Zucchini/Pumpkin Flower Pancakes

Taking a break from the usual and enjoying the last vestiges of summer in these latitude I thought I would share an old family recipe.

Old as in "Old Country" old.

Zucchini/Pumpkin Flower Pancakes

In general, zucchini flowers are more delicate.  We prefer the hardier pumpkin flowers but this recipe applies to both with the only adjustment being that you should use some more flowers if using zucchini flowers to make up the lack of bulk.


Rinse the flowers gently and lightly pat dry, then leave to dry a little more on a paper or cloth towel.   (Wash and Use the same day!)

In a bowl mix together:
1 egg
1 finely chopped onion
1/2-1 tsp baking powder (2 tsp if using my WF/GF flour or similar mixture. link later )
LOTS of chopped, fresh parsley
1/2-1 cp of Parmesan, Pecorino Romano, or Asiago cheese.  Depends on how much batter you are making. (I prefer Asiago or a Asiago-Pecorino Romano combination for the creaminess compared to just straight Parmesan or Pecorino)

Enough flour to make a batter the consistency of pancake batter.
Some milk. (cow or rice.  do not recommend soy for this recipe.)

Lastly, add cut up flowers and mix gently.  (Kitchen scissors recommended for cutting the flowers.)

Then just cook like a pancake!
Nicest if you can cook with actual Olive Oil or an olive oil cooking spray.

* this batter can be frozen.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!  

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

curiouser and curiouser

I find it funny that I post something to my NON-profit Japan blog here and some major FOR-profit news agency prints a similar article a little later.


Reuters talks about the rapid changeover of prime ministers

Reuters takes about the aging population, amoung other things.


Just saying is all ...

Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

The Disappearing Prime Minister and other magic tricks of censorship

This article on the sad state-of-affairs in education and thought in the mainstream American culture reminded me that I really need to write about Japan's (in)famous Disappearing Prime Minister, as America is on the fast-track to this same type of information censorship.

I had often made the joke that Japan has been going through a Prime Minister a year for the past 8 years. Although the truth of it is some don't even last one full year in office. (Not unlike the coming and going to the tides.)
Recently, however, I discovered that not only do they change, sometimes they completely DISAPPEAR !

Japan has a long history of censorship and denial. (Ask any Korean and Chinese national about the 50+ year-old Textbook Wars.)
Now, just recently, I found myself having to explain the difference in corruption between Japanese and American governments.  In America, the culture is one of avoidance of responsibility. In Japan, the culture is of acceptance of responsibility. Why, that makes the Japanese government sound downright chivalrous by comparison!

But there can be no sun without shade.

America is denydenydeny and never, EVER accept responsibility because you will be crucified - often way out of proportion and inappropriately - if you even give an inch.
Japan is suppress and censor, going even so far as to mob-bully into general agreement because someone WILL have to accept responsibility if the truth gets out. (There is a very thin line between group mentality and gang mentality as evidenced from my experience with animal rescue after 3/11. *LINK TO FUTURE ARTICLE*)

So we have established that both governments stink from their own particular stench.This, interestingly this also relates directly to the Disappearing Prime Minister Incident.

As was my want, when not living in Japan, I used to follow the current events every day very closely. In particular, TBS had a nice one-click online news service.

Original date of July 19, 2011 TBS carried a clip showing the then current Prime Minister making a statement about how they should have enough energy to get through the summer and the winter if they keep with their current energy saving methods.
And the winter.
The first time I ever heard anyone mention any possibility about winter energy "issues".

I knew there would be energy shortages back in April.
The Japanese government finally addressed the issue of "summer energy shortages" in June.
Now in July, there is , for all intents and purposes, a first mention of winter energy shortages??

Admittedly I had evac'd out of Japan already when I saw this, but there was only a 20 day interval of me having on-the-ground-access to information and being limited to online-only-access to information. Given the history of slow reaction and release of information by the Japanese government with this recent disaster, I wouldn't consider 20 days a major interval for sudden discovery of new information.

As it would turn out I fortunately posted a link to this video. I truly regret not downloading it because when I went to watch it again on the 20th, a mere day later... Not only was the video REMOVED, it was REPLACED by a whole OTHER clip!
Considerably shorter and completely lacking any video or statement by the Prime Minister.

Now, that is some well thought out censorship.
If you merely remove the "offending" material, that might cause interest or unwelcome questions.
If you REPLACE the video with an edited version.... Well, then you must have imagined seeing and hearing the PM because here is the video and there's nothing like that there.

(Incidentally, no other videos from that day had been removed. Only the one with the PM making a statement about summer and winter energy issues. I actually had to do a site-wide search to find the "replacement" video of the original offending video clip.)

Although, the TBS Disappearing PM Incident was certainly unexpected and quite a shock for me, this wasn't to be my only experience with the quick-hand of Japanese censorship.

Yomiuri Shinbun - previously my favorite online newspaper out of Japan - decided to remove an article from July 5th about a rather large southern earthquake.

The forthcoming Nankai M8+ quake is briefly discussed here. In even shorter terms, southern Japan is predicted to experience another quake like 3/11 in less than 30 years.

After the TBS Disappearing PM Incident, I went back and started looking through other articles I had shared. The Yomiuri article above?
GONE.
Not even in a site-wide search did something similar come up. However, one benefit of the current vanillazation of the news media is that your chances of finding a similar article elsewhere is pretty good.

And this time chance was on my side.
MSN carried an article about the exact same earthquake in southern Japan and how it was NOT related to the upcoming Nankai M8+ quake.

(click pic to enlarge)

You would think they would want people to know this, that it was NOT related.
However, any talk of the upcoming Nankai megaquake has gone by the wayside now as the Japanese government wants, needs the whole world believing that "Japan is safe and open for business." (PATA)

It goes without saying I don't bother to pay much attention to what goes on over there anymore. At least not through official media sources. As I mentioned to another friend recently on the topic of censorship in history - People live the history, media makes money off of it. You want to know what is really going on, listen to what the people are saying.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

The Fallacy of Fairness

Shirley Jackson's THE LOTTERY.
Brilliant, rather unsettling piece of work.  If you don't know it, go out and find it at your local library.
If you don't feel like dealing with the traffic (or the people), you can download it for free.

