Japanory

Japan Earthquake Map

Sunday 20^th March 2011

I've even less to report today so I've decided to stop putting extra pressure on myself during this stressful time by attempting to write this blog every day. If I have something new to say, then I will update you. Otherwise I will just let it ride until we move from Japan and then I may restart putting up the older posts again.

Rhiannon is still very disturbed by the events of Friday 11^th March and last night had no sleep at all. Which meant I didn't either. Although Tim and our visitor took the dog out this morning allowing me to sleep then instead.

School looks to be closed for the foreseeable future –having spoken with other families who have remained in Japan, none of us believe it will open again before the Easter holidays. I hope I am proved wrong. However, there is a gym "camp" next week which I've enrolled Rhiannon into. She loves this and hopefully it will exhaust her enough to sleep.

Today there are a couple of websites I'd like to share with you.

Firstly, it seems the UK Mail has finally got its act together and has written a couple of accurate articles:

Tea and ham sandwiches on a very English evacuation: Mail on Sunday joins bus convoy carrying British tsunami survivors to safety

'We have a stiff upper lip – like you British': Tokyo residents show their true grit amid nuclear chaos (OK, I'll ignore the "nuclear chaos" bit…!)

And this graphic is rather spectacular. It shows the number of earthquakes we've experienced since Friday 11^th March. If you use the drop down menu on the right of the page you can get a clear idea of what went on that day. Japan Quake Map

Due to the uncertain situation here, sadly I have had to close my Dear Fairies business down for the time being – international mail is currently and understandably unpredictable.

So there I am going to leave updating Japanory on a daily basis. I need to look to my own life and family right now. 

I also need to find time to study, get sorted ready for our move to Berlin in 3 weeks' time and try to find a way of earning some money.

Thank you all for reading – do check back from time to time as there may be more news. Who knows?

 

What does a 9.0 Earthquake Feel Like?

Saturday 19^th March 2011

I really don't have much to write today.

Aftershocks seem to be abating in regularity but when we do get one it's quite large. We had a 6.1 at about 7pm, just as we were getting used to solid ground again.

This evening's dog walk was strange and it took a while for me to work out why… all the lights were out. Not street lights, but all the extra neon signs and so on. Tokyo is never properly dark, but it's getting there now as everyone is diligently conserving power to assist in the nuclear reactor plant rescue effort.

While out, I noticed something else unusual too: some doorways had little piles of salt carefully placed outside them. When I returned home I googled to see if I could find out what this was about. It turns out to be a Shinto method of purification. "Salt is sometimes placed outside homes in little piles called Mori Shio 盛り塩 (piles of salt), usually near the entrance, so people who enter the home are purified". So it appears some people may have fears of radiation after all. I have never seen this Mori Shio before in all the time I've been here, so I'm just drawing conclusions.

Today I've suffered from information overload, so I'm keeping this post fairly short until my head has had time to process this information.

Instead, I thought it would be interesting to address some of the search strings that have led people to Japanory recently.

Let's start with the easy ones:

Pictures of Japan earthquake 11/3/11. This would have brought them to my first post on this subject

Panic in Tokyo. I intentionally used an emotive, SEO friendly title for this post and boy, did it get searched a lot with thousands of hits.

What is the distance from Fukushima nuclear plant and Kyoto? 488.4 kilometres (303.5 miles) according to this site.

Why do we get under table when having earthquake? It's what is taught to the children at school during earthquake drills. It's called the "duck, cover and hold" drill. Duck under a table, cover your head and hold onto the table for dear life. Then panic and get the hell out of the house… well, that seemed to be the right thing to do at the time.

Did the dogs bark before the earthquake? Well, our dog was barking, but I think it was at the neighbours who were outside at the time. The only time she has given us clear warning of an impending earthquake was when she was a puppy and woke us with a loud bark at about 4.30am. About 10 seconds later we had an earthquake.

Will Japan have another earthquake? Yes. Of course it will. We're having earthquakes / aftershocks every day. Even before this big quake on 11th March Japan had earthquakes every day in some part of the country. It's an earthquake zone due to it sitting on a junction of several tectonic plates. Ring of fire and all that. Let's hope Japan never experiences another one like this though.

What is Japan's earthquake called? I don't think it's been officially decided yet. See my post here for the list of currently used names; none too catchy yet.

