Globalized Broadband in ACTION

In my previous blog I talked about the "need for speed" and how high speed broadband internet access is changing everything everything EVERYTHING about our lives. This is not just from a child's perspective who grows up with e-mail and no longer needs to even comprehend how it took one month for a letter sent to get a return reply when I first came to Japan 20 years ago. Now they contact their friends in Timbukthree instantaneously to ... coordinate shoelace colours for the day!

No, I mean on a deeper level... business has changed dramatically, jobs have shifted and continue to shift to "cheaper, less developed countries". Those countries GDP and economy is skyrocketing while their generation gaps fly apart at a pace us in the west cannot even comprehend. Where our food comes from has changed, how we educate ourselves, argue, get news, make decisions, carry out terrorist activities, are brainwashed by our own governments and foreign multinationals ... it has all changed.

And not entirely for the good of humanity.

But today don't want to point out the negative aspects of this technology; I'll leave that to the naysayers and harbingers of Armageddon (a Jehova visited me this morning to tell me about .... can you tell?) I want to show you one of the GOOD things that this instant communication high-speed broadband has brought us.

As you know, people are living much longer than they used to which means that they need a lot more care than they used to need for a much longer time. Life has gotten tougher forcing families to "splinter" into nuclear units where the parents live on their own while their children bring up their own families. As the elderly continue to age and are no longer able to care for themselves they require more attention...

A company in Sweden has started exploited the power of the internet to meet this very important need: ACTION

Here is what they say on their top page:

"ACTION is a service for frail older persons who prefer to stay and live in their own homes but who are in need of support from nurses and relatives. These old people and their relatives are provided with information and training to help them make their everyday life easier and more comfortable. The ACTION service includes the provision of a videophone which can be used for communicating with the nurses and other ACTION families."

And here are just a few of their results from their website:

• family-carers feel safer and more competent in their role of caring
• the older people and their relatives develop informal support networks with other families more readily and with greater ease
• whilst there are cost savings for municipalities, there is at the same time improvement in the quality of life of both the cared and the carers

I think this is an absolutely WONDERFUL way to show love and caregiving for those who raised us into this world. It's a fantastic way to exploit the power of a system that interconnects us all.

Take a look at their website and see what it's all about. It won't take a lot of your time, but it will show you how we can utilize the tools we have developed for the greater good: ACTION

Globalized Love is not just about us here on the blogs, it extends waaay beyond that to all the nooks and crannies of the multiverse. All you need to do is take a little time and think about how you can make a difference.

Thank you Mari for sharing this with me.

I love you!

Cam

The Need for Globalized Speed

Broadband is getting faster and cheaper every day so it surprises me when I try to share this information with Masaki and he continually resists, saying, "I'm not interested; dial up is fine for me." It's funny because broadband these days in Japan is cheaper than dialup. In addition to that, it doesn't tie up the phone lines. There are plenty of times I want to call Masaki, but I can't because he keeps his cell phone off unless he goes grocery shopping, and when he is online, he is using up the phone line so I get a busy signal. I also know that part of this reason is that he doesn't want to be "bothered" with having to learn something new or to have to make "chchch changes" to his world. That puts him in a discomfort zone as I have seen in the past.

He doesn't use his computer or the internet all that often which again seems unusual to me in our day and age. I can see so many ways he can improve his business utilizing the power of the net, but he doesn't want to. And when I have tried to show him how in the past, I watch his eyes "glass over" and see him "tune out" and "go analog" on me. In fact, yesterday during our ride, he said he would love to just go into the mountains and live where there was no net access, no electricity, no nothing.

And you know what? I believe him because he has continually refused to consider upgrading the family internet to a faster, cheaper system; he just does not care about that stuff. Even his parents have thought it might be a good idea, but as he is the "chonan", the elder son, I guess they let him make the decisions now, as is often the way here in traditional Japan. He checks his email about once a month, IF I am lucky so I don't bother sending anything via email to him anymore as I always have to follow it up with a call... "go check your email".

Maybe having no girlfriend, living with your mother and father, brother and sister, and working with mom and dad in the same house (at 38) all the time does that to you. Maybe he needs no further outside contact other than his six mountain bikes and the dirt that his tires kiss... Maybe he's just like that...

