Alexander's

Yea I know I know. My Japanese is sublime. Every one of my japanese friends tells me how well I can speak and how they can somehow understand almost everything that I try to say.

And then I got a job offer:

So do you think you can talk to the boss of a japanese company in japanese?

Yes I can

Well um ... on second thought I can but I'm not sure I should. It's true by now I hardly ever insult Ting when talking to her in japanese, but talking to an important guy from a huge japanese company is a lot more challenging.

What impossible! Your Japanese grammar is stuck on the level of a beginner!

This from the girl that told me how well my japanese already is just a few days prior. So I needed a bootcamp from beginner to talk-to-the-boss-level in just a few short days.

In Austria it takes the average student of japanese about 3-4 years of hard work to be able to read the newspaper in Japanese -- but then I guess the average student in Austria does not have a girlfriend who made it into the most elite university in Japan.

I scanned 3 books already
I can't possibly learn 3 books in a month or two![^1]
Well, you are going to have a good study schedule -- I'll tell you about it tonight

Maybe she misunderstood. I'm not a Chinese student. I can't stand up at 6:00 and work till 24:00 with only three fifteen minute breaks for food and still remember the things I learned during the day.[^2]

You want to get progress really quickly so let's work on it

Oh well I guess a chapter per day is manageable -- I just wish there were other students, so I could take a break from time to time.

This post is a bit older. I just stumbled across it while looking through my not yet published posts and felt like sharing it.

[^1]: If you study japanese full time in Austria you work through a single book every six months. [^2]: Actually now that I'm a consultant this almost feels like a normal workday.

I got my first model plane when I was about twelve. I scrapped together all my pocket money and got a really nice radio controlled glider. It took me weeks to assemble and then, just before the maiden flight, Georg accidentally sat down on it -- the plane was destroyed before it ever flew.

Years later I finally worked up the courage and I decided to try my luck again and after working all summer I had enough money to buy the top of the line electro helicopter.

It was beautiful! Black body with white rotors.

The whole family gathered in front of the house, I let it hoover right before my eyes -- a moment of pure bliss -- which ended abruptly when a gust pushed it into a nearby tree trunk.

It went off like a splinter bomb.

For weeks my father was still picking up broken helicopter parts while mowing the lawn.

So when I decided that it was time to unleash my inner ace pilot again, I had a plan.

Of course I bought the plane that I wanted to fly, but I'm a married man now and therefore much more responsible. So I also got a super cheap one. You know just to get back into the hobby again.

The first flight was a full success. I was using my environment to it's full extent -- a totally random three dimensional walk through the park. The innocent bystanders were like frozen puppets staring wide eyed at the chaotic wonder that was zooming above their heads.

When I finally crash-landed -- after thirty long seconds -- I felt spent -- like a fighter pilot after a hard battle.

For my second flight I shot up twenty meters, turned around, narrowly avoided the ground and ended up in the tree right behind me -- pure adrenalin.

The third flight was probably the best and longest. Like before I had absolutely no control over the plane whatsoever, but managed to avoid hitting any of the spectators for at least 45 seconds -- until I landed in a tree top, from which the plane was totally unrecoverable.

I guess Christof put it best when he said:

Ali, once you manage to bring one back in one piece you will know how to fly.