28th March
Took a look at The Guardian website over breakfast yesterday as is my want on a Sunday morning. Always a newspaper I turn to for balance, interest, and enlightenment. Lots going on in this morning’s edition, top stories being the protests in London and elsewhere about government cuts, then the whole list of Libya related stories, on the right side the obvious stories that England beat Wales in the football, and were beaten by Sri Lanka in the cricket, despite the fact that neither would be huge surprises. Some things about that US student accused of murdering a British student, stories on the Syrian crisis (taking a back seat to Libya I notice), a murderer shows where his second victim is buried, a politician in trouble, and ex-politician talking rubbish on global warming. Lifestyle, houses, property, hair, and zumba, the latest exercise dance craze. In that same narrow, central bit as this ‘lighter stuff’ comes travel (visiting LA), the thoughts of Geoffrey Boycott (curmudgeonly and painfully unenlightened retired cricketer and professional Yorkshireman who’s face launched a thousand stereotypes and comedy sketches), how record shops still have a role in music, and the thoughts of a writer I don’t know.
Right, a full press day then. Just one slight omission. Japan. Go further down the central, narrow seam of fluff and puff and you might well see a short red banner declaring ‘Current Topics’, the sort of thing that resides on page seven of the parish newsletter, relating to jumble sales and the WVS tea rota. The three such topics listed are ‘Japan earthquake and tsunami’, ‘Arab and middle east protests’, and ‘Cuts protests’. Since two of the three had their own higher profile features nearer the top of the page, we can only presume that since there hasn’t been a nuclear explosion, a bucketful of plutonium dumped onto the steps of 10 Downing Street, or any British fatalities reported, then the story has just about ended for this bastion of British media.
As my sister, Kerry, commented, the media in Britain these days focus upon the local, immediate stories with little scope for much else, and that, sadly and increasingly, has included the BBC. Top news on the BBC yesterday, protests at cuts in the UK, with features on the closure of local libraries and public toilets. Cue interviews with people on the streets: “Should public toilets be closed?” “Well, no, they should be open for everyone, and should be much nicer as well.” So, we learn that people would like more convenient conveniences, and would prefer perfumed, pristine privies. How much more could we possibly learn in one day?
Local news is important, and living here it is easy to become obsessed with every human tragedy story, each twist in the nuclear tale, and every hint and suggestion given by officials and politicians. Cuts and Libya, and Syria, and possibly even zumba, are important, in themselves and to the people directly affected. It is noticeable, however, that the rotation of journalists has been enacted. The BBC, Guardian, and others have pulled many of the people they parachuted in after the tsunami, and the volume of stories has trickled away, like the ebbing flood waters.
Another twist in the media tail/tale is that of deliberate misreporting. Now as far as British tabloids, or US right-wing blogs go, we might expect this, but one blogger has detailed how this was conducted in a news story in the New York Times, no less.
(http://www.japanprobe.com/2011/03/26/new-york-times-quietly-edits-article-about-fukushima-evacuation/ ) This is not a unique phenomenon, and has been seen most clearly in the press reporting in Germany, where most journalists only seemed able to view events in Japan and analyse related data through the kaleidoscopes of nuclear doom-mongering.
Public broadcaster, NHK, has announced that two men have died in their cars while waiting in line for petrol. Now, that is tragic, although I am sure that many people could actually see the possibilities for some very black humour, but the most bizarre aspect of the incidents is that both men were using stoves within their cars to keep warm while they waited. Yes, one was burning kerosene, and the other charcoal, within their cars and were thereby asphyxiated. (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/27_15.html ) There is, it seems, a fine line distinguishing between suicide and stupidity.
In somewhat better news, the 10 million times normal reading of pooled water found within the Dai-ichi plant No.2 turbine building was found to be massively inflated, with the real reading being somewhat lower, although highly radioactive. TEPCO said that the first reading was ‘mistaken’ and an evacuation conducted before carrying out a second verification test. (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/27_01.html )
The good news being that the reading was inaccurately inflated, the slightly less good news is that the real reading was that the water in the building is 10,000 times the normal radiation level of water used for reactor cooling. The sea water level is approximately 1,850 times normal radioactivity. Clouds. Silver linings? Hmmm.
