Earthquake sickness spreads in Japan

There have been more than 300 aftershocks of magnitudes 5.0 or more in Japan, since the massive earthquack struck the country on 11th March.

These frequent aftershocks are causing many people, including myself, so-called earthquack sickness.

Earthquake sickness is similar to motion sickness, and makes one feel dizzy or nauseous. When you go to the sea and enjoy yourself in the water for a while, you feel like you are on the wave even after you go back to your hotel. Earthquake sickness is similar to this feeling.

These days, I often feel the ground shaking and look around my room to check if my books on the shelves are still in place. But then I find out that nothing is moving and the ground is actually not shaking. I sometimes find it difficult to walk straight because I feel that the ground is shaking.

Not only the continuous aftershocks are frightening, but also the radiation leaks from Fukushima nuclear plants and the first-ever rolling blackouts are causing much stress to the Japanese residents. These stresses are considered to worsen the symptom of earthquake sickness that is widely stpreding in Japan.

According to the Japanese media, the best solution to earthquake sickeness is to relieve stress, for example, by streaching and light exercises, drinking hot drinks, listening to favourite musics, taking a long bath and have a good sleep.

Tablets for motion sickness can help relieve the symptom, although I find it difficult to keep taking this kind of medicine for an entire day. 

For those in Japan and seeking for a professional help, you should visit an otolaryngologist, or ear, nose and throat doctor.

Panic-escape from Tokyo

Concerns over radiation leaks from Fukushima nuclear station are growing both in Japan and overseas, but the information appearing on the Japanese and foreign medias are somewhat different.

Currently, the Japanese government advices the people within a 20 km radius of the nuclear facility to leave the area and those living between a 20-30 km radius to stay inside at their homes or evaculation shelters. The Japanese authorities say that the radiation levels outside of a 30 km radius are low enough not to cause any health problems and the medias generally stress the safety side of the issue.

On the other hand, British and American governments advise their nationals to remain outside an 80 km adius of the nuclear facility. Moreover, the residents in Tokyo and to the north of Tokyo are adviced to leave the area. Many foregin governments, including American, British, French, German, Italian, and Australia advise their nationals to leave Japan and some of them even prepare emergency jets. Requests for re-entry visa to Japan are mounting as more and more foreigners want to leave the country until the situation calms down.

Watching the BBC World News this morning, I saw footage of Japanese families taking trains to move to the south of Japan or preparing to evacuate from Tokyo once the situation gets worse. I think that these images are making people even more worried about the current evolving situation.

I don't see these kinds of people around me nor on the Japanese media. I think that those foreigners who don't have to stay in Japan are better to leave the country because their families may worry about them. However, I don't think that they should panic because the radiation levels are still low in Kanto region including Tokyo.

Earthquakes and aftershocks continue in Japan

Last Friday, 11 March, there was a massive earthquake in the north-east of Japan, followed by an extensive tsunami that swept away many cities, towns, and villages. Since then, there has been many quakes in Japan, some of which are considered as aftershocks that normally follow after a large earthquake, but others are considered as separate earthquakes.

Two large earthquakes have occurred since last Friday. The first one occurred on Saturday 12 March, in northern Nagano and Niigata, on the Japan Sea side of central Japan. Several houses were clushed and many people had to evacuate. The second one occurred yesterday, Tuesday 15 March, in Shizuoka, south-west of Tokyo, again forcing the residents to stay at the evacuation centres.

Experts view that these earthquakes are likely to be triggered by the earthquake in the nor-th east of Japan on Friday. Aftershocks of Friday's earthquake are considered to be at smaller scales, whereas earthquakes originating from other epicentres can be at any scales. Thus, increasing incidents of earthquakes in Japan pose serious concerns among people living in Japan, including myself.

