Recruiting Forum Off-Topic Thread II

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#7,176
#7,176
Darth_Shiveman said:
The funny thing is that it seems like everywhere I go over here people are usually drinking beer or whiskey. People do still drink a lot of shochu (kind of like sake, but made from wheat or potatoes and 20-25% alocohol instead of 10-15%). However, I don't see as much sake drinking as I'd imagined before coming over here.

The beer is just ok...craft beer is just starting to boom over here a bit. But it's really expensive. I can get a six pack or a growler of a good microbrew back in the states for the price of a pint of it here. A sixer of something standard like Asahi runs upwards of twelve bucks. The cheapest ones you can find are still around ten bucks. It's not a great country for beer lovers.

The whiskey industry over here has been booming the past 10-20 years or so though. As Dust said, Yamazaki and Hibiki are making some really highly regarded whiskeys. Personally, I'm a Nikka man though. Sadly, it's a bit costlier to get your hands on back in the states than some other Japanese whiskeys since it isn't owned by Suntory (who happens to own Jim Beam and is one of the largest alcohol distributors in the world).
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Last time I was in Japan was 1998. Whiskey wasn't a happening thing there when I there. If it was, it was still in it's infancy and no one really knew about it. I'm guessing it probably really took off when Jim Beam was bought out. Glad to hear it's a booming business for them. I'll have to start trying some different stuff.

Asahi was my favorite Japanese beer while I was there, Most Japanese beer was definitely on the lower end of the quality meter while I was there though. Kirin wasn't bad. Saporo sucked ass.
 
#7,177
#7,177
VOL-uh-tile said:
You in Japan man? What part?? I've been wanting to go there for a while, took 2 years of Japanese at UT and I love the culture. Also, 4 Roses is a pretty ok whisky I like to get occasionally but I have been hearing Japan is making some noise with their higher end whiskies and bourbons.
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If you ever get the chance...go. I loved Japan. Well at least the time I actually got to spend in Japan. My last time there, my family got to live in Japan for three years. I was always gone.
 
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#7,178
#7,178
BaldBiker said:
Last time I was in Japan was 1998. Whiskey wasn't a happening thing there when I there. If it was, it was still in it's infancy and no one really knew about it. I'm guessing it probably really took off when Jim Beam was bought out. Glad to hear it's a booming business for them. I'll have to start trying some different stuff.

Asahi was my favorite Japanese beer while I was there, Most Japanese beer was definitely on the lower end of the quality meter while I was there though. Kirin wasn't bad. Saporo sucked ass.
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Well, the Whiskey industry over here is still pretty young, all things considered. They've been making it for almost a hundred years now, I guess. There's a popular TV show right on TV here now about the founder of Nikka and original distiller of Yamazaki, Masataka Taketsuru. He studied chemistry in Scotland, took on an apprenticeship at a distillery there, married a Scottish lass, and then took all he learned back to Japan in the early 1920s. But the whiskey industry here has really taken off over the last 15 years or so from my understanding.

I'm partial to Asahi as well. They even make a half decent black lager now. And Sapporo makes a wheat beer now as well. It's about like a blue moon. Not my favorite, but it's nice to see the bigger companies here branching out a bit.
 
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#7,179
#7,179
VOL-uh-tile said:
You in Japan man? What part?? I've been wanting to go there for a while, took 2 years of Japanese at UT and I love the culture. Also, 4 Roses is a pretty ok whisky I like to get occasionally but I have been hearing Japan is making some noise with their higher end whiskies and bourbons.
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Really? Was Professor Lacure still scaring the hell out of any freshmen who said koNEEchiwa instead of konnichiwa while you where there?

I live a little outside of Tokyo. Been here about 3 years total now. I can't recommend a trip here highly enough if you ever get a chance.
 
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#7,180
#7,180
Darth_Shiveman said:
Really? Was Professor Lacure still scaring the hell out of any freshmen who said koNEEchiwa instead of konnichiwa while you where there?

I live a little outside of Tokyo. Been here about 3 years total now. I can't recommend a trip here highly enough if you ever get a chance.
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Haha yeah her look of disappointment/ disapproval when you didn't know how to answer her was piercing. I have recently started to pick my Japanese back up some, but how well would you say you learn it being around it all the time?
 
#7,181
#7,181
BaldBiker said:
If you ever get the chance...go. I loved Japan. Well at least the time I actually got to spend in Japan. My last time there, my family got to live in Japan for three years. I was always gone.
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That's great... and a shame at the same time. It seems like such a beautiful place and I've heard the people have a more reserved demeanor so it feels like it would suit me well. I'm hoping after a year or two of being in the workforce now that I graduated I can take a decent trip there.
 