I, however, LOVE being on the cusp of technology and am always investing in newer, faster computer-related "tools" because for me, it is a form of communication that I love to embrace. I love how we are progressing with the advances of instand broadband communication. Of course I am not blind to the terrible side effects that the local communities are suffering due to the global "reaching out". There is a flip side to the wonders of our current internet advances. That aside...

I recently switched my broadband from Yahoo! BB ADSL 50MB (agent of Softbank internet services), to Nexys BB ADSL 50MB (agent of Softbank inernet services). It's weird... The system, the lines, everything are exactly the same. Even the new router that arrived came from Softbank and looks exactly like the old one (just a slightly newer model). The tech support line dials into Softbank with Nexys.BB just as it did for Yahoo! BB.

At first I wondered what the REAL difference is beside from the price. So I called Softbank to ask if they had some hidden deal that would give me the same price Nexys was offering compared to what I was paying Yahoo/Softbank for the same service.

The answer?

There was absolutely nothing different in the service, other than the price.

And it is a LARGE difference in price.

I don't agree with "price hopping" as it loses me a lot of business in my work when the Chinese companies go to someone else because it's a bit cheaper and expect me to lower my prices to the other competition if I want to keep the job. I won't because I know how much effort, time and (cost) goes into providing that extra support, and service. And because I believe in this, even if a price is higher, if I can get better service I will stick with a "provider" of the service, or product.

Think of it like buying a new bra, ladies... You can go to Wal-Mart and get your $11.99 bra that gives you some so-so support for a little while (but may be made in China with who-knows-what kind of metals and materials), or you can go to Victoria's Secret and get the latest, most technical bra-tanktop for $49.95 and have years of amazing support, comfort and versatility.

Well, I did my due diligence, and I switched because the only difference was Yahoo!BB @ JPY 4500/mo vs. Nexyz.BB @ JPY 2950/mo. That's a surprising difference considering they both are agents of Softbank selling the exact same service utilizing the exact same lines crossing the country. It's baffling, really...

It turns out that I was really fortunate to have this chance come upon me. We have two phone numbers to this home, one that I had registered with Yahoo!BB and was using for my fax line only, and the other which was just a phone line. Had I only had one number I would not have been eligible for this campaign because the service agreements state that you cannot switch to another provider during the first six months of your contract without being penalized by having to pay the original "up to three months of free service" (not included in the six month promise) that was part of the enticing sign-up marketing ploy.

But, since I have another line, I was able to sign up with Nexyz.BB on the phone line, cancel the Yahoo!BB service on the other line, and get up and running in no time flat!

All I needed to do was unplug one router, and plug the other one (that looks the same, but has a different number) in. And everything is running like a charm.

You know how ADSL works, right? It sounds GREAT but it depends upon where you are actually located because the closer you are to the "box" where the phone lines all meet up (the circuit box?) in the neighbourhood, the better your speed, and the further away you are, the slower it is. In most cases, apparently 50MB refers to the download speed that is the ideal maximum, but in most cases the actual speed is between 5-10MB. For upload, it is dramatically slower (did you know that?) Usually the 50MB ADSL services offer between 0.5 - 2MB of actual upload speed depending upon how far away you are from that "box" somewhere in the neighbourhood.

We are quite close so are quite lucky, actually and our speeds seem to be about 14MB download speed and 1.5MB upload speed.

Of course this is piddly compared to those who are on a cable connection, because cable gives you exactly what you pay for without any dilution due to distance from the "box". But cable is usually more expensive. Right now in Japan the "fibre optic" lines (cable lines) run at about JPY 7500 ($75) per month for 100MB of speed. But in addition to that, you need to pay for the cable channels, and all that other stuff so it does add up. I'm not quite ready for that since I have no interest in watching TV so it would be a waste for me to pay for TV just to get faster internet.

I am quite happy with this speed and access we have here in my little village of 3,000 people. It suits my needs exceedingly well.

I know that many of you have cable lines, some are on ADSL, and some still use "squirreloptics" for your dial up. I would be curious to hear how your internet connection fares with a speedtest. Why don't you log into Speedtest.net and let me know how well you fare? I'd really like to kow what it's like out there in the rest of the world.

