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Travel November 7, 2019
I Visited a Ghost Village in Japan Full of Scarecrows
I got off the empty bus after a nearly 2-hour ride halfway up the mountains of Iya Valley.
The way up consisted of twisted, narrow roads with blind corners that were quite difficult to navigate for the average man. Our driver, of course, was not an average man. He manoeuvred these difficult roads with ease and practised efficiency.
My friend and I were the only passengers on board.
As my feet landed on the gravel, I already feel like there was something different in the air.
It was very quiet.
On the way up Iya Valley.
So quiet that it felt like it was a tangible thing blanketing the whole area – as far as the eye can see, there were no humans around.
Empty-looking houses dotted the well-trodden landscape, and one could also see the dramatic silhouettes of mountains in the far horizon.
I looked around with fresh eyes from sleep, excited to take in such a rare view of rural Japan. Gone were the overcrowded, tourist-filled places of Japan – here I was the only guest, tourist, and person who regarded this place with any form of new interest. When you mention the word 'scarecrows', the image of unsettling human-like figures usually springs to mind. Scarecrows, with their eerie stillness, are often the subjects of many a horror story.
And indeed, I was at the village of scarecrows – Nagoro Village, to be exact. It's located in the heart of Iya Valley, one of the few vestiges of Old World Japan.
An aerial view of Iya Valley. | Source: Tokyo Weekender
It took some walking before we saw the scarecrows, but once they appeared, we realized that they were everywhere.
Outside the doors of houses were 'middle-aged' scarecrows pushing baby prams, farmer scarecrows were working on the field, and near the river an elderly scarecrow man was fishing.
I felt like we were somehow trespassing into some sort of sacred property – disturbing the scarecrows' peaceful life where they were all paused in a moment's snapshot of idyllic village life.
Every person in this photo is a scarecrow! How many do you see?
In the middle of the village was a white building that functioned as a town hall, and it was instantly recognizable due to all the scarecrows sitting outside in a row. The sliding doors were unlocked, and we were greeted by an even bigger host of scarecrows that were arranged around a table looking like they were having a fun meeting.
Truth be told, I was almost too spooked to go in. They did not appear malevolent, but they were slightly unnerving because looked incredibly lifelike.
They were well-dressed for the chilly weather – in warm clothing!
There was a side table with a hot water dispenser (and cookies!) with a note saying, "Please help yourself!" which was oddly endearing. A silent form of hospitality for a silent place.
This is a granny scarecrow. She's nice.
According to a pamphlet there, the village formerly had about 300 inhabitants, but many of them had moved out due to urbanization.
The mother of these scarecrows was a kindly lady named Tsukimi Ayano, who started making them represent the villagers that have left Nagoro.
The residents were mostly supportive of her scarecrow-making, and some of them even donated their own clothes for the scarecrows to wear. Tsukimi Ayano has made an estimated 400 scarecrows so far!
Tsukimi Ayano, maker of the scarecrows. Sadly she wasn't at home when I was there! | Source: Ina Jaffe/NPR
About 1 kilometre away from the town hall was the only school in the village. The wooden entrance led the way to a well-lit basketball court, and it was decorated with ribbons and lanterns, with brightly-costumed characters arranged in a circular fashion. In the middle, some of the scarecrows were having a wedding ceremony. Curiously, I found one scarecrow that looked like Donald Trump!
My friend at the basketball court. 'Donald Trump' is right under the umbrella.
The wedding scene up close. Did you notice the little kids have horns on their heads? | Source: The Flying Tofu
After our visit to the school, it started raining heavily and we got drenched despite our raincoats. As we walked along the road exploring other areas, an old lady came out from one of the houses and wordlessly handed us an umbrella. I tried to decline as I would be able to return it to her as we had to leave soon, but she was persistent.
As always, when Asian aunties try to offer you something, you're powerless to refuse.
It was an act of kindness, and kindness was not out of place in this quaint village.
Personally, I feel like it's important to evaluate why you are travelling. Some people do it for the photos or the glamour, some people like to build new memories with their loved ones, and some are just thrill-seekers.
Just chillin' with my new friends.
For me, I feel like travelling strips away all of your preoccupations and leaves you bare to a new foreign environment – you see everything with excited eyes and you are very, very much living in the moment.
Here in Iya Valley, technology suddenly seems unneeded and even a little shallow. You're surrounded by the abundance of life and memories of humans who have once lived here.
In other words, charming.
After walking around most of the village, we found a staircase leading down to the river by the roadside. The river looked incredibly blue, like a watered-down lapis lazuli, and it had a mysterious quality due to the multicoloured stones underneath and the overhanging fog in the air.
My self-taken picture does not do the river justice, but this photo does. | Source: TripAdvisor
I could not help but think about how Iya Valley was home to many legends of yokai (monsters in Japanese folklore), purportedly to have been inspired by the dramatic landscapes of the mountain. They certainly would not seem out of place at all here!
An illustrated guide of the kappa (water spirit) known to inhabit bodies of water. | Source: Mythology.net–
Climbing on big rocks, we spent some time in the river just basking in the atmosphere of nature. It's rare to be in a place where nature overpowers humanity, and Iya Valley was one of those places.
I felt small, insignificant, yet still a part of this lush, green environment.
Nagoro Village, with its alluring views and quirky charm, would definitely awaken your hidden childhood fantasies of magic and nature.
If you do not have a fear of scarecrows and have an adventurous spirit, do visit Nagoya Village.
In any case, I guarantee that the scarecrows will welcome you with open arms. Wink!
By Xiuwei Wong
japantravelXiuwei Wong
Travel Editor
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Graced with jazz sensibilities, exceptional vocal technique and a four-octave range, singer-songwriter Jo Davie offers up genuine story-telling. Bursting onto the national scene as runner-up to this year's Folk Alliance Young Artist of the Year, she is winning audiences across Australia, with her unique vocal style and vibrant stage presence. Jo explores the boundaries of her voice as a powerful instrument, channelling her Conservatorium jazz training into her original folk music with impressive versatility. Whether performing her own songs, soaring above her raucous gypsy band 'Cigány Weaver', or even lending her voice to a national ad campaign, she sings with heartfelt simplicity and technical skill. Just this year, her performance career has already taken her inter-state, gaining her fans in Melbourne, Cairns, Canberra and Adelaide. She has showcased at The National Folk Festival and was a 2018 recipient of the Audrey Recording Initiative, scoring a two-day recording session in Melbourne with award-winning producer, Anna Laverty (engineer for Kate Miller-Hiedke, Nick Cave, Tinpan Orange). Above all, Jo's primary focus is to share stories, hoping to put a little bit of herself into every song she sings.


