Garren's blog

Aussiemandias: Part 2

Well, we enter week three of the Australia visit, and the students have been doing very well, and have been highly evaluated by their English teacher, Edwina. Their skills are not all of the highest level, but they appear to be working diligently in class, and are relatively easy to manage, in contrast to other classes where the teacher struggles to deal with constant phone use in class and can even be pushed to confiscating all phones at the beginning of class.

We have the common pattern of a week of work resulting in a related presentation, with the students making individual power point slides and presentations, sometimes on subjects which are less than simple. Immigration, ageing society, and other issues have been given as themes to follow and make comparisons between Australia and Japan, and the students have risen to the challenges.

As part of the regular series of complimentary non-academic events we had a brief surf and lifesaving workshop on Wednesday 17^th August, which involved an active member of Surf and Life Saving Queensland giving us a talk on marine hazards, and the key point that the thing most likely to endanger your life while in the sea on this coast is a strong current pulling you to one side or out to sea. This is far more likely to kill you than sharks, which haven’t killed anyone on the Gold Coast for hundreds of years. Which was reassuring, to a degree.

We had the BBQ on Friday 19^th August and all was fine, other than a huge amount of work for me in terms of checking out sites, buying everything and carrying it home in multiple trips without a bike or car. Everyone had a great time, enjoying helping with the cooking as much as just standing around having fun, and there seemed to be not a single blot on the day, until near the end, when we were cleaning up, a druggie mom and her kids came by and used the next hotplate, borrowed some of our stuff, and that ended up in some bizarre behavior, unpleasant comments, and eventually her shouting at some of our boys playing on a slide (like kids), and telling them to go back to their own country.

The oddest thing really was that the other park users shouted at them to get out, that they weren't welcome there. The druggies were the outsiders not us.

Their own kids apologized to us and made it clear that they were only behaving badly as they were stoned, and had been all day. The youngest of them, probably 11 or 12, made the internationally recognized hand gestures of people smoking a bong, and then he and his brother, 13 or 14, went off and had a smoke, after the parents there had chased them off for being too rough on the playground rides. With parents like that…

Some of the kids were confused, some a bit upset, but we ended up having a laugh about it, and learning a couple of lessons. I was the buffer between them and us, and therefore nothing really happened, as the woman soon shut up when I asked her what she meant by her earlier comments. As my sister said, growing up in Middlesbrough probably equipped me better for that sort of behavior than my kids from nice, quiet Japanese families. One of my girls lives on a farm.

Anyway, the experience was instructive that this isn't a perfect and lovely land full of sunshine and smiles, but that there are some serious social problems below the surface. It seems that drug use is a significant problem, exacerbated by the local culture of the Surfers’ area of the hippy, relaxed, no hassle approach of letting everyone do their own thing. And that is laudable, but when the welfare system makes it highly appealing not to work, and everyone lets you get away with anti-social behavior it becomes a pattern that is difficult to break. But here even the homeless have a place to cook for free in the parks, and sleeping out isn’t so bad when it never gets really cold.

North Stradbroke Island on Saturday 20^th August was simply lovely, as it was when I visited last month. The kids had a blast, really enjoying the ferry ride over there, but sadly didn't see all the wildlife that I did previously. Amazing beaches and just a lovely place that seems almost unspoiled by humanity, but is only an hour or so from Brisbane. The place we had fish and chips for lunch at Amity Point gave us a huge bag of passion fruit, as they have a tree that gives too much for them to consume. Our driver and guide, Nathan, said he has the same situation at home, and most kids weren't interested, so I had 20 in my fridge, although I took some along to school today and managed to get students to eat about half a dozen at lunchtime. A surfeit of passion fruit is surely a sign of having one toe in paradise.

After a huge lunch one of the girls declared she was hungry, so after a lovely walk around Point Lookout, with amazing views across Frenchman’s Beach (which goes on for infinity), we retired to the gelato shop and filled our faces. Suitably stuffed, we set off for Deadman’s Beach, a broad and beautiful expanse of sand sheltered by cliffs and coves, and with magical sea that was absolutely crowded. One man was fishing about 150 meters from us, a family was about 100m the other direction, and a man with dog passed by, as did another man with a small boy. No wonder the Life Saving instructor had told us that when she did an exchange with the Life Savers of Kobe she couldn’t believe the numbers on the beach in Japan: 10,000 within one kilometer. In Australia, when people say the beach is busy they mean it isn’t possible to run around naked without someone possibly being able to see your confidential corners.

After that, we headed back to the bus, and the ever patient Nathan who always was there to make sure we were alright and I had an adult to talk to, and we set off for the ferry terminal via the Brown Lake. Not so interesting to most students, I was fascinated, as the lake was brown due to the oils from the surrounding tea trees, and was a light, almost green-brown, and the smell from the tea trees was amazing.

On the ferry going back the kids were disappointed that the ship was much smaller than the one we arrived on, and didn’t have the same café etc. Many stayed in the bus, but the few of us on the upper deck were lucky enough to be able to see a dolphin flashing and diving a few times across our course. The course set appeared to be going into rain, and this soon arrived, a short but interesting squall, that lashed down, blew hard, and rocked the ship and the bus around quite a bit, which I enjoyed but scared some of the students right up until the point that a rainbow appeared, and then a double rainbow, and then everyone was happy.

Nathan drove us home mainly in the dark, and we got back to the university by about 6:30pm, slightly later than scheduled, so that I had to walk over to the uni hospital and wait with one girl at the taxi rank as she missed her last bus. I was home by 7:30pm, and barely had the energy to eat.

On Sunday the kids went off to Movie World, and Brisbane, and elsewhere. I did laundry, walked on the beach for an hour, went to the really nice bakery off Main Beach, and then walked to Aldi! Yes, spending the Sabbath in a cheap German supermarket, the high life indeed. And I even bought some cycle gear!  10 quid for a great cycling jacket! Lovely 20 min walk there, via very posh streets and a super posh private school. A degree of irony there methinks.

Monday 22^nd August was the first day that most students had not completed their homework assignments, and it was clear they had enjoyed themselves the previous days, but they made up for it in class, and completed and made their presentations.

On Tuesday 23^rd August we had morning classes on aboriginal culture, to help prepare for the active event on Wednesday, and then afternoon tea with Griffith Uni students so that they have a chance to interact with those who are studying here as regularly matriculated students. They came from India, Italy, Namibia, Egypt, Macau, and Malaysia, and our students had a wonderful time of it, chatting, joking, and asking questions about the other students’ experiences in Australia.

News about the rest of the world has been limited. The anniversary of the end of the Pacific War (Japan’s surrender) didn’t raise too much news here, although the Chinese and Korean governments pronounced themselves deeply shocked (as they do every year on exactly the same day for the same reasons) that Japanese cabinetministers and other politicians actually visited the highly controversial Yasukuni Shrine to pray, make offerings and generally say thanks to the millions who have died in Japan’s wars. Mr Abe decided that he would send an offering with a friend, rather than raise tensions further. As he also did last year. His new Defense Minister decided that she would have to make a visit to the Shrine if she was in Japan, otherwise she would be betraying her principles (and many financial and political backers), so she displayed a canny tactical sense in flying herself off to South Sudan to visit the JSDF on PKO duty there. She was doing her duty, backing up the Japanese military (sorry, Self-Defense Forces), flying the flag, and avoiding creating trouble for her boss. Wise move.

Mr Abe appeared at the Olympics closing ceremony in Rio, initially as Super Mario, but then, disappointingly, as himself. The Tokyo Governor, Koike Yuriko, appeared as a Japanese stereotype-version of herself, clad in kimono with gold obi (waistband), and looked rather nice and dignified. Which is more than can be said for the games. They may have been wonderful, but I will never know, as I was in Australia, where the TV showed Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps, but apart from them only Aussies. If an Aussie won silver, we saw that medal being awarded but neither the bronze nor gold, and often we never even knew the name or nationality of those winners. And as for the IOC and its approach to drug cheats, Russians, Chinese and others, well, maybe they should take a leaf from the President of the Philippines and just threaten to walk away from international criticism. Preferably without an equivalent toll of corpses that he has left in his trail.

Aussified: Part 1

On the Gold Coast in Australia for a week now, and all is fine.

The start of this Aussie odyssey was a bit…odd, as the flight was delayed from Haneda and we were obviously going to miss our connection in Sydney for Brisbane. It was only in the afternoon of the departure day, Saturday 6^th August, that it was confirmed that we could all be rebooked onto the same flight. The flight itself was alright, even though the sensation of flying with 20 students was quite different from the usual, although much less stress than flying to India with the same number. The last hour of the flight to Sydney I was on my feet walking round checking and rechecking their landing cards and answering questions about immigration and transfers. That is my job, and certainly was better than sitting feeling sleepy after an overnight flight, when I could only look on enviously as the lad next to me put his head down on the little drop-down table and slept for about five hours straight.

After arriving in Brisbane there was some anxiety as we waited for our driver to collect us, but the transfer to the Griffith Uni Gold Coast campus took only about an hour. Then the students were given their uni packs, told to read the schedule for the next day carefully, with an 8:30am start, and then their home stay families stepped up, and the introductions started and they were carried off by people of all the different range of Aussie families, from Chinese to Philippino, Hungarian to Irish, and even plain old English Aussie. The look on the face of the most socially challenged boy with the worst English skills as he was greeted by his host mother with a Philippina accent so strong it could have peeled a pineapple at 10 paces was a sight to behold, but the warmth of the welcome was clear.

I was bundled off into a taxi and ended up at my rather swish and fancy apartments in Broadwater Parklands, an area of southern Southport right near the Nerang River and close to Southport and Main Beach. The area was massively developed over the past few years, with the G:link tram system connecting the area to the uni, Southport, Surfers’ Paradise, and Broadbeach, and with great big buildings being thrown up all over the place. Mine is relatively low rise at about five or six floors. It is a bit like my Cambridge sabbatical place, but newer and slightly smaller, with fancier fittings and big veranda with table and chairs outside that overlooks a small park, although the big buildings to the east block out most sun other than for a few hours a day. Woolies (yes, Woolworths, which here is a supermarket) is a 2mins walk. As is the tram (which takes 12 mins to the uni). Main Beach less than 20mins. Surfers' (Paradise, but us locals never use the second part) is a 10 min tram ride, and about one hour walk back along the beach.

