Eat road side weed -Trip to Carmel, Dog Friendly Town -3-

There is an expression in Japanese that "Michi-Kusa wo Kuu".  Word by word translation of this expression is "Eat road side weed".  Most often used as "Michi-Kusa wo Kuuna".  Again, literal translation is "Don't eat road side weed".

The meaning of this expression is "Don't loiter (coming home)", or "Don't stop off anywhere (unnecessary (like a bar)) to delay coming home."  This is one of the expressions that you will never figure out without native people telling you the meaning.

I really did not know where the expression came from.  But, I found out after we started to keep Xue Er.  Walking her out, she stops every block to smell something, pick up some tissue papers, licking road muds, and eating road side weeds.  Then, I hit my head with my finger "Oh, this is what the expression came from!"

This time, Xue Er had a problem in "Eating Beach-side Seaweed".  In the 2nd day in Carmel beach, when she was playing, running around, she found some seaweed in the beach.  She smelled, licked, and bit as usual, and when we found her doing that, she ate some part of the seaweed.  She showed a little bit wired face, but there was nothing until that night.

That night, Xue Er had a bad diarrhea and caused my wife and I stayed up almost all night to take her out every 30 minutes or so.  Her diarrhea did not stop until next morning.  Actually it took her 3 days until her digestion recovered to be normal.

Ancient Japanese people were great telling people what happens if you "Eat Roadside weed" and delay coming back home.  Don't go to the bar causing your family worry about you and what time you will be home.  It is not good for your health, too.  It does not worth trying.  This was very good lesson for our White Cutie and ourselves.

Related Posts:
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2010/01/trip-to-carmel-dog-friendly-town.html
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2010/01/trip-to-carmel-dog-friendly-town-2.html

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http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

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shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
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Trip to Carmel, Dog Friendly Town -2

Shortly after we started to keep Xue Er, Snowy, my wife and I started to realize that even American society is not really friendly to pets or animals.  There are people elsewhere to chase out cats trying to take a nap in their back yard.  In West Bay of San Francisco, you cannot take dogs into parks, especially where there are kids amusement equipment.

Most of hotels do not allow to bring pets in to stay, it goes without saying that majority restaurants even with Patio Dining area do not like people to keep dogs close to their eating area.  Food shops do not allow people to take pets in.  Even no-food related shops do not like customers to bring pets.  My wife and I one time took Xue Er to Home Depot.  We knew that they did not mind customers to bring dogs in.  Surprisingly, not staff, but one of the customers lining in the cashier complained about we bringing in our dog.  Instead cashier of the Home Depot was very friendly and kind to our white one.

I believe this is not society acceptance issue.  Instead this is people's presumption problem.  People who has no experience with pets always have presumption that pets are dirty, smelly, dangerous because they bite... etc, etc...

What is great about America is the fact that whereas there are people who oppose to you, you can always find people who are in your side.  That is the spiritual base for building and forming "Dog Friendly Town" or "Dog Friendly Environment".  And the Carmel by the sea beach is the one which is in top 5 dog friendly places.

Take CA-1 South from San Francisco for about two and half hours, exit at "Ocean Avenue" in Carmel, you drive down to the beach along Ocean Avenue.  As I mentioned in my previous post, it looks like dogs heaven.  Most of them are unleashed and running around.  Before we checked in our hotel, we spent 2 hours playing with our White Cutie.

All those stylish small shops of fashions, clothes, arts, decorations, etc... have already obtained my wife's attention, we decided to check in our hotel next and drive back to the center of the town.

Related Posts:
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2010/01/trip-to-carmel-dog-friendly-town.html

Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
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Trip to Carmel, Dog Friendly Town

Once again, Happy New Year, my friends!!!  I do hope the year 2010 will be happy and prosperous for you and your family.

Every year the short days right after Christmas and New Year, my family take drive trip to nearby California or vicinity resorts.  My wife and I took my wife's mother to Las Vegas and Los Angeles in 2008.  In 2007, we were in Tokyo and Beijing, etc...  It is partly due to my family being away from home countries not having nearby or reachable family member to visit, feel a little bit lonesome in comparison to those who are born here in the US.

This year, we decided to take our White Snowy Dog, Xue Er to the #1 dog friendly city, Monterey, Carmel, CA.  We heard from our dog's instructor in Pet's Mart that Carmel is always selected to be the dog friendly city.  He told us that any restaurant has dog's menu and you can take your dog to any shop.  The beaches are leash free area like huge dog park.

There are several ways from San Francisco to Monterey, Carmel.  I always love to take CA-1, Pacific Highway, which runs along Ocean Coast Side.  Since our 10 months white cutie, Snowy Xue Er, has motion sick problem, we planned to take several stops before hitting Monterey, Carmel.

There were several public beaches on Pacific Highway, CA-1.  But my wife and I were surprised that we came across the beaches which banns to take dogs into.  There were almost no exception "No Alcohol, No Smoking, No Dogs".  Since we did not expect this, it was great surprise.  This is why "Dog Friendly Town and Beach, Carmel" is very important for dog lovers.

Being too early to check in to our hotel, we continued to drive to Ocean Avenue, Carmel.  Driving down to the beach entrance, there were so many people who take their dogs.  We felt very happy.  Walking down to the beach, we found lots of dogs were running around.  Big dogs, small dogs, young dogs, old dogs...


Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
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A Happy New Year!!!

A Happy New Year!


