Category: Ecstasis

by jad

Japan Trip: Expo 70

The day before we went to @expo2025japan, we made a pilgrimage to @expo70park and the @tower_of_the_sun_museum_shop in particular. I’ll post a Reel from inside of the Tower in a bit. Despite the heat, this place was full of visitors and was truly worth the effort; even though it was a little out of the way, it had Seattle City Center post-Expo vibes – a real destination, not just a curio. My favorite part was, of course, the Tower of the Sun itself, a truly iconic piece of art that we saw echoes of elsewhere in our travels. The Tower has three faces: the Golden Mask … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Expo 70” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Photography & Expos

Today is #WorldPhotographyDay, a day I’ve marked before, seeing others posting about it, but as it comes this year in the midst of my Expo musings, I thought I should probably read up on it a bit. Every August 19, photographers celebrate the strange and enduring power of this craft that’s become so synonymous with modernity—a medium that’s been shaping how we see, remember, and share the world for nearly two centuries. The date honors a turning point: in 1839, the French government publicly announced the daguerreotype, a photographic process developed by Louis Daguerre, and offered it as a “free gift … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Photography & Expos” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Expo 2025

We made it to @expo2025japan on the second day of being in Osaka, and it was capital H-O-T hot. Waiting in line to get through the gates was one of those existential moments of wondering about our sanity. Thankfully, they’d set up the place with outdoor fans and misters that made the grounds slightly less oppressive than the outside, but only by a fraction of a degree or two. The irony of it all was that this Expo was all about imagining healthier and more sustainable futures, so there was something eerily dystopian about exploring the space as a breathy, disembodied ASMR … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Expo 2025” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Out-of-the-Way

I chose this out-of-the-way neighborhood in Osaka because of its relative proximity by metro to the artificial island where the Expo is being held, with the added bonus of staying several nights in a surprisingly affordable hipster hotel in the area as well. The quaint backstreets here were where we learned that one does not simply order a coffee at a cafe during breakfast time in Japan. There are set menus here and you’re going to get a slice fluffy, pillowy bread and maybe even a hardboiled egg with it too, even if you’re already looking forward to the spread … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Out-of-the-Way” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Osaka Moments

We’d decided to travel to Japan two years ago when I realized that the next World Expo would be in Osaka during the summer that Hiroshima would also mark 80 years since the war crime that became synonymous with its name. At the time, that’s all I really had planned, and as I collected points of interest and eventually developed something of an itinerary, I still regarded our stay in Osaka as mostly a pitstop that just happened to host a mega-event I was nerding out about while we adjusted to the jetlag. And yet, by the time it was … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Osaka Moments” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Osaka Morning

After a very long flight and dicey layover in Tokyo, we arrived as bleary-eyed time travelers—August 1st never happened, you guys!—very late at night in Osaka. Thankfully, Christine had had the foresight to suggest that we book a single night right next to the airport so we could find our bearings before venturing out into Osaka proper the next morning, which I’m very grateful we did. I was not ready to tackle the tangle of Japanese trains just yet; plus, the breakfast buffet was out of this world. Waking up to this view wasn’t too shabby either. We spent a … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Osaka Morning” →

by jad

Japan Trip: Every Vibey Moment

We’re back in Seattle and I’m pretty groggy, but I wanted to post something from this Groundhog Day of a transpacific Friday. I took these before our flight today; the last time I was in this airport, I spent the night on this observation deck because my flight was too early for public transport. Today was a lot easier. This really is a rare airport that’s actually pretty pleasant to spend a couple of hours in, if you ignore the fact that there doesn’t seem to be much air conditioning in the building. I think they wanted to keep that … Continue reading “Japan Trip: Every Vibey Moment” →

by jad

Cornucopia Daze

We went to Kent Cornucopia Days for the first time since we checked it out right after I immigrated here and were surprised by how much the weekend fair had grown over the years; and these are post-pandemic days too, you’ll remember. Spread across the whole downtown core, it felt like a mashup of a farmers’ market and a state fair, minus the rides and plus the sociopolitical quirks you’d expect of a town like Kent. There were some surprises too. I took a bunch of photos and will be posting them for however long feels curatorially appropriate. I read … Continue reading “Cornucopia Daze” →

by jad

Irreducible Squares

This wasn’t where I went to the first mass protest in my life, but it was the very first one I went to consciously and after agonizing about what to do. We were all caught up in the mess of affairs, but we were not all parsing them the same way, and the pressure of choosing the right side of history felt visceral at that young age. I don’t think I’ve admitted this to anyone yet, but I cried the night before, frustrated by the contrasting narratives I was scrambling to absorb in order to understand what is to be … Continue reading “Irreducible Squares” →

by jad

Between Hammer & Sickle

“The Paris Commune failed, Russia was isolated and collapsed in the end under its own contradictions and many more examples in between. Does this mean hope is lost? No, however, Marx in Brumaire, talks about revolutions which ‘constantly interrupt themselves in their own course, return to the apparently accomplished, in order to begin anew’. He recognised that revolutions ‘deride with cruel thoroughness the half-measures, weaknesses, and paltriness of their first attempts.’ We should take quite seriously that we are in the midst of many first attempts, and believe we can learn and build on them – that is what it … Continue reading “Between Hammer & Sickle” →