tokyoblog

park rules

2012-01-26T12:08:00.001+09:00

Sign posted in Arisugawa park in Hiroo:

Please Do Not Brush Your Dog's hair On a Bench

And this is because.... ?? Don't mean to quibble; I don't have a dog, and maybe the ban increases my chances of finding a place to sit whenever I think to go to this quiet and rather lovely area of the park, a clearing surrounded by woods, away from the pond and the playground, but I'd love to know the thinking behind it. What am I missing?

Last time the boys and I were in the park we noticed that some winter berries, purple things the size of BBs, had sprouted on some of the bushes. The elderly couple, in the background behind Dylan, above, are just sitting and admiring. I guess I can see how brushing a dog could kill the mood.

shortcut to Shibuya station

2012-01-22T15:29:00.000+09:00

Walking south along the JR train tracks, standing bars up ahead on the left

at the cemetery

2012-01-22T15:24:00.000+09:00

A couple months ago, when there were still some autumn leaves on the trees, KT and I spent some time in Aoyama cemetery to practice some new skills we had learned from the brilliant Alfie Goodrich. Here are some of my favorite shots from that day.

Happy Year of the Dragon!

2012-01-16T20:03:00.001+09:00

A belated Akemashite omedetou to all. It's tatsu doshi!

The 12-year cycle of zodiac animals, junishi in Japanese, is, like many aspects of Japanese culture, a concept copied/stolen/borrowed/adopted from China more than a thousand years ago, and then altered/improved/bastardized. My son Conor was born in a Year of the Dragon - the last one, 2000 - so it's his year. Dragons, it is said, are strong and powerful and wise, nonthreatening but also not shy, who like to talk and get things done. They can be hotheaded yet compassionate. (It does seem to fit...)

Our other son was born in the Year of the Horse - which means he's independent and a hard worker, friendly but sometimes selfish; energetic, with a mind of his own. He likes nothing more than to run free about the countryside, because, well, he's a horse. (Not bad.) Terry and I are Roosters, which means we're shrewd dreamers. If you believe this stuff...

Gishi-sai festival

2011-12-14T19:31:00.000+09:00

Every year on Dec. 14 there's a memorial event honoring the Vendetta of the 47 Ronin, masterless Samurai who on this day some 300 years ago performed ritual suicide after avenging the betrayal of their lord (who upon being betrayed committed seppuku, leaving them masterless). First there's the Gishi-Gyoretsu, a procession of volunteer Ronin-reps (bearing some very long swords) through the streets of Tokyo, along Showa dori and Sotobori dori and Hibiya dori, with a stop at Zojo-ji and then on to the Sengaku temple in Takanawa, Minato ward, burial site for the real ones.

Terry and I caught up with the group in Tsukiji, near the Chuo ward office, just as they were starting out around midday, and we followed them for a bit until Terry had to go back to the office. Some pics:

dude in the cool helmet, leader of the pack, waiting to cross the street, spots me with my camera...

and poses!

I read online somewhere that "The Forty-Seven Loyal Retainers in Akoh" is one of the best loved tales in Japan, told and retold in movies and TV dramas and in Kabuki theater; the plays and novels that recount the legend usually go by the titles Chushingura ("The Loyal Retainers") and Akoh Roshi ("Akoh's Masterless Samurai").

Not for nothin', but Robert DeNiro learns all about the 47 Ronin from a French guy who paints miniature samurai figures (and gives him a safe place to recover from a bullet wound) in the 1997 John Frankenheimer film Ronin, which we just watched for the 5th or 6th time the other night (we were taking a break from Season 2 of The Walking Dead). If you've never seen it, rent it, there are some terrific car chases.

silly purchase of the month: the 'Poodleg'

2011-12-10T15:29:00.002+09:00

Available now at the Pansy shop on Aoyama dori. It's near the Crocs store, between the Children's Castle/U.N. University and Kotto dori. Because I know if you're in Tokyo you'll want to run out and buy a pair for yourself right now.

it's a theme

2011-12-08T21:49:00.003+09:00

re: previous post, this "Let's..." business is everywhere. Big thanks to Katy Dix for finding these gems...and sending me these pics:

From my dentist's office:

gift tags purchased from the 100 yen store

"Let's get friendly forever and ever!"

Starbucks+XMAS=:)

2011-12-08T17:57:00.000+09:00

Ah, Starbucks and Christmas. Christmas and Starbucks. Is there a better seasonal marketing campaign than the "Let's ...." series? I don't think so.

Let's take a look.

And now my two favorites (photos by Katy Dix, chief "Let's" spotter)

Less than 2% of the population of Japan is Christian but that doesn't stop this country from celebrating the season with Santa outfits, poinsettias, and fir trees with all the trimmings. Sometimes in pink and purple...blue and silver... gotta give "Starba" (is this British shorthand or universal? help me here people) credit for going with traditional red.

Here are the boys at Shibuya station, East bus terminal. I think Dylan is drinking ice milk (me-roo-koo)...

raising the bar

2011-12-06T13:59:00.000+09:00

It's common now for Japanese companies to regularly measure employees' waistlines and demand they stay fit, else they be fined by the government. Some offices pump 'exercise music' over loudspeakers, as a way to encourage workers to periodically rise from their cubicles and move a little.

Let this mechanical guy be an inspiration to salarymen everywhere.

spotted at Hakuhinkan Toy Park, 8-8-11 Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo

Sunday in Ginza

2011-12-05T19:28:00.000+09:00

Chuo-dori, near Harumi -dori, the heart of Tokyo's posh Ginza shopping district, around 4 p.m. on December 4

Tokyo Metro, reminding us how to behave

2011-12-04T20:53:00.000+09:00

Drunk on the train? No sweat, just be sure to stay upright even as you pass out...

Actual English tagline: 'Even if you've had a few drinks, please don't lie down on the train seat.'

December arrives, and brings winter with it

2011-12-03T11:20:00.000+09:00

December 1st: The boys on Komazawa dori, waiting for me to hail a taxi to take us to school; it's a chilly wet Thursday morning, and we're running a little late...

Kaaaaaaan!

2011-12-02T20:57:00.001+09:00

The other night I finally had a chance to check out where they filmed the karaoke scenes in Sofia Coppola's 2003 film Lost in Translation. It's a Karaoke-Kan in Udagawacho, just off Center Gai and a few minutes walk from Shibuya station. Aside from the fact that a few of the rooms - like 601, where the movie was shot - offer amazing views of the street outside, the place is nothing special, really, one of a generic national chain of establishments where, like Shidax and Big Echo, you pay per hour and per person for a private room. I do like the direct telephone line to the bar, and when the waiters stoop on bended knee as not to block your view of the screen. But I need to ask: why are so many karaoke-box tunes accompanied by video footage of the Brooklyn Bridge?

Alas, our small group of four women, arriving at this Karaoke-Kan around 11:30pm on a rainy Friday night in November, could not book 601 (or 602, another room the filmmakers used), but were instead escorted to a windowless space down the hall, so we could have been anywhere. And the song selection fell short - no Adele! can you believe? - which surprised me, especially when just a couple weeks before I had spent half an hour in a karaoke room with the kids at EST, also in Shibuya, on the east side of Meiji dori across from Miyashita koen, and they had everything. EST also has ping pong, billiards, bowling and a videogame arcade - a post for another time. (And is it pronounced "est"? or "ee-ess-tee"? Anybody?)

As we were leaving to go home around 1 a.m., we saw that 601 was vacant and so stepped inside to snap a few. I've been hearing Bill Murray singing Elvis Costello in my head ever since: "What's so funny 'bout peace love and understanding..."

Ya think Bill stood right here, in this same spot?!??

Karaoke-Kan, 30-8 Udagawacho, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo. (Located northwest of Shibuya station and the big scramble crossing, on the same road as the big Coach, Loft, HMV and Zara stores; if you are walking with Coach and Loft on your right, HMV and Zara on your left, the building will be ahead on the left hand side before the police office/koban, where the road bends to the north toward Tokyu Hands.)
Tel: 03-3462-0785
Open 11 am to 6 pm

fun fact of the day

2011-12-01T17:53:00.001+09:00

Among Japanese households, the most popular meal on Christmas day is... wait for it... fried chicken.

Buckets of KFC takeaway, in particular.

Image borrowed from Metropolis)

trail walk!

2011-11-30T17:37:00.031+09:00

A few weeks ago Terry and I took the boys to Kamakura to do the Daibutsu hiking course, a 3.5km trail that snakes southwestward beginning at the Jochiji temple near Kita-Kamakura station, and winds up and around mountains and through woods, its path gnarled by exposed tree roots; at the end of the road is the big Buddha at Kotoko-in. I'd done this trail walk before, in the spring of 2008 with a friend (and posted about it here) and then again last year with some other moms from school (though that time a few of us veered off course and ended up at the beach, ducking hawks, but never mind...) As for Terry and the boys, it was their first time. A couple of years ago the kids probably wouldn't have gotten through it without a lot of whining and feet-dragging, but they're 9 and 11 now, and so they managed, and seemed to really enjoy it, and it was really rather pleasant for all of us.

The course is not too arduous, but the terrain keeps things interesting. Lots of up and down.

It's good to walk with a big stick, I always say

one of the maps signposted along the way

At about the midpoint, we stopped for a rest in this little clearing not to far from Genjiyama-koen (a few minutes' detour, but worth it for the very impressive shogun statue, pictured below). We sat on tree stumps around a giant stone slab table, enjoying snacks and sunshine. Dylan wasn't quite sure about his rice cracker, which he selected from a plastic bin outside the little nearby shrine, leaving 100 yen in the dish beside it. It has some sort of white sugary coating on it.

Drinks all around! apple juice from the vending machine.

I purchased this stick 'o somethin' from a cart manned by two lovely old ladies who were pan-frying them in a big pot, because an old man told me to. "Healthy," he said, pointing at the, what, potatoes? mochi balls? He couldn't think what to call them, until then he did, and I googled it: konnyaku, and it is in fact a type of potato, but more glutenous. Apparently native to Indonesia, introduced in Japan in the 6th Century as a medicine. Slightly crunchy, in that root veg sort of way. Fairly bland, even sauteed in soy sauce. (The ladies had a big ole pot they were heating them in.) Apparently the stuff is high in fiber, rich in minerals, low in calories. Well, the old man was pleased that I gave it a try.

The mighty Miramoto Yoritomo, Shogun from 1192-1199, the start of the Kamakura period

Dylan takes the lead (see tiny figure way beyond the other two)

What's this?! We came across this seemingly brand-new Garden Cafe, situated just off-course, at the same moment we thought the boys were about to fake total collapse...

Quick cure: tall glasses of Coke, with big fat wedges of lemon. Coffee for me, beer in a big stein for Terry. Onward!

Final stretch

The reward at the end: the Daibutsu, cast in bronze in the mid-13th century, and originally housed inside a temple, which was washed away in the tsunami of 1498. I always enjoy seeing the big guy. (I've posted better photos of him than this... click here and scroll down.)

There are several clusters of Jizo statues on the grounds of the Hase-dera temple, not far down the road from the Daibutsu. Jizo, a bodhisattva (enlightened being) in Buddhism, is a protector of children, primarily those in limbo (unborn, miscarried, aborted etc. - a tad gruesome for such a merry looking fellow). These little hillside herds are totally worth checking out, and there's also a rest area with a view of the sea.

Some extra special bonsai were on display there that weekend.

nay-chuh

2011-11-14T09:49:00.004+09:00

photo by Kathleen Paulsson

Over the weekend we took the boys for a walk through the Institute for Nature Study's amazing piece of property in Shirokanedai. Once you enter the grounds you feel completely separated from the big city, even though the place is smack in the middle of it. It's enclosed by a high wall that makes it feel truly protected. (An expressway runs all along its western border, and the Teien art museum is at its south end. See below for directions.)

There are some very, very old trees here. The trails wind through and around forest, marsh and pond habitats, and there's lots of pretty flora, though all markers are in Japanese, which, sadly, I still can't read, even after all this time living here. In spring there are cherry blossoms. For more information, visit the website. English page is here.

Note that there are strict rules. Specifically: "Please do not disturb other visitors by singing, jogging, dancing, or playing catch." (This is not Yoyogi Park, people.) Also: Please do not release any alien animals, especially fishes, turtles, or cats, as alien species of plants and animals disturb the ecosystem. (Fair enough.) No alcohol, radios or musical instruments. And no picking flowers or leaves or taking seeds home. You can smoke (Japan's still not there yet), but only at the benches that have ashtrays (at least we have that).

Admission is cheap at twice the price: 300 yen for adults, under 18 free. Visitors are given pink ribbons to wear. Conor balked at first. ("Who! WHO will not wear dee ribbon?!")

The Institute for Nature Study (Shizen kyoiku en)
5-21-5 Shirokanedai, Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-0071
Tel: 03-3441-7176 Fax: 03-3441-7012 Email: ins@kahaku.go.jp

The only entrance to the park is on Meguro dori - heading south on Gaien Nish dori, cross Meiji-dori at Tengenji bashi, and bear left onto Platinum dori. At Meguro dori, turn right, and it's past a little park on your right. Here's a map:

NYTs update on conditions at Fukushima plant

2011-11-14T09:28:00.003+09:00

Reading Martin Fackler's story in the New York Times about his visit Saturday to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, eight months after the March 11 catastrophe. Fun facts: There's a field full of 4 story-high tanks holding some 90,000 tons of contaminated water that had been dumped onto the reactors in an attempt to cool them. And so far Tepco has stored 480,000 sets of used protective clothing, discarded after each use by workers.

Fackler writes: "...[M]any nuclear experts say serious challenges remain. The biggest is the fact that the company does not know the exact condition of the fuel within the No. 1 and No. 3 reactors, whose cores appear to have melted through the inner containment vessels. 'Cold shutdown is an indication that the accident phase is over,' said Akira Tokuhiro, a professor of nuclear engineering at the University of Idaho in Idaho Falls, 'but the next phase of cleaning up will take more than 20 years.'

"During the plant tour, the bus kept moving at the most contaminated areas near the base of the reactors to limit the time there and, thus, the radiation exposure. As it did, a radiation detector on the bus jumped to 300 microsieverts per hour — high enough to reach the annual recommended maximum dosage in just over three hours."

One worker tells Fackler that the mood at the plant is "totally different now." Radiation levels aren't so high outside the buildings, but still high within the reactor buildings but not so high outside, though there are hotspots. In the only building within the plant where protective clothing is not needed, "visiting journalists passed through a series of rooms where teams of workers systematically cut off the layers of protective clothing with scissors. The discarding is done in stages to limit contamination; booties come off in one room, the full body suit in another," Fackler writes.

Click to read the full article, Devastation at Japan Site, Seen Up Close

today at Roppongi Hillzoo

2011-11-09T23:00:00.002+09:00

Only 46 days until Christmas!

I like my tea...pungent?

2011-11-06T20:46:00.003+09:00

Maybe the best worst product name yet belongs to this milk-tea beverage from Kirin, now available in convenient stores and vending machines

John, Paul, George and Ringo

2011-11-06T13:18:00.085+09:00

The Parrots performing at Abbey Road in Roppongi

Nowhere Man! Yellow Submarine! Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds! Hard Day's Night! Help!

These guys (pictured above) played all of those songs and more in five sets over four and a half hours at Abbey Road, a nightclub in Roppongi near Midtown, and they were amazing, just spot-on. The guy doing John, with his frizzy mad-scientist hair and dark specs, was absolutely brilliant, knocking it outta the park with "Happiness is a Warm Gun" and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." A baby-faced George - offstage nickname, "Bambino" - smiled a lot, charming the pants off us girls. Paul looked like a regular Japanese salaryman, but his "Let It Be" gave me chills. Ringo wasn't Ringo, but who could be?

The space isn't anything to get excited about -- we spent the evening seated with our friends around a small wooden table inches away from the next, ordering drinks and food, and forbidden to dance. You could sway a little, and clap of course -- and hold our heads and weep like those crazy fans from the early days, if we wanted to -- but how unsatisfying, especially when you hear the opening bars of yet another favorite. You wanna jump up! That's what you'd do if you were at a concert. This is more like dinner theater, with pitchers and good nachos (albeit a dainty, delicately arranged plate of them). I recommend the fish and chips.

An unexpected plus: usually when we go out at night in Tokyo, even though I don't smoke, my hair ends up smelling like an ashtray, but at Abbey Road, there's no smoking allowed while the band is playing - maybe to protect their vocal cords from the evil second-hand fumes? Whatever the reason, it works for me. No ashtray hair.

I suspect that the Parrots know every Beatles track ever recorded -- they perform at Abbey Road nearly every night of the week - and they do take requests. But no shouting out - you need to fill out a form and hand it to the waitress. The band didn't play many of the songs we asked for though. Not like the band we saw a couple times awhile back at the Cavern Club. Those guys played every tune on our list. (Helter Skelter! Glass Onion!) And like the Parrots, those guys were solid performers, all Beatles. They were also true impersonators, making more of an effort to mimic the personal styles and stage mannerisms of the original Fab Four. They even donned authentic band uniforms from Sgt. Pepper's the night they covered that album from beginning to end. (Lovely Rita! For the Benefit of Mr. Kite!) But the Cavern Club seems to have closed, or changed its theme, leaving Abbey Road to carry on solo. Or so it would seem. If anybody knows of another Tokyo hotspot of Beatlemania, please, share. In any case, Abbey Road will do just fine.

Abbey Road
Roppongi Building Annex B1
4-11-5, Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106-0032
information@abbeyroad.ne.jp
Tel 03 3402 0017
Cost is 2,100 per person, plus two-drink minimum and 15% service charge. The latest reservation you can make on Fridays and Saturdays is 7:30pm; we booked for 7pm on Saturday, and by the time the band came on at 7:30pm, the place was full. There were some empty tables during the last set, which ended shortly after midnight.

Omotesando Koffee

2011-11-04T17:45:00.000+09:00

This fantastic spot is almost too good to share. It's a tiny space, inside a traditional Japanese house down a side street in Jingumae north of Omotesando dori, with a lovely little outdoor garden seating area. I had the cappuccino, and a bit of baked custard, the sole food item available (trust me, it's all you need). Many thanks to Katy Dix (above) for introducing me. KT had seen this writeup about it in the FT, which, I should point out, calls the shop a "pop-up" that will change locations in January, but the owner told us today that it was staying put for now.

