Garren's blog

14th April: The Sky Not Falling on Our Heads

14^th April 

As Chief Vitalstatistix always said to the proud Gaul’s of his village in the Asterix stories, “We have nothing to fear, but the sky falling on our heads!” And despite the best efforts of Pyongyang, there was little to fear from the launch of the North Korean Rocket/Missile/Lemon, as within two minutes of the launch it had disintegrated and crashed to earth, landing mainly in the Yellow Sea, west of South Korea. Yet another DPRK space failure, to match the failures in just about every other department of the sad and lonely state. As The Economist stated: “On balance, the missile debacle looks laughable, but isn’t. It appears likely to increase the regime’s international isolation, which tends to make it more threatening. It is also likely to increase the young Mr Kim’s credibility gap at home, which may make him more repressive.” http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2012/04/north-koreas-botched-satellite-launch?fsrc=nlw|newe|4-13-2012|1376807|37680338|

The reason that North Korea may become more isolated is that they managed the tricky job of annoying everybody by defying UN sanctions and resolutions and the threats and pressures of its ‘enemies’ (Korea, Japan, and the US), while also resisting the pleas of its friends (well China, and possibly a rather more remote Russia). It managed to both antagonize, and yet look weak, which always seemed likely, but was very far from what the regime desired, and hence the amazing degree of openness in the run-up to the launch. Japan, the US, China, and other countries have had many missile/launcher failures over the years, as this is a rather tricky technical field, where inter-nation cooperation is the exception. The DPRK effort, however, looked odd from the outset. They were overtly attempting to launch a satellite that, to the non-specialist, looked rather recherché, and to specialists on NHK in Japan looked like a university student science project, with its clumsy plastic brackets, obvious rivets and bolts, and the distinct lack of many external sensors. It looked like the sort of thing that kids make for ‘Robot Wars’ on the telly, where boys (and yes, almost always boys, with hair, skin, and social problems) take time out from staring at their toes caps or tweeting about sci-fi trivia to make machines out of odd parts that whir along gymnasium floors and collect balls and throw them into baskets, with the possibility of a collision for the tension element. Indeed, the North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, would not be out of place in the gymnasium, and perhaps that is what he thought he was doing. Indeed, there are many cartoons depicting the wonder that was the latest launch: http://www.cartoonaday.com/north-korea-launches-missile/ http://www.google.co.jp/imgres?q=Kim+Jong+Un+cartoon&hl=ja&sa=X&rls=com.microsoft:ja:IE-SearchBox&rlz=1I7ADRA_jaJP359&biw=1366&bih=516&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=nO4AanFVpUtJmM:&imgrefurl=http://politicalcartoonsaustralia.com/tag/kim-jong-un/&docid=lvWI7RVR0FraEM&imgurl=http://resources3.news.com.au/images/2011/12/20/1226227/060383-mark-knight-cartoon.jpg&w=650&h=433&ei=1JKJT-jpLYfumAXT793wCQ&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=99&vpy=18&dur=1015&hovh=183&hovw=275&tx=179&ty=114&sig=103312793627673698464&page=1&tbnh=149&tbnw=197&start=0&ndsp=12&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:64 (Sorry, that is a very long link, but quite interesting.)

One of the better versions had the young dear leader sitting aghast seeing the launch saying, “No, I said LUNCH!”

The fear, that many media sources are carrying, is that this failure and sense of humiliation could well push the DPRK into testing another nuclear device, as its previous tests have also been only qualified successes at best. This would elevate tensions to a new high, for a failed rocket of possible civil utility is quite different from the obvious and unavoidable fact of a regenerated nuclear weapons project. Already the UNSC has denounced the attempted launch, and the US has cut off food aid, in steps that will be seen as highly provocative in Pyongyang. As yet, there have been few concrete steps by Seoul or Tokyo. It would seem that the leadership might also be rather more cautious than external media suppose, and be wondering what to do next, and it is rather, luckily, absorbed in celebrating the 100^th anniversary of the birth of the DPRK Founder and Great Dear Leader Kim Il Sung. One can only hope that caution prevails, and that they decide to wait and see if they can move on past this current tension. Certainly this is what Chinese media are urging. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-04/14/content_15046684.htm

And one can only hope that the other flaws apparent from the failed launch on 12^th April will be thoroughly investigated. As mentioned last week, Japan was at full alert for the launch and possible raining metal upon Japanese territory. At least the JSDF and government were on full alert. Most Japanese were bemused and expressed only a passing interest. The launch, just after 07:40 on Thursday (12^th) was known to be a failure in the US and South Korea by approximately 08:00. The missile blew up, or disintegrated, most likely due to a problem in the separation of the first stage main booster rocket and fuel cell, at some point between one and two minutes into the flight, at which point it had reached an altitude of at least 120km. The Japan Times, which was supposed to be ‘in the loop’ received its first notification at 08:09, stating that it could not be confirmed if a launch had taken place, which was perhaps not altogether helpful for a newspaper to base a story upon. The actual notification came at 08:37. Defense Minister Tanaka began a public statement on the matter at approximately 08:24, and stated that the missile had failed and crashed, although approximately 25 minutes after equivalent statements in Seoul and Washington. As Tanaka himself stated, “There was some difference (in timing) but we did the best we could.” Which, sadly, is probably true.

The fact that newspapers didn’t have the facts very quickly isn’t a major crisis, but the JSDF and Okinawan and other local governments also didn’t seem to have been given the facts. The J-Alert system, founded in 2007, and tasked with alerting the whole country about crises such as tsunami, earthquakes, and missiles, didn’t come into action. It provided no alerts of any launch, and no data was provided at all, until the same mails that the Japan Times received. Indeed, several local government officials in Okinawa said that they received news about the launches by either watching US or Korean TV news, or by receiving phone calls from family and friends who were watching foreign news. The unofficial explanation for this seemingly odd scenario on NHK news was provided by a retired MSDF Admiral and missile expert, who stated that the launch was very far away, and the missile broke up rather quickly, so naturally the Japanese systems wouldn’t have picked up anything, or be able to pass data to anyone. Which rather begs several questions. If Japanese sensors couldn’t pick up a large missile at an altitude of 120km, when would they imagine that the missile could be tracked? Then, how long before JSDF missiles would have time to react? And then, what the devil is the point in having the J-Alert system for civilians to take protective measures? Since the cost of the system is terribly high, and many councils haven’t had the funds to install it, perhaps they would do better to take out subscriptions to CNN and KBS. They would also be able to see all the latest Korean TV dramas, which are so popular in Japan, although none are likely to be as dramatic as the tale of a young man with a bad haircut who takes over his late father’s empire and quickly finds out that nothing works, the empire is on the point of collapse, and there are warriors and demons in every corridor waiting for the worst scenario. Just don’t ask the Japanese government to give advice on this drama. They’ll all be watching the other channel, where nothing is happening at all.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120414a1.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17703212

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-17715020

 Certainly, Chinese TV viewers will have had no shortage of drama recently, as the secret is out, and Bo Xilai, Governor of Chongqing province in south-western China, and a rising populist star of the new Chinese Communist Party that appeals to the upwardly mobile young was suspended from his party posts on 10^th April. The cat is also out of the bag about his family, with many wondering how his son came to be educated overseas, and his wife to be a rich business woman when Bo was a poor party official. But the cat has turned into a tiger that threatens to eat the family and the local party structure as well, as Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai, has been indicted in an investigation concerning the mysterious death of a British businessman, Neil Haywood, after he became embroiled in a business dispute with Gu, rumours of which have been running around the web for weeks. Bo’s deputy, Wang Lijun, seemingly attempted to gain asylum from the local US consulate as a whistleblower on the corrupt practices, before leaving the building and being detained by authorities, who it seems didn’t know whether to focus upon Wang’s treachery or the seeming corruption of Bo and his cohorts.

What, if anything, does it say about China? Could this be symptomatic of a wild-west mentality, or a sign of the increasing openness and maturity of the Communist Party to address such illegality and attempt to make China a developed country in both economic and legal terms? Probably neither, but it illustrates the difficulties any regime faces in controlling news and information in a literate, technologically developed society. Truth will out, and the CCP may not be quite ready to handle that truth. http://www.economist.com/blogs/analects/2012/04/bo-xilais-political-demise

 If any confirmation were needed of how difficult it can be to control a society and its information flow, look at Syria. The land of unity and ceasefires, where the President seems determined to alienate every possible external and internal group other than his ruling cabal. Thousands have died, mainly among the opposition and the civilians caught in the crossfire, but still it goes on, and remarkably little is actually done outside of sending envoys, implementing peace plans, dispatching observers, and passing motions of censure. Details have emerged of the Presidents proxy internet shopping to avoid UN sanctions, of his western educated media advisors and spokespeople, and of how his wife can travel freely around Europe, as she has a UK passport, but few details have merged of why the world is doing so little to prevent a slaughter far worse than that which occurred in Libya. Syria has more allies than Gaddafi had, but is that the only explanation? Is the west simply spent after a decade of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? Are many people suffering from emotional fatigue, having seen so many instances of brutality and crisis that they simply throw their hands in the air and denounce the rest of the world as ‘full of lunatics’? The US election contest provides one example that would appear to suggest this, as the hottest subject contested seems to revolve around the right of a woman to choose whether or not she proceeds with her pregnancy. Not America’s place in the world, the right to utilize force for national or international goals, or the state of the world economy. Maybe the world really is full of lunatics, both near and far.