text:
<?php

namespace OcraComposer;

use UnexpectedValueException;
use RuntimeException;
use Zend\ModuleManager\ModuleManagerInterface;

/**
 * Base module for autoloading Zend Framework 2 Application modules through
 * Composer
 *
 * @license MIT
 * @link    http://marco-pivetta.com/
 * @since   0.1.0
 * @author  Marco Pivetta <ocramius@gmail.com>
 */
class Module
{
    /**
     * @var null|array
     */
    protected $config = null;

    /**
     * @param ModuleManagerInterface $moduleManager
     * @throws RuntimeException
     */
    public function init(ModuleManagerInterface $moduleManager)
    {
        $config = $this->getConfig();

        if(!@include_once $config['ocra_composer']['autoload_file_path']) {
            $installer = realpath($config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename']);
            $installer = $installer ? $installer : $this->downloadComposerInstaller($config);

            throw new RuntimeException(
                'Could not locate "'
                    . $config['ocra_composer']['autoload_file_path'] . "\", "
                    . "you probably didn't install all required project dependencies.\n"
                    . 'Composer has been downloaded to "' . $installer . "\".\n"
                    . 'Install it by running `php ' . $config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename'] . "`, "
                    . 'then install dependencies by running `php composer.phar install`.'
            );
        }
    }

