Instagram Live!

Interviewer: Eddy Lau Eddy: Today’s topic for the coffee break is “Favourite Place to Travel”. Mende-san, you must be travelling a lot. Do you have any favourite place, you will not get bored of visiting again and again, or even living there? Mende: Yes, I have been to so many places, but it is hard to decide which one is my favourite. Each place is very interesting to explore. Eddy: For me, one of my favourites is Barcelona in Spain because the weather there in summer is amazing, sunbathing on such a beautiful long coastline. Especially for tourists to explore the city, there is such a nice walkable environment with stunning historical architectures all around the city, which are surprises everywhere to discover. The food is nice, and so are the people. How about if you want to move to a place, other than Japan, where will it be? Mende: I mean moving to live at a new country and travelling is a little bit different. Maybe travelling is more like a first impression. I never stay in one place for a long time, like studying aboard. So, I almost get a bit nervous living aboard, and you know, staying in Tokyo is much more convenient. There is one place that comes to my mind. My wife and I went twice or thrice to Andalusia, southern Spain, and there is a very small city called Ronda. This was the first…

Interviewer: Yumeka Miyamae Miyamae：In the past year telework has really taken off, which has really changed how we live and work.  Today I`d like to talk about living and working in this new era with Covid 19. Mende：Yes, I`d like to hear your thoughts, also. Miyamae：Generally, people select an area to live that is within an easy hour commute to the office.   Where people live is basically decided by where one works, since the norm is to go to the office to do your work.  In other words, work time = office time.  Work and private life are clearly divided by place, time, and role.  That is up until one year ago.  One thing I have felt during teleworking this past year is the line between work and private is obscured.   I am having trouble switching between the two. Mende：For people like you with a family and small children at home, I think it is much harder to switch on and off.  A long time ago when my wife used to teach at the university,  she had to commute two hours one way, for a total of four hours of commute time a day.  Such a waste of time.   I suggested she rent an apartment near the campus and crash there on days she was too tired to go home, but she refused and said she needed to come home so she could “switch off.”  I didn’t understand then, but…

City Night Walk Vol.064：Skybus Tour 2019.07.26　Anri Sato+ Mutsuro Honma For our 64th Stroll about town, we explored the Tokyo Nightscape using a 2 story open roof bus: Skybus. It was a great drive around town, using Skybus’ Odaiba Nightscape course. While we started the event with some concerns about bad weather, but luckily we were able to enjoy a beautiful summer night drive. A group photo at Odaiba with the rainbow bridge behind us Skybus The Significance of the Skybus tour We started before it got dark Chief Mende-san explaining the point of the bus tour The sunset setting upon the emperor’s residence Under the theme of ‘Rediscovering the nightscape of Tokyo on the Skybus!’, our members all explored the nightscape of Tokyo from a height of 3.8m off the ground. Our route was Tokyo Station → Oukyo (Emperor’s residence) → Tokyo Tower → Shuto Highway → Rainbow Bridge → Odaiba → Shuto Highway → Rainbow Bridge → Tsukiji Market → Ginza → Hibiya → Marunouchi → Tokyo Station The lighting detectives also held the same event in 2013, but as the 2020 Olympics/Paralympics are under a year away, there are heavy development projects occurring all around Tokyo and therefore would perhaps change the nightscape of the city. We were curious to explore how the nightscape of Tokyo has changed especially after the Tsukiji market has moved completely to the Toyosu Market. The highlight of this trip is the nightscape…

Interviewer:  Yonglin Ke Mende：Are we talking about childhood play today? Ke：Yes.  I have a sister, two years younger than me, and we used to play together all the time when we were younger. Mende：Did you play house? Ke：Yes.  We also played house growing up in China. Mende：Girls usually play with dolls and such, but being a boy that is very rare. Ke：Yes.  My father was a very busy man, so I only had my sister at home to play with. Mende：Didn’t you play outside? Ke：Before I started school we used to go to the park or amusement parks fairly often, but once I started elementary school I would invite my friends over and we would play video games. Mende： Yes, I thought this might come up in our talk today.  That is your generation. Ke：How did you spend your childhood? Mende：I sometimes played by myself, but usually I played with several friends.  This might sound a little dramatic, but play for children is like work and business for adults.  So even during play communication between your friends is very important.  How many friends did you play video games with? Ke：Maybe 2 or 3 friends and we would play Mario Kart, Contra, or other strategy games.  Mende：Many people play against the computer now, right.  When I was a kid, of course we didn’t have computers and television was still broadcast over “street televisions” in store windows.   There was a TV in a…

Interviewer: Xueying Piao Piao：Today I`d like to talk about patterns of a healthy lifestyle. Mende：Healthy life.  That is a heavy topic.  Why did you choose this topic? Piao：Health can be divided into two parts: mental and physical.  Now that I am a working member of society I feel a little insecure about my mental health and ability to control my emotions. Mende：Really?!  You are feeling insecure?  How old are you? Piao：I am 26. Mende：When I was 26 I was married.  I was still a graduate student and I had so many things I wanted to do.  I don’t think I was feeling anxious about anything. Maybe you feel anxious because you left your home country and are working abroad?  Were you anxious as a student? Piao：I was just fine as a student.  This all started after I started working. Mende：So, you were wondering about healthy lifestyle habits and felt you needed to make some changes in your own life? Piao：Yes. So, I want to know what other members of the workforce think about healthy lifestyles.  Mende：Like you said there are two parts to a healthy life; problems of the heart and mind and problems of the physical body.  The heart, mind and body are not separate entities, but work in conjunction with each other.   Therefore if you are like me and have a strong physical body, you can also maintain mental stamina.  If you are wondering which comes first, mental or…