I had tea, took stock of what my kitchen offered, quite a lot really, and I wish I had a kitchen like this in Japan (like in Cambridge, they will have to break my fingers to prize me from this kitchen, with its marble counters and dishwasher, and large, LARGE oven), and then I proceeded to the large shopping centre, Australia Fair, which was still open, and the bounteous goodies that Coles supermarket offered. Needing only stuff for dinner (salad) and breakfast, I bought half the store and proceeded to struggle home with it all, my knuckles scraping the ground by the time I got back, and settled down to my nice salad while watching a Harry Potter film on the big telly, and eventually found myself in the (brilliant) shower, and bed. And then couldn’t sleep. I think the bed was simply too comfortable and too big (I still haven’t explored all of it: I’m frightened).

In all, life could be worse. Kids are doing better in class than I thought, weather is great, beaches are nice, shops and trams are nearby, and my flat is brilliant.

I did make a mistake coming to Oz. I brought a teapot here, which was a good thing, but no coffee making equipment. I've been on instant at home and mixed quality shop-bought out and about. I was in Brisbane on Thursday and very much needed a coffee, after a very early start from the uni down here and 90 mins in a taxi with a student going home early to see his fading granny. This has been the only sad point of the trip. He started the course on Monday and got the call from his family on Tuesday morning. I was told at lunchtime, and then the next 24 hours or so were spent trying to coordinate between Daito Bunka Uni in Japan and Griffith Uni here, and the travel agent in Tokyo to cancel and reschedule his departure booking, try and sort out his credits for uni, and see if he could get any refunds, with only minor success. He kept his spirits up, and on Wednesday afternoon we had a wildlife presentation in class, where we had a chance to get very close to snakes, lizards, birds, little things, and a lovely wombat, Bumpy! I stroked him!! The kids went into super-kawaii over-cute mode, and just loved it, but I was very surprised that most of them wanted to pose with the black-headed python round their shoulders, but some of them couldn’t stand touching a small lizard.

After that I took them to the uni bar and told them how to order different beers, wines, and cocktails: bad teacher! They loved it, the lads played pool, and nobody could understand why there was a raffle going on where everyone got really excited about winning a ‘meat packet’. When I explained it was raw meat, the students wondered how the winners would carry it home. When I said ‘on the bus’, they just fell about laughing. It was a good way for one lad to say goodbye to his friends.

 So, on Thursday, after guiding the taxi driver to the wrong address to pick the lad up at 7:30am, and then phoning to get the right address, and being caught in traffic, and negotiating with lovely Qantas staff (they gave him his own row of seats, on compassionate grounds) I needed a coffee and something sweet in nice, calm surroundings. Having had several poor coffees thus far I wanted something better. I ended up in the Brisbane botanical gardens, looking for their tea shop. It turned out to be very small, outside seating only, all taken, and a small black coffee in a paper cup to take away and a very small choco-caramel shortbread square in a bag cost more than five quid. Horrified I grumbled and stumbled my way to a nice seat by the river. Tired, hot, and needing refreshment I opened the coffee. All was well in the world. The taste was almost an afterthought. The aroma was amazing. Best coffee since I've been here. The square was lovely too. The world seemed much better. I felt strong enough to go and buy books. And then eat a nice late Thai lunch, at Phat Elephant, the same place I went to last month where they gave me the wrong dish, minus a fried egg (in the photo), and the starter came after the main, and the missing egg arrived just as I got ready to pay the bill. This time, all was perfect, and the egg came with my meal! It was great.

Friday, I invited the kids to my place (big mistake!) and they had fun, we went to the beach, and then they brought half of it back and dumped it in my bathroom. We also had another five Japanese join us, so 25 of us in my flat. With lots of sand. Everyone had a great time. I later checked the guide to my room and the limit on guest numbers was four.

Saturday we went to Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary and that was great. Stroked ‘roos, and saw loads of other stuff, like crocs, wallabies, dingoes, Tasmanian Devils, very small and cute, and a sheep shearing show. Might not sound like much but it was a good day. The top event was an amazing bird show, where the amazing birds flew just above our heads while we were told a lot about them, their conservation etc. The kids held koalas, and were in super-cute overload again, although one lad got poohed on. Koala Collateral. The visit ended with a really good aborigine song and dance performance from the local tribe, explaining about relationships with animals, how they hunted etc. they got folks up at the end to do dances with them and it was a great end to the visit. The kids were asleep within two minutes of getting back on the bus home.

Sunday was clean and tidy up day, learning how to operate my washer and dryer, and then to Surfers’ on the tram, seeing the beautiful and less than beautiful people, and then walking back along the beach in the surf, and watching the kite surfers do their amazing stuff. The only other place I’ve seen them is back home in Redcar, although the beaches here don’t offer the same iconic views of mothballed steel works. Shame. Poor deprived folks of Surfers’.

Today, after class, I went looking for coffee making equipment, even though I have less than 3 weeks left. I ended up with an odd contraption. It is a glass and plastic beaker, of the type people carry around all day. This is different in that it contains a plunger, for coffee, or even tea. I brought it home and the coffee wasn't bad. Not as good as Brisbane, but not bad. And it cost a fiver.

Life here is very nice, but I can feel the yearning for some sense of culture, and the sight of a building older than me. I don't think I could live in this immediate area for very long. Maybe somewhere like Brisbane might be nice, and one of the better reasons for being there would be as I met up on Wednesday with Carolyn and her son Max on Wednesday for a lovely chat, wander on Main Beach, and lunch in the surfers’ club. They live in Brisbane and I can see why they would be very happy there. It is a great city and within easy reach of both the Gold and Sunshine Coasts. My maid (from Taiwan) also told me that the Tambourine Mountains are lovely, and she showed me photos of the glowworms in the caves there, so the area has so much to offer. Next Saturday, North Stradbroke Island! Strady!! I visited with my mate Cath last month after the conference and it was just amazing, eating fish and chips on Captain Cook’s seat, seeing dolphins and whales, and the amazing views along the coast. I can’t wait.

More dull stories to follow.

17 April 2016: Bigger Crisis, but not better

 17 April

Well, no blogging for 11 months and then two in three days, what is the world coming to? Well, that is what a disaster does. And the previous blog posting about Kumamoto marvelled at the power of the quake and yet the relatively small number of casualties.

Well, within 28 hours of the initial quake there followed what now appears to have been the main quake, much larger and much more destructive, and the result has been that at least 42 people have died overall in both quakes, with nine due to the initial event late on Thursday 14^th April night. The main quake at approximately 1:30am on 16^th April measured magnitude7.3, which although it registered 6-Plus on the Japan Meteorological Agency seismic intensity scale of 1-7, compared to the 7 which hit Mashiki Town on 14^th April, had far more energy and spread that power across a broader area than the earlier quake. “The magnitude-7.3 earthquake in the early morning of April 16 had about 16 times the energy of the (magnitude-6.5) earthquake that occurred on the night of April 14, and it affected a wide area with strong tremors," says professor of seismology Naoshi Hirata, head of the Earthquake Research Institute at the University of Tokyo. “For an earthquake caused by an inland fault line it was quite large. Such large earthquakes influence the areas around them, so the Oita earthquake may have been triggered by (the April 16 main shock).”

http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20160416/p2a/00m/0na/037000c　

Kumamoto, south-west of Japan, was hit by a magnitude 6.4 or 6.5 earthquake at 21:26 on Thursday 14^th April, and another of approximately the same power at 00:03 on 15^th April, then the magnitude-7.3 earthquake hit at 01:30 on 16^th April. However, from the first quake on 14^th April until midnight on 17^th April, NHK has been reporting the occurrence of over 500 earthquakes, many of them of substantial power, and this has proven to be the greatest and fastest proliferation of quakes in Japan’s active history of earthquake monitoring. The major event on 16^th April proved to be significantly greater than the Hanshin earthquake which destroyed large parts of Kobe and the surrounding area, and claimed an estimated 6,400 lives (although almost a thousand remain officially listed as ‘missing’ due the failure to recover bodies, a similar fate set to befall almost 2,000 victims of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake). Not only was the quake massive in its effects, prompting buildings and bridges to collapse, roads to split and sink, and hill sides to give way in greatly destructive mudslides, but the frequency of subsequent quakes spread the damage and the disquiet to other areas. Oita Prefecture to the east of Kumamoto has been hit by multiple quakes, of less power than the main event but still hazardous, and with widespread disruption to transport, industry, services, and citizens’ confidence in their own safety.

Most car companies have large numbers of small part suppliers from Kyushu and the transport and production disruptions have resulted in Toyota, Honda and others suspending production throughout Japan, as they have adopted the lean production standard of ‘just in time production’, whereby parts are delivered to match production, rather than through massive stock retention. Air services have been suspended for many hours as Kumamoto Airport terminal building suffered damage in the main quake to its roof, making it dangerous for passengers, to the extent that Prime Minister Abe cancelled his planned visit, also in recognition that the scale of the disaster had massively expanded within two days. Rail services are badly disrupted by rail, station, and bridge damage, and the Kyushu Shinkansen has suffered major damage to supports of the main track, making recovery of the derailed out of service train far more difficult. Even road transport has been badly affected by bridge collapse and the range of subsidence of road surfaces, embankments and other areas.

In Mashiki town many old houses were damaged and collapsed, which appears to have claimed the lives of eight of the nine fatal victims of the initial quake. However, the far greater power of the main quake, combined with the weakening of structures by multiple previous quakes of great power resulted in many much newer buildings being critically damaged. Those in the news that have received the most coverage have been apartment buildings in which the first (ground) floors collapsed and the buildings concertinaed, giving little chance to those trapped in downstairs flats. Most prominent have been six student dormitory buildings of Tokai University, which established its Agriculture Studies Faculty in Kumamoto in 1973, and in which it appears that three students have lost their lives, although their remain some unaccounted for. However, in terms of shock value for those residents of Japan who thought themselves well prepared for such natural disasters, the images of Uto City Hall in Kumamoto Prefecture are sobering in the extreme. City halls are the command and control centres for disaster relief operations, where police, fire, and JSDF personnel congregate to coordinate efforts, and where citizens report to for help or to track down the missing or injured. City Hall in your home town isn’t just an administration centre it is also a focal point for emergencies. In Uto, a small town of about the same size as Mashiki, the four storey concrete Uto City Hall building has been left a limp, empty shell. It looks as though it has been the subject of a terrorist attack or aerial bombing, with the upper floors hanging out from the main building frame, and the ground floor under strain from an evidently failed structure. City halls are built to withstand Japan’s substantial and frequent quakes, and this is a lesson for those communities elsewhere in Japan.

