Two Japanese films just one Academy Awards. Banzai!
One is called Okuribito (the person who waves good-bye). The title is Departures in English.
The other is a short animation: Tsumiki-no-ie (house made of children's blocks), or House of Small Cubes in English.
Everyone needs some good news once in a while. Even though we have--I mean had-- apparently the world's goofiest joke of a finance minister, it's nice to know we still do some things really well.
2009年2月24日火曜日
2009年2月18日水曜日
Mad, Crazy Ideas?
The idea of saving the world's economy through chocolate appealed to me. Here's another crazy idea from Thomas Friedman's column in the NY Times.
He's writing about a ride through the Indian countryside in a plug-in car with a solar-powered road show thrown in. One of the comments from a witness to the trip goes like this:
“Why this mad, insane plan to travel across India in a caravan of solar electric cars and jatropha [a bio fuel] trucks with solar music, art, dance and a potent message for climate solutions? Well ... the world needs crazy ideas to change things, because the conventional way of thinking is not working anymore.”
*** At the end of the month I'm going to Okinawa and will look at their wind powered electricity farm and fresh water from the ocean desalination station.
*** Here in Hino, about one house in ten already has solar water heating equipment on the roof.
*** Out in Yamanashi, I have a friend who gets money from the electric company--they buy his extra solar power from his roof top generator.
He's writing about a ride through the Indian countryside in a plug-in car with a solar-powered road show thrown in. One of the comments from a witness to the trip goes like this:
“Why this mad, insane plan to travel across India in a caravan of solar electric cars and jatropha [a bio fuel] trucks with solar music, art, dance and a potent message for climate solutions? Well ... the world needs crazy ideas to change things, because the conventional way of thinking is not working anymore.”
*** At the end of the month I'm going to Okinawa and will look at their wind powered electricity farm and fresh water from the ocean desalination station.
*** Here in Hino, about one house in ten already has solar water heating equipment on the roof.
*** Out in Yamanashi, I have a friend who gets money from the electric company--they buy his extra solar power from his roof top generator.
2009年2月14日土曜日
It's Valentine's Day...
And guess what is supposed to happen? Women go out and buy chocolate for the men in their lives. All of them. Like, your co-workers. Your boss. Your son. Your father-in-law. And of course your one true love.
Chocolates range from do-it-yourself treats (there is amazing packaging on sale) to one-or-two piece gift boxes to $50 assortments and more. Women (teenagers! sophisticated singles! matrons! grandmothers!) line up 30 deep at the popular shops in order to purchase these confections. Everyone says the economy is crummy, but you'd never guess it from the lines at the candy counters.
What a sweet way to put some vigor into the economy: Let's declare every day Valentine's Day.
Chocolates range from do-it-yourself treats (there is amazing packaging on sale) to one-or-two piece gift boxes to $50 assortments and more. Women (teenagers! sophisticated singles! matrons! grandmothers!) line up 30 deep at the popular shops in order to purchase these confections. Everyone says the economy is crummy, but you'd never guess it from the lines at the candy counters.
What a sweet way to put some vigor into the economy: Let's declare every day Valentine's Day.
2009年2月6日金曜日
A Year of the Cow story
“Roads and bridges are attractive, but they create jobs only during construction,” said Shunji Nakamura, chief of the city’s industrial policy section. “You need projects with good jobs that will last through a bad economy.”
This is from an article in the online NY Times about Japan's bad example in stimulating the economy through public works projects. Construction companies like to be paid for pouring lots of concrete. They don't care what happens next. They get paid, but people are employed only as long as it takes to dig a hole and fill it with concrete.
Another idea: "...let people decide how to spend their own money..."
Here's the cow story:
A few years back, Japan gave a few hundred dollars worth of consumer coupons--from funds in the welfare budget--to low income families, the elderly, and children under 16. I remember a story about two boys who pooled their coupons and bought a calf. They raised it until it was big enough to sell, and used that money to buy more calves.
Imagine all the side effects from that original calf investment, starting with keeping the boys busy with a great out-of-school project.
Not everyone needs a cow, but how about if, say, instead of company bailouts, US owners of clunky cars got enough money back to buy a real car? Would the economy rev up a few notches?
This is from an article in the online NY Times about Japan's bad example in stimulating the economy through public works projects. Construction companies like to be paid for pouring lots of concrete. They don't care what happens next. They get paid, but people are employed only as long as it takes to dig a hole and fill it with concrete.
Another idea: "...let people decide how to spend their own money..."
Here's the cow story:
A few years back, Japan gave a few hundred dollars worth of consumer coupons--from funds in the welfare budget--to low income families, the elderly, and children under 16. I remember a story about two boys who pooled their coupons and bought a calf. They raised it until it was big enough to sell, and used that money to buy more calves.
Imagine all the side effects from that original calf investment, starting with keeping the boys busy with a great out-of-school project.
Not everyone needs a cow, but how about if, say, instead of company bailouts, US owners of clunky cars got enough money back to buy a real car? Would the economy rev up a few notches?
2009年2月3日火曜日
Tremors, Earthquakes, Volcanoes, Oh My!
Here's how pansies look when they've been sprinkled with volcano dust.
There were mild tremors on Saturday and Sunday in Tokyo. On Monday morning we heard that Mt. Asama (Gunma Prefecture) had erupted shortly after midnight. The dust didn't hurt the flowers, but it did ugly things to people's shiny-clean cars.
2009年2月2日月曜日
Staying in Business
According to the latest issue of The Economist, that's the definition of sustainability for 2009. The ultimate question for business leaders this year is a simple one: can we stay in business?
Here's another question. How many companies, worldwide, that are in business today were in business 200 years ago? Two hundred years' of survival, now that is sustainablity!
The answer is, in round-round figures, 5,000. There are none in the US (short history!). I thought there might be one, Paul Revere's day job as a silver smith, since the name Revere Silver is still around, but it's not the same company. The name has been bought and sold many times over.
But that's not the point.
More than 3,000 of the oldest firms on the planet are in Japan. Can you imagine? So many companies still in business after 200 years.
The reason, according to the magazine that did the research, is simple: people come first. They are all small to medium sized businesses that put their primary stakeholders first, and the primary stakeholders are the people who do the work.
Here's another question. How many companies, worldwide, that are in business today were in business 200 years ago? Two hundred years' of survival, now that is sustainablity!
The answer is, in round-round figures, 5,000. There are none in the US (short history!). I thought there might be one, Paul Revere's day job as a silver smith, since the name Revere Silver is still around, but it's not the same company. The name has been bought and sold many times over.
But that's not the point.
More than 3,000 of the oldest firms on the planet are in Japan. Can you imagine? So many companies still in business after 200 years.
The reason, according to the magazine that did the research, is simple: people come first. They are all small to medium sized businesses that put their primary stakeholders first, and the primary stakeholders are the people who do the work.
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