00:12
Alright, so I have a very important and urgent question for you, Masako.
I, after living abroad for a third of my life now, I mean more than a third of my life actually,
probably most of my life, like two-thirds of my life, but a third of my, like, you know,
most of my adult life, let's say.
After doing that, I finally am considering purchasing e-readers, like 電子書籍リーダー,
like Kendo, like Kobo from Rakuten, and stuff like that.
The reason why it took me this long is because, of course, it makes so much more practical
sense for someone like me who moves around every two, three years, usually internationally,
if not, you know, state, crossing state borders, so pretty big move.
It only makes sense to carry my favorite books electronically rather than physical copies,
but to me, reading is an escape from, you know, it's what I do to have fun and at least
like my hobby reading, you know, we read for research, but I'm not counting those.
And when I'm reading off of screen, I'm in more of a 情報収集モード, you know, like
when I'm reading papers, because I never print out my papers, because if I did that, that
would be too much.
But I have been, yeah, like, so when I'm reading カツ字 off of screen, that's what I'm doing,
you know, 情報収集, whether I'm reading news articles or papers, you know, so I felt
like reading, even my fun reading off of screen, was really my purposes of having fun.
Because, I mean, strictly speaking, I am, I guess, processing information, even when
I'm reading for fun, but I want to just get lost in the world of this novel, or if I'm
reading nonfiction, then I want to sort of put myself in that world that, you know, I
am not in there for, or just think to myself.
So I don't, I feel like paper is less distracting, and yeah, just more enjoyable reading experience.
03:10
Away from the screen, like PC screens.
Right, yeah, like we have enough screens in our lives, and like, why add more screens
to my life?
That's another thing.
But I really feel, I'm really in a mood of reading a lot right now, maybe because I am
finally done with my PhD, and you know, my new job is a different field, and still requires,
you know, reading a bunch of articles and stuff, but it's, like, I feel like I have a bit more
yo-yo than when I was a PhD student.
So I actually have time to read for fun on my own, and because, you know, I don't have
friends in my new city, per se, I mean, I'm friendly with my colleagues.
You have one friend, right?
Yeah, I have one friend from my high school, but it's not like, you know, I hung out with
her all the time or anything.
So I realized that I like reading books.
Another thing is, because here, I don't really cook at home, I usually go out and eat, like
most locals do, for all their meals, and I realized that when I'm listening to podcasts
while I'm eating,
なんか、咀嚼音がめっちゃ入ってくるよね。
わかる?
And it bothers you.
It's amplified, it's in your head, it's amplified in your head.
So I don't love it, but I, like, you know, I don't, like, I don't know if I can eat on my own
without any, some kind of thing going on.
I'm forced to, like, listen in to other people's conversation, which is just creepy, right?
And so I started taking my books, which is perfect.
I don't have to listen to me chew on food, and if I'm reading books, people don't bother me.
That's why I like headphones, right?
Like, when I have my headphones on, people don't bother me, people don't talk to me when I'm eating alone.
But in Hong Kong, do people talk to you, like, suddenly, abruptly?
When you're eating at a restaurant?
Maybe I'm just choosing a wrong restaurant, but, yeah, either the waiters who have too much time on their hands...
And they just talk to you?
06:00
Yeah, or...
Oh, interesting.
Because I'm alone, I frequently get seated at a bar counter of the restaurant, right?
Like, that kind of communal seating, which I don't mind.
But I think if I'm not obviously emitting the aura of, like, do not talk to me,
I think people find that as a sign of, like, oh, you're by yourself on a communal seat.
You are available to chat, kind of thing.
It's a reasonable assumption to make.
I'm just, like, sorry.
I usually don't feel like talking to strangers when I'm eating my meals.
But, yeah, so I guess it's never the locals, though.
It's usually the expats who, like, I guess they're also eating alone because they also don't have friends in a city.
I don't know.
So going back to the original question of, you know, purchasing e-readers, right?
So I'm reading a lot more, and I have already gone through my stash of books that I brought from Japan.
So now I need new books.
And, of course, Japanese books are slightly more expensive to buy here.