 

Uto City Hall in previous days	After the 01:30 16 April Quake

 

It is estimated that over 180,000 people are now unable to return home, mainly due to damage to their buildings, and while many have sought shelter in the designated evacuation buildings, mainly schools and other public buildings, these are often overcrowded with the result that many are sleeping outside or in their cars with all the attendant health problems these pose. The government has announced a mobilisation of 25,000 JSDF personnel and troops are already working hard at rescue and relief tasks, while also aiding transport and evacuation. The US government has offered assistance, and it seems likely he Japanese government will draw up a list of assistance they would like to request from US Forces Japan, mainly for logistical support with heavy sea and air lift, areas in which the JSDF remain relatively poorly equipped for such capable and well-resourced armed forces.

This national crisis had the feel of a local affair, but gradually it is assuming the mantle of the truly national event, something that will be confirmed by the arrival of two august bodies of men and women: the US armed forces, and volunteers from all over Japan. In other disasters, these are the two bodies that confirm that local events have become of national and international concern. No doubt within days they will be prominent.

One clarification from the previous blog posting: ‘robust helmet man’ shrilly telling us not to panic was not wearing a helmet bearing the letters KKK, but upon closer inspection it read KKT, indicating this as the local public broadcaster for Kumamoto Prefecture. Kumamoto Council Telly would be a decent translation. Helmet man is not and never was a racist, and is a fine local public servant, and that is one silver lining in this dark cloud of a crisis. And on that note, the blog must be to bed.

A domestic crisis, far away: 14 April 2016

 

 “Yes, the blog has been away, AWOL for months, due to working to finish a book and the grind of daily employed work, and the getting out of the habit frankly.”

Yes, that was written eleven months ago, and there has been an awful lot of inactivity ever since.

So, what has happened in that time? Errr. Well. Visits to Britain and Norway, conferences and presentations, work and more work, and a visit to London in March that resulted in chronic ailments, weight loss, and the worst journey back to Japan conducted by an airline other than Aeroflot. So, not much really.

Japan has completely recovered from the Triple Crises of 2011. And yet hasn’t, as tens of thousands are still living in temporary shelter housing, the mortality rate of survivors is truly appalling, and the rebuilding of most Tohoku communities has scarcely begun. The Fukushima nuclear crisis would appear to be over, unless you actually take the time to look at the basic facts, something that most people manage not to do thanks to Japanese media. The clean up hasn’t really begun, the facilities are barely stabilised, there is still no clear idea of how much nuclear material has been expelled into the environment, nor if these leaks are continuing. In short, it is a disaster which is ongoing, and yet the impression is that all is fine and well.

This could be known as the ‘Lance Corporal Jones moment’, as the eponymous character in the long running Dad’s Army BBC comedy of more than forty years ago used to jitter about, yelling “Don’t panic!” whenever there was a minor problem or major crisis, and usually when no one else appeared likely to panic. The authorities tell us all is well and not to panic. We weren’t anyway, but since we’re being told not to worry, perhaps we’d better.

The reason for this blog now, when other things could be being done (biscuits don’t eat themselves you know) is the next new crisis in Japan. This is a domestic crisis, but far away, so far that those of us in the vicinity of Tokyo felt nothing and only saw what the TV showed us. However, that was pretty dramatic. This viewer was home late from work, just fed and watered, and bored by the NHK News 9, which in its new format this month appears to allot far more time to fluff and trivia than before, perhaps wary of heavy and hard news stories in the era of government dissatisfaction with anything remotely resembling a critical media. The hand went out for the remote, it was pointed at the TV, but before a button could be pressed a loud alert chime was heard, and a warning message flashed across the screen. No, it wasn’t NHK warning against changing channels but an earthquake alert. Immediately, the female announcer went into ‘Lance Corporal Jones mode’, telling us of a massive earthquake in Kyushu, to escape from potential tsunami-affected areas, and to evacuate from buildings, after switching off gas and electric power, but not to panic. That really was the basis for millions to panic. And for good reason, as the affected area, centred around the major city of Kumamoto in the extreme south-west of Japan, was hit by an earthquake at 21:26 on Thursday 14^th April, which in terms of magnitude (estimated at 6.4) was less powerful than the 1995 Hanshin (6.9), 2003 Hokkaido (8.3), 2004 Chuetsu-Niigata (6.9), and the March 2011 Great East Japan- Tohoku (9.0) quakes, but which due to a coincidence of fault lines led to a brief concentration of power in one town. Mashiki is a small town of about 32,000 to the east of Kumamoto City (in Kumamoto Prefecture), which hosts the local airport but is otherwise a small, country town with many old houses. In Mashiki, the energy of the quake was quickly focused, and the frequency of the waves have been found to resemble those of the Hanshin earthquake which decimated large residential areas of Kobe, resulting in a quake in Mashiki of Japanese Earthquake Level 7, on the Japan Meteorological Agency seismic intensity scale of 1-7. This resulted in large scale damage to buildings, roads and other infrastructure, and to the deaths of nine people, all but one in a small area of Mashiki, killed by their wooden buildings collapsing, as was often the case in Kobe. The relatively few deaths is the result of the sparse local population and the rapid reactions of locals, emergency services, and other supporting bodies.

An example of the contrast with the Hanshin quake was the dispatch of Ground Self-Defense (GSDF) troops to Mashiki Town upon the request of the mayor within an hour of the quake, and the arrival of the first 30 troops within approximately 90 mins of the quake. Just over 24 hours later there are approximately 1,700 SDF personnel engaged in rescue, relief, and other support duties. Police and fire fighters from 19 prefectures have dispatched personnel, and the government has coordinated dispatch of Disaster Medical Assistance Teams (DMAT), which have arrived and begun their operations. The lessons of the previous disasters seem to have been well learnt, and the emergency response has been fine. The problem is that the aftershocks have been so frequent and so strong that those who have moved to evacuation centres are often too frightened to sleep inside. With approximately 150 subsequent quakes in the next 24 hours, many so strong they have knocked adults off their feet, including during a televised earthquake briefing meeting in Kumamoto City, few have been able to feel secure despite the great emergency and support presence.

This viewer stayed up until past 1am, watching events unfold, and hoping that all would be well. However, the reassurance of the media produced one more ‘Lance Corporal Jones moment’ before bedtime. Flicking through the non-NHK commercial TV channels there appeared the most remarkable media image of the night. A gentleman, clearly a local veteran newscaster in his sixties, in a suit, sat in a TV student in Kumamoto, wearing a white, plastic helmet indicating that he and his local channel were taking the crisis seriously, and with the letters KKK emblazoned on the front of the helmet, denoting his station allegiance rather than any sinister racial ideology, was telling us information. Most of it was relatively bland. However, he had to speak up, and part of his message was “don’t worry…don’t panic…the situation has stabilised”, so that it sounded slightly shrill, and rather less than calming. One of the reasons he had to speak up was that his colleagues in the studio were bouncing around shouting at each other right behind and beside him, yelling “have you got the data? No? Well what’s happening then?” They were obviously not listening to helmet-man’s advice. But somewhat comfortingly, none of them were wearing helmets. Whatever the crises they were dealing with the roof of the studio was not likely to drop on them, and most would be able to go home to bed, eventually.

Comforted by that small crumb, this viewer switched off and retired to bed. As surely did millions of others. And that is the most disquieting thing about such a major disaster. Most of us in the same country feel the crisis is real and terrible, but we simply don’t feel any effect. The most panic we feel is when men with helmets and women without tell us not to panic. This really is a most curious and distant domestic crisis.

11 May 2015: Post-Election Post-election-blues

11^th May 2015

The election campaign and depressing results have finally provoked me to rise from my torpor and blog. Yes, the blog has been away, AWOL for months, due to working to finish a book and the grind of daily employed work, and the getting out of the habit frankly.

The election provides an imperative to blog. How can you not?

The key question came from an old mate: “Oi, Grrr, who should I vote for? Can't decide between Labour and the Greens - former, I always vote for but am not happy about their stance on the SNP and Ed's pandering to mentalists about them”.

Dear lass is in an invidious position, a Scot, proudly left-wing, working in the school-sector of education, stuck in a Tory landscape in the deep-blue south-east of England. Who to vote for wasn’t easy, but she did choose the most obvious option. Few others around her did likewise, however.

