Death from Work is Alive & Well

It seems as if "karoshi", or "death from overwork" is still a fairly large problem... among government employees.....
Here is a little article from Kyodo news explaining the situation...

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2,000 national public servants work 80 or more hours overtime a month
Thursday 29th July, 12:32 AM JST

TOKYO —
Over 2,000 national public servants are estimated to work 80 or more hours overtime a month, a level deemed as a key threshold in triggering death from overwork, a survey conducted by a labor union representing civil servants employed by the central government showed Wednesday. According to the 10,000-strong union of public servants who work in Kasumigaseki, Tokyo’s bureaucratic center, 6.3 percent of the 3,000 government officials surveyed said their monthly overtime hours averaged 80 or more.

Union officials said the figure corresponds to over 2,000 bureaucrats working such long overtime overall, as a total of 34,000 people work at ministries and agencies in Kasumigaseki. Among those reporting 80 or more hours of overtime, around 22 percent said they ‘‘currently feel the danger of death from overwork’’ and around 36 percent said they had ‘‘felt the danger in the past.’‘

In the survey, conducted recently, average overtime stood at 32.8 hours per month, down 3.5 hours from the previous survey last year. Officials at the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare’s divisions related to labor policy were found to be working the longest overtime of 73.4 hours per month, up from 66.3 in the previous survey. A union official attributed the increase to ‘‘extra work on holidays, which grew in parallel to more top-down instructions to bureaucrats from the three top parliamentary officials’’ including health minister Akira Nagatsuma.

© 2010 Kyodo News. All rights reserved. No reproduction or republication without written permission. <-- To hell with that.

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The Perfect Japanese OL's Summer Fling...

Check out #4.

 

Remember, these are Japanese WOMEN offering their idea of the perfect summer fling...

 

What would be your ideal summer fling?

TOKYO ―

Magazine website Ozmall (http://www.ozmall.co.jp/ol/honne/vol90/) recently surveyed office ladies (OLs) on what sort of a fling they fantasize about.

Here are some of the top answers from the women who responded.

 

1. With a Latin guy while I’m traveling abroad! I think he would give me an incredibly passionate trip!

2. He invites me to go for a drive one day, and I find out he’s booked a room at a seaside hotel. That would be the best!

3. Like in “Roman Holiday,” but the opposite―I’d go on a fantastic date with a celebrity that I’d never get to meet otherwise.

4. We’re at a fireworks festival when he bumps into me and my yukata gets dirty. He’s so nice, and our love progresses very sweetly; but when the summer ends he’s killed in a motor-bike accident.

5. A younger local guy pursues me passionately while I’m studying abroad for the summer.

6. A celebrity. It has to be someone I would definitely never see again, otherwise things would just drag on.

7. Love at first sight at the library or a bookstore.

8. We’ve each got a significant other, but we get caught up in a fiery love that makes us forget that for a moment. If it was at an exotic resort, I could feel totally separated from reality.

9. I’m on a trip, and he saves me from almost drowning in the ocean. So I fall in love with him.

 

This story originally appeared in Metropolis magazine (www.metropolis.co.jp).

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Music to my ears

Oh My God they've changed the canned music! I fear this is going to play over and over for the next fiscal year!!!!

Never Surrender
Walk Like an Egyptian
Like an Angel
Cuz I'm a Wonderland

And more!!!

Nooooooo!!!!!!!

..........

Hmmmmmmm........

I guess I'll get to practice even more active meditational focus on my muscles when I work out... What a great opportunity! Thanks Paletta crew for changing the music to an era that I dislike!

Cam

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Get off your big, fat, cancerous ass!

If this STUPID STUPID STUPID study makes it into the US mass media, I guarantee you we will see a MAJOR shift in how the world views work, and leisure! For example, since it seems that every single new trend (long lasting or short fad) regarding fitness seems to be invented in the USA (i.e. California), I can envision how people work and play will also get re-invented. Once that catches on in the USA (and it will very quickly because the doctors, nutritionists, health industry, and government will support it fully), it will spread like wildfire... to Japan!