7th April: Easter and All of the Heaven-Sent Joys of Spring

 7^th April 

Easter time, and naturally our thoughts turn to spiritual matters, such as what the devil is falling from the heavens? Yes, Japan is wondering what on earth is falling down upon them, as not only is the cedar pollen season still continuing, but the government also appears intent upon landing a higher sales tax upon them, which nobody wants, in order to secure a moderate welfare system, that most people want, while the effects of radiation are still being felt, emotionally and economically at least, more than a year after the Dai-ichi reactor explosions. And as if all that wasn’t enough, there is the government and media attention being placed upon the ‘threat’ (more accurately the slight possibility) of some part of a North Korean satellite launcher landing somewhere on Japan, or at least within Japan’s jurisdiction, even if only in some deep body of water where it will never be noticed or seen again. 

Taking that final fear first, the problem has come about due to the DPRK announcing, quite correctly by international law and conventions, that it plans a satellite launch in early-mid-April, and that this will probably involve a trajectory over Japan. Being hemmed in on all signs it would have to pass over someone, but Japan is jolly unhappy, as it believes that the DPRK launch is actually not a satellite at all but a prototype ballistic missile system designed to carry (eventually) a nuclear warhead. This assumption is based upon a diet of past DPRK sabre-rattling and more general public pronouncements, and might well be true, but it is the Japanese response that has been most interesting. A DPRK invitation to observe the launch was rejected, and the Noda cabinet, in the highly unlikely shape of Defense Minister Tanaka, mobilized land and naval forces to meet the supposed military test with an actual military defence. In the Japanese context of the peace constitution, the somewhat uncomfortable position of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) in relation to that constitution, and the rather abstract operational command and control structures for dealing with crises these developments have been eye-poppingly unusual.

The Ground SDF dispatched its PAC-3 (that is updated Patriot Surface to Air missile: SAM) systems to likely ‘missile transit’ areas of Japan, most prominently the Okinawa island chain, on both Miyakojima and Ishigakijima. One set was transported by Maritime SDF ship, the other by civilian ferry, rather indicating there was no particular rush, and each PAC-3 system took almost 72 hours to become operational from disembarkation. It is hoped that any actual missile threat is announced some weeks in advance. Meanwhile the MSDF is sailing two or three of its AEGIS destroyers in the East China Sea and Japan Sea in order to provide a longer range, and higher altitude defence to any DPRK missiles, using their SM-3 SAM. So, there is technology and personnel in place. Now, the very slight problem. If Japan were to shoot down any old object in the sky it would be both almost certainly illegal, and also quite possibly seen as an act of war, which in the context of a peace constitution might well pose an awkward question or two. Therefore the Japanese government has stated that it will shoot down any object seen as likely about to fall upon Japan. Now then, that makes it extremely difficult to use the SM-3, as they are ‘forward deployed’, and most likely will only be able to track missiles as they rise, and are much less likely to be able to intercept as they fall away. The PAC-3 systems are of limited range and ability, and face a different problem. However, both face the same command and control problem in this situation. Japan will be highly reluctant to devolve any decision on use of force to the local commanders, as ‘civilian control’ is such an obsession, and quite understandable when remembering the events of 1931-1945. The context of the 21^st century, however, would appear to suggest a slightly different approach might be worth considering. Even if all were to proceed relatively smoothly, and time were available to contact a civil master and ask for the right to shoot down an object, would it be the right thing to do? The chances are such an object would be a spent booster or fuel section, and the greatest threat to Japan would be it landing on people, buildings, ships etc. and causing death, injury, or damage. Hitting such a single item with a missile and creating a shower of metallic chaff would not appear to solve any aspect of that problem, while the highest likelihood would be that such a discarded launcher stage would fall into the sea. This has been made even more confusing by the J-Alert system designed to warn of a missile attack (no, most people didn’t know that Japan had such a system) either malfunctioning, or being unintelligible in approximately 30% of cases where it was tested (mainly in Okinawa Prefecture). Even when it worked the response of most local people was that they had no idea how to react to a warning of a missile attack, as there are no shelters and no drills. Natural disasters are drilled and prepared for, but not missiles. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120406004913.htm http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120403_30.html　

It seems that the Japanese government is effectively denouncing the North Korean militarization of space while at the same time militarizing this whole issue. This has riled many Okinawa residents, who are often ambivalent to Japan’s military and government due to the sense of having been sacrificed for war in 1945, and then abandoned afterwards. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120403_25.html　

Perhaps Noda thinks it makes Japan look strong to take such a notable military stand, but instead it rather makes the country look weak, and any failure in technology, systems, command and control, or simple judgment would make the whole effort appear all the more futile. However, it has provided a very fine reason to move hundreds of men and much equipment into an area which has seen a significant increase in air and sea violation incidents in recent years by China. Surely a complete coincidence. 

PM Noda is hitting the trail to sell the idea that Japan needs the 5% increase in sales tax to stave off financial collapse, even though it won’t make that much difference either way. Greeks must be wondering what they ever did wrong, as their debt is dwarfed by Japan’s, and whatever Greeks may have been doing their sales tax is 23% versus Japan’s 5%, they may lose their currency, and they are under sustained attack for their profligacy and extravagance. Japan meanwhile has one of the highest valued currencies in the world, and seems able to coast along with the world’s largest debt. The truth is naturally, complex, with most Japanese debt being domestic, and strictly managed through public and semi-public institutions where the nasty market can affect it much less. It is capitalism, but not as most people would know it, and therefore everything ticks along. Except that everyone knows the fuel tank will run out and while refueling will be expensive the government is looking under the seats and in the drink holders for loose change while the passengers are staring out of the window, humming along to the radio, and trying not to notice the instruments on the dashboard. We have to do something, but it is they who should do it, not me. Just like the Greeks. And British/French/Americans and everyone else really.

The problem for Noda is that even his own party haven’t bought the idea, so taking a leaf out of Tony Blair’s book in 2003, when he tried to sell the Iraq War to a deeply unconvinced British people, Noda is selling his tax. In a sense it is a brave thing, and a work of genius, for he can say, as Blair did, ‘look if I wanted to be popular, I wouldn’t be doing this. I know it’s unpopular but it is the right thing to do, so please back me up on this.’ He might fail, and he might lose his job, but since PM of Japan isn’t exactly a tenured position anyway, what does he have to lose? The opposition LDP suggested much the same thing when in government, but were split on the issue. The wing of the governing DPJ that objects is led by Ozawa and his acolytes, whom many in the party think they would be best rid of, as anything close to Ozawa seems in danger of defecting against itself. It is rumoured that the legs of his throne would walk away from the seat if they weren’t nailed on. But when faced with such a defection resulting in loss of power, and a possible return to LDP government, many in the DPJ would prefer to retain their veteran toxic colleague.

But don’t tell Kamei Shizuka that, as the People’s New Party ‘leader’ has been deposed in a ‘palace coup’ (well, not a palace, but a dull office room, as six out of eight PNP MPs dumped Kamei and his deputy), as he opposed the DPJ postal privatization bill, and the DPJ told the PNP to support the bill or get out of government. As dedicated and principled people they dumped their founder and leader, and his policies, like an old Christmas Tree in February, and decided to do whatever it took to cling onto the coattails of power. Bravo. Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of people. And as for Kamei? Couldn’t happen to a nicer man. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120406004915.htm

There is now, however, the prospect of an alternative to the DPJ and LDP blocs, for in the wings are a number of smaller movements and parties (apart from the PNP) just waiting to leap forth and attempt not only grab power, but to change the nature of political power in Japan. Populists such as Tokyo Governor Ishihara, Osaka Mayor Hashimoto, and others such as Mina no To (Everyone’s Party or Your Party) leader Watanabe Yoshimi, have made it known that they see their sectional and regional movements as indicating something very different than just a new man in the city hall. They see the dawn of a new politics, where the centre (Tokyo) dominates the regions far less, and where democracy becomes more local, and less party based. The prevailing view of these people is mixed. They challenge the snobbish, centralist, party and faction-addled status quo, and thus are welcome, but they seem to contain a relatively high proportion of people with fringe right-wing views (not least Ishihara), and with little sense of how they would actually build and govern, as opposed to how they would oppose and cut. Will the regional hoards descend upon the capital? Who knows, but they are highly unlikely to be heaven-sent.

 And as for other toxic issues in the regions to be dealt with cautiously, strontium has been recently seeping into the sea from contaminated stored waste water at the Dai-ichi reactor in Fukushima, and will pose a serious long-term health and marine hazard. Which is wonderful news more than one year on from the 3.11 disasters. Yes, TEPCO has been back in the news for its failure to keep its dangerous water in pipes and tanks, but these revelations were rather overshadowed by further food safety fears. During the past week, mushrooms and bamboo shoots have been found to contain greater than allowed (under new, more stringent safety standards), which isn’t doing much for consumer confidence or for farmers’ nerves. However, the main worry is that produce found in excess of the new limits is not from Fukushima, but Ibaraki, Chiba, and even Kanagawa, more than 300km from the Dai-ichi plant. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120407_12.html It seems that the fruits of heaven have spread much further than first anticipated, and although the government assures consumers that there is little risk, which is probably correct, each revelation simply erodes further the slender confidence of people in TEPCO, the government, and food safety management. Perhaps Noda should go on a national tour to mobilize a military effort against radiation in vegetables. Either that or simply pray that the heavens don’t open up and pass judgment upon him.

24th March: All in this together, except for...

24th March

The heat, the flies, the unendurable sunshine. Yes, Middlesbrough has been having an Indian Spring, if such a thing is imaginable, with temperatures (sometimes) above 15C, bright sunshine, and the feeling that all is good in the world. Which is somewhat ironic as at this moment there is thick fog and it is rather chilly, but the forecast is for March to be the warmest since the year of my birth. Japan, meanwhile is having an unusually cold spring, with the cherry blossom greatly delayed, and even in late March only the very first buds have appeared in the warmest parts of Kyushu.