No more food at supermarkets in Tokyo

The Tokyo Electric Company announced the rolling blackout starting from Monday 14 March. The blackout lasting for 3-6 hours per day at alternating times is planned to take place until the end of April. After the announcement, the consumers rushed into shops to buy batteries and torches, which were soon sold out. Realising the severity of the situation, the consumers started buying up also food to store at home. Basic foods in Japan, e.g. rice, bread, instant noodles, bottled water, or milk disappeared in most supermarket. At the shop I went yesterday, there was no meat nor fish. There is also no toilet roll nor tissue. Normally in Tokyo, we hardly see empty shelves on supermarkets, so the situation makes one worry and buy even more stuff. The government says, however, there is enough supply of goods and food to Tokyo, and asks the consumers not to buy up foods that are more than necessary.

Huge quakes hit Japan

Huge earthquakes hit Japan this afternoon. It was very scary.

At first, I thought that it was a nomal quake that happens every so often in Japan.
However, the quake got stronger and stronger and I saw that books and small ornaments on the shelves started falling down. At the next moment, a full-length mirror and a floor lamp fell and broke into pieces.

I was scared and started to praying. The image of the clashed building in the earthquake in New Zealand came into my mind. The apartment where I live is very old and I could easily image that it would clash like a pancake.

Lukily, the quake stopped. Another big earthquack hit within an hour and many smaller after quakes are still occurring. I have never experienced the earthquake as large as this one in my life.

Things are still a bit chaotc around here. There is no gas in my home, despite being a cold night. Phone lines are still not working. Public transportation is suspended in Tokyo and many people are still on streets.

However, we are still very lucky in Tokyo. In the coatal areas of northern Japan, tsunami has swept away thousands of houses and destroyed rice and farming fields. It is very shocking to see such devastating damages happening to my own country.

I hope that the damage won't spread any futher.

Penguins film their lives underwater.

The Japanese Antarctic research team attached video cameras to the backs of Adelie penguins and let them shoot videos of their lives under the water. Because Adelie penguins spend much of their times under the sea ice, and it is difficult to study their behaviour. It was the first attempt to film their behaviour under the water.

Yesterday, the Japanese news programs widely broadcasted the pictures acquired by the mission team. They were stunning. One of them showed a round head of a penguin in front and the sea ice on the back, apparently taken while he was swimming towards the sea ice. Another showed his fellow penguins swimmig closely.

While I worry how these cameras were attached on the back, it is an interesting and perhaps clever idea to unveil secrets of life below the ice.

Link to the news:
Japanese researchers in Antarctic attach cameras to penguins to film behavior under ice

What a surprise, it's snowing again in Tokyo!

It started snowing agatin this morning in Tokyo. When I was a child, we sometimes had snows in March, but we didn't have snows in Marh in recent years.

What is really surprising is the coldness. The maximum day temperature today is about 4 degrees Celsius, while it was over 15 degrees a few days before. I don't feel like going out at all.

Norovirus debut

Norovirus disease is very common in Japan where people customary eat raw shellfish such as oysters. The norovirus is highly contagious so small children tend to catch it at schools or nurseries and the parents often get it from their children.

I don't have any children and I had never got the norovirus until this week. I suddenly felt very, very ill on Wednesday. It was even hard to walk around at home, so I couldn't go to a doctor or chemist despite being so ill. Generally, when I get sick, I search on the internet to see what my illness is and what medicines I should take. However, this time, I was even unable to sit at the desk so I just stayed on my bed for a whole day.

My husband came home at around 0.30 am and told me that I had a fever. He said I should take the painkiller he got from the dentist when he removed his wisdom tooth. I was rather suspicious but it actually relieved the pain and allowed me sleep. On the next day, I felt much better and could walk around without a problem.

My brother told me yesterday that he had exactly the same symptom after he had eaten oysters.

Oh yes, oysters... I certainly had oysters Monday evening.

They were sold at a special price at the supermarket.  No wonder why.

Pandas come to Japan

Giant pandas are perhaps the most popular animal in Japan.
Two giant pandas are coming to Japan from China this evening, and many Japanese are excited about their arrival.

The first two pandas came to Ueno Zoo in Tokyo in 1972 to commemorate the restoration of diplomatic relations between Japan and China. Since then, there was always at least one panda at Ueno Zoo until three years ago when the last panda died.

