The Blog From Another Dimension: Focus on Japan 2004 Archives

Those Darn Historians

This from Kyodo News via Japan Today:

Education minister Nariaki Nakayama on Saturday said history textbooks used in Japanese secondary schools contain passages that are extremely "self-torturing" and suggest "Japan has done nothing but bad things."

He told a news conference he should judge textbooks from a "neutral" standpoint given his capacity as minister in charge of screening textbooks. "Every country's history has light and shadow. While we must reflect on bad deeds, we must not conduct education on the basis of a self-torturing historical perspective that everything that has been done was bad."

So, exactly what is he referring to when he says that "everything" done was reported as bad? Was the Unification under Oda, Hideyoshi and Tokugawa represented as evil? Was the Meiji Restoration written as a bad thing? Was Japan's post-war economic miracle never mentioned? Was the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki related as a bad deed done by the Japanese people?

I have the feeling that when Nakayama refers to "everything" done, he means "everything bad" that was done. For which he himself gives the answer: we must reflect on bad deeds. But by exaggerating to the point that "everything is represented as bad deeds," he's claiming an excuse to whitewash (excuse me--"view from a neutral standpoint") some of the bad stuff--and you can guess primarily what he's talking about. And no, it's not the wars of the 6th and 7th centuries over the Soga clan's rise to power. Something a lot more recent. Care to guess?

Ambush

Saw these fellows laying in wait the other day. The embankment they're next to overlooks an underpass. The underpass has two lanes, separated by a yellow line. On days with good weather and heavy traffic, these guys wait up here on their perch, scouting the traffic below. They're looking for motorcycles that cross the yellow line. A completely innocuous offense, never any danger--the underpass is no more dangerous for lane-changing than anywhere else on the street where there's no yellow line, but it's a rule, and the rules rule here. So it is a technical offense, and you can get a ticket for it. So the cops take up their perch and hand out a steady stream of tickets.

Their position is well-chosen: though it's not clear in the photo above, they're overlooking the bottom of the underpass just after the road that crosses over it (see right). To see them, a driver would have to look up over their left shoulder just as they come out from under the overhead street, and none do; the cops, meanwhile, have a bird's eye view of people as they drive by. In other words, it's shooting fish in a barrel.

The ticketing in fact makes no real sense. The offense, as I mentioned above, is a technical one and poses no more danger than any regular merge in traffic. It's not a high-danger area--I go past there every day, and that's not where accidents happen or where traffic is at its trickiest. Furthermore, there will never be any end to offenders--too many new people going through. Nor will it "teach a lesson" to any regular drivers--the cops are always in the same place, every time, so when a driver spots them once, they know where the cops will always be--which in fact frees the drivers to break traffic laws elsewhere, confident in knowing where the cops are located.

The only reason they are in that location is because it's easy to catch and fine people. Period. That's it. I've noted this kind of thing before, in this post from a year and a half ago. But it's nice to note that their consistency hasn't waned. Too bad their incompetence or uselessness hasn't either.

Arts Day Festival

Some images from this year's Arts Day Festival at the college where I work. You'd be surprised by the talent that exists around you but you don't know because you don't see it... until a day like this. Or like the first Arts Day last year.

A gospel choir

Pottery, among various crafts displayed by the students

A hip-hop group

Iyo at the piano

Roger rockin' down

An appreciative crowd, with more artwork displayed along the walls

A cheerleader group

...and a versatile deejay.

My own contribution was a 16-minute video of the students preparing for Arts Day, shot by Iyo, Hitomi and Moto, which I edited together, adding music, transitions, and effects. The video is linked to by the image below. It is a QuickTime movie (QT required, if you do not have it installed already), and although compressed and reduced in size, is still 44 MB, at 17 minutes running time. After watching it, you may have a better idea as to why I did not blog much in the past week or so--it took a lot of time to put it together using nothing more than iMovie.

Note: the movie was not displaying properly, but is now fixed.

You Don't Miss It

Something happened to me tonight that rarely ever happens in Japan: I got panhandled. When I lived in San Francisco, and especially when I went downtown, panhandling was a daily nuisance--and you quickly learned never to give them anything, unless you enjoy being followed around for ten minutes by an annoyingly persistent bum making ever-increasing demands for larger denominations to be handed over. I once tried to give a guy what spare change I had, and he kept upping the ante with slick sob stories and lies about when local eateries closed, until he finally tried to convince me to give him $20, but he'd pay me back--he actually told me that he'd just been released from prison and so he really needed the money, but if I gave him my address he'd be sure to mail me back the money. Really, he actually tried that on me. I don't know if he was an idiot, or if he thought I was.

But here in Japan, it almost never happens. The first time it did was way back in the 80's when I was traveling in Japan, and a street person approached me as I finished buying a train ticket and asked for change--a good perch for him, people could not easily deny they had change after collecting it from the machine. There may have been one other time in the intervening years, but if so it has receded far enough into distant memory that I cannot recall the specifics. So it was a bit of a jar to have someone come up to me tonight and ask for money. I don't know if the panhandlers target foreigners, but I suspect they do--I have the feeling that other Japanese would probably simply ignore him. Not from callousness, but rather because his behavior is unusual and strange, and the automatic reflex is to ignore such things, pretend they aren't happening. As for me, I had just finished dealing with an enormously frustrating situation (another story) and did not feel quite so generous--regretted in hindsight, actually. But not too much. Just like some elderly people on the train tend to spot me on the rare case I get a seat and come to stand right in front of me because they'll know I'm most likely to give it up, I often tend to resent it when I feel I'm being hit up because of my ethnicity.

Fortunately, I don't have to deal with the panhandling every day here. It's something you don't even realize is missing until you see it like I did today. But you really don't miss it.

Finally

Something I've been waiting for for quite some time: a fiber optic connection to the Internet. Living out where I do, it usually takes a while for new stuff to get out here. This time, it's F/O. Though this is probably not straight F/O, more likely vDSL, a combination of F/O to the building and then DSL into the building and to the room. They'll have a rep here this weekend to take orders. The max claimed speeds are 16 Mbps and 70 Mbps (both "best effort"), and if I can get near even the 16, that'll be a big improvement over now. Currently, I subscribe to a 26 Mbps ADSL service, but due to my 3km+ distance from the telephone office, the real speed is only 3 Mbps.

Another Quake in Niigata

Just a few minutes ago, another sizable tremor hit, and NHK has just reported that it is yet another powerful aftershock--a "6-" on the Japanese scale, maybe a 6.0 M quake or above on the Richter--at the same location in Niigata, where 31 people died, 3,400 were injured and more than 100,000 were made homeless. This tremor was predicted, but is not good news for those in the area, their situation already made worse by heavy rains yesterday.

Niigata Hit Hard by String of Quakes (Felt Across Central Japan)

We are in the process of being hit by a string of strong earthquakes right now. At least one is a 6.8 (Richter scale, it seems) centered in Niigata, but it was felt strongly here. About 3-4 minutes later, I felt another smaller one, and then just now, another strong one, just as strong as the first. And these are up-and-down, not side-by-side quakes.

More as it comes in.

Update: just a few minutes later, I'm on the phone with my brother, and another one hits. that's three fairly good-sized quakes, ranging from at least 5.5 and up to 6.8 on the Richter. I would not want to be in Niigata right now.

NHK is reporting that the last quake was also a 6+, though they only say it's a 5.9 on the Richter.

Update (6:20): Tenki.jp is reporting that the second big quake I felt was a 6.2 on the Richter. They also report the other two quakes.

Update (6:35): Another one! This one just past 6:30, and it felt stronger than the others! I heard the NHK guy in Niigata on TV report it first, camera shaking and all, and then felt it here just a few seconds later.

Damn.

One TV station says it was a 6.3 (NHK concurs), [update: another quake I didn't feel here but was a 5.0 in Niigata; another also hit later] making the sequence:

5:56 pm: 6.8 M
6:03 pm: 6.2 M
6:12 pm: 5.9 M
6:34 pm: 6.3 M
6:36 pm: 5.0 M
6:51 pm: 5.1 M

No reports of damage or injury yet, but this quake hit in the countryside some miles south of Niigata City, so it could be a few hours before we get solid info on exactly what the damage is up there.

Update (7:00): The quake is now being reported in the international press, the best item issued by The Scotsman. Trains have stopped across the region (not a weekday, but still a heavy traffic time).

NHK is now reporting some building damage in Niigata, a broken water main, and a minor train derailment, possibly a bullet train. At least five injuries in one area have been reported, but no fires.

Update (7:22): Correction, ten people with injuries and counting. Reports of mudslides and collapsed houses are trickling in.

Update (7:48): At least one death has been reported, as well as a number of fires. 50-60 people are now reported injured. We are hearing of collapsed walls and fences and other damage. Some areas are affected by a power outage, other reports have electricity on but street lights out. The derailment was indeed a bullet train, with cars #1 and 9 going off the tracks, but it seems like there's not much damage there, no injuries on the train. There is also a report of a partially collapsed expressway. The train left Tokyo at 4pm, and was scheduled to arrive in Niigata at 6. Aftershocks--some of them over 5 on the Richter scale--continue to rock the area. A 5.2 hit at 7:36, and now reports are coming out of a low-6 quake hitting at 7:46.

Never Tear Your Popliteal in a Typhoon

So I'm walking to the train station, I see the elevator opening while I'm still a little distance from the entrance, and I take off at a jog to catch it.

Suddenly, something hits my left calf muscles hard. Like a small, heavy metal ball had just been thrown at high velocity smack at the center of the calf. I turn around to see who did that, but no one is there, and within a second I realize sickeningly that nothing hit me--rather, something in my leg had just snapped. Never a jolly thing, that.