I used to joke that the Japanese make all their final breakthrough decisions with rock-paper-scissors.  If sumo is the national sport, rock-paper-scissors is the national decision maker/tie-breaker.  The children start learning it from preschool.  You'll see them playing it after school on the playground, while waiting in line at the grocery store, and as they get older, in student council meetings.  WE, as adults, have used in in the workplace.

At first glance, I always felt it was pretty reasonable to use it to make a choice when no one could decide or no one would step forward.  (And this is Japan so that happens A LOT.  Group harmony and everything.)
It's random, unbiased for the most part.

But "randomness"  does not equate to "fairness" as was painfully brought to light after 3/11.

Before the internal censorship on the news got out of hand in Japan, you could actually hear about the difficulties faced by the people who had lost their homes, their lives, their entire TOWNS, how they really felt and how it affected them.  Then about a month later, it was nothing but talk of "rebuilding" and other hopeful fluff stories.

But in that small interval, you could get some real news.  I recall one piece I saw about the building of the temporary housing.  If you didn't have family in another prefecture to go to, you were stuck in an evac shelter day and night because the world around you had, for all intents and purposes, collapsed and there was simply no place else to go.  And even if there was someplace to go to, no way to get there as most people had their cars washed away or so severely damaged as to be undrivable.  Then again there also was the condition of the roads.  Maps were reduced to meaningless lines on paper in just trying to navigate through the debris.  The whole landscape had been rewritten.

It goes without saying that it takes time to build a house, even a smallish temporary style housing.  And when you have to build houses for 10's of thousands of people....

Enter The Lottery.

Your number came up - you get a house!
Your number didn't - better luck next time.  Sorry, but back to the evac shelter.

Sure it's unbiased, but in making it unbiased have they not just once again reduced people to numbers with no consideration for individual needs.or circumstances?

I am sure the "fairness because it's random" of the lottery was lost on the 80-year old man whose number didn't come up.  As he faced the camera and hopelessly explained, his wife was bedridden before 3/11.  Her health had deteriorated considerably since she had spent all that time at the evac shelter.  He was in no physical condition himself to help her.  What were they supposed to do until the next drawing?

The young family behind him got their number called.


For years now, the overall makeup of the Japanese population has been becoming considerably greyer, becoming a "senior citizen society".  Not only is it an aging population, but that area in particular that was most affected by 3/11, the Tohoku region, has quite a larger than average concentration of retirees as the young usually leave for better chances elsewhere.  I do wonder how many other older citizens faced the same dilemma as that one man did.  .

Yes, the Lottery might be random, might be unbiased, but it would be a mistake to equate that with fairness.


Cheers.

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

My new job as a Highly Successful Fortune-Teller

I really try to not watch the Japanese news anymore.
It's not because of the smothering censorship though. Being able to speak and read Japanese fluently I could find the information on what is really happening if I looked around for it. The fact is I already saw it coming.

What I predicted back in April, low and behold, is happening now:
* mass numbers of people suffering from heat exhaustion/stroke because of the "energy saving" measures.
* planned/unplanned blackouts because there isn't enough energy to go around.

August 11 - In just ONE DAY, almost 1 thousand, or specifically more than 900 PEOPLE were sent to the hospital for heat exhaustion/stroke. (TBS)

August 12 - Another day, another city, a blackout of 2+ hours in the middle of 95+ degree summer day. (TBS)

If we were still in Japan, Ranmaru would be DEAD.

I stuck it out through a lot, A LOT of 5h1t, but when it became apparent that these kinds of situations were on the horizon (not to mention another M9 for our region), I packed him up and bid a sad and final farewell to a country I had loved for so long.

The fact is there's simply not enough energy to go around even with all the "energy saving" actions.  And even through the highly, extremely censored news, you can find the the government admitting that there will be over a 6% shortage through summer and the coming winter.
(Makes you wonder what the Flu epidemic will be like this time around.)

Now, admittedly, the August 12th blackout in the middle of 95 degree weather was unplanned.  TEPCO, however, is calling for even MORE CONSERVATION or there will be the infamous(ly fuddled) Planned Blackouts that we saw right after 3/11 to look forward to again by the end of August.  (Sankei,)

Oh, and I hope you have been following the recent August earthquakes.
Already, two rated at Magnitude 6+.
We saw those coming, too.
(Again, just August.  This is the July list of biggies ..)

So consider this my official application for a position in the fortune-telling business.
So far, we've been right on the dime.  :p

(Seriously, get out of that country if you can. )



 Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

End of an Era...of Information

So sad to see the extreme and increasing level of censorship transpiring in Japan since 3/11.

Although the censorship is not as bad as the Chinese government that goes so far as to eradicate the sharing of "subversive" information or calls to gather by private individuals, the quick action to censor on the part of the media we saw in the Disappearing Prime Minister Incident was truly a portent of things to come.

As we slip into August, Japan is faced with another SOUTHERN earthquake, an M6.1

What is interesting to note (and a sign of things to come) is that unlike other previous articles on the recent southern earthquakes, the media is no longer even addressing whether these southern minor quakes (M6+) are RELATED or NOT to the upcoming M8+ predicted for that exact region.


So just in case, there's another Disappearing Prime Minister , I cut and pasted the original article here.  Of course, if you don't say anything in the first place, then you don't have anything to hide.  Or in the case of the Japanese media, erase and replace.

１日午後１１時５８分頃、駿河湾を震源とする地震があり、静岡県静岡市、焼津市、東伊豆町で震度５弱を観測した。

気象庁によると、震源の深さは約２０キロ、マグニチュードは６・１と推定される。　この地震により、若干の海面変動があるかもしれないが、被害の心配はないという。震度４は同県浜松市、富士宮市、横浜市、甲府市、長野県松本市、東京都新島村など。

（2011年8月2日00時02分  読売新聞）

Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!


