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January, 2000, CANCUN, Mexico - Six days ago, we were living in the 1900's. That really sounds historic now, doesn't it? 1900's. Then we woke up on a Saturday morning, not only in a new century, but also a new millennium. It was January 1, the year 2000! Just the sight of those three zeros in a row looked so elegantly futuristic. Never have we had the same sense of history and the future in such close proximity.

It is six days later and I am now in Cancun, Mexico for a corporate speaking engagement with a biotechnology firm called Bio-Rad. Lounging on my hotel room balcony, gazing out at the waves gently rolling in on the beach at this paradisiacal resort on the Yucatan peninsula, my thoughts range philosophically.

Mindful of our rich but turbulent history, we as a civilization have managed to make notable advances. Our Star Trek communication device, imaginative science fiction thirty-five years ago, is today a necessary nuisance -- the cell-phone. Fifteen years ago, in the whimsical time travel film, "Star Trek IV, The Voyage Home," 23rd century Scotty had a comic scene where he attempted to talk to a 20th-century computer. Today, such a device, a voice-command computer that answers back audibly, is not only reality, it is a commercial product that a number of Star Trek actors have endorsed. Most astounding is the transformation of our geo-political landscape. When "Star Trek" first went on the air in 1966, the world was locked in the grips of the coldest of cold wars. Two great powers, the Soviet Union and the Western Alliance, were glaring at each other threatening mutual nuclear annihilation. Yet, on "Star Trek," we had a valued member of the Enterprise crew who spoke with a Russian accent and took pride in his Russian heritage. Back then, this character, Pavel Chekov, was pure fiction, a wistful hope for mankind's future. Today, we have had in fact, a space station called Mir up in the sky on which we heard not only Russian and American accents, but crew members speaking in the Russian language and English that worked together in concert. The grotesque presence of the Berlin Wall is gone. The Soviet Union is broken and in economic shambles while the United States has enjoyed the longest economic prosperity in its history. Despite the concern for irrational terrorist attacks that tempered our new year's celebration, looking back, our recent history has been good.

Turning from the past to our future and gazing out at a seeming infinity of tomorrows, all we can see is a vast unknown. We know that there are some certainties that serve as the benchmarks of time. The zero that punctuates the end of the year 2000 reminds us that this will be another census year. The political debates that have already begun in earnest tell us that there will be another presidential election. And the surest verity of any year -- we will be paying taxes. But the rest is a great mystery. We hope we will enjoy success. We expect there will be challenges. We pray we will not have setbacks. But we don't know.

All we can do to shape the course of what is to come can be determined by what we do and how we do it. And all we have to guide us in our actions are the values and ideals that have successfully brought us to this point. We have managed to build the most vibrantly pluralistic nation in history, still mindful of the inequities and conflicts that exist. We have made our free capitalist system the exemplar of the global economy while aware of the challenges that the deterioration of our environment industrial development brings. We have a dynamic peoples' democracy, as good as -- and as fallible as -- the people who participate in it.

As I gaze out on the waves on the beach of Cancun, rolling in with the same rhythmic regularity that it has maintained through countless millennia, I get a humbling sense of our small part in a great force. Whatever we do, let us give it our very best, acting with confidence in our problem-solving ability, our innovative talent and our creative imagination.

May, 2001, LOS ANGELES - On the first day of April, I boarded American Airlines Flight 140, nonstop from Los Angeles to Paris, France. April in Paris! My spirits soared with the plane as it rose up into the clouds. Where else but Paris, the quintessential city of light and life, to celebrate the beginning of spring.

I landed at Charles De Gaulle Airport in golden sunshine to be told by my Paris friend, Olivier Jalabert, that the sun was a rare and welcome phenomenon. Paris had been inundated by relentless rain throughout the previous month. I revealed to him that this was my southern Californian gift that I brought to Paris in my luggage. He thanked me effusively for my sunny generosity. This was going to be a glorious week.

