Whether you like, love or hate classical music, please watch at least one of the videos below. I have things to say about them which I think will astonish you. So fasten your seat belts, sit back, and let the music flow through you like cannabis oil aroma therapy.
Okay. Ready? Here’s the scoop …
These are junior high school students, at a school in Fukushima. Yes, that Fukushima, where the massive earthquake in 2011 caused the nuclear reactors to melt down. But that’s not what I’m here to talk about.
Instead, let me get to what I want you good folks to wrap your heads around. First …
Being junior high school students, everyone except the conductor is 13-15 years old. Not seasoned adults. Not college graduates. Young adolescents! What talent, eh?
It gets better: This is not a special school for music or any other area of study. It’s not some private school for rich kids — yes, we have exclusive, private schools here in Japan just like practically every other developed country. This particular school is no such uppity institution. No folks . . . THIS IS A PUBLIC SCHOOL!
And here is, what in my mind is the most jaw-dropping aspect of this tale: Participating in this choral orchestra is not part of the official school curriculum. This is not a music class. The students are not getting any credit for this. Everything, the individual mastering of the instruments, the hours of practice, the orchestra and vocal rehearsals, the concert performance, is purely voluntary. It’s an AFTER-SCHOOL CLUB!
I recall my school had a French Club, Photography Club, a Glee Club, an Astronomy Club. It’s just like that. Only these junior high kids, as members of this club, are performing — at a sophisticated level — Mozart and Bach.
What do you think? Honestly? Aren’t you a bit impressed?
I have to admit: I’m awestruck! Almost at a loss for words . . . but not quite.
Here are my final thoughts: The world is going through some very strange and difficult times. Technology, political turmoil, economic crises, environmental crises, leadership crises. We can’t keep up with it all. Unfortunately, young people get totally blindsided by all of this. They’re dropped into a world not of their making, facing catastrophes that were in the works before they were in the womb. Supposedly, societies do what they can to bring the young up to speed and equip them to take the reins when their time comes.
U.S. schools are a more relaxed educational environment.
Supposedly, societies do what they can to bring the young up to speed and equip them to take the reins when their time comes. In the U.S., as with every highly-developed Western nation, it is the public education system which provides the basic skills and knowledge needed to function in the world.
Now, I’m hardly in a position to judge the current state of public schools in the U.S., which by far the majority of young people there attend for 12+ years at minimum. True, I went to public school for 6 years but that was around 200 years ago, give or take a few decades. Moreover, as you probably know, I haven’t lived in the U.S. for sixteen years. Meaning, I can’t overcome either the generational gap or the geographical gap. So I’ll let you folks be my eyes and ears on this.
Here’s a straightforward question for you American readers: How are things going there?
Is anything resembling what you see in the above videos occurring there?
I know I have trouble imagining it. But that’s just me.
It seems like here in Japan we’re always having some holiday or festival. There sure is a lot going on to keep the smiles fresh and the video cameras rolling.
I’ve written before — in fact feature it in LIVE FROM JAPAN! — about the festival we just had this past weekend. This year, it was slightly scaled down from what has been held in the past, presumably because of Covid-19. We don’t really have much of a crisis over the dread bioweapon but Japan plays on the side of cautious.
We spent most of our time on what’s nicknamed “Merchant Street”, a narrow and extremely charming roadway which looks the way it did a century ago, especially since the city last summer buried all of the electrical and communication cabling underground. Wheeled portable shrines (as opposed to ones carried by twenty to thirty inebriated celebrants) paraded up and down the street. In the carriage on top, children played flutes, chimes and various rhythm instruments. Since the vehicles have no steering mechanism — true to a design that must go back a few centuries — they have to be elevated and rotated by hand to change direction.
Rather than try to describe this unorthodox procedure, it’ll be much easier to just show you.
After rolling up and down Merchant Street, the seven or eight wheeled shrines then headed toward the center of town, where they similarly paraded the greater length of our main street. People were in town from all over, both for the festival and to buy soybeans, an item Tambasasayama is famous across Japan for.
One final aside. Because the main street in town still has electrical wires criss-crossing its entire length, there is a tall crown which must be removed from the portable shrines. They are called ‘hoko’ and are displayed in storefronts along the way. They look like the one pictured here.
“You can magnify a single bacteria a thousand times but it will not tell you that your entire herd is missing or that everything is dying on the farm.”
The point is that when we’re too focused on the so-called details, we often miss what’s truly important to understand what’s going on.
This is an old story, chicanery that has been used without pause from the onset of human communication. The misapplication of “focus” is used by tricksters, hucksters, hustlers, politicians, and other consummate liars, on a regular basis to keep us from stepping back and getting a full appreciation of a situation — the big picture, a fuller more truthful and useful understanding. It’s used by racists to generate hatred. By citing a few bad apples they convince us the whole orchard is rotten. It’s used by salesmen to direct our attention to some apparent necessity, often illusory, in order to pry open our wallets for the purchase of some superfluous, overvalued item. It’s used by propagandists and their allies in the media to misinform and twist our view of ourselves and the world we live in. Via calculated cherry-picking the truth, lying by omission, even making up “facts”, we are enlisted for an agenda which if fully understood, we would never support, would probably oppose. As a subset of that, it’s used by warmongers to convince us of the nobility, justice, essential goodness of all sorts of horrors they inflict on the world. We save the lives three school children in a remote village, failing to mention we killed 100,000 innocent civilians to get there.
