asymptotes

I was in Osaka in February 2024 for a scientific conference. Since it was my first time in Japan, I allotted a few free days after the conference for sightseeing.  A friend connected me with Murakami Sensei, his Japanese teacher for several years. Murakami-sensei and his wife Keiko-san graciously toured me around Kobe, where we visited several significant sights in the city and even treated me to a traditional Japanese lunch which included soba noodles and Kobe beef!   The three of us share a common passion: we are all language learners!  Murakami-sensei knows English and Keiko-san is studying Spanish. As for me, I have studied Spanish for some years, but, lately, I have concentrated on studying Japanese. It was quite an experience spending a whole day talking in three languages. While it was quite mind-boggling, it definitely was a lot of fun.  I can definitely say that that day I spent with Murakami-sensei and Keiko-san was the one of the highlights of my...

I look at a poem as a painting, in which words instead of colors and textures are used as the instruments to convey meaning, emotion or memory. For some time now, I have been thinking if it would be possible to come up with a one-word poem. I've come to the conclusion that there is one such word, that, just hearing it could evoke a multitude of meanings, visions, sounds, memories and emotions. I would have presented the word to you immediately were it not for my recent fascination for haikus, a short Japanese poem that I have described in an earlier post . And so I thought of writing a one-word haiku, which I share with you below: r あい n Haikus do not usually have a title, but if I'd choose one for the above poem, I'd choose  雨に愛  (Ame ni ai). This may be a bad thing to do since it's like explaining one's own joke. But I'd put it there just the same. I won't blame you if you think this is all nonsense. Many poems and paintings have suffere...

A haiku is a short Japanese poem that contains only 3 lines of verse. Traditionally, they are composed of 17 syllables distributed as 5-7-5 among the 3 lines.  The essence of a haiku is the kiru , a "cutting" represented by the juxtaposition of 2 images or ideas. Modern Japanese haiku do not necessarily follow the 5-7-5 syllabication rule. [1] On one of my birthdays, I posted a Facebook status update, which I later realized, could qualify as a haiku (at least informally). I present it again here: The author of Harry Potter went scuba diving; She could have had it all, She was Rowling in the deep. I tried working on the 5-7-5 syllabication rule and got the following: Potter's author dove; She could have had it all, she's Rowling in the deep. Well, this fulfilled the 5-7-5 rule, but in my opinion, it had less impact than the informal haiku, in terms of delivering the kiru. In fact,   I would almost say it's disastrous, so instead of call...

Today is Pi Day. Happy Pi Day everyone! March 14 is celebrated in the Geek World as International Pi Day. The derivation of this celebration, being straightforward, is left for the readers [1],  following the great tradition of math textbooks. I wish to join today's celebration by presenting an original haiku (a form of short Japanese poetry) and a well-known trivia. Pi Haiku Circumferential Pi A point went around Its distance traveled divided by twice the length of a rotating arm Behold! Pi is in hand. Pi Trivia Do you want to remember the value of pi up to 14 decimal places?  Just memorize the sentence below.  "How I need a drink, alcoholic, of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics." The number of letters in each word gives out the digits of pi in order.  You should be able to get 3.14159265358979. Photo credit: "Pumpkin Pi" by bigfoot13 in www.sxc.hu ------ [1] But we provide the sol...