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.

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.

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.

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.

more windows crap

Windows is a piece of sh1t.
Yes, it is.
As someone who has worked with computers both professionally and personally since the late 1980s, I can say with confidence - Windoze u r a piece of overpriced sh1t.

My latest beef with windoze is the fact that it on occasion, randomly and without warning, forgets the keyboard. As in can not recognize the keyboard that it even came with.

Fert, I miss my linux machine.

Some fixes I found later to be edited copied here to make sure I have them for my own reference.

* Method One, Summary:
Not only must you add the Japanese layout to IME, but you must also install a Japanese keyboard driver. Here's the set of instructions, updated to Windows XP SP2. Of course, use at your own risk.

1. Navigate to Start->Control Panel->Keyboard
2. On the Hardware tab, click Properties (note that the current driver is probably "Standard 101/102-Key or Microsoft Natural PS/2 Keyboard")
3. On the Driver tab, click Update Driver...
4. The Hardware Update Wizard launches. When it asks if Windows can connect to Windows Update to search for software, select "No, not this time" and click Next
5. Select "Install from a list or specific location (Advanced)" and click Next
6. Select "Don't search. I will choose the driver to install" and click Next
7. Uncheck "Show compatible hardware"
8. Select "Japanese PS/2 Keyboard (106/109 Key)" from the manufacturer "(Standard keyboards)" and click Next
9. Click Yes to continue with the installation when the warning about installing incompatible device drivers appears
10. Click Yes to continue with the installation when the warning about replacing PS/2 mouse port drivers appears
11. Click Finish and reboot

I really recommend reading the FULL ARTICLE.

However, what worked for me this time is contained in the following site. This site offers several suggestions for fixing the windoze botch, but what worked for me was the dreaded registry edit. o.o

* Method Two, option#5, registry edit:
ドライバでキチンと日本語キーボードになっているのに英語配列になっちゃう場合は、
この方法をとる。こちらも自己責任で。
regeditを起動して、以下のキーに移動する。

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\KeyboardLayouts\00000411
（この操作もXP/Vista/7、32Bit/64Bit共通です）

まずはバックアップ
▲まずは該当キーの上で右クリックしてエキスポートしておく。
PCが更に不調になった場合は、このエキスポートファイルを「結合」する事で元の状態に戻せるようになります。

次にデータの変更。
「Layout File」をダブルクリックして「KBDJPN.DLL」　と入力
「Layout text」をダブルクリックして「Japanese」または「日本語」　と入力

変更が終わったらregeditを閉じてPC再起動

注意：
似たキーがありますがコッチじゃありません。
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout
▲末尾にsが無い

Again, I really can' stress how much I recommend reading the
FULL ARTICLE. And if you can't (since it is in Japanese), let me know which method you are interested in. There is over five methods offered. I will post the translation in the comments.


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.

FINAL comments, nightmare POSEF

Remedies have been 'suggested' for the POSEF problem.
My response?.

In short--been there, DONE that, sadly DOES NOT WORK.

Suggestions and my answers(?).

*Use physical punishment like the Korean teachers:
Yep. And pretty much from day 1, those students were so awful.
There was my special stay-after room cleaning for the really bad table or group. Plus group or individual humiliation punishment of kneeling out in the halls or in front of the rest of the class.

* Be loud and be heard.
HENCE I used a mike.
Not only did I use a mike, but any instructions were also typed out and projected on the screen. With most the class talking non-stop over the mike even, you had to have 'visual' explanations of the instructions.
note: My instructions were never more than 5 minutes, if that even. So there was no excuse for "English is too hard/too long..." whatever.
I taught at ELEMENTARY level previous to the high school and they had no problem understanding my very basic instructions.

I had other things I tried out that I will not bother going into here because really, at the heart of the matter, lies a more insidious two fold problem. At the macroscopic level, fundamentally Korean society still views women as lesser. So you can swear and whack and punish all you want, but if you're not doing it in a pair of pants, you'll find yourself just doing it all over again the next week. At the more microscopic level, if your fellow teachers don't have the decency to show professional respect for you (and they don't), the kids won't either. They aren't stupid. Ignorant, yes, but not stupid. They can see how the Korean teachers, teachers THEY respect, treat the foreign teachers. If their native teachers show they don't care, the students follow suit and also do not care.

And that's it.
If you have any suggestions then leave a comment for the other victims of that place. It's highly likely I have already tried and done them, in which case I will note that and how it doesn't work when they are published.

But if you are smart, you won't even bother.
Take my advice--bypass Korea and head straight for a different country like I am.


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

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

POSEF rule #32 - we don't care.

POSEF rule #32:

Stealing and defacing the foreign teacher's property is OK.

We don't care and will do nothing about it.
So if you are feeling frustrated and destructive, knock yourself out!
Just get those scores up and we will turn a blind eye to it!


Really, they don't care.
What else should one think when one returns from the weekend to find their two sweater jackets missing? (weekend of 5/15-5/16)
I reported it immediately to receive yet again another bland, "Oh, that's too bad. I don't know what could have happened."

～＊～FIN～＊～

And that's not the first thing to go missing or be defaced to the point of complete uselessness.