All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Post WW-2-Nuclear Japan

In sharing some of my recent experiences of the 3/11 events and in particular the ongoing aftermath, I heard an excellent summary, a prediction of sorts from my audience.

They are heading into post-WW2 conditions...especially when winter comes around... They had nothing... (paraphrased)

This sounds extreme to someone on the outside of the events, particularly given the highly censored news coming out of Japan.  News that has given birth to dangerously misleading statements such as those sold to the English-speaking world from the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) - "Japan is Safe and Open for Business". But given the record of earthquakes over a of Magnitude 5 just in July alone, not to mention the current and worsening energy crisis... "Safe and Open for Business" is not a statement I would put my money on..

No they aren't bombed out of house and home, their fields ravaged to the point that even the topsoil is burned away, yet at the same time, the current situation is vaguely reminiscent. Houses, entire cities, are wiped out, having been swallowed up and carried off in the tsunami. A nuclear reactor has gone beyond critical and officially into a state of meltdown. The resultant contamination of that meltdown alone is far reaching and incalculable.

The location of the Fukushima reactor is in Northern (East) Japan were there is a bulk of the farming and fishing.

However, not only were the areas within the evac zone affected, but I saw how the contamination from the radiation had gotten and still is getting into the water supply through rain and irrigation and is still contaminating both farm animals and the fields far outside the 30 kilometer contaminated evac zone.

A contaminated food supply, coupled with ongoing (and future) earthquakes would be bad enough but the final straw for me, the last thing that finally pushed me out of Japan was the looming energy crisis.  Of course, it was only looming back in April.  I saw it coming and searched for help to counteract the effects of what a lack of energy would bring about.  All to no avail as no one either officially or unofficially seemed to be acknowledging the likelihood of an energy shortage except... me?

Come end of June, however, and then the media and assorted officials finally start talking about it - 6.9% shortage anticipated during the summer. 

Some things you hate to be right about, but there it was.
Fortunately for me and Maru, we already had our respective tickets and belongings packed.  We gave our sad and final (and possibly permanent) farewells to Japan at the end of June.

And this actually brings us back to the beginning of our story, about the correlation between post-WW2 Japan and post-3/11 Japan.  Back stateside, my information was now limited to carefully contrived online news reports.  Of course, with further searching, even now I can find real unaltered information (much like I was able to during the China-Japan Border Battle of 2010).   So it was hardly a surprise then when in the Disappearing Prime Minister Incident, the prime minister himself mentioned winter energy shortages.  Naturally it was in a roundabout way.
Not that there were going to be shortages, but that "if we continue with our energy saving now, we will be able to get through the summer and the winter."

Admittedly,  there was a dead zone between the time when I had access to on-the-ground information before we escaped Japan and the time I heard this statement, but that interval of 17 days aside, this was the first time I had ever heard mention of winter in any context.

Energy shortages in the summer.  Energy shortages in the winter.  At this point in time, both are estimated to be at 6.9%.   (Although that number is brought to us through the strictly censored official media.)

All this brought to mind several stories by my all time favorite author, Dazai Osamu.  Although most of his writing takes place previous to WW2, he lived through WW2 and continued on writing for a few years afterward in post-WW2 Japan.  The images from "Osan" of broken families moving from one relative's or friend's house to another looking for shelter in post-WW2 Japan as their own houses were destroyed and rendered uninhabitable are not unlike the current scenes of the displaced Japanese captured on national TV.   People lost without proper clothing or food, much less homes or jobs going from one evac shelter to another to another and then finally maybe to private but temporary prefab house-like shelters.  Or "Tazunebito", the story of a moving letter written by one of the many homeless beggars of postwar Japan to a kindly young woman he met traveling on a train who gave him some food.  The subtle difficulties of charity, the complexity of something that superficially seems so simple as the giving and accepting of food for these displaced people.

No, it's not so bad over there and probably won't get as bad as post-WW2, but it is eerily similar.



 Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing.  (^^)

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Know Before U Go: the earthquakes are FAR from over

Before the M9 in Northern Japan on 3/11 the research institutes in Japan were already predicting within the next 30 years, there will be an M9 in SOUTHERN Japan.

That has not happened YET.

And while I was still trapped in Japan, I was living in Southern Japan.  Living in Southern Japan afforded me the privilege of not only seeing first hand how poor the Japanese government responded to a disaster of that magnitude, but also gave me access to information only accessible to the Japanese citizens.

Information such as the fact that during one of the episodes of "Eye on Kansai"series about the tsunami and earthquakes (an evening TV show about Southern Japan  、かんさい熱視線 ) they discussed how UNPREPARED that region still is for the upcoming mega-quake.  In that series they also mentioned how the research institutes were revising their estimates for that upcoming M8/9 earthquake.  Revising them to estimate an earlier date of occurrence.

In other words, Southern Japan is looking at its own M8/9 not within the next 30 years, but sooner.

This main site through Yahoo Japan will not only give you constantly updated information on tremors and major quakes, but information on past quakes.

The following are only the most recent earthquakes OVER level 5 under BOTH measuring systems after I left Japan on June 27th.
However, do not be fooled into thinking these are irregular occurrences.  Japan has been getting M5 and M6 on an almost regular basis between 3/11 and the end of June.  (You can check the history of the quakes through that Yahoo site)
You don't want to be visiting Japan now or anytime soon.
You want to be LEAVING.

7/31 M6.4

7/23, M6.5:

7/15, M5.5:

7/05, M5.4:

But if you still feel like playing Russian Roulette, we happened upon a nice collection of images and videos of the 3/11 M9 Earthquake-Tsunami disaster.  (And these are not even touching upon the nuclear reactor meltdown and fallout.) 
You don't need to understand the words, just look at the pictures.  :9




Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

sounding familiar?

