A snowfall

 

It has been incessantly snowing since early this morning. Wet and heavy snow. A very quiet afternoon . I have had a number of good QSOs in the morning. The bands have been widely open to the US. Among them, Bob N2UU was one of the most impressive one to me. He has retired 1.5 years ago. But he would like to do something worth doing again and returned to his work recently. It was not for the income. Nine hour long duty turned out to be a little bit tiring to him, though. He has shortened the work load a little bit now. Though I don't think I would back to a full time duty like he does any longer, I feel the same way with him. There should be many more retirees with the same feeling for work.

 

From the window of the shack. Everything is covered with snow. Some wind is blowing from north. Large flakes of snow are flying almost horizontally. It is the first snowfall here this winter.    



 

 

 

 

 

The antenna elements got much icy snow, I guess. The SWR reads very high even with 28MHz monobander. The radio has been turned off now.  I have been going on tidying up the storage room in the shed. From now, it is the time for music. Listening to some chamber musics and playing cello. Snowfall is not bad at all. I only hope the antenna elements won't be bent with the heavy snow.



 

 

The Pas de Deux in the Swan Lake suite

I don't like any works of Tchaikovsky so much. Too aesthetic for a listener. And too much work for an orchestral player. As an orchestral player, I have played only Nr 5 Symphony ans the Swan Lake suite. Both have not left me so good memories. Especially, the latter makes me even feel a little bit sick.

Several years ago, I was told to play as the top cellist at a local orchestra, which I took John 9V1VV for the practice in a week end. It was when we practised Nr 2 Symphony by brahms. I loved this one so much. That was the reason why I joined the orchestra. After we had played Brahms, I decided to stay at the orchestra since it was a cosy and friendly one. Then, one of the pieces it has practised was the Swan Lake. In its Grand Adagio, there is the famous the Pas de Deux of Odette and Prince Siegfried. There have not been such a beautiful and earnest theme, I think, as this solo played by the concert master. A staccato rhythm like heart beat heightens the music between violin solo. The violin solo swings fast melody in elegance. And again the rhythm in short tonging by the wind instruments comes back and beats up. All of sudden, at the height of that beats, a general pause visits the orchestra. The conductor looks intently at me. It is the moment I should start the mellow, sweet as well as manly melody. My heart almost stopped.

I always regretted taking that position as the top in the orchestra. And this music has left me a kind of posttraumatic stress syndrome.

It is still a beautiful music. Our minds are almost melted with those solo.

Listen carefully at 7 min. after the performace started.

Not for a two way monologue but for a real dialogue

Martin Buber used to write that the ultimate prayer is not asking God to do something but listening what He tells us. Pray to ask Him to tell, as he said. This expresses the most fundamantal form of dialogue. A real dialogue starts when one asks the other to tell him/her.

In ham radio, especially on CW conversation, we scarcely experience such a real dialogue. I have already repeatedly questioned about this problem. The lack of real dialogue is due to two issues.

One is that they are just making a game on CW. Just exchanging reports and promises for QSL. It is not a communication. The content is just stereotyped. The one we work with could be replaced to anybody. It is not a conversation but just a game.

The other issue is that there are no dialogue but only two way monologues in the QSO. Each would talk what he/she wants to say. No further progress in the conversation. There should be catch balls of topics between the two. But they would just throw a ball to a direction other than the other and the other won't try to catch that ball at all. There would be an endless monologue from either side going on.

I guess this latter issue comes from two different factors. One is the personality or aging of the operator. When we get older, unfortunately, we are apt to lose the ability to understand the others as well as to be  sympathetic with the others.  The original personality may be responsible for that, also. All we could do is to be careful not to fall in this pitfall. I don't know how that effort works. But it might be better for us not to try to be selfish in rambling on about ourselves. Better than nothing. At least, I believe, we should always be conscious of this trait due to aging. On the reception side, we should be tolerant to those with the lack of ability for dialogue as they get aged. Everyone should go through the elderly days in ourlives. We might have something meaningful in their monologues.

The last issue, which is unique to non native speaker hams, is that they won't listen to what the other says mainly due to reception/language barrier. They would only tell what they want to. They need to listen what the other say. It requires us much tension and patience. It is often too hard and laborious for us to be patient enough to listen to them despite of "not understandable condition". We would often focus on what and how to express our thoughts in sophisticated way. It is not, however, of primary importance. We scarcely know how important it is to listen to the other. Listening and understanding to the other could never be emphasized for meaningful dialogue in the QSO.

Ready for spring

I have been discarding the old books, mainly medical ones which I used to use in my residency days, and papers for the past few days. I could recall every moment I did with them. It was a time of sunrise for me, while I feel it is sunset or time to be ready for sunset. No sentimmentalism but a reality. Paying only a glance on them, I tidied up the book shelves and the boxes leaving those unnecessary things out of them.

The magnolia is budding. It may start blooming pretty soon. Despite of this very cold winter days going on, they are ready to come out now. It amazes me a lot even though it is the usual event at this time in a year. It encourages me to go ahead even if it seems so bleak to me at this time of my life.

    

Nuclear power plant accidents due to earth quakes

Yesterday evening, a short telop on TV told me there had been an earthquake of magnitude 7.7 along the west coast of North America 30 min. earlier. A few friends have come up in my mind. I rushed to the internet and googled about the news. Fortunately, it was far north along the coast of Alaska and no serious damage nor tsunami occurred, as it said. I was relieved to know that.

