Writing exercise 1
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Sometimes I feel I should update this blog more frequently as long as I'm blogging. I mean, as long as I'm posting something on the WWW, I feel I'm somehow responsible for what I'm doing. But the fact is that very often I have no idea what to write about.
1. This evening I stumbled upon an interview with Toshiko Akiyoshi and some of her plays on Internet radio. It was an NPR's program (we can listen to them everywhere in the world, even in Japan) and so will be broadcast again or you can search the net and download it, if you're interested. I've been interested in this Japanese jazz player who's praised as Bud Powell of Japan in the US, mainly because her name appears in a few chapters of Hampton Hawes' autobiography "Raise up off me" that relate how he stayed in Japan, not long after the WWII ended, that is, during the US occupation of Japan. The part of the book about his stay in Japan, his experience at Asaka, the bad trips he had there, and how he, as a junkie, hooked up with a Japanese junkie who was a teenage whore, as well as how he played in some halls and stayed in brothels in Yokohama, is quite riveting. The pimps and whores in Asaka where there used to be a US base dubbed him "Uma-san," 'uma' meaning horse, and -san mr. in Japanese. That's because they thought they heard him saying not Hawes but horse. Uma-san is credited with having a huge impact on the Japanese jazz with his then avant-garde bebop style.
2. Today I read the news about Google protesting about its name being used as a 'generic verb.' ("Google wants people to stop googling," on Cnet News.)
I remembered writing "How many times did you google today" somewhere in my blog. Seeing as this free blog service is being run by Google, and I've been thinking that I didn't particularly like the post where I used the 'generic verb,' I deleted it today. But don't think I'm catering to them.
Sometimes I feel I should update this blog more frequently as long as I'm blogging. I mean, as long as I'm posting something on the WWW, I feel I'm somehow responsible for what I'm doing. But the fact is that very often I have no idea what to write about.
1. This evening I stumbled upon an interview with Toshiko Akiyoshi and some of her plays on Internet radio. It was an NPR's program (we can listen to them everywhere in the world, even in Japan) and so will be broadcast again or you can search the net and download it, if you're interested. I've been interested in this Japanese jazz player who's praised as Bud Powell of Japan in the US, mainly because her name appears in a few chapters of Hampton Hawes' autobiography "Raise up off me" that relate how he stayed in Japan, not long after the WWII ended, that is, during the US occupation of Japan. The part of the book about his stay in Japan, his experience at Asaka, the bad trips he had there, and how he, as a junkie, hooked up with a Japanese junkie who was a teenage whore, as well as how he played in some halls and stayed in brothels in Yokohama, is quite riveting. The pimps and whores in Asaka where there used to be a US base dubbed him "Uma-san," 'uma' meaning horse, and -san mr. in Japanese. That's because they thought they heard him saying not Hawes but horse. Uma-san is credited with having a huge impact on the Japanese jazz with his then avant-garde bebop style.
2. Today I read the news about Google protesting about its name being used as a 'generic verb.' ("Google wants people to stop googling," on Cnet News.)
I remembered writing "How many times did you google today" somewhere in my blog. Seeing as this free blog service is being run by Google, and I've been thinking that I didn't particularly like the post where I used the 'generic verb,' I deleted it today. But don't think I'm catering to them.
posted by Tanaka @ 8:48 PM
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