Can you envision people working at standup work stations (like that "private" computer people used on "24" when they wanted to do some illicit file transfers to Jack, or (other) terrorists connected to the CTU?), typing away at computers that are waist high? All day? Then they will make TV stands designed to be viewed while standing erect (not erection, but that might be possible too - I'm serious here! in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way of course). Of course receptionists will no longer be allowed to sit on the job, movie theatres will be designed with standing backrests, and so on, and so on.

But wait! The study says that prolonged sitting OUTSIDE OF WORK LEADS TO increased death risks, cancer risks, and heart disease, so sitting during work is not related! Not related you say? OF course if standing outside of work is good, then standing during work hours must be even better! Of course, so will go the thinking....

They take it even further to say that sitting increases the risk of cancer more for women than men...

This is a huge "waist" of time and money... What will they think of next?

I'd love to post just the link, but you have to log in to read this stuff so I'll include the entire report...
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/725721?sssdmh=dm1.629077&src=nldne&uac=143390MN (in case you can access this link)...

Dumb... dumb... dumb...

If only they would spend more time thinking about the primary cause of cancer (decreased cellular oxygen), how food impacts heart disease in a HUGE way (can you say carbohydrates? Sure, I knew you could!) and not this stupid off-the-wall stuff that is not related to cancer as a primary cause, we might actually get somewhere in our desire to increase life through decreasing death by cancer.

Get off your fucking fat asses, you stupid researchers, and spend our taxpayer money in a way that will have some actual benefit to our health!!

Cam

P.S. Decreasing oxygen to the brain increases the risk of death, so maybe compression of fat cells in the anal region of these retarded researchers really IS a primary cause of cancer.....

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From WebMD Health News
Sitting a Risk Factor for Death
Daniel J. DeNoon

July 23, 2010 — Sit at leisure, die at haste, an American Cancer Society study finds.

In the 14-year study, people who spent at least 6 hours of their daily leisure time sitting died sooner than people who sat less than 3 hours.

And people who both sit a lot and exercise little are at even higher risk of death, find ACS epidemiologist Alpa V. Patel, PhD, and colleagues.

The effect is stronger for women than for men, but significant for both sexes.

Patel's data come from 53,440 U.S. men and 69,776 women who were 50-74 years old when the study began in 1992.

Study participants were asked, "During the past year, on an average day (not counting time spent at your job), how many hours a day did you spend sitting (watching television, reading, etc.)?"

After adjusting for smoking, height/weight, and other factors, Patel's team found that compared to sitting less than three hours a day, sitting six or more hours a day:

Increased the death rate by about 40% in women
Increased the death rate by about 20% in men
Increased the death rate by 94% in the least active women
Increased the death rate by 48% in the least active men
It wasn't just that they weren't getting exercise. Patel and colleagues found that sitting itself was detrimental to health.

Sitting increased risk of cancer death, but the main death risk linked to sitting was heart disease.

"It is beneficial to encourage sedentary individuals to stand up and walk around as well as to reach optimal levels of physical activity," Patel and colleagues conclude.

The study findings appear in the July 22 early online edition of the American Journal of Epidemiology.

SOURCES:

Patel, A.V. American Journal of Epidemiology, published online July 22, 2010.

News release, American Cancer Society.

Authors and Disclosures
Journalist
Daniel J. DeNoon is senior medical writer at WebMD.

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Love Storms

I love it when the sky turns an ominous pink and grey. Then the wind picks up and suddenly goes quiet.

This storm is one of thos fast and furious ones that come when the atmosphere can't bear the heat and the high pressure system any longer.

It's going to be a glorious morning in Kobuchizawa tomorrow. We had this last night in Tokyo. I actually had to take down the sun curtain and close the balcony doors as the sudden wind drove the rain through the balcony and into my apartment.

I love summer storms...

Have a great day!

Cam

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Seeking Reliable, Safe, Cheap etc... Lodgings in San Francisco

Hi!

I need your help, cuz expedia, etc. doesn't do the job. Online searches don't provide reliability so looking on the net is not an option...

