Kurashi - News From Japan

This summer I had another task except visiting Croydon in London, as described in the previous post. I also wanted to go back to the Swedish F10 Royal Air Force Flight Museum in Ängelholm, a town in southern Sweden. My youngest aunt Gertrud worked there as a nurse until the air base was closed by the end of the Cold War so she was my guide. The main reason I wanted to pay it a visit is that it has what I believe is the only complete exhibition of how Swedish airfields could be used as emergency landing places for returning airplanes, mostly bombers, after terrible raids deep into Nazi Germany during World War 2. Many hundreds of pilots and their crews were rescued this way, most of them young Americans and Brits, but also Canadians - and even a handful of German airmen. This map shows southern Sweden. Each of the top (dark green) dots represent American airplanes. The middle (red) dots represent British airplanes, and the bottom (black) dots German airplanes. As you can see...

Love music, love all of those who wrote the great music. Homage to Monica Zetterlund in Tokyo this weekend. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugTa4rU5-TI http://youtu.be/ugTa4rU5-TI Published on 13 Nov 2014 http://www.bluenote.co.jp/jp/artists/... モニカ・ゼタールンドを演じた映画が話題、スウェーデンの 人気シンガーとニルス・ラン・ドーキーの豪華顔合わせ EDDA MAGNASON with NIELS LAN DOKY TRIO "Homage to MONICA ZETTERLUND" エッダ・マグナソン with ニルス・ラン・ドーキー・トリオ “オマージュ・トゥ・モニカ・ゼタールンド” DATE & SHOWTIMES 2014 12.20 sat. - 12.21 sun. [1st]Open4:00pm Start5:00pm　[2nd]Open7:00pm Start8:00pm MEMBER Edda Magnason(vo) エッダ・マグナソン（ヴォーカル） Niels Lan Doky(p) ニルス・ラン・ドーキー（ピアノ） Ira Coleman(b) アイラ・コールマン（ベース） Niclas Bardeleben(ds) ニクラス・バーデレーベン（ドラムス） 後援：スウェーデン大使館 後援：デンマーク王国大使館 後援：J-WAVE 協力：ブロードメディア・スタジオ Category Music Licence Standard YouTube Licence

This is such an epic story of the early 1970s, back when the Cold War was seriously on. Sweden was supporting Vietnam, and - hey, why not North Korea as well? There was a trade fair in Pyongyang and Volvo, Atlas Copco and Kockums participated (Atlas Copco for the minerals that now China are eying, but that is another story, Kockums from Malmö, for ship building, I suppose...) Somehow, North Korea managed to manipulate the Swedish government and its foreign trade body to supply some 1,000 green Volvo 144 Sedans. With leather seats. Oh, I remember those, they were considered large by usual Swedish standards back when I was a child in the 1970s. As I have noted earlier on Kurashi, we had a Renault 4 no more no less, until father caught on and got a Toyota Starlet in 1981. Volvo? That was for more affluent neighbors. The Volvo 144 Sedan was - luxury. And that is the very car Sweden decided to export to North Korea. And North Korea decided not to pay. Turns out, they are still around....

(This one is for Ken and his amazing efforts up in rural Nagano) So this month we have Wood Job !, a Toei movie about forestry, a comedy actually, by the same team that gave us Swing Girls and I Forget What Other Fun Film About 18 Year Old Amateurs Getting It All Wrong At First... But this seems to be a rather genuine story about a guy who tries to escape the city life and do something worthwhile. Expect being shouted at, a lot. Filmed in Mie Prefecture, where there are no convenience stores and no mobile phone access. But there are also the fabulous festivals and the sweaty fundoshis (ahem) and the reluctant girl (what Japanese movie would be without one?) except she actually gets to bring said young man to some sort of character development. And I think I will stop trying to review this film right there and then, except to note that Swedish singer Maya Hirasawa is back with another great hit, Happiest Fool. Speaking of forests and Sweden, The Japan Times mentions (wit...

As most of my long-suffering Kurashi readers know, I'm from Malmö, a harbour city in the south of Sweden, that used to be a part of Denmark way back some 400 years ago before we all decided enough is enough, let us all get along... Well, we dealt with that. In Malmö, we are closer to Copenhagen than to Stockholm in some ways. There may be a lesson here for prefectures in Japan that are further west, near Korea and China... Funny how a single Swedish football player, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who went to the same elementary school, Rosengårdsskolan as my younger brother Johan and I, now define Sweden. Here is what happened in the last couple of days. Zlatan, who has scored for and won all kinds of honours in Europe for all kinds of great clubs, including Paris, Inter, Milan, you name it... He started out in a small local Rosengård team called Assyriska, where not a single player had Swedish nationality, and was later playing for MFF, the main club in Malmö. Fast forward, and this incr...

Finally Fredrik Löf, who previously had two bronze medals, achieved his goal and got a gold medal in the Olympics, together with Lund native Max Salminen... Congratulations, or as we say here, grattis! Very dramatic final as Sweden had to pass both Brazil and the UK, and the UK had to really muck things up to not win! If we include canoe, Sweden has gotten medals in water-related events in just about every Olympics ever.  Youtube video with nice slideshow of photos from the event on Sunday.

This interview is very interesting, a very "Kurashi" topic, as this 80 year old nuclear plant engineer Kazushige Hamazaki talks to Mainichi Shimbun about his initial enthusiasm about nuclear power back in 1970: An elderly engineer who was involved in the activation of Japan's first commercial light water reactor at the Tsuruga nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture in 1970 is calling May 5, 2012 "an important day to consider Japanese lifestyles." "I never felt tired as I was filled with the feeling that I was going to support Japan's economic development," recalled Hamazaki, former vice president of the Japan Atomic Power Co. At 4 a.m. that day, the No. 1 reactor at the Tsuruga nuclear plant completed its 100-hour electricity-generation trial. While the facility's central control room was filled with "banzai" celebration chants, Hamazaki, then head of the power generation division, felt a sense of fulfillment as he hel...