It's not that bad at first, just like most muscle strains and pulls I get, but I know that it'll hurt like heck in the morning. By the time I get home, it's already too painful to walk on anymore. No swelling or bruising, just debilitating pain, that's all. I ice it, bandage it up, and elevate it on an old bundled-up blanket while I sleep, after figuring out (okay, my father figured it out) that it was the popliteal muscle, or tendon, or ligament or whatever, not that I'm too sharp on how those are different from each other. My level of understanding is, essentially, something snap bad go ouch, hurt long time no walk. This kind of thing apparently happens when you start off on a run or the like, and is more likely if you suffer pains in the muscle beforehand, which I had, twice in as many weeks.

The next morning I wake up early and go to the hospital, and the doctor turns out to be more of what I expect from the Japanese medical schools than the doctors I have been lucky enough to get recently. This guy essentially echoes everything I told him that I found out already on the web, but he gave me painkillers and crutches. Not much else he could have done, I suppose. He did seem willing to do an MRI, but I figured it would be way expensive and in the end would mean pretty much nothing.

All this as typhoon #23 is starting to hit, meaning I can't depend on traveling in good weather, and with crutches, that means no umbrella. And I have to get to the station from home, from the other station to work, from the main office to another school a good 15-minute brisk walk without crutches away, then to the station, and then station to home. So I took five taxi rides. That or get soaked and have both my arms be incredibly sore tomorrow.

Hopefully, the tendon or whatever will heal quickly (my dad's research says it's a vestigial muscle anyway, and we can do without), and this will be the last d*mned typhoon in a way-too-long-and-wet typhoon season.

Sorry. I'm just not a rain person.

Not Even in Fiction

Japan has a bit of a blind spot when it comes to World War II and the decades of imperial expansion that preceded it. Although many of its citizens know about the time, look upon it with disapproval, and are not apologists, there is a distinct segment of society that is strongly against recognizing the sins of Japan's past, and the majority of people in Japan seem to go along with it. Japan, like so many other countries, claims to follow Santayana's warning: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." And like so many other countries, it heeds the warning wrongly. Santayana was telling us that we should remember the bad things we have done so that we can learn not to do them again. But nations tend to greatly dislike remembering their own misdeeds, led by nationalists and self-proclaimed patriots who assert national pride, but just as often suffer from denial.

Instead, nations profess to follow Santayana by remembering the misdeeds done to them by others. We all do it. Americans remember Pearl Harbor, but many protest when too much attention is paid to Hiroshima--not to mention the uproar we see now when anyone talks about American atrocities in Vietnam. Israel remembers the Holocaust, China remembers Nanjing, and so on. We memorialize and even aggrandize our victimization, and whitewash or tone down the darker parts of our own past actions. It is my assertion that this interpretation of Santayana is not just mislaid, but is opposite to his warning and can lead to the very condemnation he foresaw. If a nation feels victimized, it feels the right to go beyond ordinary means to defend itself, to the extent of paranoia. If a nation forgets its misdeeds, it feels more certain that it can do no wrong because its people look at the past and see few or no wrongs. This is a dangerous combination that makes a country feel threatened and righteous in going to extreme ends to 'defend' itself--in short, it leads us to exactly the fate Santayana warned us against.

I have witnessed both elements of the equation a fair amount in Japan. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are memorialized here far more than Pearl Harbor in America; survivors of the American invasion of the southern islands such as Iwo Jima describe the terrible experiences they suffered; and the primary mention of Japan's incursion into mainland Asia tends to be about Japanese people left behind after the war who suffered for so many years in Soviet prison camps. So much of Japanese suffering is focused on to a great extent, even in children's fiction--I remember early on in my Japanese language studies being made aware of a manga, a graphic novel written for children called "Barefoot Gen," which relates in grotesque detail the suffering of people in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

But today, a similar manga is being censored because the storyline includes a reference to the Rape of Nanjing as an actual historical event. You see, a strident segment of Japanese society vehemently believes that the Rape of Nanjing was a false story created to put Japan down, to shame it after World War II ended. No amount of documentary evidence, including photographs, countless eyewitnesses and even the writings and admissions of Japanese soldiers themselves can dissuade these nationalists from their belief that it is all a hoax. But unlike those who deny the Holocaust, those who deny the Rape of Nanjing here in Japan are not scoffed at, dismissed, or censured, No, those people here tend to be the ones who hold public office.

This is why the publishers of the Weekly Young Jump, a widely read manga, have decided to cut the story, which is a serialized story of a bureaucrat during the 30's, a serial carried by the publication for the past two years. This edition was to treat the Massacre as a historical fact, and would include a photograph. But that won't come out, and it was not due to massive public protest, but rather by a group of 37 local politicians who claim that the massive killing spree never took place, and who protested at the publisher's office last week. The publisher now calls the photo to be used a "fake" and says the story and the photo will be edited.

Those of you who have doubts might want to read Iris Chang's "The Rape of Nanjing." For those who want rebuttal, this Japanese site provides one.

Damn, That Felt Big

The quake we just felt was a 5.8 on the Richter scale, depending on who's saying, but it felt big
--the biggest one I've been in so far (again--they seem to be getting bigger as time goes by, or maybe just closer), this one almost up to get-the-hell-under-a-door-frame-now big. That one shook the whole apartment visibly--not quite enough to throw things off tables or out of cabinets, but it was close. So far, no reports of serious damage.

The quake was close, in southwestern Ibaraki, right close to where Tokyo, Saitama and Chiba are in proximity to Ibaraki. As far as I can figure, it was just 50 km (30 mi.) from central Tokyo, about 75 km from where I am.

Yikes.

On Ichiro, Baseball, and Japan

I am very happy for Ichiro and his accomplishment; he seems like a nice guy, a great sportsman and is destined to be a major Hall-of-Famer.

As for the reaction of sports fans and the baseball establishment here in Japan, my enthusiasm is a bit more muted. The reason for that is the lack of reciprocity. Japan loves few things as much as a Japanese who travels to America and is a success, especially in breaking records or winning at a popular game. And I would be absolutely fine with that--if the reverse were just as sportingly accepted. But the fact of the matter is, much of Japan despises the foreigner who intrudes and threatens to break a native record. It is not openly spoken of, but it is acted out, by both sportsmen and by the fans.

When I first came to Japan in 1985, I remember the American slugger Randy Bass had come within one home run of breaking the record in Japan. The record holder was Sadaharu Oh, Japan's Babe Ruth, who got 55 homers in 1964. Bass came within one home run of that record in the last few games of the season, and the last opponent his team played was the Yomiuri Giants--managed by Sadaharu Oh. A standing order was given to the pitchers: walk Bass. For two games, he was intentionally walked, and not allowed to try for the record. And it was generally understood that if it had been a Japanese player, he would have been pitched to. And the Giants were not in contention for the Japan Series, as I recall, so it was not strategic in that sense.

Can you imagine an American baseball manager in the same position? Imagine an American player, turned manager, telling his pitchers to walk out someone who challenges his record. The manager would be booed out of the stadium, even by the home crowds. But add to that a racial element, that he's denying the challenger the record because of his race... there would be riots. It would be considered the nadir of sportsmanship.

But maybe that's just Sadaharu Oh. In 1985, a lot of Japanese were behind him, but in 2001, when American Tuffy Rhodes had tied Oh's record and was threatening to break it, other teams gave him shots, were fair to him. But the last two games of the season were against the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks--managed by Sadaharu Oh. And again, the American player was shut out. Oh claimed that he was "out of the loop" on the decision to pitch around Rhodes, just as he claimed in '85, but there's no doubt in anyone's mind that the orders came directly from him. To his credit, Japanese baseball commissioner Hiromori Kawashima stated publicly that Oh's actions were "completely divorced from the essence of baseball, which values the supremacy of fair play." But no disciplinary action was taken against Oh, who still manages the Hawks today. If you ask me, he should have been fired and removed from any halls of fame he has been inducted into.

But it was not only the home-run record being denied, it was an entire system of treatment towards non-Japanese players. Umpires called strikes according to a much-expanded foreigners-only strike zone. Pitchers beaned foreign players far more than they did other Japanese. Fans would often shout racial epithets. And sports newspapers would alter the word 外人--gaijin ("foreigner," or "outside person")--to read 害人 (also pronounced gaijin, but meaning, literally, "harmful-person") to the extent that the word itself had to be banned in the sport.

It was not just in baseball, either; sumo also reacted this way to successful Americans. When Akebono, Musashimaru and Konishiki, all Americans, made the top ranks of sumo, there was a great deal of resistance. Every time one of them won a match, the reaction by the fans were muted. Whenever a Japanese wrestler won against one of them, the crowds went wild, throwing their seat cushions around the arena in abandon, even when the winning wrestler was not all that popular. It kind of turned me off of the sport.

As always, please understand that I am not one of those moan-and-whine Americans who just hates everything about Japan--quite the contrary, I love Japan and I love the people here. But I won't turn a blind eye to any flaw in the nation's character here, any more than I would to national flaws in America. These things can only be changed by talking about them openly.

Maybe the game and the fans here have changed in the past 20 years, regardless of what Oh did a few years ago--but frankly, I don't think it has changed all that much (ask Alex Cabrera, who ran into the same wall in 2002). When I see a foreign player in baseball or sumo (soccer doesn't count--it's not long-standing here, so there are few native records of note to break) do well and not only not be hindered, but to have as strong a following and as deep an acceptance as Ichiro has in the U.S., I will be impressed and encouraged.

Making the Bigs

Foreign universities based in Japan are soon to be accepted by Monbusho, the Japanese Ministry of Education. This is a big thing, as up until now, foreign university campuses based in Japan--even those with full U.S. accreditation--were not considered real colleges by the Japanese government. Students at these schools were not given privileges enjoyed by most Japanese students, particularly student discounts on train and bus passes and other student prices. Additionally, credit earned by these schools would usually not be transferable to Japanese colleges.

In order to be recognized by Monbusho in the past, one's curriculum had to be at least partly in Japanese, and a good many other labyrinthine requirements had to be met.

With the new rules, foreign colleges in Japan can now have roughly the same privileges while not being bound to strict Japanese-style regulations, so long as the country of origin has their embassy representatives visit the schools and vouch that their curriculum is identical to the home campus'.