Alan AC2K in Seattle told me he could barely notice any quake at the time. I was concerned about the nuclear power plants there, which could be damaged by earthquakes. The recent news other than that last night told me there had been a few earthequeakes along the west coast for the past few months. Upon my inquiry, he let me know there are a number of nuclear power plants on the west coast.  Two in WA, 1 in OR and 2 in CA. At least one of CAs is on the coast near to a big fault. No argument against such possible dangerous facilities along the fault area? Of course, it's not the matter with only the US but actually ours. There are 54 plants in this small islands. Our country has had many big earthquakes in the past. They say we are getting into the earthquake activated era now.

There are over 1500 nuclear fuels stored at the 4th reactor in the devastated Fukushima nuclear power plant. Its quatity of Cs 137 is comparable to 5000 times of that in the atomic bomb dropped in Hiroshima. 1300 of them are used ones, which are quite hazardous once they get out of the watered storage pool. The pool is right on the 5th floor of severely damaged rector building. If those used fuels are fell down and scattered by such as another earthquake, they could go critical again. It won't be managed by any means. It results in wide spread fallout all over our country. The mass media reports on the situationn of this reactor so often. We are still in hazard in this way.

I could not help considering of the same problem in the west coast where bunches of good friends are living. The internet news told me there had been a number of earthquakes occuring there for the past several months. I am afraid the earth itself is seismologically activated at present. We should quit the nuclear power generation all over the world now. 

A plan for hospital ships in Japan

Patriotism in China sometimes looks bizzare to me. It is often an expression of hatred to our country. Patriotism is essentially hatred and, possibly, prejudice toward the other people. So is it in Japan. When someone shout loudly of patriotism here, it means only exclusivism. They try to exclude some minority, wheter racial or of ideological, in the society. On the background, there are some people or party which gains from this movement in the society. They always belong to the establishment governing the country. The structure and dynamics of patriotism in both Japan and China seem almost identical.

The present government may stay quiet as for changing the constitution until they get the majority at the election of the House of Councillors this summer. But their draft of the new constitution clearly shows where they would like the country to go for. The lastest news reported that the government had planned to build a couple of "hospital ships". The majority party, LDP, says it was to prepare for the devastating natural disaster like Hanshin Earth Quake or the Eastern Japan Earth Quake/Tsunami.

The ships will belong to the Maritime SDF in Japan. It will take them a couple of days to arrive at the devastated area. It won't work as an acute phase medial aid at all. What it was intended to or expected to is to go abroad at the war site and to give medical service to those soldiers injured in the battle. It is clearly aimed at military use. According to our present constitution, JSDF won't go for war anywhere in the world. The change of the constitution is prerequisite for this hospital ship plan.

The congressman of LDP insisting to build those ships is a representative of a group of manufacturers of the hospital ship. The budget for those ships is planned up to a hundred billion JPY. What a kickback will this congressman receive from the manufacturers?

The problem is that such an important issue is not known to the people in Japan. Mass media won't take it for discussion theme at all. I would like to inform about this to the young people who should go or have their children go for the war in the future. Ardent patriotism won't breed peace. It is not a thing we are forced to be eager about. It should be based on a quiet and long lasting feeling of love toward family members, neighbors and the mother town. It should never be any exclusiveness to the people of the other ideas or of the other races. We should never be taken advatage of our real patriotism by those trying to control us from behind.

A New Years Resolution

A New Years Resolution;

1) Work less stations. Spend more time for a QSO.
I have been inclined to call CQ. But, nowadays, the content would be just exchanging reports and the related matters only. In a few QSOs, I always feel much tired of that. RBN dependent QSOs in that style are absolutely meaningless to me. I would spend more time for each QSO. Or just listen the band. This should be my policy.
2)Study more on economics/politics and possibly religion.
Where am I and where do I go? The economics and politics are in confusion on the whole. The US economy depends on China. There could never be such a cynicism. The neoliberal economy needs a fundamental reformation in my view. Our country may suffer from a serious economical collapse in the near future. In this situation, I should be aware of the above mentioned question. It is my internal demand.
3)Resume cello practice. At least, piano trio and Bach's unaccompanied sonata so far as I could do with. So far as I can. I would practise some part of unaccompanied sonata like a lesson piece every day.
4)Go on cooking and increase repertoire of dinner dishes. It is like an experiment for me to cook new recipe. A lot of fun. I will enjoy it.
5)Arrange the garden, which may require years from now.
A wood deck before the living room. More vegetable garden. Fruits like water melon should be tried this summer.
6)Plan a trip abroad again. Any FOC gathering or a trip for musics in Europe? Korea could be another destination where a good friend of mine is waiting for us. My sight problem could prevent me from going abroad. But discussing with my wife, I would try to go somewhere. Before it becomes impossible for us to do so.

I would shut my mouth because I guess someone rumoring that I could never do all of these in a year. Of course, personal and the environmental situation are pretty gloomy. But nothing might happen if we won't dream of. Something might come true so far as we dream and make effort for that.

A very HNY to you all. May your dreams come true, my friends.

Shin
JA1NUT