    /**
     * @return array
     */
    public function getConfig()
    {
        if (!$this->config) {
            $this->config = include __DIR__ . '/config/module.config.php';
        }

        return $this->config;
    }

    protected function downloadComposerInstaller($config)
    {
        if (!$config['ocra_composer']['automatically_download_installer']) {
            throw new RuntimeException(
                'Could not locate "'
                . $config['ocra_composer']['autoload_file_path'] . "\", "
                . "you probably didn't install all required project dependencies through composer.\n"
            );
        }

        if (!is_writable(getcwd())) {
            throw new RuntimeException(
                '"' . realpath(getcwd()) . '" is not writable, could not download composer installer to it'
            );
        }

        if (!$installer = @file_get_contents($config['ocra_composer']['installer_download_location'])) {
            throw new UnexpectedValueException(
                'Could not locate or download composer installer from "'
                . $config['ocra_composer']['installer_download_location'] . '"'
            );
        }

        if (!@file_put_contents($config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename'], $installer)) {
            throw new UnexpectedValueException(
                'Could not write composer installer to "' . $config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename'] . '"'
            );
        }

        if (!$installer = realpath($config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename'])) {
            throw new UnexpectedValueException(
                'Could not find downloaded composer installer "' . $config['ocra_composer']['installer_filename'] . '"'
            );
        }

        return $installer;
    }

}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


I don't know if anyone else is the same like me or not who are using Touchbar version of 15" 2017, My left speaker sound output is not the same as the right speaker.
I tried Preferences Pane/Sound and trick the Balance of Left and right while playing the music. But, the output is not normal at Left Speaker. The right speaker can bring full of bass like surround sound. But, the left speaker can bring only treble sound. Neither the bass or the surround like the right one.
Am I only one who experiencing like that? Or was is because of the new MacBook Pro speaker system?
Is this the same one that suffered a water spill;;?
I have the identical problem in the reverse. I also have the MacBook Pro Touchbar version of 15" 2017. In my case it is the left internal speaker that has full dynamic range and the right that only has highs. It is almost as if it is configured for the left to be a mid-range speaker and the right a twitter.
Had not a water spill but a single drop spill and on the left side of the laptop... right speaker won't work now. It's like it's muffled. &&^&^$^ Apple. Besides the screen being &&^&@@ up, now the speaker is &&^&@@ up too.
I had the same issue. I backed up my Mac, reset it completely, reloaded software and went into System Preferences > Sound > Output > and then I moved the balance to the middle because it was automatically on left for some reason. Resetting may be more of a last resort-type thing but it worked for me!
I had the same problem with my 2015 and got it repaired before the warranty expired. This was a hardware issue as I had the same problem on Windows Bootcamp. Apple found no evidence of water damage or anything. Looking through forums online, a lot of people has had this problem, but Apple denies that there is something wrong with the Macbook lineup.
Same here, just after expired warranty. No water needed. Driving it to a service point tomorrow to see what can be done.
I'm having this problem as well except my situation is reversed — my right speaker's volume is very low compared to the left's. Tried resetting SMC and PRAM with no luck. Verified audio balance is in the middle. Replaced my right speaker with a "new" one to confirm it's not a problem with the speaker itself. Moving my audio output balance over to the right is a hack that lets me enjoy me speakers at approximately the same volume again but this is obviously broken so I'm taking it to the Apple store tomorrow to see if they can diagnose the issue.


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Q: Requests in IIS' "SendResponse" state stuck for a long time; Slow IIS 7.5/ASP.NET 4.0 web application I have a set of very beefy, very underutilized servers which are running a couple virtual machines with Windows Server 2008 R2 and IIS 7.5.
The problem: Sometimes requests take a very long time to be processed. The user sees their browser spinning, apparently not getting any response from IIS.
Some stats & attempts at resolving:

*

*The load on the servers (host and VM) is negligible. CPU never goes over 5%, there are 10+ GB of RAM available, everything is connected via MPIO to a fast SAN.

*I get between 30 and 50 requests per second, a mix of dynamic and static content, only GET and POST. Most hits are cached (80% hit rate), so the load on the fabric/SAN/IO is close to nothing.

