. The desserts slowly started to disappear, so I resolved to go without the ice cream I wanted until another dessert tray appeared in my peripheral vision.

Cue tryptophan dream sequence. Wake up, breakfast like a boss:

The secret is, as mentioned before, committing to an airline, building up miles, and being a little lucky. I had a little luck myself. On my way home to Japan from the U.S. last year, my flight got canceled because the toilet was broken, so they put us all in a hotel for the night and gave us 25,000 miles on vouchers. Later they gave us an additional 10,000 miles just to apologize. I think these are what really helped bump me to medallion status, but flying a bunch of times didn’t hurt either.

A couple other notes:

– Book your ticket directly through Delta.com. Tickets booked via miles or a travel agent probably won’t be upgraded because they are special fares. Booking online probably won’t cost much more.

– Ask for the upgrade over the phone before the flight. I feel like this would probably improve your chances more than asking someone at the gate. Those gate people always seem to be incredibly stressed out. I’m not sure the people on the phone are any less stressed, so this might be the best idea.

– Enjoy the hell out of your first class experience! At first I was all self-concious, telling myself “Be cool, bitch!” but then I relaxed and said fuck it, I’m going to enjoy the hell out of this. I pressed all the buttons on the seat (there are a ton) until I figured them all out, despite the fact that it made me look like an idiot. I took pictures of all the food. I watched movies. I cracked some beers.

– Don’t get drunk and be obnoxious like the lady in front of me. She had something like five or six glasses of wine and then went on a toilet rampage. I waited for one to open and went in to brush my teeth and relieve myself. I had taken a little time, so when I heard a knock on the door, I assumed it was the flight attendant. I quickly finished and apologized when I got out. The flight attendant said, “Don’t be sorry” and rolled his eyes at the lady who was wasted and pounding on the bathroom doors.

– Always wear a jacket or something you can check just in case you get upgraded. They hang it up in a closet for you!

– I’m flying home in a week. I’m not expecting to get upgraded (because the service in Japan is horrible, according to some terrible documentary film asshole), but it would be a nice surprise. I’ll keep everyone posted.

white ≠ ワイト

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My first winter vacation living in Fukushima, I spent a week in Tokyo staying with my friend Thomas. He had come to Tokyo with his girlfriend shortly after graduating, and not long before I visited they split up, forcing him to move out into a guest house in Kanda. He was incredibly generous with his space (of which he had very little), and I spent the week shopping, drinking, and dancing.

When we were out one night, I helped a guy order a White Russian. When I walked up to the bar, I was standing behind the guy, and I noticed that he was having trouble communicating with the Japanese bartender. He kept on repeating “White Russian” over and over in a vaguely Japanese accent – ワイトロシアン, ワイトロシアン, ワイトロシアン.

Having been in his position before, I knew exactly what he was doing wrong. I leaned over, offered to help, and had the bartender reaching for the Stoli and Kahlua with a single extra syllable – ホ. The guy clearly expected the Japanese pronunciation of “white” to be ワイト, when it is actually ホワイト.

There are a couple Yahoo Chiebukuro pages that try to answer the question, but there doesn’t seem to be a definitive answer other than ホワイト more accurately captures the pronunciation, which suggests that it may be an English pronunciation error on my part – maybe I’m not pronouncing “white” snootily enough? What’s certain is that the ホ-spelling is so natural and widespread – used in everything from white collar and white chocolate to Pokemon White – that the locals don’t think twice about it. Which means you shouldn’t either. Get used to it and you’ll save yourself time next time you’re at the bar.

Sandra Japandra‘s recent encounter with vermouth and its unexpected (from an English point of view) pronunciation ベルモット reminded me of this ホワイト incident. These are two good examples of another way that foreign loan words can be tricky: even when the Japanese word does equate to the object in the foreign language and not some other thing entirely, the pronunciation is not always exactly the same as in the English (unless it is…in which case I’m just a linguistically evolved youth and have shed this silly ホ in English). You can try to use the trick that some of my middle school Spanish classmates used when they “need-o to use-o el bano” and Japanify all the words you don’t know, but this is not recommended. Pay attention to yer katakanas and read all those syllables.

