Here you can post your current location

Sedh dan kesal, itu perasaan-ku. Apa yg terjadi? I am here TAMAT! Aku sedih banget! Aku sangat menyukai cerita I am Here ini yang di buat oleh Ema Toyama… Banyak karya Ema Toyama yang bagus-bagus.

Dan dari semua komik-komik Nakayoshi, ini favorit-ku! Tapi, aku sedikit merasa kesal karena mengapa tamat begitu saja? Aku kira, akan ada persaingan yang lebih menegangkan… atau tidak polos seperti itu.

Misalnya, Sumine akan berpaling ke Teru tapi di cegah Hinata. Akhirnya ia bersama Hinata. Mungkin lebih bagus! Yah sudahlah… aku KAGET sekali!

Aku kira masih ada lanjuttannya, eh tapi malah ada letter kalau katanya tamat… hiks… aku sedih banget! Hahaha… pengen nangis rasanya… Tapi, sepertinya, akan ada komik yang lebih bagus lagi… aku harap…

Hello Guys!

Semua pembaca Nakayoshi pasti sudah baca I AM HERE bukan? Nih, aku lagi meneliti sesuatu. Waktu baca I AM HERE, pasti ada blog Himawari bukan? Sebenarnya ada website tersembunyi. Kalau ga percaya, silahkan meneliti dari edisi 58. Tapi, kalau kalian malas, biar aku yang memberi tahu: http://emaema.sakura.ne.jp/blog.html. Bahasanya sih jepang.

Nah, gimana kalian membacanya? Gampang. Caranya kamu copy alamat itu. Paste ke google. Nanti ada blog nya bahasa jepang. Disebelahnya ada tulissan [Terjemahkan Laman Ini]. Kamu tinggal terjemahkan saja. Memang bahasanya aneh, tapi, lumayan lah!

Halo semuanya! hari ini aku akan bicara tentang I AM HERE! Ini cerita tentang seorang gadis yang polos, ceria, manis dan imut. Yang disebelah ini chibi-nya! Mau dengar ceritanya? Tentu!

Cerita: Hikage Sumino, orang yang polos dan juga ceria. Ia tak menonjol dikelas. Semuanya pun tidak menyadarinya. Dirumahnya, ia biasanya membuat blog dan yang biasanya memberi comment adalah Kuro Usagi dan Mega Pig.

Hinata dan Teru adalah cowok paling populer di kelas. Rupanya, Hinata, sejak dulu menyukai Sumino. Ini yang membuatnya dibenci. Tapi, teman-temannya tetap membantu dan menghibur Sumino.

Kini, Sumino menjadi tidak sendiri lagi, Ia mempunyai Hinata, Teru, teman-temannya, Kuro Usagi dan Mega-Pig. Suatu hari, Kuro Usagi mendadak pergi dari blognya. Sumino jadi sedih. Ia meminta Hinata membantu mencari Kuro Usagi, ini yang membuat Hinata cemburu.

Rupanya, Teru adalah Kuro Usagi! Hinata sudah menebak-nebak dari dulu dan ternyata ia betul.
Waktu sedang kencan dengan Hinata, Sumino melihat Teru duduk sendiri. Ia pun memperlihatkan matahari senja karena Sumino tahu bahwa Kuro Usagi menyukai senja.

Tiba-tiba, Teru bilang bahwa dia menyukai Sumino… Aduh, siapa yang Sumino pilih ya?

No, I am not going to rant about facebook, but those you who actually care, I just made a facebook account. Please spread my being here. I will uncover all the rumors and contreversies in B.R.I.G.H.T. Academy. FYI, yes, I do go to that school. Obviously.

FILTER just launched a t-shirt campaign titled “I am here”. Here’s my pic:

We are running a competition for our internal employees and one for our FILTER fans. Please become a fan and vote for mine by clicking “Like”. Pretty please….

If you’d like to participate in the photo contest please email me: masah@filtertalent.com.

Plus d’un mois sans post, plus d’un mois sans venir me connecter sur wordpress, même pas pour voir mes stats’, nada, nothing, le néant total.
Mais ne vous inquiétez pas, il s’en est passé un paquet de choses depuis toutes ces nuits.