In other ways, Britain and Japan have demonstrated their great differences this week. The Chancellor of the Exchequer (minister of finance) George Osborne, brilliantly characterised by Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell as an S&M 'gimp' in chains and bondage outfit being ridden as a 'horse substitute' by PM David Cameron (the PM having a condom for a head: Bell), has delivered his long-anticipated and much-leaked budget for the coming year, which in the British version of democracy is passed with no amendments in one day. Oh how Americans and Japanese must laugh, and North Koreans and Chinese nod. The budget was very interesting for a number of points. Osborne decided that rich people weren't paying enough tax, so he cut the top rate of tax from 50% to 45%. Yes, there is logic at work, but not as most of us would know it. The unfortunate result was to give the rich Tory cabinet a massive pay rise. The perils of high office. This tax cut was funded, partly, by reducing pensioners' tax free allowance (yes, OAPs in Britain are taxed, but until now slightly less harshly than everyone else), to make them beasts of taxation burden the same as everyone else. That has been the headline: Granny Tax. And as Tony Blair stated, if the Exchequer does battle with grannies, there will be blood and tears, and the grannies will always win, politically. The numbers are on their side, as the number of old people in Britain is due to rise in line with the EU average (unless the Tory health reforms have a notable side-effect). However, there has been a more stealthy addition to tax revenue, as the middle tax band (40%) that used to be triggered when a person's income rose above 42,500 pounds will now commence from just over 41,000 pounds, ensaring hundreds of thousands of newly elevated 'middle income earners'. The slightly better news is that people won't pay tax until they earn over approximately 9,300 pounds (up from 8,800 pounds), but the bad news is that certain income support, child support, and other benefits will be cut. Which means what? That in Britain, the rich are to be supported by elements of the middle and poor, which has to be good for all of us, after all, as there is no evidence to suggest that rich people, like bankers for example, had anything to do with the crash and crises from 2008. It is also interesting that old people were specifically targeted by the government to pay for part of the rich-dividend. As the (rather ineffectual) leader of HM Loyal Opposition put it, this signifies the end of "we are all in this together."

In Japan, the dilemma has been that budgets are very difficult to pass when the opposition don't agree (I think that is called 'democratic process', but being British I am not very familar with the jargon), and the primary bone of contention over the past decade has been who will pay, and how will they pay, to support the expanding number of old people and Japan's unsustainable pension system. The large issues are a sales tax increase from 5% to 10% (yes, laugh Europeans, where 20% is rather normal), a rise in income tax, a rise in pension insurance contributions, cuts in pension payments, a rise in corporate tax, or a fudged combination of them all, which appears, eventually, to be most likely. The basic premise is that more money needs to be devoted to old people, for both pensions and welfare, but how to do it without strangling the already tenuous growth in a two decade flat-lining economy. 

The Japanese case is interesting, for the results can be seen of delaying difficult decisions in an extreme ageing society, to the point where growth and the pension and welfare systems could be massively and immediately affected, and thus could become a case study for other OECD nations. It is also unusual, compared to Britain at least, for being a battle as much within political parties as between them, with extensive intra and inter party squabbles in the highly factionalised world of party matters. Many in the governing DPJ are opposed to the proposed increase in sales tax, partly fearing the effect on weak consumer demand, and partly the effect on DPJ Diet members in the next election. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120323a4.html

The reason why this issue is so pressing in Japan is that the number of young people has been massively reduced in recent decades while the number of those reaching retirement age has been greatly expanding. The seemingly simple, and yet terribly difficult, long-term solution would be for people to have more children, and yet the increasing numbers of working poor, the relatively comfortable workers unable to place children in kindergarten, and the increase in people marrying later or not at all have frustrated the (very limited) efforts of law makers to reverse that trend. Social and cultural trends play a large part, as well as laws, with the recent high-profile case of a politician giving birth by artificial insemination highlighting pressures on women. Noda Seiko, a plain-speaking and rather right-wing (in security and foreign policy terms) LDP Diet member campaigned in her 40s for the right to have IV treatment to enable her to give birth. Denied by legal limitations in Japan, she attempted to use facilities in the US, but ran into personal difficulties, in the form of her common-law husband opposing her efforts, resulting in them breaking up, and her continuing to give birth to a son at the age of 50. Single mother, no partner, using a technique illegal in Japan, and a woman working in institutions dominated by conservative, older men, there were surprisingly many people ready to criticise Noda for her actions, and limited sympathy despite her son having significant health problems and being hospitalized. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120323f1.html  Such incidents illustrate some of the pressures facing prospective mothers. Another trend followed by the media include the decrease in numbers in population, particularly in Chiba and other parts of eastern Japan, and an equivalent increase in Okinawa, Kyushu, and the major cities of western Japan. This is due almost entirely to rational and irrational fears of radiation from the Dai-ichi nuclear plant continuing more than a year after the initial crisis. While there was an initial wave of ‘fly-jin’ foreigners who departed Japan that attracted attention, there were many thousands of Japanese who moved away from eastern Japan, even from Kanagawa, more than 250km from the Dai-ichi plant. The more surprising trend has been that the impetus to move has continued, driven by fears of radiation hotspots in Chiba, Ibaraki, Tokyo, and elsewhere, and a distinct lack of faith in official and corporate pronouncements on food, water, and other aspects of public safety. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120323f2.html

The contrasts with Britain continue. Many British feel that recent cuts have fallen upon support services for parents and children, but the welfare state still exists, and Japanese can only gaze on in admiration for the degree of support provided in the UK. However, one aspect of British population trends is inescapable. British population growth, and the relatively healthy number of young in the workface, has been complemented by immigration, the one aspect of policy the government has resolutely promised to reduce. Japan’s government has proven itself unable to increase targeted, limited immigration, such as the number of research and other foreign students, and unwilling to contemplate such a major change in policy as an immigration, or even refugee acceptance policy akin to Britain’s approach prior to 2010.

What both countries seem to share is a distinct unwillingness, despite continuing government rhetoric, to address the large public debt burdens upon future tax payers. The Japanese have insisted that this can only be undertaken as part of a comprehensive reform of pension and welfare systems, which seems unlikely given political divisions, while the British, in the guise of the Osborne-Cameron SM-axis have insisted that austerity policies continue. Except for the rich. So, we are all in this together, except those who aren’t.

 

11th March: Marking the Anniversary, and thanking God for Korean Christians

11^th March

 

The obvious anniversary is with us, and in many ways it seems rather strange that we are marking such an event. The year has flown by so quickly for those of us observing the events of the past year, and yet must have passed so utterly slowly for those directly affected, living in emergency housing, far from home, and with drastically altered conditions. For those it must seem to have been a life in a year, and not a life they would ever wish to revisit.

As with last year, I am in my sister’s house on 11^th March, with tea, but luckily everything else is very different. The sense of having lived through trauma is very real, even for those who were rather far removed. It was a trauma that was shared by millions, even those with little immediate connection to Japan. While we are often highly critical of media for making drama out of tragedies, with the tsunami there was not a great deal of scope for that, such was the scale and depth of the tragedy and drama. A Hollywood script with all of the elements of the reality might have been considered fanciful prior to 3.11. NHK recently won an award for its coverage of the events, and it was certainly very well-deserved. Also, many local newspapers demonstrated their value and courage by continuing publishing, sometimes in hand written scrolls pinned up on evacuation centre noticeboards: the best tradition of the press. Many media outlets managed to actually wrench themselves away from the cosy, warm embrace of official press-clubs and nuclear sponsorship and see the reality of the public-private nuclear family for what it was: smug, self-satisfied, self-serving, and safety-slack. Public protests against nuclear power became a reality for the first time (in a non-security and peace context) for decades.

Progress has been made, and yet the lack of significant rebuilding in so many of the coastal communities of Tohoku is staggering. And this without considering the 20-3-km zone around the Dai-ichi nuclear plant, which will presumably remain a ghost zone for decades, despite the best efforts of local authorities to clean up and move back home.

The anniversaries will be being marked by national and local sombre ceremonies, although sadly with the Emperor in hospital again. But the oddness of that time, even those directly unaffected will remain, from the power cuts, to food and fuel shortages, which now will seem so very odd, but which made a significant dent in the confident techno-dependant lives of the post-war generations. Retention of that memory, through anniversaries, memorials, or by whatever means will be a crucial legacy of value to the people of Japan.

 

The other side of this anniversary period for me is that I had a research field trip to Africa which went somewhat askew. After considerable expense and preparation, my visit to Ethiopia from 4th March, as a gateway to study the Japan Self-Defense Forces in the UNMISS PKO mission in South Sudan for a week, was cut short by illness. I was in Addis Ababa for two full days, and enjoying the very new experience of the land, before I developed breathing difficulties, nausea, aching bones, and the shivers and shakes. Having spent more than $1000 on vaccinations and pills I was rather surprised, and a bit scared. Spent 24 hours laid up, had to cancel my planned sight-seeing in Ethiopia, and then went to the Korean Christian missionary hospital in Addis, which is superb, where I was told ‘based on your symptoms we’ll start with pneumonia and typhoid, and move on from there’. Move on to where? Nile Fever? Madness? After full lab and x-ray checks they decided I had a variety of influenza, which actually made me feel relieved, as it is a non-fatal known quantity. The advice was to stay in Addis and do nothing, or, preferably, fly home and do nothing for a week. South Sudan was out, and thus ended the once-only research opportunity of seeing the JSDF prepare to commence a PKO in Africa. I’m hugely disappointed to have lost that opportunity, but glad that I didn’t become a burden on the JSDF in S Sudan. I am also disappointed that I was unable to be with the JSDF on the date of the anniversary of 3.11, as more than most public institutions, their response in the wake of the earthquake was particularly diligent and effective and greatly appreciated by local people.