Branch campuses of foreign schools in Japan exploded in the late 1980's before the economic bubble had collapsed; about three dozen U.S. colleges and universities had accredited campuses here. That soon changed as the economy went south, Japanese financial backers backed out, and standards plummeted. Schools started shutting down without warning, leaving students stranded in mid-semester. This snowballed into a nationwide distrust of the schools, which led to further recruitment losses and closures, until there were only a handful remaining. With the closure of Minnesota State in Akita last year and the closing of the University of Illinois at Carbondale in Niigata soon, there will be only two accredited American colleges remaining in Japan, both in Tokyo: Temple University, and Lakeland College (Japanese site)--the school where I myself work as an assistant professor.

Our school has been doing very well; our student body tripled in just four years after I started working here (not cause and effect, alas), although some of that gain was lost after 9/11 hit right as our 2002 recruitment drive was starting, and then the very next year, Bush started pushing for war in Iraq. Those incidents made many Japanese students and their parents nervous about safety issues. Since then, however, things have stabilized and numbers are again rising. The new expected Monbusho acceptance should go a very long way to helping us boost those number higher than before.

Additionally, Lakeland College has begun a new Study Abroad Program (Japanese page), in which American students come to live in Japan for four to eight months, while still earning credits from a U.S.-accredited college.

Don Quixote Has Changed

At least the store in Shinjuku on Shokuan Dori , which runs parallel to and north of Yasukuni Dori. They've cleaned up the image somewhat. For those of you unfamiliar with the chain, Don Quixote (Don Kihote in Japanese) is a chain of retail outlets that specializes in having tons of stuff of all kinds for cheap prices. Sort of like Walmart in the U.S., but with narrower aisles and less fascism.

Part of Don Quixote's image is the cramped, closed aisles stuffed with all variety of merchandise, laid out in an almost maze-like fashion so that one never knows what one will run into next, and every shopping experience tends to be different from the last. Imagine a

The new makeover has cleaned up that image while still embracing the fundamental principal. The store is now much cleaner and feels less cluttered, with major aisles now much wider--though the meandering nooks and crannies are still there. Their food section is now much expanded, included a wider variety of foreign imports than before. Still not National Azabu or even Kinokuniya Supermarket, but if you haven't been there for a while, you might want to check--though I don't know if the makeover is limited to that one store...

Typhoon

Once again, I'm staying up way beyond the time I should. But I looked out the window and saw the typhoon moving away. It swept over us this evening, dropping heavy sheets of rainfall for hours, sometime even splashing against my dining room windows so i couldn't see outside. (And took out satellite TV reception several times....)

And now we have post-typhoon clarity outside, starry skies and a receding swarm of clouds lit by the occasional flash of lightning within.

Should be good weather tomorrow.

Oh, Well, Naturally

Four years. For four long years I've been getting this hick-town-quality cable service. For four years I've paid them for really bad cable. Very few channels. Almost none of the good channels. For four years I've filled out and sent in those questionnaires about which channels they should get, and for four years they've consistently gotten nothing but the bottom of the barrel. Before I went to all the trouble of switching to satellite, I even asked them, point blank, when is there any chance of even one or a few stations getting changed. Nowhere in the foreseeable future, they told me. Not going to happen, they told me.

So I went out and paid about $300 to get the satellite installed. Just today I gave them back the cable tuner, closing my account (it had been prepaid until this date). And just today I open the new cable TV guide in the mail that arrived yesterday--they sent it to me for next month despite my cancelation. And now guess what?

That's right. From November 1st, just a month away, they're going digital (with an analog converter supplied), and they're adding every single channel I wanted. Seventeen new channels, in fact. And they're reducing their rates on top of that.

Do I have the worst timing you've ever heard of, or what?

Well, it's not a complete loss. The Toshiba DVR/DVD recorder I got wouldn't have worked with their service--probably--and the fact that it auto-records everything is something I have really started to appreciate.

But still, this couldn't have happened one month earlier, or six months later? No one could've mentioned to me when I asked directly about this huge change which obviously they have been planning for a long time? I mean, for crying out loud.

Pay Garbage

When I first moved into my apartment building, something I considered a nice feature of the complex was the garbage removal. They had these big metal bins with covers so you could toss your garbage outside any day of the week, and not worry about the smell or crows getting at it. It was also easier for the garbage collectors; they could simply attach the bins to a lifting device on their truck, and it would all just slide in. They did it fast and didn't have to get their hands too dirty.

But then, the city leaders of Inagi, in their infinite wisdom, decreed that bins like that could not be used. So we had to switch to the standard Japanese-style throw-your-garbage-by-the-side-of-the-street method, which stinks up the area and attracts crows and cats who fish through the garbage and make a mess, increasing maintenance costs. It's harder for the trash collectors, too; they now have to sling every bag by hand, dealing with spillage and stink.

I would have thought that the city couldn't go one worse, but I was wrong: now they're telling us we have to pay for each bag of garbage thrown out. We can no longer use any garbage bag we please (say goodbye to pull-string bags, or to using grocery store bags, they get wasted now), we have to buy city-made bags at fee-inflated prices. It's still relatively cheap--80 yen (about 75 cents) for ten grocery-store-size bags, 150 yen for double that size, and 300 yen for double that--but the point is that a price has now been set, meaning that price can easily go up anytime the city wants more money, and they inevitably will. This kind of thing should be paid for with tax revenues, at least then they can be honest about raising taxes. Though it is possible that this is a follow-up to the less-than-successful campaign of a few years ago when they tried to make everyone use transparent garbage bags and require people to write their names on each bag.

The change begins everywhere in Inagi City on October 1, and applies to burnable and unburnable garbage. Are there any other cities where they're doing this?

Aftershock

A rather sizable aftershock, 6.4 on the Richter scale, has hit in the same place that the 7.3 hit just the other day. That one could be felt way over here in Tokyo as well, though it was more of a sharp jolt, and didn't last very long.

Japan quake info can be found at Tenki.jp or at Hi-net.

Sizable Quake in Wakayama

Considering that Wakayama is about 400 km (250 miles) distant, and that I felt the tremor fairly strongly at that distance, I would not particularly want to be in Wakayama right now.

Preliminary reports put the quake at 5 on the Japanese scale. The Hi-net and Tenki quake web sites are still short on details. A tidal wave warning (up to 2 meters high) for the Pacific coast around Wakayama (near Osaka) is now being issued.

Update: Okay, the magnitude-5 reading was for land only, that was the strongest reading people had on the islands. The actual quake was out at sea, and was a 7.3 on the Richter scale, and happened right on the major continental plate boundary in the Pacific. Tidal waves up to 2 meters are due to hit in a few minutes and throughout the next hour.

Further update: Turns out there were two quakes, one at 6.8 and the other at 7.3. At least fourteen people have been reported injured, but damage and casualties are very low because the epicenter was in the ocean. So far, the tsunamis seem to be very mild. Nevertheless, more than 6,000 people in several seaside towns have been evacuated.

Well, That's Something I Should Have Done Long Ago

The satellite installer guys are here now, and they got a really strong signal--I can get satellite after all. Four years after using the crappy local cable... I just had been told it was not possible before, so I didn't try. Well, better late than never. Now to join SkyPerfecTV, quit the local cable, get the tuner box integrated into my maze of A/V wiring, and then maybe get that Toshiba DVR/DVD recorder...

Update: Unless.... A storm hit tonight--and the SkyPerfecTV reception fell to zero. Several times. I asked the installers specifically about this sort of thing, how much reception will be lost if there's a storm, and they said, "just a bit." Well, I don't call 100% "a bit." On the other hand, the weather service is saying that the rain hitting Tokyo now is unusually strong--and the regular cable did fizz out a few times itself. But it's not encouraging. Anyone else out there have satellite TV, and your reception goes bad in bad weather?

The Guy From Kojima Denki

So, as I mentioned in my previous writings on getting satellite TV, I had the people at the electronics store come over to check if I could get SkyPerfecTV. It's in question because there's a large building next to mine that might or might not be in the way--looking at SPTV's web page with a map locater, it might be blocking the satellite by just a few feet in one direction. So I went to the electronics store and asked them if they could do a check. It'll cost ¥2000 ($18), they said. I told them that was OK, better than going through the hassle of buying and only finding out then that I couldn't do it.

Now, $18 is not a king's ransom, but since they tell me they guy could figure out if I'm able to get reception, I figure the guy will come over with a little electronic doohickey that could measure the satellite signal strength or something. So I wait the few days for the guy to come. ("Between 2 and 5pm," they said--and he came just at 5pm. Typical.) The doorbell rings, I open up, and this scrawny little guy walks in. No gizmos. He pulls out a compass. Goes to the window I show him. Climbs outside, holds up the compass, says I won't be able to get the satellite signal--the next building is in the way. But in saying so, he points in a direction that seems fishy to me. I tell him there's another window, and he takes that in surprise, like he wouldn't expect a place to have two windows. He checks from the other window and says, "Oh yeah, sure, you can get it from here! No problem! It's perfect." This sounds great to me--except he's now pointing in an even more westerly direction than before to indicate where the satellite is. He's pointing in a much different direction that SPTV's web site indicates--they say it's more to the south.

So I take him inside and show him the SkyPerfecTV web site, I show him the map page with the arrows showing the direction of the satellite. He looks at it, and something seems to dawn on him. He goes back to the first window, looks at his compass again, and proclaims I can get the signal in that direction, the direction from the web page; reception will be OK, he promises. But the direction he shows me now is way off from the direction he showed me originally. So I question him about how he got that--and he starts talking faster, using words I don't know.

Here is where I explain to him that he has taken no readings that could possibly be even as accurate as the measurement I made on SPTV's web page, and so how could he really know if I could get it or not? Unsure how to answer, he leaves, makes a phone call, and comes back. "You can't get reception," he explains. "The next building is too tall." Now it's time for me to explain to him that I never expected to see over the building, but rather just to the east of it. Again, he's unsure about it. He goes outside and makes another phone call. He comes back in and proclaims, "it's too close to call." Well, hell, I could've told him that! I paid ¥2000 to have this joker who knows less than I do to tell me what I already know? I would at least expect him to know the general area of the sky which the satellite is in.

