okitokidoki's past comments

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  okitokidokiApr. 30, 2013 - 04:16PM JST

  angeia

  I remember fighting with my elementary school to allow me to teach the kids how to write the alphabet, but they absolutely forbade me to do so because it was against the ministry of education’s guidelines. They said ABCs would interfere with their hiragana-katakana learning. Puh-lease.""

  I have the same experience, and apparently frungy does too.. As many non-Japanese sounds cannot be properly represented by kana, for example non-vowel word endings, I think the monbushou would improve things much by stopping the use of katakana for teaching pronunciation of foreign language in general and by replacing kunrei transliteration of kana (taught in elementary schools) with Hepburn transliteration for English in particular.

  Transliterate "sit" to kana and then to romaji according to kunrei and it should be clear the practice does not distinguish between bull-sit and .. well it should be clear.

  Posted in: Gov't plans to increase number of foreign English teachers to 10,000

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  okitokidokiNov. 06, 2012 - 05:58PM JST

  The Airman's behavior is of course unsat. But I can't help wondering if he was one of the many aircraft maintainers at KAB that have been on 16 hr shifts with almost no days off for a year or so....

  Posted in: U.S. serviceman says he doesn't remember punching boy

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  okitokidokiMay. 25, 2012 - 12:31PM JST

  10,000 yen is about $85?

  How much in dollars will you let me exchange for yen at that rate?

  according to http://www.xe.com, 10,000JPY = 125.40USD

  Posted in: Your face on a Y10,000 bill

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  okitokidokiMay. 19, 2012 - 09:06AM JST

  Re Male-Male erotic relationships in traditional Japanese society, less informed readers of this forum might benefit from searching Ihara(井原 西鶴?, 1642 – September 9, 1693) and Comrade Loves Of the Samurai, a collection of Ihara's stories dealing with the topic, or The Great Mirror of Male Love (The Encyclopedia of Male Love) (男色大鑑 1687)

  Posted in: Beat Takeshi compares same-sex marriage with bestiality

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  okitokidokiMay. 07, 2012 - 08:33PM JST

  Torture does work- it may not work reliably as a means of obtaining tactical or strategic information, but it is effective to terrorize large numbers of people who see even a few others' loved ones' lives destroyed.

  Torture is therefore tempting to those seeking power. Some will seek to use it to impose their political will, even against their own populations. They have to start somewhere, with a plausible excuse. Then mission creep sets in.

  Study the reality of torture in political struggle and then where it leads, its ultimate forms, whether in Soviet Gulags, Nazi concentration camps, Cambodian killing fields, Chinese or DPRK's re-education camps, in Chile under Pinochet, or in Argentina during its dirty war. Torture takes on a demonic dynamic of its own.

  What person or institution can you really trust with this insidious weapon of mass persuasion?

  What you do to your enemies' troops will sooner or later be done to yours. What you do to your enemies' populations you will sooner or later do against your own. What you do to your enemies will be done to you. Imitating your enemy you will become your own enemy yourself.

  If you still think torture can get you something you want, study the lives of torturers. Many did not end well.

  Article Unavailable

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  okitokidokiFeb. 25, 2012 - 11:10PM JST

  No drinking water? Looks like it needs a water filter or bleach for purifying water, containers for/with water, trash bags to keep blankets and other items dry or use as rain coats, flashlights or light sticks. Etc.

  19 000 for blankets, toilet paper and gloves? Oh, and a blowup pillow. Sweet dreams and good luck....

  I think they make the storage box it's in and found another way to sell it?

  Posted in: Disaster survival kit

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  okitokidokiFeb. 18, 2012 - 12:45PM JST

  "Free " toll roads paid for by ----- everyone's taxes...........

  Some toll-road company must have made out in a gross way, but hardly anybody questioned this?

  Posted in: What do foreigners find strange about Japan? NTV finds out

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  okitokidokiJan. 28, 2012 - 11:18PM JST

  not even a tape recording?

  Posted in: At least 10 groups dealing with disaster kept no detailed records of meetings

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  okitokidokiNov. 09, 2011 - 04:15PM JST

  replying to DisillusionedNov. 08, 2011 - 09:50PM JST

  I have to disagree with the, "too little, too late!" comments. (..)Gees, your smoke detectors in your home give off radiation.

  I invite you to eat the Americium-241 pellet in your smoke detector. Grind and dissolve it first to better simulate the form that radioactive contamination in food may take.

  Posted in: Tokyo starts radiation checks on city's food

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  okitokidokiOct. 07, 2011 - 12:37AM JST

  @Johannes

  I'm worried that possibly the risks of internal radiation are not addressed enough.

  The radiation dose rate you mentioned -0.3 muSv/h- may be safe, but reflects only the external gamma radiation reaching the body from its environment.

  Cesium is a strong beta emitter. It is present as microscopic dust in the environment,and perhaps dissolved in rainwater.

  Beta particle radiation travels only a few inches in air, and as most contamination is on the ground, it is underrepresented by the dose rates obtained from typical measurements taken 1 meter above the ground. That's if the detector is even sensitive to beta radiation.

  Is there not a strong possibility that people will inhale cesium dust or ingest cesium in some form, whether in rice or mushrooms or from eating a sandwich with contaminated hands? Does Cesium leave the body quickly or does some of it become part of body tissues? And once in the body, does Cesium not bombard the tissues around it with beta radiation? Is that radiation not a risk? In addition to the external gamma radiation?

  I agree the ambient gamma radiation level in Tsukuba is relatively low, except perhaps in some hot spots. Going North from Koriyama the ambient level increases rapidly, in areas where people still live their daily lives.