Let us hope that the JSDF will not have to repeat their performances of 3.11, and that some degree of normality will soon be able to return to staggering communities in north-eastern Japan.

23rd February: Shocks, Reliefs, and Baffling Bewilderment

 23^rd February 

Shocks, reliefs, and baffling bewilderment are the themes of the day, as the new normal is remarkably similar to the old crisis.

The first shock came over breakfast, when I read that Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin was killed in Syria by government artillery while covering the bombardment of the city of Homs. A colleague, Remi Ochlik, also died with her, and other reporters were badly injured, and they are not the first to be killed in the violence of Syria. The shock was that I had watched and listened as Colvin, one of the most distinctive band of adventurous foreign reporters who are always in the midst of the danger while reporting from war zones, gave a live report over a phone line to Peter Dobbie on BBC World News (TV) on Tuesday 21^st February. She was emotional, rational, calm, involved, eloquent, and one of the most compelling journalists one could hope to hear. She was in the league of the best of them, such as Brian Barron, Jeremy Bowen, James Cameron, and was seen as a British correspondent, despite being from New York. She was talking from a besieged city, having given up the opportunity to leave, as her and Ochlik were the last foreign reporters there, and as in Sri Lanka, East Timor, and Chechnya, she refused to leave when the others left a place that was ‘too dangerous’. Now the UK, US, and France (Ochlik was French) have sat up a little more, are looking a little more closely as the Syrian government fights a war against its own people. This may not stop the war, but perhaps it has led to a new view of the war. It isn’t nice to think the thought, but it seems that the death of the few white middle-class, educated people we admire has a great deal more power to impress than the deaths of many thousands of Syrians of whom we know nothing, except that they are not part of ‘us’. As in Libya, maybe, soon, in Syria, the international community will begin to see the victims of this war as part of their community. One imagines that there will be a significant wait, however, particularly for China and Russia.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/22/sunday-times-marie-colvin-killed-syria

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/feb/22/marie-colvin

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17136037　

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/9099325/Marie-Colvin-Syria-regime-accused-of-murder-in-besieged-Homs.html

A very different shock in hearing the news that at least 50 had died when a train in Buenos Aires had hit the buffers and at least 600 had been injured. Again, this news would sadly not receive the same degree of prominence if it involved a train in India, but BA is much more like the cities we live in, or so we believe. The odd thing for me was that I saw this news story while travelling on a train on the Negishi Line in Japan, going into Yokohama for my Yellow Fever vaccination. The carriages, being Japan, have rolling news bulletins, weather, ads, and financial data, with subtitles, no sound. Te BA news story was the last one, followed by the cheery title in English “That is the end of the railway news.” Hmmm. Yes. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120223_07.html

And a rather nice shock. The NHK world service in English have a video showing the JSDF trying to begin the PKO-support measures in South Sudan, and who is centre-stage? My friend Major Urakami. I hope his family have seen it. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120223_06.html

 Relief comes in small doses. One is that the yen is finally falling a little against most currencies, and none too soon for most companies. However, the effect of this will be to increase energy costs due to the massive imports of carbon fuels to offset the offline nuclear plants. Relief also that the Nikkei stock index has finally risen, not that this indicates anything other than confidence, but that alone is important. http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/business/news/20120223p2g00m0bu150000c.html

Relief also that the opposition and government have finally managed to strike the beginning of a deal to move forward on cuts, rebuilding budgets for Tohoku, and structural reforms. Which is good news. However, the first step is a cut of civil servants’ salaries by an average of 7.8% over two years, which is a bit tough if you are a civil servant or a member of their family, and rather demoralising if you are one of the people who have been working hard on Tohoku-related issues. Also, somehow, the politicians didn’t seem to include their own salaries within that cut. An oversight, no doubt, that will soon be rectified. The relief though is that this means that moves can perhaps be made towards making the cuts in the numbers of lawmakers, to save money, and to begin the painful process of re-distributing seats so that Japan can actually conform to its own Supreme Court judgement that the democracy is undemocratic and needs to be rebalanced. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120223x1.html

Relief also that the number of crimes carried out by foreigners (a dubious category) dropped in 2011 by 12.7%. It is not stated how the drop in crime was affected by the drop in foreign visitors, but permanent residents are not included in the figures. http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20120223p2g00m0dm011000c.html

The odd thing is that the numbers of foreigners in Japan has been dropping since 2008, mirroring that of the Japanese population. Logic would seem to suggest an increase, to fill the gap, take up the slack, but even before the 3.11 crises that wasn’t the case. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120223_13.html

Baffling and bewildering what politicians do and say. Having bad relations with an increasingly powerful and bellicose China? Having a fine sister-city relationship with Nanjing (Nanking)? Just approaching the anniversary of the massacre of ‘a certain number of Chinese’ in said city by Japanese Imperial Army troops in 1937? Best not mention it eh? Or, how about adopting the ‘Nagoya Plan’? Mention it as a ‘mistake’ in history, something that wasn’t really as bad as it may seem, even see the jolly side of it by recalling how your Dad was treated very well by Nanjing locals during the war, and if they were so friendly, how could the Japanese have been as nasty as the Chinese government say they were? What a winner of a plan! What a trooper of a man, is Nagoya mayor Kawamura Takashi! But, not being a weak soul, he even went one better. He then not only did he do all of the above, but has now defended his position and refused to retract one iota of it. He told a prominent visiting member of the Chinese Communist Party of Nanjing that only “conventional acts of combat” took place between Japanese troops and Chinese. Now, this is an old story of denying war atrocities, in which older Japanese politicians are dab hands. They are the least sympathetic and least sensitive people one could ever meet, unless anything is mentioned about Japanese as war victims. Somehow I doubt if Kawamura would make light of the bombing of Nagoya in 1945, let alone Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He has even not understood that neutrals, including German Nazi Party Members, were present in Nanjing in 1937 and documented the most appalling atrocities, which some of them risked their lives to limit. He seems not only a bewildered man, but also one of the world’s many baffled about Japan and its pasts and present. It is one of the world’s least bellicose nations, one of the most genuinely peace-appreciating nations, and a far better repository for protecting human rights than China, but it can be baffling to accommodate that present with its sometimes appalling recent-past. Britain manages this by ignoring some bad parts, apologising for others, and simply trying to rub along with everyone as well as they can. It would be hard to find anyone in Birmingham who would deny the massacre at Amritsar, or the work of the Black and Tans in Ireland, and it shows when Irish and Indians meet Britons: they have more in common than separating them. Or at least they can imagine they do. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120223a5.html　

What do female premiers do with their husbands? Baffling isn’t it. Leave them at home, if they have any sense, but it seems in Finland they have other ideas. The ‘first man’ of the Finns has been caught catching a good look at the suitably impressive royal bosom of Denmark, which could be the start of a typical 1970s Danish ‘art film’ but is actually even more embarrassing than that. One cannot imagine the Duke of Edinburgh doing such a thing, or at least if he did he’d have the decency to strike up a conversation about the Copenhagen cleavage, or at least make a flattering comparison with a member of the House of Windsor. Mind, Philip is part Danish, so he’d probably be deeply disinterested in his cousin’s chest. Unless it had a row of medals on it. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/finland/9097513/First-Man-of-Finland-caught-gawping-at-Danish-princesss-breasts.html

 And in much welcome news, the British Royal Television Society has granted an award to NHK for its 3.11 crisis coverage. Many people complain about NHK, but they thoroughly deserve that award, and are the first Japanese media concern to receive it. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120223_17.html

21st February: Amidst the death, some signs of life

21^st February 

An odd week in many ways. There have been deaths, a death sentence, a search for those who died almost a year ago, and signs that some companies are struggling to stay alive as well. And it comes as I experienced a personal anniversary of bereavement. Over-interest in death is often considered a sign of depression, but for me it is rather more an affirmation of the value of life. It simply cannot be replaced or displaced by anything else, and thus it has the ultimate value, something which some less interested in death often fail to understand.