Here is Speedtest.net result:

In addition to this switch, what I was able to do was cancel the second phone line that was for a fax-only line (and the ADSL internet line), and use the BBPhone (IP phone) that comes with it as my fax! I can also use it as a fax/phone so that people can call me on that new 050- number or fax and it is actually cheaper from anywhere in the world (ask your local carrier how much to call a 050 internet phone number in Japan if you want to see the difference for comparison to the regular rates for an 0776 number issued by NTT). So I cancelled the second line yesterday and that also saves us an additional JPY 1600 per month! All in all, by making this shift, we will be getting the exact same service, but saving JPY 3000 (about USD $30) a month on communication charges. And I like that!

Use some of that bandwidth you have to spread the Globalized Love! I love the communication we all have via mail, chat, voice, blog, and mind. I appreciate this connection because it brings me all closer to you! And I cherish that! Thank you for being in my life!

Have a great evening, night, morning or afternoon where ever you may be, and NetSpeed to you!

I love you!

Cam

Spring on Jouhouji

Yesterday I went for a bike ride. I thought it might rain, but the clouds did not turn so the ride was a success.

I have not been on my bike since last November so I don't have the legs, arms, hands or back for it yet. Therefore I decided to take it easy and just road ride my bike up into the mountains.

Across the Kuzuryu River is a campground up at the 500-600m elevation (1m = roughly 1yard). The paved road that goes up is fairly steep and yes, it kicked my ass. Luckily the BCAAs I took gave me the energy to make it to the top because when I got there, I was once again able to enjoy the beautiful sakura still in full bloom at the higher altitude.

It was a 12km trip from door to campground. The trip took one hour and fifteen minutes to get up to the top, and thirty minutes to get back home. My max speed coming down the winding mountain road was 55kmh (about 30mph). The steepest part took about 50 minutes to climb, and only 10 minutes to descent so you can visualize the kind of trip it was.

Enough of the textural descriptions... Enjoy the scenery as did I.
(photos taken with my cell phone so the quality is not as good as it could be).

I love you!

Cam

Sick Around Japan

I was talking with Jen the other day about a variety of things and she had mentioned that her husband watched a TV program by Frontline, called “Sick around the World” on the “social” healthcare systems in five countries that “worked” compared with the USA system. He was interested to know what Jen’s “friends in Japan” thought about the discussion so he forwarded her a link to the program after it came online. She sent it to me asking if I had any thoughts on the topic. Rather than watching the actual interviews, and the program, I thought that the more important thing would be for me to read the transcript of the interview with the Japanese Healthcare Economics specialist. And so I did. It was a good read, and it reaffirmed pretty much what I experience in real life and have always thought about the healthcare system here in Japan. Of course it isn’t perfect, but it does work extremely well, and the most important thing is that nobody is “left to rot”.

I agree with everything the specialist Naoki Ikegami is saying in the transcript of the interview in Japan. There is nothing incorrect here in the interview that does not correspond with “in the street” or “real life experience” as so often happens when “global reviews” take place. A good example of this “gap” is what happens in Europe when countries switch to the Euro; the governments say that things become more expensive by only a few single digit percentage points, but in reality, (in Italy and other countries where I have real friends), they say that their cost of living expenses have gone up by 30- 50% since their currency has been dropped for the Euro. These are real-life results as opposed to “government statistics” and you always have to be careful when you look at things like this, to go to the street as well.

I will include the comments that I believe are, to me, of the most value in the interview, although I recommend reading the entire interview through to get a good overall picture of the differences between the Japanese and American systems. Before I do so, I would just like to give my own thoughts on this overall system with a few short examples of when I needed major care in the hospital (cut my fingertip off and had emergency appendectomy).

I love this system, and have never found my "copays" to be overly expensive.

When I cut my fingertip off it cost me about JPY 3,000 I think for the initial visit. Then I went back every day for two weeks and they changed the bandages. The cost per visit then was just a few hundred yen a time and the amount of time I was in front of a doctor was like he says in the interview, just a few minutes. I would say that I didn’t pay any more than JPY 15,000 in total when all was said and done, and that includes medication, antibiotics, and all the follow-up visits. The wait time was less than 30 minutes. It was no problem at all.

One of the reasons why we have “3X then number of visits to hospitals compared with Americans” that the interviewer mentions is that the doctors have us come back regularly to continually inspect, change bandages, and watch the healing process. I don’t think it is like this in the USA, as far as I know, and once the initial procedure is done (unless of course it is a major procedure), you are on your to take care of it properly.

