So what’s it like to live a Japanese life? many people ask me such questions, how do I feel, is it nice over there, etc. To be honest, I don’t know. Strange as it may seems, my circumstance is not that much different than when I was in Australia, I work with a bunch of Australian blokes, still working as full time geek (which I thoroughly enjoy), only that I am now in a different geographical location.

I guess that is what happen when you have studied enough Buddhism, things doesn’t shake you in a majorly dramatic way. Japan is a country. My apartment is a place to live. It is not insignificant, but it is not very special either. Suffice to say that given my circumstance, I am fortunate enough to say that my few days in here have been very comfortable indeed.

How long will I be here for, I don’t know. But this experience, just the act of going through the negotiation, the interviews, the preparations, have made me grew in ways I couldn’t imagine.

Let’s see where this wave will take me.

Just got a phone call from Japan, my visa is approved. They are sending the certificate of eligibility (COE) over. Im going to need to come over to the jap embassy with the thing before I can have the visa physically labelled in my passport (?).

But things are starting to gel nicely together. The situation in japan is cooling down (just!), I have successfully completed my work with my previous employer, have just managed to sell my piano, still trying to sell the car, and my replacement tenant is ready to move in.

I haven’t been this excited in ages. There are still many things to be done and resolved, but its all coming together. Back then, I was too close to see the pattern in the fabric. But now, stepping back, it all starting to make sense.

I’m glad I didn’t gave up back then and persisted. I hope this will all work for the best.

In zen buddhism there is a saying:

Preoccupied with a single leaf, we missed the whole tree.
Preoccupied with a single tree, we missed the whole forest.

Yesterday, I had a very contributive day. Did my bits at work, even did a talk on the australian computer society. Came back, I joined the buddhist group disucssion and encouraged my fellow friends. I even helped one of them to brush up their resume so he can apply for job. I tought that was a very, very great day, until I realized that I have missed to congratulate my girlfriend on her birthday. It was her birthday on that day (and it was her who tipped me too), and I haven’t got it on my calendar.

I thought to myself, after all this talk about saving and helping people in need, how could I had forgotten about it!!! She had a big heart, temendous capacity to appreciate – she knew what I have gone through and she supported me all the way that day. We reconciled and learned from this experience. Never for once is she angry towards me, never for once she said: “how could you?”. If any, she knew how bad I felt when I realized the situation, she forgive me. And in doing so I felt so much more dissapointed in myself, and swore not to let this happen, ever again.

But here is the lesson: know your priorities, never lose sight of the forest. In doing so we will keep tabs of all the tree and all the leafes. Otherwise, all is for naught. On that day, despite all I did, I didn’t mark it as a day of victory, but rather one of defeat.

But one thing for sure, I am so glad that I have her on my side.

So there. I hope this can be of help to someone in the future.

The future of Japan is still very uncertain (and with it, my job opportunity). Over the weekend the australian government have issued a very stern warning against travelling to Japan. And yet, like this moon, it shines still against the darkness.

This week will be a very decisive week.

My preparation to leave for Japan is underway, and I can’t but be concerned by the latest development in the country. Japan is in an uncharted territory, it has survived the biggest quake, followed by a tsunami, and now – the possibility of a nuclear meltfown.

A lot of my friends told me that going to Japan is not such a good idea. But I didn’t go to japan just to have fun. I am going there to seize an opportunity. As of now, I have yet to receive a red light to stop me from going. The road ahead is not yet 100% secured, my visa is not granted yet, and my packing is not yet done. There is also the logistics and selling of assets (such as car); the closure of my current work in the project I work on and so on.

Yet I am not daunted by all this. Since when do things run perfectly anyway ? no pain no gain, and I’m ready for the challenge. If anything, the philosophy of Buddhism taught me that nothing is permanent. Even this job in japan, it could well dissapear because of this catasthrophy, or not. Point is, there are a lot of things we can not control, we aught to just let go.

Things we can change though, such as our day to day activity is another matter. I will not let this event upset and throw me off-balance. What doesn’t kill me will make me stronger, I have to persevere!