Seven days in Paris flies by like the sparkle of a transporter. As I write this now, a month away from that dream-like week, the memories seem wrapped in golden haze. I'm still savoring Sunday brunch under a Tiepolo ceiling in the grand dining salon of the Musee Jacquemart Andre. This was the great town mansion that served as Louis Jordan's Paris estate in the classic film, "Gigi." Glowing memories of dining on Duck a'la Orange at the fabled Tour d'Argent with a glorious view of Notre Dame below. Ambling down the Champs Elysee on a Sunday afternoon together with aluminum wrapped Paris marathoners who had just finished the grueling run at the Arc de Triomphe. Strolling across the classic beaux arts bridge, Pont Alexandre, at night when -- precisely at 10 p.m. -- the Eiffel Tower begins to explode in an effervescence of sparkling lights. Glowing, luminous memories.

Some of my best Parisian experiences were serendipitous -- accidental discoveries or chance happenings. On a previous visit, we just happened to be at the basilica of Sacre Coeur, one of the highest points in Paris, on Bastille Day to learn that fireworks would be set off that evening. We laid down on the hillside grass and waited until the darkened sky turned into a Miro painting of exploding, swirling cascades of colored lights. Singularly Parisian serendipity.

On this trip, we saw the River Seine as we had never seen it before. As Olivier had told us, it had been raining heavily in Paris and the Seine had turned into a torrential force of nature. Those charming pedestrian footpaths alongside the river, where old men snooze with their fishing poles and lovers meet under the willow trees, were completely flooded over. The willow trees looked like long-haired maidens in distress clinging on for dear life bobbing against the oncoming assault of the flood. The tourist boats that cruise up and down the Seine had to be temporarily cancelled.

Our last evening in Paris was a convivial dinner hosted by Olivier, who is manager of Album, an intriguing collectibles store on Boulevard Saint Germain. The dinner was in a rustic restaurant called Les Bouchons. Among his guests was Alain Carraze, a witty television talk show host. I visited on his show and had a wonderful time chatting with him about my Star Trek experiences. Alas, it had to be in English. I speak only tourist French, but, fortunately for me, he spoke delightful English. The evening was congenial with good conversation and great food. I think it's impossible not to eat well in Paris. And at Les Bouchons we ate well surrounded by history. The heavy timbered restaurant was in a centuries old, pre-revolutionary structure on a narrow, cobbled street called Rue d' Hotel Colbert right off the Seine.

In exchange for my gift of California sunshine, I came home laden with another collection of glowing memories. Au revoir, Paris and merci boucoup, Olivier.

Almost immediately after returning from Paris -- before I could even shake off my jetlag -- I was on a Japan Air Lines 747 to Osaka, Japan. My mission was the opening of the Japanese American National Museum's traveling exhibit "From Bento to Mixed Plate" at the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka. This was the second venue for the exhibit after its first opening in Japan last November in Okinawa.

I landed at the beautiful Kansai Airport built on a man-made island on Osaka Bay. Kansai is the most well-planned airport that I've had the pleasure of passing through. There is excellent traffic flow, smooth passport control, good signage, efficient taxi, train and other transportation connections, a fine hotel, restaurants galore and all the services a traveler would need. The only problem is that the island is sinking. Apparently, the engineers' calculations were a bit off. The airport is slowly descending back into the waters of the bay. But until that time, Kansai will be my favorite airport.

Japan's National Museum of Ethnology is on the grounds of the 1970 World Expo that was held in Osaka. When I arrived at the old Expo grounds, I immediately recognized the giant theme sculpture and some of the exposition buildings from my visit back in 1970. But there had been many new structures built since the exposition, among them the National Museum of Ethnology. The surrounding areas also had become quite urbanized. I thought of the plans the city of Hannover, Germany, has for the grounds of their World Expo just concluded last year.

The opening ceremony for our traveling exhibit was a big success. We were honored to have the Chancellor of Seijo University, Dr. Nagayo Homma, and a colleague of mine on the Japan-United States Conference on Cultural and Educational Interchange, travel down from Tokyo to join us. The reception that followed was convivial and celebratory. Sake toasts followed one after another. The press was great. The exhibit is well launched in Osaka. Its next stop in Japan is Hiroshima.