The Conservative Party managed 36.9% of the vote, and received 331 of 650 seats (the first of many oddly British electoral statistical quirks), with only an extra 0.8% of votes from 2010. Labour increased its votes by 1.5%, but lost 24 seats (while the Tories gained 26). Their biggest losses were in Scotland, where they lost more than 40 and retained only one. The SNP wiped them out, a reward for siding with the Tories (and Lib-Dems) against independence, even though most Scots also rejected the SNP’s bid for freedom. So what was Labour punished for? Not clear, but it seems for a sense of betrayal by a leadership that banked on Scots votes without seeming to understand or care to try to understand them. From Ramsey MacDonald to Gordon Brown the Labour Scottish leaders have an impressive lineage, and even Tony Blair was a part-time Scot, but this obviously isn’t shared in spirit by Miliband and his strangely unconvincing, anaemic campaign. The SNP managed to take 56 of the 59 Scottish seats, leaving the ‘big three’ with one each as consolation prizes. The SNP managed to get less than 1.5 million votes, but 56 seats. The Lib-Dems got a million votes more, but 48 seats less, the same in fact as the DUP in Northern Ireland, who received a whopping 184, 260 votes. The lowest effort required to gain a Westminster seat was that of the SDLP of Northern Ireland, who didn’t manage 100,000 votes but got one MP, while poor old UKIP had to drum up over 3.8 million votes for their single MP. (http://www.bbc.com/news/election/2015/results )

Now, UKIP were easily the least likable people in the election, even despite the fact that the Tories, Sinn Fein, and other avowed nationalists were receiving votes and seats, a party characterised by the visiting, interested, and always insightful PJ O’Rourke: “from what I could tell by speaking to UKIP supporters, the party is, basically, a protest against modernity.” And that from a man who pronounced his basic political identity on the UK spectrum as “a Countryside Alliance Tory bog-trotter.” He also noted that Nicola Sturgeon, SNP leader, “bore a strong resemblance - not least in the demands she intended to make on Ed Miliband - to my ex-wife's divorce lawyer.” (http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-32657761 )

So, why this result? Did Britain go barmy in early May? Lose its senses? Do people really desire fiscal responsibility and cuts over services and social compassion? Do people really think that present levels of public service (education, health, welfare etc.) are all basically fine or even excessively lavish? The Tories’ campaign was basically ‘vote for us for cuts and an EU referendum, vote Labour to give the SNP control, vote Lib-Dem and they’ll just dither, vote UKIP and we’ll have a massive crisis.’ It worked. The negativity paid off, for Scottish independence and EU membership are not big voting factors in England, but fears whipped up of Sturgeon leading Miliband by the groin through Parliament was an image that the tabloids sold and middle England swallowed.

What was perhaps most astonishing for those of us who live outside of Britain was the almost complete absence of any discussion of foreign, security, or defence policy, other than UKIP wishing to cut foreign aid and leave the EU. The Tories are always keen to don the flag and defend the nation, but were rather hampered by their massive defence cuts that have even prompted public questions from the US. No party was seen as a defence advocate, but few even wanted to talk about any form of security policy. The Greens and SNP were against the Trident or any other UK nuclear deterrent, and the others were more or less in favour of keeping it, with Cameron using that as another Scot-whipping stick to beat Miliband: the SNP would force labour to give up Trident. But no-one talked about Afghanistan, Syria, ISIS, Saudi Arabia, NATO, or the US Alliance.

The latter should have been a big point, as Britain is facing similar issues to Japan on free-trade matters, with the TPP in Asia-Pacific matched by a the TTIP across the Atlantic. Not a peep. Nor anything about the things that the US is worried about regarding Britain: EU membership, UK response to ISIS, UK eagerness to join the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in the face of very strong US opposition. Nothing.

(For a comparison of the US and relations with Japan and Britain, an interesting article by Peter Tasker: http://asia.nikkei.com/Viewpoints/Perspectives/Is-Japan-the-new-Britain )

So, what indeed was this election about?

Immigration seemed to be important, but when the results are analysed areas such as Redcar on Teesside had relatively high UKIP support (despite being solid Labour), but it has the lowest proportion of immigrants in England. Perhaps more important was not the economy itself, which the headline figures show is ‘healthy’, but which deeper analysis illustrates is massively unbalanced, structurally towards retail, housing, and financial services in the City of London, and geographically towards the huge doughnut around that Emerald City of London. The more important point was public perceptions of themselves within that economy.

Some may like the sense of crisis through which they can relive the 'Dunkirk spirit' of sacrifice and misery with a joyous, stoical air. Others love the fact that the rich will get richer, but we may have hit the point of social prosperity whereby the majority (or at least 37%) believe they are on the right side of 'wealth' and they must protect it. Accompanying this sense of prosperity is a belief that most (or 37%) of us are now free from the dangers of penury, that no matter what we will never be forced onto benefits, which wasn't the case even in the mid-1990s. The country (England, that is) has become truly middle-class, not in wealth alone, but in expectations, aspirations, and standards by which others are judged. This has bred contempt for those who are on benefits and a nastiness about cuts that is quite stunning. Cutting funds for the pensions is unthinkable (and avoided by all parties) as it raises more hackles than cuts to disability benefits, as pensions are seen as ‘our right’, while disability is strangely associated with poverty. Oddly, however, those with an enhanced sense of wealth-care appear not to have minded the massive rise in university fees due to the Conservatives in 2010 (and the Lib-Dems buckling), which they would have to pay, as their kids are far more likely to go to uni than kids from Stockton or Redcar. Much the same is true of the NHS. Wealth care over health care, perhaps?

The life expectancy of a child born in Stockton, next to Middlesbrough and Redcar, is the shortest in England at 67, whereas it is 91 in Belgravia, London. Even within Stockton there is a 16.4 year difference in life expectancy between central Stockton and one of its wealthy suburbs, such as Yarm. That should surely make people as mad as hell, but those wealthy suburbs (South Stockton) returned a Tory, as they did in 2010, even on Teesside! You can't help but wonder what it is that people are prioritising.

It seems that the only people who are getting what they want are those who voted Conservative and SNP, and this is in a UK election immediately after independence was rejected. The Tories appear to regard Scotland in the Union as a missile base, an oil-processing plant, and a Labour-seat-reduction device, and seem willing to give anything to the SNP as long as those three elements can remain intact and of utility.

The new government will have its work cut out and may well rue the day it wished for a majority. Its programme is to cut away at public spending, reduce the size of the state, and then the private sector will pick up the slack and make everyone richer. If it works, many will be happy, but it does rather smack of gambling. The pledge on a referendum on EU membership was considered vital for the Tories for one big reason: it has no EU policy. Since the 1990s when the party ripped itself apart on the issue between the proto-UKIP Luddite Euro-sceptics, and pro-business, neo-Liberal Euro-philes, it has been impossible to have one position. However, the party has learned from its errors and will not repeat those mistakes. But the problem will come if the vote goes against EU membership. What does Cameron do then? Leave the EU in the face of business opposition? The party of commerce? Does it announce a period of ‘wait and see’, with possibly another vote? What would that do for business confidence? It could, of course, result in a vote for the EU, but by such a narrow margin that hope arises in those Little Englander hearts that they are close to winning if only they can try again, only harder. The only positive result would be for a united campaign for the EU, by all parties (other than UKIP), and a resounding 80% victory. But the one lesson Cameron has learned from this election is that joining up with your enemies against some of your oldest, natural friends is a recipe for future electoral disaster.

One hopes that all those that voted Tory are feeling truly proud of themselves, and shall continue to do so.

I keep being reminded of a woman I met in Bosnia. She left Sarajevo as a teenager during the siege, made a new life in Britain, but then wanted to go home and rebuild a life in Sarajevo with her kids. Turned out she couldn't register for anything as her nationality wasn't recognised: Yugoslav was no longer acceptable, she had to be Bosniak, Croat, or Serb, so she left. Without the war, siege, and kids, that might end up the case with some of us British.

 

10th November 2014: Awash With Watersheds

10^th November 2014

 Awash With Watersheds

The past couple of weeks have felt like a series of watersheds in Japan. Turning of the tide would be too strong a phrase, but certainly the river seems to be flowing in a very different way now to what it was a few weeks ago. Within domestic Japan, and the Japan that interacts with the rest of the world, both seem to be in a transition process at the moment.

The king is dead. Or at least his temporal mortality has been proved. PM Abe, the man with the Teflon suit (and desk) has been found to have unwanted news stick to him. This is interesting, not only for the worthiness of the news stories themselves but also for the role of the media up until this point. They have been unusually quiet and passive, some might even say tame, in regard to the current administration. The initial honeymoon period was to be expected, but after almost two years it was becoming a little embarrassing how little real reporting was going on, and how much the handouts of chicken feed and occasional nuggets of real content from the ‘kisha kurabu’ were being passed off as ‘real news’. This is the dream of governments everywhere: full spectrum dominance of news media. Putin would be proud. It couldn’t last for ever but just seemed as though it might. And then it all came crashing down in a most spectacular way, and from a very unexpected direction.

A politician had distributed some cheap hand fans in a summer campaign. Yes, that was the start. Not exactly Watergate but everything has to start somewhere. There were only three problems: the fans had the images on them of a female LDP cabinet member, Justice Minister Midori Matsushima, as part of her previous election campaign, and their production and distribution was in breach of a law on campaign finances. As Minister of Justice she probably should know that, but tried to just brazen it out, and might have succeeded in doing so, but for the third problem, and one more that had nothing to do with her. The third problem was that not only did she make a mistake, but that she let people know about it, and one person who you wouldn’t want knowing about it is the opposition DPJ’s beautiful assassin, Renho. She slaughtered the minister twice in parliament and made her look both foolish and corrupt (neither is probably true), and the administration incompetent, as Matsushima had only been appointed in September, and we weren’t even in the last week of October.

Now, things began to get interesting. The additional item that Matsushima couldn’t control was the spending habits of one of her cabinet colleagues. That is beyond anyone’s control, other than the person involved. When that person spends public money on cosmetics, expensive gifts, and then the ultimate display of ‘initiative’ bottles of wine with her name and full photograph on the label, well that makes a paper and plastic fan look like some very small potatoes. Yes, step forward Yuko Obuchi, until recently Minister for Economy, Trade, and Industry, and daughter of former PM Keizo Obuchi, after whose sad death in office she inherited the ‘family seat’. In Britain that means a country house, minor title, possible seat in the House of Lords, and a lot of bills for field drainage and a new roof. In Japan it means she took over dad’s place in the Diet, and was adopted by his supporters, servants, and cronies, in a vast power management-money making enterprise. This is not cynicism, but fact. Each Diet member requires a decent staff to raise funds to fight elections and administer those funds, and the top funds received from the state. More funds require more staff which require more funds. A common enough pattern.

Both women were appointed to the cabinet, it is widely supposed, as Abe was making his big pledge about one of the arrows in his quiver. He has been vexed by the issue of productivity in Japan, which is approximately half of US levels (and one wouldn’t imagine that from most Japanese or US media sources), and the declining and ageing population, so he has made a pledge to get more women into work. Many Japanese ladies choose to be house wives rather than enjoy the delights of the Japanese female work place, where the expression ‘OL’, or office lady, is a cipher for ‘woman who makes tea, does photocopying, and helps men who do the real work’. Many Japanese women are managers and bosses, not least several of my former students (hi Satoko!), but not that many. So Abe tried to take the initiative and appointed five of 18 women to his cabinet in early September, and announced that he wanted 30% of senior business and senior political and administrative positions to be held by women by 2020. Great policy, and if it doesn’t happen he surely won’t be in power and no-one can blame him for the failure.