Fortunately, when I called up Kojima and told them about the fiasco, they promised to refund my money. Problem is, I won't have time to collect on that before I leave on vacation. Hopefully in early September, they'll still remember me and agree to give the money back. But for now, I'm still just as much in the dark. I just can't figure out why they think they can do that, charge ¥2000 to have a guy who doesn't know a satellite from a skyscraper to tell you fairy tales. Hopefully their guy who installs the units will know just a bit more then this guy. What scares me is that he might be the same guy.

The Streets of Tokyo

Believe it or not, the street you see at right is a two-way street. Go ahead. Look at it. See if you can figure it out. And for perspective, that white truck parked in the back on the right, it's a mini-truck, no wider than an American postal jeep. And even two of those would have a hard time passing each other on this street--and yet, I saw a good deal of opposing traffic pass here.

Every twenty or thirty meters, there is an indentation in the street (you can see it at left in this photo, behind the parked scooters; the orange posts mark it). When cars come from opposite directions, the car most conveniently placed to get into the indentation does so, while the car from the other direction squeezes by. I know, but somehow they do it. No wonder you don't see Winnebagos in this country. Once I rented a truck to move my stuff from one apartment to another--and got stuck on a street wider than this one. When he saw the trouble I was having, the driver of the car going the other way actually got out and volunteered to drive the truck down the street for me while his friend maneuvered his car. Embarrassing, but I couldn't have made it otherwise--it takes real driving talent.

You might also notice the slight crook in the street in the photo here. Japanese streets are, more often than not, go in all directions; it is less common for them to be laid out in grids. And even those grids are more often than not irregular, with greatly differing block lengths, and tons of T-intersections, one-way streets, and dead-ends. But most streets seem to tilt and angle without any hint of planning or design, like they just grew there. And with no street names (except for large boulevards), no street signs (except for major intersections), and a confusing jumble of block numbers and area names, navigation can be extremely confusing. Take, for example, the sign shown at left. That's what the intersection looked like, honestly.

Add to that the fact that some neighborhoods are designed with one-way streets and prohibited turns such that it is impossible to exit save by one labyrinthine path; that streets are rarely more than two lanes in one direction, and usually not that; that sidewalks are sparse and properties have six-foot walls along the street, creating blind corners galore; and despite the expenses and difficulties of driving, multitudes seem to have cars, creating traffic jams all over; and top it off with scant parking, some pay parking lots charging a few dollars an hour... I am constantly amazed that people drive cars in Japan.

Oh, and gas runs about $4 per gallon.

Turning Over a New Cicada

Every summer in Japan you get cicadas, or "semi" (蝉) in Japanese. Not the type that come out once every 17 or 18 years, this bunch comes out every summer, and man, do they make a lot of noise. The Japanese characterize this noise as, "meeeee, meeeee, meeeeeeee." To which I then comically note how selfish they are. That is what Japanese people refer to as an "Oyaji gyagu," (親父ギャグ) or an "old man's gag."

The cicadas, meanwhile, are everywhere, buzzing and mating. And as the mating cycle dies down, you start seeing a lot cicadas on the ground. But just because you see them belly-up, it doesn't mean they're done for--these cicadas, it so happens, have a very tough time righting themselves once they've got six legs in the air. I've seen them do it, but usually they just lay there, immobile and apparently dead.

So the thing to do--unless you really hate cicadas, that is--is to gently nudge them over with a toe, to get them righted. But be prepared to jump away, though: the cicadas will, unless really close to death, immediately start buzzing up and away in the apparent random fashion that bugs are wont to do.

DAJ Members: The F-9/11 Segment is Airing on CNN Today

Mark and Vincentvds alerted me that the CNN story on us is airing today. Atika Schubert said our segment would be on Friday, but it seems to have been kicked back to today. It has aired a few times already, and will probably air more. It is appearing on World News, which will be on again at 4:00, 5:00, 6:00, and 8:00pm. I don't know if the segment will air each time, some of the times, or not at all again today, but I have the feeling it will.

I will also try to transfer this and what I have of the NTV report to digital video and host them on my site--I'll let you know when I can do that.

A Scorcher

It's 38 degrees C (100 F) out there, but it feels even hotter. If you're out in the sun, then just forget about it. A breeze doesn't help much, it's just a blast of hot wind.

This is the kind of day I thank goodness we have air conditioners. Sorry if that's not too environmental, but this heat is downright oppressive...

This Is What I'm Talking About with Japanese Police

A man in Soka City, Saitama Prefecture rushed to a police koban (a mini-police station) for help, but was tackled by three yakuza (gangsters) in front of the police box as the policeman on watch stood by. One of the men said, "This is our own matter. It's got nothing to do with police." The policeman was urged to "Do something!" by a rescue worker at the scene to help a different injured person. The officer reportedly walked towards them as the three gangsters dragged the man off, dumped him into a car and drove off. The man was later found severely beaten, with "broken arms and legs." The policeman's excuse? "He didn't enter the police box and didn't request help."

I don't really think anyone can count on Japanese police in a serious situation. Even in minor situations, they are not effective. They consistently stop regular scooter and motorcycle drivers for doing things like making a right turn at an intersection with three lanes as opposed to two lanes, or for crossing lanes over a yellow line even when there is no other traffic on the road--but they do not lift a finger to stop or penalize bosozoku bikers (ill-mannered biker thugs who ignore pretty much all traffic and safety laws, and adjust their bikes so as to make them as noisy as possible) as they brazenly scream through residential areas at 2 o'clock in the morning.

Police in Japan have a good reputation because of high arrest and conviction rates, but that is due more to sleight of hand than real police work. Police here will usually refuse to file reports on crimes that likely cannot be solved; many victims of muggings, assault, robbery and molestation are told to simply forget the whole situation, especially when they cannot describe the attacker. Convictions are high because judges here usually take a prosecutor's decision to charge someone as evidence of proof of wrongdoing; additionally, police here can hold a suspect for 23 days without a charge or access to an attorney (or for multiples of 23 days, by "releasing" then re-arresting them), and have been known to sometimes apply beatings or other methods of intimidation or torture, in order to force a confession.

Please don't get me wrong, I love Japan, and it really is a safe place. But not because of the police.

A Fairly Big One

...Or at least a long one. An earthquake just hit, lasting at least a minute, and it was pretty strong. Will update when I know more.

I felt it while laying down in bed for a rest (before going out on a Costco run), and it felt stronger than most I recall. I went out to the kitchen, where I have a hanging lamp that I use as a primitive earthquake meter, and it was going pretty strong--and then noticed that an open door was swinging a bit as well, and the building was creaking.

Update (3:19pm): Okay, reports are coming in that it was a 5.2 off the coast of Chiba (image from HiNet. Apparently, it was felt strongest in Yokohama (from reports on NHK so far).

Update (3:30pm): Tenki.jp is now reporting that the quake was 5.5 on the Richter scale. NHK shows that Chiba and south Kanagawa felt it strongest (using the Japanese quake strength scale), and that there is no expectation of tidal waves.

Update (7/18): HiNet has reclassified the quake as being 5.8 on the Richter scale; other reports hold it at 5.5.

Another Earthquake

It just happened a few minutes ago. It was a 4.5 on the Japanese scale, according to Hi-Net, though Tenki.jp claimed it was a 4.9. It was located in Ibaraki--but still strong enough to shake the apartment here in West Tokyo. (Update: Hi-net revised their figure upwards to 4.9.)

Buddhist Kittens

On a recent trip up into the local hills, I wandered on to the grounds of a Buddhist temple. That's where they tend to be, on the outskirts and often on the high ground (though the Shinto shrines then to be on hilltops more often). You can find temples and shrines just about anywhere in Japan, from the pocket shrines set into tiny spaces between buildings in the city to sprawling establishments almost like parks in their own right.

While up in the hills, I found an interesting place--more than just the standard temple building with perhaps a bell outside (the kind they strike 108 times at New Year's). This place was more of a modern-style temple, a bit flashier than most, perhaps belonging to a newer sect than most (they have quite a few here, some of them even a bit outlandish). This one, as you can see below, had a newish-looking, clean white structure with an alcove housing a rather attractive gold Buddha, with black calligraphic text behind it.

The temple also had cats. I guess they feed the strays or something. As there are few children around and probably just nice, charitable temple staff to feed them, they aren't too shy or skittish; the one kitten well on its way to becoming a full-fledged cat, pictured below, walked right up to me. In fact, because of the time it takes my camera to power up, I missed by maybe 5 seconds a beautiful photo: one of the many crows in the area happened to land just a foot away from the small cat, and for several seconds, they just stood there, looking at each other, like "what are you gonna do?" Maybe it's the local version of the lion and the lambs. Man, I wished I could've gotten that shot.

About Japanese Elections

Long-time BfAD visitor Pat alerted me to this article in the English-language Asahi, written by Jane Singer, the Western wife of a Japanese politician. The article seeks to explain what politicians are doing and why they do it, at least in part--if not fully--for the purpose of calming the protest by foreigners in Japan about the loudspeaker truck barrage. A very interesting read, though I do have some comments:

A Diet and a local election campaign of course differ vastly in scale and organization, but all campaigns must abide by regulations aimed at curbing fraud and vote-buying. Election management committees and local police keep an eagle eye on a candidate's activities during the official campaign period (17 days for Upper House elections, 12 days for the Lower House, 9 days for prefectural posts). The rules forbid many of the campaign activities, like television advertising for a particular candidate or, for the most part, ads in print media, that are sine qua non for elections in other major democracies, although advertising a political party is allowed. Campaigning door-to-door is prohibited, campaigns can use only one sound truck and one microphone at a time, and outdoor campaigning is restricted to the hours of 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

While Ms. Singer does not necessarily endorse these measures, she does not contest them, either--perhaps because it would not help her husband's campaign or status as a politician.