Tokyo should i stay home? I don't know quite how to answer this one. As the searcher was outside of Japan by thousands of miles, I'd say it wasn't an issue! If the search originated in Tokyo, I'd say the same. Tokyo is safe from radiation right now, so no reason to stay at home. Get out there and enjoy life. It can be wiped out in seconds as we have seen in such awful detail this past week.

How big does an earthquake have to be to feel it? Another tricky one. And one that has no definitive answer. It depends on the location, magnitude, depth, movement and a whole heap of other factors. I've felt earthquakes in this room downstairs while my husband working on his PC upstairs was completely unaware. And vice versa. Sometimes a magnitude 4 can feel worse than a 5.5 if it's closer to your position.

What the f*** does a 9.0 earthquake feel like? Oh this one did make me laugh. It was the expletive that set me off and I can empathise with the question put like that! Obviously I can't speak for the poor people near its epicentre, but there are plenty of YouTube clips giving you an idea. For us here in the centre of Tokyo the movement was a gradual build up from a gentle rolling motion to feeling like we were on a boat in a rough sea and unable to walk easily. It was the length of time it lasted that made us realise that it was a Big Quake. And furniture falling over.

And totally off topic, but I just had to include this one…

Hamster go up hoover. Oh dear! Poor hamster. I do hope it survived its horrendous journey. This search ended up here – and I hasten to add there is NO hamster involved in my post.

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One Week on from the Big Earthquake in Japan

Friday 18^th March 2011

One week. That's all. But it seems like the longest week in history.

How can just a few minutes change the lives of so many people, in some cases forever?

It's shocking, devastating and deeply upsetting. I hate feeling so helpless. I want to go out and help, but I can't.

Instead, I have to keep home life as normal as possible, which is a difficult task because life is anything but normal. Tim is working all hours and will be working this weekend too. We have our visitor here. There is no school. Nothing is normal.

My previous comments about Rhiannon taking it all very well were possibly premature and she now seems to be showing completely understandable symptoms of post-traumatic stress. And I have no idea how to help her. Any slight noise or aftershock is affecting her quite badly. She will not sleep, just in case we have another earthquake like last week. I can't distract her with play dates as almost everyone has left the country. I can't take her anywhere as fuel is rationed and we just don't know what is open and what isn't.

I have my suspicions which are shared by the few other mums who have stayed, that the school will not open again before the Easter Holidays, which is when we leave for our new country. It appears a good number of the teachers have also left the country. If this is the case, then Rhiannon won't be able to say goodbye to her classmates and I think this will make her stress a lot worse.

So, today has not been a good day.

I cannot let my emotions out as I am the strong one who has to keep everyone together. A traumatised daughter and dog, an exhausted husband and a slightly shell-shocked visitor. I have felt in turns angry and desperately sad. Anger is directed to various idiots who keep telling me what to do; leave / don't leave; go out / stay in; various media requests looking for horrible sensational stories and who will make them up anyway regardless of what is said; various random online comments saying things like "this was god's will", "god's revenge for blah blah blah" and other such ridiculous and inflammatory dogma. I've had to stay away from the computer quite a lot today in order to keep my sanity.

Sadness comes from hearing stories about people dying of hypothermia in the freezing shelters; the fact that rescuers can't actually find the shelters as all the records were washed away in the tsunami. No centralised data was kept anywhere – each area kept its own data and that's all been washed away.

Clips and tales of lost and brave animals nearly reduce me to tears. And I have heard terrible rumours (as yet unfounded) that many of the expats that left have abandoned their so-called beloved pets.

I say nearly reduced me to tears because I cannot lose it. Not yet. I have to remain strong for my family. And yes, I realise this will all come back on me in due course – probably a few weeks after we've moved to Germany.

Oh, and this week also included the 7^th anniversary of my beloved Dad's death.

 

OK. Enough navel gazing. Onto other fairly random, but still earthquake related, stuff.

I was honoured today to receive an email from the British Library who wants to add Japanory to their web archive. "We select and archive sites to represent aspects of UK documentary heritage and as a result, they will remain available to researchers in the future." I'm rather chuffed about this!

 

Wikipedia now have an entry for the earthquake. There is some confusion as to what this quake is to be called. I'm sure the name will settle down sometime, but currently on the cards are:

• The Sendai Earthquake
• 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami
• The 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tōhoku Earthquake (not very catchy, this one!)
• Tōhoku Kantō Great Earthquake
• East Japan Great Earthquake
• East Japan Giant Earthquake

 

Finally for tonight, I want to spread the news about a fantastically adventurous and ground-breaking "Help Japan" plan by a good friend of mine, Caroline Pover.

