STEVE JOBS wasn't your typical genius.  What made Steve unique was his ability to deal with failure and to be human, even in the end.  Some said he wasn't the easiest person to get along with.  Whether that's true or not is no longer important.  What is important is knowing that Steve was a college drop out that was into creating super cool things.  It didn't matter if he was one of the richest people on the planet.  Steve acted like the money didn't matter to him.  He never flaunted it.  His trademark was sneakers and jeans.  When I think of the people that most influenced me, Steve Jobs appears on that short list of names.  Not since the death of Martin Luther King,  John F. Kennedy, Bruce Lee, John Lennon, and Michael Jackson...has the world experience such a feeling of lost.

People like Steve don't grow on trees.  Although if you listen to his speech at the graduation ceremonies at Stanford University (watch the video below),  or consider the symbolic meaning behind the Apple logo, one would be lead to believe that we all have the ability and potential of achieving our wildest dreams.  It has been said that Steve would look into the mirror every day and ask himself whether he was doing the right thing, whether he was being a good person or not, and if after four days he didn't get a good feeling about what he was doing, he would change his course of action.  Remember Michael Jackson's song The Man in the Mirror?

We all have a lot to learn from Steve, and Michael for that matter.  I'm now looking at the man in the mirror asking the very same questions.   Am I doing everything that I can to make this world a better place?  Am I being the best person that I can possibly be?   Am I following my heart and pursuing my dreams?  Am I 'Staying Young and Staying Foolish?"   If after four days I don't get a resounding 'Yes', I'll change my course of action until I do.   I  recommend you do the same.   
 
Here's to you Steve.  May we all carry the torch in your name.

Ishinomaki, Japan ~ A Story of Human Compassion 

UNEARTHLY SILENCE hangs over Japan.  Even though it’s Golden Week, a national holiday that is usually celebrated with a series of festival activities that last for a week, the Rising Sun is in solemn mourning.  Everything is tempered down.  Nobody wants to appear disrespectful to those that died during the earthquake and tsunami on March 11th, 2011.

This was Japan’s version of 9/11.   

Although the destruction was not carried out by a group of terrorist or warring nation, the magnitude of the horror is impossible to measured.  It’s one thing to see it on TV under breaking news, it’s entirely another to walk through the aftermath in person.  

The last time I had seen such destruction was when I visited Ground Zero just weeks after the towers collapsed.  I could smell it then, as I could smell it now, the stench of decaying debris and asbestos that leaves a nasty metallic taste in my mouth.

I’m not sure what I expected, but as I approached the Shotaro Ishinomori Museum, I had a funny feeling this bizarre spacecraft and the activity surrounding it would somehow play a significant role in my mission.  I just didn’t know how it was going to play out.  I was too busy filming and attempting to navigate a country that didn’t speak my language.   

It was all surreal.  

Stan Lee, the man who created Spider-Man, once said, “The lesson of Spider-Man, if there is one, if you are able to do something that will do good, that will help people, you damn well oughta do it.”

After March 11th, I couldn’t get Stan’s words out of my head, especially when I read about the school that loss more than 70% of their children and teachers when the tsunami struck just minutes after the 9.0 earthquake.  

How can anyone measure the loss of life?  If it weren’t for the Shotaro Ishinomori Museum, named after Shotaro Ishinomori, the original creator of the Kamen Rider, there would be very little for the people of Ishinomaki to cling onto.  Everything else has been destroyed.   Although Shotaro passed away in 1998, his legacy lives on with this museum.     

Outside the entrance were a number of volunteers from International Red Cross and Peace Boat, preparing meals in blackened kettles with a large Japanese flag hanging on the wall behind them.  I continued filming, passing several Kaito characters in costume, as I followed Jill Glikbarg, a renowned yoga instructor, inside the spacecraft to deliver a package of Kanji cards, 

Little did I know, until returning to Tokyo, that Shotaro Ishinomori was Japan’s version of Stan Lee.   Once this realization hit me, the significance and meaning behind my visit to Ishinomaki couldn't have been clearer.  I will have to return with the intention of launching my comic book version of Skyscraperman.    Shotaro Ishinomori and Stan Lee would expect nothing less!

Below is video that depicts our trip to Japan.  Hope you enjoy!  Namaste~