Now, the first women of the five to get into hot water were internal affairs minister, Sanae Takaichi, and LDP policy chief, Tomomi Inada, who were both pictured posing smiling alongside Kazunari Yamada, the 52-year-old leader of the National Socialist Japanese Workers Party, on the neo-Nazi party’s website. Yamada has praised Adolf Hitler and the September 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre, denied the Holocaust and criticised the ban on the Nazi salute in Germany. This wasn’t good, but then Obuchi took things in a whole new direction.

She has been in politics for 15 years, was educated partly overseas, inherited her dad’s staff and support system, and even briefly served under PM Taro Aso. She is not exactly a green rooky. However, she purchased silk ties, made by her sister, and sold by her brother in law, with official funds as presents to overseas VIPs, which she claimed in the Diet were very well received and which she did not think was a problem. This was also the case for the purchase of expensive clothes and cosmetics, as these were, she claimed, required for the role of representing Japan, as though she arrived in office naked and unkempt. The ultimate, however, was the wine, seemingly produced by her campaign committee, featuring her photo, and distributed in clear breach of electoral laws, and later exchanged for enormous prices when every media group in the land was desperate to have evidence for the ballooning scandal. And yet she tried to brazen it out. Only when the boss made a press announcement that he would talk with her and ask her to explain the details of everything was it clear even to a girl given her career on her family plate that the game was up, and she needed to look elsewhere for a job.

So, story over.

And then there were the replacements. The new justice minister was seemingly safe hands Yoko Kamikawa. But the new economy, trade, and industry minister was the ‘enigmatic’ Yoichi Miyazawa, the nephew of late PM Kiichi Miyazawa, and cousin of the current foreign minister Fumio Kishida. It’s nice to keep things cosy with family. He was appointed on the Monday, and by the Wednesday was defending himself after it emerged that staff from his support group spent office money at a sadomasochistic bar in Hiroshima, his constituency area. Members of Miyazawa-kai, his political support group that manages his funds, spent 18,230 yen ($170, £106) at the club in September 2010 on “entertainment expenses” as part of “constituency business”, and the TV reporters asking the minister what form of business could be done in an S&M bar were treated to a look of startled, blank horror usually reserved for those discovered interfering with goats. “It is true such expenses were made,” Mr Miyazawa told reporters. “But I myself did not go there at all. That's true as well.” It’s also true that in the bar women dressed only in underwear are tied up with ropes and whipped. The owner stated on TV that most customers are men. But as Abe could claim, they are giving a great deal of productive employment and satisfaction to women.

(On the issue of harassment of women in Japan’s workplaces, see this new article by Stephanie Assman: http://japanfocus.org/-Stephanie-Assmann/4211?utm_source=November+10%2C+2014&utm_campaign=China%27s+Connectivity+Revolution&utm_medium=email )

After these cases it seemed that the media had woken up from their obliging stupor to find that there were real stories to be had at the government’s expense, and the media shifted direction and pace in its reporting. Not the turning of a tide, but a shift. One of the results seems to be the drop in the government’s popularity to its lowest level, with 44% supporting and 38% opposing, with the economy being the leading source of dissatisfaction, as Abe’s arrows are well past the peak of their trajectory with little real evidence of having achieved a great deal. The always excellent blog of Michael Cucek (Shisaku: http://shisaku.blogspot.co.uk/ ) explains that despite the quite outrageous inflationary measures of Abe through the BoJ (now his tame beast), and its attempts to cheapen the yen, and the entire economy, into the basement is a high risk strategy.

“...the implicit Abenomics bargain:
"We the Abe Administration and compliant governors of the Bank of Japan will goose your equities prices and turbocharge your profits. You corporates will dramatically raise salaries and hiring of your permanent employees, and not just double bonuses, creating a positive inflation expectations loop from which all of society can benefit...oh and no wanking around with further increased hiring of temporary workers to replace permanent workers! We're watching you."”

So, make things just sweet and jammy for big business, and hope they do what you want, otherwise...you won’t be quite so sweet to them in the future. A masterplan.

 

The other change in recent days has been in China Japan relations. Months of hammering away by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs upon the China edifice has resulted in PM Abe having a face to face summit with President Xi Jinping on the edges of the APEC summit in Beijing. They met this evening, and interesting it was. Abe stood in the foyer of the Hall of the People, waiting nervously, Xi walked in, Abe smiling spoke to him and shook his hand. Xi avoided all eye contact, said nothing, no smile, and walked away after a few seconds of posing with Abe for the handshake photo. The Japanese media spin was ‘Xi is playing to his domestic audience, and must show displeasure to Japan, but really he wants talks’. However, there is also an alternative narrative: Xi wanted these talks a hell of a lot less than Abe did. The Japanese PM appeared to be incredibly desperate, and he was. And no girl likes a desperate man.

However, this is only the open face of the situation. In recent weeks it became clear that China was signalling its desire to revert to more ‘normal’ patterns on discourse, through measures to reduce air and sea collisions in disputed areas, and in China expressing displeasure with some of its countrymen poaching red coral from the waters around the Ogasawara Islands. This was the reasonable face of China, and one the Japanese were desperate to see and speak with, and resulted in the four point plan between the nations agreed on 7^th November. This was the first time that both sides, in the vaguest of language, acknowledged that there was a disagreement between them regarding islands.

The tide with China hasn’t turned, but things are looking up just at the moment. Oddly, the seemingly invincible Abe seemed most popular with his people when he was determined in setting himself against China, and with a compliant press uncritically lauding his domestic achievements, even his resolve to raise the consumption tax to 10% next year. Now, he is wavering on the tax, the media are smelling domestic blood, and he is claiming success in being granted a brief audience with a reluctant Chinese President. Yes, the river seems to flowing in a slightly different direction these days.

19th September 2014: And then there was one

19^th September 2014

And the votes are counted, the results are in, and the elation, jubilation, and anxiety have all dissipated. Scotland voted No, against independence and for continuing within the Union. Not easy to know who is most disappointed. Alex Salmond, SNP leader and Yes vote architect must be as sick as a parrot, as this would have been his overriding claim to historic fame, the man who led Scotland to freedom. 1.6 million Scots are also presumably pretty much as gutted as an Arbroath Smokie today, having felt they had enough to break free and realise the dream, no matter how flawed that might have seemed to many of us who didn’t share their vision. Many Catalans, Basques, and others in Europe who fancy their own referenda must also be rather disappointed, as the Trojan Horse tripped and fell at the final fence.

But what of everyone else, the more than 2 million who voted Yes, and everyone else looking on? Not easy to read the other effects of the vote. Tories will surely have mixed feelings about this vote, as they stood most to gain, politically, from this possibility of a breakaway, making their chances of victory in post-independence British elections far greater with Scotland’s Labour, Liberal, and SNP MPs stripped from Westminster. However, the Tory party was once the Unionist Party, and the feelings of loyalty to the Union do run very deep for many traditional Tories. Cameron will also be relieved not to be the Tory who allowed the Union to be broken up, his rather eccentric decision to allow the vote being widely grumbled about within his own ranks. The Libs and Labs will be delighted, as this helps them dream of victory in 2015. The Liberal-Democrats will probably have little but dreams to keep them warm, as Nick Clegg and his crew have managed to kill off support for the Liberal Party better even than former leader Jeremy Thorpe’s involvement in a 1979 trial that involved a homosexual love tryst, a personal argument between friends, and a murder, as well as the killing of a dog. One imagines that it was the dog that lost the Liberals most votes. Labour will see this as a real chance to use their ‘northern’ support to defeat a largely unpopular Con-Dem coalition, but their leader, Ed Miliband, exerts the sort of charismatic charm usually associated with accountants and drainage engineers, and a unique blend of privileged arrogance and parochial glibness that seems to universally irritate. His only real selling points are that he isn’t someone else: Cameron, Clegg, Blair, Brown, or Alex Salmond.

And of the vote itself, well, there isn’t too much mystery there. Of the 32 council districts, only four managed to produce a Yes majority. Of these, only one had a turnout higher than the (extremely high) average of 84.6% (West Dumbartonshire), and this had a rather small number of votes cast (62,450), as opposed to Glasgow which had 364,126 votes, a 53.5% Yes vote, and only 75% turnout, the lowest of the 32. The next lowest was Dundee, my old university home, which produced the first, and largest percentage, Yes vote majority (57.3%), from a 78.8%turnout. The largest percentage No votes came in the Scottish Borders, Dumfries and Galloway (both areas in the south, beside England), the Shetlands, and the Orkney Isles (66.6%~63.7%), as well as urban and suburban areas outside Edinburgh and Glasgow. The pattern is that furthest from Edinburgh and Glasgow, and in the wealthiest parts of the country, and where the turnout was highest, the Yes vote was at its weakest. Let us hope that people don’t fancy doing this all over again in a couple of years.

However, as with the independence vote being passed, rejection signals the start of the ‘follow up’. Promises to be kept, such as more powers for Scotland, more support, but also Cameron has now raised that old, thorny issue of what became known as the ‘West Lothian Question’: how much power an MP should have depending upon his/her constituency location? This means, with a devolved government in Edinburgh in control of education, health, farming, transport, police and most other things short of strategy and security, should Scottish MPs be able to vote on these matters related topolicy in the rest of the UK in the House of Commons? This was first raised in 1977 by the Labour MP, and professional troublemaker, Tam Dalyell, in response to a previous referendum on Scottish devolution (self-government, as they have had there for 15 years now), which was rejected (by a convoluted voting procedure). Tam Dalyell was always a thorn in the side of his and every other party as he actually seemed to care deeply about truth, justice, and morality, and questioned his own right to vote on certain issues when his constituents could be separately represented in a Scottish Assembly. Cameron has taken up this issue so that he can have his cake and eat it: keep the union and yet cut down on opposition parliamentary power derived from Scottish seats. He might not be able to force the Tories into power, but he can certainly make it a damn sight more difficult for anyone else to govern.

