Ho hum

This hasn't been a good week for the Japanese economy. Last Wednesday saw China officially overtake Japan as the second largest economy in the world as measured by GDP. Today saw the Nikkei Index fall below the 9000 yen level, its lowest in 14 months. To put this is perspective, at the height of the economic boom here back in the late 1980's, the Nikkei reached a high of 38,957 in 1989. Then everything went remarkably pear shaped, $16 trillion worth of paper wealth evaporated (almost three times the country's gross domestic product), and two decades later, the economy hasn't even clawed back a quarter of that yet.

All this provides an object lesson for those back home who think that in another 12 months or so Ireland will snap back out of recession, find its feet, and start lurching back to recovery. If it hasn't happen for the world's second, sorry, third largest economy after nearly 20 years of trying everything bar selling itself to the Chinese*, then what hope for a small island economy on the periphery of Europe.

The Economist has two good articles on Japan's ongoing woes, one here on the decline of Japanese firms

http://www.economist.com/node/16847828

And one here - actually a book review - on the societal changes all this has resulted in.

http://www.economist.com/node/16843681

*(though they're probably waiting a little longer for a Japanese-Government-staves-off-imminent-collapse-everything-must-go-bargain-basement-sale).

Hafu

There is a rather vigorous debate (and a lot of name calling) going on at the 'Japan Today' site about the use of the term 'hafu' (half) in Japan. The debate can be accessed at this rather ridiculously long link:

http://www.japantoday.com/category/lifestyle/view/the-hafu-project-exploring-the-question-of-what-it-means-to-be-japanese

'Hafu' is used to describe those Japanese (?) children, one of whose parents is a foreigner. Cian is a 'hafu' and is regularly referred to by people as such. I'll have to say as a father it is a bit disconcerting to have your child labelled as something besides 'boy', 'son' or 'that noisy fecker', based solely on his mixed parentage. Some of the contributors to the above debate would go way beyond 'disconcerting' and label it racist, akin to the use of 'nigger' in American society. I'm not too sure, in Cian's case, I have ever discerned that level of opprobrium directed towards him, and to be honest, hope I never do. However, Cian is the son of a Japanese-Caucasian marriage, and one of the things I have discovered in my time here in Japan is that there seems to be a socially covert ranking of international partnerships.

Japanese-Caucasian unions are generally, (aside from the blood and soil extremists of the far right), viewed in a favourable light. Less so are unions involving Asians, particularly Chinese. This isn't a fact, just an observation on my part. In a way it reflects the esteem still granted the Anglophone world as witnessed by the primacy of the English language here in Japan despite the fact that (a) Koreans are by far the largest ethnic minority, followed by the Chinese; (b) China has replaced the US as Japan's largest trading partner; and (c) the majority of tourists to Japan hail from China.

A lot of this is to do with history, particularly the shooting, bombing and killing bits of history that tend to linger on from generation to generation (and don't we Irish just know that). More of it has to do with Japan's somewhat childish view of the world as a territorially defined 'us' and 'them' sort of place, even if increasing numbers of 'them' are living here in Japan amongst the 'us'.

In truth Japan is still a bewildered beginner at all this multiculturalism and ethnically diverse society stuff, thus, I think, the use of the term 'hafu', for they have yet to learn that there is no need for a term at all.

But a generation or two of more Cians and I reckon they might just get there.

Sanae's blog...

..has been updated!!
Yes, your disbelieving eyes read that correctly: updated!!
She's back, with more bilingual brilliance and, wait for it, video too!!!
Deep breaths people, calm yourselves, calm yourselves.
So quicker than a JR Hokkaido train, click on the link on the left and check out all that's been going on in the world of Hobbits.

