I heard about this a couple of weeks ago but only found the story recently. It not something I wanted to comment on without seeing myself but now it’s here for all and sundry to take a look at. Those in the diving community know that multiple dives per day are allowed by all major [...]
Posts Tagged ‘japanese news’
Doctor in Okinawa Decides the Diving Rules Should Change
Posted By Dave on March 2nd, 2010
I heard about this a couple of weeks ago but only found the story recently. It not something I wanted to comment on without seeing myself but now it’s here for all and sundry to take a look at. Those in the diving community know that multiple dives per day are allowed by all major diving organizations in the world, with most people doing 2 or 3 dives per day. There are considerations to take into account when planning multiple days per day and/or multiple days of diving, but as long as you adhere to these instructions then you are pretty much going to be fine.
Well it looks like an Okinawan doctor has decided he wants to turn the recreational diving world on its head, as you can see.
Forum educates doctors on diver decompression sickness
Date Posted: 2010-02-11
A noted medical doctor who specializes in diver’s decompression sickness warned “if divers dive three times in one day, and continue two or three days in a row, divers will get sick with decompression sickness” during a forum at Ishigaki City’s Civil Hall.
Doctor Masato Uehara, who works with the Prefectural Hospital in the Yaeyama District, was keynote speaker at the forum on ocean leisure. He says many divers don’t recognize decompression sickness, pointing out that between 1997 and 2009 he treated nearly 100 patients with decompression sickness at the hospital. The frightening part, he pointed out, was that roughly 80% of the patients were experienced divers or diving instructors.
“Divers believe in their computers for diving too much, or the manuals,” he says. He called for more caution and common sense, noting a 56-year-old tourist form mainland Japan who dived three times in a single day. When she tried diving on the fourth day, after her first dive her legs and hands became numb and she couldn’t walk. A bit later, as she walked again, she dived again. By that night, her hands and legs were again numb, so she visited the hospital where he had to treat her for decompression sickness.
Dr. Uehara says decompression sickness can only be treated with high oxygen treatment machines. He called the treatment “drastic measures for the sick” and encouraged divers to be more careful.
Source: Japan Update
If any of you out there are divers your reaction is probably similar to “What the…”. So a doctor (although how he is “noted” I have not been able to find as there is very little mention of him in English or Japanese online) at a relatively small hospital out in Ishigaki has now said that if you dive three times a day for 2 days then you will get decompression sickness. Note that this doesn’t say your chance of catching decompression sickness will increase (which is possible, hence the increased care in multiple diving days) but that it will happen without a doubt. And his evidence is treating under 100 people over a 13 year period.
There is also no evidence that it is the multiple diving days that have caused this (or it is not stated in this article, and I’m going to hazard a guess that there is no concrete evidence). Kind of reminds me of the Brass Eye special all those years back: “This is scientific fact. There’s no real evidence for it, but it is scientific fact”. I will agree that people believe in their computers too much for diving, so will give him that. Although diving to the tables is pretty much safe as houses as long as you know how to use them (which is becoming less the way of the world with PADI’s endless dumbing down of the theory part of the RDP).
I would say much bigger contributions to diving would be people who have to have their gear carried all the way to the entry point by an instructor as they are unable to don it themselves, being people who dive once a year on their trip down to from Tokyo to Okinawa and try to cram as much diving into their time as possible, leaving minimal saturation time before their flight back, and those who light up a cigarette or open a can of Orion beer before they’ve taken their BCD off following a dive. Should note that all of those are pretty common occurrences here in Okinawa.
Or maybe I’m wrong and people all over the world should be cancelling dive trips and only doing one day of diving at a time. What do you think?
Magnitude 7 Earthquake Strikes Okinawan Coast
Posted By Dave on February 27th, 2010
This morning at 5:31am there was a huge earthquake which struck 80km east of Naha, and around 29km underground. It was classified as a magnitude 7 quake and was easily the strongest I’ve experienced in my 5 and a half years here in Okinawa. Put it this way: I have never before considered hightailing out of my apartment and getting to somewhere open. Given my position in Okinawa on the southeast coast, I was probably one of the closest to the epicentre of it, too.