The cube of carmelized sugar (yummmm)

The interior is charming with its chandelier of paper notes and scribblings

Directions by bike or on foot: Head west (more like west-northwest) along the north side of Omotesando dori away from the Aoyama dori intersection and turn right after the United Colours of Benetton. Go to the end and follow the road as it curves to the left. When you reach "Yellow Ruby" at the next corner, turn right and head straight down that road another 2 short blocks or so and Omotesando Koffee will be on your left hand side, directly across from a vacant lot that's thick with weeds as high as your neck.

Omotesando Koffee
Address: 4-15-3 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku 150-0001
Tel: 03 5413 9422
Open 10 am to 7 pm

Toulouse-Lautrec in Marunouchi!

2011-11-03T21:44:00.002+09:00

Today was Culture Day in Japan, so Terry and I got our cult-cha on big time at the Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum, currently showing drawings and lithographs by late 19th-century Parisien painter Toulouse-Lautrec. There are write ups about it in both Tokyo Art Beat and the Japan Times, if you want details. I'll just say I highly recommend it. The exhibition runs through Dec. 25. The museum is located near the JR Tokyo station, address 2-6-2 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-0005. (We took the Hibiya metro line from Ebisu to the Hibiya station, exit B7).

A copy of one of T-L's most famous portraits, that of cabaret singer Aristide Bruant, happens to grace a building facade on 18th Street in Adams Morgan, in Washington DC. The Toulouse-Lautrec bar that occupied that building is no longer there -- the space has apparently been vacant for some time -- but the mural remains. Even though my friends and I, I won't say how many years ago, favored Millie & Al's across the street (cheapest pitcher of beer in town, but how did we eat that awful pizza??), Toulouse-Lautrec will always make me think of college.

but I'm not embarrassed...

2011-11-03T20:51:00.002+09:00

With apologies to any male readers, when a lady purchases anything categorized as a 'feminine hygiene' product here, store clerks typically wrap it in brown paper, or a separate opaque bag. Yesterday, Lawson's did me one better with a girlie polka-dot number. (My light bulbs, blank DVDs and rice crackers were placed inside a standard-issue white bag. Shut up, I forgot my eco-bags at home.)

So why the fuss? Am I supposed to be ashamed of my pantyliners?

Silly and unnecessary and old-fashioned as it seems, I shouldn't be surprised. There are particular ways of doing things here. There are standards to uphold. It wouldn't hurt us women to cultivate a bit of mystery now and then. There may be oversharing on Facebook and YouTube, but goshdarnit our unmentionables will remain hidden from view!

It does make sense given Japan's reputation for above-and-beyond customer service. The country ranked No. 1 on that score in a recent poll of 400 international travelers, reported in the Aug. 5, 2011, issue of the New York Times Magazine. Russia came in dead last out of 24 nations; also at the bottom of the heap were China and Mexico. U.S. took 7th place, England, 16th. They're not special-wrapping the maxipads over there, now, are they?

such workaholics

2011-11-01T22:58:00.000+09:00

We spent Day 3 of the boys' half-term holiday at KidZania, this insane place where children can pretend to be cooks, cops, barbers, surgeons, airline pilots, firefighters, manga artists, pizza chefs, photographers, even Coca-Cola bottlers. Grownups, mercifully, are not admitted into the various work/role-playing areas, which are all incredibly well-staffed. The moms did help the kids navigate the place a little, and did a fair amount of nudging when they seemed indecisive or otherwise at loose ends, but mainly we sat around talking and drinking coffee and occasionally taking pictures. The place is headache-inducing, with the cacophonous acoustics and dim lighting (as in most casinos, it's always dusk in Kidzania-land) but the boys absolutely loved it, and I can think of worse ways to occupy them for a day (like Tokyo Disney, with its endless lines - ugh).

Interestingly, KidZania started in Mexico City in 1999; the Tokyo franchise opened in 2006. There are KidZanias in Jakarta, Lisbon, Dubai and Seoul, and supposedly there will be KidZanias in the U.S. come 2013. Not sure if they all operate the same way, but the KidZania here is all about waiting in line, undergoing a thorough briefing of rules and procedures, donning uniforms (surgical caps are required under any headgear), etc. There's a lot of preparation before there's any action. And yet the kids don't seem to mind. In six hours, they managed to complete seven jobs.

Conor's dance card, nearly full:

Dylan, the cop

Conor, the cook

Conor, the barber

Lots of school groups were there that day

return to Ghibli

2011-10-22T21:33:00.001+09:00

The boys have been off school this past week, and with no family travel plans, we've been hitting our favorite spots in and around Tokyo. On the Monday, it was the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka. We've been to this place -- a wonderful homage to Hayao Miyazaki and his studio's animated works -- before, but that was a couple years ago, so it was nice to return for another view of the robot on the roof (a soldier from "Laputo: Castle in the Sky," see pic below). The kids were also happy to climb on the beloved cat bus (after queuing and being briefed by staff on the rules, of course), and throw plush soot sprites at each other. And who can ever get tired of looking at the zoetrope (spinning figures illuminated by strobe light as to appear animated) featuring characters from My Neighbor Totoro.

It's easy to combine a visit to Ghibli with a day out in Kichijoji. We took the Keio Inokashira express train from Shibuya so it took no time at all -- maybe 20 minutes -- and walked down Nanaibashi shopping street, a pleasant pedestrian friendly corridor, though we did not stop in any of the cute shops or cafes but instead bounded straight into Inokashira park.

Immediately, a sign to guide us

Get that chin up over that bar! Many thanks to Russell (straw hat) for getting us the Ghibli tickets. You have to buy them in advance, which you can do at any Lawson's convenient store; you're only admitted at your appointed time -- ours was 2pm -- but can stay until closing; the cost is 1000 yen for an adult, 400 yen per child. For more ticket info, click here.

The first thing you see when you reach the museum from the park side is a giant Totoro in a glass booth.

You have to climb a spiral staircase to reach the roof. A little girl we didn't know watched my friend's kid climb while my 9-year-old posed next to another fellow museum visitor whose boyfriend probably figured, might as well take it, these kids are never gonna get out of the picture!

Taking photographs is prohibited indoors, so it's amazing I was able to snap a sharp one, seeing as it was done on the sly, and with an iPhone, no less. (See Russell's cat bus pic, below, marred by haste and bad lighting. Sorry, R!)

This here cat bus -- a second one, big enough for adults to lounge in (no soot sprites to throw around, though) is part of a special exhibit going on right now. Read more about that on the museum's own website.

All in all a grand day out.

marvelous joe

2011-10-21T17:31:00.130+09:00

My friend Anna took me to this wonderful little coffee shop on Aoyama dori, in a nondescript building just north of the Omotesando crossing, east side of the street. (I would tell you more precisely how to get there if I could read the address on the meishi.) The man making the coffee (above) is the proprietor, Dai-Bo. A fastidious gentleman, he seemed genuinely pleased to see my friend, who frequents the place and can speak Japanese well enough to maintain lively chitchat with both the kohi master himself and the other customers.

Upon entering I felt like I had been let in on one of the best kept secrets in Japan. There is such a love affair with coffee going on in this joint, such commitment to serving a high-quality cup -- even before we arrived, we caught the smell of beans roasting from the street.

The coffee was served in charmingly mismatched ceramic bowls that reminded me of my visit to Sicily, when my grandmother's cousin served us some really strong Italian brew with lots of hot milk in the same kind of bowl every morning for breakfast.

If you order the set, you get coffee and dessert. That day it was cheesecake. In typical Japanese fashion, it was only faintly sweet.

Dai-Bo's is a cozy space that stays open into the evening. Whiskey also available.

There's a long shelf of books that runs the perimeter of the place, just below the ceiling. When we asked about them, Dai-Bo pulled down a hardcover about jazz musicians written by one of his regular customers -- the one and only Haruki Murakami, who, before he achieved world fame as a writer, ran a jazz club in Tokyo. The author's autograph was scribbled on the inside cover (how cool!). Dai-Bo then took out his scrapbook to show us a yellowed copy of a newspaper article about his shop that ran in the New York Times travel section, complete with a photograph of himself, when he was much younger, with a head of thick dark hair.

Anna, leading me in.

where you can stick it to the famous guy...?

2011-10-15T09:31:00.003+09:00

spotted in Udagawa-cho near Shibuya station

Smile, it's art!

2011-10-12T19:06:00.009+09:00

Sculptures by Ugo Rondinone, outside the Yokohama museum of art, now through Nov. 6:

Altogether, there are 12 heads currently keeping watch outside the museum, part of the Yokohama Triennale 2011 exhibition, "Our Magic Hour: How Much of the World Can We Know?" I went to see this show the other day with three other moms from the British School ("A Spaniard, an American, a Brit and a Norwegian board a train...") and we all thought it was worthwhile, if a bit puzzling in parts (that's ahht, for me at least).

We took the Tokyu-Toyoko line from Shibuya to Minatomirai, a few stops past Yokohama (where you can switch from an express to a local train if you're not already on one) and the museum is a short walk from there. The 12 works that make up Rondinone's "Moonrise" series, according to Art Agenda, were modeled in brown clay, then cast in aluminum and lacquered to match the color of the original material. Their surfaces are finger-stroked, mottled, soft to the touch. We couldn't help but push gently into the surface grooves with our fingertips before noticing the sign saying keep off - oops.

The rest of the show was a bit hit or miss for me. My favorite video work was a short film by Romanian artist Mircea Cantor called "Tracking Happiness," featuring seven women dressed in white, walking barefoot in sand, each silently sweeping away the footprints left by the person in front of them. It's shot from various angles and there's a certain pattern to their movements. We were all a bit mesmerized by it. Apparently it's a commentary on "the creation and revision of history, and the state of information in the computer age." (Audio tours available in English or Japanese.)

We hopped on a free shuttle bus to get to the second venue, BankART Studio NYK, a.k.a. NYK waterfront warehouse, near the Bashamichi metro station (where we later caught our train back to Shibuya -- it's about a half hour's journey).

In one room inside the warehouse you could relax on one of a half dozen upholstered sofas and watch a bit of "The Clock" by Christian Marclay, a 24 hr.-long film comprised of thousands of video clips (it won the Golden Lion prize at the Venice Biennale). Each segment makes some reference, specifically or obliquely, to time - a snatch of dialogue here ("You're late," "It's five to two") a wordless action sequence there (a stressed-out cowboy gets up to go to a window and pull back the curtains). Next there's an Italian family sitting around a table talking and eating dinner, a grandfather clock tick-ticking nearby. And on and on it goes, a continuous string of non-sequiturs culled from a variety of movies and television programs, old and new, obscure and mainstream, dramatic, comedic, in English and other languages. It's a video clock, telling time minute by minute, only the museum can only show the 11 am to 6pm portion (the hours it opens to the public). Glenn Close, in a scene from the 1994 American movie The Paper, looks at her wristwatch and complains about the way her skin "bunches." Spider-Man's boss warns him that if he doesn't deliver those pizzas in 9 minutes, he's out of a job -- cut to a wall clock showing 1:51 pm, and it's 1:51 pm in real life! You get the idea. What an enormous undertaking this must have been, to find all that footage and put it in order, with the timing just right...

Tickets to the Triennale cost 1,600 yen per adult and cover admission to both venues. You need at least 90 minutes at each place if you like to take your time at these sorts of things. You can grab a bite to eat in the cafe at the Yokohama Museum of Art's own cafe (I had the egg salad and tomato sandwich) or take advantage of the many restaurants in the Landmark Tower or nearby Queen's Towers. For 1,000 yen you can ride the superfast elevator up to Landmark's 69th floor "Sky Garden" observatory. Here's the view overlooking the Minato Mirai Shinko district and Cosmo World amusement park, with its giant ferris wheel:

Yokohama Triennale 2011 runs through Sunday, Nov. 6. For information including some useful maps, click here. For more information about that whole area, see Japan-Guide.com

the wrath of Typhoon Roke

2011-09-28T16:19:00.001+09:00

outside Shibuya station on Wednesday afternoon, September 21, 2011 (photo by Katy Dix)

From Time Out Tokyo

2011-09-27T17:04:00.007+09:00

Posted here on Sept 26, 2011

Sayonara, Center-Gai
Shibuya shopping street undergoes bizarre name change

Click here to the article on the Time Out website.

For decades, it's been a magnet for shoppers, after-work revellers and disaffected youth. But Center-Gai's final weekend of infamy is now behind it. The pedestrianised shopping street, which connects to Shibuya's famed scramble crossing, unveils its new name today – and it sounds more like a children's TV show from the 1970s.
Read more »

I needed a shot of those stripey socks

2011-09-24T18:06:00.005+09:00

Every so often there's a flea market in a large parking lot down the road from the Meiji Jingu baseball stadium in Kasumigaokamachi, in Shinjuku-ku. You can reserve a spot on the pavement for a couple thousand yen, so a friend of mine booked three spots, and a few of us spent the day selling old clothes, toys, books, random household items and electronics all donated by ourselves and some other friends. We were lucky to be across the aisle from a coffee truck and a few food vendors, and managed to unload heaps of stuff, while practicing the art of bargaining, which I am not good at and which is not usually done here in Japan (it's probably considered poor manners to argue over price). I tend to give in too quickly -- whatever it takes to get rid of that Toy Story puzzle or that large plush mallard duck, I say. But this over eagerness did not always serve me well - when one couple asked how much for the ginormous stuffed lion I practically screeched "200 yen!" and thrust it forward, prompting them to back away, slowly. (My friends at the other stall sold it later for 500 yen - they clearly have the gift.)

So why do we do this? All our proceeds (I think we earned in the neighborhood of 50,000 yen, all told, which ain't too shabby) will go to charity, though we haven't decided on a recipient yet. Last time we did it we gave money to a friend of a friend who was making regular runs up to Tohoku, buying and distributing fresh fruit and veg to those barely scraping by among the wreckage of the March 11 tsunami. Maybe this time it will go to an established NGO like Peace Boat. In any case it was a lot more fun than I thought it would be, and by the end of it we were giving lots of things away for free. These lucky customers (below) looked thrilled to score this plastic Pokemon toy, so in return I asked them to pose for a photo. I think we all know who got the better end of that deal.

jishuku

2011-09-21T14:02:00.008+09:00

illustration by David Labi for Metropolis

I lifted the following article (and the cartoon above) from Metropolis magazine, Issue No. 912. You can read it online at metropolis.co.jp by clicking here .

Sacrifice, Teamwork & Optimism
Noble restraint leaves no doubt of Japan's recovery
By Ben Humphreys, Sept. 16, 2011, Issue No. 912

During my seven years in Japan, one of the most interesting and unusual aspects of Japanese culture I experienced was that of jishuku.

Simply put, jishuku refers to the act of voluntary restraint or the use of moderation in one’s actions or activities. This typically occurs after a terrible event or occurrence, in particular when there has been loss of life or human suffering. In April 2005, in Hyogo Prefecture near Osaka, a seven-car commuter train derailed, killing 106 passengers and injuring over 550 others. In August, four months later, the annual fireworks festival held by the local city—usually drawing tens of thousands of spectators—was canceled out of this sense of self-control.

The March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami brought immeasurable devastation to the north east coast of Japan. In April, the usually festive and much revered season of hanami saw significantly fewer people out and about drinking and enjoying themselves during parties. Extravagant weddings were scaled back, travel plans canceled, and frivolous shopping trips abandoned.

But the most fascinating aspect of jishuku is that nobody is forced into it.
Read more »

don't lean on me

2011-09-19T13:02:00.008+09:00

Here's the latest from the current cute and cuddly Metro campaign. The series is no match for the cartoons of past years, IMHO, but I'll concede that these birds -- bearing the somewhat longwinded message, 'Please be careful not to lean against the person sitting next to you should you fall asleep' -- are pretty good. It's funny, because it really happens. Real life example:

from the archives: Terry and Conor on the JR Yamanote line, January 27, 2008

Several years' worth of instruction on mass transit etiquette, including signs featuring Clifford the Big Red Dog (see 2006), teddy bears and characters from Sesame Street (example below; 2005) can be viewed online. Here's Bert and Ernie, with Metro Manners Lesson 5:

'Hold your backpack in front of you.'

View from the Windsor House back stairwell

2011-09-16T11:13:00.002+09:00

iphone pic by Terry, taken Sept. 15, 2011 at 7:30pm Tokyo time. Click on the image for enlarged view.

from WSJ: 6 months later, rebuilding eludes town

2011-09-15T20:08:00.018+09:00

By Gordon Fairclough and Patrick Barta
The Wall Street Journal : ASIA
September 14, 2011
Click here to read the article on WSJ.com
RIKUZENTAKATA, Japan—Efforts have largely stalled to rebuild cities and towns along Japan's northeast coast that were smashed six months ago by a cataclysmic tsunami, as renewal efforts are crippled by political wrangling and the task's sheer complexity.

In Rikuzenatakata, where rampaging waves on March 11 carried off nearly one-tenth of the population and obliterated the downtown, the city center remains a desolate plain. Studding the landscape are the gutted concrete shells of City Hall, a hospital and other buildings.

Workers have pushed most of the splintered wood, tangled steel and other debris into piles several stories high. But there has been no real rebuilding in the low-lying areas that were once the heart of the community. It is unclear when such work will begin.

"Without a plan, we can't do anything," said Eiko Kanno, a 56-year-old housewife whose home, near one of Rikuzentakata's main fishing ports, was obliterated by the tsunami. Read more »

first course

2011-09-14T20:17:00.002+09:00

This is the tomato salad starter at Grill Tsubame in Ebisu, one of several restaurants on the 6th floor of the Atre mall above the JR station. The tomato is peeled (like a grape - unnecessary, but nice) and coated in ginger-carrot dressing. There is shredded daikon hiding underneath. Fancy fancy. Totally unexpected addition to, and the best part of, my straightforward grilled salmon with rice lunch special.

When we first moved here I thought I'd try to avoid eating in shopping malls but the truth is, when it's like Miami in August out there, and you're on your way to catch a train or just stepped off of one, these clean, spacious and air-conditioned dining halls can be very appealing.

Grill Tsubame

Atre Ebisu 6th Floor
1-5-5 Shibuya-ku, Japan
www.tsubame-grill.co.jp
Telephone: 03-5475-8429

from The New York Times

2011-09-13T13:51:00.006+09:00

'Civic Paralysis Seizes Tsunami-Stricken town Still in Shambles'
By Martin Fackler
September 12, 2011

MINAMISANRIKU, Japan — Six months after Japan’s deadly earthquake and tsunami, the naked steel frame of the former Disaster Management Center stands like a tombstone over the flattened field of weed-covered debris that was once this town’s center. People come from near and far to pray before the three-story structure, turning it into a shrine of sorts for the town officials who died here.