De Nantes à Nice, ou le voyage fantastique.

Comme je vous l’avais signalé dans le précédent post, j’avais pour projet de trouver un appart’ à Nice, de déménager de Nantes, d’emménager à Nice, tout le train-train habituel.
Et bien mes ami(e)s, sachez que depuis 15 jours, je suis niçois (enfin pas tout à fait pour le bronzage) : l’opération “trouver un appart’ en 3 jours s’est bien déroulé, ma chère mère a accompli une mission digne des plus grands commandos.

Je vous épargnerais les détails du voyage, ou plutôt de l’épopée fantastique (1200 km et deux nuits dans un camion, c’est pas la fête tous les jours).

Pretty Nice.

La première chose qui m’a frappé en arrivant à Nice, c’est la taille de la ville comparé à celle de Nantes. Le centre ville de cette dernière est très concentrée, alors que celui de Nice est plus étendu, et les kilomètres sous le soleil se multiplient. Grâce à cette étendue, les magasins fleurissent à tous les coins de rue, et trouver chaussure à son pied devient aiser.

De plus, étant un féru d’art contemporain et d’art moderne, le MAMAC m’ouvre ses portes, habitant à 500 mètres des lieux.

Trouver sa place dans une nouvelle ville.

Il ne me reste plus qu’à trouver ma place, ou plutôt à la creuser, à faire de nouvelles connaissances, à renouer des contacts avec mes anciens camarades de classe du Var.
Ce n’est pas toujours facile d’habiter un nouveau lieu, une nouvelle ville, une nouvelle région, tout est à refaire dans les moindres détails, mais la vie m’a plutôt réservée de belles surprises de ce côté-ci.

A peine une semaine après mon emménagement, j’ai trouvé un job de vendeur pour cet été, de quoi m’intégrer un peu plus en profondeur socialement dans ma nouvelle vie niçoise. Et pour me faire de nouveaux “bros”, il va peut-être falloir attendre la rentrée universitaire prochaine (mais avant cela, inscrivons-moi en Master 1 !).

Demain, un nouvel article.

I am here. I am here. I am here.

Simple idea, I am here. But where is “here” exactly. Am I my mind, my body, my computer keyboard, that random thought that has nothing to do with anything right now? Is “here” what I feel, what I see, what I smell, taste, hear?

I think I was “here”, up there in the drawing, while I pulled my sharpie around in a circle and aimed to meet it’s other end. But was I the line or the spaces in between? I don’t think I know the answer, but it’s fun to think about. Meditation is cool because it gives you another perspective; new ideas give you a fresh outlook on other parts of your life.

Took a short unexpected hiatus. Sometimes, life has a mind of its own and runs away with you. I am here though. Still on the inspiration journey. Hope you’ve been revitalise and inspired by the breaking of Spring.

Maame x

I was thinking about making a list of all the things I’d rather be doing right now. I even considered being virtuous and writing out all of the lesson-planning, tracking (humor me), grading, gathering resources, fixing problems, strategizing, take your pick. Or I could list the far larger set of things I’d rather be doing that are fun. The weather is nice this week. And yet I am here.

Again for emphasis, and yet, I am here.

(avatar photo of Second Life by Sisi Soderstrom)

Mathew Honan, WIRED editor, decided to try publicizing his every movement through GPS as a social guinea pig for a few weeks to see how it altered his life, his ability to find good restaurants or friends, using the latest locational software.  It’s a “good, bad and sleazy” tale of some breakthroughs but also many missed connections and awkward social implications.

“Thanks to the iPhone 3G and, to a lesser extent, Google’s Android phone, millions of people are now walking around with a gizmo in their pocket that not only knows where they are but also plugs into the Internet to share that info, merge it with online databases, and find out what—and who—is in the immediate vicinity.”

