Japan

A Day in Ueno Zoo & Children’s Library

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It was a sunny Saturday yesterday and we went to the Zoo & the International Museum of Children’s Literature in the Ueno Park area.At the Zoo, Lisa and her friend Hayato enjoyed a monorail ride as well as watching elephants and monkeys.

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Ueno Park, full of lotus leaves

We had lunch at Park Side Cafe, then walked to The International Library of Children’s Literature. The reading room on the first floor had a section of transportation-related books, where both of the kids spent some time opening several books one after another.

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The International Library of Children’s Literature

After saying goodbye to Hayato and his parents, Lisa went on playing at a playground across the zoo. Then we walked by the Shinobazuno-ike pond and head home. She fell asleep on the way back – it was a fun day!

#上野公園 #紫陽花

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Kamakura, May 2017

We took a day trip to Kamakura, which is a town in Kanagawa prefecture 1-hour train ride away from Tokyo Station.

First, we arrived at Kamakura Station around 11:10 and had lunch before it gets crowded. ROOFTOPS near the station was a hit (though you need to be prepared to get really messy!).

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Avocado & grilled tomato burger at ROOFTOPS

Then, we strolled Komachi Dori Street to Tsurugaoka Hachimangu (鶴岡八幡宮) Shrine.

From there, we walked more to see the bamboo grove in Hokokuji Temple (報国寺). The quiet zen garden was a nice contrast to the vivid shrine. Some bamboo shoots and young stalks

We took a local bus and Enoden train to the Great Buddha, then walked by the Yuigahama beach.

Kamakura has so many places you can easily visit within a day. We picked some of the major spots to visit since it was my first time there (Keita’s second), but it felt like I only saw a small portion of this old town. We kept walking around until it’s time to go home.

It’s a great destination to take a short trip to while in Tokyo. So much closer than Kyoto but you still get to see & learn the historical parts of Japan.

Kamakura Travel Guide (japan-guide.com)

WordCamp Europe 2016 Slides & Photos

Last Friday, I presented a talk about the Japanese WordPress community at WordCamp Europe 2016 in Vienna.

The video will be published on WordPress.tv at some point. Meanwhile, here are some points for those who had missed it:

  • Japanese is the most widely used non-English WP locale (12.3% of non-English locales)
  • WordPress is by far the most popular CMS in Japan today (78.5% share – higher number compared to 59.5% for English sites)
  • Meetups are held almost every weekend somewhere in Japan. We make it easy to see events across Japan through the WordBench website and the event calendar. Many of the chapters create unique banners for each event.
  • The online community is also active, with many contributors on translation, documentation, support, bug fix & report, and Wapuu too!
  • Show others how to get involved, recognize their hard work, and help out.
  • Your own contribution can be multiplied if you help others to contribute. It’s necessary to grow the community for WordPress to succeed.

It was a pleasure to have had an opportunity to share what I’ve seen in the local community for the past 13 years. As I said in the talk, my goal is to help others contribute to WordPress so the “small steps” of more people can build up to form a long stride. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions!

Day 0 (WCEU Picnic) Photos

Francesca and I hosted a picnic at Burggarten near the venue on Thursday.

#wceupicnic #wceu #wceu2016

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Day 1 Photos

Petya’s opening remarks
WCEUBall wapuu
Event venue
MuseumsQuartier
Giant wapuu
Closed caption typists
Sergey
Wapuu stickers & coloring book
Matt & Brian
Kel

Day 2 Photos

The childcare support at WCEU this year was really great.

Francesca Marano on Italian Community
Child care room
WCEUBall
WCEU banner at night

Thanks #wceu organizing team for arranging a visit to the children's museum. It was fun! 💕

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Photos: Contributor Day

Having discussion face-to-face was the best part of the Contributor Day.

Polyglots rooms
Local coffee
Polyglots wapuu
Bego
Bego and Birgit

WordPress Meetup Tokyo: November 2015

Last night, I co-organized the 24th WordPress Meetup Tokyo. This meetup group for English speakers hosts smaller and more intimate get-togethers compared to WordBench Tokyo, which is in Japanese.