Giant pandas are rented from China to Tokyo at an incredible cost.  It costs Tokyo about 83 million yen (1 million US dollars) per year to rent the giant pandas to Ueno Zoo. In addition, Ueno Zoo spent 90 million yen (1.1 million US dollars) to reform the panda house. It is fully air conditioned with floor heating in winter and has a big swimming pool. Their special foods cost 18,850 yen (235 US dollars) per day.

All of these are paid, of course, from our tax!

Wisdom removed

Yesterday, my husband went to a dentist to have wisdom tooth removed. It took him nearly 2 years to make up his mind after his dentist suggested. He said that the surgery took for a few hours when he had another wisdom tooth removed and the experience was horrible.

The extraction procedure seemed to have gone very smoothly yesterday and finished within 45 minutes. My hasband said that the anesthetic injection was a bit painful but effective. He went to bed early last night before the anesthetic wears off completely and he could eat normally this morning.

The wisdom tooth is called "Oyashirazu" in Japanese, which literally means "(the tooth that) parents don't know", because it develops after one's adolescence. I perfer the Japanese term to the English one.

Who would want his wisdom removed?

Warm and windy

It wasn't an intention of this blog to record everyday weather in Tokyo, but I haven't been going out much these days and there isn't much happening in my life.

Anyway, it was very windy today. In my old apartment, the windows were constantly making loud noise. It was even hard to walk straight when I went shopping in the evening.

While winds were strong, it was unusually warm during the day. Some of my spring plants started flowering. I think that they made a mistake because the cold weather is focasted to return tomorrow.

It's cold and I have a cold.

It all started a couple of weeks ago. First, I had a sore throat and felt a chill. I went to a chemist and bought a medicine for colds. After taking the medcine for a few days, I felt much better, but then my husband became ill. He said that he caught a cold from me, so I gave him my medicine. A few days later, while my husband got better, I started coughing. My husband said that that's because I stopped taking the medicine before my full recovery. We both took the medicine for a few days and finished the pack. During the next few days, we were both well, and even went to the gym to do some exercises. However, my husband came back home very late last Saturday when it snowed and was very cold. He started coughing and seemed ill. He went to the chemist on the next day and started takig the cold medicine again. And, guess what? Since this morning, I have a sore throat. Boy..., when can we get out of this negative spiral?

Snow again, but sunny now.

It snowed again last night in Tokyo. It was heavier than the last week's snow and it accumulated to 2 cm from the ground, according to the Met Agancy. Snow piled up on my doffodils and its stem was bent..., however they regained the strength today so I felt relieved.

It was Valentine's Day yesterday. Some of the major trains were stopped last night, and I hope that people who were out for dinner could safely go back home. Trains and flights are back to normal since this morning as it became sunny much earlier than the Met Agency forcasted.  It was very cold in the morning due to radiative cooling, but the weather is easing in the afternoon.

Snow in Tokyo

It is snowing in Tokyo today. It is the first time in this winter to have this much snow in Tokyo. In the morning, the snow contained lots of water so it did not accumulate on the ground. It has now changed to more like a real snow... It is very cold too, with the maximum day time temperature of 2 degrees celcius.

Japan Meteorogical Agency has issued a snow warning, which is generally issued when the Agency expects more than 5 cm of snow on the ground in Tokyo. (In more snowy regions where people are accustomed to much snow and where the infrastructure is well equipped, the warning may be issues for more than 40 cm of snow.) When I was a child, such snow occured perhpas a few times a year, but in recent years, it became less and less frequent and occurs once in a few years.

Today is the national foundation day, a public holiday in Japan, so is the start of a long weekend. Unfortunately, snow is expected to last until tomorrow, so I'm going to be at home most of the weekend...

The start of spring

Today is "risshun" in the Japanese calendar, which literally means "the start of spring".

Just as it says, it is sunny and warm like spring today in Tokyo. It is a nice change after the severe cold weather for the past few weeks.

Record snow in Japan

Japan Meteorological Agency announced yesterday that the amount of snow in January was the highest on record at 37 weather stations located mostly on the Sea of Japan side of Japan. In Tokyoku and Hokuriku in the north of Honshu, the snow amount exceeded 3 metres. On the other hand, the climate on the Pacific Ocean side of Japan remained summy and recorded extremely low precipitation.