He first tried WhosThere (the iPhone application).  Curious what it was used for Honan e-mailed those around him, and one woman (Bridget),  “who, according to her profile, at least, was a 25 year-old woman with a proclivity for scarves,”  responded ” ‘To find sex, a@#hole.’ “

Honan notes that some warn that GPS threatens to violate your privacy. “Geo-enthusiasts will assure you that these privacy concerns are overplayed: Your cell phone can be used to pinpoint your location anyway, and a skilled hacker could likely get that data from your mobile carrier. Heck, in the UK, tracking mobile phone users is as simple as entering their number on a Web site (as long as they give permission). But the truth is, there just aren’t that many people who want to prey on your location. Still, I can’t help being a little skittish when I start broadcasting my current position and travel plans. I mean, I used to stop newspaper delivery so people wouldn’t realize I was out of town. Now I’ve told everyone on Dopplr that I’m going to DC for five days.”

Honan also notes how locational  information can jump platforms with unexpected results.  He explains how he forgot that the social application Whrrl (like many other social apps), cross posts to Twitter which then prompted postings on Facebook  and FriendFeed before landing on Honan’s blog, where Google indexed it.  He notes that one seemingly innocuous iPhone application  led to a “giant geotagged footprint across the Web.”

“A few days later I had another disturbing realization. It’s a Tuesday and I’m blowing off a work meeting in favor of a bike ride through Golden Gate Park (37.771558 °N, 122.454478 °W). Suddenly it hits me—since I would later post my route online with the date and time, I would be just a Google search (“Mat Honan Tuesday noon”) away from getting busted. I’m a freelancer, and these are trying economic times. I can’t afford to have the Internet ratting me out like that.”  Honan notes that Fire Eagle, a location clearinghouse started by Tom Coates, lets you input that information once and have it broadcast to other geoapps, such as  Outside.in and Bizroof but Fire Eagle also lets you decide how specific to be for each application: you can provide the latitude and longitude, the neighborhood or only the city.  “[A]s Coates also notes:  ‘You have to have the ability to lie about your location.’”  if you input your fake position manually.”  Of  course being more general about your location or lying about it, defeats the purpose of finding friends who are proximate or other points of interest near you.

“I was starting to revel in the benefits of location awareness. …While working downtown one day, it looked like I was going to have to endure a lonely burrito lunch by myself. So I updated my location and asked for company. My friend Mike saw my post on Twitter and dropped by on his way to the office. Later, I met up with a couple of people I had previously known only online: After learning I would be just around the corner from their office, we agreed to get together for coffee. One of them, it turns out, works in a field I cover and gave me a tip on a story.

But then, two weeks into the experiment, I bumped into my friend Mindy at the Dovre Club (37.749008 °N, 122.420547 °W). She mentioned my constant updates, which she’d noticed on Facebook. “It seems sort of odd,” she said with a note of concern. “I’ve been a little worried about you. I thought, ‘Wow, Mat must be really lonely.’”

I explained that I wasn’t actually begging for company; I was just telling people where I was. But it’s an understandable misperception. This is new territory, and there’s no established etiquette or protocol.

This issue came up again while having dinner with a friend at Greens (37.806679 °N, 122.432131 °W), an upscale vegetarian restaurant. Of course, I thought nothing of broadcasting my location. But moments after we were seated, two other friends—Randy and Cameron—showed up, obviously expecting to join us. Randy squatted at the end of the table. Cameron stood. After a while, it became apparent that no more chairs would be coming, so they left awkwardly. I felt bad, but I hadn’t really invited them. Or had I?…

There were also missed connections—lots of missed connections. Apple doesn’t let applications from outside software makers run in the background on the iPhone…. As a result, iPhone location apps can’t send out constant updates….[So] people are often showing up where you were, rather than where you are. On a Friday afternoon, for example, I posted an update looking for nearby friends to share a postwork beer downtown (37.787229 °N, 122.387093 °W). A short time later, I heard back from my friend Lisey, who wanted to meet up. But I had already moved on to Zeitgeist (37.770088 °N, 122.422194 °W), a beer garden in San Francisco’s Mission District. I again updated my location. But the place was packed, so I decided to split and headed to Toronado (37.771920 °N, 122.431213 °W), a bar closer to home. Just after I left, I heard from Lisey again, who was now on her way to the Mission. I had accidentally dodged her twice. I later discovered that two more pals had shown up at Zeitgeist looking for me.”