But I certainly would disagree with the need for the exact restrictions. For example, television or print ads. Politicians make speeches on NHK Educational--very democratic (as you sometimes see the loonies in there too). And if that's not enough, then in exchange for licensing, private TV stations should also be made to allow for such statements. Or, if necessary, the government can fund each candidate who receives a certain number of petitions or other prerequisite to a limited amount, forbidding any other funding for advertisements. Singer notes that parties can run ads--I just saw one today for the Jiminto, the ruling party--and it featured Koizumi, a specific candidate--which kind of puts a hole in the anti-corruption net--and the idea that corruption is not rampant in Japanese politics despite these restrictions is, of course, wishful thinking. Despite the freedom-of-speech questions, I fully approve of restrictions on advertising (I do not see money as equalling freedom of speech in any case), but completely banning it, to me, is a far less attractive alternative than banning the loudspeaker trucks. As I noted a year ago, at least you can turn advertisements off.

The door-to-door ban is a fair idea, I'll admit--especially if it keeps the party reps from doing the business. If it were allowed for candidates only, I'd be OK with it--just a half dozen doorbell rings to fend off, rather than weeks of non-stop noise pollution.

However, the rules on loudspeaker trucks I cannot abide. The trucks are restricted to 8am-to-8pm shifts (I can personally attest that some politicians break this rule), and though she does not detail this, the trucks are "cautioned" from doing their thing in front of schools, hospitals, or nursing homes. Those restrictions are far too lax. First of all, not everyone has the same sleep patterns. One reason many foreign residents may complain is because many of us are teachers, often with late schedules. And we're not the only ones who sleep later than 8am. As a result, a great many people have their sleep interrupted for weeks on end. But more than that is the disruption for infants--can you imagine what it must be like to get an infant to sleep with those trucks blasting by every few minutes? Limiting the trucks to predominantly public and shopping areas areas (in front of train stations, at shopping streets and so forth) would be best--I mean, whatever happened to the famous Japanese "wa"?

And if that is not possible, then turn the damned volume down! Who says that it has to be up so high? I'm rather high up (equivalent to the 6th floor or so relative to the street, and even if I set my TV to blaring levels, the volume of the sound trucks still competes hardily with the audio right there in my apartment. If it's that loud, then it's too loud. I can hear the trucks clearly when they are half a kilometer away and more--and there are two schools closer to me than that (so much for the school zone rule). The obvious solution (which Professor Dolan speaks to) is to limit the vans to a reasonable sound level: enough so you know when they're out in the street in front of you so you can go look if you want to, but no louder. And I certainly would not be averse to forbidding the trucks from entering parking lots for apartment complexes and driving at 5 kph through every last lane, keeping the high volume in your ears for 5 minutes at a time.

Singer's article does explain a few things, though:

When voters visit the polling place, they write their candidate's name directly on the ballot, rather than just check a box or punch out a chad. So the need to ensure name recognition despite the restrictions on promoting the candidate may help explain why the uguisujo (nightingale women), as female campaign van announcers are charmingly called, spend so much of their on-air time repeatedly warbling the candidate's name.

That explains that. But it also calls into question why they can't do it another way. Not that it would make the loudspeaker trucks much more bearable if they varied their message.

Singer's observations are also sometimes amusing:

After an hour or so, the driver received an urgent call from the campaign office. A local resident had called to complain that my hand-waving "lacked sincerity.'' For the rest of the drive, I leaned halfway out the van's side window, endeavoring a full-arm flourish that left my shoulder aching for days. My efforts were praised by the campaign staff.

I have to admit, this sounds quintessentially Japanese, not just that windowsill observers would note and call in a complaint about lackadaisical hand-waving, but that the call would be treated as "urgent," and--well, I can just visualize the Japanese campaign staff earnestly praising the candidate's wife on how strenuously she waved. "Good waving!" "Yes, that was an excellent job. Sugoi!" "Yes, I'm impressed, too."

Early Sunrise

Here in Japan, with no Daylight Savings Time, and living in Tokyo, which is on the west edge of an already overextended time zone, you get early 4 am sunrises--a bit of a problem for late-night-owls like me. But at least I get to see the sunrise sometimes without waking up at an ungodly hour. Nonetheless, it does seem such a waste. I have heard that DST has been suggested in Japan, but that some people reject it because they feel that it would only give their companies another excuse to make them work an hour later each day.

Click on the image for a larger (800 px. wide) version.

All New Ways to have a Heart Attack

McDonalds just released a new burger over here, the "Mac Grand," which is essentially a version of the Quarter Pounder, or perhaps more accurately, an attempt to copy the Whopper available at the few Burger Kings here in Japan. The new burger comes as a regular or a double. If you look closely at the picture, the patties look very thick, and the double looks ridiculous--but using the rule of thumb that you can expect half the meat/filling and twice the crust/gristle displayed in any food photograph for fast food, one can get a better image of what the burger really is.

Until now, we had to suffer with the "double burger" at McD's if we wanted something like this--just a regular burger but with two patties. But now, o glorious day, we now have more meat, a smattering of lettuce, and two sauces. Lo, I can die happy. And obese. I would never go to the place if it were not pretty much the only restaurant near my work, save for a small lunch place across the street that sells an expensive classic-Japanese-style meal which is mostly stuff I don't like, and a small gyoza place I would love except that the cook is always smoking over his cooking. When I can, I take the 20-minute walk to Subway and get a nice, slightly healthier sandwich.

But Mac is not alone in having a new product; Coke has a new version out as well. They usually have just regular Coke and Diet Coke (called "Coke Light" here).

The new Coke product here is a semi-diet Coke called "C2." Aside from naming their new product after a plastic explosive, Coke is, I think, trying to fool people into thinking that it's a diet drink. They make a big deal about having less calories, but they express the calories not by how many are in the bottle, but rather how many are in each 100 grams--and give no calorie amount for regular Coke to compare. As far as I can figure, though, C2 has more than half the calories of regular Coke, but is not as volatile as C4.

By the way, there is no caffeine-free Coke here (I have to order from Foreign Buyer's Club). I think that removing caffeine from a drink is illegal here in Japan. They have "Vitamin" drinks here that come in little brown bottles which have heavy doses of caffeine and, I kid you not, nicotine. Pretty much a standard fix for the salaryman here. The commercials for these little drug-filled drinks are pretty lacking in subtlety. I recall one had a guy drink the tiny one-gulp, and the be immediately engulfed by a high-powered lightning-emitting aura. Another was accompanied by a now-famous song well-known in Japan, which declared, "Can You Fight 24 Hours a Day, Japanese Businessman?!" Well, after downing several charges of drug-laden vitamins, it would probably be surprising if he didn't die of karoshi (overwork).

Considering new products like Mac Grand and C2, it should be no surprise that there is concern of kids in Japan being overweight. Of course, this is all relative. Japanese people are thin, endemically so. Yes, there are sumo wrestlers, but they grow with great effort and massive overeating. Here in Japan, at 190 lbs. and 5'11", I am overweight (my doctor said "obese," thank you very much). But when I would visit our home campus in Wisconsin, I felt downright slim.

A lot of Japanese slimness might be metabolism, but I think it also has to do with diet. There's not really much sugar here. Donuts do not taste as much like donuts. Frosting is always whipped cream, not sugar-butter icing. There is less meat and much more fish and vegetables than you would see in the U.S. And there is very little diet food. At least McDonalds does not indulge in the massive irony that would be the inclusion of Diet Coke in their menu.

Oh, and by the way, I tried the new Coke. Too sweet--strange for Japan, where sweet foods are usually not popular. Diet Coke still tastes better to me, at least. And I love sweet foods.

Oh, Crap

Here we go again.

When you see these boards, pictured at right, go up around the neighborhood, it can only mean one thing:

We're about to get bombarded by day-and-night loudspeaker trucks.

That, and an election is coming. From looking at the sign, it seems that the election will be going on for the next three weeks or so.

When I started this blog about a year and two months ago, one of the first things I blogged about was the noise created by these damned trucks (it's a miracle that we've been free of them since then). It's like they have no concern about what people feel. They are supposed to avoid schools and hospitals, but there are two schools nearby and they don't let up. They love to crawl through the neighborhood, blaring out at full blast, but unlike the other trucks that do the same (selling food or collecting secondhand junk), the political trucks keep coming by all day long, every day.

What's more, they love to park in front of your building, where the politician steps out and gives a 15-minute political 4-loudspeaker harangue right in front of your building. They love big apartment buildings.

To listen to what I'm gonna be in for for the next three weeks, take a listen from the last election's noise pollution.

Yaki~imo!

In Japan, there are sales trucks all over the place. Most are just plain noisy and annoying--the secondhand shop truck, the kerosene truck, lunch and snack trucks, and so on. Annoying because they drive at 5 kph and wander through all the driveways and small roads in the neighborhood, all the time blaring annoying announcements and mind-numbing repeating electronic tunes at full blast. Their slow and winding path keeps them well within earshot for perhaps half an hour each, and it's impossible to shut out unless your listening to headphones with the volume way up.

One truck selling stuff that regularly wanders by is a bit less annoying: the sweet potato truck. A traditional standard in Japan, a small truck (in older times, a cart) with a small oven furnace and sweet potatoes ("yaki-imo," or baked potatoes" in Japanese) hot and ready to eat. Hard to miss when it comes, there is always a musical call, a voice singing, "yakiiiiiiii... imooooooo!"

This is a bit less annoying than the others because it is (a) an organic sound, and (b) not shouted at blaring volumes--they seem to be aware of the annoyance factor and keep it down to a reasonable blast.

Not only that, they even emit a nice smell--a product of the wood-burning stove in the back of the truck, a kind of fireplace/campfire smell.

I'm not a big fan of sweet potatoes, though, so I can't review the taste. But I'd have to say that if these were the only trucks going around selling stuff in the neighborhood, I wouldn't mind quite so much. Well, at least the weather is warmer and that blasted kerosene truck no longer comes by Wednesday and Saturday evenings.