Amid the white flowers, smoldering incense and bottles of beer and whiskey left to comfort the dead, there are also signs of rancor. A long handwritten letter, laminated to shed the rain, criticizes the failure to tear down the structure as callous disregard for the families of those who perished.

“This thing should be destroyed right away,” demands the letter, which is signed by the father of a victim.

The people of northeastern Japan won global admiration for their stoic dignity and communal spirit after the disaster on March 11, which ravaged hundreds of miles of coast and left more than 20,000 people dead or missing and hundreds of thousands homeless. But these days, that unity is fraying amid frustration in remote towns, like this one, that feel left behind.

In some of the tsunami-stricken areas, particularly the more prosperous regions closer to the city of Sendai, the removal of millions of tons of debris is progressing rapidly. Large improvised disposal facilities are grinding up broken concrete and wood into landfill material for reconstruction. But in the poorer fishing regions farther north along the mountainous coastline, many towns have barely finished the first basic tasks of survival. Read more »

foxy

2011-09-12T12:51:00.003+09:00

some groovy wall art spotted near the Nakameguro canal

summer weekend in Minakami

2011-08-31T16:57:00.274+09:00

If you find yourself in Tokyo in late summer with high-energy adventurous kids to entertain and want to hightail it out of the city, you can't do much better than a weekend in Minakami. There are several outfits up there offering all sorts of activities, but we booked everything with Canyons, and you don't really need anybody else. We even stayed at Canyons' own Alpine lodge, which offers basic Japanese-style tatami rooms (shared baths down the hall), a communal kitchen and barbecue sites for self-catering, a cafe and bar. There's also a nearby swimming hole with rope-swing and a small campground next to the parking lot, if you'd rather pitch a tent and save a few bucks (not ideal but ok, friends say, if you can stand the sound of trains roaring past in the middle of the night). A half dozen other families we know were there the same weekend, not all doing the same activities at the same time, but all meeting up at the end of the day for drinks etc., and we had one big group barbecue, with each family bringing something to throw on the grill and a large salad or side to share.

The guys who run the Canyons operation really know what they are doing -- they know the area, they know the terrain - some of the most popular courses they created themselves. And they take every safety precaution. You bring a swimsuit, they provide the rest: wetsuits, life jackets, helmets, etc. Many Canyons guides are ski instructors during the winter.

From July to September, conditions on the Tone River are calm enough - Grade 1-2 rapids - for children to go whitewater rafting. That is, the rapids are grade 1-2. In Spring, they're grade 3-4, and you have to be at least 13 to participate.

suiting up at the base lodge

safety briefing

right before setting off down the river, with the Dix family

It was the last weekend in August, and the current was just swift enough (in parts) to keep things interesting. We had a few good thrills paddling through some rough patches, our guide steering from the rear and telling us when to pull our oars out of the water and just hold on...

Canyons' own photog took some great shots for us

my own pics, snapped from my seat in the second row of our raft

At several points along the way, we were able to climb out of our rafts and float downriver feet first, or climb onto the banks and up onto some rocks to jump back in.

Not everybody had the nerve to leap off from this one very high cliff; somehow I managed it but only because I was afraid I would fall if I tried to climb back down in my neoprene socks! Here's Terry and the boys in midair:

At the end of the course the guides flipped a raft over and let the kids bounce off it and into the water below..

On the Sunday we did the family-style canyoning, which was brilliant. It entails taking a ride up into the mountains and then hiking along forest trails until you reach a good point of entry, where rocks become water slides.

Our boys love water parks, so they were over the moon doing this. Canyons offers canyoning for grownups too, and Terry says it's similar, just more intense - more climbing, deeper, rougher waters, etc. Something the expat guys do when the wife and kids are away for the summer.
We were lucky to have Mike as our guide. (He's the one not wearing a yellow life jacket in the photo above). Originally from New Zealand, he's lived and worked in Japan for years - he's one of the guys who started the whole Canyons operation - and is fluent in Japanese. I kept wondering how he keeps his long ropey dreadlocks from catching on the rocks. He made a sculpture for us:

Logistics: Many of the families who spent this weekend in Minakami with us drove up from Tokyo, a 140 km or 2-hr journey up the Kanetsu Expressway. And they were glad to have their cars, to get out and explore the area a little. A few moms took their daughters to a co-ed outdoor onsen - pretty setting, lots of naked old men. A few of the families went kayaking, which they had to arrange separately, as Canyons doesn't offer it.

It's just as easy to take the train - we took a JR to Omiya and then a Shinkansen to Jomo-kogen station, which took less than 2 hrs, plus another half hour van ride to the lodge. One of the Canyons guides collected us at the station at no extra charge. Everything was arranged via email: canyons@english.jp

In addition to the rafting and the canyoning, we managed to fit in a half day of mountain biking with MTB Japan, also booked through Canyons. MTB provided the bikes, helmets and gloves; the instructors picked us up at the lodge and brought us back. We learned how to cycle down steps, up steep rocky slopes, down and around steep curvy trails covered in leaves that make you skid out. And I learned something else that day: that I'm a big chicken.

CANYONS Outdoor Adventure Experiences
TEL: 0278-72-2811 FAX: 0278-72-2812
Canyons Ltd., Japan
Tours & Lessons
Alpine Lodge
Canyons on Facebook

Canyons Minakami Base:
45 Yubiso, Minakami-machi, Tone-gun, Gunma-ken

P.S. As a bonus, there was a matsuri that weekend - most communities in Japan throw some sort of summer celebration, or harvest festival, with food, beer and sake stalls and revelers processing in yukata robes, headbands and and tabi sock-booties, beating on taiko drums, singing and/or dancing around. Mike, Mr. Canyons himself, drove a bunch of us lodgers out to the Minakami festivities in time to catch the fireworks:

Nadeshiko No. 1!

2011-07-19T09:16:00.002+09:00

I am thrilled that Japan's women's soccer team won the World Cup on Sunday. My mother was stunned that I would root against my own country, but Japan is my country too, and the Japanese needed something to celebrate after a spring from hell.

Yūshō omedetō !!!
Congratulations on the victory!

Image: AP

'Hope for a Radioactive-Free Future'

2011-07-17T12:00:00.001+09:00

UPDATE 11/15/11: Just read in the Oct 17 issue of The New Yorker that while sunflowers can leach some of the radiation out of contaminated soil, Japanese scientists have since concluded that those that were planted in former rice fields near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have had little effect.

Here's an interesting story by Matthew Battles in Fast Company...

A young Japanese entrepreneur is trying to convince people to sow sunflower seeds in Fukushima Prefecture, intending the plants to cleanse the soil of radioactive contamination. Project leader Shinji Handa has sold some 10,000 packets of sunflower seeds at 500 yen ($6) to people throughout Japan, ostensibly to produce seeds that will be sent to Fukushima to create a sunflower maze.

Given the scope of the Fukushima disaster, planting sunflowers may seem quixotic at best, but the principle behind it is sound. Many plants have evolved mechanisms to adapt to high levels of toxins and even radiation, taking up heavy metals and radioactive isotopes and sequestering them in disposable parts like stems and leaves. Scientists last year reported on several varieties of domestic plants, including sunflowers, that are thriving around Chernobyl, gradually reducing contamination levels in the soil...

Click here to read the rest.

about that beef

2011-07-13T22:50:00.002+09:00

Headline in the Wall Street Journal, Wednesday, July 13, p. A13:

"Tainted Beef Enters Japanese Food Supply"

The lede: "Japan grappled with a fresh radiation scare Tuesday, as authorities found that beef contaminated with radioactive cesium had been shipped to shops and restaurants throughout the country."

Uh, oh.

The story continues: "The beef, from six cattle raised on a farm near the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, registered radioactive-cesium levels up to seven times that permitted by Japanese food-safety standards. Some of the meat had already likely been eaten..."

Jeezus.

"Experts said the level was too low to create health problems in people who ate just one or two servings."

Oh, well, ok.

By the way: "Radioactive cesium emits gamma rays, which can damage cellular DNA and raise the risk of cancer."

Man.

"The levels found in the beef, though, would become a health concern only if a person ate large quantities every day for a year, said Shizuko Kakonuma, a researcher at Japan's National Institute of Radiological Sciences who sits on an independent committee investigating the Fukushima Daiichi accident."

And...exhale.

Still: "The government ought to increase its testing of cattle for radiation contamination..."

Hell, yeah!

The amazing Maru

2011-07-04T19:17:00.010+09:00

Last Friday Terry took me out for the best birthday dinner ever: modern kaiseki at Maru, a charming basement-level restaurant off Aoyama-dori, near the Omotesando crossing (same block as Las Chicas, but closer to the main road -- around the corner from Muji and Crocs). Very reasonably priced too.

a few of the dishes we had, all of them scrumptious:
fried lotus root, in a glaze of arum root, red peppers and soy (renkon no kinpira)

corn tempura (toumorokoshi no kakiage)

I think this is duck (kamorousu to nasu moriawase) or it might be the beef (kuroge wagyu isozuke sumiaburi)

chicken with spring onions in a citrus-soy sauce (jidori no tatsutaage negiponzu)

We also had shitake mushrooms stuffed with chopped shrimp cooked in a taijin pot (futami shitake to yasai tajin) and shrimp and summer vegetable croquettes with sweet miso (sakuraebi to okara korokke) -- not the best of the night but still tasty.

As for drinks...
Terry tried three kinds of sake while I worked my way through the umeshu menu.
I think the one of the left was my favorite. It tasted vaguely of apricots.

At the end of the evening our server pulled this fourth bottle of umeshu out from his special stash. It was also very good. I need to stop drinking the cheap stuff from the grocery store. These were so much better!

I always have my umeshu with rocks. Sometimes with a splash of soda if it's too syrupy-sweet but I didn't have that problem at this place.
why is the ice in Japan so good?

From The Japan Times' review:

Rakushokushu Maru

Location: Aoyama KT Building B1F, 5-50-8 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku
(03) 6418 5572

Open: Lunch: 11:30 a.m.-2 p.m. (Mon.-Fri.); dinner 6 p.m.-1 a.m. (Fri. 6 p.m.-2 a.m.; Sun. 6 p.m.-midnight)

It's the 1st of the month. Here's your $452, honeyI

2011-06-30T19:37:00.003+09:00

'Wives Tighten Purses on Japan's Salarymen'

According to a survey by Shinsei Financial Co., the average allowance given to Japanese salarymen by their wives-- who typically manage the family finances, including the husband's earnings -- is now a pitiful $15 a day, or 36,500 yen per month -- the lowest since 1982, Bloomberg reported in this article dated June 27, 2011. Economic growth in Japan has been stuck at less than 1% a year for the past 10 years, exacerbating deflation; wages are down since the March 11 earthquake/tsunami. Chances of a consumer-driven rebound? Slim.

Workers’ allowances peaked in 1990 at the height of the country’s asset and real-estate bubble, with men receiving a monthly 76,000 yen, more than double what they get today, according to the survey. Respondents in [the June 27] report said they spend the greatest proportion of the money on lunch, dispensing an average 490 yen.

That's a beef bowl at Yoshinoya. Or two cucumber rolls from a sidewalk sushi vendor. Or 4 sticks of yakitori from the Food Show.

It's a Coffee Jelly Frappuccino at Starbucks.

Read the story here.

free cake!

2011-06-30T18:42:00.004+09:00

This is what happens when you go to a neighborhood restaurant every other week, usually on a Tuesday or Thursday and always an hour earlier than most other patrons would dream of dining (so the place is empty aside from yourselves) over the course of 3+ years. Both the waiter-manager and the cook smile as if greeting old friends, and they start preparing the kids' usual -- fried chicken and margarita pizza. And when your child mentions that it's your birthday (technically it's tomorrow, but whatever), they go all out -- at the end of the meal, before bringing the check, they switch off the lights and, with candles ablaze, deliver a slide of roll cake with sliced strawberries and "Mommy" written in chocolate on the side of the plate. And then they sing. And the manager takes a picture with his own digital camera. And then asks for your email address. And then emails it to you within the hour. With a message that reads, "Thank you for coming every time!" and "We wish you a HAPPY LIFE!"

I love Japan. And I will absolutely keep going to La Boheme-Ebisu.

Usually it's just me and my two boys grabbing dinner at this place, but this time we had friends with us. Standing in the back, arm in arm: Ana and Pedro, recent arrivals from Brazil. Pedro's 3-yr-old brother was with us too, but he missed the photo...

photo of the day

2011-06-28T20:53:00.005+09:00

Spotted on Komazawa-dori, around 9 a.m. Tuesday, heading toward Ebisu. I have to say, it's really not as hard as you might think to pedal in high heels.

for PB&Js

2011-06-28T20:51:00.003+09:00

I've never before seen this "peanut cream" (left) but now it's available at the combini!

Mejiro shotengai

2011-06-28T20:04:00.006+09:00

I met up with Louisa the other day and we wandered up and down Mejiro's neighborhood shopping street, or shotengai (a term I can't believe took me three years to learn). We grabbed lunch, talked about books and trains and Tohoku, and while walking back to the JR train station, we passed a tatami shop. I didn't realize that underneath the mat's soft top layer of woven straw (onto which this guy is sewing a fabric border) there's a foam core between two boards of compressed wood chips (see lower right). Apparently this is how newer tatami are made; in the old days, the mat was made up of rice straw through and through.

Yakuza in Tohoku

2011-06-28T19:41:00.003+09:00

The most important thing is helping the weak. Duty and kindness are second. Then the third would be: don’t betray others.

– Matsuyama Shinichi, chairman of the Kyokuto-kai yakuza organisation, on what it means to be a yakuza member.

For the yakuza helping the relief effort, it’s partly about living up to the slogans they profess. It’s also about getting a stake in the reconstruction of Japan. Construction is big business.

– Tomohiko Suzuki, author of I’ve Met 1,200 Yakuza, investigative journalist and former editor of the yakuza fan magazine Jitsuwa Jidai Bull.

Read this fascinating story by Jake Adelstein, author of Tokyo Vice (which I swear I am going to read), about the role of organized crime (yakuza) in Japanese society, and the response by some of its members to the disaster in Tohoku. Think truck loads of food and supplies, delivered immediately and under cover of night...

It's in the Asia Literary Review, vol. 20, Summer 2011.

the boys after school

2011-06-21T18:39:00.004+09:00

Shibuya station, West bus terminal

Hiro-o, 1 chome

today's treat from the combini

2011-06-21T18:33:00.003+09:00

Purchase motivated solely by packaging.

Score! Something we actually like - caramels.

one of these things

2011-06-20T21:13:00.002+09:00

is not like the other...

Who can tell me what these things are? (Hint: my boys collect them and use them whilst doing homework.)

OK, that was an easy one. Now tell me which one isn't one of those things.

Bonus points for the person who reveals the unique problem these things present for an American parent whose kids attend the British School.

Go!

What IS the Red Cross doing?

2011-06-20T18:08:00.007+09:00

Here's a link to a pdf file from the Red Cross on some of the work they have done so far in the aftermath of the disaster. (When you click on the hyperlinked text above, the pdf file will immediately start downloading to your computer. It's a three-pager, a quick read, and gives a good synopsis but it's the two-month report so it's more than a month old.)

On June 10 the American Red Cross announced it was making another $46 million donation to the Japanese Red Cross, bringing its contributions to date to nearly $210 million.

According to the press release:

Three months on from the devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan’s northeast coastline ... the Red Cross remains focused on helping to improve living conditions for many of the 98,000 people remaining in evacuation centers - most of which are situated in the hardest hit prefectures of Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate. Japanese Red Cross employees and volunteers are providing a range of services for the evacuees and plans are underway to install washing machines, water tanks for hand washing, privacy partitions and televisions. “The physical and mental health of evacuees is of major concern, particularly where people are facing prolonged stays in centers,” said Alex Mahoney, disaster management expert with the American Red Cross. “Longer-term solutions to find more appropriate accommodation for people who have lost their homes are urgently needed.”

The Red Cross is supporting families moving into temporary housing units provided by the government, helping to restore a sense of normality in their lives. Home appliance packages, comprised of a washing machine, rice cooker, refrigerator, hot water dispenser, microwave and television, will be provided to more than 90,000 families with support from the American Red Cross.

The Red Cross is also increasing the number of caregivers and psychological support teams working in evacuation centers and nursing homes to address mental health issues, post traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety amongst survivors.

With major damage to health and care services, another priority is to support medical facilities, such as hospitals, clinics and care homes. In Ishinomaki, the Red Cross is planning to boost local health services by building and equipping temporary medical facilities. Specially-equipped beds are also being donated to existing nursing homes across three prefectures where many elderly people require special care.

To date, the Japanese Red Cross has sent approximately $1 billion to 15 municipalities charged with distributing cash grants to the survivors who have lost their homes, loved ones and livelihoods as a result of the tsunami.

Picture of the Day

2011-06-20T16:43:00.004+09:00

This is from Japan Today (and this is the link that will take you to the webpage)

A wrecked car is seen in Minamisanrikucho, Miyagi Prefecture. More than three months after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, people are still in dire need of assistance, say members of OGA for Aid, which has been in the field providing assistance daily based on the motto “no person left behind.”

I met the people of O.G.A. who are busting their butts to help the people of Minamisanriku a couple weeks ago, when I was in Sendai. They made a presentation about their mission and the state of things there, about how the people of this town still aren't getting what they need three months on, and described some of the difficulties and frustrations of relief work. And this is just one town - one that was completely flattened by the tsunami. As of June 1 there were still 9,500 living in shelters (more than half the pre-March 11 population). Click here to read more about this startup NPO and to see the latest needs list. The organization has a Facebook page too.

the choice up north: stay home or eat

2011-06-20T10:23:00.007+09:00

This story posted June 18 by the UK's Daily Mail echoes some of the things I've heard first-hand from people I know who've been up to Tohoku and have seen for themselves what's going on up there. And it ain't good.

According to the article: "With unemployment running at 90 per cent, the needy are starting to revolt. One third of families are refusing to move to temporary housing, opting to remain in shelters to hang on to their precious food benefits. Sixty per cent of the 28,000 temporary homes remain unoccupied. A staggering 90,000 people remain in shelters."