The odd deaths, rather than regular deaths of traffic accidents and illness, were of three people in a small flat in Saitama City, about 25km north of Tokyo. Parents in their early 60s and a son in his late 30s died at home. The flat was clean and orderly, there had been no intruder, no violence, and there was no disease present. The three had lived there, it seems, for 11 years, but several months earlier had stopped paying the rent and had the electricity cut off in November. They had moved to Saitama from Akita, in northern Japan, and the father it seemed had worked in construction, but had been unable to work due to some ailment, and, very oddly, they had failed to register at the local City Hall, a requirement under law. The great oddity is that the three died of starvation, with neither food nor money in the house, and yet they never sought out public assistance, nor were approached by any public body. Even odder is tha fact the police have no idea who they are. This seems extraordinary, but the government estimates that since 2000, more than 700 Japanese have had starvation as their primary cause of death, with many others having been certified of having died of complications of starvation, such as pneumonia, without being thus designated. Most have not been homeless, but simply died, such as the old man who wasn’t found for six years, despite dying at home, as he had told the local authorities that he didn’t need any more welfare. He probably didn’t know how accurate that was. http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20120221p2a00m0na007000c.html

That such things can happen in Japan isn’t as shocking as the mundane nature of such deaths, and how society cannot seem to find a way to prevent their causes. But then death is not always something we can prevent, or even wish to do so. Which brings us to the case of a man, now 30, when he was a newly graduated High School student of 18 when he broke into a flat, raped a young mother, and murdered her and her 11 month old baby. He admitted his crime, but said he hadn’t intended murder, or rape, when he broke in, but things escalated out of his control. This is bad enough, but the really hard part is that he has been sentenced to death for his crime, much encouraged by the 35 year old widower and father of the victims, despite the fact that he was a minor under Japanese law at the time of the crime. The age of adulthood in Japan is 20, and usually such cases result in long custodial sentences as the young are seen as capable of rehabilitation. However, there is a suggestion that the legal reforms instituted, partly as the result of the activism of the bereaved husband, have resulted in a hardening of attitudes in such cases on the part of the judiciary, and in cases where juries are present (a relatively new phenomenon in Japan). This is important, for the case was unusual in several aspects. It was the first in which a minor (at the time of the offence) has been given the death sentence for the murder of less than three people, and one of the presiding justices expressed a dissenting view (uncommon, and highly unusual in a murder case where the client admitted guilt) that the perpetrator was immature and possibly not fully cognisant of his actions. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120221_03.html http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2012/02/20/20120220p2g00m0dm141000c.html

Whatever the views on this case, it highlights the fact that in Japan people spend a very long time in prison, and death row can last for decades, even after the final sentence has been handed down.

In what might seem at first to be a very odd story, a search was conducted yesterday in Fukushima and Miyagi for the victims of the tsunami almost a year ago. The search was another attempt to find answers and a degree of bereavement closure for families who lost members, especially for the families that lost primary school children near the coasts on 3.11. No news has been released of any results, but the fact that the search is going on illustrates the degree of suffering the people affected are still going through, mirroring in some ways what people in Christchurch have been going through, one year on from their most devastating quake, and with equally little sign of recovery and rebuilding. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120221a5.html

The economy of Japan is still in serious trouble, despite the best efforts of the government to sound positive. The national trading deficit reached 1.5tn yen ($19bn or GBP12bn) as exports dipped 9.3% while imports rose 9.8% compared to a year earlier. And some companies are suffering a great deal. Car maker Mazda is one of them, which is not only restructuring, but is also caught amidst that process and its current situation, resulting in a cash shortfall, resulting in a 100bn yen capital raising appeal which is 12% less than its loss in the final quarter of 2011. Mazda has the problem of investing in building new plants in Russia and Mexico, to offset the high yen, while that high yen is eating into its core business. While Toyota produces 40% of its vehicles in Japan, and Nissan and Honda approximately 23%, Mazda is a true Yamato patriot, with 80% domestic production. And the lesson for all Japanese makers is, lay off your Japanese staff and move overseas, which will certainly have an effect on the yen, although long after that effect is felt upon Japanese workers. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120221x1.html

But if you feel the need for some uplifting story affirming life...read another blog.

No, the story that proves that life goes on, with the oddest consequences, even amidst death. Police found a 1.5 meter long shark in Yoyogi Park, Tokyo. Yes, a park, with no salt-water lake, and about 15 km from the sea. The Shinjuku police were a tad baffled, but then a shushi-shop owner revealed that he had bought it, but couldn’t get it into his kitchen, so had it on display for his customers for a couple of days (it is winter!), after disembowelling the fish. Then, when, presumably it was getting a bit long in the tooth (boom, boom), and less appealing than it had initially seemed, a self-proclaimed artist asked for it for his art project, and took it away on his hand-cart (artists in Tokyo and London always seem to have a handy ‘Carl’s Cart’). Police suspect the man then found the aquatic corpse a bit too much to handle, and may be in breach of bylaws on dumping rubbish, rather than abandoning a body, which is a serious crime. They have put out a call for anyone seeing a bearded artist, with a cart, being followed by a gang of hungry cats to contact them (the police, not the cats). http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20120221p2a00m0na003000c.html

13th February: What to do about issues where you can see both sides

 13^th February 

The cabinet popularity makes for interesting reading, as does the subtext to TEPCO’s finances, and defence is once more a thorny issue. The trouble is, you can see both sides of many of the thorniest issues. 

US Marines from Okinawa practiced with their artillery pieces in Oita Prefecture, Western Japan. This is at this moment deemed to be a news story, even though such practices were moved from Okinawa in the 1990s, mainly to the Fuji training ground in Shizuoka Prefecture. The news is news now as the placement of USMC personnel is a major issue that simply will not move away. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/movie/feature201202102205.html

The Governor of Yamaguchi Prefecture and the mayor of Iwakuni City in Yamaguchi which hosts USMC aircraft both announced in discussions with the Foreign Minister Genba that they could not accept any more USMC personnel. In particular, they don’t want USMC ground forces, given their reputation for civil disturbances in Okinawa. It is interesting that the foreign minister was given the job of negotiating with Japanese municipal leaders. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120207006322.htm

Even more interesting when considering the results of the latest NHK public opinion poll. The headline shows a 1% increase in support for the cabinet, and a 1% drop in the disapproval rate. Which in statistical terms is meaningless. And thank you for watching the NHK news. However, there is news there to be had, as supporters are far outnumbered by the actively disgruntled by a ratio of more than 4:3. Also, there were two interesting results on individual politicians. Okada, now Deputy Prime Minister, and former Foreign Minister, has received an overwhelmingly positive reaction, despite the fact he is in charge of cross-party talks on taxation and welfare and pension reform, the poisoned chalice of modern Japanese politics, akin to Secretary of State for Northern Ireland between 1972 and 1996. He received a very or rather positive response from more than two-thirds of those polled. This is in contrast to the new Defense Minister, Tanaka, who has been ‘featured’ in this blog more than once. His combined positive rating was 11%, while 36% considered him rather unsuitable for his position, with 46% considering him highly unsuitable. Not the man to lead negotiations on national defence related issues of great delicacy then. We can often see both sides of many issues, but on the cabinet’s composition, these two men show the two sides, but only one of them appears to be acceptable. One wonders why the unacceptable side is allowed to persist. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120213_25.html

This issues has been made even more delicate by the US asking Japan to pay for the move of the USMC to Guam (If you want us out, you’ll have to pay to get us out!) after the President withdrew funding, that had already been cut and delayed by Congress. This has resulted in the USMC move being cut in half to 4,000. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120206005049.htm

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120205003835.htm

The Japanese government seems to want to move the Futenma Air Station in Ginowan City to Nago City, in southern Okinawa, despite previously having opposed such a move, and to follow the previous LDP pan and the 2006 J-US agreement on the transfer, but with deep reservations, and several caveats. They seem to want to add several sugar pills to sweeten local and national opinion in order to convince people that having a DPJ government really does ‘make a difference’. Easy to scoff, but if we were in their shoes we’d probably be shuffling our feet in embarrassment more than we would like to admit. The US position is the easiest to understand. They want something to happen, but if it doesn’t, then they are basically fine where they are, and can blame Tokyo. Win-Win, as they say in Washington. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120209006912.htm

The oddest part is the local element, as many oppose US bases in principle, while appreciating them for investment and employment issues in practice. This leads to some unusual political phenomena, such as an LDP backed candidate, Sakima, winning Ginowan City’s mayoral election, and promising to press for a move of Futenma to Nago, and a reclaiming of base land (for what, we aren’t sure). The defeated Mayor, Iha, had pressed to move the base, but outside of Okinawa, a move that seemed likely under former DPJ PM Hatoyama, somewhat less likely under his successor Kan, and about as likely as a resurgence in nuclear fission investment under PM Noda. The real problem in Okinawa is the very genuine push-me, pull-me feeling of locals that with US bases their lives are pretty poor, but without US bases many of them will be very poor. It comes down to being the poor and usually ignored cousins of the rich-suits in Tokyo.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120213a2.html

This isn’t any easier to face when the national GDP declined in the final quarter of 2011, and the high yen and various calamities have driven manufacturers and other exporters to the edge of giving up on Japanese bases. Negotiations on the TPP Trans Pacific Partnership are simmering on, with US car makers opposing extending it to cover motor trade (meaningless without it one thinks), but perhaps the US unions should consider the rational result of such a TPP deal. With the present level of the yen, the most sensible thing would be to produce in the US and export to Japan, as Nissan has done in from its UK plant on Sunderland. More car production jobs in the US, and great for the US balance of payments, but not too great for the (US taxpayer subsidised) Big Three car makers. Or for Japanese workers. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120213_11.html

Producers are facing a further problem, as TEPCO has stated it wishes to raise commercial power rates by 17% to cover post-3.11 losses. Not wonderful news for companies, nor for the government, and today Trade and Industry Minister Edano, the former Chief Cabinet Secretary who did as much as anyone to manage the 3.11 disaster, and who was at university in Sendai, did as much as possible within Japanese manners to ravage the TEPCO leadership. He met with three TEPCO leaders, in front of cameras, and stated he wasn’t at all happy with their plans, that they needed to re-think, and that if they were really wanting so much state money (about $9 billion) they will need to make the Japanese government a major or even majority share holder. That was the equivalent of slapping their faces with a black leather glove and demanding a duel at dawn. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120213_29.html Edano isn’t really the sort of person you would want to make angry, but TEPCO, hate them or just resent them, are in a tricky position too, as they are bleeding cash to pay for oil and gas imports while carrying the costs of their nuclear plants that are offline, the Dai-ichi crisis, and the ongoing compensation payments to affected people and businesses. Their business is no longer viable, but declaring bankruptcy in Japan is much more severe than most other countries, and there would still need to be some form of public intervention to maintain services.