Oh, and Tam Dalyell’s autobiography is entitled The Importance of Being Awkward. Unsurprisingly, he denounced his own party leader, Tony Blair, as a war criminal. One thinks back and rather wishes Tam were still the MP for West Lothian, just dying to get his teeth into the upcoming post-referendum parliamentary debates. The clashes to come between Cameron, Clegg, and Miliband will be more akin to collisions between sheep or clouds, rather than the bared teeth and claws of a proper backbench beast. We can only hope that the most diligent MP in the House of Commons, former coal miner Denis ‘The Beast of Bolsover’ Skinner is on fine form and ready to put in a good, hard shift at the Commons coalface.

17th September 2014: Time to Get My Coat?

17^th September 2014

 

And the blog has been away so long perhaps it may have seemed that it had faded into the past. How remnants from the past have a way of returning for unexpected reasons. Separatism, nationalism, and the whiff of rebellion are such remnants, lots of Rob Roy and William Wallace, retold with an ever greater veneer of artifice and syrup added to make the stories more palatable and exciting, whereas the originals require no embellishment. And they are all back. Scotland votes on the issue of independence tomorrow, Thursday 18th September, and it is a very odd vote in many ways. Independence seems to have a great chance of being accepted or grasped than at any other time since the Union. And then one wonders why? The Scots have a powerful devolved government, good finances from the UK central government, and with the EU we have free movement across most of the continent. Would it matter so much to have a Scottish foreign and defence policy? Or a separate pension system? Really?

It would seem that the one point on which almost all Britons agree is that the financial centre of the UK is protected by political elites of all parties, and that this financial core is corrupt. So the Scots wishing to break away from this is perhaps not only understandable but one that fills many other Britons with envy. However, the leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) Alex Salmond, the head of the Scottish Assembly and the leader of the ‘Vote Yes’ campaign, is determined that he wants Scotland to keep the British Pound, realising that this means retaining the control of the Bank of England (key name) over this currency, and that the BoE is bossed about by the Treasury (in London) and the financial institutions of the City of London. So, freedom for Scotland would mean what exactly? Giving up what small fragment of potential political control Scots might have had over their currency in exchange for no control at all? And plan B is what? An independent currency has been bandied about by the SNP, and roundly rejected by the financial institutions of the City of Edinburgh, a huge financial base in its own right, and second largest in the UK after London. The Euro is less favourably viewed but with that comes some rather complex issues. The Euro is not in a good place right now, and isn’t likely to be for quite a while. It is also only open to EU member states, and Scotland, by leaving the UK will, automatically, leave the EU. To apply for membership is no problem, but the usual time taken to be accepted ranges from five to 15 years. Even with a fast-track application, and with complete agreement of all EU states, an independent Scotland would be created in the Spring of 2016 and the application would probably only be seriously considered after a new state has been created. That is unless the rest of the EU were feeling very kind and cosy toward the new Scottish State.

And that raises another issue. Everyone loves Scotland in Europe. They love it inside the UK. Their views of an independent state might be quite different. Many would surely be supportive, possibly in Scandinavia and Ireland, and some indifferent. But the views of Belgium and Spain, facing strong internal secessionist movements would probably be less than embracing. Germany could possibly fear that the UK economy would be weakened and that the free-wheeling and (outwardly) free-spending Scotland would not be a fine model of post-2008 austerity, the whole austerity movement being under attack in France and elsewhere. Those countries most badly affected by spending cuts, such as Greece, would be unlikely to be overly cheery either, not least as an independent Scotland would be financially incapable of covering their own banks’ potential defaults. The Royal Bank of Scotland was the largest financial institutions of the UK to be bailed out by the government, but Edinburgh would not be able to manage such an operation as London did. So, Scotland would presumably be depending on the EU, in the form of the European Central Bank, to underwrite its banks, and its national budgets, which the SNP claim will be larger per person than in the rest of the UK, due to increases in education and health care budgets. And who will be happy and willing to assume this burden?

 

This may all seem churlish nit-picking, and possibly it is, but it is important nit-picking. I happen to dislike nationalism, and to feel rather uncomfortable with much patriotism. Parochial prejudice isn’t a good thing, or something to be valued. I lived in Scotland, have family and friends there, and feel comfortable in Scotland and with Scots. I feel I am not Scottish, but that Scotland is very much part of ‘my country’, possibly more so than London, and that my identity is British, so the basis of my opinions is a personal prejudice that I can recognise. I have been in discussion with some friends on this issue and some interesting points arose.

Alan in Berkeley wrote that he sympathised with much of Scottish ire, and one point he made was that “Scotland got pulled into the Iraq War by Westminster, if I am not mistaken.” My response rather frothed over the breakfast table:

The British people were taken into war by a government. That war was not popular, but after we entered into it the narrow margin of opinion against became an equally narrow margin in favour. Oddly, Scotland was about on the same national (UK) scores for support and opposition, and Scotland has traditionally been rather more tolerant of military operations, wars, and adventures than many other parts of the UK. In Scotland, military service has rarely been seen to clash with socialism, unlike in South Wales or Northern Ireland. This 'Taken into Iraq' line has been peddled about quite a bit on the fringe of the debates, but it is wisdom after the fact. We were all 'taken in' and in all senses. National heritage has little meaning in this respect.

Alan also made a number of interesting points relating US and Scottish experiences and feelings:

“Eight years watching this country (the US) go off the rails, watching the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, watching the right-wing come to control the money, the press, the political discourse.  Eight years of this and I have total sympathy for the Scots when they say they are fed up with Westminster.  There was a time when I said they were missing the woods for the trees, that the solution was not to separate from Westminster, but to work harder to be represented fairly in Westminster.

But eight years of awakening (I think it is awakening; it could of course be something else entirely) to the possibility that American democracy is broken, quite likely permanently, and the certainty that we don't have what it takes to control the top - we can't fix the banks, we can't stop the gerrymandering of political districts, can't change the electoral college system, can't curb the power of the lobbyists, can't get the informationally-challenged voter to read and to think.  Our only hope is to tend our own garden.  And politically, that means invest our time, energy and money in local control and hope somehow if everybody does it and gets local leaders answerable to their constituents, they in turn will somehow use their influence to fix things at the top.

All this is just another way of saying our political institutions are too big and too remote.  The bosses don't answer to us because they don't have to.  They don't even hear us, actually.  This isn't working, this notion of a national democracy.  It's better to bring the large political units down to size.  We needed the large nations in the day of military imperialism when it was smart to band together against other large imperialisms; today the nation-state is little more than an invitation to oligarchic control and corruption on a massive scale.” 

My response to Alan:

Centre and locality yes. That is very true. Difference of the US with Britain is we have emerged as a country with increasingly one overarching centre, of government, finance, media, and culture, as in France. In the US this is not the case, and 'the centre' may refer to DC, New York, LA, Chicago, or Boston. It may refer to Des Moines if you live in the farm belt of Iowa. We live in such a small place that our local centres are usually rather small, like Des Moines, and London swamps and trumps all. There is strong evidence that independence support is weak in the Scottish countryside and the Islands due to fears of Edinburgh-Glasgow, and fears in Glasgow that the largest city of the land will be displaced even more by those swines on the east coast in Edinburgh. Yes, Scotland is really so parochial that the cities 50 miles apart have such a bitter rivalry. And not just Scotland. The north-east of England was given a referendum on regional government about 15 years ago. It was rejected by a large margin. The main reason? Most people didn't want to have a local government bossing them about from Newcastle. Yes, that huge metropolis of about half a million (if you include suburbs etc.), that is 40miles from Middlesbrough, was seen as the unacceptable face of 'central' government.

So, what does it mean? Not sure. Maybe, as Alan says, tend your own garden and do what you can. Maybe ignore the people, as they are all idiots. Maybe just don't try and change anything as none of it matters. Or change everything as we've nothing to lose.

Breaking away as you have different values and wish to fend for yourself with those values intact is innately decent and fine. Trying to find differences between yourself and others to justify your own nationalism isn't fine, nor is telling lies about finance and selling independence as freedom, but with the full knowledge that you don't want to be really free. The resentment will linger, yes indeed. But given independence, and given the pound and crown that they say they want so much, the first bump in the road and the resentment will be back, with all blame for woes placed on 'those foreigners who control our currency'. Nationalism once stoked is a nasty, pernicious thing that is impossible to eradicate, and difficult to manage, and yet politicians repeatedly try to ride its startling potential energy for self-elevation, a legal high for the power seeker.

 

As part of this discussion, my friend here in Fujisawa, Japan, Andreas, gave his own perspective, which is an interesting one in many respects. He is German, but half British, or rather half Yorkshire. His mother’s family is from Skipton, itself an embattled Yorkshire enclave as it has been part of the North and West Ridings of the County (or country, as it has sometimes portrayed itself). For those unfamiliar with Britain, Yorkshire is the equivalent of Texas among US states: large, diverse, very proud and voluble about its unique qualities, dismissive of other places, and yet full of internal arguments. Yorkshire folk and Texans would understand the Scottish issue very well.

Andreas’ points:

“I, for one, see the developments in Scotland, Catalonia and various other areas in Europe as an almost inevitable outcome of the developments in Europe, ie. a fundamental reassessment of the idea of the nation state. And in general, I see this development as a positive one, a trend towards a more region-based, less centralized version of government which, who knows, might even result in some deep-reaching realignment of the borders within the EU. What is happening in the former Soviet Republics - Transnistria, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia, and now Ukraine, only goes to show just how volatile superstructures built on little more than an overarching ideology are, once the central power has eroded. A bit closer to home, Yugoslavia. So in my mind, what we see in Scotland and Catalonia is no surprise at all. With the idea of Europe as a socio-political common ground catching hold among people in Europe (and I see this happening to a growing degree), the erstwhile ultimate unifying factor, the nation state, is losing its currency. If we are Europeans, if it is easier for me to drive from Passau to Salzburg than to Munich, if I have to pay last summer's Italian speeding ticket even though I am back home in Denmark, what then, apart from history, is the reason behind the borderline between me and the people over there? And once the realization sets in that these borderlines are not a (historical/political/economical etc) given, why not redraw the borderline between me and the others? For what reason should the hard-working North of Italy finance the lazy corrupt lifestyle of the mafia-infested South? (quote Lega Nord) For what reason should the hard-working North of Belgium finance the lazy corrupt lifestyle of the garlic-chomping South? (quote Vlaamse Blok)
             So in short, the Scottish have all the right in the world to turn up their kilts at the tossers in Westminster, embrace Wee Eck and fly St Andrew's Cross from the top of Edinburgh Castle. What worries me, though, is the timing, the emotionality of it all, and the impending hangover once the party is over. At the first TV debate, the pro-independence idea went into a spectacular nosedive when the pro candidate had no answer to offer to his opponent's pointed questions regarding the economic and political feasibility of Scottish independence. There are so many problems looming, there are so many issues that have not been seen through. But what the heck, tomorrow's worries are tomorrow, and this is now, so let's get roaringly drunk on the mood of the moment! In my mind, with the gloomy long-term economic prospects of Scotland and the obvious lack of any contingency plans apart from relying on an EU bailout, I am afraid that before long, Scotland will be among the most unpopular nations in Europe.”