My partner at work asked me to help her find a hotel in San Fancisco for her husband with the following conditions:

* Long Stay (2-3 weeks at a time)
* Opportunity to return regularly on business (i.e. preferred client status perks)
* Within walking distance to Union Square
* Low Price
* Safe
* Clean and comfortable
* Food not necessary

Kyoko's husband goes to SF regularly and has the need to get a new base of operations but because the business is mostly sales-related travel for his custom product (see www.magicboxincusa.com) it needs to be low-cost operations (thus the price requirement above).

Can you or anyone you know living and/or working in the region help out with some direct experience and suggestions? Simply checking on the net doesn't really provide rliable info and in this case using a network of friends around the globe actually provides better, more trustworthy results. Thanks in advance for any suggestions you may have!

I love you!
Cam

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Shangri-La, Summer 2010

I'm at Komatsu Airport an hour and a half early. Its a teeeeny weeeeny airport (kinda like me) so that when you enter the building you are already checking in and when you go up the stairs you are already going through security and when you exit security you are in line and boarding the plane! But if you take one step to the left or the right you can avoid the boarding, sit down and gaze out on my beautiful mountains in Shangri-La and watch them slowly fade into darkness. The weekend was fantastic! We cycled deep in the mountains all day Saturday after saving a woodsman who had collapsed on the side of the road and was suffering serious heat stroke. We rode all day Sunday in our Saturday riding place. We saw a ton of wild animals, big and small. On the way home we visited Kamishii and saw that the house in which Mayu and I lived in for the last six years was unlived in and falling/rotting into disrepair. It was a pitiful jungle of despair.

We visited our old friends at the previous house and chatted them until they were smiling and laughing. I gave them some Tokyo gifts and in exchange received two huge boxes of freshly-dug (that afternoon) potatoes as well as about 50 onions, two giant heads of cabbage, a dozen or more cucumbers and a bunch of fresh eggplant! Wow! Talk about country friendliness!!

Then Sunday night out we went for a night run enjoying the cooler humidity and the heightened tension that goes with only seeing where the bike lamps light up. We lay on a bridge over a river in the middle of nowhere and gazed at the stars for 45 minutes as the heat from the concrete warmed and dried our soaking wet bodis.

Today we rode along the sea in the forest and then along the cliffs (met two gorgeous sisters and their family from Tokyo and chatted them until they were smiling and laughing). We stopped at our favourite coffee cabin by the sea and chatted the owner (as usual) until he was smiling and laughing.

We napped in the mountains, got lots of sun, enjoyed the heat, humidity and the sun. Saturday was the official end of the rainy season so the weather was hot, clear and perfect the entire three days.

We even went hiking in the mountains Sunday!

Talk about the perfect weekend in Shangri-La.

Now I am heading back to the concrete jungle, laden with omiyage for my coworkers and preparing to put on the monkey suit for days of sitting at the computer reading, typing, and more.
Over the next week or two I'll upload the myriad of photos of scenery that most of you will know because I have been shooting this scenery for 20 years. I NEVER get tired of it. NEVER!!! Also I will work on the video I took and probably end up processing and uploading five or six videos to my YouTube channel (some only in Japanese this time). That is going to take some time considering my busy Tokyo life, but I'll get it done. It amazes me how Hokuriku and I speak the same soul language... Even the humidity which is way higher than tokyo just feels right.

Max and I had a three day weekend that felt just like any other extended weeknd as if I was still living here. And in a big way... I still am. Something tells me I'll be back...

I love you!!

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Shangri-La la la!

It never ceases to amaze me how my back locks and is so stiff the morning after spending the night sleeping on a futon on the floor. And yet so many people swear by it, Japanese and aliens alike.

The air smells like earth... there is so much more humidity compared to Tokyo that the air really does feel wet; it maintains all the surrounding smells due to the heaviness. Ahhhhh the sounds of a myriad of insects buzzing, humming, chitting, whirling and squealing tells me I. am. home.

Where is the constant traffic hum, I ask myself? Gone! Vanished! Self replies. The vehicles that do pass by are interruptions to the sound of peaceful nature, not the standard background noise of the city. I miss the cicadas; to hear them everywhere around me... their meeee meeeeee meeeeeee songs have always been a pleasure to my senses, one of Mother Nature's perfectly tuned, always playing in harmony musical instruments.