In the past few months, I have been wondering where he’d gone because he is usually very active on the net. I was a little bit afraid that the darkness would consume him as I feel that it was in there from our exchange of thoughts, but because I never knew him at personal level, I never asked the question. He left me a message before saying he will respond to my latest comment, but never did.

Weeks passed, and today I received a DM from his twitter account – @VinaMist notified me that Chris (lethe’s real name) had passed away a month ago. I was just at Taste Of Melbourne, in rapture after savouring the myriad of beautiful food and wine in that place. To receive news of death at such a joyous occasion is a new experience to me.

To be honest I feel for him, not many people connects to others with that amount of sincerity. He connects to people through his work – I feel that had he not died, he would have contributed greatly to the world of literature. He invited me once to converse over Skype, I wished I had taken that opportunity while it was still knocking on my door. But such is life, I guess.

I don’t think that the news ruined the experience. I accept that this is the nature of things, that for every beginning there is an end. At the back of my mind I wanted to know, how did he passed away? But for me who is on the other side of the world, and with no means to find out, it is a no-question. I will never know. And so I let go of the question and appreciate what little is left.

Lethe, this will be my final poetry for you. May you rest in peace, my friend.

The Day Turned

With eyes open I stepped outside;
on the pond was the moon,
reflected.

Darkness falls, the day is gone
and the sun’s warmth in my heart,
remembered.

Every entity in this world will go through this cycle of living and dying. Nothing shall escape it.

This applies to the most obvious entity of all, our own self. However this also applies to other concept in life. Take for example, a computer system.

A computer system is often the result of a software project. There is the moment where an idea is being formulated, a prototype is built to pitch the project, budget acquired, team formulated and grown, and finally, the project took off (birth). Over time, the system is crafted, again and again it is perfected, broken, fixed, patched, deployed. installed, broken again, fixed again, and so on (aging).

However, as software system changes hand from one team to another, fixes and enhancement done to it may or may not be in accordance with the original structure conceived by its creators. This will eventually result in various internal complication and inconsistencies. Sometimes it is not the software that age, but the hardware. Disks failing, cables aging, memory corruption, dead power supply, and so on. Indeed, nothing last forever! (sickness).

Finally, at some point, all software system will be retired. It may became obsolete, replaced by a newer system, or simply, broke down (death). On that fateful day, management, end-users, or whoever it is that work closely with the system will eventually look back and reflect upon the value it has contributed to the organization or end users. Even future systems implemented will be measured, directly or indirectly, against its older counterparts.

Therefore for those of you who works in the realm of computing, do keep in mind this principle. Take it to your heart that nothing in this world is permanent.

In doing so, when crafting and scoping a system, it is important that we ask ourself (and the client) – what is the intended lifecycle of this project or software system? how will it be supported and maintained? who will look after the system when your team is gone?

Remember that a software system is an entity as much as you are. How you write each of your system reflects your view and life-state in general. And verily so, you can infer the character of a programmer from a piece of code that he has written. From the various decision points he made which is visible in the way the system is structured, organized, partitioned and optimized.

Have that system lived a life worth living?

Well, have you?

Indeed it is true that truth emerges and lies stripped bare when one reflects upon Death. When the system has reached the end of its live, and your name written as craftsman of that system in the various source code and documentations that surrounds the system, how would you like to be perceived?

So if there is one credo for a programmer to follow, this would be it:

Live a life worth living – Craft a system worth crafting.
The two goes hand in hand.

Didn’t someone say…
“life is what happens when you are busy making plans”

In a blink, your life will be over.
Old age, sickness and Death, will soon be upon you.

When that moment come,
a question will enter your mind.

Have I lived a life worth living?

You will know the answer,
not from the amount of wealth you have created
nor from the conquest you have achieved,

But from the sum
of all the moments that you have lived
and the ones that you have missed.

Bodhidharma said:

When mortals are alive, they worry about death.
When they’re full, they worry about hunger.
Theirs is the Great Uncertainty.

But sages don’t consider the past.
And they don’t worry about the future.
Nor do they cling to the present.
And from moment to moment they follow the Way.