When I had my emergency appendectomy, the entire thing, including 10 days in the hospital didn't cost me any more than $300 to the hospital. That was it. Of course there was the national healthcare I pay which varies every year depending on how much money I make in the year. If I make very little money, I pay very little. When I made a fair deal two years ago, I ended up paying about $2,000 for the entire year. That's about $166 per month. It’s peanuts, really.

There are two kinds of coverage; one is funded over 50% by employer. Mayu was in that when she was working. The other one is national health care and I have opted for that. It revolves around your salary, and the copay used to be more than the employer based, but now it's the same: 30%. I did my calculations years ago to decide which one to go for and chose National because I don't get sick much at all.

Also the company-related one includes deductions for pension, etc. and since I don't pay pension here I chose not to, even though it is mandatory and instead invest overseas my monthly pension contribution for my future. The reason I chose not to is that in order to get pension I have to be working in Japan for minimum of 20 years. At the time I did not know if I would be here in Japan that long and chose not to invest in something with "iffy" returns. Now, 20 years later I look back and am still glad I invested on my own because the pension plan system in Japan is collapsing and the government has made a mess of it (they "lost" the pension payments of 500,000 people. It's a debacle).

Also the number of elderly and retiring baby boomers is skyrocketing, and we are at critical mass plus the numbers of young not working, and not paying pension is at an all time high, a very bad situation. This is a separate problem, and not really directly related to healthcare, but related to the amount of money the elderly who get sick more often have to use on healthcare, so it indirectly affects the situation.

It works very smoothly indeed, and because the government is involved, it can be considered "social medicine" but it is in no way anything like it is portrayed as in the USA "socialized (communistic) medicine".

Please be sure to read the interview and then you will understand my next comments: I can see doctors in the USA screaming "government control!!" over this system because the Japanese government does control the amount of money they can make and how much can be billed; it is highly regulated.

I believe that "the business of healthcare" should NOT be treated in the same way as “the business of products and services”. In the latter you provide basic commodities, luxuries and services to people at a price, and try to make as much money from it as possible. That’s business. The people who can afford the product at the highest profit margin, will pay it, and those who cannot will go elsewhere to find a lower level, lower quality basic product that suites their needs. If they can afford it, they will purchase, but if they can't they learn to do without.

In healthcare, if you can't afford the product you have a good chance of becoming extremely ill, or even of dying. It isn’t a matter of “doing without” if you’ve cut your fingertip off, or just finding some “discount 100 yen shop” to run in for an appendectomy. It doesn’t work that way. And it shouldn’t, in my opinion. I feel there is a fundamental difference in these “businesses” and only those who understand this difference should be in "the business of saving lives". Healthcare should not be about making the highest profit margin that the market will support. It is not the same.

I think this pretty much covers my experience here in the Japanese system that runs very smoothly. It will be interesting to see how it works over the next 10 years as the baby boomers, retirees all age and our aging silvers are more than the paying and working population. There will likely be a big stress on the system. It may get more expensive and they may find way to shift taxes around, and the working population may have to pay more in taxes to cover the retired, but it won't break us; we won’t be put out on the street wandering around confused, and drugged because we don’t have the funds to pay grossly over-inflated prices. The country will most likely continue to provide medical care to everyone who needs it, without making them go broke. - Cam

Here are the key points that I believe hit home in this interview:

So here we are in a country with the longest life expectancy, good health results, low costs -- sounds like paradise. Are there problems in paradise?

I think it's a mirror image of the United States in that we [underspend] on health care. For example, in the year 2006, health expenditures only increased by 0.1 percent, whereas the nominal GDP increased by ... 1.5 percent.

Health care went up 1/10 of 1 percent?

Right, and the reason why the government has this tight control over all prices is because the national government funds one-quarter of health expenditures, ... and the Japanese government now has a huge deficit amounting to 1.5 percent [of] GDP, and the debt is still increasing as a result of having to make tax cuts and investing in public works during the 10 years of deficit.

So in order to [start] paying back, they are making every effort to cut expenditures. This is across-the-board cost containment, and health expenditures are under that umbrella.

And remember that this is happening at the time when Japan is having a very rapid growth for the elderly. According to my calculations, just aging within the population should contribute a 2 percent increase, so the fact that there has been only a 0.1 percent [increase] means that real ... expenditures did decrease. ...

I think what you're getting at here is that they've got a system that makes sure people don't go broke paying medical bills.