And Honan’s article doesn’t deal with the social discomfort of other ‘friends’ learning you are nearby and joining you for drinks or a meal when these are people that you don’t really want to hang out with.  For more on the awkwardness of excluding people from your social networks online, see “Anxious about non-friends inviting you to be their Facebook ‘friend’? You’re not alone” or “Amassing Friends: Collect the Whole Set.”

Honan’s article also raises the interesting question of how we change social norms around open-ness to meeting with people.  If Americans have far fewer friends on average than a generation ago, can we start to change that without people worrying about the stigma of appearing socially desperate, trolling for friends by posting their GPS and encouraging people to join them for a beer or lunch.

See the WIRED article:  “I Am Here: One Man’s Experiment With the Location-Aware Lifestyle” by Matt Honan.

Joseph Azize Page

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Henri Tracol

The notes I summarize here were written by Mr Adie under the heading “3 October 1951, Group II, Colet Gardens”, and placed in the same folder wherein I found the Gurdjieff group meeting of 16 October 1943. Their six pages relate to Henri Tracol’s exchanges with two persons, ‘Mr Andrews’ and ‘Mrs Brown’. I find the second exchange sound, but is not so novel now as it would have been in 1951. However, the first is unique, and deserves to be known. Mr Adie must have valued it, because he has written these notes very carefully. I suspect that he either worked from memory or had jotted down some rough notes during the meeting. Also, the meeting almost certainly had more than two exchanges. This also points to the probability of selection.

Part One
‘Mr Andrews’ had a question about the suffering he has occasioned himself by causing “a lot of trouble” to other people. Mr Tracol replied that there are different types of suffering: first, there is suffering in personality. He offered the example of the ordinary negative emotion we experience at having made ourselves look silly or bad in front of others. Secondly, he said, there is the suffering which comes when we have done something wrong “against ourselves”. With this suffering, the essential thing is not that other people have been touched by it or even know of it, but that “it has been against ourselves in the sense of the work”.

In this instance, replied Andrews, it was definitely the first type of suffering.

“Then”, said Tracol, “you have to fight very hard, probably all you can mobilize of effort of work against it.”

How?, asked Andrews, whart type of effort?

“So you can get some result when you fight”, replied Tracol.

I find it a little hard to follow what Andrews then said, but he spoke about his manifestations. Tracol may have too, yet he understood the man’s state. “But I mean the fight itself” – he used that word again – “That ought to be very very clear to you. You must know how to fight, really fight your negative emotions. Try to tell me more clearly.”

Andrews then mentioned his efforts to stop thought and to relax.

Tracol responded bluntly: “That is not sufficient now. You know that your help is ‘I’, but you must know how to do it. I will try to make you understand by a kind of pciture. You are in a house and a fire is in some part of it and you have to stop it. … We are in the presence of something quite catastrophic. You have to mobilize all your forces against it. It is quite a concrete thing that is happening, as concrete as fire … quite concrete and you have to oppose it with something quite concrete also.”

“It is a thing that demands energy against energy, or, if you will, energy to direct energy in another direction.You have to arrive ready at this feeling of yourself before a complete process after having tried and tried very much. This I want you all, when you have such an enemy inside you, to try.”

“You relax and you really try to get ‘I’. ‘I’ is an affirmation that you are there fighting. ‘I’ is like the soldier who arrives on the battlefield, who says ‘I am there’. That must be very concrete. ‘I AM HERE’. You must feel that ‘I’. It comes from your sensation. You must try to put all the force you can behind it.”

“Without that ‘I’ you can do absolutely nothing. For the moment when you say it, everything else has to disappear. Just the moment when you say ‘I AM’ you sense as much as you can. Then you begin again, ‘I AM’. Try really to understand that you can put an energy in there, and that now you must try at any cost. Then you will try and the beginning and perhaps not succeed, but try and try again. Then you will attract into your ‘I’ the energy that is in your feelings.”