If we take a long step back and look at how our country got to be so rich, so powerful, so respected and feared, if we are honest with ourselves, completely objective, attentive and balanced, there is only one possible conclusion we can draw . . .
The overall trajectory of U.S. foreign policy is that of a predator, a conqueror, a colonial oppressor.
There is nothing in the historical record of the last 100 years which contradicts this.
There is no example of voluntary retreat. There has never been an apology for the death and destruction wantonly inflicted on other countries. Except for a steady stream of self-flattering virtue signaling about justice and human rights, we’ve never made up for the grotesque theft of the labors and entire lives stolen from the millions of people we’ve enslaved over the entire course of our existence. This now includes the use of prison labor in our bloated system of corporate incarceration. There have been no reparations for the wars the U.S. has prosecuted, for the enormous social, economic, and political damage resulting from both military and non-military aggression by the U.S. against other nations. The U.S. has countless times covertly and overtly violated international law, broken treaties and its trusted word. It has turned truth on its head to justify its aggression and sometimes outright theft of money and resources, 1) falsely claiming its “national security” is under threat; 2) falsely portraying its military campaigns and economic terrorism as mitigation for human rights abuses, e.g. the public relations charade mockingly called Responsibility to Protect (R2P); 3) falsely accusing other countries of treaty violations to justify its own treaty violations; 4) hypocritically utilizing terrorist groups it claims to condemn for proxy wars against its perceived enemies; 5) bullying, instituting sanctions, blockades and embargoes, starving whole populations of essential food and medicines, self-righteously declaring itself judge and jury in determining how other sovereign nations and their people must act or be condemned and isolated for violating some model of proper behavior — a rules-based order — which the U.S. itself ignores when inconvenient or unprofitable for the corporate interests the government loyally represents and serves.
The War on Terror, among the most egregious frauds perpetrated under the banner of Pax Americana, has been a War of Terror by the #1 terrorist country in the world — the U.S. itself. The unnecessary and illegal wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Yemen, now Ukraine, to name the most prominent ones, have caused the greatest refugee crises in history. Taiwan is next on the assembly line of horrors generated by our belligerence, arrogance, and recklessness.
What do we take from this? What’s the lesson?
The message is clear: Any attempt at repairing U.S. foreign policy requires a complete reversal of priorities which are currently baked into our economy, politics, social and political system.
And such a reversal of priorities must necessarily require eliminating from positions of power any and all proponents of global hegemony, world conquest, indispensability, “American exceptionalism”, total spectrum dominion. Our current geopolitical agenda only produces one trajectory: imperial conquest. This trajectory only embraces one mechanism: War in all of its contemporary manifestations: war on other countries, war on economies, war on social structures, war on people (including its own), war on families, war on human rights, war on the environment, war on the truth.
Returning to our discussion of the “details”, meaning the focus on single, easily spun and manipulated events and public posturing. Questioning and challenging what the U.S. does in its relationship with the rest of the world by only targeting individual incidents, single moments in time, each supposedly a unique crisis — as it mysteriously just pops up out of nowhere and spoils our good time like some party crasher — is a pointless and futile task, a fool’s errand . . . A HUGE WASTE OF ENERGY AND TIME.
How many times do we need to be reminded of this? We question the wisdom and necessity of invading the tiny island nation of Grenada, we get Panama and the first Iraq war, then Kosovo. We object to the war on Afghanistan, we get a war both on Afghanistan and Iraq. We condemn the Iraq War and we get Libya and Syria and Sudan and Yemen. How many times do we need to be reminded that any calls for basic civility, diplomacy, restraint, peace, are scoffed at — if even noticed — are mocked and dismissed as childish fantasy and unhinged idealism, the stuff of hippies and dreamers? How often does the current power elite have to make it clear that for them confrontation, aggression, and war are the answers to every question?
The latest crisis to monopolize our attention — and admittedly it’s a whopper! — being used to obfuscate America’s real and ultimately self-destructive agenda, is the Ukraine war. Starting this war has been in the works for decades.* Further proof of the West’s real intent — a major drawn-out conflict which will weaken and ultimately destroy Russia — is the refusal by US and its NATO lapdogs to negotiate, have any conversation with Russia. Boris Johnson — a pathetic servile sheepdog if there ever was one — flew to Kiev and told Zelensky to pull out of peace talks and refuse any further discussion with Russia to resolve the situation. Zelensky is being generously rewarded by Washington DC to follow orders, toe the line, and sacrifice unnecessarily tens of thousands of Ukrainian lives in support of US/NATO thuggery. He’s got millions in the bank now, luxury homes far from the conflict zone, and presumably access to the best comedy writers in America, should he decide to return to his real calling, that of a buffoon TV comic.