I quote from her site:

"I can give speeches, I am persuasive, I can write, and I don't like the word "no." Those skills have to be helpful in this situation somehow. This is what I'm doing … I am going to drive a truck around the UK giving talks to schools and any other communities about how wonderful Japan is and all the reasons why I love it, and fill that truck with food, clothes, toys, money, and whatever else the people of Japan need in order to rebuild their lives. Virgin Atlantic will help me get it to Japan, and I will arrange for it to get to where it is needed."

There is a Facebook page set up for this venture. Please spread the word and if you can help in any way, please get in contact directly with Caroline as soon as possible.

Panic in Tokyo!

Thursday 17^th March 2011

Oh my god! The panic in Tokyo today was unbelievable!! First thing this morning my inbox was full to the brim with messages from friends in the UK and Facebook friends had posted links to various UK newspaper headlines with dramatic impact such as:

"GET OUT OF TOKYO NOW"
"BRITS TOLD TO GET OUT OF TOKYO TONIGHT"
"THOUSANDS FLEEING THE CITY IN A PANIC OVER RADIATION LEAKS"

Holy ****! I checked other papers online and most said the same sort of thing.

What on earth had happened overnight to prompt this melodramatic journalism?

I checked my many sources, and found a paragraph on the FCO Travel Guidance site had been changed slightly, and could have been misconstrued by anyone not reading it properly, or those with little knowledge of semantics…

But the journalists stopped reading at that line and made their sensationalist headlines. Well, it sells the papers, I suppose. But it also misleads everyone and for those of us with friends and family in the UK meant we had a lot of explaining to do later today. Naturally they were terribly upset. After all, isn't everything you read in the papers true?

Of course it isn't. Luckily, most people realise this, but still, it creates panic where none exists. Apparently the TV and radio were just as bad too. There's a particular story in one paper that is wrong in every single respect but I don't want to give them more hits, so I'm not going to link to it here. Whether it was the interviewee lying or creative journalism, I don't know.

The FCO site has now updated its travel advice to make it clear that British nationals currently in Tokyo and to the north of Tokyo should consider leaving the area. Consider being the operative word here. This advice is totally unrelated to radiation, which as I stated yesterday will not be an issue even in the worst case scenarios. It is purely because of disruption to travel, power and possible food shortages.

I guess my rant against the media comes from this: I have been approached by numerous media companies requesting interviews and such.

Initially I thought this was a "good thing" and I had a tiny piece with my name on it in The Times on Monday (and even that was misquoted). But I have since realised they are mostly only after horrendously awful stories. Take this request from a TV station I received today, for example: "when things go wrong in Fukushima, and there's a death cloud going towards Tokyo, we would like to talk to as many people as possible"…

<Insert many expletives here>

Anyway, I emailed, Twittered and Facebooked soothing words wherever I could. Made a mental note to call Mum early, before she read her paper. Then I got on with my day. I took the dog for a nice walk in the glorious sunshine and admired the early cherry blossoms, helped Rhiannon make her Lego train, read a magazine, bought food (yes, there is food in the shops).

Life is going on pretty much as normal here in Tokyo. It is not a ghost town. People are no longer queuing for food, although they are for petrol. Children are playing in the parks. Obviously we are panicking wildly here.

Then I came back to the computer.

Wow!

An email giving details of a special chartered flight out of Tokyo tomorrow was waiting for me. What on earth was going on now? They need to have an answer by this afternoon. To be honest, I'm still not entirely sure why this was set up, but there it was.

Back on the phone again… And got firm confirmation that the radiation levels are absolutely fine, and will remain fine (I keep repeating this, but look back at yesterday's post with the briefing transcript). We are in more "danger" from aftershocks – which seem to be calming down now (hope I haven't just jinxed Japan by writing that) and walking home at night in London is statistically way more dangerous than living in Tokyo.

Should I stay or should I go? I went through the pros and cons of leaving – I couldn't think of any pros and the cons are too complex to go into here.

We're staying. Basically I cannot actually leave this country until our leaving date of 11^th April. So, if I do have to move anywhere, it will be further south in Japan, but goodness knows where as I have no family or friends there. As for potential blackouts, transport problems, food and fuel shortages, well, we're only here for another three weeks or so, and can certainly cope for that long. We were expecting a blackout tonight but that didn't happen. As long as Tokyoites continue to be frugal with electricity, we should be OK. All the neon lights that Tokyo is famous for are switched off.