Mr Andrews made a comment that it was more than a metaphor, it was a picture. Tracol continued: “You have a little sensation in you sometimes. That sensation is, right now, all that you have to lean on in your effort. When we begin to remember ourselves, we say ‘I AM’. We say it as we must, with whatever is available to us. But it cannot change anything until you have tried again and again. Then, little by little, through these unsuccessful efforts, we start to understand that the affirmation has contain a certain kind of something, and what can that something possibly be but an energy?”

“You remember how in ‘Fragments’ (i.e. In Search of the Miraculous) Mr Gurdjieff says it has to make a vibration? I have heard him say that many times with his own mouth. That vibration is a sign that the energy of vibrations is there and that energy is in that direction. You can not do it at once. You do it twice, thrice, four times, five times. I am suret aht your negative emotion is a little less after it and you will understand what the fight is.”

Part Two
A vigour leaps at me from the page. Gurdjieff had not then been dead two years. I suspect that the power of this exchange reflects Gurdjieff’s personal impact, at a close remove. Later, of course, that influence was obscured by time, but also by Mme de Salzmann’s “New Work”. The later material I have seen from Henri Tracol is not, in my view, of the order disclosed here.

Note that Tracol’s first advice was to try whatever gave results. As I have mentioned in the book George Adie and in earlier blogs, one can take the advice of not working for results too absolutely. Anyone who never seeks any result from their work is mad. The real problem, as I see it, it is identification with results, and dreaming about possible results. This will all undermine the very effort.

Further, I find the exchange fascinating as being consistent with the impression given by Mr Adie’s 1949 diary, which shows Gurdjieff speaking similarly about the importance of ceaseless struggle so that sweat pours even from one’s heels. But for me the important thing is that this robust approach is the one which for me works. The New Work only set me back.

But now, with the material I recently posted from Gurdjieff’s October 1943 group meeting, I feel that readers of this blog have access to some high quality and otherwise unpublished material which could lead to a new understanding of “effort” and how a clear intellectual understanding of true efforts can lead to encouragement.

To tie these strings together, Gurdjieff had said in 1943 that the secret is in the effort. And the effort demands an intensity only of attention or of concentration while the person remains relaxed. As Mr Adie would say, I focus or concentrate without self-tensing. There is no tension in any of the centres, just direction. This, of course, is what inner concentration is: all of the faculties are pointed towards the centre. One can look at an object while relaxing the eyes or one can fixedly stare at it. It removes some of the self-tension, perhaps, to reflect that as Gurdjieff said, the exercises should be allowed time to work. Tracol stressed the last aspect of this, especially. Do not expect to succeed the first time: be patient, and let the work operate.

In 1943, Gurdjieff stated his hope that the exercises would produce faith in our possibilities of becoming. Tracol stated as a fact that if one persisted one would feel the vibrations which lead up to “I AM”, and from this would understand what the fight is. His advice was to think of a soldier coming in to battle. Gurdjieff had prayed “May God help you with your intellect”. Perhaps these are three aspects of the same thing, for as Orage said: “Thought is the pure effort to attain the truth and takes place in the Intellectual centre.”

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Joseph Azize has published in ancient history, law and Gurdjieff studies. His first book “The Phoenician Solar Theology” treated ancient Phoenician religion as possessing a spiritual depth comparative with Neoplatonism, to which it contributed through Iamblichos. The third book, “George Mountford Adie” represents his attempt to present his teacher (a direct pupil of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky) to an international audience.

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Hello World!

I just want to let you know I’m here.  You think you’re tough.  I know.  You hold all the aces.  You are designed to destroy me.  I will not be destroyed by you.

I just want to let you know I’m here.  You are a sweet smelling flower.  You are soft as silk.  You are designed to distract and tempt me.  I will not be put off.

I just want to let you know I’m here.  You are a beautiful day, ready and waiting.  I will cherish and respect you just a smooth rock in the bottom of a lake cherishes and respects you.  You are a willful child and a stern parent.  I will comfort you and learn from your teachings.  I just want you to be ready for me.  I just to let you know I am here.

shooked and crooked

Even though it’s only been a word for about a month and a half, still I would sit up at nights and wonder if I’d ever truly know the meaning of “bromance”. Now I do. I have a design crush. Meet me by Heather’s locker after home room and I’ll tell you all about it…

To be totally straight up, the work of UK graphic designer Alex Ostrowski makes me tingly and jumpy on several levels. But the ultimate reaction is that it just makes me really happy. “Shiny happy people holding hands” happy. Happy go lucky happy. Happy on the soles of my shoes happy.