Any cursory review of the actual events which made this mess inevitable leads to an indisputable conclusion: The “special operation”, as Russia calls it, is not naked Russian aggression, or as the media reminds us every ten seconds, an “unprovoked” attack. It is a reaction by Russia to calculated provocations, intimidations, a program engineered over at least a half a century — though hatred of Russia by the West goes back much further — ultimately intended to destroy Russia as a nation, then plunder it. It is the direct result of a highly-sophisticated, multi-layered strategy for imperial conquest, sometimes subtle and always covert, by the US and its puppet institution NATO . . . destroy, conquer, subjugate, pillage. It’s not Russia that’s circled the continental U.S. with military bases. It’s the U.S. and its puppet allies that have tried to construct a noose around Russia. The US by its own admission put $5 billion into creating turmoil and installing a US/NATO-friendly puppet regime in Kiev. The Ukraine coup of 2014 was nothing more than a tightening of the military noose around Russia and a ham-fisted attempt at stealing Russia’s major naval base in Sevastopol. That plot, of course, was foiled when Crimea decided by referendum to again become part of Russia.
Next in line — as if destroying and conquering Russia is just a day’s work — is China. This likewise is nothing new. The subjugation of China has been a work in progress for two centuries. The effort by the West+1 (the +1 being Japan) from 1839 to 1949 is referred to by the Chinese as the Century of Humiliation. China has never forgotten or forgiven. Why should it? Why shouldn’t it protect itself from future humiliation and plunder? The long history of racist, imperial aggression by the Western-led colonialists is what drives China’s distrust of the U.S. and its current partners in crime (Australia, Japan, Canada, the NATO lapdogs). As with Russia, China is not rattling its sabers across the planet. Understandably it is attempting to construct an impregnable defense framework against more anticipated Western colonial incursions. It’s not China performing FONOPS (Freedom of Navigation Operations) in the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, off the coast of California and Virginia, not even around Hawaii and Alaska. It’s not China that has surrounded the U.S., Australia, the U.K. and other NATO countries with military bases. It is the U.S. in concert with its obsequious puppets that have encircled China with a huge array of forward-positioned bases, staffed and armed to the teeth with offensive weaponry. Japan alone has 56 U.S. bases. There are close to 30,000 active duty military persons in Okinawa alone.
It is imperative that the citizens of the U.S. who are still sane and capable of making their own rational judgments, understand that the obvious, truly frightening, unavoidable, but completely unnecessary result of our present course with Russia and China is WAR, WAR, AND MORE WAR — potentially nuclear war and the end of human life on this planet!
And putting aside death and destruction, as if tens of millions of deaths and ruined lives is just collateral inconvenience, for us now and future generations right here at home, our current trajectory guarantees more waste, an evisceration of our individual and national potential, a squandering of our vast human, national and economic resources, all in pursuit of the unattainable, undesirable, pathological insane goal of world domination!
During discussion of the most recent budget cycle, we might have detected the usual barely audible pleas for restraint and rationality, from the small chorus of voices attempting to alert the public exactly how skewed our funding priorities are. These are the same appeals we’ve been hearing year-after-year: Reduce the DOD budget, then repair the infrastructure, fix health care, take care of the planet, put the people back in the equation. The result of the “negotiations”? The defense budget increased to an all-time high, with Republicans and Democrats adding billions more than the White House requested, the grandstanding gas bags from both major parties competing for bragging rights over who is most responsible for this unconscionable bloat.
Did we vote for this? Do we really need more weapons of war, more military bases, more ships and submarines, more bombers and fighter jets, more missiles and nuclear bombs?
Or put another way . . .
Does the sturdy, proud individualism we claim defines us as a people have to equate to mass murder and destruction across the globe? World War III? Nuclear annihilation?
Is this what we as Americans stand for?
I think not.
This regime of perpetual war and global domination is the work of madmen, power-drunk sociopaths who’ve grabbed and now maintain absolute control of our foreign policy. They are empire-obsessed megalomaniacs who’ve seized the initiative and are the architects of the Great Imperial Project — the U.S. as absolute imperial master of the Earth. They have without any consent by an informed citizenry, established the disastrous direction of the country, and are now taking us to a final denouement, an epic clash with two other major nuclear powers. To say ‘this will not end well’ ranks as the greatest understatement in history.
I repeat: There is nothing in the historical record of the last 100 years — some historians go back to the very early days of our republic — which offers any hope that our constant beating of the war drums will magically stop. That the trajectory of imperial conquest, and all the misadventures and war crimes which follow from that, will spontaneously reverse. Whether it’s the Monroe Doctrine or manifest destiny or the Wolfowitz Doctrine or R2P or Brzezinski’s Grand Chessboard or charter for the Project for the New American Century, whatever form the justification and rationalizations take, the direction is clear and ghastly: The promise of aggression, chaos, and carnage, distinguishes itself as the only promise the U.S. will keep.
I’m baffled why anti-war activists can’t see this. Right now the U.S. is a beast. The nature of the beast is war. The beast is merciless, relentless, unforgiving, amoral, sociopathic, homicidal. If we don’t slay the beast, the beast will continue to do just what such a creature does. Negotiating with the beast is impossible. Taming the beast is impossible. Even slowing down the beast will only insignificantly temper the pace of its ravaging ways.
Many well-intentioned individuals over decades have been appealing to the better nature and better instincts of U.S. leadership. The reality is, it has neither. Nor does it show signs of common decency or common sense.
There is only one option: Removing from power those who now embrace threats, intimidation, confrontation, violence, and ultimately military conflict as the only mechanisms for dealing with the rest of the world.
Removing ALL OF THOSE now in power! They are all culpable. They are all complicit.