*TCP offloading is disabled on the host and virtual machine, both on the network adapter and via disabling TCP chimney

*The web applications are running in ASP.NET 4.0 Integrated Mode. They do not make long-running calls to third party web services or the like.

*I have tried both the processModel autoConfig, as well as setting maxWorkerThreads, maxConnections, maxIOThreads etc. to very high numbers with no difference.

*Database querys are all completing in less than 1 second. I profiled for an entire day and didn't capture a single query that would take longer.

*I've looked at tons of performance monitor counters; the ASP.NET queues and Application queues are always empty, nothing appears to get queued (which wouldn't make sense anyways considering that the server isn't breaking a sweat at all)

*I've identified using appcmd list requests that sometimes requests get 'stuck' for 20-60 seconds in IIS' "SendResponse" stage. This is the only thing I could find so far that would make any sense as to why we're seeing users getting stuck when navigating around. Note that most requests are getting processed fast though, it looks just like random requests from different application pools get stuck here.

Any idea what else I can look at? What would cause requests getting stuck in the 'SendResponse' stage in IIS?

A: Have you found any solution to this?  I'm reguarly seeing the same thing for quite a while now where static content such as JS, PNG and GIFs are stuck in the "SendResponse" state in the "IIS Web Core" module.  I'm in the same situation with IIS 7/ASP.NET 4.0.  I'm monitoring these with this Microsoft.Web.Administration code, rather than appcmd.
UPDATE: On some further research, one possibility I've come up with is that it may be a dropped network connection.  In this thread, the person reports Win32 status codes of 1236 in his IIS logs, which is "The network connection was aborted by the local system.".  I'm not sure however if this means the requester cancelled the request, or the web server has aborted the request.  Conceivably the requester might navigate to another page on your site before all these HTTP requests for page content (images, JS, etc) have completed which would probably abort all the pending requests to the web server (i.e. he clicks on a link on the page when it first renders).  I've found some 1236 Win32 status codes in my IIS logs (mostly for static content such as GIF, PNG and JS with a few of them tied to ASPX pages), however, I'm not sure if these are the same requests I'm seeing stuck in the "SendResponse" state.

A: This is usually due to mobile devices on slow data connections downloading large asset files. When I say "large" I mean relative to the speed of the connection.
The requests aren't "hanging", they're just taking a long time because they're dependent on the user's network speed. The requests will be dumped if the user disconnects, so they're probably patiently waiting for the page to load.
Check the IPs listed next to the "hanging" requests and look them up, you'll probably find that they belong to mobile phone operators.