Tama-Cats

On a nice saunter down to the Tama River today--the weather has been beautiful lately, I couldn't pass up the chance--I found something which is quite rare in Japan: friendly cats.

By "friendly," I mean ones that you can walk up to and pet. Living in Japan for a while, you tend to get used to the fact that neighborhood cats never let you get near them; they get skittish at anything less than 20 feet at least. I used to wonder why this was, and I think I found the answer some years back. There was a cat once I saw in the street, and was having some success approaching it. But then, about 100 feet down the road, a child darted out into the street. Despite the distance, the cat bolted. Ah. In addition, I've seen cats getting treatment not exactly in line with cat protocol, for instance people picking up poor felines by their front legs.

So when I saw two cats lazing in the grass on the banks of the Tama River, I did not expect to be able to get close. Instead, I got out my camera so I could take some pictures. To my surprise, when I looked up, I found that both cats were approaching me. I let them sniff my hand, let them see where I was going to pet and scratch, and both cats were cool to it. As a number of adults walked by, the cats paid no heed. But as I expected, when a group of young boys walked by, both cats ran for cover--not too far though, and they came back. So I snapped my pics and enjoyed some tame, friendly cats for a bit in the warm, late afternoon.

To see some of the photos, I've posted them here.

Japanese Politicians Turn Viciously on Heroes

The three Japanese people initially taken hostage in Iraq may have thought that they were having the worst experience of their lives. Apparently, Japanese politicians and right-wing organizations are making it even more unpleasant for them now that they are back home. The way these people have been treated in their home country is cruel, heartless--and highly politically motivated.

Usually these people would not be treated like this. In America, we greet returning victims of kidnapping with yellow ribbons. Japan does not have that custom, but usually it treats with high regard those sons and daughters of Japan who have shown strength overseas, representing Japan well.

These three should have been such heroes of Japan. Nahoko Takato, 34, was helping Iraqi street children, an act of selfless charity at her own great personal risk. Even after her ordeal in Iraq, she did not want to stop helping people in the war-torn country. The kidnappers, she said, "did things to me that I did not like. But I cannot hate the Iraqi people."

Soichiro Koriyama, 32, is a freelance photographer, and sees it as his job to document what is happening in Iraq. He has photographed people who have suffered from war and disease in developing countries like Thailand; this is no money-seeker, but a man who wants to publicize the suffering of people in an attempt to stir awareness of their plights, to make people aware of what is happening in the world so they can help. Koriyama, a former soldier in Japan's self-defense forces, labored as a construction worker in Japan to raise the money to go to Iraq.

The third, Noriaki Imai, is a man concerned with depleted uranium shells used in wars; these shells are left behind in war zones, and create a radioactive hazard, contaminating the landscape; Imai planned a picture book about Iraqi children poisoned by the shells.

These were no seekers of fame, they were not there for the money or the glory. All three of them wanted nothing more than to help others who could not fend or speak for themselves. The three are humanitarians all. And two of them, Takato and Koriyama, wanted to keep on doing their work, despite the great risks involved. And that dedication to the welfare of others was their downfall.

Once Koizumi and the right-wing politicians heard that at least two of the three former hostages wanted to stay on, the attacks began. Koizumi said publicly, "It doesn't matter how good their intentions are. After this ordeal and having had so many officials working without sleep or food to help them, they still talk that way. They should be aware of their actions." Another politician said, "If they really hate to return to Japan, I want them to defect to Iraq. Since we've paid so much from the state coffers, I feel they should compensate us for it."

Why such icy hatred? Well, the three humanitarian heroes had become inconvenient to a conservative government that is intent on dismantling a vital part of Japan's constitution, the part that says Japan should militarize only for self-defense, and never for offense. Japan's participation in Iraq, no matter how small and tenuous, is the first fragile step towards bringing Japan back onto the world stage as a military power. It embarrassed Koizumi and his party, with a bellwether election just a few weeks away to test how the public reacted to the new role of the military. The hostages screwed up that mission for them because Japanese citizens started asking why the troops were really there, and perhaps they should be removed. Japanese friends I have spoken to about this say that they would prefer the troops come home, especially if it puts Japanese into harm's way.

The government could not stand this. So as soon as the Japanese government (some say by bribing the hostage takers) successfully got the hostages released, they wasted no time in vilifying them. They called the reckless, irresponsible, trouble-makers, self-righteous, nuisances, even "Japan's shame," and attacked them for going into harm's way. They whined about how government workers sacrificed so much, and the government spent so much time and money to help them, and they want to stay in Iraq?! Ultra-right-wingers--a nasty group here in Japan--showed up at the airport to insult and harass them.

Then the real smear campaign began. Takato, the woman who helps street children, was featured in the gossip rags and right-leaning newspaper editorials as a juvenile smoker and drug addict who had connections with terrorist organizations. Noriaki Imai was accused of coming from a Marxist home and was called a "communist sympathizer," however that could possibly have any relationship to his work to help children in Iraq.

To add insult to injury, the Japanese government plans to bill them at least $6000 for air fare and medical checkups.

Having returned home, they have been so hopelessly smeared by the right-wing establishment in this country that neither they nor their families can show themselves in public. Nahoko Takato had to be calmed with tranquilizers, and doctors have announced that their treatment here in Japan has been far worse in many ways than their captivity in Iraq:

Dr. Satoru Saito, a psychiatrist who examined the three former hostages twice since their return, said the stress they were enduring now was "much heavier" than what they experienced during their captivity in Iraq. Asked to name their three most stressful moments, the former hostages told him, in ascending order: the moment when they were kidnapped on their way to Baghdad, the knife-wielding incident, and the moment they watched a television show the morning after their return here and realized Japan's anger with them.

"Let's say the knife incident, which lasted about 10 minutes, ranks 10 on a stress level," Dr. Saito said in an interview at his clinic on Thursday. "After they came back to Japan and saw the morning news show, their stress level ranked 12."

Well, Koizumi's tactics worked. They won the elections.

And three selfless Japanese heroes have been ground into the dirt. Job well done.

Entrance Ceremony

Well, the Winter semester has ended where I teach, and that means another new year at the school. Our attendance has been down a bit since 9/11--our school prepares Japanese youngsters of college age to go to institutions of higher education in the U.S. and elsewhere (though many take our own Associate of the Arts degree program here in Japan before moving on), and since the terrorism scare, and then the build-up to the Iraq war, more people have been a bit more nervous about studying abroad. However, that appears to be turning around, as our numbers are growing again--as you can see a bit in the photo above, about 600 new students entering this Spring.

So we had our annual entrance ceremony, which is always fun--meeting the new students and their parents, getting to know some of the people we'll be spending a lot of time with in the next year and two. Also, we hold these events at nice hotels (this year at the ANA Hotel, last year at the Century Hyatt), where the halls are nice and the food excellent--see the chef carving the roast beef at right, and one small example of the pastries below.

There was also entertainment; some from the outside, like a marching band, a professional bagpipe player, a magician, and a string quartet--and from students, including a violin duet (two young ladies who styled themselves "The Violin Vixens"), a choir singing an original composition, and a pair of dancers. That along with the requisite speeches and presentations of awards to last year's students.

All in all, quite a big and impressive bash. If you'd like to see more photographs, you can visit a small gallery of photos from the event.

An elderly woman made an impromptu dance for the Violin Vixens

Yum...

Hostages and Mad Cows

The first three Japanese hostages are back, but two more (a journalist and a "civic group activist," whatever that is) have been taken, so I guess it's back to work for the government. Meanwhile, opinions in Japan remain varied but low-key on the long-term impact of the SDF presence and Japanese hostages in Japan. One young woman commented, "Those three people were doing what they wanted, even though the Japanese government repeatedly warned that Iraq was too dangerous a place to go to. However, Koizumi was the one who sent the SDF in violation of the Constitution. I wonder what he would have done if those three had died. Their release is good news and a lucky break for Koizumi, even though he did not recall the SDF."

Well, Koizumi is none too happy that two of the three released hostages want to go back to Iraq and continue their work. While the government got fairly good marks for how it handled the crisis, it remains vulnerable on the issue. Not too surprising, since most Japanese people--86%--will blame him for any deaths, whether they're SDF or civilians. He commented on an advisory by Japan warning Japanese civilians to avoid travel to Iraq, reminding the former hostages how much work they put the government through to get them back. "It doesn't matter how good their intentions are," Koizumi complained. "After this ordeal and having had so many officials working without sleep or food to help them, they still talk that way. They should be aware of their actions." One senior official, apparently on the condition of anonymity, remarked, "If they really hate to return to Japan, I want them to defect to Iraq. Since we've paid so much from the state coffers, I feel they should compensate us for it." Which makes one wonder if indeed there was a payoff. It should be noted that mostly the anger towards these dedicated people comes from the government, which has the most to lose politically.

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Meanwhile, Japan is slowly opening the gates for U.S. beef to be imported into Japan. The previous reopening of the market consisted of allowing U.S. beef to enter Japan only if each carcass is tested for Mad Cow disease--pretty fair, considering that all Japanese beef must undergo the same requirement. Even so, this has not mollified the U.S. government completely, as it recently prevented one cattle producer that wanted to test their cattle for export from carrying out those tests.

Yesterday, Japanese government announced that it is loosening the standards a little, allowing cows younger than 20 months to be imported without any testing. Considering that only one case of mad cow disease has been found in America, and that cow was raised in Canada, there is the possibility that Japan is being a bit strict. However, there remains the question why the U.S. government is so strong against testing. If they are taking that stance out of principle, then OK, but if they are trying to hide more possible cases of the disease, then there may be reason to worry.

Spring Sunrise

One of the benefits of spending a sleepless night because of a bad cold--you get to see the sunrise.

Hostage Terror

More details have come out about the three Japanese hostages held in Japan, some of them harrowing:

"The government will do its utmost so that those who have become hostages will be safely released as soon as possible," he said, adding there is "no reason" for Japan to withdraw troops that are conducting humanitarian reconstruction aid for Iraqi people. ...

Armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, the kidnappers shouted "Allahu akbar" — God is great — in the video and held knives to the throats of the Japanese. ...

In the full video, four masked men point knives and swords at the blindfolded captives as they lay on the floor of a room with concrete walls.

At one point, a gunman holds a knife to the throat of one of the men, whose blindfold has been removed; his eyes widen in panic and he struggles to try to get free. The woman screams and weeps.

A Senior SDF (Self-Defense Forces) official said, "We could be laughed at by other countries if we run away." Perhaps true enough, but it seems to me that this is not really the point. I think that it is a foregone conclusion that Japan will not agree to any sort of pullout in exchange for the hostages. The question is whether the hostage-takers, if they can even be contacted, will agree to anything less than a troop pullout as a reason for not killing the hostages.

And if the hostages are killed, especially if it done in a way that would shock the Japanese people--especially with such personal information, names and faces and families to associate with the victims--what will be the political fallout, not just for the current Koizumi government, but for the whole right-wing-led movement to remilitarize Japan?

Interestingly, the news reports in Japan seem to be emphasizing the fact that this terrorist group, calling themselves the "Mujahedeen Brigades," is not on the list of known terrorist groups, and seem to be suggesting that this is not truly a political terrorist action, but rather one done for money or other non-political reasons.

I spoke to two Japanese acquaintances about the issue, one who supported sending the SDF forces, the other against. Both mentioned that the three people who went there went of their own volition, and they knew the risks; therefore, although this is a terrible thing, it is not really related to the SDF forces being in Japan. The target--three civilians--didn't seem to make sense. Japan's SDF forces, while armed, are only doing reconstruction work, so why target Japan? My friend who supported the SDF being there said that killing these three civilians wouldn't change their mind on sending people to help reconstruct Iraq, though they did say that if SDF forces became the targets, they might change their opinion because it would clearly be too dangerous.

One factor that plays into this matter laterally is the nature of the SDF forces sent overseas. This is a political hot potato in Japan, though the lines are sometimes blurred. My friend who supported the SDF being in Iraq saw them as purely reconstruction workers, and while armed, armed only for self-defense. That much is of course true, but there are deeper politics involved. If the forces are only there for reconstruction, then why send military troops? My own belief is that this is a gradated political effort to transform Japan's constitutionally mandated self-defense-only military stance into one that allows Japanese troops to go overseas--right now, just a fledgling step to do reconstruction, but as time goes on, perhaps they will take on more of a military role--one which would naturally evolve as armed Japanese soldiers are sent into combat zones.

So while I agree that the hostage situation is not really connected to the political situation per se, and the hostage takers chose a strange and perhaps even meaningless or powerless manner to effect change, this situation is a direct consequence of changing Japan's military stance.

Comments?

Japan Now Tested on Its Military Commitment

Three Japanese civilians Japanese civilians have been kidnaped in Iraq, along with seven or eight South Koreans. The three Japanese are being focused on now, as a videotape has been released (and shown on NHK national television) showing their identities, along with a message of extortion forwarded by Al-Jazeera: "Three of your sons have fallen into our hands. We offer you two choices: either pull out your forces, or we will burn them alive. We give you three days starting the day this tape is broadcast."

The three, two men and one woman, have been identified as Noriaki Imai (18), Soichiro Koriyama (32) and Nahoko Takato (34).

This will be an extremely difficult problem for Prime Minister Koizumi, as the story of these three Japanese citizens will be closely followed, and he and his policy to support the Iraq war and sending Japanese military (Self-Defense Forces, or SDF) to battle zones. If the Japanese people are faced with three of their citizens, with names and faces, being burned alive as sacrifices to Koizumi's militaristic policies, then Koizumi's government will be faced with a grave test to justify themselves.

This is significant because Koizumi and others have been pressing for Japan to take a much more militaristic stance, changing the post-war constitution (or sidestepping it) to allow Japan to send armed troops overseas and have more than just defensive forces. The conservatives here have long been pressing hard for this, with the right-wing Yomiuri media corporation especially using its media outlets to popularize the campaign.

But when you do things like that, things like this happen. Until now, the Japanese people have uneasily acquiesced to this campaign--but faced with a terrorist response with such a personal face, it is uncertain how the Japanese people will respond to all of this.

UPDATE: The seven South Koreans, evangelical Christian ministers, have been freed. Two Arab men have also been kidnaped, and at least one had a U.S. driver's license, and attended school in the U.S. The Japanese government has already stated publicly that it will not withdraw its troops, saying it has "no reason" to do so.

This information on the hostages comes from Japan Today:

Koriyama, 32, is a freelance journalist from Miyazaki Prefecture. The video footage showed his staff identification card from Japanese magazine Weekly Asahi.

The Asahi Shimbun said Koriyama is currently not contracted to the company but has frequented the office due to personal ties with editors there. He had provided photos for the weekly magazine by contract on several occasions.

Takato, 34, is a volunteer worker from Chitose, Hokkaido. Her mother Kyoko said on Thursday night, "That is her in the footage. I believe the Foreign Ministry will contact us later."

Imai, 18, is also from Hokkaido. His family said he is a friend of Takato's and that he got to know Koriyama in Amman. His mother confirmed the man in the video is her son, and said he was scheduled to return around April 17-18.

Blossom Time

Caught this nice image on the way home the other day, the sun setting behind a cherry blossom tree. The trees are in full blossom in Tokyo now, and the trees are very popular, and are all around. It's a beautiful time, even though the past few days of rain have subdued the trees a bit.

American Bases in Japan

Something that Americans do not often think about is what it would be like to have foreign military bases in your country. Even living in Japan, knowing the bases are here, it doesn't come to mind much, and though there are many who protest the bases in Okinawa and sometimes elsewhere in Japan, the truth is, you don't hear about it often. But then, most Japanese people will not complain about the obnoxious politicians during campaign season with their all-day loudspeaker truck battles, so it doesn't mean that nobody minds. I certainly know that Americans would mind if, say, England had bases across the country.

Living out in Western Tokyo, I tend to be reminded of this a bit more often. Just tonight, several jets flew over--more than usual, but still, we get them flying out of Yokota Air base, the main American base in Japan, housing the HQ for a string of military bases with as many as 50,000 American servicepeople living on them, along with about 52,000 dependents. That's a lot of people.

Most of the forces are based in Okinawa (around 78%), including bases at Kadena, Futenma and Torii; Okinawa is a well-known island at the southernmost end of the Japanese archipelago. It's famous for being a Hawaii-like resort, and for the fact that American bases occupy 30% of the land area on the island. Next is Tokyo, with bases in Yokota (air base), Yokosuka (naval), Zama, Sagamihara, Fuji and Atsugi. That probably does not include the U.S.-military-run area in tama, immediately behind my apartment building in fact, which houses ammunition storage and a golf course/recreation center. There's also the naval base at Sasebo (Nagasaki), the Marine Corps base in Iwakuni (Yamaguchi, also southern Japan), and Misawa Air Base (Aomori, in northern Japan).

I remember first going to Yokota, to visit a coworker living there. You come through the gate, and suddenly you're looking at an American landscape. The streets, the green-lawned front yards, the building styles, the shops and their contents--it's like being suddenly transported to the U.S. In the days before Costco and other now-common import stores, the shops on base were a major attraction--if you could buy something there. You need to have base ID to do that. I remember one friend who said he'd found a way to sneak on base at Yokota--had to do with following train tracks until they intersected with a road on base, which was unguarded--and usually got away with shopping there by claiming he'd forgotten his ID cards at home.

But few Japanese know what it's like on the base, save for those who work there or those who visit for air shows and the like. It's something I'd be interested in talking to more Japanese people about. One time, it came up while I was visiting the local hospital. A man in his eighties, very gregarious, struck up a conversation (in Japanese), and we talk about various topics. One that came up was the bases (the entrance to the local munitions dump and rec center is right next to the hospital), and I asked him how he felt about it. He didn't mind, he said; "we lost the war, after all." I suppose that made a certain sense to him, having lived through that time. But I have to wonder what younger Japanese people feel about it. Strange that I've been in Japan close to 12 years now and have never asked. But I suspect the answer would be along the lines of not knowing much and not caring much--it's just the way things are.

Do any of the visitors here have their own stories, conversations you can relate on the subject? I'd be interested to know.

Another Quake

Got hit by another quake, this one as I was winding up a class. The quake measured 5.2 (some reports say 5.4) on the Richter scale, but was centered off the coast, so it wasn't huge in town--it never got to the we'd-better-leave-the-room scale or anything. But the class did shake and rattle some. At that point in time, a student was giving her PowerPoint presentation, and as the students in the class reacted to the quake nervously, this one student just kept going right through her presentation without so much as blinking.

Turned out, afterwards, we found out she was the only one in the class that didn't even notice the quake! She was so focused on what she was doing--and was pretty surprised to hear that it was the room that was shaking.

I know exactly how she felt.

Smoker's Paradise Lost? Not Yet...

Last weekend, Sako and I met to discuss the goings-on at The Expat, and sat down to eat at an Italian place near Hashimoto Station. As we were being seated, I asked if there was a no-smoking section. Sorry, the waiter told us. Not here. Afterwards, we went for a drink at Starbucks, the ubiquitous U.S. coffee and snack lounge--one of the few places in Japan that is non-smoking. That contrast might show the divide between past and present in Japan, but the country is still pretty firmly on the smoking side of things.

Historically, Japan has been a smoker's paradise. Whatever concessions that were made for non-smokers was superficial, at best, and many times they still are. For example, not long ago I stopped at a McDonald's for a quick lunch. I was told that in the seating area, there was a non-smoking section--but before I even got there, I knew what I would find. And sure enough, the "no smoking" section was three small tables at the back end of the room (almost always opposite from the windows), and not more than five feet from several other tables filled with smokers, with no air currents favoring the no-smoking area. When I left a half hour later, my clothes and hair smelled like an ashtray.