Yes, the world is a dangerous place. But those now in control of our governing institutions systematically and systemically make it a more dangerous place. They are not protecting us. They are not even protecting our nation. They are dooming America to a horrifying and catastrophic fate. Either they go away or the U.S. itself will go away. It won’t be a pretty sight. Manifest destiny will be manifest implosion and collapse. Or total annihilation in the war to end all wars, which will fulfill that hope by ending everything.
* You might consider looking at my The Peace Dividend book, written six years ago, which exposes the unhinged geopolitical agenda which made this conflict inevitable.
Language and grammar are dynamic; ever-evolving; adapting to new usage, current trends and fads. There’s no reason to pass judgment on this, as many academics and publishers of dictionaries might presume to do. You can’t set language and punctuation in stone any more than you can declare that the sun will shine every Monday or outlaw oxidation.
While it didn’t really catch on, it did address a gap in our ability to have a final punctuation mark reflect the entire mood and intent of the language that preceded it. It’s a combination of a question mark and an exclamation point, allowing a statement to both act as a query and express awe, amazement, excitement, marvel, wonder, approval, acclaim, shock, and so on.
What in the world is going on with the Catholic Church and organ trafficking?!
Now, I should have been able to put an interrobang at the end of that exclamatory question, but as I said, it didn’t really catch on. At least, I can’t find it on the keyboard of my laptop.
The point is, as useful as something might potentially be for language and grammar, it’s actually impossible to dictate use and guarantee general acceptance.
So now I’m about to attempt the impossible.
Yes, I’ve come up with a new punctuation mark!
And without intending to blow my horn, bring undeserved attention to my genius, or capitalize on your gullibility as a reader of my articles, I’d like to say unequivocally that this innovative punctuation mark, aside from any other merits it might have, completely and thoroughly sums up the current mood — fear? despair? cynicism? resignation? — of a huge segment of the people living on the planet, the ones who have some idea what a horrible mess we as a species are now in.
Here it is . . .
Does it look familiar? It should.
An important question: Will it be useful?
A more important question: How long will it be around?
Maybe the best question we can ask: If my new punctuation mark really does work, really captures the zeitgeist of our troubled times, how long will we be around to use it?
(Sure wish I had that damn interrobang on my computer. I could have used it at the end of that last question.)
Why should this come as a surprise? The ruling elite has over five decades contributed millions of dollars, tens of thousands of hours, gone to great lengths to take our democracy apart, skew the laws to maximize their profits, marginalize and silence opposition, reduce the voice of everyday citizens to a pathetic whimper, perhaps worst of all, promoted war and ecological destruction, bringing us face-to-face to possible human extinction. And we should expect to undo all of this with an article here and there, a few comments, and some Twitter and Facebook posts?
I don’t mean to criticize or mock anyone. But I get this all of the time and every time I’m truly astounded that well-meaning, concerned progressives think there’s some quick and easy defense to the wrecking ball taken to the building blocks of our “democracy” and the value system that underpins it, and to repair the colossal damage already done by the oligarchs to our current quality of life and potential for a decent and harmonious future.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen and everything in between, there’s a lot of work to be done. And with some reservations, I’m inspired by the enormous amount of energy and time devoted by the few sane activists among us.
Unfortunately, almost all of that energy and time is completely wasted. It isn’t going anywhere and never will without some serious rethinking and creative strategizing.
Change is impossible without “the people” and the vast majority of people are pretty much left scratching their heads at BLM, woke, cancel culture, Antifa, QAnon, Proud Boys, build back better, and especially the incapacitating, binary weaponizing of everything into left vs. right, Republican vs. Democrat, and all related iterations: liberal vs. conservative, Trump vs. Biden/Sanders/Clinton.
Here’s the main problem as I see it. People vote against their own interests because they’re overwhelmed, confused, misdirected, brainwashed. They step into the voting booth thinking they’re voting for one thing and end up getting the opposite. The science of messing with people’s minds has surpassed quantum physics in sophistication. Soon we’ll all be implanted with neural interfaces and directly turned into clueless, obedient drones. But that’s for another article.
What I try to do is introduce issue-by-issue some genuine clarity. Remove any possible ambiguity or misinterpretation. If you want this, then do that. To the point of this article, if you want to know if the candidate you’re voting for is truly on your side, then perform a simple, straightforward, sensible test. You can and will know. The result will be a clear and unambiguous ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
That in a nutshell is the whole idea behind the electoral strategy I’ve been talking about for ten years. Another topic for yet another piece, as if I hadn’t already written three books and hundreds of such articles already. But for now let me quickly reiterate, the candidate contract electoral strategy represents issue-by-issue clarity and real choice. A candidate is either for the proposed change, or against it. He or she signs on the dotted line making their commitment crystal clear. If they sign, we know where they stand. If they don’t sign we know where they stand. In either case, we as voters know exactly what to do.
Why don’t current activist demands for real change ever make a difference?
Two reasons . . .
FIRST: They are directed at the wrong people. They are directed at those in power who are not listening, will not act, will never listen, will never act favorably. We only need to look at the record to know this is true. Very legitimate, extremely popular reforms simply NEVER GET DONE. Do I need to mention a few?