And: "The worst affected may prove to be those who lost nothing in the way of homes or relatives. They may have no running water, no money, no employment. But when compensation is finally awarded, they will be entitled to nothing" because they will not qualify as "victims."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk

When I first read the headling I thought the story would be about the people in the devastated areas, turning on each other, that that would be the "proof" that Japanese 'wa' or harmony was a myth, but apparently it is the government that is failing the people, not doing their jobs, not acting quickly or capably to minimize suffering and get recovery going. There are plenty of examples of people helping each other get by, taking neighbors in, etc., so I think there is still some 'wa' on that level. Take the woman in the story Chieko Miura, 62, who has 12 evacuees still living with her in her home on a hilltop just north of Minamisanriku. If that's not wa...

tourism 'takes a nose dive'

2011-06-15T09:00:00.004+09:00

JAPAN STRUGGLES TO ATTRACT TOURISTS

By Chico Harlan
June 15, 2011

TOKYO — Beth Reiber, the freelance writer responsible for the set of Frommer’s guidebooks on Japan, felt lucky just to get on the plane. Her editors had canceled plans to publish a Tokyo guidebook for 2012, thinking it didn’t make sense to spend all that money to publish a book that nobody would buy.

But Reiber pushed back and gave them the same message that Japan is struggling to give the world: Tokyo remains radiation-free and just as safe as always.

The plane from Minneapolis to Tokyo was “packed,” Reiber said, “and I was thinking, ‘That’s great. People are coming to Japan.’ Then we arrived at Narita [airport in Tokyo], and about 30 people got off the plane. The rest went on to Vietnam.”

Although the triple catastrophe of three months ago caused its most acute damage along Japan’s northeastern coast, it changed the image of the entire country, with millions across the globe following the news and concluding that one of the world’s safest nations was no longer so.

Much of this is founded on misperception: A region was battered, not all of Japan. But the March 11 disaster has dealt a severe blow to a tourism industry the nation had been counting on to help offset static domestic consumer demand due to a shrinking population. Tourism and its secondary industries contributed 5.3 percent to Japan’s gross domestic product and accounted for 4.3 million jobs in 2008, the most recent year for which data are available, according to the government-run Japan Tourism Agency.

Now, when Japanese officials speak about a brisk recovery powered by necessary reconstruction spending, they acknowledge that the tourism industry could face a particularly long-term setback amid lingering fears about radiation, food safety and the possibility of future quakes.

“Everybody else in the world thinks Japan is saturated with radiation,” said Zensuke Suzuki, an international travel executive at the Japan Tourism Agency. “And we can try to convince people otherwise, but whatever Japan itself says, people won’t really trust.”

Amid the ongoing nuclear crisis, Japanese travel officials have not tried to calculate the effect on foreign tourism. But eventually they will promote not just Tokyo but also major cities such as Kyoto and Osaka that are farther from the disaster zone. They will also promote travel to the tsunami-battered Tohoku region, in the hopes that tourism can boost its ailing economy.

Radiation fears

Japan’s travel agencies used to base their campaigns on postcard images: geishas, white-capped mountains, plates of sushi. Buses docked every afternoon along the main shopping streets in Tokyo’s ritzy Ginza district, depositing Chinese tourists who thronged department stores that had signs in Mandarin and ATMs from Beijing-based banks. The Japanese government designated 2011 as a benchmark year for tourism, hoping for the first time to exceed 10 million international travelers.

Now, the Japan National Tourism Organization posts radiation levels from around the world on its Web site. (Most days, Seoul has twice the background radiation that Tokyo does.) In April, the number of tourists visiting Japan was down 62.5 percent from the same month last year, and a comparable decline was expected for May, though statistics have not been released. Airlines have slashed flights. Small-hotel owners fear for their businesses. New York’s Metropolitan Opera came recently to Japan for a three-week tour, but two of its superstar singers backed out at the last moment because of radiation concerns.

For celebrities who do come to Japan, their mere arrival sometimes doubles as a sign of solidarity and hope. Despite reported fears among his crew members, pop star Justin Bieber kept his plans for two Japan shows, in Osaka and Tokyo. “Like I said . . . we are going to JAPAN! #supportjapan,” he tweeted May 8. Ten days later, he was at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, posing for photos with nine schoolchildren from Tohoku.

“Justin, I just want to tell you how much we admire you and appreciate you coming here to Japan,” U.S. Ambassador John V. Roos told the singer. “You’re a very special young man, sending a message to the entire world.”

In a way, Japan is depending on outsiders — celebrities, travel writers and government officials — to reassure foreigners. The United States recommends that its citizens avoid travel within a 50-mile radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, but on May 16 it relaxed the restriction slightly, advising that people could safely use the bullet-train line and the Tohoku expressway, which cut through the no-go zone.

When Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak visited the Daiichi facility last month during a trilateral summit, they ate locally grown cherries and cucumbers, and both pledged to help Japan’s tourism industry recover. A week later, a 100-member delegation of Chinese travel officials visited Japan.

“Having [Wen] come, that has had an enormous effect,” said Shinya Kurosawa, an executive at JTB, the largest travel agency in Japan. “But nothing will improve drastically overnight. There hasn’t been any proof to say that there has been an end to the radiation danger, and that has a lot of impact on the consumer psychology.”

Few foreign faces

For Reiber, the travel writer, this latest trip to Japan has underscored the depth of that impact. Every day, she picks a neighborhood, touring hotel rooms, double-checking restaurant menus, asking about operating hours. On her first day, in Tokyo’s Ueno neighborhood, she saw “four foreigners total.” When she visited one branch of the Sakura guesthouse, a worker there said it was catering to a domestic clientele and offering cheaper prices.

Reiber has been coming here for almost 30 years, starting in 1983 — Japan’s economic-powerhouse years, when the country didn’t need tourists and didn’t try to get them. After spending several months here in 2009, compiling the 10th edition of the Frommer’s Japan travel guidebook, she wrote about the way in which the nation’s recession had forced the beginning of the tourist industry. She wrote about 100-yen stores and lunch deals at upscale restaurants. She wrote that “virtually every prefecture” is “trying to figure out how to lure more international travelers.”

On Monday, Reiber spent several hours walking through the Akasaka area, a salaryman-friendly neighborhood of office buildings and lunchtime eating spots. At the exclusive Hotel Okura, a luxury spot for foreigners, she asked whether the hotel was still offering its afternoon tea service and free shuttle bus. Reiber took notes.

“International guests — do you have fewer now?” Reiber asked.

“It’s half of what it was,” one employee told her.

“Is it getting better?”

“Yes. Slowly.”

A few hours later, Reiber talked about the ways in which Tokyo feels dimmer, cheaper, more homogenous. She still isn’t sure how her Frommer’s guide will address radiation concerns. Until a few years ago, she said, the guidebook included an entry for the Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s free museum, an eight-floor center with displays about energy history and the safety of nuclear power. She said she eventually deleted the entry, because the museum appeared like a shameless company advertisement.

The museum closed May 31.

Special correspondent Akiko Yamamoto contributed to this report.

If you want to see photos...

2011-06-14T19:34:00.004+09:00

You can click here to see my Flickr album, but my snaps are nothing compared to the talented work of two pros, Dee & Tracey from 37 Frames. (There are a few great shots in my album but they are the ones that I "borrowed" from fellow volunteers who shared their pics with me on Facebook. It's not theft, it's a tribute!)

Dee & Tracey's brilliant shots, which you can view here on their blog, show in living color the condition of northeast Japan after the Great Tohoku earthquake/tsunami of March 11. They have driven relief supplies up to the area a few times already and so have several photo-driven journals posted over the last three months. In "Black Mouth," an account of their first trip up to Ishinomaki posted March 29, they wrote something that sort sums up how I justified my own recent weekend up there with a group of mainly Western businesspeople ("Get Your Hands Dirty" program organized by ACCJ): "All we can do is make a difference on a human level. Try and help, assist, listen to one person. Touch one. If we could all affect this, volunteer even for a day, reach out to just one person then collectively tides of survival give way to those of recovery and life beyond."

This follow-up was posted on April 19, after their second visit: "[In] downtown Ishinomaki ... the big white boat on the corner now doesn’t wait to cross the road. The dramatically parked red fishing vessel is also gone, the streets a little bit clearer, change certainly occurring here." When I walked through the downtown area with my group on June 5, most storefronts were still dark, but a school uniform shop was open for business and you could see through the front windows that it was stocked with merchandise. An izakaya was functioning as a kitchen for Peace Boat's food service for the people in nearby shelters. But signs of life (economic and otherwise) were few and far between. And the waterfront was flat, bleak, a mess.

Click here to see some more of Dee & Tracey's astonishing photographs, so beautifully rendered. I should've linked to them ages ago.

the holdup

2011-06-13T21:17:00.001+09:00

From the blog Foreign Volunteers Japan, posted June 10 (reprinted from Yomiuri Daily newspaper):

Less than half of the more than 80 billion yen in disaster-relief donations already sent to prefectures affected by the March 11 quake and tsunami has reached the hands of people waiting for urgently needed cash to rebuild their shattered lives.

To be paid, a person needs a disaster victim certificate. To get a certificate, one must undergo an inspection. The problem is that there is not enough staff to handle the issuing of the certificates, which has severely slowed up distribution of the donation money.

Click here to read the full article. (Foreign Volunteers Japan is also a Facebook Group. And here's a link to its Ongoing Volunteer Opportunities page. There are so many organizations out there striving to help fix the unfixable. )

Facts and figures:
Municipalities in Miyagi prefecture have paid out just 28% of the 33.1 billion yen they've received in donations; in Fukushima, the rate is higher: 61% of the 35 billion yen received has been distributed. In Iwate prefecture, 47% of 10.2 billion yen has gone out to victims.

This is interesting: If your house was completely destroyed, you get 350,000 yen. Partial damage, either by tsunami or fire: 180,000 yen.

But there's another issue in all this. It's my understanding from Peace Boat that local governments at least in Miyagi prefecture have yet to determine whether certain areas should be rebuilt. Those residents who receive their compensation and move forward with reconstruction without awaiting official word on this could end up being told to relocate, their streets declared unsafe. How long can people wait? Not just for the money, but to find out the fate of their neighborhoods?

It's a fair question. But rebuilding in the same spot that got swept away with the March 11 tsunami seems, well shortsighted. But it wouldn't be the first time. This Japan Times article looks at several communities that refused to leave low-lying areas despite previous wipe-outs. Yoshihama in Iwate prefecture was an exception -- only four houses were lost and only one person died on March 11, because the town had relocated its homes to higher ground after the devastating tsunami of 1896. For other towns it took a double whammy -- 1896 and again in 1933 -- to convince people to consider moving. According to the article, in those other towns the fishermen were inclined to prioritize convenience over an uncertain threat, and so they returned to resettle again on lower ground close to the sea. Then others would follow the fishermen's lead.

At a party the other night I was talking to someone (who's in a position to know about these things) about the frustrations of assisting with the relief and recovery efforts, and he said that this resistance to leave the coast will not change even now. The fisherman from these small towns on the Tohoku coast simply do not want to live away from where their boats are docked.

Another thing this guy said: without qualification, the Japanese government has failed the people of Tohoku "on every level," in the way they've responded (or not) to the events of three months ago. The best way for somebody to help out is not to go through "proper channels" but to find out what is needed in a particular place (by talking to somebody who's on the ground, officially or not), to acquire those things, and then to drive them up north and hand them out yourself. My friend Lisa, along with her husband and some friends, did exactly that last weekend. Here is a photo of her after one of her supermarket runs:

I was skeptical of these kinds of rogue relief operations but I'm not anymore. I should point out that Lisa knows somebody who'd been living in the area for three months who could direct and guide her. I still think that's important, to have contacts like that. Avoid the red tape, play the gaijin card.

I just wish I had a car. And a license to drive in Japan. And kids who could fend for themselves, or a full time nanny.

Big Blue, we like your style

2011-06-13T17:02:00.003+09:00

Watch Peace Boat volunteers from IBM hoist bags of contaminated soil that our crew had just dug out of a small park:

Shot June 3, 2011, in Ishinomaki, Miyagi prefecture

what June looks like

2011-06-11T23:59:00.001+09:00

Three months after 3/11, Tokyo still feels different and yet is very much the same. Take the hydrangeas, which always seem to sprout up everywhere this time of year, in the parks, on the side of the road, in pots outside doorways, wherever there is a bit of landscaping or spot of green, like so many mini cheerleader pom-poms.

Have always loved this lumpy stone lantern, which anchors the north end of Ebisu Prime Square, the bricked plaza up the stairs from the Lawson's and the Dexy Diner and the fountain, and right across the street from our building where most weekday afternoons a group of dogs and their owners get together for a playdate.

Go Team 2!

2011-06-09T20:47:00.012+09:00

Louisa and me. I was lucky to have her on my team in Ishinomaki last weekend. Those two-hour bus rides out to Peace Boat's base camp passed very quickly when we were seated next to each other.

A few days after we had returned to Tokyo, she emailed this to me: "I'm looking out my window at the incredible clutter of buildings and antennae and water towers, lightning rods, ventilation ductwork, water pipes, air conditioners, all chockablock (great Tokyo landscape). There are four guys out there on assorted roofs, dressed kind of like you in the picture (above)! I love this view and how I can see, on the exteriors of the buildings, how all the innards work. But it was another thing to see the innards inside out, so to speak, banged up and shredded, and to think of them as, well, dead."

Here's all of Team 2 (there were six teams of 7 total) at the end of our second work day, posing in front of the heap of trash bags we had spent the last several hours filling with toxic gutter slime and contaminated soil from somebody's yard (two other teams worked with us on this).
From right to left: The corporate trainer (Miyuki, Japanese), the Japanese translator (Brendan, American), the seasoned Peace Boat volunteer (Kenta, Japanese, assigned to make sure we didn't hurt ourselves, I imagine - see previous post), the construction firm exec (Adrian, Australian), the business school professor and organizer of this whole weekend (Tish, American), the history professor (Louisa, American), the writer (me, American), and the recruiter (Tomoyo, Japanese). Love all you guys.

And here's the whole lot of us:
It looks like Yoshioka-san, Peace Boat's founding director (front row, second from left, with Kenta sitting to his right) is holding up my chin with his thumb.

Click here to see more photos on Flickr.

Teyandei in Nishi-Azabu

2011-06-09T14:32:00.004+09:00

Here's a great place to eat, not that expensive, and they get extra points for having a waiter on staff who happened to be standing outside when I arrived, saw that I did not have a lock for my bike, and so went inside to get one for me and then tied my front wheel to a pole himself. It was a combination lock so he had to unlock it upon my departure as well. (He had to come outside anyway to tell our group to hush as we were talking quite loudly and disturbing the neighbors.)

Our set menu consisted of some sesame tofu, a bit of unagi-tamago roll and pickled veg to start, fried yams with lemon and fresh cabbage leaves and a tasty dip, assorted sashimi, pork dumpling soup with a delightfully crunch chili-oil (we think the crispy bits were toasted garlic), onigiri, and for dessert, a slab of lovely vanilla ice cream inside a round of maple-sweetened crusty bread (unexpected, and delicious).

How to get there: if you are traveling along Roppongi dori, away from Shibuya station, turn left down a quiet narrow street (it's actually two one-way roads -- follow the direction of the traffic) a few meters shy of Gaein-nishi-dori (if you get to the big Gonpachi on the opposite corner, across the intersection, you've gone too far).

Once you've turned off Roppongi dori, continue along for a few minutes; the road will curve slightly to the left but you're basically staying straight. The restaurant will be on your left-hand side, in a two-story converted private house on the corner. Not much signage, just a small paper lantern and tasteful bamboo decorating the outside. Look for the signpost announcing that you are at 2-20 Nishi Azabu (address is 2-20-1).

I think the Bento.com review sums it up well:

This is a comfortable neighborhood izakaya that serves terrific food. ...with decor that veers toward the traditional end of the scale. Traditional, but never stuffy - the friendly, upbeat staff set the tone, and their enthusiastic shouts and the celebratory sounds from the upstairs party space create a lively auditory backdrop.

tenderfoot

2011-06-09T14:19:00.007+09:00

I've seen a lot of dolled-up dogs over the last 3+ years, but nothing that comes close to this.

Check out the kicks:

Here's a closeup of the front legs and paws

Now the hindleg view

This Sunday: Peace Boat info session

2011-06-08T12:00:00.004+09:00

Just pulled this straight off the Peace Boat website:

Peace Boat will hold an event on June 12 (Sunday) to report on its activities in Ishinomaki in the three months following the devastating earthquake and tsunami of March 11.

Yamamoto “Jr” Takashi, Peace Boat executive committee member who was one of the first on the scene in Ishinomaki to set the foundations for the relief and recovery efforts, will come to Tokyo from Ishinomaki to report about the situation. Other panelists will include musician SUGIZO who participated as a volunteer in Ishinomaki, Libyan student Adel Suliman who has acted as coordinator of many volunteers in the field, and other international volunteers and coorporate representatives. The second half of the event will be an information session for people considering volunteering in the affected areas in June or July.

Date: June 12, 2011 (Sun)
Part 1: 2 pm – 3:30 pm; Part 2: 4 pm – 6 pm
Venue: JICA Global Plaza
Bookings: Peace Boat Disaster Volunteer Centre
TEL: 03-3363-7967 (10:00-19:00, closed Sundays and public holidays)

Visit the Japanese homepage for full details about this event here.

Note: We are still confirming if English interpretation will be available on the day, please check again later for details.

[Editor's note: If you can not speak Japanese you must go up for an entire week, an the orientation is mandatory. No shorter stints available unless you bring a bilingual friend, according to my friend Kathleen who tried to sign up for three days.]

the comedown

2011-06-08T09:37:00.015+09:00

I'm back in my nice Tokyo apartment, feeling like a very lucky human being with my safe, healthy family, modern appliances and a kitchen full of food, electricity and wi-fi and functioning washlets, restaurants and shops and the dry cleaner down the road all open for business, trains and buses and taxis at my disposal. The big city, a world away from the Tohoku disaster zone, is getting on with things. The boys are in school, so the apartment is quiet and I am sitting at my computer and thinking about last weekend, its purpose, how to use it as a jumping off point to do some more volunteer work. The kinds of things I'd like to do, I can't do, because they require running away from home and abandoning the spouse and offspring. Oh to be unattached and between jobs... wait, I don't really want to be that, just sayin'.

This is Kenta, fellow gutter-worker (we took turns shoveling the slimy black stuff and holding a bag open so the other could drop it in -- eeeyewww). You can see the concrete covers resting there like fallen dominos, which the bigger/stronger members of our team removed and placed to the side so we could get into the muck. But to the left are some pieces of plastic and slate and glass covered in all that black gunk that were stuffed into the gutter as well. We had to pry those out with a crowbar (well, Kenta did that while I watched and admired his skills).

