What now? Should we evacuate?

We know the people responsible are doing everything to avoid a total meltdown. We know the people within 30km of the reactors are evacuated. But what about those who are a little farther away?


Yes, this guy can switch the channels to watch the news. But the sentiment remains there is a lack of what's going right NOW in Fukushima. Things can literally change in a second.

We need more transparency with TEPCO and the government. We need more minute updates now.

First snow 初雪

First snowfall this winter (is it winter yet?) in northern Japan comes earlier than usual. First time in 6 years Oct sees any snow. It looks to be a tough one this year.



purple: snow
blue: rain
(latest weather map 10/26/2010 4pm Japan time)

new earthquake warning system

There seems to be a new earthquake warning system in place lately in Japan. It must have come into effect in these few days.

Here is how it works:
1) sizable earthquake happens somewhere in this area (Kanto regions)
2) a loud warning beeps and vibrants for a few seconds on your cellphone (despite silence setting)
3) impact expected 5 - 10 seconds from time of warning
4) brace

We had our first warning this afternoon at around 5pm. We were in class so I got the students ready to dodge under the table if/when it'd happen. But it didn't, turned out a fairly regional quake didn't make itself felt over here. Still, a bit of a scare. We thought it was "the Big One".

Norwegian Wood, the movie

only trailer I can find now:


Tran presents 'Norwegian Wood' at Venice film festival

VENICE, Italy — The pacing, the blowing wind, the music and other atmospherics all helped create the tension in "Norwegian Wood," says Tran Anh Hung, presenting the haunting movie at the Venice film festival.
Based on a best-selling novel by Japanese author Haruki Murakami, the story of love, sexuality and loss -- mainly through suicide -- is set in Japan in the volatile 1960s.
"The film is rich in physical variation," the Vietnamese-born Tran told AFP, discussing scenes in which the lead character Watanabe (Kenichi Matsuyama) paces around an apartment with the troubled Naoko (Rinko Kikuchi), and later tries to keep up with her in a green field.

Senna, the movie

It looks like Senna, the Movie is being released in Japan first. Japanese title:
アイルトン・セナ　音速の彼方へ

Go to the official movie website to see a clearer trailer:
http://senna-movie.jp/

There is a trailer posted to youtube here


It's being released on Oct 8th in very limited theaters in Japan. I'll probably go see it in Odaiba Cinema Mediage in Tokyo.

the new widow-maker?

...introducing Ferrari 458 Italia

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/41513/

The Ferrari 458 Italia, the Italian car manufacturer's latest model, might just be cursed. Ten of the exceedingly expensive vehicles have crashed in the past month, according to reports on Tuesday.

Six Ferrari 458 Italias have been involved in accidents, three caught on fire, and one was destroyed in a fire while it was being stored innocently in a warehouse.

Aug 23 2010

high 33C (while thermometer shows 35.8C)
overnight low 25C
humidity 88%
south wind 5m/s

Happy Birthday to my girl!
The heat of this summer is something. We had a relatively cool summer last year. The year before that was pretty brutal; we saw 40C weather in several prefectures. The nights are cooler this late into Aug but no breeze. The humidity is thick in the air through out the night you can cut it with a knife. We want to turn on the A/C but catching a cold is no fun.

Man VS Wild
I've been watching Man VS Wild. I'm usually pretty OK with the "delicacy" but this morning with some wine and overly sweet chocolate cake being digested down my stomach it almost turned. I had to stop the video to take a long breather.

I'm very surprised this group of people keep calling Bear Grylls fake. First of all, it's a TV show. One that shows survival situations, worst case scenarios, and ways to get out of them. How else can a TV show do it without setting things up? Bottom line, to me, it's entertaining, keeps my pulse racing, is far removed from what I can ever hope I can do, other words - a fantasy. On top of that, there are some real gems on survival techniques, however unlikely.

August updates

Summer summer hot hot hot. high 33C, overnight low 23C, humidity 88%

work:
moving forward... ever so slowly, need a new manager right now

life:
middle of summer, lots of festivals, another one this Sat
kid doing great, another one on his/her way
real physical signs of getting old(er)

car:
serious need of a pro wax job
car detailing is hard
as paint ages

ouch.....