• Decent good-paying jobs
• Fair, equitable, livable wages
• Health care reform (Medicare4all)
• Serious attention to climate change
• Election reform (getting $$s out of politics)
• Law enforcement and comprehensive prison reform
• Ending the wars (reversing military expansion)
• Comprehensive immigration reform
Mind you, there are huge consensuses on these and similar issues. How do we know what these areas of agreements are? There’s no mystery. Poll after poll, year after year, point to pretty much the same things. Without exception, concerns about the economy are at the top of the list. People now more than ever are struggling. The American Dream is fading and prospects for the future are becoming increasingly bleak.
SECOND: Many activists are personally committed to a cause, feel enormous passion for that cause, can’t imagine a world without it, can’t imagine any decent, aware human being being opposed to that cause.
Unfortunately, they’re often wrong and despite their best efforts, nothing changes, nor will it ever change. Either the object of their devotion is unpopular and/or it simply doesn’t even get noticed. There’s not sufficient public awareness, perhaps little enthusiasm, for whatever they’re promoting. Such niche issues are important and can be addressed when we have a Congress and White House listening to and on the side of the people. But until we put in power who actually represent the interests of the vast majority of citizens — NOT those of the ruling elite, Wall Street, the MIC, big banks and big corporations — NOTHING WILL GET DONE for the people. PERIOD!
These two undercurrents are intertwined and synergistic . . . in the worst possible way. Making impassioned pleas to our elected officials when they’re not listening is a non-starter and enormous waste of energy and resources. Focusing on issues which have little popular support ends up discrediting activists and knee-capping more promising activism, all too often turning the majority of citizens off. This not only drives away support, but infects the citizenry with cynicism about anything positive ever getting done. Predictably, resignation and apathy sets in. Just look around. Look at the comments we see on articles like this. Hopelessness is growing. Surrender is the new pandemic.
The system is rigged … AGAINST US, WE THE PEOPLE.
It’s certainly foolhardy to think that the people who benefit from the rigging are going to unrig it. They will continue to do what they’ve been doing. Serving themselves. Ignoring us. They will thrive. We will suffer.
Maybe naively I believe we can refocus, unite, change things. Maybe foolishly I believe we can rock the boat enough to get the scoundrels on board into the drink, without sinking the ship.
But I don’t think so.
We can fight this but we have to work together.
So what do we do?
First, we apply the Ultimate Wedge Issue Test. What is that? There are certain issues which are crucial to the survival of our nation as a democracy which “promotes the general welfare.” The test determines who is in favor of a nation that works for everyone, not just a privileged elite, and who is too selfish, myopic or misinformed to want what is the foundation of our society … equality, justice, peace, harmony, opportunity.
This is the wedge. Either you’re for working together as a society . . . or you’re for continuing on the road to oligarchy, tyranny, fascism. This applies both to citizen voters and candidates for office.
I sincerely believe that the majority of citizens want a country that works for everybody.
Issue-by-issue we find out what we as citizens think is important, then issue-by-issue we see which candidates are willing to commit to getting the job done.
We only vote for those candidates who are on the side of the vast majority of Americans.
No excuses. No compromise. No exceptions.
While applying the “wedge test”, we always keep in mind, this has nothing to do with party or label or ideology. It’s strictly about where candidates come down on those items which the vast majority of citizens have targeted as essential — in most cases things we’ve needed all along — things across the board that haven’t been getting done.
As I said, we all already know what these issues are. And we know those now in office have not nor will they ever support us in promoting and instituting the necessary reforms, such that WE THE PEOPLE get what’s long overdue . . . a fair stake in the vast wealth, blessings, and opportunities of the allegedly richest country in history.
Not just talk about it. Not just say pretty words and make empty campaign promises. Not just continue to spew out sound bites and pleasant-sounding word salad so we will again trust them, fall for their shallow rhetoric, and vote these hypocrites back into office.
It’s that simple. I didn’t say easy. No way will this be easy. But it’s certainly simple.
It starts with us no longer being gullible fools. Those in power will continue to lie to us, continue rigging the system in their favor and that of their patrons, the privileged elite, if we let them.
But we can stop this right now. By getting serious about installing a government of the people, by the people, for the people. By electing “people’s candidates” who have proven themselves worthy of our vote.
I didn’t give it much thought. Of course, I was extremely glad that Masumi, my wife, had time off from teaching school, and we could spend the entire day together. Moreover, a major typhoon was heading our way, so we were preoccupied with preparing the house and garden for a combative assault by Mother Nature.
Then the doorbell rang. I answered it and there stood a gentleman from my local village. He handed me the gift package pictured above. Then it hit me . . .
As I’ve explained before, national holidays here in Japan are by Western standards rather unique. Overall they are not nationalistic. They are more cultural. But they’re not like Mother’s Day or Father’s in the West, which are more like National Cat Day or National Talk in An Elevator Day, which aren’t official holidays at all. These national holidays, which celebrate everything from coming of age (turning 20) to mountains and children, are official holidays! The banks, post offices and most businesses are closed.
Now get this! Because yesterday was Respect for the Aged Day, every person in my small city of about 50,000 people who was 75 or over, received a gift package from the city. Let that sink in!
The package consisted of Japanese tea, and various treats. There were a couple cakes that were scrumptious! But I admit that I find some snacks here a little odd. In this package, there were seaweed crackers, pancakes filled with red bean sauce, green tea flavored udon (noodles). What you see on the right is kelp candy. No, that’s not a typo. It’s chewy candy made from kelp, harvested from the sea. It’s like munching on licorice that has no flavor.