April was the perfect time to be in Japan. It is the very peak of cherry blossom season. And right outside my hotel, the Imperial, along the beautiful Ogawa River, is the best place for cherry blossom viewing. Sachie Kubo, of the Japan Excelsior campaign, who lives in Osaka, had called and kindly offered to personally escort me on my cherry blossom viewing. She and other fans had given me a wonderful time in Osaka last November when I was passing through on my way back from Okinawa.

I had imagined Japanese cherry blossom viewing to be a tranquil, contemplative, almost poetic, experience. How wrong I was! Cherry blossom viewing in Osaka was the most raucous, congested, massive aesthetic experience I had ever encountered. It seemed as if the whole nation of Japan had turned out to view the cherry blossoms outside the Imperial Hotel. Once we were swept up in the solid, shoving, mass of humanity, free will was gone. One had to go with the flow. There were policemen with bullhorns urging the crowd to keep moving on. But the cherry blossoms were simply breathtaking. I had never seen such variety, the shades of pale pinks and whites. I had never witnessed blossoms in such abundant density. At times, we seemed to be flowing through a heavenly tunnel of pink white clouds. It was gorgeous, almost surreal and absolutely unforgettable. Sachie-san, domo arigato.

I arrived back in Los Angeles to be greeted by a script for a new television series titled "Chronicle." The series is about a New York tabloid newspaper and its crew of journalists that cover paraphenomenal events. My guest starring role in the episode titled, "Here There Be Dragons," scheduled to air this summer on the Sci Fi Channel, was that of a Chinese immigrant father whose daughter, it is suspected, might be involved with a dragon inhabiting the sewers of Chinatown. The drama is played with straight-faced seriousness. I thought it might be fun. But I was baffled by the location. It was to be filmed in San Diego, California! A New York story on location in palmy, balmy San Diego? Now, that is paraphenomenal. I phoned my agent to find out why but he couldn't explain this mystery of Hollywood either. Oh well, I thought. After all the jetting about I'd been doing this month, a quick relaxing train ride down the coast to San Diego would be much preferable to another long cross country sit on a plane to New York.

Arriving in San Diego, I was picked up at the Santa Fe Train Depot and taken directly to what the driver called, "the studio" for my wardrobe fitting. There the mystery was cleared up. "Chronicle" is produced by Stu Segall, an entrepreneur who had indeed developed a studio complex in San Diego consisting of six soundstages with all the necessary support facilities. The series was keeping film activities humming at his facility. For exterior shots, sections of downtown San Diego, with clever camouflaging of palm trees, was passing for dense, gritty New York City. How fitting for a show dealing with paraphenomena.

The week in San Diego was the perfect antidote to a month of globe girding air flights - back in make-up and in front of the cameras. The regulars on "Chronicle," Chad Willett, Rena Sofer and Reno Wilson are bright, talented and personable young performers and it was a pleasure working with them.

The weekend there was pure tonic. I went to the award winning regional theater, the Globe Theater, and enjoyed a wonderful production of "Dinner with Friends." Taking the title to heart, I had dinner with friends - Sam and Lydia Irvine at their son Ken's fabulous restaurant, Chez Loma in a charming Victorian house on Coronado Island.

The month began in Paris dining on extraordinary French cuisine with friends and concluded with superb California cuisine with friends on Coronado Island. April was a magnificent global banquet table with friends.

June, 2001, LOS ANGELES - What an undreamed of invitation -- the Kentucky Derby! I had been to Kentucky many times before. My niece, Akemi Takei, the broadcast journalist in the family, had worked at a television station in Lexington. So I had visited her when she was there. And, of course, there had been many Star Trek conventions in Kentucky. I like the lush and gracious landscape and the warm hospitality of the people of Kentucky. But I'd never expected to actually be at the legendary Kentucky Derby at fabled Churchill Downs. This was fantastic!

Before departing L.A., on my way to the airport, I swung around to Twentieth Century Fox studios. I was squeezing in a quick voice-dubbing gig on another episode of "The Simpsons." It didn't take much time. I was off to the airport and Louisville, Kentucky, in about an hour.