Well, as I was restructuring my room, I realized that what I am doing is very similar to refactoring of source code (in the context of computer programming). Basically, you take a step back and assess the following things:

• What are the tasks (use cases) that got executed most often
• How does the facility (in this case my room) get used to satisfy those use cases.
• If I were to start with a clean slate (a blank room) how best to rearrange the components, as well as the parts within each component to best satisfy the requirement?

Usually when people rearrange their furniture around, they are mostly concerned with only space, looks, and feel of the room. But what I did today was more than that, of course I think about space – I think about the limited area in my room that are not used very often and re-arrange my bed, study desk, and shelf around based on that.

But more than thinking about the placement of things, I also think about stuff like:

• Where should I store my recent documents, vs my old documents?
  Where should my old documents live?
  I settled with putting recent document on the right end of my desk, and archived documents on the bottom shelf. I rarely access these old docs so firstly, it make sense to put them on separate pile. But the question then becomes..
• How should I archive my old docs?
  I settled with sorting and storing them in chronological order, by projects / case. I put them on a small box each. I don’t open up old docs regularly, (else they will not be called old) but when I do want to find something older than 6 months, it usually take ages. To partition and archive it this way feels right for me. Loving the outcome so far.
• Where should I put my boiler?
  Because I’m a serious fan of tea, I actually moved the boiler up from the kitchen into my DESK. I reckon there’s no need to go downstairs to get hot water if I can just boil them right in front of me. Again, loving this decision so far.
• Where should I put my guitars?
  I actually noticed an area in my room that I don’t use a lot – it’s actually a walkway to the balcony. But because it’s usually very windy and cold outside, I never accessed the balcony. So I turn this area into my mini reading area and I put my guitars close to it. Instant mini zen space. I just sat down there after dinner strumming stuff out. That mini space rocks.
• …And so on and so forth, you get the idea.

I know, right? This is so geeky, LOL – But it surprises me that the thought process I went through is VERY similar to refactoring the source base for a computer program. Even the dilemma at the middle of the procedure is also very similar – while I was restructuring there was so much mess in my room (I can’t walk in a straight line!) that I doubted whether I was actually adding some real value or whether I was just in the mood of shifting things around. If you are a computer programmer that have experience in undertaking a big refactoring ‘surgery’ – you should be familiar with what I am talking about.

Anyway, all in all it turns out that the restructuring was for the better. I’ve moved old books I don’t use downstairs to the big shelf where all books live, I’ve reclaimed areas in my room that I don’t use very often into my mini zen space, and my book shelves – even though it looked the same, now the areas within it are partitioned and each partition have a purpose that better fit my current need.

In short, my room now satisfy the requirement better.

I know, I can ready your mind – WHY THE HASSLE? IT’ S JUST A BLOODY ROOM!

Yes, all of the stuff I’ve mentioned here are all small things – boiler placement, document archival policy, reclaiming spaces – they’re all just ‘insignificant’ details. I mean it’s just a room right? It’s so easy to just put stuff in and be done with it…

But so is refactoring a computer program. Indentation, comments, function signature, separation of concern, re-assessing the role of a class, a module, a package, and so on. So is about being organised, being punctual, being disciplined, being mindful, and so on.

All of this are just small ‘insignificant’ stuff. But add all of those small things up, and you will find that the cumulative sum of those things defines your limitation. The short term reward of fixing each ‘insignificant’ problem is usually not very noticeable – but in the long run, the reward of removing or reducing a factor that limits your ability to function more effectively, more in tune with your personal self is well worth the trouble.

How’s that for room restructuring philosophy?

So tonight, before you go to bed, if you feels like taking a spin at this stuff, go and stand in a corner of your target room and really think about what you want to use this room for. What is its purpose? And in doing so, still with your ‘organizer’ goggles on, look again at all the components inside it. Does that stuff fit in the room? Does it feels right to have those stuffs there, positioned that way, arranged and partitioned that way? If not, and you genuinely feel that – then the question is not “why take the trouble to move it around?” – but rather “why NOT move it around?”