Ok, so let’s break it down. I’m a writer, and I love words. I also love design, but most of the time the words in highly designed works are used more as a vehicle to augment the imagery. In Ostrowski’s work, usually in book form, the text and design are fully integrated. Truly, the very medium of the book itself lends itself towards text, but he uses his design skills to enhance the meaning and conveyance of the text in conjunction with layout, not to sacrifice it at the alter of graphic design. Each enhances the other. In the end, the subtlety and clarity of his design shine through while the message speaks much louder.

This year he won “Engage!”, an RSA created competition aimed at fostering social responsibility in young designers and challenging them to create a project that did just that. Working with the Frenchay Brain Injury Rehabilitation Clinic in Brighton, England, he created “I Am Here” to help brain injury victims suffering from post-traumatic amnesia. Directly addressing their disorientation and confusion, he created a colour-coding system and book to help patients re-orient themselves to life, time, and place. I have a feeling though that the greatest triumph here would be the sense of calm and stability it would give, just to know that someone is here and someone is helping you. I find there’s such a genuine kindness to this project, especially when you hear Ostrowski talk about it. Click here to watch a video of the man himself discussing the concept behind “I Am Here”.

Though he went to UWE Bristol for graphic design, he’s clearly also got a poet’s touch. If there was ever a more lovely, life-affirming, literary hand-hold than “I am here”, I can’t think of it.

With “Note To Self”, he’s created a big book of happy morale-boosting posters. Each page is designed to be pulled out and posted around your life, wherever you may need it. Besides being hot design with some clever font work, it’s the basic idea of it that I love the most. In a similar vein to You Are Beautiful, in a world that so often focuses on everything wrong with us “Note To Self” is simply asking for the opportunity to remind us to feel good. How fucking rad is that? I want to marry this dude.

But the goodness keeps on coming. One of his smallest projects – no larger than a business card – is one of my favourites. Having once learned from a friend with depression that therapists sometimes tell their patients to look up at chimneys so that they see more light with their eyes and release some happiness-inducing hormones, he created “Look Up”. Nothing more than a business card with the chimney counting tip, which he then distributed around low-light areas in Bristol.

I love how he seems to be on a very simple mission to induce some joy in people’s lives. Every medium can do this. We’ve all been uplifted by the usual suspects: music, film, art. But these media all have the handicap of being intrinsically a little one-sided. A movie is a movie is a movie. We’re all moved by music but once recorded we can’t add to it’s purpose. It will not alter and you can not actively change it or participate in it. The beauty of the wide open door of design, and exactly what I think Ostrowski is tapping in to so brilliantly, is that there are myriad possibilities to inspire interaction. To galvanize people a little. And through one lovely idea, well designed and handed to others in ways they will trust and understand, you can plant a seed that can sprout in untold directions. From this one card, and from the positivity it creates, there’s no telling where each individual will go. Chimney counting… and onward.

His design work might seem really simple at first, but don’t be fooled. All true creatives know the greatest challenge is to take something seemingly plain and make it perfect. I can write paragraphs for days, so much room to maneuver and flap my wings and run about, but it’s honing down a concept into that one, succinct, perfect sentence that really makes me shit my pants. I would try it right now but I’m sure I’d fuck it up.

Above all, this sense of social responsibility and passion to do good isn’t just for flair. As he states on his site, Ostrowski is interested in using “design for good” and has made a conscious decision to tangibly and directly help others with his work.

His site is a must-see for all the projects he’s involved in, but to end off here’s one more that I love:

Ostrowski says “In 2006 researchers at The University of Leicester concluded that Denmark is the happiest country in the world – this was good enough for me. In March 2008 I made the decision to visit happiness, and embarked upon a pilgrimage to find it. My experiences are presented in this book.

Only one copy exists.”

My frustration at not being able to read it is exceeded only by my joy that something like this is exists. And perhaps that is precisely the point.

Via It’s Nice That