My only regret is that it looks like school may not open again for some considerable time and friends have disappeared overnight, so Rhiannon and I won't be able to say goodbye to people properly.

 

We have a visitor staying with us at the moment (what an introduction to Japan!) and this evening we decided to go out and find a restaurant for a meal out. We discovered the most amazing little bistro down a back street near where we live. Just one lady customer was sitting in there and we were welcomed with open arms. The menu was all in Japanese but the chef did a sterling effort trying to explain what the items were. He was translating into Italian, so I managed to grasp the basic items. Delicious!

The lady customer spoke perfect English and we spent some time discussing recent events with her and the chef. She told me that on the day of the earthquake people had to walk home as the trains stopped. Many had to walk for hours and hours and along their route Japanese people were offering them tea, coffee, rest, beds for the night and the use of their bathrooms. A huge department store over Shinjuku station allowed stranded travellers to sleep in the store; fed them and basically made them as comfortable as possible. Naturally all the staff had to stay there too in order to look after the temporary refugees.

This they did happily.

This is Japan.

Social Networking and Japan’s Earthquake / Tsunami

Wednesday 16^th March 2011

Not much to add today: we're still getting numerous aftershocks, some bigger than others. Shops are still hugely under stocked, but by doubling up our efforts to visit various places we're now OK for food and other essentials. Most shops and train services are closing a lot earlier than normal – Tokyo is not a 24-hour city at the moment. Rhiannon's school has been closed for another week. But this seems to be because other international schools have closed for two weeks and so many people have left Tokyo rather than any concrete reason (see the transcript at the end of this post for my reasons for thinking this).

I mentioned in my post yesterday that as I was writing, a large-ish quake jolted me. It turned out to be a 6.1 magnitude tremor centred on Shizuoka – a prefecture south of Tokyo, near Mount Fuji. Apparently – according to Twitter - 33 people were injured, 92 buildings damaged, 3 landslides, 500 homes still without water. And 21000 homes lost power but that was soon restored This quake was very worrying as Shizuoka is designated as the place where the doom-laden Tokai earthquake is overdue. Japanese geologists have long forecast a huge earthquake, called the Tokai Earthquake, along this zone. It hadn't happened yet. When people talk about "the big one" (ie earthquake) it's the Tokai they are referring to. Friday's magnitude 9.0 was not "it".

Social networking has been a lifeline – literally – for many people during these grim days. When all the telephone lines were down, including mobile phones, the internet was still working. Twitter has been buzzing, with approximately 1,000 tweets from Japan every minute in the early hours after the quake. Since then it has been an amazing way of communicating information around the world. Of course, misinformation has also been doing the global rounds, but it's quite easy to sort the wheat from the chaff.

Hashtags have been put to great use. My favourite being #Edano_Nero (nero means "go to sleep"). This refers to Yukio Edano, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary and right-hand man to Prime Minister Naoto Kan who has been communicating every development since the catastrophes hit. He's been on TV almost constantly since Friday, to the extent that people started telling him to get some sleep. #Edano_Nero = Edano_go to sleep! He's been described as the 'Jack Bauer' of the crisis. He has commanded much respect here in Japan because he has explained the situation to people honestly and directly without reading from a script. Finally, he went to bed after working for 105 hours. Then people started using the hashtag # #kan_okiro … okiro means "wake up". Kan is of course, the Prime Minister who hasn't been seen much.

Facebook has been incredible too. My personal group of family and friends have been a huge source of comfort to me with their many messages and words of comfort and it's enabled me to update everyone on my situation with ease. Also, people have found friends and relatives displaced due to the earthquake via Facebook and the 6 degrees of separation theory really seems to hold water right now. News and information has been disseminated rapidly. Facebook even include this little box at the top of my Facebook page informing me of country-wide updates regarding the power-outages and other details.

News from the tsunami-wrecked north east has been very distressing. Due to the enormous death toll (at the time or writing, the number is over 4,000) the recovery teams have been told to photograph unidentified bodies and take DNA samples before disposing of them as soon as possible. Many thousands of people are still missing.

Finally, I just want to re-iterate my post from yesterday. We are staying in Tokyo unless we are told to go. The main danger is the aftershocks NOT radiation.