A: Wanted to share my recent experience with the same symptoms you described.  We had periodic request hangs where the browser seemed to be waiting a long time (over 10 seconds, up to ~100 seconds) for random requests.  This was happening with static content requests as well as dynamic.  After watching the requests using the same method as you (appcmd list requests), I could see they would be stuck in SendResponse.
To replicate the issue I would loop 100,000 requests to a small static .jpg file and could generate 1000s of 1236 responses (verified by checking IIS logs).
After disabling Windows Defender real-time scan my 100k request test generated 0 1236 responses.  In our UAT environment we were getting about 10-100 1236 errors in our iis logs every day (out of about 500k requests).  After disabling Windows Defender real-time scan we now have not had a single 1236 win32status for any incoming request.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
In the style of Capablanca and Fischer – Peter Leko
2/27/2008 – Peter Leko may not be the most popular player among amateurs, but to neglect his chess would be a pity both aesthetically and instructionally. He is one of the world's strongest players, and his games are very useful to study. Our Playchess.com lecturer Dennis Monokroussos proves this with a 2002 Leko masterpiece against Alexander Beliavsky from the Olympiad in Bled. Enjoy.
Dennis Monokroussos writes:
Peter Leko may not be the most popular player among amateurs, but to neglect his chess would be a pity both aesthetically and instructionally. He is one of the world's strongest players, after all, and came within a single draw of the world title back in 2004. His wins have a strategic clarity reminiscent of players like Capablanca and Fischer, and that makes them very useful to study. We'll have a look at just such a model game in this week's show, a win over Alexander Beliavsky from the 2002 Olympiad in Bled.
Beliavsky, no slouch himself, essayed the Breyer Variation of the Ruy Lopez, and despite many years of experience on the Black side of the Ruy, he found himself on the receiving end of a chess clinic. First, Leko put into action a then little-known prophylactic plan which neutralized Black's hopes of queenside and central counterplay. With that taken care of, he started augmenting the pressure on the kingside, forcing a series of small concessions along the way. The next step was to stretch Black's defenses too thin, and that required finding the game's best move. Having found the move, and the various plans it made possible, it was time to administer the denouement, and Leko finished the game in style.
The win was beautiful and strategically complete, and very much worthy of our attention. I hope therefore that you'll join me tonight, Wednesday night, at 9 p.m. ET (3 a.m. CET) as we examine this masterpiece; you'll be glad you did!
Dennis Monokroussos' Radio ChessBase lectures begin on Wednesdays at 9 p.m. EST, which translates to 02:00h GMT, 03:00 Paris/Berlin, 13:00h Sydney (on Thursday). Other time zones can be found at the bottom of this page. You can use Fritz or any Fritz-compatible program (Shredder, Junior, Tiger, Hiarcs) to follow the lectures, or download a free trial client.
You can find the exact times for different locations in the world at World Time and Date. Exact times for most larger cities are here. And you can watch older lectures by Dennis Monokroussos offline in the Chess Media System room of Playchess:
Enter the above archive room and click on "Games" to see the lectures. The lectures, which can go for an hour or more, will cost you between one and two ducats. That is the equivalent of 10-20 Euro cents (14-28 US cents).
Monokroussos in Mexico: World Championship 2007
Dennis Monokroussos is 41, lives in South Bend, IN, where he teaches chess and occasionally works as an adjunct professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame and Indiana University-South Bend.
At one time he was one of the strongest juniors in the U.S. and has reached a peak rating of 2434 USCF, but several long breaks from tournament play have made him rusty. He is now resuming tournament chess in earnest, hoping to reach new heights.
Dennis has been working as a chess teacher for ten years now, giving lessons to adults and kids both in person and on the internet, worked for a number of years for New York's Chess In The Schools program, where he was one of the coaches of the 1997-8 US K-8 championship team from the Bronx, and was very active in working with many of CITS's most talented juniors.
When Dennis Monokroussos presents a game, there are usually two main areas of focus: the opening-to-middlegame transition and the key moments of the middlegame (or endgame, when applicable). With respect to the latter, he attempts to present some serious analysis culled from his best sources (both text and database), which he has checked with his own efforts and then double-checked with his chess software.
The Sniper is a universal opening framework which can be played against all main first white moves - 1.e4, 1.d4, 1.c4, 1.f4 and 1.Nf3. Black plays 1…g6, 2…Bg7 and 3…c5 against practically anything!

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


This hotel's address is 11 EAST WALTON CHICAGO IL US 60611 in Chicago, United States. You are now Chicago from the hotel. To see all hotels near your location, please use the map.
Elysian Hotel Chicago is located in the heart of Chicago's Gold Coast. The property features 188 exquisite, residential-styled guest rooms and suites averaging 889 square feet, two exceptional restaurants; Ria and Balsan, a bar; Bernard's, 4,500 square feet of Event Space, and an incomparable Spa & Health Club totaling 14,000 square feet. The richly detailed exterior and European-styled courtyard are reminiscent of the grand hotels of the 1920's, while the interiors embrace a sophisticated, urban sensibility. Fireplaces, outdoor terraces, private bars and advanced technology are provided in the hotel. The best of the city is just steps away with famed Oak Street and Michigan Avenue shopping, fine restaurants, theaters and lakefront activities. And while the hotel itself is exquisitely designed, the Elysian is not simply another beautiful building—it is the team we have assembled from around the world that brings this property to life. Our staff's ability to create remarkable moments for our guests is the true hallmark of the Elysian. Hotel near Chicago, United States.