As they say, it’s the thought that counts. And the thought here is one of extraordinary generosity and kindness.
By the way, there was a special letter included in the box. It conveyed a charming message of appreciation. Paraphrasing, it said: “You’ve lived many years, faced difficult challenges in your life, struggled against adversity. The people of Tambasasayama want to thank you for your hard work and your dedication and service to others. May you continue in good health and live a long and happy life.”
As ‘racism’ is discrimination based on race, in the West, ‘ageism’ is discrimination based on age. Someone is elderly, thus they are not accorded the same rights and courtesies as someone younger. They are dismissed personally as less able, and socially as less worthy. But here in Japan, ‘ageism’ — if there is such a thing — has the opposite effect. Ageism here accords an elderly person greater respect, preferential treatment, additional courtesies and admiration based on their advanced age.
What a completely different, and for me at 76, awe-inspiring attitude! Getting older may be inevitable. But in Japan, it doesn’t equate to being “disappeared” or forced to live in the margins of someone else’s life. The kids here don’t shuttle mom and dad off to some convalescent home when they get old, then visit them once a month, if they’re not too busy. The kids here make a room for them in their own home and they all live together again as a family.
The holdup has been . . . well, life on this chaotic planet during these turbulent times.
Let me explain.
Before a novel becomes available to the public, it’s released to a select group of readers. They are given advance reader copies — ARCs — to provide a number of things to us. First, any constructive criticism of the book is welcome, i.e. glaring inconsistencies in characters or plot; typos; mistakes and anomalies the editor may have missed; did the book meet whatever expectations the reader might have had? Second, suggestions for improvements are always helpful. Did the story drag in parts? Is the cover unappealing? Should the book be longer? Shorter? Third, in the hope that the reader found the novel delightful, exciting, moving, eye-opening, life-changing, whatever, positive comments, preferably short and catchy, are much appreciated. These will appear on the inside cover as “blurbs” when the book is finally published. I’m sure you’ve seen them before. Here’s an example of one I already received for Love Connection . . .
“One of the most distinctive and enjoyable aspects of Rachel’s novel is his voice, which travels confidently between the serious and humorous. It’s a good balance, and the writing itself is lively from start to finish, which is no easy thing.” – David Joiner
Thanks, David!
But here’s my problem, and what’s been holding up the book.
Over twenty ARCs were sent out in February. Sadly, we’ve only gotten feedback from five folks. We like to have at least 12 to 15, not just for the blurbs, but to get a range of opinion and feedback on the story, writing, presentation. People are simply not available.
I understand. I don’t think it’s the fault of the book. Like I said, it’s life . . . Covid-19, war, inflation, lockdowns, bankruptcies, all of the craziness we’ve been subjected to for over two years now. Who has time to read a novel? Who can concentrate?
Here’s my offer to you, which will hopefully lead to a solution for us. If anyone out there is interested in reading this book, let me know. I can send either a paperback to hold in your hands, or a PDF to read on your computer, tablet, or book reader. I’m shooting for fifteen more folks to dive into my story, take the ride, have fun, and then tell me what they think.
By the way, and this is important . . .
Love Connection, despite the sub-title, IS NOT A ROMANCE. Not in the traditional sense. I don’t want to give too much away, because a major part of the appeal of the story is the suspense. In fact, it’s more of a “true crime” suspense novel than a romance.
Plus there are many changes of scene. Though it mainly takes place in Japan — and you’ll get a healthy dose of what Japanese people are really like and what it’s like to live here — there’s some serious globe trotting: to Germany, France, Morocco, Nigeria, Uganda, and Kenya. Trust me, you won’t be bored. And the ending! I think when you discover where this whole convoluted adventure eventually ends up, you’ll be quite shocked. Amazingly, this aspect of the storyline is based on real events which have taken place here in Japan.
Hey! What have you got to lose? A few hours? I know it’s not easy with all the distractions and turmoil to sit down and read a book. But look at it as an opportunity to get away from all the distractions and turmoil.
If you’re interested, let me know. It’s first come, first serve. Limited at most to 20 more people. Folks who agree with Groucho Marx when he said . . .
“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.”
Email me at john@jdrachel.com or leave a message with an American Embassy near you.
Artists next to Sasayama Castle capturing the beauty of the moat and all that lives in and around it.
I realize that ‘artistry’ is a sloppy choice for a title. It’s a broad stroke which embraces many activities, from musical performance to jewelry making. But here, I’m using it in the narrowest sense, referring to painters, capturing with deft strokes what and how they see their world.
It might silly on the most superficial level to be “celebrating” something as anachronistic as painting. Ages ago, it was the only way to give a permanent visual record of a person’s appearance, a still life, a landscape, a battlefield, a coronation, a vision. But things have dramatically changed.
Now we have smart phones and digital cameras, technologically cranked up to always take perfect photos. We have dash cams, body cams, Go-Pros that capture everything in real time, not as stop-action stills but as streaming visual records of reality, as it happens.