I now have the full transcript from the briefing meeting yesterday with The Government's Chief Scientific Officer Professor John Beddington, Hilary Walker from the Department of Health and Lesley Proctor from Health Protection Agency.

It's long, so get a cuppa and see why I am reassured!

Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Situation

Also – When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping…

Tuesday 15^th March 2011

Today did not get off to a very good start as we were rudely shaken wide awake by a particularly nasty aftershock at 5am. Not a rolling sensation this time; more of a 'poltergeist has got hold of the bed and is very angry' movement. Rhiannon came hurtling into our room and got into bed with us. Tim got up and ended up going into work at 7am. I drifted back to sleep only to be woken by the doorbell – an international DHL delivery! Some normal life is still going on, thankfully.

It took me a while to discover that it was only about a 4.1 magnitude, but it was apparently right under Tokyo. Personally I think the epicentre was under our house.

We haven't had too many earthquakes / aftershocks today (can anyone yet explain the difference between these two descriptions?) but they've kicked off again this evening. Why have the tectonic plates decided to shudder at night time? During the writing of this post we were hit by a 6.1 mag which seems to have caused a number of problems in Shizuoka. It had me and the dog running outside (Tim and Rhiannon are at Haneda airport collecting a visitor who will be staying with us for a while to help Tim out at work).

My helper comes on Tuesdays so I was looking forward to seeing her and to take the opportunity to leave the house for a while because she can look after Kita (the dog) who I don't want to leave alone right now. She'd had a long trip to reach us and I felt very guilty for her journey to us and had to leave early as all the trains are stopping very early in the evenings now.

So at lunchtime, Rhiannon and I went to Omotesando for a much-needed retail therapy trip. We spent a happy hour in Kiddyland and, with the prospect of no school for a while, I treated Rhiannon to a huge lego set to keep her occupied for a while. I also kept my promise to a friend in the UK to buy her some weird Japanese goodies before we leave. Then we had lunch out and laughed a lot and basically had a wonderful time. It reduced stress levels immensely. I would have bought my birthday present, but all the designer stores were closed and only a couple of independents and tourist places open. The only people shopping were gaijin.

No, I was not worried about any potential radiation problems.

I do not subscribe to the sensationalist news reports and prefer to rely upon information by scientists directly involved in this crisis. For example, the word "meltdown" is emotive and not necessarily correct. We are miles away from Fukushima and radiation dissipates quickly. Naturally I do feel desperately sorry for those close to the plant. And we must not forget the devastation in Sendai and other places affected by the tsunami.

There was a briefing today. Some details are below.

Update on Japan's Nuclear Power station situation 15 March 2011 17:00 (From Business Link Japan) Highlights are my own.

Telephone briefing from Sir John Beddington, the UK's Chief Scientific adviser and Hilary Walker Deputy Director Emergency Preparedness at the Department of Health.

"Unequivocally, Tokyo will not be affected by the radiation fallout of explosions that have occurred or may occur at the Fukushima nuclear power stations."

The danger area is limited to within the 30 kilometre evacuation zone and no one will be allowed to enter this area other than those directly involved in the emergency procedures currently being undertaken at both Fukushima 1 & 2.

Sir John went on to answer a series of questions including a comparison between Chernobyl and Japan. He said, "They are entirely different. Chernobyl exploded and there was a subsequent fire with radioactive materials being launched 30,000 ft into the air". The maximum height of any Fukushima explosions would be no more than 500 metres.

"The amount of radiation that has been released is miniscule and would have to be in the order of 1,000 or more for it to be a threat to humans" This was confirmed by Hilary Walker.

Sir John went on to say that the Japanese authorities are doing their best to keep the reactors cooled and that this is a continuing operation. All workers on site dealing with the emergency are being fully decontaminated at the end of each shift.

When asked how reliable the information coming from the Japanese authorities was as to radiation levels he said, "this cannot be fabricated and the Japanese authorities are posting all the readings on the recognized international information sites which they are obliged to do. Independent verification shows that the data provided are accurate".

In answer to a specific question from the Head of the British School in Tokyo, Sir John Beddington and Hilary Walker said that there was no reason at all for the school to be closed unless there were other issues such as power outages and transport problems.

A transcript of the briefing should be on the British Embassy in Tokyo website soon.

