I don't use my real name which I love very much. What do you want others to call you? Do you ask people to call as you like? It is not customary to ask that in the Japanese context, but I have actually "forced" people call me Rikki at work. Do you know why? Last night when I came off from class at 10:00, I had another mourning guest who my mother and I taught decades ago. It is great that we become friends over time. She is now a loving and artistically-talented mother of two. She calls me Rika-san instead of Professor as you are supposed to do as a civilized person. I believe in "pretence of equality (in the level of knowledge and experience)" in my class of any level, in which case, Professor may not be quite suitable. That's why I invented the former nickname, "Ricky." A Japanese would feel too strange calling your teacher simply by their first name. It would be too impolite. But a foreign-sounding nickname would work, I thought. It would be a good practice of "r" sound which we do not have, as you know. So, Rikki has been a strategic tool at work for several years now. But recently I decided to use it with foreign friends because it would be a bit complicated to pronounce "(R)ika-chan" in the correct pronunciation. I added my foreignness (not necessarily Asian sounding, though) to English speakers by replacing the ending -cky with -kki. But to be honest, I truly love my real name, 理佳☆♪★ ( R/L-ika), followed by -chan instead of -san, if possible.　 It was a gift from my dear father who left this world too early when I was barely 6 years old.

I don't use my real name which I love very much. Last night when I came off from class at 10:00, I had another mourning guest who my late mother and I taught years ago. It is great that we become friends over time. She is now a loving and artistically-talented mother of two. She calls me Rika-san instead of Professor as you are supposed to do as a civilized person. I believe in "pretence of equality (in the level of knowledge and experience)" in my class of any level, in which case, Professor may not be quite suitable. That's why I invented the former nickname, "Ricky." A Japanese would feel too strange calling your teacher simply by their first name. It would be too impolite. But a foreign-sounding nickname would work, I thought. It would be a good practice of "r" sound which we do not have, as you know. So, Rikki is a strategic tool at work. But I came to use it with foreign friends because it would be a bit complicated to pronounce "(R)ika-chan." I added my foreignness (not necessarily Asian sounding, though) to English speakers by replacing the ending -cky with kki. But I truly love my real name, 理佳☆♪★　（R）ika. It was a gift from my dear father.

I love hard rock and ...hard baroque! Sure, I am just another music fan. Only, I love Mozart and Bach, and enjoy listening to symphony to meet my thoughts, or baroque music to feel the season. Classical music also rocks as well as Aerosmith does! I like to imagine that people living in Mozart time must have found his sonatas and operas cool, and must have yearned for a new piece was would be released! きっと１８世紀の人々も、ロックして居たのだろうな♪　いえ～い！ rikki

I wrote this to a friend who was suffering from a word of cruelty of someone else. I would like to share my thoughts about receiving "what we do not deserve." We seem to keep coming across little aggressiveness daily, and probably tend to feel upset and we just start blaming ourselves. "Why do I get this? Am I wrong? Am I the one who is crazy here. ...?" etc. etc. I remember I would often feel so sad that I almost felt myself disappearing into void. So when someone was felt aggressive aginst me, that's the end of the day, though covered under my cheerfulness, the end of my life. Only because of an angry little word or look of someone else. Then over years of such little experiences I came to realize that it would be a better policy to dismiss all that emotions on her/his part and mine by means of this theory: 1. the anger of that person doesn't originate from you; 2. based on 1., the anger or any negativity has nothing to do with you; 3. still, the expressed anger was let go of her/himself and perhaps you contributed to clean up her/his soul; 4. despite understanding of all the above, you might have had a slightest little egotism to trigger such emotion from others, so let's find this as an opportunity to improve your thoughts. 5. OK! so let's be grateful. You have just got stronger to be able to let go of this agony. How about that? I also like to write in English with mistakes here and there. But the thing is that just like yourself, I write only to extend my warm heart. May peace prevail in the heart of each!