So, the problems of most issues seem to come down to public confidence in leadership. Perhaps in view of business and politics across the world Japan is just another normal country.

12th February: What is first in the news, and slow in coming

12th February

In the news this evening, the death of Whitney Houston has assumed the centre stage in most countries, but in Japan prior to that news breaking the main article online and on telly was the news that the Emperor, Akihito, has been diagnosed with a further constriction of the cardiac arteries and will undergo an operation on Saturday 18^th February. Since he is now 78 and has a recent history of heart trouble, this is an obvious cause for concern. However, it will provide an opportunity for his son, Naruhito, to assume some official duties, as something of a dry-run for the day when his father is no longer able to perform his duties.

Akihito seems to strike most people as a sincere and diligent man, and the perfect contrast with his father, Hirohito, who greatly divided domestic and international opinion after 1945, with some lauding his role in bringing and fostering peace, and his marine-biological research interests, while others condemned him as a war criminal. The son is very much a product of the post-war era, probably aided by having seen so much destruction in Japan as a boy. http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2012/02/11/20120211p2g00m0dm008000c.html

The other news has struggled to gain much impact, but is nonetheless important for that. 11 months after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami the Japanese government has now finally managed to establish a Reconstruction Agency for the affected areas. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120211a2.html The lethargy, leaden-footed tardiness, or dilly-dallying over such a move might surprise those who witnessed the rapid rescue and immediate recovery operations from afar, but it was really to be expected.

Japanese institutions tend towards great efficiency in certain set tasks, primarily those which can be easily seen and assessed from outside, those which demand great skill, technical proficiency, and diligence from workers, and which require little or no negotiation or mediation. Thus repairing roads and railways, re-establishing ‘lifelines’ and postal and telephone services, and the re-start of the (deservedly) famed Japanese Takyubin courier-delivery services (yes, you can send strawberries or rice to your auntie at the other end of the country and they’ll be picked up from your home and arrive in great shape the next day, for a relatively small fee. British people, sit down, put your head between your knees and breath deeply but slowly: the dizziness and nausea will soon pass.) were rapidly achieved, with minimal fuss. But planning real reconstruction, involving public and private land, commercial concerns, possible unification of community bodies and municipalities, as well as actually forbidding some people from re-building in areas deemed ‘at risk’? That is when the Japanese (rather nice) desire to accommodate all opinions, find some degree of consensus, or at least reduce open conflict to a minimum results in stasis. And for 11 months we have had an awful lot of mediation between competing desires and interests. Local versus national, immediate recovery versus long-term planning, safety versus prosperity: these are just some of the competing interests.

Another slight shock, little perceived from afar concerns the Dai-ichi nuclear reactors in Fukushima. They were declared safe, in ‘cold shutdown’ two months ago, when TEPCO declared the temperature had been maintained below 100C. The new safety measure for cold shutdown was later revised to 80C, and over the past week the No.2 reactor temperature appears to have been rising, exceeding 82C on the weekend, before TEPCO pumped in more water and reduced it to 80C.

This illustrates two important points. The first is the fragile nature of the reactors, and how dependent they are upon external cooling mechanisms, which is a worry considering the frequency of further quakes. The second is about TEPCO’s safety management. The company has stated that the temperature probably is lower than 80C, so there is nothing to worry about. Their reasoning is that the thermometer may be malfunctioning. Now, they haven’t drawn the logical conclusion from that statement, that if it is malfunctioning the temperature could be almost anything, from well-below to well-over 80C. The lack of information and accurate monitoring that seems to be available almost 11 months since the reactors exploded seems rather surprising, but when dealing with ‘TEPCO safety management’ perhaps surprise is not warranted.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120212_24.html

Oh, and another slight revelation about 3.11. TEPCO provided a radiation map to the US before it do so for the Japanese population. Yes, that is the taxpaying providers of the TEPCO bailout funds. Warms the cockles eh.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20120212p2g00m0dm019000c.html

And TEPCO have announced the taking off-line of their last operational nuclear reactor, at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, in Niigata, the world’s largest nuclear plant. In a part of Japan that is prone to very large earthquakes. So, from now, the entire TEPCO area is ‘nuclear free’ in terms of generation, so that we get the best of both worlds: the cost and the enduring dangers of nuclear facilities, with none of the power, and the added bonus of carbon-based pollution. Cools the cockles eh. http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20120212p2g00m0dm019000c.html

Three men have been arrested at the weekend for car theft and burglary in April. Not a big news story in itself, but this is the tip of an iceberg. The three went to commit the crime in an evacuated town in Fukushima near the Dai-ichi plant. Theft is one of the major concerns for evacuees, and is also an obvious safety concern, not only for irradiated property, but also for the ability of people to enter restricted areas.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2012/02/11/20120211p2a00m0na009000c.html This is related to proposal to introduce background checks for nuclear workers, in light of recent news that criminal groups were arranging work-gangs among the homeless and other poor groups, and ‘selling them’ to TEPCO’s major personnel contractors. Checks are hoped to prevent criminal connections, and bolster counter-terrorism measures, but it seems ironic that fears of nuclear proliferation are forcing Japan into banning imports of (much needed) Iranian oil when Japan’s nuclear industry seems so (relatively) loosely policed.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2012/02/11/20120211p2a00m0na002000c.html It

Oh, and in a highly surprising move, the Chinese President, Hu JinTao, has called off a meeting with Japanese ‘friendship’ groups in protest at the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s naming of a number of rocky isles off the Senkaku islands, an area that China claims as its own. Who would have thought a minor and almost completely meaningless legalistic move by Japan would result in a political huff-and-puff by China? Whatever next? Empty gestures by politicians and notes of protest from diplomats? Heaven forefend.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120212a1.html

2nd February: Chronic Heartache

2^nd February 

The subject of this blog is heartache in its various forms. 

My previous visit to Utsunomiya was detailed for the mixed feelings it engendered, but one aspect of Utsunomiya that I left out was that it is the gyoza capital of Japan. Yes, since the end of the Second World War and the returning soldiers from northern China sought to scratch a living by selling the little Chinese dumplings that they had grown accustomed to there, Utsunomiya has been a gyoza city. There is a singing statue to gyoza by the station. There are gyoza maps, trails, pamphlets and guide books. Gyoza are small-ish dumplings, generally contain garlic, nira (a thin green, leek or onion style vegetable, apparently called ‘Garlic chives’, which is new to me), and pork, but Utsunomiya has produced many variants, including liver, prawns, vegetarian versions, and even a sweet dumpling. So, all is well. Except it isn’t.

The heartache is that Utsunomiya is, officially, no longer Japan’s gyoza capital. Not many governments would collect such figures to be able to designate such a status, but Japan’s bureaucracy knows no bounds in its quest for dumpling supremacy. Hamamatsu City in Shizuoka, a fine place famous for the Yamaha music company and being shelled by the US Navy in 1945, has overtaken Utsunomiya by the amount of money spent per resident on gyoza. The reasons seem to be related to the March quake and tsunami, as power-cuts and limited supplies in northern and eastern Japan prevented eating-out and production on previous scales. Shizuoka was largely unaffected.

However, the comparison may be unfair, as I used to eat at the Masashi chain of gyoza restaurants which sold nothing but dumplings: no rice, accompaniments, or anything. Straight gyoza, boiled or fried. A single plateful cost about 160yen (or about $2 today, more like $1.25 then), the price being so low due to the massive competition in the crowded Utsunomiya market, and due to the volume of turnover. I can’t imagine Hamamatsu having such a shop, where even the poorest could eat until full. So, the heartache of Utsunomiya is double: losing the crown, and knowing that it should still be theirs. A Shakespearean plot if ever there was one. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120202a4.html

 

The heartache of leaving Japan, and trying not to die.

I shall go overseas this year, and to places requiring various immunizations, vaccinations, and associated shots, jabs, and pills. They will probably make me sick, but hopefully help keep me alive. I have only ever been sick once while travelling, but such was the effect of India upon my body that I am erring on the side of caution this year. Trying to find a medical institution that provides such services isn’t altogether easy, but they do exist, and for this I am indebted to friend Jennifer, who is acting as my nurse, with assistant nurse Judit. For the millions of people who live between Shizuoka and Tokyo there are only two places which provide the yellow fever vaccine, and they are both in Yokohama, about 200 meters from each other. One provides that vaccine and no others, only gives it on a Wednesday afternoon, and it must be booked at least two weeks in advance. The other place provides other vaccinations, but not typhoid. It also hands out malaria tablets, but tells most people they don’t need them, even when the WHO says they do. Oh yes, and the names of these organisations are almost the same: the Yokohama Quarantine Station, and the Yokohama Japanese Quarantine Association (http://www.kenekieisei.or.jp/about.html) respectively.

I took two days to try and make sense of it all, on the phone, reading homepages, and working out who was who and what was what. Today, I went for my first two shots. I spoke with the same kindly gentleman whom I had encountered on the phone, who speaks in such a rushed, gnarled form of Japanese that when he asked my age I thought he was asking me how long I would be overseas, and he was even more impressive in the flesh. Sitting behind a mass and mess of paper, he wrote on my document, then scribbled out what he had written, then stamped it with something, then crossed it out, and stabbed again with another stamp. He then said ‘Is that alright?’ about changes he had made that I couldn’t see. The ladies of the staff smiled knowingly, with a degree of sympathy and pity, and the nursing sister told me about her travels to Britain, which included Stratford upon Avon, as she harpooned my left arm, and Sunderland, as she snagged my right. I was somewhat taken aback by her comment that the latter city had been ‘beautiful and quiet’, which made me grateful that she hadn’t injected my skull and buttocks, such being the obvious state of her eyesight, and she wouldn’t have been able to hear my screams if she had. Sunderland has many points to commend it, but not beauty and silence.