And I haven't found, like, a used bookstore for English book.
Doesn't seem to be very common out here.
So it's hard to find English books as well, unless you want to buy a brand new book.
So I figured, you know, maybe this is the time to purchase e-readers,
because I can then just carry, you know, keep a bunch of books there and travel with it.
And this sounds like a perfect thing, too.
And because if it's only a reader rather than, like, a tablet, then all I can do is read on it.
I cannot do anything else.
It doesn't distract you.
You know, you don't have to check emails, Google search something.
You just want to read, and you can do that.
I do recommend getting one.
So you have one.
I have two.
You have two?
Yeah, and you can...
You can read even when you're in the bath.
Even if you're in the tub.
Yeah, you're in the tub and you can read books.
Well, see, I don't have a bathtub.
I know, that's such a luxury now.
09:00
Anyways, because I also move a lot.
Like, every several years, I do cross the border.
I mean, you know, move to another country and coming back to Japan.
So it was a lot of...
It's impossible.
I gave all of my books to my Japanese friends.
Like, all my Japanese books to Japanese friends when I left America.
I left all the other books also either to library donation.
Yeah, I did.
It's impossible to carry those around anymore.
So I still have some books, but not a lot.
Because I switched to e-readers.
Yeah, like the ones I really wanted to keep, I shipped them back to Japan to my parents' house.
But, you know, you have to be very selective about it.
And then there are a few art books, like a catalog, museum catalog books that I have that I wanted to keep.
But those are heavy as fuck.
Really big and heavy, right?
Yeah, so I felt like, okay, well, this is just 必要経費.
Because I wasn't going to carry that around myself either.
So that's in Japan.
Novels, things I buy from 古本屋 randomly in Japan, those are not like 絶版されてるとか
この本役のバージョンが売ってないとかそういうわけじゃないから
I buy them for cheap and then I don't feel terribly bad about letting them go.
Because if I really wanted to read again, I'll buy again.
So that's that.
But yeah, still, it feels kind of wasteful.
And I do want to do something about it.
So with your e-books, is it mostly for your fun?
Yeah, mostly for my fun.
Some are more academic.
But most of them are just for fun.
Like novels.
Yeah, I guess you could still buy 専門書, right?
Yeah, I do have some 専門書.
But most of my books are more like for fun.
And so why do you have two?
How do you differentiate them?
Because I have two accounts.
One in Japan, one for Japan, you know, Japanese account.
The other for the account in the United States.
12:00
I can't really move the books around because of the copyrights.
I never thought about it.
Yeah, so I can't really merge those two.
Oh, that's stupid.
It's so stupid, but it's copyright thing.
Right, it's like back in the days when DVDs had a regional restriction.
Yeah, exactly, something like that.
Yeah, so I have one for each.
Yeah.
I mean, do Japanese, I don't know, Amazon or Rakuten account,
do they have English books?
Or it's just not as many as the United States one?
They have English books.
I think, yeah.
I never had trouble finding English books.
Because a few years ago, when I thought about getting an e-reader,
that was my major problem.
Not a few years ago, maybe it's more close to like 10 years ago
because I was diagnostic or something.
But at that time, it felt like there were not enough English titles
that I wanted to get from Japanese.
I think the situation has changed because I never had trouble
finding English books.
Oh, that's good.
Yeah.
Yeah, maybe I'll do that.
Genuinely, because I do read, I think, a lot more now.
And I'm also trying to reduce my time on social media.
And I've put timers on my social – well, Instagram, really.
That's the only social media I do.
So that I don't mindlessly keep scrolling.
And I find books to be a perfect alternative where I can focus
and also refresh my mind from thinking about my work.
By redirecting my focus on something else.
It's important.
Something else entirely.
Yeah.
While we're at the discussion – yeah?
Yeah, I would recommend e-books.
Yeah, I do.
Okay, okay.
I know that we've talked probably plenty for an episode,
but I just want to throw in one more question about books in general, I guess.
That's it for the show today.
Thanks for listening.
And find us at EigoDescience on Twitter.
That is E-I-G-O-D-E-S-C-I-E-N-C-E.
See you next time.
