What I Learnt Today

It would appear that yes, he does.

What I Learnt On 31st March in other years

31st March 2016 So it’s “Goodnight” from me – Swedish Made Simple

31st March 2012 Beware – April Fool

Garr Reynolds has lived and taught in Japan for many years.

He writes:

Japanese culture and ways of thinking can not be adequately addressed in a short space, but this Japanese proverb “Nana korobi ya oki” (literally: seven falls, eight getting up) reflects an important and shared ideal. This speaks to the Japanese concept of resilience. No matter how many times you get knocked down, you get up again….

The concept of gambaru is also deeply rooted in the Japanese culture and approach to life. The literal meaning of gambaru expresses the idea of sticking with a task with tenacity until it is completed—of making a persistent effort until success is achieved.

This week at Presentation Zen he write about the Japanese resilience in response to the earthquake.

On the same subject, Andrew Knight points us towards the British Medical Journal blog of Ryuki Kassai, Professor of Family Medicine at Fukushima.  Andrew writes that the Prof “came with some of his registrars to visit our practice in 2009.  I have visited him and his registrars in Fukushima.  He gives a fascinating and moving insight into living through such events”

Sometimes it became difficult to keep our strong Fukushima tradition of endurance (gaman) and non blaming culture. The mental well being of the caregivers who were under constant demanding pressure is an ongoing issue. A video clip on YouTube entitled Pray for Japan: be strong deeply moved us into tears. That was a good example how music and narrative can heal us

Read the Profossor’s blog in the BMJ.

He has also posted an update for the second week.

What I Learnt On 30th March in other years

30th March 2014 Handling Errors : And here’s me thinking that they dropped the ball by accident

You might disagree with the claim that The Spice Temple is Sydney’s coolest restaurant,, but I think there is no dispute that it is the restaurant with the coolest door.

The Spice Temple , in the heart of the financial district of Sydney’s CPD, is down in the basement of its more famous sister, Neil Perry’s Rockpool. To get down into the opium den, you pass through exotic fluttering multi-coloured curtains – which on second look turn out to be an illusion -they are a video playing on the giant screen that doubles as the door.

We’re not on Alstonville now, Toto. The Spice Temple is not your average suburban Chinese. The dishes are sourced from provincial China, with an emphasis on the chilli. The waiters are very knowledgable about the menu and the wines, and it is certainly worth seeking their advice.

Alex and I were lucky to get the last table, tonight, so it would be best to book ahead. Many of the clients were finance types after work, although the table next to us looked like a meeting of two gangs from Underbelly making a million dollar deal.

Despite the opulence of the decor, the prices were quite reasonable, with mains starting at $30. We started with Lamb and Fennel Dumplings (yum) and then shared two of the signatures dishes, which were superb.

Three Shot Chicken is finished at the table in a clay pot over a burner, where the waiter makes a broth by adding Tsing Tao beer, chilli oil and soy sauce to chicken and mushrooms.

We also had ‘Hot, Sweet, Sour and Numbing Pork’, which was cooked with chilli, black vinegar, sugar – and Szechuan peppercorns to give some extra bite.

The servings were large, and we had trouble walking back up the stairs. Thanks Michelle for the tip, but I’m surprised you didn’t mention the door.

Modern smartphones have the very useful feature of correcting your typing mistakes by predicting what you actually intended to type.

Drats. What I meant to say in the preceding sentence was that modern smartphones have the amazingly annoying feature of sending completely random messages completely unrelated to what you actually intended to type. It appears my iPhone ‘corrected’ my first paragraph as I typed it. Even now I am struggling to get him to accept this paragraph the way it is written backspace delete backspace retype.

If you have been a victim of your iPhone, you may be interested to know that ‘Damn you autocorrect’ is a website devoted to bringing light to this phenomenon. The website is so popular that it was released as a book last week. It appears that iPhones have a preference for the profane – although it is a bit worrying to think that the autocorrect feature prefers words you type regularly.

Here are some of the examples from the site that are suitable for publishing in a family friendly column. You can see more examples of the treachery of iPhones at http://damnyouautocorrect.com