The devastation of England losing to Germany is so thorough it hurts this total bystander.

If the match was fair:
2 - 2 at halftime
3 - 2 in the end

The Germans were a better team. They played together better. They had much much better defense.
The English on the other hand, Rooney being as useful as a potato, defense had too many holes. Could a strong national football/soccer league lead to horrible team chemistry? More or less like the NBA and the US basketball team?

Too many egos. Too much at stake.

The UK can't win against Germany today. F1 Englishmen Hamilton and Button finished behind Deutschland's Vettel earlier at Valencia on race day Sunday, European GP. Not a bad day though if you're on the other side.

US not deserving sweet 16?

As a country, it possibly is questionable.
(worst soccer non-fans in the world)



The USA world cup team? They deserve to advance the Fuck out of it! Guys played their hearts out despite two game altering miscalls. They would have won the second group match and scored earlier in the last game.

The French on the other hand, textbook sore losers. Calling it disgraceful doesn't begin to describe its monumental failure in humanity.

Go USA!

summer solstice 2010

The longest day of the year (for northern hemisphere) and supposedly the first day of summer.

In this part of Japan
Today's sunrise: 4:24am
Today's sunset: 6:57pm
Day light lasts 14h 33m

f-king useless leaders

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Naoto Kan was elected prime minister at both houses of the Diet on Friday to replace outgoing Yukio Hatoyama.

Another one bites the dust. Another year. Another prime minister. Someone tell these heads of state that one political misstep, one broken promise doesn't merit their resignation.

Whatever happened to responsibilities? Whatever happened to integrity?

Four prime ministers in the last four years. FUCKING USELESS.

/rant

May updates

Has the world always been so fucked up (short answer: yes), or have we just grown up? (another yes?) So what has the reality come to in this one month's time?

THE GOOD:

Elena Kegan as a US supreme court justice (if confirmed)
sees US seeking intellects to staff important public offices. It's time to move on. The world has changed. It is the 21st century. Now let's just wait for baby boomers (60 y/o) to die out so we can have a more progressive society.

Miss USA a Lebanon-born Muslim beauty
Whether she can keep her crown may be a different story. But if the world wants to survive the second half of this century we're going to have to find a solution to religious/cultural clash between the West and the Middle East. I think she qualifies in all aspects but beauty-eye-beholder. Now Israel why are you so Nazi-like?

THE BAD:

BP oil spill
Is oil gushing out thousands of gallons per minute a spill? By definition it still is. Fishing gone, marine ecosystem lost, pollution up 1000%, and no end in sight. We're fucked as ever.

Thailand anti-government demo
A full blown state-of-emergency war on the ground is going on between the battle-ready army and Red-shirt demonstrators. They're fucked. We can only hope there is a silver lining behind the massive clouds.

THE UGLY:

World population projection in 40 years
tops 9 billion. If the projection is correct (likely), by 2050 we'll have to double current food production, which already uses 99.9% of cultivatable land on earth, to accommodate the extra 2B people. Pretty much every single problem in the world can be solved by having a smaller population. Please, have fewer kids! China's one-child policy won't look so bad in 20 years (not that it's humane; educating women would probably do). We're mega-fucked.

Will 8.8 quake bring devastation?

A huge quake halfway across the globe in Chile on Saturday (2/27/2010) may or may not result in disaster in these coasts of East Japan. The real problem is - we can only wait to find out. Technology available for tsunami prediction is still pretty primitive. The slightest rise of sea level can create havoc on coastal areas tens of thousands of miles away. We'll find out at around 1:30 Sunday afternoon Japan time.