The birdsongs are another instrument of life that I find mysteriously lacking in Tokyo. You actually have to go somewhere specific to find birdsong because in most cases they don't come to you.

The surroundings are tall, lush, green mountains instead of architectural wonders of concrete, steel and glass.

In the future years when I have moved on from Tokyo to the next great adventure, Tokyo will always have a place in my heart. But Hokuriku will always have my soul.

It's no wonder meditation came so easy to me here... Just being. Is. Being.

Enough newage mumbojumbo shit. Time to get some food in my gullet, fill my drinking bladder with water for a ride, slather on the necessary insect repellant with 100% deet (not needed in Tokyo as biting insects seem to be absent - except cockroaches of course) and then get some of Mother Nature's soap stuck between my teeth!

Have a goooooood weekend. Mine is long. And wonderful it is to be spending it in my Shangri-La.

I love you!

Cam

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Theresh Alwayshroom for More, or...

Better & Better

... is how I would describe this day's progression.

I arrived at Kobuchizawa, enjoyed some sun and rain, caught the cab and had a good chat, arrived at work...

and one of the researchers gave me this delicious mushroom that she had just picked this morning in the surrounding area! She says it is like the italian portobello mushrooms.

I can hardly wait to cook up a great mushroom steak.

All the great things that happened today are a blessing. I am so grateful for each and every one of them!

I love You Universe!

Cam

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Another Fantastic McUniversal Adventure

I KNEW there was a reason why I wanted to take lunch at McDonalds today! The reason eluded me but ithad to be there since only amazing things happen in my life on a daily basis.

As I was sitting and enjoying a half hour of A/C I saw a woman with her crying infant putting her finished tray of food in the appropriate place. I knew she was going to have to carry her infant, and her bag and the child stroller down the stairs to leave... because she had to carry them up to find a place to eat (no tables or chairs on the main floor, no escalator nor elevator). As soon as I saw the wheels of the stroller begin to move I jumped up, went over to her and offered to carry her stroller down to the exit for her. She accepted with gratitude and appreciation. So I carried it down for her, made sure that she came down the stairs safely, and wished her a wonderful afternoon in the rain.

And then I went back and continued eating.

It was raining as I walked to the statioin entrance and I got wet but it sure felt good! I am so glad it is raining.

Off to Kobuchizawa so have a glorious day.

I love you!
Cam

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India Ink

OK, here's a questian for all you Indian friends (India Indians) out there:

Tonight the really smelly (i.e. sour week old curry-sweat) Indian guy came into the bath just as I was heading out. Nice body, not overweight, shapely longer face, good teeth. And... He had loosely tied around his waist two strings of differing hues of red. I didn't bother to stop him and ask him face-to-face with both of us singing the theme song to "Free Willy" but nonetheless I am curious.

Can anyone out there enlarge my ... perspective on different cultures, please? After all there are all kinds of different strokes for different folks. Namaste.

I love you!

Cammywood

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News From The Big Rice Bowl 2010/07/01

Here is a little Rice Bowl News for you to chew as I enjoy my lunch. Happy Canada Day!!!

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Anything for a princess...

A weekly magazine claimed the Imperial Household Agency asked administrators at Princess Aiko's elementary school to supplement the school meals with ADD medication in order to calm down "unruly" boys who were scaring the little princess. The agency denied the story and demanded an apology and a correction.

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You're kidding, right?...

A man walked into a koban (local police box) in Itabashi with a kitchen knife and tried to make the officer on duty hand over his gun so he could rob a bank. The cop used his nightstick to knock the knife out of the perpetrator's hand and then arrested him.

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And here's one from my old stomping ground...

A 61-year-old man in Kanazawa o trial for using a stolen bank card to withdraw cash from an ATM was xonerated in a case of mistaken identity. ALthough the man bore a remarkable resemblance to the culprit, who was caught on a surveillance tape, he was freed after the police lab "determined that the defendant and the man on the tape were different based on the shape of their ears."

*****

Have a great week. I love you!

Cam

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