Lost In Translation

Relax

The British embassy in Tokyo says even in the worst case of a meltdown and explosion its only serious for people living within 30 km of the power station.

 

This is what it says below:

 

Let me now talk about what would be a reasonable worst case scenario. If the Japanese fail to keep the reactors cool and fail to keep the pressure in the containment vessels at an appropriate level, you can get this, you know, the dramatic word “meltdown”. But what does that actually mean? What a meltdown involves is the basic reactor core melts, and as it melts, nuclear material will fall through to the floor of the container. There it will react with concrete and other materials … that is likely… remember this is the reasonable worst case, we don’t think anything worse is going to happen. In this reasonable worst case you get an explosion. You get some radioactive material going up to about 500 metres up into the air. Now, that’s really serious, but it’s serious again for the local area. It’s not serious for elsewhere even if you get a combination of that explosion it would only have nuclear material going in to the air up to about 500 metres. If you then couple that with the worst possible weather situation i.e. prevailing weather taking radioactive material in the direction of Greater Tokyo and you had maybe rainfall which would bring the radioactive material down do we have a problem? The answer is unequivocally no. Absolutely no issue. The problems are within 30 km of the reactor. And to give you a flavour for that, when Chernobyl had a massive fire at the graphite core, material was going up not just 500 metres but to 30,000 feet. It was lasting not for the odd hour or so but lasted months, and that was putting nuclear radioactive material up into the upper atmosphere for a very long period of time. But even in the case of Chernobyl, the exclusion zone that they had was about 30 kilometres. And in that exclusion zone, outside that, there is no evidence whatsoever to indicate people had problems from the radiation. The problems with Chernobyl were people were continuing to drink the water, continuing to eat vegetables and so on and that was where the problems came from. That’s not going to be the case here. So what I would really re-emphasise is that this is very problematic for the area and the immediate vicinity and one has to have concerns for the people working there. Beyond that 20 or 30 kilometres, it’s really not an issue for health.

Dealing With Mass Hysteria

The biggest stress and challenge of this crisis for me has been dealing with the fact that the event of a large earthquake aftershock off the coast of Tokyo is quite probable this week and the ongoing crisis at the nuclear reactors in Fukushima.

The second biggest challenge is dealing with the mass hysteria surrounding the situation that has people hording food and supplies (see the photo above of the eggs section at the local supermarket and the water section below), making ignorant and uninformed statements that lead to fear mongering, and the fact there has been a great exodus of people out of the country or out of the Kanto area. This is mostly due to the prospects of radiation clouds being blown into the area from the nuclear reactors. Radiation poisoning is something that really sends people in a panic since it's something they don't understand.  A friend who is in the medical profession had to talk someone out of iodine pills for radiation poisoning in Seattle, Washington yesterday.

There is great distrust with the Japanese government on informing people of what is going on at the reactors-which can not be helped since they cannot get close enough to inspect them yet and are doing their best. The French government has suggested that French citizens evacuate Kanto just in case and western expats are making a huge exodus out of the city. I must know of a dozen. My contact at the US Embassy is following the Japanese line on the crisis-so I can't believe that they are going to put millions of people at risk for fear of setting off a stampede with evacuation-it is 120 miles away and is being somewhat contained-remember people survived Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I think Japanese are easily the most pussyfooted nation in the world and they are largely staying put in this crisis and THAT tells you something. I am not evacuating until I am TOLD to do so.

So how am I passing my time in this crisis?

• Spending much too much time monitoring the fear mongering from emails, social media, and mainstream media.
• Finishing up a correspondence course that will allow me to renew my teacher certification in Washington state (just in case-you never know what the future will bring). It's fairly involved, History 137 "Reconstruction to Present." 12 2-4 page essay assignments (which includes a significant amount of reading), a midterm, a final, and a 8-12 page research paper with 3 book length sources. I already completed the first, HIST 136: "Columbus to Reconstruction," and another course HUM 105: "Interpersonal Communication." However, I enjoy studying history so it's been interesting doing so from an adult and informed perspective. So far I've completed 8 assignments and have started planning for my research paper.
• Recently I have been reading a book on Kindle via my iPhone application and sometimes using the actual Kindle machine, in addition to reading a "physical" paperback book. My current Kindle book is Hitch 22 a memoir by Christopher Hitchens and my current paperback book is I'm Staying With My Boys: The Heroic Life of Sgt. John Basilone, USMC by Jim Proser that was one of the sources used in the HBO miniseries The Pacific.
• I am also re-watching The Pacific on DVD (I had hoped there would be lots of extras in the box set and sadly there are precious few).
• Studying Japanese-I'm using a workbook that is called "Idioms: Basic/Intermediate Level."
• Making my way through Sergio Leone's "Dollars Trilogy." I've already watched A Fistful of Dollars and For A Few Dollars More. Today I plan to watch The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

Post Earthquake Images

I'm uploading some images I took with my iPhone that I posted on Facebook for people who aren't on it, like my parents. Today I went to Shinjuku and many businesses were closed and conserving energy-and the big TV screen at Studio Alta was also shut off.