Numerous personal magazines (usually missing, several obscenely defaced), comics (horribly defaced like the boys spit in them or blew their nose in them), and other "extra" materials to make the classroom environment more well-rounded and inviting. Because as anyone with even a few months experience much less a few years will tell you, the English conversation class is even more worthless than the music class.
As such, the clever teacher must find other ways to get them to do things.

If they still care by that point that is. -_-

The ironic(?) thing is they gave me NOTHING but a filthy, empty classroom to start with.
Not even a textbook.
And I revamped it from floor to ceiling with posters, a book corner, a separate work/lab table, a special free-chat corner to the point that one upperclassmen English teachers came in to take pictures of it because "the daughter of this teacher is just starting an English club and he wants to show her what a good classroom looks like. You are the best English conversation teacher we have ever had."

*click*snapsnap*

At least they could reimburse me for my loss incurred by one of their precious students. After all, until the items were recovered, the ENTIRETY of sophomore-world came to a screeching halt when a bunch of the students' items were stolen from their classroom. The only people with keys to the room are other teachers and the porno-movie club. Not even the janitor goes in to clean that place, so it was one of your little darlings..

You know what I have to say to that all-mighty POSEF?

You make it very obvious that you don't give a sh1t about what happens to the foreign teachers, so why do you expect them to care about anything in return??


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

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

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

plush, cottony POSEF tissue

Well, I was going to post something different about why you want to avoid taking any ESL teaching post with POSEF in South Korea, but something better came up.
(And, yes, I am being sarcastic.)

My contract ends on May 31.
However because I am traveling with a pet I can not leave until June 7.

They are aware of this.

Last week Ellen (Unyeong Lee, 2-fa[ed b1t[h-a13rt) assured me that "POSEF doesn't pay for it, but you can stay longer in that apartment until you are able to leave."

TODAY it's "You have to be out when the contract ends."

Excuse me?!

And I am supposed to do what for an entire week?
Sleep outside??

With all my luggage and a pet?

That would be GREAT advertisement for how POSEF treats its employees.

Actually, sadly, that would be a very accurate advertisement -

WELCOME TO POSEF WHERE WE USE AND LOSE YOU AFTER HINTING THAT WE WANT YOU TO STAY ON.

Our lessons, my friends?

We, the ESL teachers on the front lines, are the only ones protecting ourselves.
And we can only protect ourselves by sharing information.

Because to organizations like POSEF and Hagwons like Avalon, we are just toilet tissue to be used for wiping their a$e$ and then be flushed down the drain. After all there are a dozen rolls more out there waiting to be used so just wipe, flush, and move on.

Look forward to more fun POSEF information in the future!


Cheers! (^_-)-☆

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

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

oh, yes. another nasty school crawls out from under the rocks

So Korea it is!

But before that, here's another company to avoid in Japan while your out hunting - tis the season and all.

RCS Corporation Recruiting

Not only are the benefits ATROCIOUS - frankly I told my friends in Japan the only benefit was it being IN Japan - but apparently they are not interested in qualified applicants. Just so much... work... to schedule... interview... *pass out*

Seriously, they were all high-ho to interview me, but way behind the ball. To make a short story even shorter, I received this message:
Thank you for your email. I have scheduled your telephone interview for Tuesday, February 10th at 10am JST.
Please confirm your interview time.
Vanessa Oguchi HR

SEVERAL HOURS AFTER I had already scheduled an interview with another company that had been in constant email contact with me even throughout the weekend. Like I said, take your time people. Don't want to break a sweat or anything.

Anyway, I sent them a duly apologetic reply, finishing up with a 元気いっぱい:
Terribly sorry for the inconvenience. If another day or time works better for you, please do let me know. I am sure we can work something out!

To which I received a completely そっけない response:
Thank you for your email. Unfortunately, Wednesday is a national holiday so our office is not open.
Kind regards,
Vanessa Oguchi HR

うわ～今時のRecruiterは頑張るよね～。（爆笑） Seriously that was the extent of it. Again, don't want to overextend ourselves here. ^o^

Oh, and if their attitude does not make you wary, check out their benefits. I've clipped some below from the info sheet they sent me. If you have never taught in Korea or Japan before, let me say again, they are the WORST I have ever seen.

-Basic salary: \100,000/month (this figure already includes travel expenses)
- Location allowance: \130,000/month
- Attendance Bonus: \10,000/month
- 3 days possible sick leave

And scarier, there's summer (August) and winter (December) vacation to consider. Vacation, YAY? No, Vacation NO PAY:

OPTION A: Aug & Dec paid at 60%
OPTION B: All months paid at 100% except Aug

Then there's this charming little added expenditure which I have NEVER had to pay before:

Car fee: \20,000/month
Accommodation:
We will assist you in finding accommodation within your budget. Please note for most apartments there may be considerable initial outlay.

And yes, renting an apartment in Japan does have "considerable outlay".
What is there left to say? Someone is making money here but it's definitely not you.
Basically, you are completely on your own with this company. Good luck and all. :D

Anyway, from my end, cheers and be back with more info on Korea in the future! (^_-)-☆


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

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!