Baird Beer Taproom Pub Crawl

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Last Saturday I dragged four friends along on a tour of the Baird Beer Taprooms starting in Numazu. We had a miracle start to the trip. I’d planned on catching a 9:41 train from Yokohama, an express out to Atami, but we weren’t able to get through the gates until the minute hand was just about right on the :41, so I just kind of moseyed over to the escalator assuming that we’d end up on the next train and stood on the slow ride up to the platform. When we got to the top the train was still there for some reason, and the door-closing music had only just started playing. I turned to see where the four others were behind me. Teppey was close, but we shared a look – there’s no way we’re getting on this train, right? Slowy Rei, Junichi, and Adam ascended the escalator as the music continued, and we stepped slowly toward the doors as a group. Then suddenly we were on the train and moving to the West at 9:43am:

Baird Beer Taproom Pub Crawl from Daniel Morales on Vimeo.

Numazu Fishmarket Taproom

The original Taproom. The brewery used to be on the first floor until they outgrew it. Great atmosphere, great view of the fish market from the counter along the window. And the pints are all 200 yen cheaper than the other Taprooms – your bonus gift for making the trek out to Shizuoka. The food was very impressive as well. I highly recommend everything we tried, especially the chicken wings which I don’t normally like. I was a bit disappointed there were no exclusive beers available – the first time I visited, there were a couple new selections and lots of older bottles available The beers we had were: Nihon Monogatari Ale, Old World Kolsch, German Summer Ale, Hop Havoc Anniversary Ale, Shimaguni Stout, Numazu Lager, Red Rose Amber Ale. We also picked up bottles of the Wheat King and Single-take Session Ale for the train.

Bashamichi Taproom

The newest and most well-appointed Taproom. Three floors of beer and barbecue goodness in a great part of Yokohama. I have to admit that I have been disappointed by the barbecue; what they offer is good – really good – but when I think barbecue, I think pulled pork, and there was none to be had. I was told, however, that they offer it occasionally. I think the chicken was the most flavorful of all the meat we tried, but I’d like to try the sandwiches at some point. Of all the Taprooms, this is by far the nicest space. There are tables on the roof, which will be amazing when the weather cools down a little, and the second floor is nice and open and surrounded by brick and wood. Free darts! The beers we had were: Bashamichi Ale, Rising Sun Pale Ale, Wheat King.

Harajuku Taproom

The third Taproom, right off of Takeshita-dori – quite a juxtaposition with the wacky Harajuku fashion scene. I love the food at this Taproom. It’s slightly upscale yakitori – everything is nicer than you’d find at a ガード下 location. Don’t miss out on the gyoza or the potato salad, and of course all the chicken is great as well. Also the smallest space of the four Taprooms, so it fills up quickly and seems more full than the other locations. We had: Harajuku Ale, Shimaguni Stout, Single-take Session Ale (I believe…this was the only location where I forgot to film close-ups of the beers themselves, so I’m forced to judge from afar.)

Nakameguro Taproom

The first Tokyo Taproom, second Taproom overall. They’ve done some redecoration since I last visited, and now there the vibe is much comfier – there are sofas in one of the corners and some smaller more intimate tables. The food is the least remarkable of all the Taprooms – unfortunately Nakameguro Taproom has been the big loser of the expansion (in my opinion). I’d choose Harajuku or Bashamichi over it, partially out of convenience but also because of food selection. Nakameguro does serve imported guest beers at decent prices, which offers a refreshing change, and they also have the very sessionable (3.7% ABV) Nakameguro Bitter on hand pump. We had: Naka-meguro Bitter, Old World Kolsch, Green Flash West Coast IPA, Caldera Amber Ale, Suruga Bay IPA.

Notes:

– Very impressed with the Single-take Session Ale as a new addition to the regular lineup. Great beer. Definitely my go-to Baird Beer.

– I’m disappointed we weren’t able to go (for Seishun 18 Kippu reasons) a few weeks earlier when the Cool Breeze Summer Pils was on. Nice beer. Also disappointed that the Sayuri Saison wasn’t available, although I managed a pint at Ushitora’s third anniversary.

– Other Baird Beers I miss: rauchbier he made back in fall of 2008 and the strawberry something in the summer of 2008. I haven’t seen either since, and they were nice. Don’t remember anything specific about the rauch, but it’s always nice to see that style. Hard to compete with Fujizakura, though. And the strawberry beer had this weird metallic aftertaste…not unpleasant after the first few sips…which I hope sounds like a compliment.

– I feel like Baird has done impressive expansion, but I’d like to see the beers available in more grocery stores and other easy-access locations. I guess this is asking the impossible, though: the latest macrobeer craze is beer that can be served on ice. Boo.

Collabo-Ramen – ほん田

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Brian and I thought we’d covered Tokyo Ramen Street last year when we finished Collabo-Ramen videos for the first four shops, but then they went and expanded this past April, adding four more shops which we felt the need to cover for completion’s sake.