気象庁の関田康雄地震津波監視課長は２７日午後７時から記者会見し、「日本列島で津波が観測される可能性は考えられる」としたうえで、到達する場合も大津波とはならず、高さは最大１メートル程度で、陸地での被害が出る可能性があるかどうか程度、との考えを示した。

ただ、遠隔地で起きた地震の影響による津波の予測は難しく、今後の情報に注意するよう呼びかけている。

同庁によると、日本に津波が到達する時刻は父島など小笠原諸島が２８日午後１時過ぎ、北海道太平洋側が午後１時半頃になる見込み。同庁では今後、２８日朝に津波が到達すると予想される米・ハワイでの観測データなどを基に日本各地への注意報、警報などを検討する。

同庁によると、今回の地震は海洋プレートが大陸プレートの下に沈み込んでいるプレート境界で発生した逆断層型。１９６０年５月のマグニチュード９・５のチリ地震では、三陸地方を中心に国内でも約１４０人の死者・行方不明者を出す大津波が発生しているが、今回の地震のエネルギーはこの時の１０分の１から３０分の１程度で、観測や警報の体制も整備されている。link

People in Hawaii were urgently told to protect lives and property from a tsunami crossing the Pacific as fast as a jetliner after a devastating earthquake in Chile.

Tsunami waves were likely to hit Asian, Australian and New Zealand shores within 24 hours of the earthquake, which struck early Saturday on Chile's coast.
.
.
.
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A tsunami after the magnitude-9.5 quake that struck Chile in 1960, the largest earthquake ever recorded, killed about 140 people in Japan, 61 in Hawaii and 32 in the Philippines. That tsunami was about 3.3 to 13 feet (one to four meters) in height, Japan's Meteorological Agency said. link

CR-Z is finally here

Honda's new nippy (hopefully) hybrid sports/y car is here. This is said to be the first of its kind - hybrid + light + sporty + manual transmission + small footprint (size & carbon)

Today Honda Japan officially updated their website with new info on CR-Z. To me the most important thing is its weight.

some important specs:
weight: 1130kg (manual transmission)
price (Type alpha): 2.5 million yen (~27k USD)
engine: 1.5l i-VTEC IMA (intergrated motor assist)
114ps at 6000 rpm (~112hp)

motor: 14ps at 1500 rpm
gas mileage: 22.5km/L

Dilemma dilemma dilemma - potential buyers of the new CR-Z would want something light and very chuck-able if Honda CR-X (~850kg) was any indication. Now this reincarnation of former feather-weight CR-X is a hybrid and of course that means added kilograms of a motor, its battery, various parts and modern safety concerns. I wish they would build a lighter version (-100kg) with slightly more power (~150bhp). People like me won't mind missing a number of features.


Cut-away graphic. There is hardly any room in the back. A 2+2.

Good thing rumor has it a CR-Z type R is in the pipeline. Do it, Honda! Do it.

no denying Joseph Andrew Stack makes you question

...all the things that are wrong with the society we're living in.

I'll reserve my judgment until more info surfaces.

Read the suicide letter.
http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/b3piw/web_site_of_the_guy_who_crashed_his_plane_into_an/

GEOS on its way out?

Rumor has it GEOS is in trouble. It turns out at least their schools in Australia have recently closed their doors.

GEOS is one of the original big 3 English school companies in Japan. They were NOVA, GEOS, and AEON, with ECC and Berlitz following closely in number of schools and students. The McDonald's of eikaiwa, NOVA, is largely gone despite certain regional schools still in operation under different management.

Is GEOS suffering from the recent economic downturn? Some online discussion can be found on fuckedgaijin here, more legitimate news here about their Australia school closing.

We don't know how far down this is going to go. It could be a bad Wednesday, or a game ender. We'll see. When English language learning giant NOVA went down, it was all triggered by a bad refund policy, followed by government intervention, finally a major drop in student enrollment = debt. One bad move is all it takes.

a little update
From GEOS Japan's website a pdf letter was posted to address their Japanese students who are stuck in Australia about obtaining a refund and transferring to other available facilities:

オーストラリアへ留学中のお客様各位
生徒様、弊社英会話を希望されている方、また関係者の皆様に多大のご不安をお掛けしておりますこと、深くお詫び申しあげます。(株)ジオスおよび国内の各校、オーストラリア以外の海外校は通常通り運営されております。オーストラリア関係機関より生徒様向けの説明会の日程が一部発表になりましたので一部を抜粋してお知らせ致します。授業料返金、転校等の詳細につきましては、契約エージェントまたはHPにてご確認をお願い致します。
http://www.englishaustralia.com.au/index.cgi?E=hsvalidator&template=student&PT=dd&Lev1=students07&Lev2=stu_clos10

signs USA is rotting

As if you really need any more.