For my pains, I paid 21,300yen (175 Pounds, $275). I will have another seven injections over the next few weeks. It is not only my heart that is aching.

 

The heartache of returning to Japan, your home, and being beaten, robbed, and expelled.

A Canadian freelance journalist has made the (minor media) headlines, and a story in The Economist, due to his having lived here for more than 20 years, and yet been detained, mistreated, and kicked out of the country by immigration staff and private contractors, claiming that he was beaten, robbed, and threatened with a pistol. Now, Japan’s Immigration Service is no stranger to controversy, as the death of a Ghana citizen in 2010, detailed on this blog, revealed. However, this case is unusual in some ways. Not to avoid a key point, the subject was white, middle-class, and seemingly fairly respectable.

As The Economist details, “Still the case of Christopher Johnson beggars belief. Returning to Tokyo after a short trip on December 23rd he was ushered into an examination room, where his nightmare began. Over the next 24 hours he was imprisoned and harassed. Most of his requests to call a lawyer, the embassy or friends were denied, he says.” He was forced to buy a ticket and leave Japan within a few hours. http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2012/01/japans-immigration-control　

Now, Japan’s Immigration Service is no stranger to controversy, as the death of a Ghana citizen in 2010, detailed on this blog, revealed. However, this case is unusual in some ways. In short, he was ‘people like us’, rather than a ‘third world visa-overstayer’, as the Immigration Service likes to depict those it turfs-out of the country. Johnson claims he was being stigmatized for having written critical comments about Japan after the 3.11 crises, but he is scarcely alone in that respect. The case of Johnson is not quite as simple as it initially seems, with some issues regarding his visa status and therefore legality being unclear, and the subject of some flux in the retelling, according to at least one, seemingly well-informed, blogger. http://www.japanprobe.com/2012/01/23/christopher-johnson-discloses-visa-information-work-visa-application-paperwork-but-no-approval/　

However, even if he were a visa overstayer, and even if he arrived at a Japanese airport wearing nothing but a ‘Down with Japan!’ T-shirt, his treatment, if accurately portrayed, would not have been warranted. The problem with parts of the Immigration Service seems to be that if someone is designated a ‘criminal’ (anyone with a visa problem) they seem all to ready to go into ‘Guantanamo mode’, rather than treating the person as someone with a problem, to be resolved by either administrative, or, failing that, judicial means. Therefore, the heartache for Johnson, and for every fair-minded reader, foreign or otherwise.

 

The heartache of the lonely islands without even names.

There is a group of islands called the Senkaku in Japan, Diaoyu Islands in Chinese, which have in recent years become a bone of contention between the Japanese and Chinese governments, or rather between Japan and both Chinese governments, for Taiwan also claims the islands. As ever, the devil is in the historical detail, with Japan having ‘discovered’ them in 1885, and incorporated them in 1895. There were no objections to this situation until 1970, when the People’s Republic (PRC) raised its objections, but possibly driven more by the prospect of Japan-Taiwan (RoC) cooperation than the specific Japanese claim. The disputes escalated somewhat but faded away until the early 1990s when the economic and military growth of the PRC was accompanied by an expansion of its ambitions and diplomatic efforts, further affected by the newly assertive approach adopted towards potential Taiwanese independence.

The Senkaku issue is complicated by the failure of Japan and the PRC to mediate their respective East China Sea (ECS) Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ), and the accompanying efforts to manage natural resources, whether fisheries or oil and gas. As usual, the PRC has proved adept in many ways at frustrating Japan and getting what it wants, while Japan has so often been left flat-footed, and appearing ditheringly indecisive. This is widely seen among observers as evidence of the supremacy (or strength) of Chinese strategy, and the inferiority, weakness, poverty, or even complete absence of strategy in Japan. It is also, however, evidence of how increasingly sure-footed the PRC feels, and how unsure is the foothold of Japan. This is due not only to the relative imbalance of scale, and, increasingly, of economic power, but also to a broader lack of unity and confidence in Japan’s role, methods, and what might be referred to as ‘strategic vision’. This blog has noted how Japan has faltered in dealings with Korea and China on any issue whereby the other country is able to pick-up the handy club of ‘war legacy’ and beat the Tokyo brain whenever it seems most apt. Japan’s unwillingness to solve many of those legacy issues provides the club with which it is beaten. Since neither the Senkaku or ECS EEZ issues are war legacy issues there should be no such problem, but naturally such a useful weapon is easily and expertly wielded by Beijing.

Which long-winded background brings us to the issue of nameless islands. The Senkaku have little or no population, only some visiting government missions, and fishermen passing through, but in order to maximize the Japanese claim for the ECS EEZ the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) felt the need to have every part of the chain named, even the smallest rock outcrops, as proper islands, thus expanding Japan’s EEZ line. They asked the local government, but after checking records the council simply didn’t know. Then MoFA itself decided the names of the seven islands/islets based upon their relative position to the main island: north-east island, east island etc. Quite a simple matter. Until the PRC and RoC found out, and then the objections streamed in thick and fast. Taiwan made three objections in three months, and the PRC insisted that the islands were Chinese, and that they formed a central part of Chinese policy.

For the most cogent exposition of this issue, and what needs to be overcome (and possibly how this may be achieved) see the excellent article by Reinhard Drifte for Japan Aktuell, March 2008: http://www.giga-hamburg.de/dl/download.php?d=/content/publikationen/archiv/ja_aktuell/jaa_0803_fokus_drifte.pdf As Reinhard has noted, the Legal Affairs Bureau of MoFA is very strong, and anything to boost Japan’s EEZ claim becomes important, particularly at the moment when all three littoral states of the ECS have submitted their (mutually exclusive) demands for extended continental shelves to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. In short, they will use any means at their disposal to press their case at the UN, and mainly due to the prospects for exploiting oil and gas, but the MoFA Legal Affairs Bureau seemed to press the legal case regardless of the effects elsewhere. It could be said that this illustrates how MoFA resembles Somalia: a defined area full of largely independent, occasionally warring, tribes, that share many common aspects of culture, which fail to unify them. Luckily MoFA is unarmed, and many of their staff are very bright.

Now, the odd case of the Chinese gas rig in the ECS was raised just as the Chinese objections to Japan’s island-naming were in the news. NHK sent out an aircraft to report the ‘breaking news’ that black smoke and flame was coming from the rig on the median line, in breach of previous cooperative agreements between the two countries. The facts as laid out were indeed correct, but with one small caveat: it wasn’t really news. The rig in question, Tianwaitian, began some degree of production sometime in 2005. We know this as that was when the Japanese government protested about the matter. So, NHK is providing the Japanese government with the platform to say that they are protesting about ‘new production’ on a rig, which they have known was in production for the past six years. And this came out in the same news bulletin which featured the island renaming issue. And we criticise China for using any handy weapon with which to beat their opponents. It is enough to give any fair-minded observer a fair degree of heartache.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120131_01.html

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120131_h22.html　

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2012/02/01/330281/Taiwan-lodges.htm　

http://www.chinadailyapac.com/article/china-makes-representation-japan-over-island-naming　

 

The heartache of life and death.

And so we come to real heartache, with matters of life and death.

How has life in Japan changed? Has it improved as it has changed, or just changed? These questions can be applied to any country, but living in Japan results in a local focus. Working life has certainly changed, with the working balance between sectors in the period 1960-2000 illustrating a massive move away from agriculture, as found in most developed countries. However, unlike the UK, the recent speed of the shift is remarkable, with 1960 seeing almost the same number of Japanese employed in farming and fishing as manufacturing and transport, while the figures for 2000 reveal little change in the latter industries but a drop in the agricultural sector percentage to less than a fifth of that previously found.

Also notable is the rise of those working in clerical and administrative capacities, constituting the largest single group for employment by 2000. Perhaps driven by technology, or welfare, or the scale of government, but it isn’t naturally a phenomenon regarded as constituting progress.

By working sector,

agriculture, fisheries etc:               1960     32.5%   2000     5.2%

manufacturing, transport etc:                     32.9%                  31.9%

sales, services etc.                                            17.1%                  25.2%

clerical, admin etc.                                            17.4%                  37.5%

http://www.ipss.go.jp/p-info/e/S_D_I/Indip.html#t_15

Table 20

The good news is naturally that Japanese live longer than pretty much anyone else, especially women. However, even here there are oddities. The greatest longevity in Japan is among women in Okinawa, possibly due to sunshine, frost-free winters, and fresh fruit. The shortest life spans among Japanese? Men in Okinawa. Why? Well, it must be the Awamori (fierce hooch, up to 60%), the popularity of SPAM, and the hard working conditions found on the islands.

And not only how long, and how, people live has changed, but also how they die. The big killer 20 years ago was of cerebral seizures, often associated with diet, especially salt intake. Today it is cancer (if all varieties are taken together) but closely followed by heart disease, as Japanese succumb to such western maladies, with pneumonia taking 8% of the population, usually the oldest and weakest, who are seen to have simply died of old age, but have that as the specific cause on their death certificate.

How people die isn’t a subject most of us would choose to examine too carefully, but sometimes there is a need to try and understand even when we finally can’t. Statistics can tell us a great deal in this respect, even though they can’t tell us why. In 2000, more than 4% of Japanese men who died committed suicide, twice the rate of women, and twice the rates experienced immediately prior to and following the Pacific War. With an increasingly old, healthy, and small population one wonders why there is seen as being such a great imperative to end one’s own life? Japan’s government has launched panels on the issue, sent research groups overseas to see how Finland and other countries have reduced their suicide rates, but still there is no clear answer. Maybe the answer is one we care not to consider, for it defies science and governance. Maybe it is overwhelming heartache.