#7,182
#7,182
VOL-uh-tile said:
Haha yeah her look of disappointment/ disapproval when you didn't know how to answer her was piercing. I have recently started to pick my Japanese back up some, but how well would you say you learn it being around it all the time?
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Its wayyyy easier to learn when you're surrounded by it. Studying via classes and textbooks is vital of course. You can't really get a decent grasp of things if you can't at least read a couple hundred of the easier kanji and know their various readings and whatnot (though I do think that writing them is a bit overrated nowadays with word processors...i see plenty of Japanese people have trouble remembering how to write some of the more complicated ones even though they know how to read them just fine).

But total immersion is the best way of picking up a functional use of the language. Especially since the Japanese you learn in textbooks and classrooms is a little different than the way people actually speak. Most textbooks build a foundation of polite Japanese and feature some dated words and phrases that Japanese people understand just fine but don't often use. That kind of stuff is a little hard to pick up on unless you're mingling with native speakers on a fairly regular basis.

The problem being in a bigger city is that more often than not the people know at least a little English and wanna practice on you. Sometimes you even get people who can't seem to wrap their heads around the fact that not all foreigners are tourists who can't speak the language . I've had a few times in restaurants and stuff where the staff will insist on speaking to me in really difficult-to-understand English even after I reply in Japanese and ask them to explain in Japanese lol. It's kind of frustrating sometimes, but they're just trying to make people feel welcome.
 
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#7,183
#7,183
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6RV373-i50[/youtube]

This is a video of the aftermath from a recent wildfire that devastated portions of The Great Smoky Mountains in the southern United States. This Video is shot in and around the mountain town of Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Like the forest, the town is rebuilding, though the lives lost in the fire can never be replaced.

If you're still thinking about a vacation this year, I hope you will consider visiting this area and supporting the community as it recovers from the wildfires.

Although the event was a tragedy, the park remains beautiful and there is an opportunity to see how life responds after a potentially catastrophic event.

I am not the best film-maker and I don't have the best equipment, but I wanted to share this with you. In my opinion, the wildfire was criminally under-covered in the national and even in the regional media.

I am sure most of you know, the wildfire itself was a result of arson, kids started the fire.
 
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#7,184
#7,184
I think the park will be just fine. The main reason it was so bad was because forests should have fires naturally every decade or so but that area had not had one for several.
 
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#7,185
#7,185
bignewt said:
I think the park will be just fine. The main reason it was so bad was because forests should have fires naturally every decade or so but that area had not had one for several.
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I agree. There are things you can't see on the video that are pretty neat. The smell of charred wood is still very strong, much stronger than I imagined it would be.

The forest floor is also recovering a lot quicker than I would have thought. In some of the areas effected most, the floor shows few signs of a fire to the naked eye. A ton of new growth has started, although much of it is so small that you may not notice it on video.
 
#7,186
#7,186
Roan mountain burned for 3 years and everything was destroyed. Everything was starting to grow back by 6 months
 
#7,188
#7,188
Drove through the mountains again yesterday and walked up to Laurel Falls. It was a pretty decent trip, starting from the Townsend side, heading through Gatlinburg, then back to Knoxville.

I made a video of some of the rivers and waterfalls on the trip and thought some of you who are not nearby or who haven't been in a while might want to see it.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfTJti1waUs[/youtube]
 
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#7,190
#7,190
Evergreen forests begin to die out without blazes.

Lived in Yellowstone in '03. Watched lightning start a fire in Absaroka chain. in days later the fire gree and grew. Only until it got close to camp did they start to fight it. ifs a part of life...like misspelling words on an iphone :)

Some seeds dont actually pop open without reaching certain temperatures, when fire comes through they open, the soot creates perfect topsoil.
 
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#7,191
#7,191
jackcrevol said:
Evergreen forests begin to die out without blazes.

Lived in Yellowstone in '03. Watched lightning start a fire in Absaroka chain. in days later the fire gree and grew. Only until it got close to camp did they start to fight it. ifs a part of life...like misspelling words on an iphone :)

Some seeds dont actually pop open without reaching certain temperatures, when fire comes through they open, the soot creates perfect topsoil.
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Yeah, it's definitely a part of the natural process. It just sucks how it happened and that people died due to the fire.
 
#7,192
#7,192
PS4Pro coming in Monday. I got FFXV and Nioh. Next will be Uncharted 4. No 4ktv yet though til later this year.

Hype!!!
 
#7,195
#7,195
Catbone said:
If you like dark souls or bloodborne you'll like nioh. Also heard great things about Yakuza 0 and Tales of Berseria. Fantastic start of the year for Sony
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I love the "Tales of" series more than I like the FF series. I forgot Tales of Berseria came out also
 
#7,196
#7,196
tonybologna said:
I knew he was being sarcastic but he still was poking fun at his speed which is like an OL or DL from that number. :wink:
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you_keep_using_that_word.gif
 
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