Three years have passed

It has been 3 years today since the mega earthquake occuredin Tohoku. It has killed, including those missing, up to more than 20, 000 people. It may be inappropriate for us to remember this disaster only with the size of the damage and the number of casualties. What fright has each of the casualties had? There have also been sorrow, pain and regret in the heart of the family members left. It should be beyond our imagination. There must be deaths related with this earthquake not counted in this number as well as that due to the deaths related with nuclear power plant accident, as described below.

Actually, as I have already written somewhere in this blog, my mother has died a monthe after this earthquake. She has experienced the massive quake and the following power off for a few days in a nursing facility in Sendai. Even though the personnel of the facility has done as much as possible at that time, she might spend a few days in a frightening situation with the cold and humger. Four years prior to the earthquake, my brother had taken her from here up there. She has passed away at a hospital in a month. I am sure the stress due to the earth quake and the sequel has killed her. I still regretfully think if I did not let her go up there by any means, she could have gone through this disaster. There must have been so many such cases as my mother related with this disaster. We should sympathetically imagine, even if not possible, how they and the families have got through in the disaster

Needless to say, one of the most serious events following to the earthquake was the nuclear power plant accident in Fukushima. There are still 135000 people evacuated from their homes. The main cause of evacuation is the nuclear power plant accident. The government used to announce immediately after the accident that they would enable all of the evacuees go back home in some time. In this past 3 years, quite some of the evacuees have been forced to decide not to returen home. No infrastructure and community are left there. The government announced some areas next to the disabled nuclear power plant would be inaccssible for decades. That means the people in those areas won't be able to go back there if they wish. They might be paid money for the compensation of the damage due to the accident. However, they would lose their homeland, work and community. It means they will have been socially killed. Actually, they are being killed.

By January this year, the number of the deaths related with the accident has reached over 1600 in Fukushima, which is more than the number of the casualties in the same place due to the earthquake and the tsunami. It is wrong that the accident has killed anyone as some nuclear power supporters insist. The aged people in the evacuation houses are getting weak and are apt to be sick now. There will be more of the deaths related with the accident from now.

We should consider how to protect them from being socially killed and from being dead related with the accident. The number of evacuees and of the deaths related with the accidents tells us the support and aid for them is much less than needed.

After this disatrous accident, the political leaders should have renewed the paradigm regarding energy in the society. We, the people, have approved the policy of no nuclear power plant, either at once or in some years. It was taken into the policy of the government. But, with the regime changed, the present government has ignored it and has regarded the nuclear power plant as the basic source of power. Their explanation is full of intentional lies and of misunderstandings. The business circles intimately related with the power companies are at the back of the present government.

They insist that nuclear power is cheaper than the other method of generation of electricity. When we take account of the expenditure for the construction, the deconstruction and the disposal of used nuclear fuel, the cost for nuclear power generation turns out to be much more. The insurance for serious accidents should be much more expensive than before; actually, they have not bought such insurance. The nuclear power plant has various inevitable risks such as fragilization of the casing due to neutron exposure. If it causes explosion during operation of the plant, the damage would be much more serious than this Fukushima case. As told elsewhere, Japan is one of the areas where earthquakes hit frequently. They bay we are getting into the era of the crust instability. There have been 20 times more of the outer rise type earthquake just east of Japan Trench after the mega earthquake than before. It could cause a big tsunami, which may destroy the Fukushima nuclear power plant under cooling at present and may spread the contamination.

In spite of these findings, the government would go on restarting nuclear power plants. They won't invest for the natural power generation. They even lowered the rate of the feed in tariff for the solar power generation. They are not willing to invest more for the wind power generation, which has been estimated quite hopeful.

Together with this old fashioned attitude toward energy policies, I am afraid, the people being socilaly killed are left helpless here by the government. I am sure they should be remembered with those dead in this disaster.  

                                         Since the dasatered area in Fukushima is not accessible
                                         now, here are a couple of photos showing the beautiful
                                         mountains and fields about 60km in Fukushima west of
                                         the area.

                                         Our son is studying medicine over there.

Accepting aging

Jim, W5JAW, a very proficient guitarist, told me he won't play a long piece any longer.  He won't play a suite of Bach as a whole. It is too much burden for him now, as he said. But he would play any favorite piece in the suites. Actually, he played the prelude of Nr1 suite before starting the QSO with me this morning. He also told me he won't care for the tempo or the way of expression for certain music. He would play a piece as he wants to.

Aging gradually deprive us of the strength or the functions of our body, that is, of our performance ability. I know he is a man of sports and has been enjoying rawing boat etc. His efforts to stay young might have slowed down the process of aging. He might be younger mentally and physically than me. But even with such efforts, he could not avoid this aging process. Even in that process of aging, how free and vivid his attitude toward music is! He might be able to say something like this as he has achived success as an amateur guitarist. But it was still encouraging to me a lot to see how he accepts the fact of aging.