After all, isn’t this the essential way of personalising your, well, personal living space?

This is why even though I now live in Melbourne, on the death anniversary of people who are dear to me, I would chant an extra 30 minute on that day to honor the memory of that person.

I’m not really sad or anything like that, I understood the Law of life and death – that everything that has a beginning has an end. All entities goes through the cycle of birth, ageing, decay, and death.

Not only human beings, but also your table, your PC, your work, a music, a fruit, a fashion trend, fame, a happy moment, a sad moment, the earth, the sun, a star, even to problems – and so on and so forth. This cycle happens to everything, and so it is with our life.

What happens when we die?

(As far as I know) In Buddhism there are 2 big school of thought on what happen to our soul when we die. One school of thought reckons that the soul is eternal, when it enters the stage of Death, it will re-enter Nature. In time, it will be reborn into this world, thus continuing the motion of the cycle of reincarnation.

The other school of thought, which is less commonly found reckons that the soul is NOT eternal. When we die, we die. Our entity will permeates the universe and our soul dissapears. A very unique way of looking into Death.

Someone whom I really respect believes in this point of view – and he clearly indicates that the Buddhism of Nichiren Daishonin (which is the branch of Buddhism that I choose to be my way of life) states that this is so.

I never really get it before, but perhaps now I do.

Fade to black vs. Live forever

You see, I can remember my cousin quite well in my mind. I can picture him walking around, smiling, brooding, laughing and making jokes – I can even picture several scenarios, ‘what would he do if…’ kinda thing.

It is indeed very hard to prove or disprove as to what would happen to his soul after he died – we don’t even have any means to prove whether such a thing as a ‘soul’ exists or not. But nevermind that, because what happens to his soul doesn’t really matter to this discussion.

The point is, his entity as a being remains with the people that knew him. Some knew him as a brother, some knew him as a cousin, some knew him as a good friend, some knew him as a son, some only knew him as a story, or a gossip – and so on.

Whatever it is that happens to his body and soul -  any deeds, values and impacts that he has left behind, those things stays with us. Those things have changed us. Maybe the impact is very, very, very subtle. But nevertheless it is present.

We’re all connected?

It doesn’t really stops there, I guess. You see, he was really into gaming. In fact, he is one of the best DoTA player in Indonesia, definitely one of the key members of his gaming clan. His style of gameplay would have been copied, adopted and studied time and again, and have contributed to the style/gameplay of his friends (and enemies too, I bet). No doubt that his existence would have direct and indirect influence to people in his gaming circle.

My younger brother is very close to him. They share mutual respect and share a deep bond, despite the fact that they grew up in different country – his life, his struggle and his suffering affects my younger brother very much. And what goes though my younger brother’s life affects me, my closest relatives, and his close friends.

His story influences many people too. How he died at such a young age, what he could have become, what he has already achieved and so on. I was influenced by his story, and here I am writing this. Who knows what sort of chain of thoughts this piece of writing would set off in the minds of people who are reading this.

So in that sense, both school of thoughts are actually correct. He did pass away, and his soul would perhaps dissapear into nothingness (who knows), but a part of his entity would live on. In our memories, subtly influencing our way of life. Every time I remember him, a part of his entity that I remember would be born, age, decay, and die. Everytime anyone in DoTA enacted a particular trick / technique that he invented, everytime my brother joke around in the style of my cousin, that part of his entity is living a life on its own, being born and reborn over and over again.

I guess this is the case with all things. Simply by living alone, we are already making changes not only to ourselves, but also to everything around us. Our connection to others are inseparable, as do our connection with the environments, thus is the law of cause and effects.

We impact each other, directly or indirectly and thus we have a direct / indirect impact on everything else in this world, and everything else in this world has an impact on us. No matter how subtle, it is present.

Existence

So, what would I have left behind when I die? What values have I contributed to my friends, family, to my work place, to my wider social circle, to the world? What cause have I made, what effect have I set off throughout my existence so far?

I know that there are so much more things that I could do. I guess we just have to take it one step at a time.