I usually cut through the JR station to get to the east side of the station from the Keio line and there was orchestrated chaos as people lined up in the station for the limited service trains (many were cancelled due to the rolling blackouts).

This picture was from Friday the 11th, the evening of the big quake, when all trains were stopped for several hours and hordes of people walked home from work-here walking west from Shinjuku. The elevated expressway was shut down so traffic was also at a standstill.

After Shock

I don't usually make personal posts on this blog-it's become a space to discuss things like movies, books, food, travel, and things related to Japan. But the last few days have been really surreal due to the massive earthquake that rocked Miyagi prefecture and that has been haunting everyone with all the horrific video coverage out there.

It may have been the big one, but from where I was at home it wasn't. Don't get me wrong-it was the worst earthquake I've ever felt and seemed to go on forever. But it did little more than knock some things off shelves in my apartment, which is located at ground level. I imagine it must have been terrifying for those who were 20 stories up in office buildings. There was no apparent damage in my neighborhood of Sasazuka, which is located just west of Shinjuku about 25 minutes by walking. I always wonder when an earthquake hits, and there have been many over the 13 years I've been here, if this is the one that will rock Tokyo to its foundations. It wasn't and I feel extremely lucky. The fact that I'm on spring vacation means that it hasn't affected my professional life either-I don't have to be in an office or teach any classes. I'm on my own schedule. So I didn't get stuck away from home like so many people who were stranded since the trains closed down for most of the day. I went to see what was going on at the station area and saw the legions of people walking west from Shinjuku to their homes on Koshikaido, which is a major arterial. Also the traffic gridlock of people driving home. Many shops were closed down, and those that were open looked gutted of food, water, and other supplies. I guess I took it for granted that Tokyo would be taken care of.

I had dinner at a ramen place down the street-just in case the gas was still off. That was my major inconvenience-initially the gas was off, but at some point it came back on after I reset the switch. I was in desperate need of doing laundry, but the coin laundry places I usually use had gas power dryers weren't working, so I left the clothes out to dry naturally.

The next day I tried to go to the gym, but it was closed, as were many shops. But elsewhere business as usual was going on. Several events were cancelled: a friend's club event the St. Patrick Day's Parade. I got fed up with sitting around in my apartment seeing Facebook hysteria and watching the news so went and met some friends for drinks in Shinjuku and Shibuya. It was eerie like New Year's Day-so few people out and about. 

There will be rotating blackouts in the surrounding area possibly until April, but the main 23 wards of Tokyo will not be effected and I live in work in this area, so again it, doesn't have  a direct effect on me personally. I guess I am extremely fortunate.

The next few days will hopefully see Japan return to some sort of normalcy, but I know that won't be true for those near the epicenter. But I guess the rest of us are ready to get back to normalcy. Who knows what the long term effects of the quake will be? However, I do know that things will get worse before they get better as the number of dead are tallied and the nuclear power plants that are in danger of meltdown have been shut down.

Wong Kar-Wai

Since I started reading Stephen Teo's book Wong Kar-Wai I've been writing posts about the films of Wong as they were informed by the specific chapter from Teo's book. I found it to be an excellent resource and reference for analyzing the films and it will figure greatly in my  next academic paper that will discuss the Japanese culture influences in his films. I also found his discussions on the themes and motifs of the films useful and enlightening. If I had any complaints they might have to do with the fact that sometimes it comes across as too academic with references to French theorists and in that he sometimes makes a stretch in comparing the films to surrealists paintings and what not. This is the second book I've read from the World Directors series, the first was Takeshi Kitano, and have found both both very informative and useful in understanding the oeuvre of the director in question.