Of late, I often think of the meaning of aging in my own life. It seems quite difficult for me to accept it as it is. It has been an absurdity. I need the future to live. But aging will greet me with death in possible future. Hopefully, I could be strong, or I should say, could be free from the sadness of aging and death, even if it is not able to be averted. His attitude toward performing instrument was really suggestive to me as for this point. May our aging bring us strength and wisdom like Jim had.

Thanks for the nice chat, Jim.

Please don't omit my call sign.

I am often called with only caller's call sign for my CQ. They send it only once. If the caller is right on my frequency and in time, I could guess I am called by him/her. The problem is that they are often a bit off my spot and are delayed starting calling me. It confuses me a lot. Nowadays, there are numerous pile ups (games if I could say) going on even away from the DX window. Pile up participants could be like those callers. Should I reply to them?

Another frustration about them is that they won't enjoy "tell me your story type" QSO. As soon as they give the routine items like report/name/QTH, they are always ready to quit. Actually, even if I should ask them about them, they ignore that or they won't seem to understand me. I haven't counted such callers yet. In my impression, they are up to 70 or 80% of the whole callers.

So far, operators enjoying conversation are sometimes in those callers. I am dubiously replying to them. But who knows I won't answer to such a caller any longer soon? I am actually inclined to feel going that way.

Please don't omit my call sign before giving yours when you call me.

The hiatus is getting widened

The budget for the next year was set to boost the public enterprise sector while the welfare section is stringently suppressed. The most part of the increased tax income will be used for the former sector and for the export business. The people seem to be intoxicated by this apparently generous expenditure. This pattern has been repeated under the LDPJ government
since 1990s. The public enterprise boosting has been like a drug. It has been proved to end in failure. It heightens the economy for a while followed by a much more recession. Together with the side effects of massive quantitative easing by BOJ and the risen sales tax, the economy will surely drop very soon. It may even crash the economy considering of the astronomical amount of national debt.

The school children receiving the public financial support for education is steadily increasing. Fiftenn percent of the whole school children, that is the record high, are paid for that support a couple of years ago. On the other hand, the recipients of the financial aid for the poverty is also steadily increasing and has reached record high last year. More than 2 million people are receiving this aid. The major companies, mostly of export sector, are told to be willing to increase pay. Only originally rich people could enjoy it. The hiatus between rich and poor is increasingly widened now.

The cause of apparent deflation in Japan is believed to be due to the derease of working population and the increase of aged. That is the decline in demand. The policy of the government is clearly against any trial to improve this decline. In addition, this widened hiatus in the society will make it unstable.

When will the people wake up from this intoxication?

Congratulations, Bob!

When I came home from my parttime work this evening, an email from Bob W6CYX had waited for me in the mail box. It told me he had a successful surgery for cataracts and he could see things "like a baby." It was a real pleasant news to me. Since he has had a vision problem on one eye, he might be concerned about the result. As soon as the procedure was finished, he knew he could see things clearly. What a pleasure it was for him!

I have known him since 1960s. We had not talked much on the radio until 1980s. I have visited him in San Jose for three times. In my 1st visit to him in mid 80s, he ans his wife have come to see us, me and Hide JH0FBH, at the SF Intnatl airport. I was impressed at his nice house on a foothill of Mt. Hamilton, where we could look over the bay area.  He was fond of a japanese actress named Yasuko Sawaguchi, whose big picture was put on the wall of his shack in the basement. In my 2nd visit htere, an old friend of mine, Steve, WA6IVN, and his wife came to see me at the party Bob and his wife held for me. Steve was seriously ill at that time and passed away not so long after that visit. I and my wife have visited him in the summer in 2012. I have written an article of this visit in this blog. He has taken us to a redwood park in the peninsula and a pier in Santa Cruz. I have enjoyed listening to his story at a concert in Monterey Bach Festival. Reflecting of this drive trip, I knew he had had vision problem at that time. I could not recall of this visit to him and his family without heartfelt gratitude.

He has been a conservative dialectician while I have rather liberal way of thinking. We often have opposing views about politics or economy. When he insists on his view and listen what I say about it, he always leave it as it is. No big debate. It may be his wisdom. I always enjoy, however, his propaganda against democrats or beaurocrats. My wife always smiles when we remember how he told about them in the dining room there. Both he and I are not so young any more. Hopefully, I would go on talking with him on the radio as well as in eye ball in the future.

We have had the 1219th QSO a couple of days ago.

Again, congratulations to you Bob!

Ume has come out for the first time this year

Ume flowers are coming out as if they knew it would get warmer from tomorrow. I was a bit touched to have found it early this evening. While it has been cruelly cold this winter, we have looked forward this flower coming out for the earliest sign of spring in our garden. The others will follow Ume. And there will be a lot of work in the garden ready for me. 

 

 

Codfish with cream sauce

Last week end, our daughter was coming home. I and my wife were wondering if we would take her to a French restaurant for dinner. Eventually, I decided to make something like French. Codfish with cream sauce. The outlook is not very fancy like the dish at a restaurant. Too much sauce. But it tasted fine. We might say it was a success. Our daughter has enjoyed it.