As if to emphasize the performance of TEPCO throughout, the Tohoku Electric Power company has announced that its Onagawa and Higashi-Dori nuclear plants are fine. The Onagawa reactors powered down into safe mode, as designed, and the Higashi-Dono plant was undergoing regular maintenance and was thus offline at the time of the tsunami. (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/27_25.html )
As for the whereabouts of the President of TEPCO, we have had a news article. It appears, according to the Mainichi Shimbun that Mr. Shimizu, who last appeared in public on 16thMarch, has been unwell since his meeting with Prime Minister Kan on the 15th. One can only presume that it is stress related. Let us presume that the government, JSDF, fire-fighters, and TEPCO and affiliated workers in the Dai-ichi plant are not feeling any stress at all, and feel able to continue with their duties. One can only wish President Shimizu a speedy recovery. I think when he has recouped his powers he will be personally handed an engraved silver bucket by Kan and told to bale-out the No. 2 reactor turbine pool.
(http://mainichi.jp/select/biz/news/20110328k0000m020145000c.html in Japanese)
Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano has also just been on the television in his regular press briefings, which I must say are quite informative, balanced, and reasonable. Knowing the ‘press club’ system in Japan, where membership of clubs and thereby access to such press conferences has been very tightly controlled to prevent overly robust interrogation of politicians, it is impossible to say if he is being given an easy time, but he appears to be handling the situation rather well. He has just said that despite the wishes of local people evacuated from 20km around the Dai-ichi plant, it would possibly be dangerous for them to return home to collect belongings and possibly care for livestock, but that he would re-assess the situation in a few days.
I could imagine that this approach could be seen as rather harsh, but each person returning would need to be transported and accompanied by JSDF personnel, and then they and all belongings checked for radiation contamination, and then possibly decontaminated. This would be a major operation involving a lot of personnel who might otherwise be engaged in recovery work.
Latest figures are dead 10,872, missing 16,244
(http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20110328/t10014940751000.html )
Police have also confirmed that the deaths in Miyagi Prefecture alone (the area around Sendai, between Fukushima and Iwate) has already exceeded that of the entire 1995 Hanshin earthquake that devastated Kobe and surrounding areas.
(http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/28_01.html )
These latest figures are horrendous, but I wonder if many people will pay much attention. Life here in Fujisawa made another step towards normality yesterday, as for the first time my local petrol station was open without lines down the street. Kamakura, the tourist haven just 10km down the beach road, was a little quieter than for a normal warm, spring Sunday, but far busier than last week, with its eerily empty roads and shops. The traffic cycling home was as bad as most weekends, with young guys in their garishly painted American cars playing bad music very loudly and trying to look cool in the traffic jam while driving behind a bus. And I suppose this is the way that many people deal with exceptional, crisis situations: they look at the back of the bus in front. The media response to the quake-tsunami-nuclear crises may be shaped by our media, but we also greatly influence that media. Like the seismic forces released, they spread far and wide, shake and create waves, attract attention, and slowly ebb. The aftershocks scare us locals, but no-one else. The survival, recovery, and rebuilding really affect only those coastal areas of Tohoku. The radiation directly affects the evacuated, immediate farmers and fishermen, as yet, and most of us can simpy carry on. The simple truth seems to be that we all localise, compartmentalise, and then neglect what is beyond our immediate vision. That is when media can play vital roles as educators.
I would recommend a couple of blogs for you, as I don't seem to be able to work out how to get this blog thing of mine to do it for me (I think it demands that you sign up to Faceache, but that is one step away from collective farms and fascist mind-control, so I won't: yeah lots of rational perspective here!):
David and Julian (with lots of book, moview reviews, and comments about art and life in Japan): http://onlyablockhead.typepad.com/blockhead/#tp
Alan (covering every moral and political event, with the odd rant, and lots of insight): http://hepzibahpyncheon.blogspot.com/
Spike Japan (recommended for the power article, but much else besides. I love the Ugly Japan section): http://spikejapan.wordpress.com/
Thanks, Garren, for the hat tip. Your recent post, like all the others, was entertaining and informative.
D
Posted by: Only a Blockhead | 03/28/2011 at 05:57 PM