Supreme Court rolls back campaign cash limits
WASHINGTON - In a landmark ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down laws that banned corporations from using their own money to support or oppose candidates for public office.

By 5-4 vote, the court overturned federal laws, in effect for decades, that prevented corporations from using their profits to buy political campaign ads. The decision, which almost certainly will also allow labor unions to participate more freely in campaigns, threatens similar limits imposed by 24 states.

It leaves in place a ban prohibiting corporations and unions from directly contributing funds to candidates for any use. link

In layman's terms, big oil like Exxon Mobil, private military companies like Blackwater Worldwide, pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer, special interest tools like lobbyists can literally choose the next president of the US, not that they weren't trying before.

While this looks like a small step towards what I just claimed above, the lack of comprehension among ordinary citizens, silence on media, apathy between law-makers disturb me to no end.

Like farm pigs, wolfing down their artificial feed, oblivious to the slaughter ahead.

This is the direct opposite of democracy. The USA is the corporation that is too big to fail now, until it systematically collapses.

snow and quakes

Purple: snow
Blue: rain

Bucketful of snow being dumped on half of Japan as the real winter season kicks off. In this part of Japan where warmer Pacific Ocean currents are keeping the conditions undesirable for snow, we have yet to see any. Warm is however not how I'd describe it with overnight outside temp at -2C (28.4F).

top 10 snow accumulated regions (courtesy http://tenki.jp/)

1. 道央 朱鞠内 127cm 注意報 (Hokkaido)
2. 道央 幌加内 108cm 注意報
3. 道北 音威子府 102cm 注意報
4. 岐阜 長滝 98cm 警報 注意報
5. 福島 只見 98cm 警報 注意報
6. 新潟 入広瀬 95cm 警報 注意報
7. 山形 櫛引 93cm 警報 注意報
8. 岐阜 白川 91cm 警報 注意報
9. 秋田 矢島 82cm 注意報
10.岐阜 河合 82cm 警報 注意報 (Gifu)

===========================================================

In other news, we have had some 120 earthquakes west of Tokyo as large as 5.3M on the Richter Scale in just 2 days' time.

Between morning hours of the 17th and 8pm on the 18th (JST), 121 earthquakes powerful enough to be felt have shaken the Izu Peninsula in Shizuoka Prefecture, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). Nine of those earthquakes have been rated as a three or above on the JMA seismic intensity scale, which measures shaking on the earth’s surface. Any score of three or more is described as “rather strong” and felt by most people in the affected area.

The two most powerful quakes so far have each registered 5.3 in magnitude on the Richter scale, or a weak five on the JMA’s scale. They hit the Izu Peninsula at approximately 11:45pm on the 17th and 8:45am on the 18th. link

A yesterday news clip:

Yes Japan can?

(2009 Japan's election results, taken from wikipedia)
DPJ - Democratic Party of Japan (民主党)
LDP - Liberal Democratic Party (自由民主党)




Below are four BBC news clips on their fairly thorough coverage of Japan's 2009 general election, its brand spanking new prime minister Hatoyama and his cabinet. If you're pressed for time, watch the first and fourth videos. This probably sounds cliched BUT 2009 election may well change modern Japan.




about the party
new ruling Democratic party founded only 11 years ago
ran on a platform of aggressive change (Obama and Kimutaku?)

bold promises
reduced relationship with US militarily
serve the people, not big businesses

Japan in deep water
Japan in its worst economic slump since war
a significantly shrinking middle class
national debt no less impressive than US

recap on what happened last month
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TOKYO — Japan’s voters cast out the Liberal Democratic Party for only the second time in postwar history on Sunday, handing a landslide victory to a party that campaigned on a promise to reverse a generation-long economic decline and to redefine Tokyo’s relationship with Washington.

Many Japanese saw the vote as the final blow to the island nation’s postwar order, which has been slowly unraveling since the economy collapsed in the early 1990s.

In the powerful lower house, the opposition Democrats virtually swapped places with the governing Liberal Democratic Party, winning 308 of the 480 seats, a 175 percent increase that gives them control of the chamber, according to the national broadcaster NHK. The incumbents took just 119 seats, about a third of their previous total. The remaining seats were won by smaller parties. NYTimes
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