Toru did a presentation on the upcoming WordPress version 4.4 with an emphasis on the responsive image feature, based on his talk at WordCamp Tokyo last month. I showed a couple quick demos on how WordPress post embed works and the new Twenty Sixteen theme.

WordPress 4.4 embed test post

A screenshot from my test site, displaying a WordPress post embed on the Twenty Sixteen theme.

Next speaker was Sarah Cada from the Philippines. I met her when I was at WordCamp Philippines 2012 and kept in touch through our mutual friend (now a coworker) Andrew. Sarah came in as a special guest to this meetup while she’s visiting Tokyo as a part of her first trip to Japan. She talked about her involvement in the Philippine Web Designers Organization, the state of local web communities, and painfully slow internet connection there 😛

Jeff Crawford shared his experience building a business site using a theme from Thrive Themes. Jeff had shown me his site Connect-Local with another choice of a theme at a previous meetup, but this time he said he’s really happy with the ease of customization.

He also mentioned other WYSIWYG customizable themes he had tried: OptimizePress and Beaver Builder.

Junko from Kagawa joined us, and Ichi from Meetup.com Japan was also there

At WordPress Meetup Tokyo with Sarah, Mayuko, Junko. なかなかない組み合わせ！

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The next meetup is not yet scheduled, but be sure to join the meetup group if you’re interested in getting a notification about it.

Photos: Automattic Table at PHP Conference Japan 2015

Last Saturday, I staffed the Automattic sponsor table with two of my coworkers at PHP Conference Japan. Thanks to the great team of organizers, this conference in Tokyo has been growing in size and popularity year after year.

Event banner
Automattic Table
WP-branded sunglasses
Job board
Jordan, the newest Automattician in Japan

Since I was around the sponsor area all day, I only saw that part of the event. I still got to listen to a few sessions that took place in the same hall, including the keynote by Rasmus Lerdorf.

PHP Bookstore
Flash talk
Cosplayer from Prime Strategy
Sponsor tables

If you missed our PHPCON table, I hope to see you at WordCamp Tokyo 2015 (October 31 – November 1)!

Tokyo Coffee Festival 2015

Tokyo Coffee Festival.

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This morning, we went to the Tokyo Coffee Festival 2015 at United Nations University.

Out of 10 coffee from different roasters/coffee shops I tried, I really liked:

(I tend to like balanced flavor with minimum acidity)

There were many roasters/shops from outside of Tokyo, and I enjoyed getting a taste of their unique coffee.

Tokyo Parks

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During this Silver Week holidays, the weather in Tokyo was perfect for enjoying some time outside. We went to different parks for picnics and walks and got to see my daughter get better at walking day by day.

Niko Niko Park.

Niko Niko Park

Niko Niko Park, Kita-Aoyama.

I took this photo from a window of the building next door, where I went for Tokyo Art Book Fair.

Shinjuku Gyoen.

Shinjuku Gyoen

Shinjuku Gyoen lawn.

This lawn area close to Sendagaya Gate is not as crowded as the ones near the main gate.

Koishikawa Botanical Gardens

Red Spider Lilies

Red Spider Lilies at Koishikawa Botanical Gardens

Red spider lilies were everywhere at Koishikawa Botanical Gardens ― “the birthplace of Japanese botanical research”. Even on a nice fall day, it wasn’t hard at all to find a great picnic spot under a big tree here.

Kitanomaru Park.

Bamboo groove
Walking path

It was my first time at this park near the Tokyo Imperial Palace. It had a relaxed neighborhood-park feel and isn’t as large as others we visited this weekend. Looking forward to taking a walk there again.

Not pictured: Inokashira Park in Kichijoji. We also went to this park in the town we used to live. If you are with babies learning to walk or prefer softer lawn to benches, visit the west part of the park past Inokashira Koen Station on Keio Line.

More Park Info