This was one of Kenta's last days volunteering with Peace Boat. He had spent the last month camping in a tent on Ishinomaki Senshu University grounds like so many other volunteers. He turned up shortly after quitting his job, which he said he was planning to do anyway, before March 11, to bike around Japan. (He has since postponed that trip). Kenta joined our group as a seasoned hand, and I was lucky to work with him on that second day of our 3-day tour.

On Sunday we did not work, but instead went to see some of the other things Peace Boat has going on in Ishinomaki, and then out to the more severely devastated areas along the coast. And for that, there are no words. Well yes there are words, such as, obliterated and astonishing and incredibly sad. Japan's Self-Defense forces are still looking for bodies in the rubble here. There is no rebuilding happening, and no word about when it might start. In these hardest-hit areas (we were in Miyagi prefecture but the tsunami also destroyed parts of Iwate, to the north, and Fukushima to the south), the local government hasn't decided where it should allow people to rebuild, where it will be safe to rebuild. Survivors are in limbo.

The stench in Ishinomaki's coastal Minato-ku is ghastly -- a lethal combination of sewage, rot and decay, I imagine, more potent than the gutters we cleaned (you had to bend down and get close to that gutter sludge to smell it, while here a face mask isn't enough). At least in the neighborhood where we were working, a few kilometers inland, many of the houses are still standing (if partially structurally damaged) and the roads are clear for vehicles to get through. We saw one car wedged between two small apartment buildings and another stuck in a tree. We saw piles of trash and a couch near a boat in a dirt lot. But there's just no comparison.

Earlier in the day we stopped at the base for a glimpse at part of Peace Boat's takidashi (emergency feeding) operation -- an izakaya in Ishinomaki city where volunteers cook the food that is then picked up by delivery van and taken to nearby evacuation centers, three times a day. Our group gathered in a small upstairs tatami room (sleeping quarters for some of Peace Boat's volunteers) for a look at the area map they had tacked up onto the wall. "Junior" Yamamoto -- Peace Boat founding director Yoshioka-san's right-hand man up there -- pointed out the fishing village we would later be taken through, including Onagawa, which must have been one stunning little coastal town right on the coast surrounded by green forests and beautiful mountains.

Yoshioka-san -- who spent most of the day with us -- told us that once survivors move into temporary housing, which is already starting to happen, they are no longer eligible to receive these hot meals they're providing at the centers because, the thinking goes, they will then have their own kitchens in which to cook for themselves. Trouble is, most don't have cars anymore (as they were all washed away and busted up by the tsunami) so can't get to a supermarket (the few and far between that are actually open and stocked) and anyway they have little funds with which to buy any food, because there are no jobs so there's no income. Doesn't give much incentive to leave the evacuation center. Yoshioka-san said he was thinking of starting up a food-delivery service to the new homes, much like the 'Meals on Wheels' program in the U.S. that brings food to poor house-bound elderly. He just needs the money and the manpower and the vehicles....

It is quite discouraging to see all that is needed up there, the enormity of it all. But also inspiring to see those who are working their tail off to get relief and recovery efforts going. There are Peace Boat volunteers who are living there, without pay, working day after day, week after week, month after month and sleeping on factory warehouse floors or in tents in a field, like my new friend Kenta. Not that our group didn't work hard, but we were in and out in three days and had private cozy hotel rooms and hot showers, electrical outlets in which to plug in our iphones, a 7-Eleven down the street and an izakaya around the corner. (Sendai city proper did not experience the effects of the March 11 quake.) We took the bullet train there and traveled locally by luxury coach. At least we gave the Chisun business hotel in Sendai some solid business. And I'm sure the izakaya that a dozen of us kept open late on Saturday night appreciated our bloated bar bill. So our presence was a not insignificant infusion into the local economy. Oh and we were told that the money we paid to go on the trip included a 15,000 yen donation to Peace Boat, so there's that as well.

Since I've been back I've been thinking what else I could possibly do, from Tokyo and during school hours. Lots of people on our trip said they hoped to return to Ishinomaki with a whole bus load of colleagues, which is good, because fewer folks are heading up there these days that did in the weeks immediately following the catastrophe. Numbers peaked during Golden Week, when there were three national holidays in a row (so volunteers needed only take two vacation days in order to spend 8 straight days pitching in). But there's been a dramatic drop since then, and student volunteers are not expected until the summer holidays (late July-August).

But Tohoku needs more than just day laborers clearing debris out of public parks and people's yards and taking toxic slime out of street gutters. They also need people to help with the big-picture stuff, like getting the fishing industry back on its feet, and local businesses up and running again. Question is how, where, who, how. They need international corporations with expertise and resources. How to make those connections and get that stuff going? I'm out of my depth here but maybe there's a small role for me to play, if only to write something that someone else reads and then decides to take action. So I am looking at ways to do that.

ok, a tiny dent

2011-06-04T17:33:00.005+09:00

I am on the bus heading back to the hotel in Sendai at the end of day two volunteering for Peace Boat in Ishinomaki. Thinking we did a good job. My team shoveled a lot of inky black sludge today, some of the nastiest shit I have ever seen, a malodorous blend of what looked like motor oil and smelled like fertilizer (probably run off from nearby factories that had been destroyed), with regular old dirt and the random item mixed in- squares of kitchen floor tile, a ceramic cup, a door handle. This toxic stew is clogging street gutters all over town. It took a dozen of us 5 or 6 hours to dig out a 100-yard or so section running in front of a single two story house (standing) and detached garage (gutted). There was a sidelined Harley and busted piano at one end, field of debris at the other.

When the the last bag had been wheelbarrowed out to the collection heap, when the guys had put the last concrete cover plate down over what had become a slowly moving river of filth, it felt like a triumph. It was watery and it was flowing. Maybe a miniscule achievement in the grand scheme of things, but it was something.

in Sendai

2011-06-02T23:03:00.004+09:00

We're all checked in at the Chisun Hotel in Sendai. I am in a single room with bath and mini fridge and electric kettle so in the morning I will be able to drink the instant coffee that I brought from home. I am happy about this.

Got to know the members of my team during the 2-hr shinkansen trip up from Tokyo. A couple of them said they felt apprehensive, not about their personal safety, but about how much they will really get to do. There is concern that they won't do enough, that their contribution won't be meaningful.

We've each been given rubber work gloves and cotton liners, and face masks to keep us from breathing in dust, but it's supposed to rain tomorrow so maybe that won't be an issue. We're to report to the lobby at 6 am. We will go to Ishinomaki by bus- about an hour away. At 7:30 am we will join other Peace Boat volunteers for the morning exercises, and then, I presume, we'll get our assignments.

I should get to sleep but I am too keyed up.

making a dent

2011-06-01T22:00:00.006+09:00

Many people I know here in Tokyo have a strong urge to jump in the car and drive up to the devastated areas with a carload of kitchen appliances or donated bicycles or other items that can help displaced persons restart their lives. Some have already done so. I say go for it -- as long as you've made contact with somebody who's there and knows what's needed and can guide you and help you stay safe. With 200 km of northeast coastline destroyed and 27,000 dead or missing, I imagine the relief orgs could use all the help they can get. The March 11 tsunami submerged 443 square km of coastal areas (!), sweeping across cities, villages, farmland. A half million people displaced! It's said to be the worst humanitarian disaster since WWII.*

Not having a car of my own, or much ability to read/write/speak or understand Japanese, I lack the means to go rogue -- I also don't have the guts. (Oh, and I've got two young children to look after, besides.) The only way for me to physically help out is to go with a group, for a limited time, under the supervision of an organization already working in the affected areas. Which is what I'm doing this weekend while Terry stays home with the kids. I'll be traveling up to Sendai then on to Ishinomaki, in Miyagi prefecture (one of the worst affected areas) along with 40 or so other volunteers, mainly young professionals who responded to a call from the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan (ACCJ). Each of us attended the required orientation and paid 88,000 yen to cover train fare, bus transport, hotel stay, meals, insurance, supplies and a donation. (For 35,000 yen you could sleep on a factory warehouse floor; for 115,000 yen, you sleep at the Westin.)

ACCJ has arranged for us to work under the supervision of Peace Boat, an NGO working with the Japanese Self-Defense Forces. They've brought 2,000 volunteers into the area to date -- all of whom, it's worth mentioning, returned unharmed, according to Yoshioka Tatsuya, the founding director. (This guy made one helluva presentation at the orientation last week, which I'll recount in more detail later. For now I'll just say that during the safety briefing/warning portion of that evening, after somebody shared that there had been some 120 volunteers deaths reported -- folks falling off a roof or being hit on the head by falling debris, that sort of thing -- Yoshioka-san reassured us that none of these unlucky souls had been working for Peace Boat.)

The ACCJ contingent has been grouped into teams of six, each with a bilingual leader; we are to wear waterproof jackets and pants and knee-high rubber boots (I got all three at D2 for less than 6,000 yen) and hardhats (provided); towels to help sop up the sweat, and a bandanna on hand should anybody need a tourniquet (to quote the packing list).

We will be cleaning up people's homes and shoveling mud. This is the manual labor phase of the recovery -- soon efforts will turn toward resuscitating businesses and local governments. Yoshioka-san told us at the orientation that by wiping dirt off someone's family photo album, or scrubbing a kitchen floor, or making a living room inhabitable again, we will help restore some hope and dignity to those who lost both on 3/11. I want to believe him. I'm just one person, and I'm probably not strong enough to carry one end of a rolled-up, ruined tatami mat out to the trash heap, but I can do other things, and so I am going to go and do what I can do. Wish me luck.

An article about the ACCJ program ran today in The Japan Times. Click here to read it.

*Source: Peace Boat report entitled 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Emergency Relief Operation

Wonky

2011-05-26T08:40:00.005+09:00

I discovered this website when somebody who calls himself Goemon commented on my "Super Cool Biz" post and included a link about chilled undergarments:

Tofugu. It's fun, it's light, it's a mixed bag of observations about Japanese culture, plus jokey advice on learning the language. While digging around in the archives, I came upon this little gem, about a Holographic Vocaloid Rock Star (filed under In Japan/Characters). Particularly handy: Japanese Cheatsheet for Travelers.

I love the Tofugu name and the logo and -- what do you call that? a brand icon? -- the blowfish (i.e. fugu) shaped like a soy protein square (the tofu). So very kawaii. I want to be a brand too. I want a cutesy cartoon character to represent my blog. Better come up with a better name for it then, huh. Somebody out there with a marketing background: help!

Cooler than Cool Biz: Super Cool Biz

2011-05-25T22:09:00.007+09:00

Sandra Barron's latest piece in Japan Pulse gives the lowdown on local setsuden (energy-saving) measures that, she writes, are at once an attempt to stave off power reductions and a taste of what they would entail.

One example: employees of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government's Ministry of Environment will be permitted to wear jeans (without rips or holes), T-shirts (solid colors only) and Hawaiian shirts to work as part of its own campaign, which kicks off June 1 and aims to reduce peak usage during summer by 15%. Hopefully private companies to follow its lead (Tokyo and the rest of the Kanto region is serviced by TEPCO).

"Where last year the most that a hot-under-the-collar salaryman could get away with was ditching the coat and tie, this year he can lose the collar altogether," Barron writes.

I hope for my husband's sake that his employer is similarly inspired to at least allow the T-shirts, if not the cabana-wear. He can always try the Tsumetai backpack, from AnzenYouhin.jp, as seen in TimeOutTokyo (yes those are ice packs and I believe they're meant to be positioned between your shoulder blades):

There's also a USB necktie cooler from Thanko -- an awful looking tie with fan hidden behind the knot. Only 3,000 yen!

Who wants to grow one on MY balcony?

2011-05-24T18:51:00.007+09:00

A woman checks the growth of goya and "togan" winter melons on a green curtain at her home in Kasugai, Aichi Prefecture. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Japan's largest daily newspaper reported today that nonprofit groups and local governments, in order to encourage more businesses and households to conserve energy, are distributing free vine seeds and plants for growing natural sun shades for windows and exterior walls. These 'green curtains' are not a new concept, but recent events (earthquake, tsunami, nuclear disaster, power shortages) appear to have heightened interest. (It gets beastly hot here in the summer, and it has become, shall we say, unfashionable to blast the aircon.)

As a testament to the effectiveness of the practice, toilet manufacturer TOTO Ltd. reports that its own swath of "goya" (bitter gourd), "hechima" (sponge cucumber) and morning glories planted outside its Oita plant helped reduce indoor temperatures by an average 2 degrees and at times as much as 5 degrees last year. Not bad, I say -- not bad at all.

Read the Asahi Shimbun article online here.

Elementary schoolchildren in Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture, harvest gourds and goya from a green curtain covering their school last fall. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Foreign ministers from Latin American countries study a green curtain covering a wall at the ward office building in Tokyo's Suginami Ward in September 2010. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

first impressions

2011-05-19T20:46:00.004+09:00

On Jan. 12, 2008, I sent the following in an email to myself, probably intending to post it on this blog, but apparently never got around to it. (I came across it while attempting to clear out my gmail inbox -- which is currently holding more than 8,600 messages, the oldest one dated March 13, 2006...!)

Napping

In T's office it is acceptable to nap at your desk. It's okay to nap
anywhere, really. Taxi drivers nap in their cars; I've seem some
people asleep on the bus and on the subway. As long as you remain
sitting up or standing, it is socially acceptable to snooze.

combini, open for business

2011-05-17T12:21:00.008+09:00

Take a look at this 7-Eleven operating in Minami Sanriku, a former charming resort town on a coastline of wooded islands and mountainous inlets (wikipedia) in Miyagi Prefecture that was obliterated by the recent earthquake-tsunami. (ABC News reported shortly after 3/11 that 10,000 of the town's 17,000-plus residents were lost and 95% of the town's buildings were destroyed.)

Some folks I follow on Twitter (TokyoReporter, SandraJapandra) were tweeting/retweeting about this on May 12, but I'm not sure of the date of the photograph. Click here to get to the page where a short video clip is posted on the Asahi Shimbun (Japan's largest daily newspaper)'s website. The article is in Japanese but the footage speaks for itself. Our neighbor, who recently spent a week in Ishinomaki clearing debris, shoveling mud and so on, told us he saw several vendors setting up shop out of the backs of tiny trucks, selling sustenance to the teams of volunteers. I will be posting more about his experience soon.

Update, 18 May: I had my husband ask someone in his office to translate the article for me and here's the gist: The 7-Eleven store's clerk, after making sure his family and employees' families were OK, decided to reopen using cardboard signs and a refrigeration truck. He has promised to rebuild there.

Quick!

2011-05-12T20:27:00.001+09:00

The 'My Japan' exhibition ends Saturday!

It's a charitable fundraiser going on at Studio Lily, a lovely little photo gallery right in my neighborhood.

Address:
3-5-25 Hiroo, Shibuya-ku
(it's down a sidestreet off Komzawa dori, not far from Roppongi dori or Niseki dori)

Time Out Tokyo wrote a little item about it this week and provides a map to help you find the place.

Read more about the project on the official website here, or on the My Japan Facebook page.

If you buy a mounted print of one of these fabulous photos, all proceeds go straight to JEN, an NGO working to help clean up some of the hardest hit areas up north. (According to the organization's blog, volunteers are concentrating efforts in Ishinomaki at the moment, removing sludge and clearing debris, among other arduous tasks.)

The "Top 50 Voted by You" album is also on Facebook. Click here to view.

I ordered this one, by E K Snowden
The image is also posted on the My Japan website, along with several others that didn't make the top 50 but are still well worth a look. Go to http://myjapan.withtank.com/photos/
(my pick, above, is on the Outdoor/Nature2 page)

As I said, lots of great stuff. Like this one by Alfie Goodrich, part of his Shibuya in the Snow series, posted here on Japanorama.co.uk

This shot is the star of the studio show.

retail therapy

2011-05-10T21:52:00.009+09:00

I have been meaning to buy a gas burner for our table so that we can have proper shabu shabu (boiled meats and veg) at home for the longest time. Better late than never...

Tonight we ate our first dinner cooked using our new portable flame. Drop sliced pork into the pot of broth, fish it out a minute later, dip in ponzu or sesame sauce and eat. Yum. (I flavored the water with a little soy sauce... no dashi in the house... surely there are other better ideas out there... must research.)

All directions for hooking up the gas canister were in Japanese, yet somehow I managed not to blow up the joint.

I have my friend Katy H. to thank for this. It was she who suggested this week that we go to Kappabashi, a.k.a. Kitchenware Town, which is chock full of restaurant-supply stores selling everything and anything to cook and eat with. I've been there a few times before but always on a different mission. Giant lacquered salad bowl, check. Pack of 100 paper placemats, check. Random assortment of tiny plates from sales basket outside the pottery shop, check. Fake gyoza fridge magnet from the plastic food sample store, check...

This time I would also be investing in another fancy knife from Kamata.

The friendly salesman oiled it for me before taking my money.
My pick: 4th from the right. Pretty bad-ass, no?

Katy bought this paper lantern (adorned with the three characters that spell out the phrase eigyo chu, as in, we're open for business, come in and we'll give you a menu). I told her to hang it next to her side of the bed. (Naw she di-int...)

"Kappa" sprite (Japanese mythical sea creature) for which the 'hood is named.

high alert

2011-05-10T12:43:00.006+09:00

I tell everybody who asks that life is "pretty much back to normal" here in Tokyo, except for the fact that I am almost constantly wondering when the earth is going to start shaking again and with how much force, and will it be enough to topple the fish tank?

I think about these things almost constantly as I walk the city streets, taking kids to/from school and running errands and going about my usual business. It's spring, we're all healthy, life is relatively good where we are, radiation scares have subsided (at least they're off the front page) and yet I can't help feeling like some giant thing is about to happen. Any moment. That nobody can control, or even predict with any accuracy. It's a strange way to live. I wouldn't say I'm on 'high alert' but I am hyper-aware. Conscious of the peace and quiet. It all seems so, I dunno, misleading. I'll think, hey, listen to that hush and calm here in the supermarket or on the sidewalk outside the coffee shop (have I mentioned how relatively subdued Tokyo as a city was even before 3/11? no shouting or honking horns, the hustle and bustle almost on mute). I'll be walking here, or headed there, on a bus with the boys or in a yoga class (failing yet again to manage "crow" but doing one heck of a headstand) or puttering around the house or taking the recycling out and I just think, any time now...

The other day, as I approached the four-way pedestrian bridge that is Shibuya-bashi, the intersection of Komozawa and Meiji streets near Ebisu station and down the hill from our building, I thought about the freaky bounce of those elevated walkways whenever my kids scamper across them (an engineering marvel, really) and then wondered what it would take to make them snap.