We finally made it to the last shop this past Friday – Honda has slight variations on traditional bowls of shoyu and shio along with shoyu and miso tsukemen. Brian and I had the tsukemen. Afterward we went over to Kanda to have beers at Devil Craft, one of the newest bars on the Tokyo craft beer scene. The store is somewhat small but not uncomfortable – we made a reservation for five and were able to fit six at one of the tables upstairs. They also have a nice beer selection that isn’t monopolized by high ABV beers:

Collabo-Ramen – 本田 Honda from Daniel Morales on Vimeo.

I have to admit I was skeptical when Brian first suggested that we review the restaurants on Tokyo Ramen Street. I’d been reading his blog for a while and knew that he was the Ramen Adventurer: I wanted to trek out into shitamachi neighborhoods in search of Ganko-style secret ramen shops. But he had much more experience recommending ramen to readers of his blog, and he insisted that Tokyo Station is easily accessible for most tourists and that the stores on Tokyo Ramen Street have great bowls.

There’s definitely an extensive selection, and working with Brian has expanded my palette, which I think has enabled me to appreciate some of the bowls more. Definitely check out these stores if you have to be passing through Tokyo, especially Junk Garage, since that brings the Saitama-based mazemen into the heart of the city. Here are links to all the Tokyo Ramen Street Collabo-Ramen episodes:

The first four:

Rokurinsha
Hirugao
Mutsumiya
Keisuke Nidaime (lobster ramen, currently a crab ramen which Brian and I gave a pass)

And the new four:

Shichisai
Junk Garage
Ikaruga
Honda (you’re reading it)

サークル ≠ circle (Join my 会話サークル!)

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Well, I’ve been on Google+ now for a week or so, and it’s pretty cool. You can find me here, and my Public posts will probably be along the same lines as my Twitter feed.

I still haven’t made any major adjustments to my Circles just yet, but I’m about to start sorting them into Input and Output Circles, interest group Circles, ridiculous GIF poster Circles, et ceteraz.

I imagine that in the near future there will be public Circles or at least publicly visible Circles, so I’d like to create some useful ones for students of Japanese that I plan to open up publicly when/if that feature becomes available. One of the biggest problems for me back in New Orleans is that there are only just over 100 Japanese folks in the whole state of Louisiana, and only one of these 100 is willing to speak with me on a regular basis: I need Japanese speaking partners. The Google+ “Hangout” feature is a perfect way for groups to get together and practice speaking Japanese.

I plan on having three Circles at first – 日本語サークル初級, 日本語サークル中級, and 日本語サークル上級. I’m thinking this all up on the spot, so I’m not sure exactly how it will work, but the basic idea is to get a group of folks together who are at a similar ability level to speak Japanese. For the beginners, I’ll try and give explanations and keep things simple. Intermediate folks I think should focus on speaking more accurately and increasing the sentence patterns they can use actively. And the advanced folks can chat about whatever they want.

Maybe I’ll have set times during the week to host hangouts. Maybe I’ll just do it randomly (more likely). Who knows. So let me know if you want in to one of these speaking Circles, and if so, which Circle you would like to be placed in. You can either DM me on Twitter, email me, or leave a comment on my Google+ feed and I’ll sort you out. Ideally you’ll be able to add yourself to these Circles in the future.

I don’t plan on spamming any of these circles with anything except the actual Hangouts themselves, so you can join with the assurance that I won’t be overfilling your G+ streams.

And a wee Japanese lesson for you today as well. Did you notice the pun above? In Japanese サークル is based on the English word “circle,” but サークル ≠ circle. The Google images evidence is overwhelming: サークル, circle. サークル in fact means “club.” Schools, particularly universities, use the term to refer to student-run interest groups. When I studied abroad, I helped teach an 英会話サークル. Basically, I’ve made サークル Circles.

So, once again, mind yer inequalities.

Collabo-Ramen – Junk Garage

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There’s never too much Junk in the trunk of a big fat bowl of mazemen. Brian and I checked out Junk Garage on Ramen Street:

Collabo-Ramen – Junk Garage from Daniel Morales on Vimeo.

Six down, two more to go. (Oh, and we also tried the crab ramen over at Keisuke – I’d recommend against it. It comes in a bowl shaped like Hokkaido, and there’s a layer of oil on top about a centimeter deep.)

Game Lingo – クリア ( = clear?)