I so love the Old Time Radio stories.
The GOLDEN ERA of Radio was truly a Golden Era not just of radio as a medium, but of creativity and thoughtful speculation.  A time when horror was creepy and haunting, not bloody and violent.  When science fiction was more than just special FX and CGI.

By chance recently I found myself listening to an old familiar one I had not heard in five or more years.  And frankly, having just left Asia after working there for around six years now, I found the story eerily appropriately.

If you don't feel this way now, you will in a few years given the continuing job climate and state of world economics.

Just keep repeating to yourself, "Like work here. No complain.
 Like work here. No complain!  
LIKE WORK HERE! NO COMPLAIN!"

And in the meantime, please enjoy a brief glimpse into your future from 1943 with the Light's Out classic, Profits Unlimited.

It IS later than you think.



Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!
All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Radioactive Reporting..... of a different sort

Well, I can post all about the news censorship and information suppression in Japan. Boy, could I post about the things I know and saw.

And STILL see and know even know that me and my fuzz are safely out of Japan. One just has to know where to look because you won't hear any of it on the official TV stations. The one time I did find something, not only did that video disappear when I went searching for it several days later, but they replaced it with a completely DIFFERENT video. But that's a complete other story. Although, for those of us familiar with Japanese "history" and the modern Textbook Wars, it's the ages old business-as-usual in Asia.

Anyhow, just as I predicted way back in April (according to my Twitter account, April 5th, but earlier in actuality), things have been thrown into high gear and started to get really stressed once the calendar flipped over to July.

Like a gear shift.
Or a bathroom light.

Or the ticking of a clock...

Something for consideration for those still hesitating on leaving Japan. Of course, it might be too late already for those trying to travel with their pets.  (add IPATA info links)

High levels of radiation detected in Northwest (USA )rainwater

"... radiation from the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
'The level that was detected on March 24 was 41 times the drinking water standard,' said Gerry Pollet....'...the rain water in the Northwest is reaching levels 130 times the drinking water standards,'..."

And those levels are NOW, xx months LATER, an OCEAN APART from the failed reactor.


Safe travels, and hope to see you again.



Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!
 
All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

a brief note to plagiarisers

Thank you.

No, really.

THANK YOU.

If you're making any hard $$ off of my works or ideas, I salute you because I sure as he11 am not.
Not that I started writing with the intent to make any money off of it.  That just happened to be a nice little bonus.
A nice little bonus that google was soon to extinguish with its ever changing, ever burgeoning Ad(NON)Sense rules and addendums.

HOWEVER, the sudden end to the ca$h flow didn't halt my publishing.
As time allows, I continue to write what I need to, what I care about.

So if you are making $$ off of my works by repackaging them and in effect selling them on your site, then you are conducting some serious traffic there.

And in the end, my ultimate intention has been carried out - to foster awareness, to get the information to more people that need it.

So, really, I do thank you.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

被害届け： a visit from Jack Sprat and his wife

Life is filled with first's.
First crush.
First kiss.
First baby...

This was a first I could do without.

I made my first call to the Japanese Police this past Monday! (The 13th, incidentally.)
There were obvious signs that someone had been in my apartment while I was away at work. In other words, my very first actual case of breaking and entering. Not a very competent job fortunately as nothing was missing, only messed and.. increased? (They didn't take things, but they left things. ) However, I called the police anyway since if they entered once, they could do it again. And it was too freaky to think what they might be handling while I am not there. And what might happen to Ranmaru?!?

They took their time getting here, or at least it felt like it, but when they got here...
It was like a bizzare bridal procession for Jack Sprat and his wife. Officer "J", we will call him, was not tall like in the story but just as skinny and uninspiring. I am quite sure he was wiry-strong, but I am just as sure the gear he was wearing weighed more than him.
And his pledged partner Officer "W" was a retired sumo wrestler?
There are no really overweight people in Japan beyond the sumo wrestlers and comedians.
However, he seemed to have found the situation inappropriately amusing so maybe he fancied himself a comedian on the side. (All I could think as we approached my door was how is he going to get through the foyer to the back of the apartment??)

I filed an official police report.
They advised that since nothing was missing this time, that would be best course of action. If it happened again (and it does.), then they would call the detective in and it would be officially investigated whether or not anything was taken . They asked me about calling a detective this time too, but that was kind of unsettling so I went with their suggestion of just filing a report for now.

Oh, and like I mentioned above, the a$$h01e$ invaded again.

This time we were waiting for them though.
They triggered my door "alarm" and Ranmaru's very own ferret "alarm" - jerk stepped in a ferret landmine waiting by the front door.

That was the situation when I returned from work on Friday.
Once is more than enough.
But MORE THAN TWO TIMES!?! And in the same week?!
Camera came out for evidence pictures and I went to talk to the landlord who was actually in for once.
They immediately called in a locksmith...
Who then, as an apology of sorts for not being able to come immediately on Friday, arrived Saturday 30 minutes EARLIER than planned and before I had even gotten dried off from my shower.
... ...
At least it got done.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Assignment, Set and VOLLEY!

I have decided that instead of being merely pumped for information by the a$$h01e$ at work, I am going to jump in the court and play with them.

I could go into the details (and will later), but suffice it to say that at this current place, beyond a few early... mistakes? shall we call them? no one has actually ever spoken TO me. Mostly, they have talked AT me, always with the intention of pumping me for information about what I am doing. (Seriously, VILLAGE of the DAMNED here.) This makes me sad really given I always struggled to speak to these people in their native language, speaking to them as people, not as some f)(&'%&$#"g assignment for work.

Yeah, I am pretty bitter about this. I'd like to throw a bunch of these uppity, self-centered a$$h01e$ into a totally foreign totally UNFRIENDLY environment where why could barely communicate and say, hey, knock yourself out, Honey.

Anywhoo, I just had the idea that if all they care about is pumping me for information, then that's just what they'll get. I am going to start responding to all poorly-veiled information-searches with some odd and confusing "answers"
After all, why should they have all the fun?