Better yet — from some perspectives — we have software that can take all that imagery and transform it. Take a photo of that basket of fruit on your table. Process it and you end up with a Rembrandt or Van Gogh or Monet. Want a Titian? Import some angels and naked bathers into the photo you took at the dog park. Add Jesus or Mary or the Twelve Apostles. Looking for a Jackson Pollock? Easy. Just do your own digital drip painting while riding the Tilt-A-Whirl at Six Flags.
Congratulations! You’re an artist!
Want celebrity status? Photoshop yourself having dinner with Angelina Jolie or playing poker across from Christopher Walken in Las Vegas.
This creative “flexibility”, of course, applies not just to visual arts but across the board. There are apps for writing stories or entire novels. Apps for composing music. Apps for making up jokes, pick-up lines, compliments on your grandmother’s new hairdo.
What a wonderful world we live in, eh? Everyone is a creative genius, a star, the life of the party, admired by . . .
Uh . . . well, somebody. Anybody?
Is anyone paying attention?
You really have to wonder where this ends up. If everybody is capable of doing everything at the highest level, no one will stand out. No one will be special. No one will be admired for anything. Except maybe the huge variety of apps they have on their Galaxy or iPhone. And if someone gets a jump on you, hey, no problem. Just go to the app store, do a quick search, put in your credit card and voilà . . . you’re the new Beethoven or Hemingway.
Meaning . . . it’s not about what you actually do. It’s about what you can get done.
In a revealing aside, let’s look at the world’s glamor stage of wealth. There are a few names which are constantly in the news. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Apple Corporation. Elon Musk is the wealthiest person on the planet. He didn’t design, engineer, or make anything which created his fortune. Jeff Bezos doesn’t make anything either. He sells stuff. Bill Gates didn’t invent the computer or any of the software which runs on the PC. He didn’t even invent the graphic user interface which made him famous. He stole the “windows” GUI, the concept and code. Steve Jobs certainly didn’t invent the telephone. To be fair, he was the driver behind the smartphone revolution. But the technological breakthroughs — the grunt work — the actual design and building, were performed as work for hire by his employees. None of the “big names” actually innovated anything. What they did is create the entrepreneurial conditions for the innovations they are credited with. To be blunt about it, they are heralded as geniuses, on the world stage, for one reason. They each amassed huge piles of money. You have to ask: Is this what achievement looks like now? Is merit no longer related to talent, but purely a function of net worth?
So look at these members of my home town. Is it possible they somehow don’t know about all of the wonderful innovations we have at our fingertips? Are they stuck in some world that’s centuries old?
What’s wrong with these people?
When the weather is nice, this is a common sight around Tambasasayama.
I’ll tell you what’s right with these folks. They understand that it’s what you do, not what you own or can buy, that’s fulfilling. That it’s the journey, not the destination, that sustains the soul and adds value to life.
There’s always a surge of excitement when a new face appears on the scene. My village in Hyogo, Japan is no exception to this universal rule.
Yes, there’s a new kid in town. Her name is Mei, and we affectionately — already she has been accepted and embraced with an easy familiarity and an outpouring of love — call her Mei-chan. I have to say right up front, she’s a real charmer.
The home where she lives is quite close by. The houses here in the country are certainly not on top of one another. But it’s an easy walk from my front door to my neighbor’s home. Here is a photo taken from in front of my house of Mei’s new digs.
It’s a pretty typical Japanese home, traditional elements with lots of modern mixed in. Since my neighbor is a farmer, there are additional structures to house equipment, seeds, hay, tools, etc. That’s his rice field growing right in front of his house, quickly approaching the time for harvest. Farming is, of course, demanding work, to put it mildly. It’s certainly good to have extra hands on deck to help with the chores. I’m sure Mei will do her part to keep things running smoothly.
Now, without further ado, let me introduce you to the new kid on the block.
Mei-chan, a baby goat that speaks better Japanese than I do.
New kid? Get it? Ha ha ha ha! Okay. Not all that funny. But I’ve always been a compulsive kidder. The most repeated question I get is: “Are you serious?” As if I would know.
My neighbor has his hands full at this point. Of course, goats eat everything. Which is what makes them useful for weed control and clearing debris. But their omnivorosity — yes, I made up that word — embraces just about anything that will fit in their mouths, which can result in unintended destruction of everything less rugged than titanium. Right after this next photo was taken, Mei tried to gulp down the flowers in front of the house.
But how can anyone get upset? She’s just so darn cute! I’m reminded of this about twenty hours a day, when Mei declares her joy at just being alive, not that I’m privy to the nuances of goat speak. “Be-he-he-he! Be-he-he-he!” fills the airwaves morning, noon, and night. But she’s far enough away, I don’t find this especially annoying. In fact it’s pleasant in some odd fashion. It sure beats “Cock-a-doodle-doo!” or “Oink oink!”
I wish I had something profound to add here. As you know from reading my other writing, I usually like to close on a cosmic note, concluding with some epic morsel of wisdom.
I guess I’ll just settle for this elocution tip: ‘Mei’ is pronounce like the month of May.
They claim proof in this video that age is a state of mind. Well, I’m not quite convinced of that. If a toddler just had a different attitude, he could start using chopsticks or master the Argentine Tango? When your heart stops beating or your kidneys quit functioning, it’s because you’re looking at things wrong? I don’t think so.
At the same time, state of mind is important in achieving a balanced, healthy perspective on age, whatever the number turns out to be. That’s the real message and it’s a good one.
