Social distancing

Reckon this wouldn't be a bad auld spot to give it a go.
Any guesses as to where this is?

Another state of emergency

 Last Tuesday, exactly a week ago, primary and secondary schools all across Japan reopened and millions of children went back into their classrooms. On the very same day, Tokyo along with 6 other prefectures, declared a joint state of emergency and closed all their schools. This neatly (perhaps too neatly) sums up the haphazard approach Japan is taking to the pandemic.
'Haphazard', listen to me. 'Half-arsed' is the appropriate technical term.
On Sunday, Sapporo city here in Hokkaido declared a second state of emergency in response to the sudden increase in coronovirus cases in the past week. And so, from today, schools in the city closed again. This morning's online edition of the New York Times highlighted Hokkaido as a case study in the adverse effects of lifting restrictions too quickly.
But of course, dear reader, you already knew that, for when you are not 'oohing' and 'awwing' at the rhetorical and intellectual virtuosity of this blog, you are of course perusing the Gray Lady (though that does sound a tad unsavory).
Cian, understandably, is raging as we live too far away from Hokkaido's 'Big Smoke' to be included in the school closures. Though, as I tell him, it is only a question of time. The numbers across Japan are ticking up at a fair old clip and I reckon we are perhaps at most only a week away before a state of emergency is declared for the entire country.

Japan, the coronavirus and applied linguistics

Yes, I know, an intriguing title. So read on, dear reader, read on.
As of today, April 4th, Japan has 3,139 cases with 77 deaths. What Japan doesn't have as of today is a national lock down, or even a Tokyo lock down, where the majority of new cases are occurring. Nor does it have a strict policy of testing for the virus, enough face masks, or ICU beds for all the potential cases that are about to emerge.
What it does have, however, is a series of new geographical designations based on the number of cases. These are:
1: Warning of areas with increasing infections
2: Area with confirmed infections
3: Uninfected areas
So, unlike other countries who are combating the virus with strict social isolation policies, and legally enforceable stay-at-home rules, Japan is fighting the virus with, yes, ... semantics!
Oh, how us Applied Linguists feel so emboldened. Finally recognition of the vital role we have to play in stopping this pandemic.
This is as good as an example you will ever get of the perils of political administrators deciding health policy. Four days ago the President of the Japanese Medical Association called on the government to officially declare a state of emergency, warning that if the number of daily cases in Tokyo reaches 100, "it is highly likely that the medical system will collapse".
Today, the number of new cases in Tokyo reached 118.
I never studied political policy making but in years to come they are going to have to introduce a new course, based on Japan's approach to the epidemic, called, 'Rolling the dice'.

Hokkaido and the coronavirus - part 6

Well, I suppose it had to happen.
The coronavirus has officially arrived in Muroran. A receptionist at a pediatric clinic in the city was diagnosed earlier today. She had returned from Hawaii last week, went to work, a few days later began feeling 'a bit dodgy', got tested and lo and, indeed, behold, she has successfully taken the title of Muroran's 'patient zero'.
Cian thought it would be me, but no, yet again I disappointed the boy.
Mind you, I'd say there a fair few worried parents in the town tonight who have visited the clinic with their children over the past few days and must be imagining the worst.
And yet the Made-in-Japan absurdity train keeps right on rolling along. The school year is set to start as normal next week. Children will be asked to wash their hands a lot, wear masks, and the classroom windows will be opened at the end of each period.
There is snow forecast for this coming weekend, and masks can't be got around here for love nor money.
People are still being politely requested to 'refrain' from venturing out at weekends. As if the coronavirus only struck on Saturdays and Sundays. 
Then there was this morning's paper. After a weekend that saw three successive days in which a new record was set for the number of new confirmed cases of the virus in Japan, the Hokkaido Shimbun's front page led with ...

Yes, that's right, the Olympics. Or more specifically, the new proposed course for the Olympic Torch relay. You couldn't make this up. The country is on the brink of an uncontrollable epidemic and Hokkaido's largest newspaper thinks that the most newsworthy topic is an event that has already been rendered utterly irrelevant by the rest of the world.
I would describe this as 'ostrich head in the sand' stuff, but that would be cruelly libeling the intelligence of the bird.

