July 25, 2004

Sayonara Nippon!

I'm sitting now in my couch, half my appartment is already packed but it still feels like I'm just beggining. After 6 amazing years in Tokyo, I'll be finaly making the big move next week. Starting this september I'll be pursuing a masters degree in interaction design at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea in Italy. Yup, that's why the silence for the past month. It's been a little bit crazy, trying to finish with all my projects at work and catching up with local friends who, who knows when I'm going to see next. Giving up your work life to go back to school is not an easy task, and specially when you have an overseas moving ahead it might be a little bit stressing. There's so much stuff that I have to get rid of! But I'm really excited about this. Suddenly having so much time to be able to work on my own projects sounds so nice. Plus, Italy! my grand grand parents where italians but I've never been there before. Will have to learn italian, though probably jumping from spanish it shouldn't be that hard. So I'm leaving japan on September 2nd, headed first for Ars Electronica in Linz, where I'll be speaking a little bit right next to Lawrence Lessig in the Prix Ars Electronica Forum on September 6th. Hang out there for a couple of days, and later catch a train to my new home in Ivrea. This friday, I'll be having a small sayonara party in a bar in Omotesando. If you are reading this, YOU ARE INVITED. We start at 9pm with an excellent deal of all you can drink belgium beer for 1500 yen! drop me a line for directions mail[AT]marcosweskamp[DOT]com And for the rest who can't make it, well, expect a ton of stuff to come. I'll be renewing the site soon, still have the phidgets projects on the work, newsmap screensaver is almost out there, and a slick graph visualization engine are on the way. So, keep an eye on this feed! * update! due to the overwhelming ammount of people comming tonight I had to move the location to a bar in Ebisu. Still happening at 9pm. map over here. see you there!