Zoals velen in mijn richting ontstond mijn interesse in Japan al op jonge leeftijd onder invloed van het zogenaamde Cool Japan: de globale verspreiding van Japanse popcultuur (muziek, televisie, games, …) die sinds de jaren ‘80 geleidelijk aan begon door te sijpelen in ook onze nationale media. Het zou, zo blijkt, zelfs een interesse worden die zodanig groeide dat ik er jaren later mijn... Continue →

UPDATE 2018~: Rikaisama has been rendered obsolete since 2018 updates broke Firefox’ support of unsigned XUL-based add-ons. Nevertheless, this guide can still prove useful in two ways: further use of Rikaisama through XUL-supporting Firefox-derivatives such as Waterfox, Pale Moon and Basilisk, as well as the list of applications for Browser/Anki-integration listed in the second half of this... Continue →

Those who know me well might accuse me of preaching popular memorization tool Anki as a revolution in studying, and they wouldn’t be that far off. Over the past year I have extensively integrated this software in my studies, with (to me personally) remarkable results in both productivity and academic grades. There are, however, some pitfalls for the casual user to take heed of, and getting the... Continue →

Due to my studies I (will) often use Japanese in my blog. As I gave some thought to typography and readability, I found the default appearance of Japanese text to be in stark contrast with the rest of my design. To target specifically Japanese text, I wrote a small Markdown-Python extension for use in static blog generators as Jekyll and Pelican (or pretty much anything that utilizes... Continue →

Earlier this year us second year Japanese Students were invited to participate in an international speech contest (theme: “tell an interesting story”), organized by Kobe University. Just this week we were informed that the video-recordings of those entries had been uploaded to the contest’s website and were available for all to watch. My story is a classic “awkward Japanese language mix-up”... Continue →

After a long, stressful first semester exam-period, I spent my brief time off traveling to two completely opposite places I’ve been wanting to visit for a very long time: Rome, Italy and Iceland: one of the coldest winter destinations I could imagine, but a place of stunning natural beauty. Over the past years, Iceland has gained somewhat of a reputation for its hipster trends and excellent... Continue →

After a long, stressful first semester exam-period, I spent my brief time off traveling to two completely opposite places I’ve been wanting to visit for a very long time: Iceland and the historic city of Rome, Italy, cradle to one of the most well-documented civilizations in western history. In order to recharge our batteries, we decided on this 4-day city trip and, looking back, it really did... Continue →

Footnotes are a classic staple in any writer’s toolbox, allowing them to, in an unobtrusive way, cite sources or display additional information not directly related to the original argument. Nevertheless it is my impression that online footnotes, through the way they are often implemented imitating printed media footnotes, come over quite counterintuitive and force the reader to disrupt his... Continue →

Earlier this year, me and a couple of friends decided on a summer road-trip throughout the so-called Deep South, the most southern states of the USA. As we have a shared history of playing in bands and writing music together, my friends and I thought it would be cool to purchase some second-hand instruments and travel through some of the more musically well-known states. This short blog covers... Continue →

I had been thinking on starting a small, personal blog for a while now and was already in the progress of writing up a small stack of possible articles to post. A long summer-break permitted me to sit down and get started on the technicalities; a process a bit more complicated as initially expected but worth it in the long run. This blog serves not as a tutorial on making one with Pelican... Continue →