Some further clarification from Sir John Beddington:

"The point about the Chernobyl thing was, it went up to thirty thousand feet or so and it continued for months on end. The sort of thing that would happen with an explosion in Fukushima would actually be relative duration, hours at the absolute most. What happened with Chernobyl was that the graphite core caught fire and you got radioactive material being putting out to a very great height over a very long period and pretty much went round the world. That radioactive material then went in to the food chain; sheep ate it and concentrated it. That was the problem. It's totally different here in Japan."

 

So, no, we are not leaving Japan before we're supposed to (unless of course, other events occur in the next few weeks) and we are all well. Rhiannon is not traumatised by all the quakes, she's taking each and every one in her stride – apart from the one this morning which is understandable!

And we shall probably go for some more retail therapy tomorrow.

Exodus

Monday 14th March 2011

I wasn't sure I would find much to write about today, but as you will see I managed my usual verbose entry.

Rhiannon's school have decided to close for the entire week, something she is extremely happy about. Apparently all the other international schools are closed for two weeks and our school was the last to make this decision.

I'm in two minds about this development. Mostly I am extremely happy about having my daughter safe at home with me so if anything happened, we'd be together. This is most important, I've come to realise. However, she is Hard Work to keep entertained, especially with all our belongings out of the house in a shipping container. Today we had a lazy day and I allowed her to watch way too much TV. The dog isn't doing so well. She's unsettled and nervous still, and doesn't calm down properly until everyone is home, including our wandering cat.

I can't stop thinking about how lucky we've been in all this, and how dreadful it must be in the devasated areas further north. By a bizarre stroke of luck or an incredible set of coincidences, my entire family was at home together when the earthquake struck on Friday. So many families have been separated; with many thousands separated forever.

Perhaps because we were all together when it happened, Rhiannon doesn't appear to be traumatised too much by it. I should imagine that if she had been at school on Friday she would be in one hell of a state by now.

In fact, I believe it is this trauma that has caused many of our fellow expat families to make a rapid exodus from Japan. I've been astounded by how suddenly and quickly they have left, leaving brief messages on Facebook saying things like "we're catching a plane tomorrow to go to X, Y or Z". Some have said that their children are so panicked by all the aftershocks that it is better to get to a more stable country as soon as possible.

And we've certainly had a lot of aftershocks, with a couple of big ones today which sent us trotting outside again. I've given up trying to work out what magnitude each one is now. As you can see, the map is so full of markers, and it updates quite slowly and sporadically, that it's just not possible to discover which one was "that one". When I phoned Mum this evening for my daily update, her first words were "I hear you've had another big quake". My response... "Have we?" I don't know all of what the British media are reporting, but from what I have seen it's mostly sensationalised and not all accurate, that's for sure! Yes, as I mentioned, we had two substantial ones today, but the whole day has been pretty rock and roll. As was yesterday... and the day before that. I'm beginning to feel quite queasy from the motion.

Of course, the extremely scary situation with the Fukushima nuclear plant is also contributing to the panic and the urge to get as far away from it as soon as possible is strong. Our information indicates that there is nothing to worry about - yet. We're monitoring the situation on a minute by minute basis, though.

For us, it's not so straightforward to just up and go. We're due to leave Japan for good on 11th April anyway. So if Rhiannon and I left now, we'd still have to come back before moving on. That's a lot of travelling. It's much too far to go back to the UK. And I can't think of anywhere else closer we could afford to go for a "holiday" as we've only just come back from one which was rather expensive. And of course, we'd have to leave Tim and the pets behind. Neither of which is conducive to keeping stress levels down.

At the forefront of my mind today was the extremely disturbing information from somewhere that there is a 70% likelihood of another huge quake before Thursday. I was doing OK until I heard this, then every aftershock set my already ragged nerves even further on edge. I've since heard this has now dropped to only a 40% chance. Whether this is true or not - I mean how can this figure be proven or even decided upon? What precedence has been used to predict that?

On the food front - there are quite major shortages here in Tokyo. Even the restuarants are limiting their offerings. I did manage to get some milk today, so I'm OK for my numerous cups of tea and Rhiannon's daily intake. But there is no meat or bread to be found. Tim went out on a hunter/gatherer trip early this evening and came back with vegetables and some unknown frozen nugget-type things. I will have to get inventive!

He also tried to get petrol. It's being rationed now, but he was unlucky as all the petrol stations closed early for a change.

So it looks like life here may get quite difficult in the coming days / weeks, but I've managed the "hard life" before and will do it again.