The deepest accumulated snow was observed in Uonuma in Niigata with 4.09 metres. The measurement was the second highest on record and twice as much as the average year.

JMA reported that this extreme weather in Japan was caused by Arctic Oscillation and La Nina, which brought intermissive frost over the Japanese archipelago from the Japan Sea side.


Yes, it's been very dry here in Tokyo. It's the first time I need to put so much moisturiser on my skin. It is also very, very cold.  I generally don't turn on a heater during the daytime to save energy, but I cought cold last week and I now use heating all day long.

NHK Special Life force evolution never ends

A new TV series by NHK, Life force: evolution never ends started last night. This is a special series program broadcasted for six weeks every Sundays at 9 pm.

Life force is a nature documentary like Life series by BBC. The picutures present some of the most rare animals on earth and their life. The camera work is brilliant. NHK spent three years to film the animals and  the changes in life events through seasons are beautifully presented. They use a high-speed camera to capture the quick movements of animals.

What, however, is very interesting is that the Japanese version of this program has a totall different title, Hotspots: the last paradise. NHK explains on its web page that the program shows endangered animals in so-called biodiversity hotspots. It's true that the regions that the program cover are designated as biodiversity hotspots, but the content of the program is more about the evolution of animals than the biodiversity at risk. In fact, NHK fails to mention about the key characteristics of hotspots that they are the most threatened and fragle ecosystems. NHK says on its webpage that biodiversity hotspots are modern-day Noah's ark and a paradice for animals. I think this is a big mistake and suppresses the fact that hotspots are threatened ecosystems and require urgent conservation actions.

For many people in Japan, this may be the first time that they hear biodiversity hotstpots. It is unfortunate that no scientifically valid explantion of the terminology is given in the program.

45 people killed by snow.

My friends in Europe told me last month that it was very cold and snowy.

Now, cold spells came to Japan. It's been very cold everywhere in Japan and there has been much snow on the Japan Sea side of the archipelago. Up to yesterday, the death toll due to snow related accidents was 45 throughout Japan.

(Due to high mountain ranges running perpendicular to the direction of seasonal winds, Japan exhibits contrasting climates between the Japan Sea and Pacific Ocean sides of the archipelago, with the former receiving much snows while the latter remaining dry. )

In Tokyo, there has been no rain for more than one month and the air is very dry. Humidity is only about 30% in my room now. I heard on the news that the moisturisers are selling well in the chemists. I should go and buy one too...

Japan's greenhouse gas emissions in 2009

The Japanese Ministry of the Environment announced the greenhouse gas emissions in 2009 was 4.1% below the 1990 emission level. (1990 is the base year of the emission reduction target under the Kyoto protocol for most countries including Japan.)

The amount of the greenhouse gases emitted during 2009 was 129 million tonnes, a decrease by 5.7% from the previous year. In 2007, Japan' s emission level was 9% above the 1990 level, so there has been a drastic decline since then.

The ministry says that recession was the main cause of the emission declines for two consecutive years.

Under the Kyoto Protocol, Japan must reduce its emissions to 6% below the 1990 level in the fiscal 2008-2012 period. While it seems a good sign that the emission level has declined to the level close to the Kyoto target, it is worrying that recession is the main reason. It is expected that the economy is turning to recover this year, which would then increase the greenhouse gas emissions. It is a great challenge for Japan to keep the emission levels low while boosting up its economy.

New Year cuisine

 Time flies. The festive season has gone very quickly.

 I had a relatively quite new year this year. I visited my parents and my husband's family as usual, went to a sale at a department store, and that's all. I didn't go to any shrines or temples because these places are generally very crowded.

 
 This is a traditional Japanese cuisine called Osechi. In general, Japanese families eat Osechi for a few days in the new year, typically 1-3 January but can be shorter. The idea is that we prepare all the food for the new year on the night before, 31 December, so we don't have to cook during the new year. We put the food into lovely Osechi boxes. Each family has its own style and preference. My mother prepared the Osechi in this photo and it is more or less very similar every year at my home.