ASSIGNMENT!!

For practice....how would you answer this question?
Remember has to be believable yet leave one feeling a little, huh??

"What did you do this weekend?"

The more basic the question, the harder it is to come up with something off.

Consider that a nice version of what I usually get pried with:
Do you meet with anyone?
Do you meet with other foreigners?
Where do you go after work?
Where do you go on the weekend?
What time do you get home?
... o.0

Look forward to hearing from friends and visitors.
Will post the most promising responses!


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Eternal 1984

I live in the Village of the DAMNED.

Or maybe time has never passed beyond the eighties?
Like 1984?
An eternal Orwellian 1984.

No, really, very creepy here.
As in Big BROTHER is Watching creepy.

As a non-Asian in Asia you live in the perpetual fish bowl. You get everything ranging from the outright GAWKING to most common yet only mildly offensive "Oh, look at the white person." "Oh, a foreigner." to the native language equivalent of "GO THE FUCK HOME!"
After more than five years, yeah, I am tired of it, but I am also thoroughly used to it, completely non-responsive in any case. (Actually, I have been practicing Korean lately so I can mess with them back. It's the little amusements that get you by here.)

But here.... This place is truly creepy with its monitoring and watching and veiled digs for information.
It's subtle too, until the pattern gets repeated so many times so can't NOT notice it.

I got a very large package one day. At my APARTMENT.
The following day at work, I was on duty with someone I normally NEVER see. They were very chatty with me which NO ONE EVER is. In the conversation it came up out of no where, "Do you ever buy things online?"
This suddenly coming from a person at work who can barely turn on a computer.

?

Obsessed with TV much?
Really, how many times can anyone ask me " Do you watch the TV?" before it gets odd? And how weird is it that when the final time it's asked I mention that I remember that I did watch this one program only to then have the TV Collection service suddenly show up out of nowhere the next day after I answer yes??

??

The weirdly distorted ones are almost the creepiest for me though. The one that stands out (and yes there has been MORE than one instance.) is the night I heard a kitten crying outside. I am on the third floor. It was a dark NIGHT. And yet the crying was so loudly insistent that even though I am deathly allergic to felines, I couldn't ignore it. It was obviously a kitten and s/he sounded stuck or lost or hurt or hungry. Whatever was the problem I went to look for the wayward critter.

Now, behind the apartment building is a school surrounded by one of Japan's famous cement block prison-like school fences. So I am looking all over the back, where the school fence and the apartment parking lot meet. That's where the sound is coming from. Over, around, along the Twiggy-thin intervals between houses. Peered into the school ground by the apartment once or twice - cats do sleep there I had noticed before from my balcony. ZIP. NADA.

Give up and go to bed.

So, another morning, another day in hell house (work).
I arrived at my post when curiously out of no where, the person I am on duty with mentions, oh so casually, "You live next to a school, don't you? Isn't that inconvient?! Don't you worry about them peering over the fence into your room??"
Without missing a beat, I blandly responded, "I live on the third floor."

Oh, and did I mention it was DARK out that night?

I don't need to spell out how fu)(&&d-up creepy this is, do I?
who the f%#$ reported what to whom who then passed the message to work and then that message was passed to the VP (most likely) who then assigned the person on duty with me to deliver not just a "warning", but a weirdly distorted allegory of a warning ?!

・・・
・・・

Cheers!
and SMILE!!
remember, we're watching u 2 (^_-)-☆


Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

B1tch H1tler, again

Another conversation
Unwanted but overheard by the misfortune of being in the same room.
And did I mention she basically runs the Buddhist preschool/kindergarten (or in this case, military academy for short people)?

This was message delivered on behalf of nonpresent employee "A" by another of the staff, employee "B". Employee A had previously had a miscarriage. Traditionally there are specific times at which you go to pray for/to the soul of the miscarried child. Employee A apparently wished to take a day to go to that place and give offering, have rites said, etc.... Employee A was wondering why she was not being given permission to properly pray for her dead child.

B1tch H1tler didn't waste a second before delivering her proclamation to Employee B much the way she would sign a paper or write a check, "Time doesn't matter. It's the thought. She can go and pray and come back."

・・・

Not someone I would want influencing my offspring, but it is appropriately a Buddhist school and for the parents of those school children, 知らぬが仏 - The Buddha is unknowning, or in other words "Ignorance is Bliss".


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

coming to a theater near YOU!

Well, not coming to a theater, but definitely coming to an ESL Blacklist in the near future.

And it's just the tip of the ice berg of what this place is like.

I was privy to a conversation tonight through the auspices of having my desk literally IN the VP's office.
Another teacher walked in to give notice of vacation plans during summer vacation. The conversation quickly degenerated and came to a screeching halt with
休みがあるというのは休みが取れるわけない。
Literally, Just because I said there was a vacation doesn't mean you can take vacation.
REALLY.
The foul she-beast then went on to EXPLAIN to the teacher how she had "interpreted" the original comments about the "vacation" time to "suit herself".
REALLY.

My desk faces the wall. I sat there until quitting time, making my little notes for tomorrow, quietly shuffling papers, but mostly ears up and listening. You could hear the confusion in this teacher's voice.
How could anyone not be confused?? I can't take vacation during vacation??
From my little corner, I imagined that the utter confusion was the only thing keeping her from bursting out into tears because that is surely what it sounded like.

Note here, there is nothing ambiguous about the Japanese word she used for vacation. The VP is just being an outright facist sadist twisting any normally accepted concept of vacation that everyone else in the country has to suit her own ends. As a result, this teacher will likely lose the money she spent on a very expensive airplane ticket in addition to having a working summer vacation and spring vacation AGAIN.

A working vacation? Isn't that just WORK?

I think someone at school needs to work on their own language skills.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

false(?) rumors flying

I encourage all to send a request to this Minister to ask if he is seriously saying "It is the fault of the private (animal welfare) groups that pets can not be brought out of the no-go zone."
Because that is the rumor being spread far and wide by this local vet.

