A photo of an old postcard has been sent to me as a file in an e mail by my brother.
Brother has found it inserted in a book. The postcard is toward my father in Tokyo dated back in 1937 when father was around 20 years old. With the sender's unreadable handwriting, the name is not identifiable. But the content of the mail convinced brother he had been the person whom father had met in Tokyo and had been lead to Christianity by. Having lost his parents early in his life, as brother said, father had tried to study at a prep school and to attend to a higher education in Tokyo.
The coup d’etat by the young soldiers in Tokyo, the Feb 26 Incident in 1936, has increased the power of the military in politics. They have surged into the invasion to Manchuria at first and later into the entire China, even though it was destined to be defeated. Father has been swallowed up by the inevitable avalanche into war whatever he might have wanted in his life. He was recruited to the military twice and has spent a few years in China. Although he has not mentioned of his experience so much as a soldier there, he seemed to have seen the dark side of the war.
From the church, a person, possibly very poor without any family members, has been sent to the sanatorium at this place, as mentioned frequently, my aunt had managed for tuberculosis patients in poverty. Father has visited here to see her for a few times and has seen mother working here. It was after the war when they got married and had a family. Without seeing the person who sent that postcard, father would not have had his family including myself.
As reiterated in this blog, father has been concerned what and who have caused that war which had ruined his youth. He never stopped rebuking any movements toward rearmament and war. I strongly wonder what he would say now since the ultra right PM and her cabinet would be approved in this general election going on now. They predict that in polls conducted recently.
The person who sent the postcard to my father wrote in it that he would care for his parents and brother. It was from far north Aomori. How has he lived there around WWII?
So far as the wiki explains it, Gini Coefficient(abbreviated as GC) is a measure of statistical dispersion intended to represent the inequalities in income, wealth, consumption within a nation or a social group. It is expressed before and after redistribution of wealth. In no inequality, which is theoretically impossible, GC is 0, while, in only a theoretical situation, all wealth belongs to one person in the community, GC is 1.
GC before redistribution of wealth in this country has been steadily increasing since '80s. The most recent data has hit the worst, that is, over 0.6 among the OECD member countries. It has made me so surprised. It might be due to progrss of the population aging and increased contigent employment. The asset bubble in economy also might be a factor for that. The introduction and gradual increase of the consumption tax, a regressive tax system, might be contributory to it as well.
Fortunately, GC after redistribution of wealth still remains lower and in the mid range among OECD member countries. It may mean the redistribution of wealth, ths social security and the redistribution of income by taxation, is still functioning in our country.
We could not be too optimistic for the inequality of economy. In fact, the people is getting generally impoverished in our country. The absurd economic easing since so called Abenomix has caused economic disparity among the people. Now, the government is steadily reducing social security benefits. Together with impoverishment due to inflation without rise in income corresponding to it, reduced social security benefits may result in failure of redistribution of wealth sooner or later.
One of the imminent, or rather already beginning, problems is the lack of workers of nursing care. We have a public insurance for nursing care. More and more individual payments are required in it. The expenditure for nursing care workers is not abundant to pay the workers enough for specialists. The workeres, either Japanese or those from developing countries, won't continue working long time. The aging is in real fast progress in the society. They assume they could benefit from the long term care public insurance established in 2000. Its benefits have been reduced step by step by the government. The service supplier system is not going to function soon. The workers for the service is already insufficient in number already.
The general election is going on in our country. They predict the ruling parties would win in it thanks to the reputation of the 1st female prime minister. Only few know what is going on in our country expressed with GC. The society is facing an absolute aging problem with retired people having impovertized with contigent employment throughout their lives.
It is well known global warming is inducing polar vortex in winter. Here. Cold wave with heavy snow fall has been noted in North America, Europe as well as our country in this winter. In summer, it will get hotter with more numerous hurricanes and typhoons. The latter tend to become larger in size and strength. Global warming exaggerates the extreme weather world wide.
It is a hoax to insist that these phenomena global climate changes are not true. Those unscientific hoaxsters are either involved in industries which fossil fuel is the mainstay for energy. Or they are unintelligent captured by consipracy theory and/or unscience. That is only interests in money and/or lack of intelligence.
If a leader of major country which yields much greenhouse gas in the air is such a person as pictured in the last paragraph. it could be a real disaster for themselves as well as for the whole world. Predecessors have ground to the Paris Treaty to do with the global warming. But that person has decided to withdraw from that treaty without any hesitance.
An organization named "America is ALL IN" strongly protests the endangerment of world environment which Trump administration aims for on behalf of the global industries having much benefits from it. This organization is said to cover the industries involved with 74% of GDP in the US. It is a big relief that such an organization is working in the US against the unscientific policy leading to almost unrecoverable climate change process.
A couple of dishes cooked recently. One is pork loin stewed in tomato sauce. Tomato was not fresh unsuitable for salad. Still tasted good.
The other is pork miso soup. Radish, carrot and taro were the products of our garden farm.
Both were pretty successful.
Inflation is quite remarkable here especially for food. I am going to grow more veggies this spring. I have purchased seed potatoes which are much more expensive than last year. Possibly one potato costs about a dollar or so.