Table 15

http://www.ipss.go.jp/p-info/e/S_D_I/Indip.html#t_15

31st January: Old haunts, heritage, and haunted presents

31^st January 

A busy time of year for university types, as we struggle to grade, sort out admin, and plan research trips in the spring. That explains almost a fortnight’s blog-silence.

One thing that has kept me busy has been a local history project examining the memorialisation of war in my home area of Britain, the north-east coast of England, and the Shonan coastline of Kanagawa where I presently live. This has been ticking over for more than a year, but has reached the point where I am making discoveries (at least to myself). These include the only Imperial Japanese Navy interrogation camp in Japan, in Kamakura, but far off the well-beaten tourist path, a 500 year old fort site near-by the camp, and a series of defensive gun positions designed to repel the expected US invasion of the Sagami Bay area that have been turned into parks, including one naval gun-turret position converted into a monkey house. And who said that Japanese don’t appreciate irony?

A visit to two cities in Tochigi last weekend brought out another aspect of history that has rarely troubled historical publishers: confronting personal historical impressions. A stroll through the main thoroughfares and back lanes of Utsunomiya was most revealing. It showed not only how much the capital city of Tochigi Prefecture had changed but also how I had changed over the 18 and a half years since I first wandered there. The station, public buildings, and roads don’t seem that different, but a closer look revealed a worrying trend. I visited the Shinohara Former Residence, a preserved old house of a Shoyu (soy sauce) merchant built in 1895, and the only such example in the city, almost everything else having been destroyed in air raids in 1945, the largest of them being on 12^th July. The house was wonderfully preserved, and with two fine ladies chatting away to me about it I was as happy as could be. http://www.city.utsunomiya.tochigi.jp/bunka/geijyutsu/002266.html I mentioned I was returning to see how the city had changed over the years, and their comment was ‘not much, except that Orion Dori (Orion Street) is now Shutter Dori’. Walking down the once crowded arcade shopping area in the centre of the city, leading up to the Tobu Department store, it was clear how correct they had been, with half the shops shuttered, and many others looking glum. It was a far cry from the once thriving and crowded arcade where everyone went to be seen on a weekend. http://www.opentopia.com/webcam/8939?viewmode=animated

When I first visited Utsunomiya from my home in the mountains of Nikko I thought it was an incredibly sophisticated and exciting big city. This is what Japan, the economic leviathan, the number two power, the hive of efficiency was all about. Even in this city, which locals considered to be inaka (countryside), was a plethora of lights, shops, and bustle. Utsunomiya then had half a dozen city centre department stores, and land on Odori, the main high street, was probably the most expensive stretch of real estate between southern Saitama and Sendai. Now there are shuttered shops and offices, and the worst indictment of all: where there were buildings are now gravel spaces for parking cars. The car has won in Utsunomiya, and the city community has lost. Not only has local industry faltered, with large companies such as Honda, Nissan, Toshiba, Sharp, and Canon employing less people, and far less as ‘regular employees’ with permanent contracts, but the city planners in order to make the city more motor friendly precipitated a dash for the ring road. Now, to buy a TV, to visit a cinema, and to keep the young ones entertained there are far more options on the fringes of the city than in its centre. Even further out, beyond Utsunomiya’s city limits, shopping malls have sprung up where there once were rice fields, and as sure as night follows day these malls lead to the modern pilgrimage of the weekend: sitting inside metal containers, looking at the back of another container, waiting to enter a resting area for containers, so that you can walk around and look at things before returning to your container.

Places like Utsunomiya, in Tochigi, are ‘middle Japan’, and more ‘authentic’ in many ways than Tokyo and Osaka. It is in places like this that most Japanese live, not massive cities nor tiny villages, but the middle-range. The problems of the city and prefecture are the problems of middle Japan. GDP fell in 2011, and the profits of companies fell with them. Toshiba announced today that its profits were down over 70%, and Honda announced expectations of a drop of over 60%, and the same is true for Fujitsu and Canon (both in Tochigi), and most manufacturers are moving production, and in some cases even product development, overseas to counter-act the effect of the strong yen. No-one sees drastic improvement coming soon, and the fact that Hyundai, ARM, and the other competitors in the technology and manufacturing sectors are generally booming does not provide any comfort. The best the country can look forward to is a collapse in the yen and a slightly slower drop in population than anticipated. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nb20120131n2.html

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/biz/inside.asp?xfile=/data/marketing/2012/January/marketing_January21.xml&section=marketing

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-01-31/toshiba-cuts-profit-forecast-on-stronger-yen-thai-floods.html

My wanderings in the backstreets showed me what had always been there: a mixed bag. Small shops, some empty, old houses and a few new ones, and lots of tired buildings that hadn’t seen a lick of paint in decades, and some that appeared close to collapse, with only the rust and washing lines keeping them up. In short, the sort of place I used to call home when residing in Utsunomiya. Now, with perspective, it seems the city wasn’t such a gilded lily after all, and even before the economy began to sag the place had its less attractive underbelly. In fact, there were quite a few parts of the cityscape that had far more in common with a developing country than with an economic powerhouse. In that sense, perhaps those locals were right: this was inaka after all. But what do we find attractive and what do we find squalid? I was rather charmed to hear the ringing of an old telephone on one such backstreet, and presumed it was one the ‘chime options’ of a mobile phone. Passing by an old builders’ office I noticed an old man scurrying along and then picking up an old black Bakelite phone with a rotary dial face. It was older than the one we had in our house in 1972. The office looked of a vintage that was similar to its occupant, and the whole scene was one of enchantment for a passing visitor. For a resident it may have been a further indictment of how poor and run down the place seems. And old. The average age of prefectures outside of the major metropolitan areas is increasing, and Japan’s ageing society, not a massive problem in itself, is being combined with severe population decline and a dash for the bright lights of the big cities. Tohoku, post-3.11, has experienced a loss of people since the disaster, with almost 20,000 killed or missing, and a net movement of 40,000 out of Fukushima, Miyagi, and Iwate since March 2011. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120131_03.html However, these Tohoku prefectures had been experiencing population ageing and decline for several years before the tsunami, and the same has been true in many cities and towns in Tochigi Prefecture.

In Britain, people often associate ‘old’ with ‘heritage’, which has become a password for any number of policies, activities, and events. It has an almost completely positive connotation, denoting that old is good and worth preserving, even when the ‘old’ reality in question was pretty bloody awful. Thus, there are ‘heritage’ coal mines, where the emphasis is on hard, honest graft, rather than oppressive work and early death, and even ‘heritage’ Prisoner of War camps, where the war years and all of their fun can be recreated and enjoyed, rather than be treated as a traumatic syndrome episode to be freed from. The first recreation of the past, complete with a ‘community’ of staff and volunteers who dress-up and behave as period people, was founded in north-east England at Beamish, County Durham, and it has developed, since my rain-soaked, egg sandwich-belaboured visit there in 1977, into the leading ‘living museum’ in Britain. http://www.beamish.org.uk/ It trades upon not only interest in the past, but also on the obsession with nostalgia, although the industrial and particularly the mining heritage of Durham is both a source of local pride and misery, for its economic benefits and environmental and mortal damage.

Japan treats heritage far more suspiciously, with old buildings ripped down without ceremony, vestiges of the past cast-off with scarcely a thought, much to the chagrin of heritage-obsessed foreigners (such as I). However, it is hard to imagine many Japanese regarding heritage as something to be savoured when considering a PoW camp, or a copper mine where many, including PoWs, died. One such mine exists in Tochigi, up in the mountains of Ashio, now part of Nikko City, and it runs a small museum tour, but it is about backbreaking labour, environmental pollution, and (a very minor reference to) Chinese and Korean slave labourers who died there. Not much in the way of dressing up as Victorian or Meiji period miners and singing jolly songs while off to work they go.

I also visited Nikko last weekend, my first home in Japan, and this brought back memories of my first weeks in the country. Coming after a week in which I had attended the wake of a former boss and friend, bringing with it the attendant re-visitation of memories and emotions that such events engender, it was interesting to see how I felt about the old place. Utsunomiya was cold, but snow-free, while Nikko was freezing cold and snow-covered. That helped place everything in context, reminding me of falling off my bicycle on the snow and ice, slipping and sliding my way between work and home, and the wonderful sight and sound of the local postman delivering the mail in a blizzard on his Honda 90 with a snow chain on his rear tyre.

Nikko had changed, a little, but for the better perhaps. But some things seemed timeless. The row of dozens of jizo, or small statues of Buddhist deity which are believed to relieve the sufferings of people, particularly children, still stood much the same as ever in the Ganmangafuchi gorge, with red bibs, and with small piles of snow on their heads. The river flowed, the icicles hung onto the waterfalls, and all seemed as it ever had. The biggest differences were within the people looking at the scenes. I was seeing this for the first time in some years, not for the first time. I was able to look at the beautiful scene of the Kanaya Hotel building by the river and the Shinkyo sacred bridge, not as a fresh faced visitor, but as a veteran resident, and a former hotel guest. While Nikko had changed a little, it was obvious that I had changed more. Still recognisable, but with a history that was shaping me into different forms than those previously seen. The past is often regarded as though a foreign country, but not all foreign countries are all that foreign. Perhaps the past is really a second home, where some of us feel rather too comfortable for our own good, while others feel discomforted by the eerily familiar surroundings. Heritage and ghosts as house guests. Some we invite in and others we try to keep out.