Right. I think the main goal of a public health insurance system is to prevent people [from] going broke.

How many people in Japan go bankrupt because of medical bills?

None, or at least there should be none, because first of all, they should be covered, and if they're not covered, then they can get covered by paying back one year's premiums. And if they can't pay back the one year's premium, then they will be on public assistance.

If somebody in Japan loses [her] job, does she lose her health insurance, too?

She loses the employment-based insurance, but then there's the community-based insurance, which is mandated for her to enroll and for the local government to enroll that person.

Can they turn her down if she has heart disease or something?

That is forbidden. ... Neither can the employer deny in hiring someone because of health conditions.

So if lose my job I don't lose my health insurance; in fact, I'm required to buy it, but from the city instead of an employer?

Yeah. ... It's more like taxes rather than having something that you want to pay or must pay. ...

These health care plans covering basic health care for a worker and his family, do they make a profit?

No, because they are not allowed to make a profit. And anything left over is carried over to the next year, and if there's a lot carried over, then the premium rate would go down.

Do you think the Japanese people feel that everyone in this country should all have a basic package of medical coverage?

According to opinion polls, I would not only say basic but egalitarian coverage [for] all. Over 70 percent of the Japanese, when they're asked that question, say they're not only in favor of basic coverage; they are in favor of egalitarian coverage.

Notes:

Link to Interview Transcript:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/interviews/ikegami.html

Current Exchange: JPY 100 = USD $ 1.00

I.A.M. Kyoto Part 2: The Kyoto One Day Tour, April 16th

Hugging Pandasu on the bus tour.

I awoke at 3.45 in the morning to someone out in the street opening and closing the big metal shutters in front of their business. I dozed again, to be awoken another 15 - 20 minutes later to the same effect. If you have ever heard these shutters that they open and close in front of their entire store front, you will know the sound; it ... grates... garagaragaragaragaragggggrrrraagggggg. Sort of like that. And early early in the morning, it is not a pleasant noise to be awakened by.

Right next to my head was an air duct vent in the wall that stuck out. I could hear the five Axe Murderers above me snoring all night long. I awoke and dozed to their orchestrated symphony of varying decibels as it echoed up and down the pipes.

The pillow filled with rocks made my neck and face sore, but I survived that as well as the fact that even sleeping diagonally was not quite long enough for me and my shoulders and feet stuck out at both ends of the futon. But I survived that, too.

Then at about 5 in the morning I heard some women through the paper thin walls and that got my attention, but not enough to really understand what language they were speaking. Likely it was a foreign language as I couldn't pick out any words I really understood.

At 6am I heard through the pipes again from the floor above me the Axe Murderers above all up and moving around, laughing, joking, and teasing.

At 6.45 I got "the call" saying they were all downstairs and ready to go.

We walked 30 minutes to Kyoto station and some of the other women were kind of worried that NOW maybe I was really going to do them in because I was taking them through "questionable" parts of town. But they made it all in five pieces to our Tour Pickup point, The New Miyako Hotel. We dropped off our luggage, and walked 10 minutes to a Skylark restaurant for a great JPY 800 breakfast buffet that filled us up with good protein for the day.

Then we headed back to the hotel, and loaded onto the bus for the Kyoto One Day Tour by JTB Sunrise Tours. Here is how JTB markets it:

Experience Kyoto, Japan’s capital from 794-1868. Visit Nijo Castle, the residence of the Tokugawa era shoguns, and the gold-leaf covered Golden Pavilion, which houses sacred relics of Buddha and is surrounded by exquisite gardens renowned for their beauty. Walk through the Kyoto Imperial Palace and watch traditional Japanese artisans work their craft at the Kyoto Handicraft Center. Visit Heian Jingu Shrine, a partial replica of the Imperial Palace. Walk through Sanjusangendo Temple, Japan’s longest wooden structure, famous for its 1,001 human-sized Kannon statues, and browse through the specialty shops leading up to Kiyomizudera Temple for a sweeping view of the city.

Here is their itinerary with some photos that I took, stuck in between:

Nijo Castle

The Kyoto Residence of the Tokugawa Shogun built in 1603, Nijo Castle is noted for the contrast of its solemn appearance and gorgeous interiors.

Visiting the Shogun's castle in Kyoto was fascinating. The nightingale flooring, a security system designed centuries ago is unique, and utterly brilliant!