Not only for frugality but also for pleasure to do with living things, I would go on farming.
Brahms has composed a number of excellent pieces of chamber music. Among them, it is his sextets or quintets with strings or strings plus another instrument which is famous and often performed. His tendency in composition for dense and thick harmony and for counterpoint may work well with those genres with multiple instruments. However, his piano trios including the famous clarinet trio are jewels as well. I have loved those trios since young days. Here is another trivial memory on his Nr 1 piano trio OP8. It is well known Brahms has first composed in 1854 and has revised it in 1889. The revised edition is more famous and always played like the trio uploaded in the last of this post. Its matureness in the style or composition technique is prominent but the breathing of youth could be audible especially in its beautiul melody.
It was in my early twenties when I first heard this piece; the 1st piano trio by Brahms. It was the hall of Hibiya in the middle of Tokyo on an evening of early summer in '70s. The piano starts the 1st movement with grand theme which is passed on to cello. For a young cellist, this melody was haunting. I can't recall the pianist or the violinist but the cellist was, I remember, Kenichiro Yasuda in his late twenties. He has made brilliant debut as a cellist not too long before that. Placing the instrument in almost vertical position, he played it really as if dreaming. After listening it, I went for a small journey to an island. All alone. I could not recall this piece without that wandering spirit. It is still a music in youth for me.
Almost 30 years later, I asked a violinist to play it with me. The development section was a bit tricky for an amateur cellist like me. But I got it through. The pianist was one of my old friends since orchestra days, a professional pianist as well as a teacher. She has spent time to come to Tokyo from Shinshu to make rehearsals with us for a few times. At a small concert with other amateur players, we have played it before audience. The pianist used to tell me Brahms had composed it with the chords so "heavy and thick" that she found her forearms got more "muscular" than ever. I am sure it was a kind of joke. It might mean she has made some effort for us. Still moved to hear that.
I wanted to rehearse and play it, including the other movements, again with the same gang someday . But it seems no chance for me to do that. The 3rd movement is sure poignant, calm and beautiful. I still thank two of them for letting me play the 1st movement.
I believe this trio played it bestl; Pires, piano, Dumay, violin and Wang, cello. Each musician has own unique personality in performance, quite different each other. Pires sounds seriously profound while her husband Dumay is sharply penetrating music. Singing broadly is Wang's cello. Their mixture is a kind of fascinating ensemble. I have listened to them playing this trio so many times when I was practising it 20 years ago. At my room of the office late at night. Wang played cello smooth and beautiful. I have tried to learn his rendition so far as I could from the recording. Bowing, expression, dynamic or agogigue etc. I still could picture myself practising it in my room of the office. It was quiet evening in late summer.
This is that trio. Pires has announced to put an end to her career as a pianist last year.
While looking for this recording, I have found even hundreds of renditions by different groups. I should correct saying it is not popular. It seems pretty familiar among classic music fans and players. It is noted a lot of Japanese and Korean ensembles are playing it. This piece may resonate particularly in people of East Asia, even though it is not proven at all.
This systematic review and metaanalysis have given the decisive conclusion on the effect of the exposure of acetoaminophene in pregnancy making no effect on the fetus as for autism and related diseases.
Why and how does such as RFKennedy Jr try to change the medical findings already authorized? No background of medicine or of epidemiology with him at all.
He and his faction seem to be entrenched in unscientific views and conspiracy. They might get certain economical and/or political interests from such behaviour.
It is a comedy as well as a tragedy for the US people as well as the world that such a person is taking the seat of Secretary of Health and Human Services. Certain proportion of the people in the US is still approving him as the Secretary. It is the issue of those people.
Trump is imposing new tariff on the countries which are against his attempt to occupy or invade Greenland. Needless to say it is completely wrong against the international law. On behind such tariff deals, he is accepting such a bribery from Qatar as this news tells. Qatar was excepted from tariff thereafter. Could a president make such corruption without any accusation? Not in a developing country but in the US.
That tariff would be eventually paid by the US people. It is a kind of domestic tax with high regressivity to the people aggravating cost push inflation. Do those supporting his tariff policy still approve it? It would destroy the world trade as well. Such abuse of tariff could cause another great depression in the world. They say the influence of tariff takes several months or even a year to appear in the market/society. The Marshall Lerner condition is variable according to the country applied with it.
He has got not only a big private jet plane but also a great sum of money from Qatar. Big bribery!
Quote;
PAM BONDI JUST WENT TOE-TO-TOE WITH PETE BUTTIGIEG ON LIVE FOX – 62 SECONDS OF SCORCHED-EARTH FINANCE FURY THAT LEFT TRUMP’S “BILLION-DOLLAR BRIBE SHIELD” IN FLAMES
No warm-up. Pam Bondi, Trump’s new personal attorney, sits stone-faced in red blazer.
Pete Buttigieg walks straight past the host, grabs the second chair, and stares her down like she owes him blood money.
Pete opens fire:
“Pam, your client took $2.4 billion in ‘consulting fees’ from Qatar while selling them tariff exemptions. That’s not business. That’s bribery with extra steps.”
.JPEG)