Tokyo and the coronavirus

I think this is when we begin the ominous duuuh-nu, duuh-nu, du-nu, du-nu, du-nu theme from Jaws. The graph shows the sudden spike in confirmed cases within the largest city on the planet. Still relatively small, but what is worrying is that many of the cases cannot be traced to a specific person or cluster as the source of the infection. Based on what is happening in New York, this would suggest that the virus is already quite widespread in the city and that we are going to see an exponential rise in cases over the coming days.
And yet, the main story on yesterday evening's seven o'clock NHK news was about the cancellation of the Olympics. That's sport's news, in fact it is now 'old news'. There are much more pressing and important matters to be concerned with.
In a news conference last night, the governor of Tokyo, Koike Yuriko, called for the citizens of the city to remain indoors over this coming weekend and to work from home as much as possible. What was interesting that this was a 'request' rather an 'order' or even a 'directive'. It was phrased in elaborate 尊敬語, (sonkeigo), the honorific form of the language used when you trying to convey your apologies at how much of an imposition your request is. It is the sort of language Japanese politicians typically use when they are announcing unpopular measures or policies.
Unfortunately, this gives the impression that the crisis is still a political rather than health crisis. The implication is that the people of Tokyo have a choice; that they can ignore this request, venture out on Saturday and Sunday and at worst be thought of as selfish individuals.
What was needed (and will probably happen as the situation escalates) our medical experts, particularly epidemiologists, to explain clearly and calmly (and without using 尊敬語), what is happening, what needs to be done, and what the consequences are if expert advice is ignored.

Ad Astra - A brief film review

Now, like most of the other important international media (New York Times, The Guardian, the Economist, the Hokkaido Shimbun), it would be very easy for this blog to become all consumed with the coronavirus.
But I am not going to let that happen, dear reader. No, I will balance the darkness with light, the tragic with the uplifting, the Mayo Footballers with the special genius that will be forever Joe Canning.
So, with this post I am going to commence an intermittent series of brief film reviews. With my university classes suspended until April 22, and no overseas travel for the foreseeable future, I now, finally, have some time to catch up on matters celluloid.
First up is Ad Astra, a science fiction film starring my doppelganger, Brad Pitt. In this movie Brad plays a man suffering from bradycardia. For the medically illiterate among you (and by now that should be a vanishingly small number of you), 'bradycardia' describes a medical condition whereby a person suffers from an abnormally slow heart rate.
Ad Astra details Brad's increasingly wild attempts to accelerate his pulse into beating more than 40 times a minute. He free-falls from an exploding space station in low Earth orbit and his heart rate barely budges above 40. He gets assailed by Pink Floyd fans on the dark side of the moon and still his cardiogram blips along at the four zero mark. He tries to escalate matters by getting attacked by psychotic baboons on a spaceship (no, seriously) just beyond the Asteroid Belt (a.k.a. Cavan). And still his heart tick-tocks along under 50. He even gets as far as Neptune, has a bit of a schmozzle with his old man, all manner of things get blown up and yes, you guessed it, still no cure for the bloody bradycardia.
I will have to say that this film affected me deeply. Like Brad, I too suffer from bradycardia. Like Brad, I too possess a whiskey-oak handsomeness that defies age. And like Brad, I too have spurned the desperate love of Angelina Jolie (it's why I came to Japan. Long story).
Five stars.

The Tokyo Olympics

 This is Mori Yoshiro, former prime minister and current head of the organizing committee for the 2020 Olympics. Yesterday he presided over a packed press conference where he said that over the next 4 weeks a decision would be made regarding the event.
Yes, 4 weeks.
To make a decision that every dog on the street knows is inevitable. The question is no longer if the Games will be postponed, but rather until when? Indeed, just this evening the prime minister of Japan announced that he and the IOC are planning to postpone the event until next year.
But that's not why I am writing this piece. No, my interest is in Mori-san. Like I said, he appeared before the world's press and acknowledged the difficulty in proceeding with the Olympics as scheduled. Lots of reporters, lots of questions, lots of excitement in the air. God only knows what else was in the air, too.
Mori Yoshiro is 82 years old. What on this plague-stricken Earth was an 82 year old man doing in a hot, stuffy, windowless room with a crowd of people from all directions of the compass answering a question that we all know the answer to already?