Kohei Nozaki's blog

650km car trip

2014-12-30T04:39:19+00:00

Last month I went to Tokyo by my car. It was a long distance of about 650km one way. It was good for me because nothing bad happened and I enjoyed it. The real highlight of the trip was a majestic scenery of Mt.Fuji. It took my breath away and made me take a few photos of it.

My car was fine, there was no trouble during the trip, and the fuel consumption was low. The car is old and cheap but the gas mileage was about 20 liters per 1km on the highway.

The trip took almost 12 hours one way. It took so much time because I strived to drive safe. So I kept in the slowest lane and had breaks almost every hour. Sometimes I felt it was tough but it was pleasant for me to drive to my favorite music and radio program recordings. And all the rest areas were good. These places were clean, and I enjoyed many good meals at their restaurants. I loved the Akatsuka parking area's fried oysters. I ate the dish 2 times during the trip.

Still, some difficult things happened, e.g. traffic congestions and driver fatigue in urban areas. Sometimes the traffic congestions tended to be terrible, especially in the evening. And it made my GPS arrival time estimation useless. The Metropolitan Expressway is extremely complex. Maybe I couldn't have made it without the GPS.

I used Shinagawa Intercity Parking, where I had reserved a parking space for 1000 yen. The very parking charge was 2000 yen per day. I think it was so convenient because sometimes it's hard to find a good parking space in urban areas (sometimes it is surprisingly expensive). I was able to reserve it easily because there is a lot of parking space. And there is a mechanical parking garage. So there's no need to worry about the car getting dirty or scratched.

And I used Rest-in Toki no sumika at Ashigara Service Area. It's in the rest area of the highway, so I didn't need to get off. It cost not too much, and I was able to make a reservation easily. It has a nice 24 hour hotspring and I loved it but sometimes it was too crowded. I used the regular bath in my room to avoid using the crowded hotspring.

Next time I wish to go somewhere I've never been to.

Two ultimate MMA fighters: Junior Dos Santos and Cain Velasquez

2014-12-29T14:14:09+00:00

A documentary of Cain Velasquez who is current UFC heavyweight champion. the video was created at just after his championship match that was the first time against Junior Dos Santos. he lost the match.

But now, he revenged JDS two times, taken his champion belt back. Velasquez is still king of MMA world like Fedor Emelianenko in the past.

My favorite band called Champion

2014-12-29T07:32:07+00:00

Another favorite band. a video of great live set. unfortunately, I have never seen their show because I couldn't catch their first show in Japan. after the tour, they broken up. so sad. their record titled "Promises Kept" is an master-piece for me.

Their guitarist Aram Arslanian's band called "Betrayed" also great. I would post about them later.

My favorite band called Hatebreed

2014-12-29T06:23:16+00:00

I love this band, especially their early recordings and live shows. surprisingly, this video has some un-recorded song. I saw this band at 2002 in Tokyo for the first time. that was great. I just reminded about them so I drop some their videos.

Here's an another excellent live set. I really love this video and watched so many times.

How's winter in your part of the world?

2014-12-28T10:42:28+00:00

I want to post an entry because I've just updated the Apache Roller blog engine.

In Japan, temperature is low for me these days, so I catched cold 3 times this season. I'll be useless when I catch cold after several days. so I take any measures in every winter, but no luck. I know it's good for some sports like ski, but I don't like winter that much. and I hate many alcohol party that held at the end of the year season, and watching many drunks... I wish I go to hot country...

How's winter in your part of the world?

Thoughts about destination of migration

2014-06-11T22:53:18+00:00

I wrote about some conditions of subject in another entry, so I got to think more further this time for that subject.

I'm living in a advanced country, but its sustainability is uncertain. so I guess what I need is more stable country which keep better sustainability. sustainability of developing country might be not stable. so... finally I got to know what, really I need is keeping my physical light.

What I mean is... the ideal status is... if the need which moving to another country, arises, then I can move to another country immediately. it's impossible to stay to one country for rest of my life nowadays. so I think what necessary things is:

Keep your ability to earn money portable

Learn popular language. such as English, Chinese, Spanish (But I'm curious if great translator will be invented).
Find a way to earn money with Internet (but I know it's pretty hard to me...)

Remote working as a software engineer (it's ideal to me!)
Develop apps or services on the web
Create famous website and put adsense or such advertise things

Improve abilities that demanded globally

Keep fluidity of your assets and money

Don't buy land, house and car
Stocks or cashes are good

Don't buy physical things as possible

Furnitures
Records (buy mp3 instead!)
Books (buy eBooks instead!)
Pets (it's hard to carry them!)
Ultimate goal is: all you have is a laptop computer, a smartphone and some clothes and passport/certificates etc. rent other things that need for living.

Men who abandoned Japan

2014-06-11T22:10:23+00:00

I read a book titled "Men who abandoned Japan". this book contains some real-life stories of such men. all of them are moved to Philippines from Japan for some reasons. almost all of them said same thing like "Philippines is better than Japan". but I think it's too far from ideal life of them, and they seems to be escaped from heavy debts or something. I got to know what:

Bad relationship destroys your life. if do you have many assets or money than your partner, you might be unhappy
Debt is evil. buying a house or land is ridiculous unless if you are a billionaire. renting is much better than buying in my opinion
Moving to another country will not solve your personal problem
Life in a developing country is hard on many aspects

I know It's funny these are not related to any country. but anyway I have to prepare to move to another country because of bad sustainability of my country. so I have to deal with:

Improve English and technical skills
Investigate foreign countries that I will be moved to
- Sustainability
- Conditions of visa
- Languages
- Job demands
- Quality of medical service
- Social security system
- Crime rate
- Unemployment rate
Save money

Thoughts of staying in a foreign country

2014-06-11T07:57:43+00:00

I sometimes wish to move to foreign country because I'm getting anxious when I think the future of my country. the cause is:

Aging of the population
Politics
- I hate current government which keep neoliberalism forward
- The government is ignoring younger generation. they cares only seniors that have strong voting power. younger generation forced to pay for a pension plan, but it won't be returned to them at all!
Bad environment of workers
- Especially, working time is terrible in Japan! I don't want to work 9:00-24:00 every day again!
- It will be getting worse because labor deregulation is keep forwarding nowadays.

So, I guess I have to prepare to move to alternative country like big company does. like they always threat us like: "We have to move to another country because of high rate of tax in Japan."

Looking for easy reading books that wrote in English

2014-06-10T08:51:02+00:00

I'm looking for easy reading books that wrote in English at iBooks, Apple's eBook store. I almost prefer eBooks than paper books because I have only small amount space for me, and I don't want to bothered to disposition.

the following is lists of some websites that suggests easy reading for beginners.

I looked some books in the list, but still I can't found interesting one to me. I can't understand Shakespeare at all, I guess it must be difficult to me. or it might be not good because I'm not interested in such genre of books. so I would try to find interesting ones of particular genres next time. I'm interested in (except programming / software engineering):

Southeast Asia (I wish to stay a country in that area in the future!)
History
Philosophy
Music

I know this kind of entry doesn't mean at all for almost all of visitors, but I would try to keep blogging for my writing practice.