Festivals (Part 2)

Japanese Anthropology 101
Okay people, pay attention. Time to enlarge your knowledge of Japan beyond Sony Bravia flatscreen LCD TVs and faulty Toyota accelerator pedals. Over the past weekend the country celebrated (commerated?) the Obon festival and we did the same. Or rather, Sanae and Cian did. I pleaded global agnosticism and spent the time instead catching up on my reading.
According to Wikipedia - (after Sanae's explanation of Tana Bata, I have had to look elsewhere for legitimate explanations of the country and its customs) - "Obon is a Japanese Buddhist custom to honor the spirits of one's ancestors. This has evolved into a family reunion holiday during which people return to ancestral family places and visit and clean their ancestors' graves, and when the spirits of ancestors are supposed to revisit the household altars. It has been celebrated in Japan for more than 500 years and traditionally includes a dance, known as Bon-Odori."
Unfortunately Obon also coincides with the hottest days of summer, and the mass migration of Japanese all over the archipelago. This results in packed trains, planes and buses, not to mention 40km+ tailbacks on the motorways and the sort of heat induced stress levels that can be observed from space. In our case its not so bad as we travel across the island to Obihiro Sanae's family home. Others though have considerably longer distances to travel and the various travel services are not averse from making money out of people diligently conforming to custom. During the Obon period, not only are full fares charged, but knowing there is guaranteed demand for all forms of transport and lodging, the airline companies, trains, buses and hotels all charge an 'Obon premium'.
Bastards.
And then you have your typhoons. On Thursday last I was due to take the train down to Obihiro late in the afternoon. Sanae and Cian had driven down on Tuesday as I had movies to watch, sorry, work to do. On Thursday morning, biblical downpours and the resulting landslides close the rail line at Muroran. So I jump in my car and drive up, nay heroically drive up through the same biblical downpours, to Minami Chitose to catch the train from there. Get on the train. Have to stand as the train is packed. An hour into the journey the train stops. And remains stopped for the next three hours due to, yes, heavy rainfall. When we did get moving again, we trundled along at less than 25 kph. And what should have been a three and half hour journey ended up taking ten hours. And JR Hokkaido charged a premium for this.
Bastards.
Anyway Obon also involves the Bon Odori dance, an example of which is held here on the streets of Muroran every year. I went along with Cian and his friend from the Nursey, Aika, to watch Aika's Mammy get in the 'real groove'. Aika's mother is a foreign student here at the university (she's from Indonesia), and all the foreign students have to take part in the town's Obon dance festival. As you can see from the photos, she's barely able to contain her happiness and being made to take part.

Festivals - Part 1

Apologies for the break in correspondence. End of term here in Japan (in August, I know. God love the poor students. Summer is almost over and they are only getting their summer holidays now. All 8 weeks of them. No going to California on J-1 visas and thrashing apartments for them). Summer here in Muroran is marked by matsuri's (festivals) of various sorts held hither and thither, which as far as I can make out, are essentially just an excuse for people to dress up, get drunk and let off fireworks. And that's just the children! (boom! boom!). Anyway, at the end of July Cian's nursery celebrated Tana Bata*, a festival that, according to Sanae, celebrates one of Japan's oldest and most enduring legends. Apparently, in a galaxy far, far away and a long, long time ago, the elves on the Death Star got together and made one true ring "to bind them all" and gave it to a young boy called Harry. Harry lived a special place where nobody ever aged until one day he ate a burned salmon and turned in to a swan and, eh, he dropped the ring which was eaten by, umm, a machine sent back in time to protect mankind and, eh, swans, from the future apocalypse that is due to take place in 2012. Or something. Sanae tended to gloss over the details and there are parts of the underlying history I'm not certain about, but that is generally the gist of it. And every year in July this remarkable story is celebrated by young children all over Japan who give thanks that they are not swans enslaved by machines growing up in the shadow of the Death Star.
*Remarkably, tana bata liertally translates as "bookshelf butter" and refers to the special bookshelf in the Japanese home where traditionally the butter is stored. And elvish rings of power.

Mammy's Pet

Sanae doesn't like snakes, as was made abundantly clear to me after the other day's close encounter with the reptilian kind. (She doesn't even like me blogging about them). She does, however, like beetles. Stag beetles in particular. She found one the other evening while out for a walk, and what did she do? She brought it home, of course. And gave it some apple and lettuce. And poured it a nice, cool, relaxing glass of wine. For reasons beyond me, Japanese have an enduring fascination with beetles. Summer for kids means beetle hunting. In the pet shops you can buy all the necessary gear - nets, jars, bark, moss, and ultraviolet night lights for spotting them after dark when they are most active. You can also buy them, for about 100 euro a pop, along with the aquarium like enclosure for keeping them in. And then after a week or so of captivity they invariably die, having overeaten on a rich diet of wine, cheese and crackers.