Is this true? Can someone in the government really be trying to place the blame on Humane welfare groups?

Maybe and Maybe not.
After all, it was posted by the vet, not directly by the member of the Diet.
Not directly or officially by the speaker.
It could be yet another case of this is what the poster (vet) wants to hear.
OR it could be he really did hear those words.

But it is all the same in the end.

If this is true, it is reprehensible.
Do NOT let the Japanese government get away with "starving the animals out" as a solution. Let them know that the world is still watching.

If this is false, it is just as dangerous.
Citizens that were actively working to save the animals from starving to death will now take a step back and cease their efforts falsely believing that they have done something wrong.

email addy: info@takamura-five.com

subject header: 本当ですか？獣医師の語る議員の本当のお言葉？？

copy and paste message:
～～～～～start～～～～～～

これが議員の本当のお言葉でしょうか？

"一時帰宅の際のペットの連れ出しは、ないですが、これは時間の関係もあります。
。。。
民間団体が入れないのは、残念ながら一部の団体が現地に強硬に入る様子などがネットで流されたことが原因でもあります。。。警戒区域を突破したのも確認されたのかな？そんな噂も関係して念には念をの感じです。

善意の団体でも一部の暴走があったことが行政の目にうつり、残念な結果です。。。"

http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/shinjo_ah/62765441.html#62765441

～～～～～end～～～～～～

Even though the quote above is taken directly from the original blog, by now, the original blog may have been removed.

And if you don't trust the translations of a professional, please feel free to plug the above quote into google translate.
Although it does make one wonder why professional translation companies would choose to pay for my translations rather than use a free service like google if machine translation is so much more reliable.

(Yes, I am being facetious. It's a long standing issue that we as professionals are tired of dealing with. I can't tell you how many times I have had to rewrite from scratch a more "accurate" machine translation or a translation by a non-native speaker for that matter.)

All we are doing is asking for an answer to a question - Did you really say this?
What real harm is there in that?

Beyond letting them know that WE KNOW.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Barks, Hisses, and Tweets

Finally got to the point where there is some real collective action being taken as there is now more information being collected and dessimated from stable sources.

Where are they? Online, naturally.
And just as naturally, in Japanese.
To that end we dookfully request that if you want to help and have a twitter account to please please please retweet this information.
Often.
As often as you can.

Please tweet/post these no matter where you live. The hashtags (words preceded by the #) make the post/tweet searchable by ANY search engine. The Japanese language of the tweet just makes the info more readable by the native Japanese speakers who are the ones that need this information. Even if you can't read it, someone reading your tweets may be able to read it and pass the info to someone who needs it.

The most important thing is to keep tweeting the info ESPECIALLY in Japanese. The more you tweet it, the more the info stays in circulation and the more chances there are that it reaches the people/animals in need.

The two separate tweets are as follows:

【拡散希望】 行方不明のペットを探しですか。ＵＲＬで登録下さい。http://bit.ly/dEiFnJ http://bit.ly/goePGN http://tiny.cc/f0saz http://bit.ly/fR1cJF #311pet #jishin

【拡散希望】 迷子を見かけた知っている人ですか。ＵＲＬで登録ください。http://bit.ly/dEiFnJ http://bit.ly/goePGN http://tiny.cc/f0saz http://bit.ly/fR1cJF #311pet #jishin


Many wet-nosed Thank You's!! (^_-)-♪


Cheers! (^_-)-☆
Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Sometimes Big Brother IS on our side?

Thank you CNN.

As much as I have little regard for the current degenerated state of American journalism, that is not to deny that they still have their moments.

In a sea of frivolous to downright useless information out there, my posts and similar posts by other organizations are surely being ignored, but the good news is the media isn't ignoring us. Or at least CNN isn't.

What have we been engaged in since the 3/11 triple-header?
Things like this...



Dazed Animals Still Found In Empty Japanese Cities

Japan's 4-legged Survivors, by CNN.


I've said it before, and I will happily say it again:

Only way to get ACTion is to let them know the world is WATCHing.

Please consider helping by donating through one of the sites listed here or directly through the group I do volunteer translation for, Kinship Circle. (KINSHIP CIRCLE is a 501c3 public charity. All contributions are tax-deductible.)


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Donations for Japan's Voiceless

Got a very nice list of donation sites worked up so reposting!
(You repost and pass the word too. ;) )


THE ANIMAL RESCUE SITE has direct and credible online donation abilities.

The Humane Society International (HSI) is now prepared to accept donations for the welfare of animals affected by the recent disaster in Japan. Secure donations can be placed to their International Disaster Fund. (Paypal, in addition to credit cards, are accepted.)

The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) finally has a fund specifically dedicated to fund rescue efforts in Japan. Accepting secure online donations through credit cards only.

CARE2.com has a a collection of links for donating offsite.

PETA is also finally on the ground in Japan and offering help. Onsite donation abilities.

A group of 3 local JAPAN animal welfare societies have created this site for donations. Credibility not assured.

FBCusa, the largest importer of American home products, food stuffs and various necessities for the foreigner in Japan has also opened up donations for pets. FBC is offering a way for you to purchase items that will go directly to shelters and those they identify with needs.

Global Animal Foundation functions like a Red Cross for animals, distributing donations to established and vetted animal rescue organizations worldwide. Donations received during the ongoing crisis in Japan will be donated to Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue & Support (JEARS), a coalition of three animal rescue groups that are on the ground providing rescue and supplies to animal victims of the earthquake and tsunami. (Paypal, in addition to credit cards, are accepted.)

Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support (JEARS) is a collaboration of three established and registered no kill animal rescue NPOs in Japan. The intention behind the creation of JEARS is to coordinate rescue and support efforts for animals in crisis due to the March 11 Earthquake and Tsunami in Northern Japan.

MANY ways to donate including tax deductible donations for US citizens.