That's what has been called the "Menagerie Lion," a famous child's mispronunciation of "Imaginary Line," a standard smoking issue in Japan. Separate areas for smoking and non-smoking are found only when they are naturally formed, like restaurants with tables on two different floors. Sometimes the floor area is great enough to allow for some actual semblance of separation. But usually, you can expect no real protection from the smoke, and precious few eating establishments have entirely no-smoking policies.

Some areas have improved, however; trains and train stations are an excellent example. Local trains are now of course no-smoking, but many trains with seat reservations (like the Narita Express) have smoking cars. That would not be so bad, but the non-smoking cars allow smoking in the areas at the ends of cars near the doors. There is a door closing that area off, but it is motion-activated, and since the smoker almost always sets it off every minute or so, the smoke rushes in--which is less of an issue anyway as the air conditioning is recycled and shared through the areas, meaning that it's pretty much a smoking car anyway.

Train platforms are mostly non-smoking; the Keio Line recently banned smoking altogether on them. Other lines have a few smoking areas along the platform, and despite the outdoor ventilation one generally has to stand a fair distance away from them (or upwind if there's a breeze) to stay in fresh air--not that smokers will always honor the no-smoking signs.

Things are improving, but at a snail's pace. I do remember back in the mid-80's having to get up from my seat at the movie theater every other time I saw a film to tell some guy five rows in front to stop smoking (it's not just the smell, it gets in the way of the picture), and that never happens to me any more. I see fewer people taking ashtrays from smoking areas into the non-smoking areas for a few puffs. And the yakitori place I've been a regular at for 15 years, despite being a smoking joint, watches out for me--the guys behind the counter, knowing my preferences, kindly try to arrange seating for me so as to keep me segregated enough to make a big difference.

But it should be noted that Japan's tobacco industry is still coddled by the government, which is still a major stockholder in Japan Tobacco, the third biggest cigarette company in the world. Warning labels, last time I checked, were still very mild (along the lines of saying, "Try not to smoke too much"). Campaign girls can still be seen handing out free sample packs on the streets near major stations. And cigarette butts decomposing on the sidewalk and streets are still more ubiquitous than cell phones. So it'll be a while yet. But things are getting better.

Meanwhile, Back in Japan

The Daily Yomiuri, for all its faults, has a nice event every year with its cartoon contest. Tied for third place was this cartoon, which prompted me to laugh out loud--but I caution you that you have to be a bit familiar with things Japanese to understand it.

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The Japanese government moves closer and closer to amending its American-imposed peacetime constitution so as to curtail or repeal the no-war stipulation. But it also realizes that Japan is going to need more soldiers when that happens. Not to worry; the Japanese government is on the job. What's the strategy?

Dancing sailors.

Really. The commercial features seven men dressed as sailors, prancing about the deck of a warship, singing, "Nippon Seaman Ship, Seaman Ship, For Love...For Peace." Really. I kid you not. I mean, they might have taken the "Navy of One" route. Or perhaps, "Sea All You Can See." But it looks like they opted for, "The Few. The Proud. The Dancing Navy."

You gotta take a look--the Japanese Navy, called the Japan Marine Self Defense Forces, has put the commercial up on their web site (Flash plugin required), complete with high kicks and gyrating hips. It's quite a thing.

Update: Here's the video via YouTube:

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The end of an era: Beef in a Bowl. Gyuudon, as it's called, has long been a favorite dish for diners seeking fast food in Japan, at places like the now-famous Yoshinoya. But that is beginning to end now, after a single cow in the United States tested positive for Mad Cow Disease. The gyuudon restaurants are taking beef off the menu, as U.S. beef is banned and Aussie beef doesn't sit as well with the customers. So beef is out, and many gyuudon lovers will have to find cheap culinary satisfaction some other way.

Of course, one has to wonder, why U.S. beef is banned. The single cow that tested positive came from Canada, and the U.S. has found no other cases in three months. You could say that they are being careful, but if that is so, then why is Japanese beef still on the market? Japan just uncovered yet another case of Japanese BSE, the eleventh so far since the first was discovered on September 10th, 2001. And all of those cows were born and raised in Japan.

Seems to me U.S. beef is safer.

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You might enjoy this man-on-the-street bit from Japan Today. The question: What kind of attitude toward Japan or Japanese by foreigners don't you like? Some pretty interesting answers there, and some discussion by mostly non-Japanese people afterwards.

Poor Mr. Aso.

Cable Conundrum

One of the nice things about living where I do is that the neighborhood is very nice. I'm just 45 minutes from downtown Tokyo by train, but the town I live in is open, spacious and green. Lots of parks, great view from where I live. There are drawbacks, however--fewer stores, and my place is a good distance from the train station, so I have to depend on buses, and they usually are not very convenient.

And oh yeah, the cable TV sucks.

Cable TV in Japan is very different from back home. You don't get fifty channels here. Nor seventy. With the most liberal count, you get 35 where I live. Only about 20 count as non-broadcast type of channels, the rest are just local stations you can get for free. And of the non-broadcast channels, few are worth watching. CNNj, Super Channel (U.S. TV shows), Movie Plus, and Discovery Channel are all that are really worth watching. MTV if you like that. But the rest are pretty much mind-numbing, like the "Go and Shogi Channel," a channel devoted to the Japanese board games go (or "i-go," the one with black and white stones on a grid) and shogi (Japanese chess). Not included are channels most other cable companies give their clients, like the BBC, FOX (entertainment, not news), AXN (lots more syndicated TV shows), TBS Movies, and lots of other good channels.

Every once in a while, they dangle the hope of new channels in front of you. I just got a questionnaire which asks to rate which channels you like, which you don't, and which channels would you like to get. Last time this happened, they listed all the really good channels everyone else has--but the "results of the survey" apparently prompted them to get rid of an excellent news channel and a few other decent stations, and add pretty much just crap--including the "Go and Shogi" channel, yet another sports news channel (we already had three), and a home shopping channel. Oh, joy.

So I'm filling out the questionnaire yet again, but without hope of getting anything decent. Probably they'll take away the Discovery Channel and give us "The Golf Network" or "The Golf Channel" (both are candidates this time, but I'd rather go with Nader on that one), "The Jidai Geki Channel" (24-hour bad samurai dramas from 30 years ago), and Yet Another Sports Channel (5 of the 20 extra choices offered are sports).

I'd go for the SkyPerfecTV satellite dish, but another apartment building is 10 meters too far in the wrong direction and is blocking the reception.

Ah, the horrible suffering I must endure.

Composite Resin and a Good Dentist

Here in Japan, a good dentist is worth his weight in amalgam. Or, as is the case with my latest visit, composite resin.

A filling that I had filled maybe a decade ago started to chip a few days back. It didn't hurt, but it was enough to make me worry and naturally warranted an immediate visit to the dentist. After a horrifying dental experience with a doctor close to my apartment which cost me a tooth, I looked for and found a good doctor: Dr. Nishibori, with offices in Sendagaya (very close to the JR station) and Roppongi, in central Tokyo. Dr. Nishibori was trained in the U.S., and has a very modern office--and two very important elements here are that (a) he speaks English well, and (b) he takes National Health Insurance.

I had visited Dr. Nishibori earlier for a full exam and to get a bridge put in (to fix up the disaster the other dentist had left behind), and I liked his offices--good, modern equipment, fast service, good people. He even recommended another dentist when he felt that other dentist provided better work than he, a sign of professional integrity.

When I came in for the tooth work yesterday (made the appointment just a day and a half before--but there was almost no wait), I noticed some new equipment. Every dental station was now equipped with a flat-panel computer display. From looking around the room, I could see that they were used for X-rays. I didn't get to see it close-up because I didn't need X-rays then, but I could see that the X-rays showed incredibly large and clear on the screen. A new system, Dr. Nishibori told me. Very cool.

He also gave me a resin filling instead of amalgam, the first time a dentist had done so for me. The composite resin filling, aside from being white and blending in better, bonds to the teeth better and contains no mercury, along with other benefits. The downside: some sensitivity after treatment--my teeth still hurt a bit a day later.

Nishibori, despite his qualifications, modern office equipment and central location, does not charge much: the whole session was completed in about an hour, and I was charged about 1,500 yen (maybe $13). That's my 30%, with insurance picking up the other 70% of the bill. Not bad, as resin fillings are supposed to cost up to twice as much as silver fillings.

If you live in Tokyo and are interested in seeing Dr. Nishibori, the Sendagaya office phone number is (03) 3403-8885 (alternate is -8886). They're open weekdays till 6 pm, and until noon on Saturdays.

Resources for Japan

I just wanted to let you in on a few web resources for living in Japan that I find useful.

Yahoo Trains and Jorudan

With Tokyo's labyrinthine train system, it is a wonder anyone can make it around town--what with the dozens of train lines crisscrossing this way and that around Tokyo, with the psychedelic spaghetti that is the subway system in midtown. Should you take the Chuo, Tozai, or Marunochi line to Kichijoji, and then transfer via the Inogashira line, or should you go by the Keio instead? Which one is cheaper? Which is faster?

Well, there's a great web utility for those in doubt. You can find it on Yahoo Japan's web site; just enter the starting point, destination, and when you want to travel, and the engine will produce a list of possible ways to get there, citing departure and arrival times, transfer points, and total cost and transit times. Links to maps of the station areas are included. Unfortunately for those unable to read Japanese, the Yahoo site is not provided in English (though station names may by typed that way), but not to worry: the Japanese Traffic Guide by Jorudan accomplishes the same thing in English. The Yahoo version is better if you can get by the language barrier, though.

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Free Maps

None of the Japanese mapping services are in English, but if you know the language enough, they are excellent for finding what you want. Both Yahoo Maps and Mapfan allow you to find a location by narrowing down by prefecture, city, and local area--or by typing in the address, station name, or postal code.

My preference is for Mapfan--their interface is easier for me, and their maps have greater detail.

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Good Weather

There are many sites to give you weather reports, but the best weather site for Japan that I