 

And all of this comment has simply been about the vote. What of the aftermath of the vote? A no vote, and what becomes of all this nationalist fervour? Does it simply drain away, never to be seen again? Not likely. A yes vote would trigger all sorts of interesting developments. The UK will have elections in 2015, but independence would be due in 2016, so the year of transition would be a tough and confusing one. The division of national resources and debts would be another area of potential conflict, as the precious ‘Scottish’ oil is assigned by international treaties with the UK. How much would the UK government wish to ‘give up’?

Much talk has been had over defence and the UK nuclear deterrent, but as important as they are, these are logistical issues that can be resolved, but the timing will be very tricky. A Scotland outside of the EU and NATO will be interesting, however, to see how different they really wish to mark themselves compared to the UK and other US allies, and it would be fascinating to observe the creation of Scottish armed forces.

But that is all conjecture. Interesting conjecture for a defence and security nerd like me, but something to wait and see about.

Which is just what a small group in Japan (at the moment, Japan) is doing rather closely. Yes, there is an Okinawa Independence Movement, looking closely at Scotland, especially the security aspects, and hoping that they can become independent of Tokyo (and Washington), and kick out the military bases that dominate the islands of the Okinawa group (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/15/okinawa-independence-scotland-japan-us-military-base ). Interestingly in Okinawa, many of those local politicians arguing so heatedly with the present and past governments belong, mainly, to PM Abe’s LDP. They see Washington as the main problem, and LDP membership they imagine gives them leverage over Tokyo. However, it seems obvious that (since 1972) it is the Tokyo government that has most obviously abused and ignored local communities rather than represented and protected them.

As Andreas further commented:

“In a chat about the Senkakus, my friend at Ryudai (Ryukyu University, the main university in Okinawa) pointed out that the local politicians on Ishigaki (a small island distant from but part of the Okinawa group), among others, are staunchly behind the belligerent line of the Abe (+predecessors) government in Tokyo, welcoming if not outright inviting the presence of the jieitai (Japan Self-Defense Forces) on their island, thus turning their homes into a potential target in case of a conflict with China. The reason for this seemingly odd pro-Tokyo line is quite simple: it riles those hated centralist bastards in Naha.”

And that is one important point. Parochialism and local enmity drive far more of policy than we would wish to admit. In Scotland, the enmity between Glasgow and Edinburgh is legendary, and that between Highland and Lowland historically bloody, and between Catholics and Protestants alarmingly common. So, good luck, whichever way you vote. And remember, no matter what the big men with the bigger mouths and the outsize flags might say, you have a fair few friends to your immediate south, and in the far east, who wish you well.

Declarations of Media Independence: 4th July 2014

4^th July 2014

Apologies for the lack of blogging activity. Simply too much else to do. Writing, reading, and sitting with eyes like saucers agog at the varied wonderment that is the stuff of life here in Japan.

The past few days have provided enough for several PhD theses on the nature of politics and the media’s portrayal of politics in Japan. The big news story of the past weeks has been the attempt of the Abe administration to gain agreement of its coalition partners, Komeito, for a re-interpretation of the constitution to allow Japan to exercise the right of collective self-defence (shudanteki jieiken in Japanese). Now, in most countries this would not be such a huge issue, but in Japan it is, and for good reason. While it would appear eminently sensible to allow the Japan Self-Defense Forces to come to the aid of allied forces under attack, or to rescue Japanese caught up in conflict, or to provide joint/combined defence with other nations’ contingents within a United Nations peacekeeping mission, as ever in discussions of security in Japan, this isn’t the whole story. Why? Well, there are multiple sub-plots, under currents, and hidden and open agendas which make King Lear look as intriguing as slicing up a birthday cake. There are the questions about Abe’s actual agenda, based upon his stated desire when first PM in 2006 to change the constitution, only to be shocked when the Japanese people preferred not to, thank you. The widespread belief is that his views haven’t changed, merely his approach. Reinterpretation is therefore revision by stealth and without the need for a public referendum, which he would almost certainly lose (unless China were to ‘help him’ by some outrageous provocation or conflagration). Then there is the drama between the main LDP and junior Komeito coalition partners. The opposition parties, rarely strong in Japan, have been like shy spectres only scantily visible and vocal. The main opposition has come from the interesting demographic of peace protest activists, concentrated among university-age youth and retired elders, and this has been active, visible, and vocal. This peace movement itself has a track record of varied opposition to policies, including even the existence of the JSDF, which admittedly is somewhat problematic considering they look just like military forces that are banned under the constitution. Most Japanese, however, want to have the JSDF, but also to keep their ‘peace constitution’, so have their cake and eat it. Like old King Lear’s family then. The peace folks tend to be rather left leaning, but combine a rather interesting loyalty to a constitution drafted by the US occupation authorities, which was widely seen as having saved Japan from its own militarists, with a condemnation of US military bases in Japan and the efforts of the US to encourage Japanese pro-active defence and security measures. So, something of a love-hate relationship. Which brings us to the first major media incident.

A man decided that the Abe reforms would be steamrollered through, and he felt a stand needed to be made. Sadly, he chose a very dramatic means of doing so, by climbing onto the upper-works of a footbridge in the busy Shinjuku area of Tokyo on Sunday 29^th June, demonstrating against the security reforms, and then dousing himself in fuel and setting himself ablaze. (http://us.tomonews.net/a-man-burned-himself-alive-in-tokyo-to-protest-japan-s-new-defence-policy-104890653065216?utm_source=Youtube%20TomoNewsUS&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=0630%20Japanese%20man%20self-immolation ) This is very rare in Japan, but the media response was just as unusual. NHK, the BBC equivalent national broadcaster ignored it, made no mention yet alone show footage. A few days later it seemed to gleefully show the details of an exploding catering truck on a US street, repeating the point of explosion several times in slow motion so that we could take in the full majesty of the horror. But that was an accident, abroad. Not on a Tokyo street most Japanese have walked along, involving an amazingly rare act, on one of the most controversial issues in politics and society today. The Asahi media group covered the story in print and broadcasting, but that is natural, as it is the most vocal opponent of the be reforms, the self-immolation story actually occupying a small section of The Japan Times two days after the event, on the same page 2 that contained the article “Japan on verge of legalizing war as Komeito bends”. Hardly Abe fans then. Oddly, most other news organisations also gave the story no or little coverage. This is the sort of media response that makes people wonder what is wrong with Japan, and if it really holds the liberal, democratic, moral high ground over China.

Then there is the yaji or jeering problem, in Japanese local government assemblies and even the national Diet. It came to light more than a week ago when a Tokyo assembly member, a woman in her thirties, was speaking on childcare and population issues, and some of her male ‘colleagues’ jeered at her with comments about ‘why don’t you have kids?’, or ‘hurry up and get married’. Coming on the back of Abe’s new policy to empower women and boost childbirth this wasn’t ideal, especially as it soon became clear that the culprits were members of his own LDP. Cue media storm, outrage, and then a forced apology from one male member, Suzuki, who claimed not to know anything about any of the other comments shouted around him, nor to have even heard them, although we could at home thanks to video footage. It was revealed today that much the same thing happened three months ago when another young woman speaking on the same issues was similarly jeered by another LDP male member but this time in the national Diet. It is difficult to believe that the media would take three months to unearth such a story in the House of Commons or the US Senate, but the Japanese media had to be forced to report it, by the young MP coming forward and making a statement in front of the Diet building (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20140704_10.html ). The media are up in arms, representing Japanese public opinion with their own representatives, but journalists are hardly blazing a trail of investigative reporting.

The final bizarre event of an odd week was the public meltdown, hysteric screeching, and then apology, followed by yet more of the same from a minor local politician before the assembled media, who seemed taken aback by his reaction. Hyogo prefectural assembly member Nonomura Ryutaro was making an appearance before the media as he had been accused of corrupt practice on a grand scale, with 195 dubious trips at the public expense this year alone, spending more than $30,000 in the process, and providing no cogent answer other than he was ‘conducting research’, presumably into geo-thermal energy, as most of his trips were to local hot spring onsen resorts. When pressed, and not in a very robust manner, he began to bang the table, shriek like a banshee, and cry and blubber like no Japanese person above the age of five that most here have ever seen. Extraordinary, which led to the oddest public discourse two-step imaginable. The media folks present said they wanted to end the news conference as they felt frightened. Yes, the media were frightened of the melting man. There was an adjournment, after which the reconstituted politician returned, and spoke calmly and quietly, apologising for his outburst, and asking each person preset to in turn provide his business card so that he could respond calmly to any and all questions. All fine then. Until someone actually asked, ‘so what was the money for again?’, and then were off again into the world of pained banshees, scared journos, and bedazzled viewers at home. This was rounded off by a cut away to a female activist, who spoke in the most delicate and sympathetic way possible of Nonomura’s failure to actually answer any question or provide a single explanation. Cut back to the table banging and wailing. Then cut back to the studio, and the quietest, calmest young TV announcer on air moving on to the next vanilla news story. It was like a brief sojourn to Oz, with the lion and scarecrow combined in one hysteric mass. Compulsive viewing, but disturbing. (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20140704_02.html and http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/video-japanese-politician-weeping-viral-article-1.1853465 and http://kotaku.com/japanese-politician-freaks-out-spawns-internet-memes-1598976161 ) Welcome to Japan media world.