Experts say there's an 87% percent chance that a quake of magnitude-8.0 or higher will hit the Tokai region (in Central Honshu west of Tokyo) sometime in the next 30 years. So I'm not talking the crazy talk. Not really.

Shibuya-bashi pedestrian bridge in Ebisu/Hiroo, Shibuya-ku, on a beautiful spring day in May

for serious collectors

2011-05-09T18:21:00.005+09:00

Astronaut Barbie, available now at Kiddyland

Many thanks to Tara for sharing this little treasure..

something fun to follow on Twitter

2011-05-06T12:08:00.005+09:00

@TokyoFashion
Harajuku, Japan

Daily Japanese fashion news and Tokyo street fashion pictures from Harajuku, Shibuya, Shinjuku, and other areas.

http://TokyoFashion.com

sample tweet:

Photo: Lady Gaga Girls of Harajuku - 4 Japanese Little Monsters I met in Tokyo yesterday! http://flic.kr/p/9EJwzs
4 May

Quakebook

2011-04-30T14:05:00.008+09:00

Buy it today!

All proceeds - every penny of the $9.99 you pay for this digital collection of stories about the events of 3/11 in Japan goes to the Japanese Red Cross and its relief efforts. To get my copy, all I did was go to Amazon.com , where I could get the free Kindle iPhone app and then the ebook itself. If you already have a Kindle, you're ahead of the game. (There's a Kindle app for every other kind of smart device, it seems.) Easy peasy.

Here is the link to the Quakebook website. Apparently it soon will be available in paperback too.

2:46: Aftershocks

I haven't read through the whole thing yet, but would like to draw your attention to these two pieces in particular: "Beautiful"
and "Leaving" ...

The Village

2011-04-28T18:48:00.005+09:00

Japan's original nuclear trouble:
Culture of collusion

Long before the tsunami, protection of interests undermined plant safety

BY NORIMITSU ONISHI AND KEN BELSON
The International Herald Tribune
April 27, 2011

Given the fierce insularity of the Japanese nuclear industry, it was perhaps fitting that an outsider exposed the most serious safety cover-up in the history of Japanese nuclear power. It took place at Fukushima Daiichi, the plant that Japan has been struggling to get under control since the tsunami last month.

In 2000, Kei Sugaoka, a Japanese-American nuclear inspector who had done work for General Electric at Daiichi, told the main Japanese nuclear regulator about a cracked steam dryer that he believed was being covered up. If exposed, the revelations could have forced the operator, Tokyo Electric Power, to do what utilities least want to do: undertake costly repairs.

What happened next was an example, critics have since said, of the collusive ties that bind the nation's nuclear power companies, regulators and politicians.

Despite a new law shielding whistle-blowers, the regulator, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, divulged Mr. Sugaoka's identity to Tokyo Electric, effectively blackballing him from the industry. Instead of immediately deploying its own investigators to Daiichi, the agency instructed the company to inspect its own reactors. Regulators allowed the company to keep operating its reactors for the next two years even though, as an investigation ultimately revealed, its executives had actually covered up other, far more serious problems, including cracks in the shrouds that cover reactor cores.

Investigators may take months or years to decide to what extent safety problems or weak regulation contributed to the disaster at Daiichi, the worst of its kind since Chernobyl. But as troubles at the plant and fears over radiation continue to rattle the nation, the Japanese are increasingly raising the possibility that a culture of complicity made the plant especially vulnerable to the natural disaster that struck the country on March 11.

Already, many Japanese and Western experts argue that inconsistent, nonexistent or unenforced regulations played a role in the accident - especially the low sea walls that failed to protect the plant against the tsunami and the decision to place backup diesel generators for powering the reactors' cooling system at ground level, which made them highly vulnerable to flooding.

A 10-year extension for the oldest of Daiichi's reactors suggests that the regulatory system was allowed to remain lax by politicians, bureaucrats and industry executives single-mindedly focused on expanding nuclear power. Regulators approved the extension beyond the reactor's 40-year statutory limit just weeks before the tsunami despite warnings about its safety and subsequent admissions by Tokyo Electric that it had failed to carry out proper inspections of critical equipment.

The mild punishment meted out for past safety infractions has reinforced the belief that nuclear power's main players are more interested in protecting their interests than improving safety. ...

...In Japan, the opaque network of connections between the nuclear industry and government officials is now popularly referred to as ''the nuclear power village'' - an expression connoting the collusive interests that underlie the nuclear establishment's push to expand the industry, despite the discovery of active fault lines under plants, new projections about the size of tsunamis and a long history of cover-ups of safety problems.

As in any Japanese village, the likeminded - nuclear industry officials, bureaucrats, politicians and scientists - have prospered by rewarding one another with construction projects, lucrative positions and political, financial and regulatory support. The few who are openly skeptical of nuclear power's safety become village outcasts, losing out on promotions and backing.

Until recently, it had been considered political suicide to even discuss the need to reform an industry that appeared less concerned with safety than maximizing profits, said Kusuo Oshima, one of the few lawmakers in the governing Democratic Party who have long been critical of the nuclear industry.

''Everyone considered that a taboo, so nobody wanted to touch it,'' said Mr. Oshima, adding that he could speak freely because he received financial backing from Rissho Kosei-Kai, one of Japan's largest lay Buddhist movements, not from a nuclear-affiliated group.

''It's all about money,'' he added.

Click here to read the rest of this article on nytimes.com (you have to be a subscriber to read the archives) or here to read it on the Herald-Tribune site.

1 month, 2 days later

2011-04-15T08:56:00.005+09:00

Yoyogi Koen, Wed., April 13, 2011, 3pm

Can't think of a better way to get reacquainted with this city than to wander into our favorite city park and come upon this man making things out of balloons -- and not just swords and puppies, but Donald Duck (see above, small child at right) and Snoopy as The Flying Ace (click to watch youtube vid). The kids were entertained for more than an hour, along with a handful of other observers, including two young couples and their tiny dogs (my friend thought the guy on the far right, below, was holding a baby).

On this, our first full day back in town, I learned that local govt officials really had canceled city-sponsored hanami. Which didn't stop drunken student gatherings in Yoyogi but apparently did affect Ueno Park, where in past years we'd seen lots of food vendors set up their takoyaki and yakisoba grills, corn-on-the-cob and chocolate-dipped banana stands, and where prime viewing areas would be roped off for lucky groups with reservations. According to AFP, this year was the first time since official celebrations began at the end of World War II -- and possibly the first time in four centuries -- that the city didn't make its usual preparations for the season. "As an expression of our condolences to disaster victims, and of self-restraint, we have decided to cancel the festivities," Masahiro Kayano, who heads the Ueno district's tourism federation, was quoted saying in this April 1 article.

Terry had told me about this general mood of self-restraint -- jishuku in Japanese -- on March 29, when he was in Tokyo and I was still in New York (I know the date because I took notes in iPhone Notes). He said the unofficial consensus was that it was inappropriate to party. Nobody was going out or celebrating or making noise, and the karaoke clubs and izakayas were empty; people were heading home straight after work to hunker down with the family and think about what's important. "It's very somber, very post 9/11," he told me. His office lights were left off during the day (which he considered an improvement over the fluorescent lighting). The AFP article (mentioned above) notes that on TV, many commercials had given way to public service announcements; companies had delayed product launches, and many neon lights have been switched off amid a national power shortage.

Now, one month and two days after the earthquake-tsunami one-two punch that left some 28,000 dead or missing, and subsequent 'nuclear accident,' the city still seems quiet, subdued, but not dramatically so, I don't think. Terry agrees that the jishuku seems to have lifted, somewhat. There is milk and eggs and bread in the shops. Some vending machines have bottled water, some don't. The international schools are back in session (except those on a scheduled spring break, like ours) and the trains and buses are running. There were a dozen expats drinking coffee at Segafredo in Hiroo.

But the National Azabu supermarket parking lot, usually full of black SUVs, was deserted. And I had no trouble getting Conor in to see the very popular pediatrician Dr. Che on Thursday. The doctor, a Korean-American, told me his sister in New York had begged him to leave Japan until he finally sent her a detailed analysis of exactly how much -- or, I should say, how little -- radiation had been released out of the Fukushima plant. "Now she says maybe my brother knows what he's talking about."

health/safety risks "low" in Tokyo

2011-04-14T12:02:00.004+09:00

Today a travel "alert" was issued by the U.S. State Dept. to replace the travel "warning" of March 31, 2011. Here it is (I tried to put all the important bits in bold)

The assessment of technical and subject matter experts across U.S. govt agencies is that while the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi plant remains serious and dynamic, the health and safety risks to areas beyond the 50 mile evacuation zone, and particularly to Tokyo, Nagoya (Aichi Prefecture), Yokohama (Kanagawa Prefecture) nearby U.S. military facilities and the prefectures of Akita, Aomori, Chiba, Gunma, Iwate, Nagano, Niigata, Saitama, Shizuoka, Tochigi, and Yamanashi, and those portions of Fukushima, Ibaraki, Miyagi and Yamagata prefectures which are outside a 50 mile radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are low and do not pose significant risks to U.S. citizens.

This analysis takes into consideration both various age groups and the classification of the severity of the situation at Fukushima Daiichi as a Level 7 event by the Government of Japan, which reflects what has transpired since the initial incident and the potential long-term effects in the area surrounding the plant.

This assessment reflects inputs from our national laboratories as well as the unanimous opinion of the U.S. scientific experts on the ground in Japan.... Based on the much reduced rate of heat generation in the reactor fuel after one month of cooling and the corresponding decay of short-lived radioactive isotopes, even in the event of an unexpected disruption at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, harmful exposures to people beyond the 50 mile evacuation zone are highly unlikely, and there would be a significant amount of time to best assess any steps that might have to be taken.

The situation at the plant is dramatically different today than it was on March 16, when we saw significant ongoing releases of radioactivity, the loss of effective means to cool the reactor cores and spent fuel, the absence of outside power or fresh water supply for emergency management, and considerable uncertainty about the condition of the site. Today, while the situation remains serious, and there is still a possibility of unanticipated developments, cooling efforts are ongoing and successful, power, water supply, and back-up services have been partially or fully restored, and planning has begun to control radioactive contamination and mitigate future dangers. Our coordination with the Japanese is regular and productive, and we have a greatly increased capacity to measure and analyze risks.

The Department of State has lifted Voluntary Authorized Departure, allowing dependents of the U.S. government employees to return to Japan.

We continue to recommend that U.S. citizens avoid travel within the 50-mile radius of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant. U.S. citizens who are still within this radius should evacuate or shelter in place.

Japan is one of the most seismically active places in the world. Tokyo and areas to the Northeast continue to experience strong aftershocks related to the March 11 earthquake. Aftershocks following an earthquake of this magnitude can be expected to continue for more than a year. Identifying potential hazards ahead of time and advance planning can reduce the dangers of serious injury or loss of life from an earthquake. See the Embassy Website for detailed information on earthquake safety:
http://japan.usembassy.gov .

Springtime in the 'hood

2011-04-13T18:44:00.002+09:00

Walking the back way through Ebisu Prime Square around 12:45pm today, on our way to Meiji dori and the 06 Toei bus that will take us to Shibuya, where we are to meet Terry for lunch

Goodbye New York...

2011-04-13T10:15:00.005+09:00

Hellooooo Tokyo!

The boys and I are back home in Hiroo. Haven't left the apartment yet- boys are catching up on their "home learning" (big piles of assignments we put aside while they were attending school in the States) while I putter around and enjoy being in my own home, in my own kitchen, where I can make any old mess I want and leave it sitting there until I decide to clean it up. Or not. No disapproving neatniks in sight.

The best part is, I am finally after 27 days, sleeping in my own bed! With my husband!

It's a beautiful spring day, clear skies and sunny, so we'll be meeting Terry for lunch near Shibuya station, maybe ramen in Dogenzaka...then I will take the boys to the park near the supermarket.

We definitely need some hanami, and stat. Terry says it had been assumed that the usual partying under the trees would not take place this year, out of deference to the tsunami evacuees and devastated areas in the northeast, and in keeping with the city's post 3/11 somber vibe, but on Sunday the revelers were out in force. "Yoyogi was packed today," my neighbor Nancy told me via FB. "It felt like Tokyo had its heartbeat back finally, lots of people laughing and having a good time and in the shops buying. Let's hope it continues."
Terry in Yoyogi Park, Sunday, April 10, 2011

'let's not beat ourselves up'

2011-04-05T22:20:00.005+09:00

the New York mag piece (cited in previous post) got so many comments!

Take this one, for instance, posted by JugglingTam:
"Nice article and completely on point. I was 1 week away from moving to Tokyo when the earthquake hit. My life was packed, the decision was decided, and then this happened. I decided to go despite all of the protests from friends and family... mostly because I had made a ready decision a long time ago to make the career change. Now that I am here and realize that the media is fairly sensationalized and that Tokyo life has moved on, I am relieved that I made the decision I did. I wouldn't say I feel pride for coming or scorn toward those who left or are leaving, but I feel that I want to help others realize that the conditions here are safe. On the other hand, though I do occasionally roll my eyes at the fact that people are delaying or canceling trips, I can't help but agree that all the pressure from friends and family is almost impossible to handle, as well as the 24/7 scares from the news. Whatever your decision is, I think it's justified and we (including myself) should accept it and move on."

Tam
http://tamdoesjapan.wordpress.com/

And this one, from American Tokyoite:
"Please try to imagine the courage of the Japanese people. Their calmness. Their fortitude. Not only the folks trying to get the reactors under control at Fukushima, but also the thousands who have lost a family member or a home, the ruined farmers, the millions of Tokyoites shivering in the cold without complaint because they want to do what little they can to help.

No hysteria, no panic, no looting.... Instead, cohesion. Kindness. Support.

Now look at the foreigners, particularly the relatively new "expats," many who live in luxurious apartments in essentially earthquake-undamaged, radiation-free Tokyo, where there is electricity and plenty of food, pushing each other out of the way as they scramble to flee the country. [Blogger's note: Harsh! and totally unfair characterization given all the agonizing...]

We long-time Japan residents have Japanese friends, Japanese spouses, even Japanese children. We care what people think. We try hard to project an image as responsible parents, coworkers and neighbors. It has taken decades to build what we have.

So again, look upon the quiet strength of the Japanese people. Then turn to the frantic flight of the foreigners. Can you blame us for not wanting to be associated with them? "

And from 34Watts:
"Agree with (previous poster) in that while it's easy to simplify what's going on here as unique to Japanese culture or a foreigner issue, there was a similar exodus of transient Americans (and probably foreigners too) leaving NYC after 9/11. The backlash towards those who fled the NYC then was less extreme, but there was certainly a renewed pride among those who chose not to leave the city. At any rate, there is no shame in re-evaluating one's choices after a brutal reminder of mortality."

Many of my Facebook friends also commented when I posted the link there. Here's the transcript:

The Departed: Exodus of Expats Draws Scorn in Japan
nymag.com

Is leaving Japan for safer ground an act of betrayal?

(CHM) Ooh LIKE! Shall we discuss while on the secrecy of Facebook?!
(MB) Well, where do I start.....I don't really like to idea of "foreigners" sometimes myself, (in my opinion) they're sometimes loud and bawdy and I've met some that are proud that they've lived here for 15 years and still don't speak a word of Japanese, to a Japanese person leaving when things get "tough" must only serve to compound this cultural division further, however, we'll never fit in, not in a million years...so, I think its a personal decision that you make for your family at the time and no one should judge that.
(Me) Carole! be sure to read the comments posted below the article too- some are a bit nutty/angry/hostile...
(Me)‎@MB yes I agree everybody's situation is different. I am trying not to be too defensive- not just about our leaving, but also about our plans to go back
(MB) Don't be defensive at all M..., if anyone has completely embraced this city and its culture you have....xxx
(KE) we went "home" to protect our children...less use of electricity and food items, and many city guys stayed and held the fort...lets not beat ourselves up about this...
(KP) You linked to a blog some time ago that gave a foretaste of this discussion, the wall growing between those who left and those who stayed. I looked forward to watching the discussion grow but now it is already leaving a bad taste. Only home a few days and some comments I've heard are rubbing in the wrong places. There is so much to discuss. I just hope the fallout doesn't get uglier than necessary.
(KP) I was the only Gaijin at Nissin and National Azabu. Very empty stores. Man it felt weird. The cashiers at Starbucks Roppongi gave a very very warm welcome. Will those that need our patronage be the first to welcome us back?
(LH)Awesome! I get to witness yet another pissing match among American expats. The dialogue is always the same. The name-calling. The arrogance and self-righteousness. The shame-blame-guilt game...
(AL) I am simply a simple expat living in Japan for financial means. I don't try to be a hero and have no guilt of leaving Japan now or later.
(KW) for some reason this term 'flyjin' annoys me enormously. I want to slap anyone who uses it in anger! However I do think any of you coming to HK for sanctuary may have been somewhat misguided! 'cough cough' the air here is dreadful! I don't think there is anything to discuss. Whether you stayed or left is surely ones own business, desu ne?

This Flyjin has no regrets

2011-04-05T20:40:00.000+09:00

My grandfather died yesterday. So, really, it's lucky that I am here in New York with the boys, because now I can help commemorate the life of a man who lived for 93 years (72 of them in Brooklyn), a barber by trade who gave my son Conor his first haircut back in 2001.

Here they are in the basement of the old house in Bay Ridge...

'Flyjin' shame

2011-04-04T21:40:00.001+09:00

To now abandon Japan for a former, safer home—to take the escape hatch not available to Japanese friends—would be a betrayal, both of your hosts and of the expat identity you’d carefully cultivated. -Paige Ferrari, New York magazine, 3/24/11

This is how I felt leaving Japan with my two boys on March 16. (We are still in the U.S. but plan to return next week.) But my own decision to go after the quake-tsunami, in the midst of a "nuclear emergency," was made significantly easier by a few very simple facts: that I have young children, and that their school had closed. Oh, and the fact that my husband's employer was offering to pay for the plane tickets.

Call these excuses, justifications, rationalizations, whatever. Or tell me I'm foolish for feeling guilty at all (Hi, Mom). But whatever you do, read this piece, it's really well-written.

The Departed: An Exodus of Expats Draws Scorn in Japan
By Paige Ferrari

Before I left Japan three months ago and returned to New York to take a new job, I had dinner with a fellow American expat at a ramen-counter restaurant in Tokyo’s Shibuya district. As we sat side by side eating our noodles, I sought assurance that my impending move wouldn’t constitute desertion—a strange anxiety, maybe, but one an expat feels acutely.