Finally, there is WorldVets.org (the non-human version of Doctors without Borders). They don't specifically have a donations for the Japan Earthquake fund, but they are on the ground working in affected areas.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Hits, Misses, and in betweens

Back to something less heavy yet infinitely more caloric.

Tirol is a traditional, much beloved chocolate in Japan. Often found in the convinence stores, it's not known so much for quality, but for it's compact size, quaint designs, and variety of unimaginable flavors. (Yes, it even puts Kit Kat to shame in this respect.)

Allow me to introduce a few of the recent flavors.
We'll start with the 'hits'.


Milk one was a super-creamy milk chocolate and the one in black was an espresso flavored Tirol. Both definite redoables.

You don't need to read to know what this one is.


I must say the Japanese have done quite an excellent job of squeezing in all the deliciousness of a tiramisu into such a tiny chocolate. Of course, they do have a lot of practice in this area.

NOW, on to uncharted frontiers of in-betweens and outright misses...


Yes, that is a pancake not an illusion and they are serious about it, complete with butter and maple syrup.
And yet, it wasn't a miss, but one of the fence-sitters. Packed inside that teeny chocolate was a dime-sized dot of maple syrup(ish liquid) on top of a heavily butter-flavored cookie. (I had been seriously questioning the proposed butteriness of the "pancakes" until I bit into the Tirol.)

The one to the right is Kinako Mochi, which is good if you like kinako and mochi. The sweet, chewy rice cake (mochi) is inside a kinako flavored coating. It only made it to the in-betweens though because although I like both main ingredients, it had as much as chocolate in it as white chocolate does. (The kinako was mixed in white chocolate then used to encase the mochi filling.)

Now on to the final two. Can you guess which will be the miss and which will be a fence-sitter??




The one up top is a Matcha Soy Latte.
On the bottom....



Yes, that does say Gouda cheese.
If the smell doesn't knock you out upon unwrapping it, you could probably convince yourself to eat it, but a cup of coffee later and I still can't get rid of the taste.
It was not chocolate.
In no way, shape, or form was that chocolate.
That is what is known as congealed cheese `food` with a cracker on the inside.

Not much to say about that.
I was once again blinded, deafened and lead astray with the sweet, deceptive promises of chocolate.

Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

radioactive Reporting (2)

Just so no one feels bad, here's a curious(?) followup to this previous article.

This article about the evac zoning was published in the Japanese equivalent to the Wall Street Journal. I posted it back on March 30 on my other major site, (Don't worry no one reads that either.) but as it has been brought up again, I will repost it here.

I know most can't read this, but it said at the time that the British are recommending an EVAC zone around the reactors of 50 K and the Americans up to 80 K. The Japanese government were still holding to their measly 30 K radius.

Interestingly enough there is actually an English "version" of the article; however, only paying members can read the likely propag#==% can read IT.

I would like to have read the English version for comparison particularly now that the evac zone has come back under discussion in the news. Last night's news was broken into with a live announcement from the Japanese government officials we've all grown to love and anticipate. The "emergency" in this case was that IAEA had sent their own people in to test for radiation levels around the site and found the Japanese evac recommendations WAY below what they should be. (NHK TV news. Reuters Online News. Also reference 03/20 article above.)

Naturally, the Japanese officials have since been repeating constantly that the IAEA measurements are done differently from the way the Japanese do their measurements for radiation levels. As a result, the recommended evac zones were different. And, as an additional result of their differences in measurement, the Japanese way of doing it is a more accurate to measure of the effects of radiation.
It naturally came with pretty graphics and charts and a pointy stick.

I can more or less go along with that. Think of it like measuring in meters compared to measuring in feet. Neither is necessarily more right than the other, just one is much more wide spread and far easier to manipulate.

What I would really like to know is what kind of proof the Japanese can stand on allowing them to say their way of measurement is a far more accurate measure of the effect of radiation on the human body leading to their recommended evac zones being perfectly within the safety zone. (NHK TV news. Also, Yomiuri Shimbun. )

If someone has a link to an actual scientific paper or non-government agency research, please do share it.

It's not impossible that this could be true. But given that it is government officials trying to sell another of their ideas ....

Like we've never seen that before.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

radioactive Reporting

I am rather tired of hearing about the latest American sensationalist news.

Radiation over 100,000 times the normal limit?!?!

When did minuscule become synomynous with 100,000?
Or NINE even?

Being very very distant from the site, I find the rampant fear-mongering and exaggeration to be far more frightening than the actual radiation itself. Did CNN or FOX bother to mention how much radiation you get just passing through La Guardia security these days? Or how much you are exposed to every time you get a CAT scan?

Incidentally, compliments of Reuters, FACTBOX: Japan's nuclear crisis and radioactive half-lives.

That aside, there are other things to consider.

As much as people urge me to leave, in the first place, we are NO where near the site. In the second place, it's "radioactive material".
"radioactive iodine has been detected in a milk sample from the U.S. state of Washington"(Reuters)
"extremely small amount of radioactive iodine was found in the air samples taken from 12 regions across the nation, including Seoul and Daegu."(KBS, Korean Broadcasting)

There is no escaping radiation.

And what is this about Japanese news isn't reporting the truth?
Remember those Cold War safety films compliments of the U.S. Government?
It's radiation.
DUCK and COVER was never going to help anyone and they sure as hell knew that much about nuclear reactions, but that didn't stop the U.S. Government from selling that lie to the masses.

Or if you would prefer something more recent...
Remember the intense reporting of fearful massive stockpiles of WMD in Iraq??

Maybe too political for some.
How about non-political and even MORE recent?

Remember the whole TOYOTA cars are dangerous and wildly accelerate out of control insanity? I believe there were two weeks when it was almost nothing but that news.
And yet, how much coverage was given on the final testing results conducted in joint by NASA and NHTSA confirming there was NO electronic errors or malfunctions?

Having lived - not merely visited - but LIVED in three different countries in three differing cultures, there is one thing I can say with absolute certainty:

There is no chosen people.
There is no chosen religion.
There is no chosen country.

Humans are the same everywhere.