Kinkakuji Temple (Golden Pavilion)

The most authentic and exquisite Japanese style garden in the world, plus the celebrated Golden Pavilion.

The Kinkakuji Temple in Kyoto, Japan is one of my favourites

Kyoto Imperial Palace

The ancient Imperial Palace clearly shows the Japanese taste for purity, simplicity and calmness.

The sakura in Kyoto were still in bloom so we were very fortunate.

This is one of the most beautiful publicly-owned gardens in Japan.
The Kyoto Imperial Palace is owned by us, the taxpayers, so it's "ours"!

Kyoto Handicraft Center

Enjoy buffet lunch (free soft drinks included except alcoholic drink) and shopping at Kyoto Handicraft Center.

Heian Jingu Shrine

Graceful old court life is reflected in the brightly colored shrine with its vermilion pillars and green roof, and in its enchanting inner gardens and ponds.

There are many kinds of Sakura. This is one of the bigger ones. But just as lovely. Wouldn't you love to have something like this on your lapel for an April Sakura Wedding?

It started to pour as we walked through the gardens at Heian shrine in Kyoto.

Sanju-Sangendo Hall

A renowned long wooden hall housing all of 1,001 statues of Kannon that date back to the 13th century.

Kiyomizudera Temple

A quaint old lane lined with pottery shops leads to the temple. Enjoy a sweeping view of the entire city from its lofty terrace.

It was crowded going up to Kiyomizu-dera, as usual.

This temple is one of the busiest and most popular in all of Japan.

When all was said and done, we made it back to the hotel, where we picked up our stuff, and wandered into the Kyoto Station. We found a good restaurant up in the department store, enjoyed dinner together, and then headed back down to the Shinkansen Gates where we hugged our goodbyes and they walked off into the sunset, happy, tired, but alive and in five pieces to ride the 19:29 Shinkansen back to Tokyo where they planned to meet yet another Internet Axe Murderer, Jaime, the very next day!

Pandasu and her "adepts", learning the Axe Murderer ropes.

I loved meeting all five of them, and I hope they have great memories and stories to take back with them to their homeland. I loved it!

If four "normal people" can hug an unknown MALE Internet Axe Murderer, I have to conclude that it was yet another mission accomplished successfully!

More photos can be found on Flickr.

I.A.M. Kyoto Part 1: Sharpening the Axe, April 15th can be found here!

IAM Kyoto Part 1: Sharpening the Axe, April 15th

The trip to Kyoto went flawlessly, except for the fact that I left the house five minutes before my first train arrived, and had to drive instead of walk like I usually do. I made it with 30 seconds to spare, and no sweat, so all went well. The trip into Fukui was eventless (i.e. nobody threw themselves in front of the train, thus delaying our trip). I specifically went in about 90 minutes early so that I could go and see if there were any bags like the one we sent my brother for Christmas.

I'm needing a bag of like a thick, rough take-anywhere shoulder slinger thing with lots of pockets outside for stuff like pens, notepads, cell phone, airborne, and more. And then inside with a couple of slots big enough to say hold my computer sideways, as well as an A4 notebook and stuff. and a 500ml bottle of water on the outside, too. Of course outside pockets need flaps to tie, or button or buckle down. "Pocket-like" shape would be cool, too; kinda "neo-military-ish" if you know what I mean.

I want to be able to toss it around and roughhouse with it without stitching coming undone. I figured brass buckles and closures would be cool in canvas... or ... denim. I am hoping to find something like this unless the Fabric Goddess has any other awesome ideas (which in all honesty just came to me now as I was typing... I'd get a bag like that from her gladly if she could do one up.

I kind of thought it would be cool to take on exactly the kind of trip I went on to Kyoto so would want to put in it a change of clothes, toiletries, and the such. Having buckles and straps on the side, I could cinch it thinner when I was only needing it to go into town, or let it all the way out when I wanted to overnight. Very cool idea....

Well, I didn't find it in Fukui so went with my cycling bag which is cool for cycling, and feels great on the back, but not so hip when you want to look cool and impressive to meet five women, if you know what I mean? I caught the train and took an easy 90 minutes into Kyoto, reading "A New Earth" by Chart Tulle, and listening to an hour of my relaxation MP3's. It was a great trip.