In the wake of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, expats in Tokyo confronted that same insecurity as they wrestled with a far more fraught stay-or-go dilemma: to tough it out or join the great, and greatly maligned, foreigner exodus. Complicating the calculus was the fact that the decision wasn’t simply a matter of self-preservation, the way it seemed to be from thousands of miles away. To judge from foreign-news segments in the days after the disaster, all of Japan was a radioactive hell¬scape, one aftershock from even graver calamity, and families watching those broadcasts understandably urged their loved ones to get out, now. But life in Tokyo offered a less alarming perspective: The lights were slightly dimmed and the trains out of whack, but the karaoke bars remained open, as did the pachinko parlors. And with city radiation levels reportedly below what you’d be exposed to on a long flight home, there were reasons to bet against catastrophe.

Leaving meant abandoning that reality in favor of the apocalyptic narrative from abroad—to take the outsider’s view after wanting so badly to prove yourself an insider (another expat fixation). For Tokyo expats, many of whom take pride in rejecting the conventions of their old lives, it also meant suddenly, openly, opportunistically trading on their nonnative status. Foreigners in Japan are sometimes given a “gaijin pass” upon trampling one of the country’s social codes, but if you want to fit in, that’s not a privilege you exploit. To now abandon Japan for a former, safer home—to take the escape hatch not available to Japanese friends—would be a betrayal, both of your hosts and of the expat identity you’d carefully cultivated.

Over the past two weeks, the same social-networking sites invaluable in confirming acquaintances’ safety following the disaster have doubled as a scorecard for tracking how expats were resolving that conflict. Among those who stayed put, status updates carry a whiff of back-patting, as if, once the Fukushima Dai-Ichi reactors cool, the government will begin distributing awards for loyalty. Expats who announce their departure, meanwhile, are now “flyjin,” a freshly coined pejorative for fleeing foreigners. (“Maybe it’s good if those people don’t come back,” a Japanese finance worker told a friend. “Then maybe some of the homegrown talent can finally rise through the ranks instead of being condescended to by Brian or Jean-Philippe.”)

With the nuclear situation still uncertain, those now watching from abroad hope for the best while ramping up their defenses. “Running away is not what I do,” wrote an American friend I’d made in Tokyo, “and yet, here I am, on my boyfriend’s dad’s computer in L.A.” In other cases, guilt is mixed with counter-resentment. Another friend, who’d kept his movements off social networks, spoke candidly via Skype after arriving back in his home country. “You know this whole going-down-with-the-ship thing?” he said, leaning into the screen and eyeing me as if facing an accuser. “I am not the fucking captain.”

why the news is making me crazy

2011-04-04T12:30:00.003+09:00

Articles like this one (below) convince people who are not in Japan that it is dangerous to be in Japan. Anywhere in Japan. Not just in the evacuated zone around Fukushima where the nuclear reactors are, not just in the areas east of Sendai devastated by the tsunami, but anywhere in the whole country. In the minds of many Westerners, Tokyo is Japan, and so Tokyo must be dangerous too.

It's tough to talk to people who think this way. If I say I am going back soon, they look at me gravely and say, but think about the children.

I am thinking about the children! About how they need to get back to some semblance of normal life, about how they need their dad, and for our family of four to be under the same roof. Of course nobody knows what could happen up there in Fukushima (140 miles away from Tokyo), because the situation remains serious and won't be under control for several weeks or even months, probably. But staying away isn't a good option either.

Japan Struggles to Plug Leak as Radioactive Water Seeps Into the Sea
By Ken Belson and Hiroko Tabuchi
April 2, 2011

TOKYO — Highly radioactive water is leaking directly into the sea from a damaged pit near a crippled reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, Japanese safety officials said Saturday. The leak was the latest setback in the increasingly difficult bid to regain control of the plant.

Although higher than normal levels of radiation have been detected in the ocean water near the plant in recent days, this is the first time the source of any leaks was found.

Because the government did not report the levels of radioactive materials in the waters near the stricken plant on Saturday, it was difficult to judge how dangerous the levels of radiation were for fish or for humans who might come in contact with it. The government has already set up an evacuation zone for 19 miles around the plant, and fishing in the area has been suspended since the earthquake and tsunami...

click here to read more (you'll need a digital subscription I think)

Unbelievable

2011-04-04T10:50:00.002+09:00

(Copied from the April 2 New York Times)

The town of Taro's sea wall was one of Japan's tallest and longest. It was called Japan's Great Wall of China by the government and news media. It consisted of a 34-ft. high inner wall reinforced by an outer wall, stretched 1.5 miles across the bay, and had a surface so wide that people cycled, jogged and strolled along it.

So unshakable was this town's faith in its sea wall and its ability to save residents from any tsunami that some rushed toward it when the 9.0-magnitude earthquake struck off Honshu's northeast coast on March 11. But then the tsunami caused by the quake tore right through the outer part and surged over the inner part -- sweeping away those who had climbed on its top and then taking most of the town.

Japan now has to decide whether to rebuild this infrastructure that failed to hold up when it was needed the most -- the so-called Great Walls that provided towns like Taro with a dangerously false sense of security -- or skip the coastline engineering and focus on education and evacuation drills. Maybe it's just not worth turning beautiful seaside communities into "garrison-like towns with limited views."

"For us, the sea wall was a source of pride, an asset, something that we believed in," Eiko Araya, 58, the principal of Taro No. 3 Elementary School told the Times. "We felt protected, that's why our feeling of loss is even greater now."

Read the whole story here. (You may need to be a paying subscriber to the NYTs online to access it)

What's in the Water

2011-04-04T00:41:00.000+09:00

You can read all about what's in Tokyo's Tap Water on this web page, aptly named
Tokyo Tap Water Information, brought to you by Metropolis magazine. Most info comes from the Ministry of education, culture, sport, science and technology Japan (MEXT), which has its own website for reporting the same data.

Roentgens and Sieverts

2011-04-04T00:11:00.003+09:00

Terry just sent me the link to a Tokyo Radiation Levels page on Metropolis magazine's website. It looks like a very handy way for anybody following this dicey situation to keep things in perspective.

The gist:

"Due to concerns about radiation in Tokyo from a number of our readers, Metropolis will publish daily radiation levels (sometimes multiple times daily if relevant). This is a log of background radiation levels in Tokyo from March 15 2011. Measurements will be taken daily at different times. Levels are measured in micro-Roentgens and micro-Sieverts using using a Polimaster PM1703M Scintillator and S.E International Radalert 100 Geiger counter respectively."

The disclaimer:
"We are not qualified experts in the field of nuclear science and nuclear medicine. Metropolis owns a Geiger counter and we are just giving a daily reading of exactly what we see on the screen of the Geiger counter. Geiger counter readings are taken outside, in an open area after the device has had 2 minutes to get an average reading of the background radiation level."

I like the "what does this compare to?" section, and the "what do the units mean?"

Bottom line: Levels detected over the last several days are "safe"

Pandas!

2011-04-03T22:00:00.004+09:00

Yep, the Ueno Park Zoo has pandas once again.

Check out this BBC News story about the exhibit's opening day.

The much-anticipated arrival of "Shin Shin" and "Ri Ri" finally happened in late February -- just in time for the big earthquake-tsunami. According to Japan Probe, these pandas were living in Sichuan, in the China Giant Panda Protection and Research Center there, when the May 12, 2008 quake devastated that area. (Now that's unlucky.)

When the March 11 quake hit here, the pandas ran around in their cages and took two hours to calm down, NHK reported. They're better now, zookeepers say.

Fun fact from the Probe: these pandas are not a "friendship gift" from China. Japan will pay $950,000 a year (about 90 million yen) to "lease" the animals.

2 days in

2011-03-31T00:11:00.003+09:00

The boys seem to like their new/substitute/temporary school (it's really hard to categorize anything these days) and are making friends and generally enjoying the enormous playground and all the space and freedom of movement that suburban living provides. I am finding it sorta nice myself. It's easy going. A bagel and cup of coffee at the Pelham Bakery on Fifth Ave. costs $1.80. I can find my favorite Burt's Bees lip balm at the local CVS for about a third of what I paid for one at the fancy international supermarket in Tokyo. And of course my parents and grandparents and brothers and a whole herd of nieces and nephews live in the area, so I am getting a major much-needed dose of extended family time. I am a rather lonely pedestrian on my walks through town and even to school, but that's ok.

Just received an email with the latest U.S. Department of State Travel Warning for Japan, dated March 31, 2011, which says that American citizens should "defer non-essential travel" to Tokyo and Yokohama (and surrounding regions) plus 15 of the country's prefectures. I guess it's not essential for me to go to Tokyo right now, even though BST is supposed to reopen on Monday (it will close again five days later for a previously scheduled two-week Easter break). But it is essential that I get back there eventually. Or is it? Today, the answer to that is yes.

Japanese Exchange Students

2011-03-30T20:20:00.002+09:00

Within hours of getting the boys into the local elementary school here, in this lovely suburb some 20 miles northeast of Manhattan where I grew up, and where we've been spending most of our days since the earthquake-tsunami-nuclear clusterf**k, I received a call from the the school's chief photog -- she wanted a picture of the new kids for an announcement she would hang in the hallway.

This is that shot.

17 days later

2011-03-28T22:26:00.001+09:00

Boys start school tomorrow at Prospect Hill elementary, the same school I attended back when Lindsay Wagner was starring in a popular prime time TV show called The Bionic Woman. I am happy for them, because there are only so many unstructured days these kids can take before they turn feral. And as for home schooling, let's just say I have profound respect and admiration for those who can do it. (I can not.)

Meanwhile, I am trying to keep tabs on the situation back home. (Funny how "back home" now means Japan; technically, I am already "back home" living in the town where I grew up. Strange times.)

International Atomic Energy Agency
Director General's briefing: Fukushima Nuclear Accident
March 28, 2011, 14:30 UTC

"The crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant has still not been overcome and it will take some time to stabilize the reactors. For now, radioactivity in the environment, foodstuffs and water - including the sea - is a matter of concern in the vicinity of the Fukushima plant and beyond. Current levels indicate a need for further comprehensive monitoring."

Click here to read more of what the IAEA is saying this week, or go to the agency's website.

U.S. Embassy in Tokyo
Warden Message to U.S. Citizens
March 26, 2011

Availability of Potassium Iodide Tablets
"As a precautionary measure, the U.S. Embassy is continuing to make potassium iodide (KI) tablets available to private U.S. citizens who have not been able to obtain it from their physician, employer, or other sources. We do not a recommend that anyone should take KI at this time. There are risks associated with taking KI. It should only be taken on the advice of emergency management officials, public health officials or your doctor. For more information about KI, see this fact sheet from the Centers for Disease Control, or contact your doctor."

'Nightmare and Defiance'

2011-03-27T23:06:00.001+09:00

Here's a beautifully written essay I read earlier today...

From Newsweek/The Daily Beast
March 28 and April 4, 2011 issue

Vulnerable, shaken Japan has attracted the sympathy of the world.
By Paul Theroux

All of it—the towns and cities tumbled flat in a torrent of mud and death—is appalling, and almost ungraspable. But, looking for a coherent image, anything to understand it better, I found an echo in the sight of besieged and brave figures, wearing white full-body jumpsuits and respirators among the sizzling reactors in the Fukushima nuclear plant at the devastated town of Okuma.

Called the “Fukushima 50,” they are standing fast and directing seawater onto the fuel in the process of meltdown, risking death. The New York Times reported, “That kind of response is not out of the normal for some workers in the nuclear energy sector.” Perhaps. But it is also a classic stance in Japanese iconography. The Last Stand of the Kusunoki Clan, a battle fought at Shijo Nawate in 1348, is one of the enduring images in Japanese iconography, occurring in many woodblock prints (by, among others, Utagawa Kuniyoshi in the 19th century and Ogata Gekko in the early 20th), the doomed warriors defying an immense shower of arrows.

These samurai who were defeated—their wounded leader committed suicide rather than be captured—are inspirational to the Japanese, representing courage and defiance, and the samurai spirit. So the Fukushima 50 are braving 250 millisieverts of radioactivity, five times the permissible dose, in the way the Kusunoki defied enemy arrows.

The popular notion of Japanese life is one of order, where tranquility is the ideal made into an aesthetic, whether in poetry, gardening, flower arranging, the tea ceremony, or titupping geishas. Yet Japanese history, a chronicle of disasters both natural and man-made, helps us understand why it is also a culture of defiance. The Japanese know that they live precariously on these steep volcanic islands. Their iconic mountain, Fuji, is a volcano. Mount Asama in central Honshu has been erupting regularly for 1,500 years—the last time in 2009. Vulcanism, an aspect of their uniqueness, is celebrated; their sense of being offshore, apart, at risk—fires, earthquakes, floods, storms, as well as catastrophic bombings—is part of their culture, not as survivors but prevailing and making themselves better.

“We will rebuild,” Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said after the recent tragedy, and promised that the country would be stronger, improved in its preparedness against this sort of disaster. You might say he could hardly have promised anything else. Japan is almost without hinterland. Its population lives mainly on its coast. The mountains are for tunneling through, not residing on. And where there is open landscape, as in the low rolling hills of Hokkaido, it is thinly settled. From the carriage window, as the train travels north from Tokyo, through Sendai and the coastal towns of Minamisanriku, Kesennuma, Okuma, and others—the ones now swept away—the Japanese can be seen living in unusual urban density, the low, snug houses cheek by jowl, traversed by narrow lanes, as they have been throughout history. My sense is that they have been able to live closely together because of their elaborate good manners, mutual respect, self-sufficiency, and work ethic. A less polite society would require more space or higher fences or guard dogs.

More than most countries, Japan is one family, one language, one set of rules, believing in the greatness of its destiny and overcoming any obstacle to achieve it. This unifying metaphor encourages envy that is voiced in facile mockery (look no further than the belittling film Lost in Translation) depicting Japan as a farce of funny accents, where Western culture is mimicked as though in a funhouse mirror; or else robotic, unsmiling, a sniffy, xenophobic society of salarymen and whale slaughterers. “I thought that was the whole point of them,” a woman says in an Alan Bennett play, seeing a weepy Japanese man in an English café, “that they didn’t cry.”

Drudges, overachievers in a well-oiled machine—that is the superficial first impression of the traveler. Certainly the surface reveals something of the inner state, but after a while one sees more similarities than differences, and a great deal to admire. Their national pride is so strong, it’s possible to go overboard in seeing Japan as a bastion of rituals. The fact is that it has an aging population and a low birthrate, and labor costs are so high that most of the traditional brands of electronics and cameras are outsourced to China. Far from feeling superior, the Japanese feel somewhat jinxed and vulnerable, hemmed in by social pressures and the high cost of living (for someone in Tokyo, it’s cheaper to go to Honolulu than Sapporo), and consequently always seeming to be living as though squinting against a high wind.

With this acute sense of limited land and few natural resources, and the hostility of nature, they have taken pains to put off the evil day by manipulating their weird geography, even if it means a disfigurement. The result makes the strange Japanese landscape even weirder: it is the most possessed-looking place imaginable, its awkward-seeming features ordered and buttressed, the human hand visible everywhere. The notion of control and containment, which dominates Japanese life, dominates the landscape. Rivers are cemented into place, embankments are tiers of concrete blocks; sidewalks and bridges exist in the most unlikely places. The 33-mile Seikan Tunnel that links Honshu to Hokkaido under the Tsugaru Strait is the world’s longest railway tunnel. The watchtowers and sea walls all over the coast reinforce the look of Japan as a fortress in the sea. It is, of course, an illusion.

“We’re in a state of defeat now,” the writer Haruki Murakami told me four years ago, long before this present crisis. He described how the bursting of the baburu keizei, the economic bubble, in 1991 and 1992 had left people dazed and, in many cases, bankrupt. As I wrote in Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, this period of uncertainty was followed by two events in 1995 that shattered Japan’s notion of itself as solid and immutable: the earthquake in Kobe and the sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subway.

These events, Murakami said, were traumatic, as he described in his book Underground: “Before ’95, to get rich was everything. But hard work didn’t bring us to a better place. We found that money is not the answer. We had our goals. We achieved them, but the achievement didn’t bring us happiness.” It was Murakami’s view that the Japanese had lost their way. When I asked him what Japan’s goals were now, he answered, “Our goal is to be happy and proud. And we’re looking for a new goal.” He was optimistic that it would be found, because the Japanese wanted it. He said, “Japan’s people are its treasure.”

The Kobe earthquake accounted for about 6,500 lives, and the subway outrage by the Aum Shinrikyo cult killed 13 people. “Both were nightmarish eruptions beneath our feet—from underground,” Murakami wrote in his account of it. “Nightmarish” in this context is relative, because the world of horror that Murakami discussed with me one winter day in Tokyo four years ago seems trifling compared with the catastrophe that may have killed more than 25,000 people, wiped away whole towns, and, because of the damaged nuclear reactors, has poisoned and demoralized not just Japan but the wider world.

Japan was hammered by nuclear bombs, but you could argue—many have—that it was retribution for waging a war that no one else wanted. And many Japanese are realistic about that final curtain. Seeing me tearful in Nagasaki 30 years ago, my Japanese translator, Hiroyuki Agawa, a distinguished war historian, chuckled and said, “But if we’d had the H-bomb, we would have dropped it on you!”

The questions Murakami asked—what role? what goal?—have perhaps been answered. Vulnerable, shaken by the earthquake, flooded and massacred by the tsunami, poisoned by the damaged reactors, Japan is universally—and rightly—perceived as a victim and has attracted the sympathy of the world. Until now, Japan has never been pitied. To the outside world it seemed unknowable, smug in its secrecies, its cult of the samurai. Even after the Kobe earthquake it remained itself, not asking for help.

But now, in its reaching out, and in the generous way the world has responded, Japan has a human face—a wounded one, much like the rest of humanity in times of crisis. We are never more human than when we are afraid. But Elias Canetti wrote, “Once [fear] has been overcome, it turns into hope.” History has shown that Japan has a long memory, and that the kindness to it now will never be forgotten.

Theroux is the author, most recently, of The Tao of Travel to be published in May.

Click here to read this article online

Radiation - no biggie?

2011-03-27T09:15:00.003+09:00

Below is an interesting article by Wade Allison, a nuclear and medical physicist at the University of Oxford, and author of Radiation and Reason (2009) and Fundamental Physics for Probing and Imaging (2006). It's posted on the BBC News website here.