For every non-truth in the Japanese news or propagated by the Japanese government itself, I can find you just as many perpetrated from the American side.

Be selective. Be doubtful. And most importantly, please be educated in your choices.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Social Surivial

Tonight's CLOSE UP JAPAN was about the use and effect of twitter (and facebook) after the earthquake-tsunami disaster.

reporting back later....

Cheers! (^_-)-☆


Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Flowering Friday

Forget TGIF, it's HANAKIN!

花金

Or "Flower Friday" if you prefer, the most blessed day of the week in any culture. Hanakin is also the day, for me in particular, to partake in 鯨飲馬食。

Working at a Japanese preschool and kindergarten, you barely have time to have a decent meal yourself at any point during the day much less at lunch time. Morning is time to quickly wolf something down (usually while in the shower because that's the only room above 70 F at any time), matched by an equally hastily made dinner, only this time it's out of exhaustion. Forget lunch. Sure you'll eat it but you won't remember eating it as you spend most of the time monitoring for spills, doing refills, and shoveling food into the mouths of slow or outright resistant eaters.

So Hanakin has come to be synomonous with another Japanese classic, 鯨飲馬食 (GeiInBaShoku) - drink like a whale, eat like a horse.

I apparently lean more to the horsey-side of the phenomena though judging from the mountainous pile of "white balloon" brand cookie wrappers siting on top two chocolate bar wrappers. (All the cookies amounted to the same amount of calcium as a glass of milk so it wasn't a total "loss".)

So Noms and Cheers to you and yours on your upcoming Friday.



(^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Happiness is....

getting a paycheck ON TIME
and in the PROPER AMOUNT.

(The way this place is I was naturally suspecting some funny business in this department too.)

Of course, nothing but NOTHING beats a warm fuzzy tunneling through the covers to sleep on your feet at night, but a paycheck is not so bad either. Particularly when you had been balancing how to spend the last 500 yen (about 5 USD) for the past 2 weeks.

In this case, I immediately went out and bought myself a rainbow of happiness.


And there were even more soy milk flavors not shown that I haven't tried yet!!
New ones included oshiruko (sweet red bean soup) and sweet potato flavor in addition to my old favs Vanilla, Chocolate, and the #1, Black Sesame Seed.

If one rainbow is good, surely two must be better.


Yes, a rainbow of sake you could never find anywhere else but in a Japanese supermarket. My old faithful companion, straight up sake by Gekkeikan is on the far right in a double size bottle this time thanks to the spiffy paycheck, but then I added some new friends to the gathering. I had been feeling it was long due time to venture into new frontiers..

On the far left is traditional sweet Umeshu made from local ume fruits (this area is either the top ume producing area in all of Japan or the second one down.), next a blend of sake known as Nigori-zake as it is nigotteiru or "muddied" by the rice, followed by a bottle of gently sweet sake as stated by the cute bunny on front. (Yeah, it was the bunny that ultimately sold me. Also, it added confidence knowning that it too is made by Gekkeikan.)

I shall report my taste findings in the future, if only for my own record.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

Information Gap

I was called in for a little chat with the VP this morning AGAIN. (That woman seriously scares me.) Fortunately, it was a harmless session, but after reading this below, I have a feeling it was more for her to check on my emotional stability with the ongoing news of earthquakes, reactor failings, tsunamis, REACTOR FAILINGS.

The U.S. embassy in Tokyo has urged citizens living within 80 km (50 miles) of the Daiichi plant to evacuate or remain indoors "as a precaution," while Britain's foreign office urged citizens "to consider leaving the area." Other nations have urged nationals in Japan to leave the country or head south.

Towards the end of the meeting she mentioned that the French government was officially telling its citizens throughout ALL of Japan to flee the country because it was going to sink or some such nonsense. (I thought California was supposed to be the one sinking into the Pacific?)

Anyway, a well written article, not the enflammed sensationalist crap that is usually present by today's so-called reporters. Breaks rhythm by inexplicably jumping into finance towards the end, but then refinds its original path and sails on to a smooth finish. Worth the read.

Again.
It's Friday.
It's a day for drinking, not sinking.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.

DONATIONS for Japan ANIMALS

Finally some donation sites poping up.

THE ANIMAL RESCUE SITE has direct and credible online donation abilities.

The Humane Society International (HSI) is now prepared to accept donations for the welfare of animals affected by the recent disaster in Japan. Secure donations can be placed to their International Disaster Fund. (Paypal, in addition to credit cards, are accepted.)

The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) finally has a fund specifically dedicated to fund rescue efforts in Japan. Accepting secure online donations through credit cards only.

CARE2.com has a a collection of links for donating offsite.

PETA is also finally on the ground in Japan and offering help. Onsite donation abilities.

A group of 3 local JAPAN animal welfare societies have created this site for donations. Credibility not assured.

FBCusa, the largest importer of American home products, food stuffs and various necessities for the foreigner in Japan has also opened up donations for pets. FBC is offering a way for you to purchase items that will go directly to shelters and those they identify with needs.

Global Animal Foundation functions like a Red Cross for animals, distributing donations to established and vetted animal rescue organizations worldwide. Donations received during the ongoing crisis in Japan will be donated to Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue & Support (JEARS), a coalition of three animal rescue groups that are on the ground providing rescue and supplies to animal victims of the earthquake and tsunami. (Paypal, in addition to credit cards, are accepted.)

Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support (JEARS) is a collaboration of three established and registered no kill animal rescue NPOs in Japan. The intention behind the creation of JEARS is to coordinate rescue and support efforts for animals in crisis due to the March 11 Earthquake and Tsunami in Northern Japan.

MANY ways to donate including tax deductible donations for US citizens.


Finally, there is WorldVets.org (the non-human version of Doctors without Borders). They don't specifically have a donations for the Japan Earthquake fund, but they are on the ground working in affected areas.


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

All translations copyrighted and owned by myself. All copyrights of their respective owners. No part of this web site may be produced, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the copyright owner.