My brother was visiting briefly this week before a conference in Hong Kong. What to do on a very hot day in mid August? Tom, frequent commenter and old friend from London, suggested - baseball! I would rather have gone sailing with Pandabonium, but as I checked out the game, it all made sense. 45,000 fans at Tokyo Dome, for a fun event (I watched the Carps beat the Giants in Hiroshima in May) so I got the tickets. What a good call that turned out to be. Baseball fans in Japan are the best, with brass bands, drums, and good manners. When the home team is batting, only the home team fans will cheer. Then, when the away team bats, their fans get to lift the roof. Johan, an avid Malmö FF football fan, noted that there was no hatred, no firecrackers, no violence. Check one for team sports, Made in Japan. We have a lot to learn in Europe. He also liked how they serve beers and while not cheap (800 Yen) it is the Real Deal, no imitations. A big cheer for the young ladies running u...

Very clear sky tonight, with some thunder and lightning back over in the Chichibu mountains. Wish we would get some rains. It is rather hot this summer, is it not? Which means, taking a walk at night is such a pleasure. Thanks to P , I was made aware of the fact that you can easily spot Jupiter, that huge planet, as it emerges in the night sky near the full moon. He even suggested that it is possible to see a moon or two, using binoculars. I was reminded of how much effort people in the past put into carefully noting such events. Tycho Brahe , a Dane living on the tiny island called Hven or Ven between Denmark and Sweden, near Malmö and east of Copenhagen, made many of the observations that were later used by greater minds to help us all make sense of the universe. Uranienborg, "The Castle of Urania" was his star observatory, and he also tried to impose farming methods, inspired by his travels, such as his journey to the botanical garden in Padua that Tycho probably visited ...

May I introduce Mikael Wiehe from Malmö, Sweden, who has had an amazing career since the 1970s, on the "Silence" record label, and stayed very true and close to his roots, thinking about workers and people who don't have such an easy time. Live concert, winter of 2008. Here is a song to courage (modet, an ancient Swedish word for "brave") It is for all who dared to believe in love (kärlek or kär lek, "love play") Even though the night Is so long Here is a song to courage A little, simple song It may seem meaningless But I sing it Anyway Here is a song to courage For joy and hope and laughter It is for all who dared to believe in love Even though hatred is so strong For all who build bridges For all who let it in For all who think man can do, what he wants Here is a song to courage For those who say the truth For all who makes demands For those who knows how difficult it is And yet, they say, "yes" (Chorus 2.25) Here is a song for all of you W...

I was born in a small/medium size harbour town with fog horns at night and strong winds all day long. We liked the salty air but hated this time of year, when summer turns to autumn, and you know it is just going to get darker for a very long time. When I was a child, the Kockums shipyard in Malmö had the world's biggest gantry crane, which for many years stood as a strange symbol, no longer used, for the city I was born in. The good news is that in 2002, it was sold and dismantled, and shipped to Ulsan, South Korea. However... Must read over at Mail Online: Revealed: The ghost fleet of the recession anchored just east of Singapore By Simon Parry Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers - all should be steaming fully laden bet...

Today, the South Korean president has arrived to North Korea for talks between the two countries that still technically remain at war since the Korea War. He will watch the Arirang Festival, mass games of gymnastics and music, that are difficult to describe in words. Have a look at the YouTube video! My home town in Sweden has a small team of gymnasts, Malmöflickorna , with Swedish girls that have performed internationally since the 1950s. Their photos are rather funny compared to the North Korean seriousness... Anyway. The South Korean president is under a lot of pressure at home for meeting with Kim Yong-Il, and also for watching the Arirang games, that many feel are a huge propaganda show. However, Chosun Ilbo notes that a South Korean politician compared the Arirang Games to an opera by Verdi! Well, it is true that European culture, such as Verdi's Aida, was used at the time to glorify European colonialism... BBC: Mixed feelings over Koreas summit (Photo from Marmot of South...

When I was a child, the Kockums shipyard in Malmö had the world's biggest gantry crane, which for many years stood as a strange symbol, no longer used, for the city I was born in. The good news is that in 2002, it was sold and dismantled, and shipped to South Korea. Great pictures (if you are into industrial photography) of how the crane was dismantled in Malmö in September, 2002: Varvshistoria.se Hyundai Heavy Industries shipped it off to their Offshore Fabrication Yard in Ulsan, South Korea, where they painted it orange and kept on building the big ships that Malmö workers could only dream of. In Korea it us used for the construction of drilling rigs, FPSO (Floating, Production, Storage & Offloading) and other offshore structures. Recycling? You bet. And here is the official Hyundai Heavy Industries website with a promotion gallery of photos of huge oil tankers, if that's your thing...

I went to school in Rosengård from grade 4 to 9. So did my brother and most of our friends. As the Swedish social democrats and the shipyards of Kockums (in Malmö) and Öresundsvarven (in Landskrona) suddenly collapsed due to competition from Japanese shipyards such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., the Hitachi Zosen Corporation, Kawasaki Heavy Industries Ltd. and Sumitomo Heavy Industries Ltd. and Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries... - and as the oil crisis of 1974 meant the end of huge oil tankers... - bells ringing as we are now in a " Peak Oil " crisis, of even more serious ramifications for heavy industries, and for ordinary folks as well. (London Pride, built in 1971 in Malmö, Sweden: Tonnage: 255 090 dwt.) Malmö is a city that had to adopt to a lot of change over the years. Kockums where the fathers of several of my friends worked, is now "innovative", but mostly in the field of military technology, as part of ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems. For example, J...