Viewpoint: We Should Stop Running Away from Radiation

March 26, 2011

More than 10,000 people have died in the Japanese tsunami and the survivors are cold and hungry. But the media concentrate on nuclear radiation from which no-one has died - and is unlikely to.

Nuclear radiation at very high levels is dangerous, but the scale of concern that it evokes is misplaced. Nuclear technology cures countless cancer patients every day - and a radiation dose given for radiotherapy in hospital is no different in principle to a similar dose received in the environment.

What of Three Mile Island? There were no known deaths there.

And Chernobyl? The latest UN report published on 28 February confirms the known death toll - 28 fatalities among emergency workers, plus 15 fatal cases of child thyroid cancer - which would have been avoided if iodine tablets had been taken (as they have now in Japan). And in each case the numbers are minute compared with the 3,800 at Bhopal in 1984, who died as a result of a leak of chemicals from the Union Carbide pesticide.

So what of the radioactivity released at Fukushima? How does it compare with that at Chernobyl? Let's look at the measured count rates. The highest rate reported, at 1900 on 22 March, for any Japanese prefecture was 12 kBq per sq m (for the radioactive isotope of caesium, caesium-137). A map of Chernobyl in the UN report shows regions shaded according to rate, up to 3,700 kBq per sq m - areas with less than 37 kBq per sq m are not shaded at all. In round terms, this suggests that the radioactive fallout at Fukushima is less than 1% of that at Chernobyl.

The other important radioisotope in fallout is iodine, which can cause child thyroid cancer. This is only produced when the reactor is on and quickly decays once the reactor shuts down (it has a half life of eight days). The old fuel rods in storage at Fukushima, though radioactive, contain no iodine.

But at Chernobyl the full inventory of iodine and caesium was released in the initial explosion, so that at Fukushima any release of iodine should be much less than 1% of that at Chernobyl - with an effect reduced still further by iodine tablets.

Unfortunately, public authorities react by providing over-cautious guidance - and this simply escalates public concern.

Over-reaction

On the 16th anniversary of Chernobyl, the Swedish radiation authorities, writing in the Stockholm daily Dagens Nyheter, admitted over-reacting by setting the safety level too low and condemning 78% of all reindeer meat unnecessarily, and at great cost.

Unfortunately, the Japanese seem to be repeating the mistake. On 23 March they advised that children should not drink tap water in Tokyo, where an activity of 200 Bq per litre had been measured the day before. Let's put this in perspective. The natural radioactivity in every human body is 50 Bq per litre - 200 Bq per litre is really not going to do much harm.

In the Cold War era most people were led to believe that nuclear radiation presents a quite exceptional danger understood only by "eggheads" working in secret military establishments.

To cope with the friendly fire of such nuclear propaganda on the home front, ever tighter radiation regulations were enacted in order to keep all contact with radiation As Low As Reasonably Achievable (ALARA), as the principle became known.

This attempt at reassurance is the basis of international radiation safety regulations today, which suggest an upper limit for the general public of 1 mSv per year above natural levels.

This very low figure is not a danger level, rather it's a small addition to the levels found in nature - a British person is exposed to 2.7 mSv per year, on average. My book Radiation and Reason argues that a responsible danger level based on current science would be 100 mSv per month, with a lifelong limit of 5,000 mSv, not 1 mSv per year.

New attitude

People worry about radiation because they cannot feel it. However, nature has a solution - in recent years it has been found that living cells replace and mend themselves in various ways to recover from a dose of radiation.

These clever mechanisms kick in within hours and rarely fail, except when they are overloaded - as at Chernobyl, where most of the emergency workers who received a dose greater than 4,000 mSv over a few hours died within weeks.

However, patients receiving a course of radiotherapy usually get a dose of more than 20,000 mSv to vital healthy tissue close to the treated tumour. This tissue survives only because the treatment is spread over many days giving healthy cells time for repair or replacement.

In this way, many patients get to enjoy further rewarding years of life, even after many vital organs have received the equivalent of more than 20,000 years' dose at the above internationally recommended annual limit - which makes this limit unreasonable.

A sea-change is needed in our attitude to radiation, starting with education and public information.

Then fresh safety standards should be drawn up, based not on how radiation can be excluded from our lives, but on how much we can receive without harm - mindful of the other dangers that beset us, such as climate change and loss of electric power. Perhaps a new acronym is needed to guide radiation safety - how about As High As Relatively Safe (AHARS)?

Modern reactors are better designed than those at Fukushima - tomorrow's may be better still, but we should not wait. Radioactive waste is nasty but the quantity is small, especially if re-processed. Anyway, it is not the intractable problem that many suppose.

Some might ask whether I would accept it if it were buried 100 metres under my own house? My answer would be: "Yes, why not?" More generally, we should stop running away from radiation.

on the stay-or-go conundrum

2011-03-26T09:12:00.007+09:00

I left Tokyo for the U.S. 10 days ago, so the question for me is When do I go back??

After a week with us visiting family and friends in New York and Washington DC -- and, I hasten to add, working remotely and staying in touch with his colleagues in Tokyo -- my husband will be back in Japan on Monday. He is going back because he has a job there, whereas my job is with the kids, and their job is to go to school, and their school in Tokyo is still closed, due to "continuing problems at the Fukushima nuclear plant, the continuing number of large magnitude earthquakes and the uncertainty about what would happen in Tokyo if a major incident occurs at Fukushima, possibly combined with a large earthquake, during a time when we had the school full of students," according to the headmaster's March 25 letter to parents, posted on the BST website. Fair enough.

So am I being sensible? Yes. But I feel bad, maybe even a little bit ashamed. I want to show my support for a country that's been so good to us for the last three years. Staying away feels like the opposite.

My situation is further complicated by some family stuff going on at home, matters that are heartbreaking in completely unrelated ways, and for which I am glad to be around for, and that under normal circumstances, I probably wouldn't have been around for. So I am OK with our decision to be in New York for now.

That said, here's an essay I came across on Facebook (a friend posted a link to it). I don't know the writer personally, but I can totally relate...

Reflections on staying in Tokyo after 3/11
by Tito Poza on Friday, March 25, 2011 at 7:49pm

When disaster struck northern Japan two weeks ago, Tokyo suffered relatively little physical damage. Even so, the effect on life in Tokyo has been profound, and caused many foreign residents to decide to leave. I decided to stay; what follows are reflections on the circumstances and decision-making process that I and many others faced.

I've lived in Tokyo for twenty-two years, and I've never experienced an atmosphere quite like the current one. (Probably the closest was after the 1995 sarin gas attack.) There was the emotional shock of the earthquake, which though we were not at the epicenter was for most of us the strongest quake we'd ever felt. It wasn't enough to bring down buildings, but it was more than enough to make one nervous at the prospect of it happening again. Then, very soon, we were stunned again as we watched our TVs and saw the devastating tsunami hit, knowing that many lives had to have been lost. This would have been more than enough of an emotional blow, but then we soon found that there was severe damage at a nuclear power plant, and with it a serious threat of the spread of radiation. That's a lot to absorb in twenty-four hours.

We (non-Japanese living in Tokyo) then began to receive frightened e-mails from our friends and relatives back home, inquiring after our safety and urging us to consider returning. For some of us, these messages were concerned suggestions; for others, emotion-laden pressure. With all this happening, it doesn't surprise me at all that many people would seriously entertain the idea of leaving. In a sense, I feel that at that point the degree of actual danger to Tokyo was not what was driving many people to go, or consider going: as much or more, it was the emotional impact of what had happened. The death toll mounting, TEPCO crews scrambling to avert disaster... even though it hadn't happened in Tokyo, it hadn't been that far away. Tokyo didn't feel like the safe place it had been a few days ago, and the sudden inability to buy bottled water, toilet paper, and other basics of life only emphasized how many were feeling that way. Most of us had never seen so many empty store shelves in our lives. Another jarring change, another feeling of the rug being pulled out from under our secure lives.

If for no other reason, the e-mails and Facebook messages from our loved ones forced us to at least consider the possibility of leaving, even if it was a thought we quickly discarded. Those of us who stayed had various reasons for doing so. Jobs, friends, and loved ones who are here. Feelings of debt and connection to Japan. Not wanting to leave when things got tough. Tasks not yet finished. A rational feeling that the level of danger didn't warrant leaving. Many others, no doubt. But it can be tough to fly in the face of winds blowing so hard in the other direction. More than one person expressed to me that despite having made a well-considered, rational decision not to leave, they later had doubts, mostly inspired by the sheer number of people clogging the Narita and Haneda departure lounges; a feeling of, what makes them wrong and me right? It's a very natural feeling, especially since even though expert opinion is that Tokyo is in no real danger, we cannot prove this. Also, in many cases the people leaving are ones we like, respect, and care about; we don't want to think ill of them, so it isn't so easy to dismiss their actions casually.

So, even though most all of us are confident that we made the right decision, we are in the middle of what can feel like a whirlwind, what with all that has happened and still is happening. We've been buffeted by these events and the atmosphere; even though we're trying to keep it at bay, fear is contagious, and fighting it takes effort. We do research, to convince others (and ourselves) that we've made the right choice. We reach out to each other for support. We think seriously about what's important to us, which is something we don't usually have to do. We avoid sensational news sources and gossip-mongers. We try to approach the always uncertain future with confidence. A friend said that he felt that the decision to stay was a defining moment in his life, which makes perfect sense to me. Making the decision to stay in the face of the enormous pressure of this situation isn't easy, and the harder something is to do, the more impact it has. And one feels bad saying that we have it hard, because those up north have it so much harder; I've talked to more than a few who've had that thought. It's true; we are quite lucky to have what we have, and we know that. But I've talked to enough of us in the past two weeks to know that a lot of us are feeling this stress; this is our reality, we feel the way we feel. So it feels like a good time to take inventory, to reflect on what brought us to the decision we made.

As I write this, two weeks after the disaster, we know that life in Tokyo may not be like it was for quite some time. No one can say when supermarkets will be fully stocked again. Scheduled blackouts in the Tokyo suburbs continue, and may for the foreseeable future. With a significant portion of Japan's electricity production gone, large shortfalls are forecast for the hot and humid summer months. And of course the Fukushima nuclear plants still have not been brought under control, and even if one discounts the radiation threat to Tokyo, this fact will certainly unnerve many. More foreign residents may leave, for no other reason than that they may feel the stress of these circumstances makes Tokyo an unpleasant place to live right now. Or those who had entertained vague thoughts of leaving for unrelated reasons but had not done so may now look at leaving in a new light. Even though I still have no intention of leaving, this feels very understandable: if something important to us changes, we react to that change. A 25% salary cut will cause us to re-evaluate remaining in our job. There is a 'new normal' settling over Tokyo, and inertia will keep many people here, but as with the decision not to leave in the immediate aftermath of the disaster, we will be asking ourselves why we want to stay, and as with everything we do, that will say something about who we are. Every moment, I feel, is a defining moment.

I love this country

2011-03-25T21:43:00.002+09:00

Residents in Yamamoto in Miyagi Prefecture, relaxed in a makeshift public bath set up outside a shelter for tsunami and earthquake victims.
Shuji Kajiyama/Associated Press

The New York Times
March 25, 2011
Newly Homeless in Japan Re-Establish Order Amid Chaos
By Michael Wines

KIKUZENTAKATA, Japan — Koji Yamaguchi, a 76-year-old survivor of the tsunami that all but eradicated this town on March 11, was unavailable for interviews. He was out walking his dog.

Which would be unsurprising, were Mr. Yamaguchi not an evacuee himself, living on a 9-by-9-foot grass mat in a junior high school gymnasium here with 1,000 other people.

To an outsider, much is striking about Japan’s response to two weeks of serial disasters: the stoicism and self-sacrifice; the quiet bravery in the face of tragedy that seems almost woven into the national character. Just as striking, however, is that evacuees here live in a place that can kennel your dog, charge your cellphone, fix your dentures and even provide that nonnegotiable necessity of Japanese life, a steamy soak in a hot tub of water.

There is a free laundry service, too, although they are still working out clothes-drying kinks.

Just two weeks after this nation’s greatest catastrophe in decades, the citizens at Takada Junior High School No. 1, this town’s largest evacuee center, have managed to fashion a microcosm of the spotlessly organized and efficient Japan they so recently knew.

Theirs is a city where a hand sanitizer sits on every table; where face masks, which Japanese wear the way other people wear sunglasses, are dispensed by the box. It is a place where you do not just trade your muddy shoes for slippers at the front door, but also shed the slippers at the gymnasium door lest you carry a mote of dust from the hallways into the living areas.

“It’s hard to gather these people to live together here,” Tsutomu Nakai, the soft-spoken 61-year-old retiree who manages the center, said on Thursday. “They all have different lifestyles and different personalities. But so far, people have volunteered to help each other, and it works very well.”

None of this is to suggest that Takada Junior High is the Waldorf. There is immense suffering and personal misery here: grieving survivors, financial ruin, smelly bodies, no running water, frigid outdoor toilets, endless boredom and the prospect of sleeping on a hard floor with complete strangers for weeks — even months — to come.

But this, too, seems to be part of the national character: a passion for order and civility so deep-rooted that the chaos and despair of 1,000 strangers somehow is subdued to the level of disarray expected at the monthly meeting of a book-lovers’ club.

The spirit is captured by the hand-drawn signs that adorn the gym: “Let’s be grateful that we are alive”; “Cheer up, Takata”; “Let’s communicate and bond our hearts.”

The messages are lived in simple ways. One expects that 1,000 evacuees would have access to a doctor, and the Japan Red Cross has opened a well-staffed clinic on the first floor. But one might not expect the two dentists next door, who decided on March 17 to volunteer their services and opened shop the next day, treating about 15 patients daily with the help of staff members whose own homes were lost in the tsunami.

“I don’t have any other place to work, because my office washed away,” said Masanori Yoshiday, 60. “We can rebuild the office later.”

The dentists were followed by Shoichi Yanashita, a 66-year-old barber and a fellow evacuee, who was giving free haircuts on Thursday with scissors and a razor borrowed from a friend in a nearby town. “We have to support each other,” he said, “and this is what I know how to do.”

Hair cutting and dentistry joined a long list of services, donated and otherwise: volunteer bicycle-repairing, a shuttle bus ferrying evacuees from center to center, pet cages donated by local veterinarians, free laundering of refugees’ clothes by local high-school students.

Drying remains a problem. “We have to dry the ladies’ underwear where people can’t see it. So we put it in two classrooms on the second floor, and then we lock the doors,” said Mr. Nakai, the evacuee center manager. Classes at the school have been suspended since the disaster.

Asked whether he has had to deal with petty thievery, personality conflicts or any other social ills that beset strangers unwillingly thrown together, Mr. Nakai replied: “Nothing at all. They don’t even argue.”

Not quite true, said Hiroe Sasaki, a 42-year-old evacuee. “We had only one blanket for each person on the first day,” she said. “People did get stressed. Some shouted at each other.”

And now? “They wouldn’t tell me,” she said, “but I know some people aren’t happy that other families have more blankets than they do.”

Ms. Sasaki staffs the help desk in the gymnasium, the urban center of this makeshift town. To the right is the lending library. To the left is a cardboard mailbox where evacuees can deposit postcards — also available at the desk — that are delivered to other centers around town.

Opposite her desk are recycling bins for burnable trash, plastic, glass and metal (subdivided into aluminum and steel). On the desk and adjacent shelves, free for the asking, are batteries, hand and foot warmers, cotton gloves, pens and paper, plastic trash bags and eye drops for the tree pollen that is spreading with the arrival of spring. A small box holds cellphones that have been charged at the power strip behind her chair. Beside the chair is a wireless microphone used to deliver the news through the gymnasium’s sound system, heralded by the four-chime alert often heard in train stations and airports.

This week, Japan’s Self Defense Force soldiers offered a much-coveted new service: two hot tubs for men and women, holding 25 bathers at a time, at a nearly elementary school that also houses evacuees. Now the Takada center offers daily shuttle buses to the tubs, which sit side by side in steam-saturated tents outside the school entrance.

The orderliness extends to the residents, who have assembled the detritus of two weeks on a gym floor — donated clothes, blankets, folding chairs — into neat barriers that provide a modicum of privacy from the neighbors. The gym floor is carved into neighborhoods, each with a representative who carries grievances to higher-ups.

Not that there are any grievances, of course — at least those that people are willing to admit publicly in a culture that prizes the capacity for endurance.

“Some people gather around the space heater at nights because they can’t sleep. The young people, especially, snore really loudly,” said Yukiko Yamaguchi, 73, who lost her home in the tsunami.

“But it’s unconscious,” she added quickly. “You can’t complain about that.”

Moshe Komata contributed reporting.

'caring for its own'

2011-03-24T08:56:00.008+09:00

Children whose parents died in the tsunami "will likely be absorbed into extended families," according to experts interviewed for this article. What if they're not? Will Japan allow more foreign adoptions?

Never thought I'd post something I read on Fox News but here are some excerpts of an article posted March 22 (comparing the situation in Japan to what happened after the January 2010 quake in Haiti, when foreign adoptions were fast-tracked):

Martha Osborne, spokeswoman for the adoption advocacy website RainbowKids.com, said Japan and Haiti couldn’t be more different when it comes to adoption.

“You see that in developing nations, there’s no outlet for these children and the people left in the wake of the disaster are completely impoverished and unable to care for them, and in that case even extended relatives often say that the best case for the child is to be adopted because there are no resources,” Osborne told FoxNews.com. “But in Japan that’s just not the case, it’s a fully developed nation that’s capable of caring for its own children.”

Osborne said a dwindling population, as well as strong family ties in the country, makes adoption fairly unnecessary, because children who can’t be cared for by their parents are usually taken in by other relatives.

“I don’t believe there’s going to be a true orphan situation in Japan in the wake of this disaster. I do not believe that there are going to be children without any ties to relatives…that extended family system is going to consider that child their child,” she said.

Tom Defilipo, president of Joint Council on International Children Services, said that stress on lineage also makes the Japanese society “very averse to adoptions.”

“Very few adoptions take place in Japan domestically and only about 30-34 last year internationally” despite having “about 400 children’s homes in the country and about 25,000 children approximately in those homes,” Defilipo told FoxNews.com. “Bloodlines are exceptionally important, so the whole idea of adopting or raising a child that’s not your own or isn’t part of your extended family is relatively unheard of.”

Still, Ogaway, Osborne, and Defilipo all agree that the the children whose parents died in the earthquake will likely be absorbed into extended families. It is, they say, far too early for any of the children to be considered for adoption because Japanese authorities are still searching to find which children’s parents are just missing, which are confirmed dead and which of those children have other family to care for them...

Read the whole story here.