IT as our beloved pet...? Students rarely go without their smartphone in hand and they "look up words in the dictionary apps" and "take notes" in class using it. So it is understandable that some may start to worry about "independence" from the net. But as you may see in this commercial TV video, people also get inspired and find their new freedom, even feel more connected with fellow human beings instead of on-line friends. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JUWFMasmjM&fb_action_ids=619287074753441&fb_action_types=yt-fb-app%3Afavorite&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=10151303830384306 Many Japanese say they like to watch it on YouTube when they need to feel braver. How do your find this short gig where the audience join the event to create lighting etc, at a fomous Zoujo-ji Temple in the heart of Tokyo? rikki Note: The artist featured here is a twenty-year-old artist Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, who is generally considered a cute little advocate of independence (in fashion for a start).

Feeling Great♪♪ Life is often said to be all about learning to find new capacity and infinite creativity in ourselves, especially when in the face of a challenge which we seems "impossible to handle." For the above "learning," I have had to spend sleepless night over the past several years. Amazingly (yet naturally, perhaps?) even during this "challenging" period of life, I have found some easier moments to breathe and laugh. Yesterday, I made had a new contract of my life insurance, recommended by a bank clerk who mentioned our new interest and taxation policy by our new government (,which BTW the world will not notice, unlike Obama's second term, ours changing too frequently!). On the way home from the bank, I found myself walking like a ballet dancer, incredibly light-hearted. Following night I slept perhaps the 2nd best in my life! (Boy, I felt GOOD in the morning!) I wondered why. Was that because, I felt I was building up good relationship with this bank clerk? Or because, even though there could be some 10% loss of my deposited money if Aflac should do something, basically a large chunk of my savings will be in a safe hand of my beloved man upon my death (+tax-free)? Was it my love letter when I signed the document with his name on it? Ney, I think that is just a minor part of it. It was mainly because of this famous "space clearing" effect. I have always wanted to clear up my bank accounts and I could finally do it. It took me 2 long years to actually clean up an account and now I feel one mission accomplished. Invisible as it is, clutters seem to be able to eating someone up sometime. rikki

日本語は、やっぱり敬語が大切。 カジュアルな言い方は、親しさの表現。良い人間関係の形成に欠かせない。 しかし口語的な文体だけではだめ。 How are you? My name is Rikki. Polite=＊＊の益戸と申します。 （理佳、と下の名は名乗らず、まず苗字から紹介。特に職場ミーティングなどの場合。） 宜しくお願い致します。 Casually polite=＊＊益戸（理佳）です。どうぞ宜しく。 初めの一言は、丁寧さが必要です。 八百屋さん、高級ブティック、いづれの場合も。 自分を控えるのが丁寧表現となる日本文化。 Friendliness seems essential to be polite in, as far as I know, English-speaking cultures. What do you think?

Start of Seasons for Tea (instead of Water---time for tea, darling!) When warm enough to perspire, you might like to lessen the load to your kidneys by NOT drinking water. The western medicine always seems recommend daily intake of 2 litters of water. A school of the oriental medicine recommends to refrain from water intake during the warm seasons, since the kidneys will be over-lorded by perspiration without circulating water. Does it prove that residents in warm areas tend to drink hot tea instead of icy cold water. (I have a fond memory of Middle East passengers on a train running through Europe--they kindly shared their hot chai cooked in their own conpartment--when I literally begged for something, or anything, to drink where no clean drinking water was available running the old Yugoslavia. They were each carrying 2 bottles of mineral water to make the tea there. So, stick to hot tea now.

Hey Fever Has　NOT　Eaten Me Up (Yet) ! So, we are at the height of the hey fever across Japan with exceptions of rural areas, where, with vast lands of cedar trees that keep sending pollen to residential areas, a magic seems to be working to keep people away from this miserable state. I have just willed NOT to suffer the famous symptoms-- runny nose and incessant sneezes without taking any medication (whose theories I am disagreeing with right now)--and seems to be working a bit this spring. (Very little→) Yay! Whenever a doctor says something is incurable, I feel as if we all humans are a bit underestimated. It seems that, at the bottom of my heart, I have always believed in human capacity and creativity. So... why not are we able to correct reactions that one's own immune system produces? If not, I should have to seriously consider moving to the beautiful island of Yaku, a World Heritage site with its 3-to-7-thousand-year-old cedars. With tons of pollens that must have hit me during our 10-hour hiking there, my hey fever was "cleaned up" and felt healed!