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a_cubedSo, from Monday morning (actually Sunday night) until Thursday morning I was at an NII Shonan Meeting. This is explicitly an attempt to replicate the Dagstuhl Meetings that purplecat has blogged about. I'm not sure it is as successful as the Dagstuhl Meetings in attracting attendeed. This one on "Privacy's Biggest Failures" was actually conceived by a few people (including a Japanese prof) who attendeda "Security's Biggest Failures" Dagstuhl Meeting.
The academic content was good and the people were worth meeting. I'm hoping there will be some output afterwards in the space of both academic papers and some advocacy-oriented materials. We certainly have some plans.
What was not good at all was the food. Having registered as "vegetarian" for the event, they came back and asked about "milk, eggs, fish and fish broth" in an email. However, for lunch and dinner every single day the main meal for me was some form of fake soy meat in a variety of forms ranging from fairly unappetising to downright off-putting. I know no vegetarian who actually uses these kinds of fake meats by choice. it's the lazy solution for a meat-eating cook who can't be bothered to learn how to cook vegetarian.
On the Wednesday, after a half-day excursion to Kamakura (well worth visiting if you're in Japan) we had a meal out at a local restaurant, which really showed what can be done for vegetarians. That meal had as much as possible of the menu shared with the others, but either did a substitution of something other than fake meat for an ingredient or did a different (tasty, appealing) vegetarian dish. It was all both Japanese ingredients and pretty traditional Japanese cooking. It was also a well-balanced meal with tofu (not soy-based meat substitute, just tofu), miso and a variety of mushrooms providing the protein. The Shonan Village Centre really need to send their chefs to that restaurant to learn how to make tasty, balanced meals with Japanese ingredients and dishes.
purplecat has blogged about. I'm not sure it is as successful as the Dagstuhl Meetings in attracting attendeed. This one on "Privacy's Biggest Failures" was actually conceived by a few people (including a Japanese prof) who attendeda "Security's Biggest Failures" Dagstuhl Meeting.The academic content was good and the people were worth meeting. I'm hoping there will be some output afterwards in the space of both academic papers and some advocacy-oriented materials. We certainly have some plans.
What was not good at all was the food. Having registered as "vegetarian" for the event, they came back and asked about "milk, eggs, fish and fish broth" in an email. However, for lunch and dinner every single day the main meal for me was some form of fake soy meat in a variety of forms ranging from fairly unappetising to downright off-putting. I know no vegetarian who actually uses these kinds of fake meats by choice. it's the lazy solution for a meat-eating cook who can't be bothered to learn how to cook vegetarian.
On the Wednesday, after a half-day excursion to Kamakura (well worth visiting if you're in Japan) we had a meal out at a local restaurant, which really showed what can be done for vegetarians. That meal had as much as possible of the menu shared with the others, but either did a substitution of something other than fake meat for an ingredient or did a different (tasty, appealing) vegetarian dish. It was all both Japanese ingredients and pretty traditional Japanese cooking. It was also a well-balanced meal with tofu (not soy-based meat substitute, just tofu), miso and a variety of mushrooms providing the protein. The Shonan Village Centre really need to send their chefs to that restaurant to learn how to make tasty, balanced meals with Japanese ingredients and dishes.