New year greeting from San Francisco.  

I hope 2010 finds you and your family healthy and prosperous.

Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
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Shaw Funami
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Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas, Folks!

Happy Holidays!


I hope peace and happiness to everyone in promising year 2010.

Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
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shaw@zhenintl.ws
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Story about Language and Words

As you know, I am a Japanese born and raised in Tokyo.  My wife is a Chinese born and raised in North-East part of China.  My Chinese is not good for daily life communication.  My wife's Japanese is not as well.  So, English is very important for my wife and I to communicate.  Living in dual language environment for relatively long time, I feel sometimes frustrated that something, some emotion, some symptom, some phenomena, good movie, etc...

I just have written a Japanese Blog Article on "Breakfast at Tiffany's".  I found it difficult to explain what "$50 for Powder Room" means in Japanese.  Some English can never be translated without full understanding on cultural, language, emotional background.  By the time I explain all of necessary setting of the movie, the expression is not as good as original English.

Same thing happens when I try to explain Japanese words in English.  For example, there is a simple and short word "En" in Japanese.  It is extremely difficult to explain the word in proper English.  I turned to Japanese English dictionary and found there are 20 definitions of this short Japanese "En".  "En" can mean "fate", "karma", "connection", "relation", "tie", "bond", etc...  The list continues on and on and listing these English words will not give you understanding of this Japanese at all.  It will confuse you instead.

Trying to give you an idea of the meaning, "En" stands for a concept "relation, connection, or some kind of tie which exists between the people without any given reason beyond the time factor of past, present, and future and over the physical distance.

Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
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House Lighting Complete for Christmas this year

My wife and I have been lazy and slow on completing House Decoration for Christmas this year.  There were some considerations on how to decorate what not to use.  But, finally completed our home lighting project for Christmas this year.  Please take a look!!!

If we try to do same decoration in Japan, it could cost us more than 3 times of what we actually spent, here.  It was great fun to decorate, and enjoyable taking a look at them at night.


Happy holidays again everyone.



Related posts:
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2009/11/joy-of-holiday-season.html
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2009/12/home-decoration-for-christmas.html
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2009/12/house-lighting.html

Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
Fill the Missing Link

About Digital Products

I am in the middle of launching a great affiliate and sales service for digital products with my friend who is a successful internet marketer.

It is not unusual to hear about Internet Market Guru or Successful Internet Marketer.  But, not so many appear in front of us.  It is because many of them are CREATED figures or self-advocating Internet Market Guru living studio apartment by himself.  There are some who try to cheat you.  There are some skepticism in Internet Business world.

But, my friend is a real person who you can talk with, touch, or exchange views and opinions if you wish. And, there are good advantages in the market of Digital Products, as my JV partner friend and I explain:

#1.  You do not have to keep buying ridiculous amount of products and keep them in your home as inventory.  You can set up download site and your customer can download the file as they wish.

#2.  It is relatively easy to change, add, or delete your products, since it is existing in website.  Or you can have variety of products as many as you wish to have without spending so much money.

#3.  May related services, such as ads, promotion, video, audio, etc... are provided free in Internet world.  It may not be too simple, but you can make yourself familiar using them free.

Yet, there are some certain points to be kept in mind.  The largest point is that you should not just copy or duplicate what others are doing.  You should have your own products, website, promotion, advertisement, etc...  You may think it is not easy to keep your identity in the Internet world.  You can relatively easily achieve and maintain your identity by following our program.

Here is a video testimonial I made after I tried my friend's program for about a month:


Related posts:

http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2009/11/instant-membership-site-creator.html
http://zheninternational.blogspot.com/2009/11/instant-membership-site-creator-2.html
Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
Fill the Missing Link

House Lighting

My wife and I worked on house lighting for the first time in our lives.  we found it is fun.  I heard that house decoration and lighting up in Christmas time is becoming popular in Japan.  It was just for shops, offices, and buildings when I was living in Tokyo.  Well, about China, I think Chinese decorations are colorful and shops are decorated all over the years.

We plan to put out the North Pole Animals with this lighting over the weekend.  I will post the picture in my next post.


Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
Fill the Missing Link

Home Decoration for Christmas

Since this Christmas is our first one in our own home in Hayward, California, my wife and I talked in Thanksgiving week and decided to give our new house Christmas Decoration.

We have spent a lot of money in buying the house, so we would not be able to do much.  But, we wanted to give some kind of holiday season feeling for us to enjoy.

My wife is originally from North-East part of China and I lived in New York in 1985.  We both know how winter is severe in northern places.  We tried not to forget about it.  Our first project was to put some decoration to give us a kind of winter feeling in northern countries.


Again, it is not much, but we are glad we bought the Snow Bear, Penguin, Seal, North Pole animals for our home decoration, this year.  I thought we would be able to share the enjoyment of Holiday Season.  As we put them out front garden, since they looked so lonely, we decided to go out to buy more Christmas illumination for further home decoration.

This is a season when I have a lot of pictures to taken.  Also there are some Christmas pictures taken in past 3-4 years.  As our home decoration develops, I would like to continue to upload seasonal pictures!!

Happy Holidays, again, everyone!


Check my websites to find out what I am doing:
http://vur.me/shawfunami/main
http://vur.me/shawfunami/SF
http://vur.me/shawfunami/zi

Feel free to contact me:
shaw@zhenintl.ws
Shaw Funami
Fill the Missing Link