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My handy set of inequalities doesn’t always hold true when it comes to video game terminology. I realized this last Friday when I was checking the translation of a video game manual. The word クリア is always used to mean “complete (a goal, level, task),” and the translator had left it “clear” (e.g. “when you have cleared easy mode”).

I’m always torn with this one. I often change it to something a little more natural (in my opinion) like “complete,” but in this case I left it “clear” and made a note to reconsider my decision after I’d finished looking through the entire manual. Then I could go back through and see how many times it was used throughout the whole manual. If it was used just once, then I’d feel comfortable making the change. If it gets used repeatedly as a sort of set term, then it should probably stay as is.

I am realizing now the decision might already be made for me – we have the in-game text and if I go in on Monday and find an instance of クリア = clear in the text, then I have to 統一.

This game has already had one frustrating example of 統一. The Japanese ミス has been rendered “miss,” which just feels dirty and wrong. Initially I was surprised that the translator made the decision to translate it that way because he is one of our more reliable translators, but then I found an instance of ミス = miss in the in-game text and quickly realized that he had done a thorough job of checking back and forth between manual terminology and in-game terminology. Which leaves some terrible sentences like “You completed Level 1 without a miss!” Ugg. Time for a shower.

ミス is closer to “mistake,” as noted by スペルミス – spelling mistake – and depending on the circumstances it could be anything from a mistake to a failure to an error and should be translated in context.

Collabo-Ramen – 七彩

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In April, Tokyo Ramen Street expanded to eight stores. The original four are still there (although Keisuke now serves a crab miso rather than the past lobster miso) along with four new spots. Brian and I checked out 七彩 (Shichisai), which serves a Kitakata style ramen – a light shoyu or shio soup with amazing chashu pork:

CollaboRamen – Shichisai from Daniel Morales on Vimeo.

For three years I lived in Fukushima Prefecture about thirty minutes away from Kitakata. I ate in famous Kitakata shops a number of times, but it never really made an impact on me until I tried Shichisai. Sure, I noticed the pork tasted great, but until Brian showed me what to look for in different bowls, I always erred on the side of miso and went for hearty, savory bowls of Hokkaido style ramen.

I was also intimidated by the huge amount of pork that some chashu-men bowls offer. Shichisai has the perfect amount of pork on its 喜多方肉そば – not too much, not too little – and the soup was light and delicious – I finished the whole bowl, which is a rarety for me.

One of the neat parts about this shop is that there are windows into the kitchen area, so you can watch them cook while you wait.

Brian ran into some guys from the Tōno, Iwate-based Zumona Brewery at the Daimaru department store giving out samples of their German-style beers. After the earthquake, a group of twenty-one Japanese craft breweries created their own relief effort under the title “Re-Fermenting Japan.” Illustrator, author, and overall Japan beer guru Hiroyuki Fujiwara created the slogan and the graphic that’s being used on posters and bottles.

Sasaki-san, the Zumona brewer, will be at Daimaru until Tuesday, June 28th, so be sure to drop by to try some out and pick up a few bottles. We covered the basement of Daimaru in a past Collabo-Ramen video – they’ve got a decent selection.

Cool Web Thing – Drop Down Box of Prefectures

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I hate filling out web forms. Ever since I applied to grad school, my browser has memorized ten different combinations of my personal information. Even when I use the autofills, they are rarely correct. One of the most annoying parts of a given web form is selecting the country. I never know where to look for the U.S. Some forms put them at the top of the drop down box (AMERICA, FUCK YEAH!). Others file them at the bottom under U. Some even put them under A for America? (This I’m not sure of, but it wouldn’t surprise me.)

Selecting Louisiana is a little easier. It’s the only state that starts with L, so I open the drop down box, hit L, and Louisiana pops up.

I love the way they take care of this in Japan. Every Internet drop down box for prefectures looks like this:

Have you figured out why? No, they don’t do 五十音順. No, it’s not alphabetical.

It’s even more awesome: the prefectures are listed in geographical order from north to south. It starts with Hokkaido in the north, works its way through Tohoku and Kanto, continues through Kansai, and finishes with Kyushu. It’s a brilliant way to create a textual representation of the island through the prefectural names. It’s almost like one giant pictogram made up of words. I love it. (And dammit all, wouldn’t you know that now that I’ve professed its brilliance, I find an exception that lists the big cities separately on the top. Most of them are like this, trust me.)

I guess this is just as arbitrary as alphabetical order, really, but it is more visually pleasing. So learn your north-to-south position on the island. It’ll make these forms easier to fill out.