Night Catches Us

Tanya Hamilton's film Night Catches Us is a fine film that depicts a time and a group that we don't often see on the screen. It is set in 1976 when Anthony Mackie, a former Black Panther, returns to Philadelphia after spending time in jail. He is welcomed back by Kerry Washington, who is the widow of his best friend who he is known to have snitched on and led to his death when the police tried to apprehend him. Of course the story is more complicated, but the old gang has it out for him and he is being harassed by the police, The Wire's Wendell Pierce, to try and set up his old friend Do Right. The film has great production values and recreates Philadelphia in the 70s. It is a compelling story and there are several fine performances-a sleeper of a film that deserves a wider audience.

Nan Station

I like the logo for the Nan Station in Shimokitazawa. They have an inexpensive lunch special for Indian style curries. Below is the Keema curry, my favorite.

Back To The Future: 2046

In some ways 2046 is the continuation of a story that started in Days of Being Wild that continued in the film In The Mood For Love, and in others it is a summation of all the themes that Wong Kar-wai has addressed in his previous seven films. It is a continuation of In The Mood For Love in that Chow Mo-wan (Tony Leung) tries to get on without his lost love. Stephen Teo suggests that the character is based on the handsome, womanizing hero of Osamu Daza's novel No Longer Human. But, as Teo points out in his book, it is also about people's reaction to change as it takes effect over time-a delayed reaction that hits as change becomes apparent. The motif of delayed reaction repeats throughout the film as Wong shows characters slowly overcome by the pain of separation or loss of love-this is also the theme of the science fiction story that Chow is writing and acts as a film within the film. The connection with Days of Being Wild can be seen with Carina Lau's character Lulu/Mimi from that film reappears in 2046 as a former fling from Chow's days in Singapore.

There's also the apparition of Maggie Cheung's So Lai-chen from In The Mood For Love as a memory of Chow's. However, there is another So Lai-chen, Su Lizhen (the Mandarin pronunciation of So Lai-chen) in 2046, a mysterious woman from Phnom Penh played by Gong Li who helps Chow. She helps him win back his money so he can buy his return fare to Hong Kong-but she refuses to go with him and he passionately kisses he as she leaves. One inspiration for the story relating to telling secrets to a hole in a tree comes from Osamu Dazai's novel The Setting Sun, in which a character commits suicide and leaves behind a note confessing his secret to his sister: that he was in love with the wife of a painter. Anyway, the storyline about this idea concerns Faye Wong and Tatsuya Kimura, a Japanese guest staying at the hotel, as star crossed lovers since Wong's father, the owner of the Oriental Hotel that Chow is staying at. He is in room 2047 even though he wanted to stay in 2046 (because it reminds him of his affair with So Lai-chen), but it had to be repaired since Mimi was killed a jealous boyfriend the night before. These two become his models for the SF story he is writing. He has a platonic relationship with Wong and she helps him with his writing and becomes a conduit for their relationship and exchanges letters for the two to avoid arousing Wong's father's suspicion. The room is taken by a dance hall girl, Bai Ling, played by the sultry Zhang Ziyi who eventually becomes Chow's lover. He breaks her heart by establishing the relationship as a business proposal when pays her after having made love. The nostalgia and heartache that Wong evokes in the film has many layers. For example, there's Lulu's nostalgia for her dead boyfriend, Chow's nostalgia for his encounter with Lulu in Singapore, and the viewer's nostalgia for the film Days Of Being Wild. There is Wong's nostalgia for the past and anxious thrust to the future that is seen in all of his films and is expressed in the title 2046. This is the date in which China's vow not to change Hong Kong will come to an end.

Jon And Sarah in Tokyo

First night in Akasaka at the Ninja Restaurant (trust me it is as cheesy as you are imagining and I look better in real life!)

We saw a couple of weddings at Meiji Shrine in Harajuku the next day.

Here's Sarah and Jon in front of the Meiji Torii gate.

Modern architecture in Omotesando on our travels.

No trip to Tokyo is complete without a stop in Kabukicho. If you want to see the inside of a host club-you have to ask Sarah.

A temple in Yamanaka.

 A steel mask at a temple in Ueno Park.

This doesn't look like a temple or shrine, but it's in Ueno Park.

This picture has the Sky Tree and Golden Turd in the same picture in Asakusa. (Although my guests from Minnesota said that the Golden Turd looked like a Viking Horn)

The new Gap/Mizuho building in Ginza. We did more than this. I Promise. Ask Jon and Sarah.

 

Nissan Laurel SGL

I've never seen a Nissan Laurel before-or at least that I was aware of, but I saw one the other day. It slightly resembles a 70s American muscle car to me.