When I arrived, I got a call saying the women would be a bit late because they had to go past Kyoto up to Osaka, and then get on a different train and come back. They did, and after figuring out that they were waiting at the Kyoto Shinkansen Central entrance while I was waiting at the "real" Central entrance, we met up. Pandasu gave me a great bit Axe Murderer hug, and her four wary-weary travel companions eyed me with caution, and politely shook my hand, keeping a good distance from this monster tall "Internet Axe Murderer"...

The Internet Axe Murderer (IAM) Conference in Kyoto had begun!

I decided to break the ice by taking them out for tonkatsu dinner. And so I did! We went up the nine stories of escalators in the Kyoto Station atrium and they enjoyed the beauty of the station. It's a wonderful work of art, that station, and I think it was designed by the same person who designed the Paris CDG airport which is also a wonderful work of industrial art. We ate, and they loved it all!

(You can catch all of this on the video once I process it).

After that we took a cab back to the Kyoto Guest Inn which was about a 30 minute walk from the station in the old shopping section of Kyoto. The innmaster was... weird. And that's all I'm going to say other than he showed us a bunch of magic tricks, insisted that we all listen to everything he had to educate us with, and bragged on about the "famous people" who had stayed there in the past.

The rooms were pretty darn small. I got a teeny one for myself with a rock hard futon on the floor and a cornhusk? rice husk pillow that felt like it had rocks in it. The five ladies enjoyed snoring all night long in another room that held five futon, and three pairs of underwear. And that's about it!

Well, five of the six of us went out for a drink and I introduced them to the taste of shochu as well as a couple local tasty dishes of mochi and yomogi grass. They enjoyed it. We had all gotten tired, but Teeza and Maria wanted to do the sento thing (Teeza is half Japanese and grew up here) so we found a local sento and enjoyed it! It was hot! And it had an "electrocution bath that had a current running through it. I THINK you are supposed to just dip body parts in. I jumped in up to my chest and was surprised to watch my hands turn into unopenable claws from the electricity coursing through my entire body. It felt like I was being pummeled by a boxer. I got out, washed, soaked... and then did it again. Twice. I think the ladies next door heard me saying, "I'm dying here!" but I don't really remember it! It was an interesting experiment for sure!

After the bath, we headed back to the inn, and everyone promptly fell asleep and snored until morning.

to be continued...

Keep your eyes open for IAM Kyoto Part 2: The Kyoto One Day Tour, April 16th, coming up next!