The Time of Our Lives: 28th March 2014

Greetings from Japan,

A year passes and life continues. That year can seem so short, and yet so eventful and important that it can also seem to have lasted longer than any other year since childhood, when each day seemed so long. I am just completing my eleventh year as a Daito professor, and that statement alone makes for a question of wonderment about where that decade went? This past year has not been on a par with that previous decade, but it is difficult to remember any time in adulthood that has been such a revelation. The new friends made, the countries visited, the family and friends revisited, and the creation of a new life in a new place, which then had to packed up, closed down, given away, put in storage, or disassembled for shipping to Japan.

This issue of time, and how quickly and eventfully it may seem to have passed came into sharp perspective last night, as I watched the evening TV news, mesmerised to the extent that I forgot to eat. A man, 78, former boxer and live-in soya bean factory worker (wait, it gets much odder), called Hakamada Iwao, was released from prison last night to a barrage of media interest. Why? Well, he was the world’s longest serving death-row prisoner, having been arrested in 1966, and sentenced to death in 1968 for the murder of his boss and family. This is the latest in a long line of cases where the suspect was interrogated in a manner more familiar to Guantanamo or Bagram inmates than those faced by ordinary civilians of democratic, peaceful states, with continuous verbal abuse, interrupted sleep, and limited access to anyone other than the questioning officers, resulting in an end to the ordeal being only admitting guilt. Hakamada was interrogated  for a total of 240 hours, a few hours apart each time, so that he never got a proper sleep, never had enough food or water, never saw family or lawyer, and was left in his own sweat in the humid heat of Japanese high summer. He signed and spoke a confession, which he retracted at his trial, but he was found guilty anyway.

Now, all this is quite amazing. But there are even more extraordinary aspects to the case.

The death sentence was confirmed in 1976, and the Supreme Court confirmed this in 1980. So, he was confirmed as due to be killed 14 years after conviction. How long did those 14 years feel? How could a man remain sane in that time? How would you get through each day? His family filed a plea for a retrial in 1981. This was rejected, but only in 1994. Why did it take 13 years to consider? Is this not tantamount to a compounded abuse of a prisoner, even if a guilty prisoner? It took until 2004 for this decision to be upheld by the Tokyo High Court, and 2008 before the Supreme Court confirmed that decision.

Yesterday, the decision was made back at the lower level of the Shizuoka District Court, the original trial court, not that he was innocent, but that there were sufficient grounds for a re-trial. The judge stated that the grounds included the final acceptance of the convict’s lawyers that the bloodied clothing found should be DNA tested (previously rejected by all courts), which revealed that Hakamada couldn’t have worn them. It is perhaps revealing that this case followed the Ashikaga Murder Case of 1990, where the person convicted was released after more than 15 years on the grounds that the DNA proved him innocent and that police had bullied him into a confession, and that evidence had been fabricated. That case was lucky in having an expereinced investigative reporter following it up. The judge in the latest case has suggested impropriety on the part of police and public prosecutors, a very rare accusation in Japan.

And yet there remain so many questions. How would a man cope with prison when innocent? Or how would he cope with freedom after prison? But perhaps the more intriguing question is why he is free at all? Why wasn’t he executed? If the authorities were as sure as the repeated decisions of various courts suggest why wasn’t his life ended for the sake of perceived justice? While we can be glad that this wasn’t the case, the way in which this man has been treated suggests a rather cavalier approach to notions of justice and law by the judicial and legal authorities.

But on other matters, what of my domestic issues?

The last month in Cambridge was one of the busiest of my life with barely a free part of a day, but busy for mainly wonderful reasons, seeing new and old friends and meeting with the family. It was great to be able to meet up with my friends from the Faculty of Asian and Middle East Studies in Cambridge, and with lots of people related to my research interests. I’ve met my old friend Wilhelm more in the time he’s been at Oxford than we manage in Japan, and that is the beauty of the sabbatical, to free us up for broad-ranging and detailed discussions and cooperation.

The last few days were very stressful, with my family and wee Xia lending amazing support. My mother badgering me to allow her to clean more was possibly the first time I have heard of such a thing. She was rewarded with more cleaning, then a car ride to Middlesbrough stuffed into a tiny, almost air-tight, pocket packed in with duvets etc. Xia was weighed down with my cast-off food and stationery, and had to lug it all home to Grantchester.

Sadly, it left me shattered, and walking like John Wayne after a cattle-drive westward. Then I visited Michaela in Leeds, met up with Theresa and Andy, and had a wonderful time despite the weather. My step-brother, Ian, came to stay as he is retraining from mental health to baking, and is loving it and making amazing progress. My brother Peter was also visiting from London, and we had a great chance to spend time together, visit small towns around Teesside and we also were both rather worn out, so we were both lucky enough to catch the ‘flu. Sadly that was also when my sister was visiting, sandwiching her trip from Liverpool into a hectic work schedule. A few aching-bone-days later I was off from Durham Tees Valley (the world’s most convenient airport: no queues, no problems, free parking), to fly to Tokyo via KLM/Amsterdam. I arrived at the airport, had a longish wait for the three bags, then wondered yet again at how an incredibly busy takyubin courier desk where four staff dealt with mountains of luggage delivery requests in an operation of stunningly polite experienced efficiency. I left them at 10am, the bags were delivered to my house at 8pm, for less than 10 pounds each. Read this in Britain and weep.

Took the Narita Express and JR train home, and wondered at the dank, flat, grey weather, painting the scenery of Chiba and Tokyo a dank, grey, and depressing hue, and my heart sank. There were flashes of blossom to raise my heart, and the train guard, who could see I wasn’t in good shape and didn’t mind me sitting in the wrong seat, but made sure to tell me in English that I needed to change carriages as the train would split at Tokyo. I responded in Japanese, and he continued in English. Good English, and he was using this chance for practice. Taxi home, into my house, and then the realisation of what I was coming back to and what I had left in Middlesbrough and Cambridge. This was made rather worse by my physical condition, lack of sleep, and lack of a working mobile phone, house phone (apparently non-functioning, only emitting the irritating ‘on hold jingle’, or internet connection (needed to phone them and wait a few days, but tricky without a phone: could only think of pay phones by the station and 7-11, and didn’t fancy standing in the rain competing with train and road noise while talking in Japanese about contracts and modems).

Saw my lovely neighbours, the Endos who visited me in Cambridge, and chatted away, and then went to the shop to get some food, ate, and passed out on the floor for an hour. Then into Fujisawa to restart my mobile, stood for ages in a cheese-ticket line, then headed off to a shop to buy a new house phone. Again, mobbed by people buying white goods as the sales tax/VAT will rise from 5% to 8% on 1^st April. Eventually a young guy came to help, he gave me some advice, and then he ran off to get the phone I wanted. Came back apologising that the stock had been discontinued. Chose another, off he went, came back sweating that this one could be delivered to me in three days. Chose a third, he said ‘we have it’ with great glee, and gave me a 500 yen (3 pound) discount. Back to mobile phone shop, lost my place in the line, but sympathy extended to me by young lad, who showed me the cheapest plan, easy to set up, need new phone, have one for free, all fine. Only colours in stock: canary yellow, or pink. No chance of changing later. I’ll pick up a white one on Friday. Have a new number as well.

Cycled home in the rain, set up my new home phone, and phoned the internet provider, only to find they had closed 10 minutes earlier. Such things do wonders for the spirit. Then as I was setting the day/time on the phone it rang, I thought it was broken, but answered it and found Sally in Kamakura was calling me, which really did give me a boost, although I had to cut her short as my bags were delivered then. Then Xia called from Cambridge asking after me, which was lovely. Then I ate my dinner (leftovers of lunch: salad and bread), had tea, and fell asleep on the floor. Woke up badly needing a shower and bed, but just as I was about to step in, a knock on the door, and it was my old mate Jonathan who had lived in my place from July to February, and had fixed a few things, and cleaned up a lot of the rubbish I had left, as well as taking care of the place alongside Andreas, Jennifer, Mika, and the Endos. He called in on his way home (not on the way at all) to see I was alright. Very nice, even if I couldn’t offer much entertainment and had to decline the offer of a beer in a bar. He left after 11 fortified by nothing stronger than my tea, biscuits, and BO.

In bed after midnight, slept well, but awake by 6am and aching. Not helped by a year of beds having softened my flabby body to the joys of futons on wooden floors. Felt like death only mildly reheated. Helped by the weather, chilly, grey, wet, as at least that keeps the appalling cedar pollen at bay, which within a few hours of returning had my nose and eyes streaming. Yes, my first day back was just lovely in so many ways.

Internet is still not on, but I have just spoken with the very kind Mr Arakawa about it and it will be back on this Sunday, 30^th March, sometime! Mrs Endo dropped by to tell me that two builders will come by to assess and give quotes my kitchen floor that is a bit blistered and fraying, but the house was a tip, covered in my exploded baggage, so forced to shift and tidy. The chap came, saw, and quoted, and it was very cheap and practical, the man being the typical Japanese builder. Small, wiry, looks mid-50s, probably younger, tight perm, crawling around the floor, and saying there is no need for the additional expense of changing the whole lot, then asking me if I would be alright with that. No worries that I will understand, no foreigner complex, writes up his quote, a smile, says goodbye (apologising for having arrived 15 mins late, due to another job), can do it in half a day, just say when, and off in his truck in the rain. Again, in Britain, weep.

Forced out into the cold rain to reach to the café, my departure made easier by the constant scream of US Navy jets coming in to land at their Atsugi base 25km north of me, one of the things that I didn’t miss while living in Britain. Nothing quite like an F-18 with a very low cloud base, so that the jet noise bounces down from the cloud in a weird echo amplification. However, the café provides comfort in so many ways, for the internet still exists, it has survived without me for 48 hours, and the café offers (very hard seats that disconfigure me, and) a British 1980s music compilation collection. I sat and checked mail, and wrote, to the strains of The Cure, Bowie, Roxy Music and others. Not at all bad. Again, so interesting I forgot to eat. At this rate I may even lose of my excess British flab. Only time will tell. And we are back again to time.