  I watched kids walking to school as I drove by, my car raising a cloud of dust as I listened to my GM counter making more noise than I had ever heard from it (other than testing using a known source). And I worried about that. Perhaps I was overreacting?

  Posted in: Contaminated soil found outside Fukushima no-go zone

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  okitokidokiAug. 10, 2011 - 09:18PM JST

  Mimana

  Article Unavailable

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  okitokidokiAug. 07, 2011 - 05:53PM JST

  smithinjapan: Why not just send a TEPCO manager? Good point! They could probably lie, cheat and mismanage any country back to the stone age using just the available local technology if given a chance by politicians they bought and paid for. Sigh.

  Posted in: Ishihara says Japan should conduct simulated nuclear weapons tests

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  okitokidokiAug. 07, 2011 - 05:39PM JST

  Does Japan really need nuclear bombs? Can't they just send a Tepco-managed nuclear powerplant to their enemies? That weapon was already tested and appears capable of serious damage.

  Posted in: Ishihara says Japan should conduct simulated nuclear weapons tests

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  okitokidokiAug. 05, 2011 - 03:31PM JST

  Chewable?

  Posted in: Edible condiment from soy sauce

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  okitokidokiAug. 05, 2011 - 03:25PM JST

  IMHO If you have the money to drink out -after driving there-, you have the money to take an unten daiko. If you don't have the money for an unten daiko, you don't have the money to drink out .

  Posted in: 3 Kanagawa teachers disciplined for various infractions

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  okitokidokiJul. 25, 2011 - 12:31AM JST

  @ Liz Many hospitals are paid by the national health insurance system for the number of days a patient occupies a bed, whether that's needed or not, obviously if the patient is not very sick he/she won't be much trouble, nor require expensive other measures or staff time. The patient pays bout 20 percent of what the insurance pays I believe. I suspect that may have something to do with this Japan having "one of the longest hospital stays in the world" issue- almost (social-) insurance fraud?

  Posted in: Cases of emergency patient refusal by hospitals rise to over 16,000

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  okitokidokiJul. 25, 2011 - 12:21AM JST

  We brought a Japanese man who was sufferingfrom a reaction to a wasp sting to Onna clinic in Okinawa. He had lost consciousness abd stopped breathing due to swelling in the throat, he was sweating and his skin looked gray. Our medic was not trained or equipped to open his windpipe with an airway or tracheotomy, nor to administer oxygen or epinephrin. We called ahead to the clinic and they started refusing us, but the nearest hospital was over 30 minutes away and as the victim had already stopped breathing during our evacuation from the worksite I believed we had no time. We continued to the clinic and the man at the reception continued to refuse to allow us to speak to the doctor. I had to scream out loud so the doctor who was in a treatment room down the hallway could hear us. Once he heard my description of the sting and the signs he ran out and he treated the victim in our vehicle, as there was obviously no time to bring him inside. After receiving epinephrin by IV he started breathing again and regained consciousness. The doctor himself said the man almost died. Because of later events I believe he may have had lasting effects as it is, and I wonder if a slightly quicker treatment would have made the difference. I was especially disappointed because they advertise they operate an ambulance and I had visited this clinic earlier while preparing our safety plan, and had received their assurance that I could rely on them for emergency treatment during business hours.

  Posted in: Cases of emergency patient refusal by hospitals rise to over 16,000

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  okitokidokiJul. 24, 2011 - 10:32PM JST

  @ crazyJoe

  Sounds like the voice of reason. You seem well informed. Sure hope you're right. Would you explain how you came to this figure? 3591 bq per kg means , I believe, that in every kilo of meat, every second, 3591 events of disintegration (decay) of an atom occur. AFAIK in the bq measurement there is no distinction made between gamma or beta or alpha type decay events . However I think the damage done (energy transferred) by a beta versus a gamma event is much greater at short range, such as in the case of ingestion. If I understand this correctly, the destructive potential (weighting factor) of beta is at least twice and alpha 20 times as powerful as that of gamma. Therefore there is no clear relation to the the exposure type measurement applicable to CT scans, which I think are much less destructive photon-type radiation events, and happen only momentarily, instead of continuously. Radiation from radioisotopes permanently lodged in the body might be more comparable to something like a very low power ct scan that never stops, and also includes particulate radiation, not photons only. I need some help with the math. Would you please explain how you came to this figure of 46mSv? Is this 46mSv per year? Whole body? Intestinal tract only? For one year only or for the multiple half lives of the radioactive isotopes permanently absorbed into bones, muscle or connective tissues? I worry about this and look forward to your informed response.

  Posted in: Radioactive cesium found in rice straw fed to cattle in Mie

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  okitokidokiApr. 03, 2011 - 05:53PM JST

  Perhaps withholding information on dangerous levels of contamination or on the seriousness of ongoing uncontrolled nuclear emergencies should be a prosecutable offense, especially if it can be shown to have lead to serious physical or enormous economic damage.

  This should be reviewed after we decide whether managing of nuclear facilities in such a way as to lead to widespread contamination (or worse)should be a capital offense.

  Posted in: Should rumor spreading be a prosecutable offense?

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  okitokidokiMar. 30, 2011 - 07:52PM JST

  I've seen escape capsules and boats on oil platforms that had engines that could survive (as part of/inside the vessel) being submerged tens of meters for several minutes. A similar type encapsulated generator (and control room?) should be able to survive a tsunami of just about any height that can be realistically expected. Sure wish I had patented this earlier...

  Posted in: TEPCO dismissed important scientific evidence in planning nuclear plant's defense