On the flight, seated in the row just behind me, I recognized actor Bill Brochtrup from "NYPD Blue." In conversation with him, we discovered that we were guests of the same host, Michael Berry of the Kentucky Derby Festival. We would both be riding in the Kentucky Derby Festival's Pegasus Parade and going to the same Derby festivities. This was going to be great fun.

Immediately upon arrival, we were swept up into a whirlwind of activities - lunches, dinners, parties galore, and, on the Thursday before the Derby, the Pegasus Parade. The parade's Grand Marshal was none other than the second man to walk on the moon, astronaut Buzz Aldrin. I had met Buzz and his lovely wife Lois before -- at a charity fund-raising event at Paramount Studios. Our paths seem to have a way of crossing in the most interesting ways, in fiction as well as in fact.

In the parade, our vehicles were, unlike the futuristic crafts with which Buzz and I are associated, handsome treasures from the past. Buzz's car was an elegantly restored antique that I couldn't identify and mine was a classic red Corvette. The crowd was wildly enthusiastic and I shouted myself hoarse. That night, we recovered over dinner at Jicama Grill, a trendy restaurant that serves delectably exotic Latin American cuisine.

Kentucky Derby day was sunny and hot. But the dress, we were told, was sports coat and tie. As we boarded the air-conditioned luxury bus that was to transport us to Churchill Downs, I couldn't help but be taken by the elegantly dressed women who, almost without exception, wore enormous confections of feathers, flowers, silk or gossamer on their heads. The practicality of a large hat on a sun-scorched day was contradicted by the preposterous creations that almost covered their faces like some fantastical umbrella balanced over their heads. But as the bus approached Churchill Downs, I noticed that the mass of people surging toward the grandstand carrying their picnic baskets and aluminum lawn chairs, wore tank tops, halters and practical wide brimmed straw hats. There was clearly a two-tier dress code.

Indeed, when the bus parked, we were escorted directly to a bank of elevators that swiftly lifted us up to the sixth-floor clubhouse. It was air-conditioned, well provisioned with a beautiful buffet and a panoramic glass window that provided a spectacular view of the sun drenched racetrack below. In this cool and luxuriously coddled setting, the colossal hats seemed even more wacky. Friends greeting the behatted women couldn't reach them under those massive canopies - all they could do was blow friendly air kisses toward the faces hidden under the huge hats.

They told me that you have to have a strategy in the betting process. I had never bet on horses before. I knew nothing about racehorses. What was I to do? The Kentucky Derby itself was the eighth race of the afternoon. I decided to prepare by observing the betting process during the first race. People were talking about the lineage of each horse, their track records, how they looked in their warm up runs the morning before. They might as well have been speaking in Swahili. I knew then that I was on my own. I would have to depend on sheer luck. Nevertheless, I would try to craft a strategy.

I decided to dive in on the second race. I studied the list of horses on my program. The third horse on the list was named Lake Pontchartrain. It reminded me of the delicious Blackened Red Fish from Lake Pontchartrain that I enjoyed when I was in New Orleans. Aha! I had a connection with that horse. This strategy should be as good as any. I bet $2 on Lake Pontchartrain to win. The race began and the horses were off and running. They were all bunched together. I couldn't make out which horse was Lake Pontchartrain. A batch of horses came thundering in with one nosing out all the others. I couldn't tell which one that was. We all waited for the scoreboard to show the final result. At last, the board lit up with the name of the winner. It said Lake Pontchartrain! I had won on my first try! Astoundingly, my $2 bet won me $32!!! Lady Luck was definitely with this beginner horseplayer.

But she is a fickle lady. She left me for others for the next five races. My $32 was reduced to $22. Now the big one was on us - the Kentucky Derby. I studied my program. There it was - the twelfth horse - seductively beckoning out to me. Startac! This was such an obviously clear message. Could anything be closer to Star Trek? But there also was another horse with the word star in its name -- Balto Star. Not as close as Startac, but it still had the word star in it. And if you dropped the B from Balto, you would have alto, which in Spanish means "high." Star Trek soars high. This too could be telling me something a bit more subtly. I decided to bet $10 on both Startac and Balto Star.