Mammanomics: How to get screwed in the global kitchen

This morning I saw a very interesting topic on the news: Japan has a butter shortage!
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My first thought was to write a post about this. Before I could get to it, Rob sent me an equally interesting link on the first recession ever that Starbucks is facing. You can read the article Rob sent me a link to, "The First Starbucks Recession" by the wonderfully propagandized news reporter TIME/CNN .
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In all honesty I don't like Starbucks coffee. It IS too bitter, exactly as the author of the article said at the end of his commentary. And in all honesty, even though The Starbucks CEO Schultz claims McD's coffee is "less than satisfactory" (he was quoted using the word "swill"), I have found that here in Japan, McDonald's Premium Roast is FAR BETTER than Starbucks' brewed coffee which is, in my opinion, "burned toast". They burn the shit out of their beans which leaves a horridly strong acidic aftertaste in the mouth. Sure, it works for latte's but not all of us want to dope ourselves up on cow hormones and get massive carb-induced sleepies (yes, milk is a BIG carb) from it.
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And soy latte's? HAHAHAHA. I've talked about how bad for us soy is, so you won't find me drinking that stuff! I have tried all cream latte's, but although I love the taste of cream, a grande cream sat like a huge lump of curds in my tummy and just rolled around there, making me feel ill. So I try the variety of brewed coffees and other "watered down shots" and stuff, but still, they are all too burned in flavour for my "Italian roast spoiled tastebuds". (Yes, it is true, the espresso in Italy is infinitely tastier than that at Starbucks).
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What I DO like about Starbucks is the atmosphere, a LOT. McDonalds sucks for "atmosphere" and the other coffee shops here are all smoke filled dingy dens, even if they do try to compete with Starbucks. Ugh. But the problem is as the Fox explained, the USA is soooo hard hit by deficit and "middle class cleansing" that the masses (the poor and the rich are at the opposite ends of the economic bell curve) simply cannot afford five bucks a cup!
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If you read that article, I think you will see that Schultz is not entirely on the mark with his assessment, because he is not taking into account that North Americans (Americans specifically) simply DO NOT HAVE THE CASH to go in for the "five bucks" on a regular basis anymore, and it is only getting worse.
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"We Japanese" learned through our 15 year repression all about becoming "recessioned". Now it's time for America and their big companies to feel the pinch along with all the consumers who may want to buy a "five bucks" but simply cannot...
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Back to my main topic of the day: butter and the amazing shortage in Japan!
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This is an easy lesson on global economics and even a "house mom" who gets sleepy at simply hearing the word "economics" should perk up her ears at this topic because it really DOES affect the household, the family and a whole lot more.
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It seems that Japan has basically "run out of butter" Yep. It was on the news this morning. It is a massive deficit of that creamy goodness stuff that goes in everything from the croissants and delicious breads the Japanese are maniacs for, to the buttery smoothness of tonkotsu raamen! The patisserie's are getting a fraction of what they need, or none at all. Schools have been forced to change school lunches because they can't get the breads they were using. Prices are rising, demand is strong... but there is NO SUPPLY.
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What happened?
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Economics.
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Global Economics to be more specific.
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FRIKKIN GLOBALIZATION if you want to know the truth! Globalization in all its glory that the economists and governments and businesses completely ignore when they make their decisions to cut costs by "going global" and importing products and services from overseas based solely on "price competition".
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Yep. Big business really screwed up this time, and it looks like it's going to take a long time to fix this mess.
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It is a serious problem.
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In the past, prices for milk in Japan started to go up. So butter manufacturers decided to buy from India and China. Well, guess what happened out there? Their GDP (income) has increased dramatically, and they are demanding more milk-related products, more grain-related products, more "obesity-related carbohydrates" just like we in the west. They are following on our heels quickly. But because their population is so vastly ginormous compared to ours in the west and here in Japan, the demand for these "new foods" like dairy, cheese in China which was until recently shunned as "not fit for human consumption" has created a giant vortex in the production so that prices have skyrocketed out there, as supply gets all sucked up.
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I can't blame this entirely on "out there" of course, because the consumption of "designer breads and pastries" as well as cheese products is skyrocketing here as well, eating up huge amounts of milk products before it ever gets turned into butter (the last thing on the milk-product food chain to be made).
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In the past Japan was buying a ton of milk from China and India to meet the demand, and throwing out the more expensive Japanese milk because nobody here would buy it at the high prices. Then prices out there went up as it does when more people want something (that was the economics lesson by the way, right there), and they stopped using the foreign milk.
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So the companies that produce butter have tried to return to using the now "cheaper" Japanese milk, but because they stopped using the J-Milk processors and dairy farms here a lot of dairies went teats up. So guess what that means? It means that now there is not enough supply here in Japan to be shunted off for butter production and for the first time ever, there is a SERIOUS shortage of butter. This is causing major problems across the land here, and not just in the home kitchen, but in retail as well.
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So, thanks to "globalization", we are not only screwing our blue and white collared middle class "bread winners", we are screwing all of the mamma's working hard to feed their children, keep within the budget and try to stay alive amid dwindling salaries, skyrocketing healthcare, and basic loss of position in the social bell curve.
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You can read this good article from the Japan Times Online, "Butter supplies running short at supermarkets" , written April 6th. Today, three days later, we are actually at a more dire situation than they let on here, as seen on TV news this morning.
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On a final note, I just want to say that I sure hope the Margarine manufacturers don't capitalize on this and "marketize" (brain wash through marketing) the kitchenplace to convince them (again) that margarine is "good for you". It isn't. It's one of the worst things you could EVER put in your mouth. A plastic food that won't ever rot is scary enough, but when you understand how it works on a biochemical level and takes over the receptors that require healthy Essential Fatty Acids that are found in butter, cheeses, proteins, eggs and stuff, and basically prevents the cells from GETTING what they really need... and you begin to see the true health nightmare that "no cholesterol!" margarine has done to our health. It is a true "fake food" not fit for even our worst nightmare enemies and ghouls!
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It's lunchtime, and I'm hungry so I'm heading over to the kitchen, going to open up the fridge and enjoy a nice cold slice of delicious (and expensive) designer butter.....
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I... *tummy rumbling*... love you!
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Cam