Blog — Remote Year

Throughout our first week, we have learned so much about the unique Japanese culture.  They have lots of traditions, rules and sayings to learn.  One that many Remotes have connected with is Wabi-sabi (侘寂?), which represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is “imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete.  Some more great Japanese sayings here.

We did a Japanese cooking class at the cooking studio ‘Cooking Sun’. The studio was located in a restored traditional townhouse in central Kyoto. The class began with a shopping tour for ingredients at the famous Nishiki Food Market.

We enjoyed many of the local foods and explored the beautiful city.

The Remote Year team went to see GEAR, a “unique non-verbal performance that stimulates your five senses with a moving story set in the future. Accompanied by impressive stage effects set up using techniques ranging from those used in Kabuki plays to the latest technologies, GEAR is bound to offer you a theatrical experience you will never forget!”

On Saturday we hosted our monthly Junction networking event.  We met some amazing people from Kyoto working on lots of interesting things!

Then we jumped on the beautiful subway and headed our to do karaoke. 

A group of Remotes did a biking tour of temples around Kyoto.

Greg caught a happy moment of Nate taking a picture of Dave taking a picture of Kim taking a selfie with Steph

We celebrated an amazing holiday season with our new Remote Year family as 2015 came to an end and headed over to Japan right after the start of the new year.

Cameron and Greg U. went to Con Dao, off the south coast off Vietnam.  The intention was to do some diving, but the winds were too fierce for too long – 2m+ seas, with very limited visibility.  So they rented some scooters and rode around the island a bit.

Geetika ‘Drew’ her New Years Resolutions and Plans of building off of the success she had launching Vawaa.  If you haven’t heard of it yet, Vawaa, or Vacation with an artist is a platform for finding and booking studio sessions with curated artists around the world.  Check out www.vawaa.com

She also spent a day hanging out and cooking with local Vietnamese artists in a small town called Tam Dao. 

Geetika also visited Bat Trang, a traditional porcelain and pottery village with history of seven centuries near Hanoi. It’s handmade ceramics can be found in stores globally, including IKEA and Target.  

Joe hosted his famous Joe Matta work-out to get people ready for the holiday feasts.

Everybody brought out their new custom made clothes to celebrate Remote Year Christmas.  Some of them looked like secret service agents and others looked more like members of the Kringle  family.

We all gathered for an amazing Christmas dinner, an early teaser of a new concept Joe is working on around experiential dining events.

At the end of Christmas dinner, Cassie, Nate, Dave and Sam surprised everybody with a Christmas song performance.  

Everybody lounged out for a lazy Christmas day as we hosted a puppy from a local couple.

At our New Year’s party, Remotes busted out tons of crazy custom clothing from the expert Vietnamese tailors. 

Throughout the holiday week, many people checked out one of the seven new wonders of the world, Halong Bay.

We boarded a plane and headed into our 8th month of Remote Year in Kyoto, Japan.

Sam was brought good luck by getting his head bit by the traditional Japanese dragon dancers.

There are so many amazing things to do and see in Vietnam and Remotes have been exploring far and wide!

Lots of people at the work space for our community lunch.