At my advanced age, I love Japan, and Asia in general, because here they don’t demote or disappear people just because they were born a long time ago. The youth culture — should I say ‘youth-worshipping’ culture? — of most Western countries requires that old people be written off as persona non grata, once they get crows feet, or most certainly when they are no longer reproductive-capable. Or as my now deceased friend, British TV character actor David Rayner, liked to say: “We become invisible.”
By contrast, older folks here are respected, often revered, assigned a special, important place in their communities and families. Where it’s standard protocol in the West to get gramps and grannie into a retirement home or elderly care facility — out-of-sight out-of-mind — as soon as the old codgers agree to live in a pre-death camp, here it is extremely common for the oldest members of the family to live with their sons and daughters and their spouses until they die. I had an English student in his 70s whose parents, both pushing 100, lived with him and his wife until they passed away. This is customary.
Then again, it’s not just about work. Contrary to stereotypes about Japanese people, they do like to have fun. Which brings me to the central topic of this piece . . . Japan Pom Pom!
As you already suspect, this is a cheerleading squad. But what makes it unique is all of the ladies in it are over 55, the average age being 70. Their nickname is ‘The Cheerleading Grannies’.
Japan Pom Pom is the brainchild of Fumi Takino, an 85-year-old resident of Tokyo, who wolfs down pizza, and drinks beer and Coke like a 16-year-old high school exchange student.
Fumi Takino.
At 84.67 years, Japan has the second-highest life expectancy in the world, right behind Hong Kong. This is largely attributed to diet and an excellent health care system. I’m sure “state of mind” plays some role. First, Japanese expect to live a long time. Second, they do not let age hinder them from fully participating in society, at whatever level makes sense. Many refuse to retire and work into their 70s, 80s, 90s. I wrote back in November 2020 about Silver-san, aka Jinzai Centers. Jinzai — 人材 — means human resources. But what makes these work centers special is they only employ people over 65.
The video at the top tells the entire story. I really have nothing to add, except this: If you’re feeling old and thinking about just surrendering to deterioration, convinced that your “old age” has condemned you to hopelessness and inevitable decline, watch the Cheerleading Grannies. If you don’t find it a shot of inspiration or a strong case for unfettered optimism, I’m confident you’ll at least enjoy a smile.
Bonus video: If you’re really in need of a good jaw-dropping, check out this performance by 94-year-old Johanna Quaas, from Germany — the oldest active gymnast in the world!
Age is a state of mind? Only if your state of mind is ageless.
Life In Japan: Excellence
Whether you like, love or hate classical music, please watch at least one of the videos below. I have things to say about them which I think will astonish you. So fasten your seat belts, sit back, and let the music flow through you like cannabis oil aroma therapy.
Okay. Ready? Here’s the scoop …
These are junior high school students, at a school in Fukushima. Yes, that Fukushima, where the massive earthquake in 2011 caused the nuclear reactors to melt down. But that’s not what I’m here to talk about.
Instead, let me get to what I want you good folks to wrap your heads around. First …
Being junior high school students, everyone except the conductor is 13-15 years old. Not seasoned adults. Not college graduates. Young adolescents! What talent, eh?
It gets better: This is not a special school for music or any other area of study. It’s not some private school for rich kids — yes, we have exclusive, private schools here in Japan just like practically every other developed country. This particular school is no such uppity institution. No folks . . . THIS IS A PUBLIC SCHOOL!
And here is, what in my mind is the most jaw-dropping aspect of this tale: Participating in this choral orchestra is not part of the official school curriculum. This is not a music class. The students are not getting any credit for this. Everything, the individual mastering of the instruments, the hours of practice, the orchestra and vocal rehearsals, the concert performance, is purely voluntary. It’s an AFTER-SCHOOL CLUB!
I recall my school had a French Club, Photography Club, a Glee Club, an Astronomy Club. It’s just like that. Only these junior high kids, as members of this club, are performing — at a sophisticated level — Mozart and Bach.
What do you think? Honestly? Aren’t you a bit impressed?
I have to admit: I’m awestruck! Almost at a loss for words . . . but not quite.
Here are my final thoughts: The world is going through some very strange and difficult times. Technology, political turmoil, economic crises, environmental crises, leadership crises. We can’t keep up with it all. Unfortunately, young people get totally blindsided by all of this. They’re dropped into a world not of their making, facing catastrophes that were in the works before they were in the womb. Supposedly, societies do what they can to bring the young up to speed and equip them to take the reins when their time comes.
educational environment.
Supposedly, societies do what they can to bring the young up to speed and equip them to take the reins when their time comes. In the U.S., as with every highly-developed Western nation, it is the public education system which provides the basic skills and knowledge needed to function in the world.
Now, I’m hardly in a position to judge the current state of public schools in the U.S., which by far the majority of young people there attend for 12+ years at minimum. True, I went to public school for 6 years but that was around 200 years ago, give or take a few decades. Moreover, as you probably know, I haven’t lived in the U.S. for sixteen years. Meaning, I can’t overcome either the generational gap or the geographical gap. So I’ll let you folks be my eyes and ears on this.
Here’s a straightforward question for you American readers: How are things going there?
Is anything resembling what you see in the above videos occurring there?
I know I have trouble imagining it. But that’s just me.