The gates opened and horses were off and running. The announcer's booming voice narrated the race. "Balto Star is second," he intoned. The crowd and I cheered. "Come on Balto Star," I shouted. Thank goodness I covered my bet with two horses, I thought. But after the second bend, Balto Star began to fall behind. "Come on Balto Star! You can do it!" I urged. But that horse continued to fall back. Then the booming voice announced, "Startac is passing Balto Star." My gosh, I still have a chance! "Go Startac," I yelled. But Startac wouldn't move ahead. It continued to maintain its place in the pack. "Go Startac. Go," I pleaded. Suddenly, out from nowhere - literally from the back of the pack - came an incredible horse. It galloped past every one of the others and was thundering toward the finish all by itself. "Monarchos is ahead by four lengths," the announcer's voice bellowed excitedly. It was an awesome sight to see. A magnificent animal moving with powerful grace dashed across the finish line. "Monarchos has won the Kentucky Derby," the ecstatic voice announced. It was later declared that Monarchos' time, 1:59.97 minutes, was the second fastest in the Kentucky Derby's 127-year history. The fastest was Secretariat with l:59.4 minutes in 1973. This was an awe-inspiring experience - but I was poorer by $20. Startac came in tenth and Balto Star was fourteenth. My $32 winning from the second race was reduced now to $2 - the very amount I first bet on Lake Pontchartrain. At least I broke even. Thank you Michael Berry and all the wonderful people of Kentucky for an unforgettable - and not too costly - experience.

Two days after returning to Los Angeles, I dove into another major event - this one, a binational conference called the Japan-United States Conference on Cultural and Educational Interchange at the Japanese American National Museum. As well as serving as the Chairman of the Board of the Museum, I am a member of the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission, a non-governmental federal agency. So I was doubly invested in this conference. It turned out a great success. Our panelists from throughout the U.S and senior officials from the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Education, distinguished leaders from academia, business and culture were in accord that this conference in Los Angeles was one of the best ever held in its forty-year history.

I had another quick voiceover gig before flying off again. This one was the popular "Jackie Chan" Saturday morning animated series. I was the voice of a wise and benign Buddhist priest. Jackie Chan was voiced by a versatile young actor named James Tse. Then, I was off to Atlanta, Georgia, for Vulcon, another Star Trek convention.

The lucky bonus with this trip was that my good friend, gifted writer Peter David, was getting married to his love, Kathleen, a stage manager, puppeteer, editor and all around renaissance woman, in Atlanta on the same weekend as the convention. What blessed serendipity! I arranged with Joe Motes, the organizer of the convention, so that I could manage both the wedding and the convention. He was most cooperative.

Peter and Kathleen were married in a charming chapel on the picturesque campus of Emory University. It was a lovely ceremony. But it was the reception that really captured the spirit of the couple. The venue was a converted former warehouse now called the Shakespeare Tavern. It is a theater patterned after the old Globe Theater of Elizabethan London. So eminently appropriate. Both Peter and Kathleen are theatrical people - she literally and Peter in every sense of the word. His personality, if anything, is colorfully theatrical. His bountiful talent is of the theater as well as literature. Indeed, he even looks like he could play Shakespeare's Falstaff. To top off the theatricality of the reception, the best man at the wedding also became the master of the revels of the reception. He was none other than literary lion, incendiary raconteur and volcanically outspoken convention speaker - Harlan Ellison. He was touching in his fondness of the couple; he was hilarious with anecdotes about their relationship; he was ribald with his jokes; he was inexhaustible and never-ending. Finally, Peter broke in. Peter too is an expert raconteur. The afternoon became a bountiful banquet table of words, words, words as well as good food. Among the guests was Bill Mumy, who you might remember as young Will Robinson in the television series, "Lost In Space." We laughed, we ate and we drank - much too much. It was a fantastical wedding reception - as it should be for Peter and Kathleen. May this marriage live long and prosper.