A Little Solemnity on the 49th Day

When a loved one dies and funeral rites are held in Japan, it's not a matter of one ceremony and you're done. Religious services are held over an extended period of time, and one of the milestones occurs on the 49th day after death.

For those who lost their lives in the earthquake/tsunami that struck northeast Japan on March 11, the 49th day is today. In Buddhist tradition, it is believed that it takes 49 days for a soul to make the transition from life in this world to whatever comes next. This is the day for the final good-bye.

Under normal circumstances, there is a wake and then a "departure" ceremony, after which the remains of the deceased person are cremated. The ashes are gathered and placed in an urn, which is enshrined at the home of the next of kin. Once a week, for seven weeks, incense is burned, candles are lit, and prayers are said in front of the urn. Then, on the 49th day, the ashes are taken away for interrment.

Though these are not ordinary times and the circumstances are far from normal, it is still the 49th day.

Please take a moment and remember the ten thousand and more whose lives came to an unexpected end on March 11, 2011.

Influential by Example

This is from the Japan Times online, about one of the many people who did his/her best for others during the March 11 tsunami.

"— A Japanese doctor who was recently chosen as one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people said Tuesday he believes he was picked as a symbol of all the people who have been courageously fighting against difficulties after being affected by the March 11 disaster in his homeland.



Takeshi Kanno




Takeshi Kanno, a 31-year-old internist, spoke with media outlets in New York, where he was visiting at the invitation of the magazine. He was noted for helping evacuate patients at his hospital in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, after the tsunami alert and waiting until the last of his patients had been helicoptered out before he too left.

Then on March 16, Kanno attended his wife's delivery of a baby boy.

Asked about the latest conditions, Kanno said, "Needs for goods and housing are being met to a certain extent, but (the survivors) still cannot fully live like humans. The question used to be how to survive. Now it has shifted to how to live and be independent."

What is Influence?

Influence is the power to make things happen.
Influence means being listened to by the people who can make things happen..
So, if a person cannot make something happen and no one who does have that power is listening to him, is he influential?

Time magazine should think again.

If a person who has to complain to You-tube that he personally (as mayor!) couldn't make an evacuation happen in his village and that no one else who might have had that power would listen to him, is that person really one of the 100 most influential people in the world?

Can you say GE?

Everyone by now probably knows the acronym Tepco, for Tokyo Electric Power Company, the people in charge of the damaged nuclear reactor in Fukushima. How many people know who sold Tepco a plant that, as early as 1972, was described by a US regulatory agency as "guaranteed to fail"?

The answer is in Time magazine, April 4.

Guess who sold Tepco the Mark 1? The same company that doesn't have to pay taxes!

GE

Earthquake (6)

Living in eastern Japan is almost like living on shipboard, the way the ground beneath us seems to roll without rest. On some days, the after-shocks from the March 11 quake seem bigger than brand-new earthquakes. Experts say that is only to be expected. After-shocks are, by definition, a degree or so smaller than the original quake, and when the original one is huge, the after-shocks are also huge.

Here is a part of a Q/A from the Japan Times, with Yoshiro Ota of the Japan Meteorological Agency, written by Minoru Matsutani:

(1) Why do aftershocks occur?

Because tectonic plates and faults try to stabilize ground conditions that have been greatly altered by a huge earthquake.


(2)Why do we have so many big aftershocks?

The magnitude of the largest aftershocks tend to be about 1.0 magnitude lower than the main quake, which was 9.0, said Yoshiro Ota of the Meteorological Agency.

"People tend to think aftershocks are small. But a magnitude 8 is huge. Magnitude 7 is also huge, so we should be very careful," Ota said.


For more of this article, go to:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110414a5.html

Earthquake (5)

Are we a 5 or a 7? A City University of New York expert says neither one is exactly right.


"It's incorrect to say that it's on the same level as Chernobyl," Japanese-American physicist Michio Kaku, a professor at the City University of New York, told the Daily News.

"Chernobyl represents the high end of the category. Right now Fukushima would be more on the low end - about one-tenth the level of Chernobyl."

Japanese officials raised Fukushima's rating to the highest level on the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) accident severity index Tuesday - sending shock waves through surrounding villages and the international media.

Regulators stressed it didn't represent a worsening of the situation at the tsunami-crippled nuclear plant, just a reassessment of overall radiation leaks since the March 11 earthquake."


Nothing is as serious as the Chernobyl disaster was. Perhaps it simply means the rating scale is off, and if the rating scale is off, maybe a lot of our thinking about nuclear affairs is off the mark, too.

Earth to humans: wake up! wake up!



Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2011/04/12/2011-04-12_japan_is_no_chernobyl_physicist_says_threat_level_upgrade_is_wakeup_call_but_not.html#ixzz1JOGns1oP