Woke up with my phone going off making a strange noise (which I later found out to be the earthquake alert). Seconds later the apartment started shaking violently. This was accompanied by a roaring noise which sounded like a bulldozer was passing by or something of that nature, but the shaking that came with it was too strong for that. I sat up immediately and for a few seconds was ready to grab my dressing gown and getting out. Things fell of my shelves as the seconds ticked by, and it seemed to go on for an age. In fact, the violent shaking lasted around 40 seconds with the earthquake continuing for over a minute I would guess. Eventually it died down and all became quiet again. I checked out the apartment to look for damage to the apartment and to do a little cleaning up.
There was a tsunami warning issued for coastline areas, but nothing on the village PA system was broadcast so I just stayed up watching the NHK reports for a little while. There are only a few reports of minor injuries I think and only a little damage has been sustained (mainly ruptured water pipes). Need to check in with people today to make sure everyone’s ok, but I wanted to check in on here first.
Take care folks, and let me know if you were in Okinawa and what your experiences of it were. Personally, I don’t want another one of those in a hurry.
Lindsay Ann Hawker murderer arrested in Osaka
Posted By Dave on November 10th, 2009
Over 2 years after the body of English teacher Lindsay Ann Hawker was found in a bathtub of sand in Chiba, the main suspect was arrested this evening. Tatsuyo Ichihashi was captured by 
police early this evening at the Nanko ferry terminal waiting to board a ferry to Okinawa. After recent leads in the Osaka area and a new photo being published of him following cosmetic surgery he had done, a passenger in the ferry terminal reported a person bearing Ichihashi’s description to authorities at the ferry terminal. Police then approached and arrested him.
Currently, the charge is only the complete joke of “abandoning a body”, although Chiba police are hopeful of upgrading that charge to murder. I’m usually very critical of the Japanese police but it seems like after 2 and a half years they have finally got their man. Since initial posters were released, he has undergone a number of plastic surgery operations on his eyes, nose and mouth (no doubt funded by his wealthy family) and was attempting to undergo another round of surgery at a Fukuoka clinic in the near future. It has also emerged that he has been working undetected in Osaka for over a year while managing to remain under the radar.
But he is finally in custody and now the job moves from the police to the criminal courts to ensure that justice is done. I’m trying to be hopeful but just get the feeling he may only be found guilty in the eyes of the law in Japan of abandoning a body. I certainly hope not and hope that the Hawker family can finally get some closure on this.
Farcical Crimes Making the Headlines in Okinawa
Posted By Dave on October 1st, 2009
I just knew that if I kept quiet for a little while something like this story would come up. And lo & behold it has. Haven’t had so much motivation to do writing on here for a while, but this story I saw on Japan Update I just had to report on. The headline read “American GI’s arrested in two separate incidents” which drew me in for 2 reasons. Firstly I’m sure the apostrophe shouldn’t be in there, and secondly to see what horrific crimes they had been arrested for. Assault? Rape of a minor? Murder? Not quite…
One American is in Japanese custody on charges of stealing game dices from a snack bar, while a second has been charged with being drunk and crossing onto private property.
A 22-year-old stationed at Camp Schwab was caught shortly after he stole game dices at an Okinawa City Chuo area snack. Police say Calvin Edward Chandler took the dices, then fled. Staff saw Chandler take the dices and chased him, while others called police. He was caught and charged with stealing two dices, valued at ¥3,000.
A 20-year-old Marine stationed at Camp Foster was arrested after he knocked on the door of a residence in Chatan Town’s Miyagi area. Sean Patric Slein approached the residence and knocked on the door, frightening the woman occupant. She called the police who arrived shortly and found Slein still outside the door. The police asked him “Who are you? Why are you knocking on this door? This is not your area. This is somebody’s private yard.” The police then arrested Slein who was reportedly drunk at the time.
I mean, really… where should I start? I think bad English is as good a place as any! In a week where I’ve seen an exhaust manufacturer inexplicably called Drug Bomber, and a car horn with the manufacturer tagline “We produced with spartan air” around the edge of it, this completes a Triple Crown of Engrish! One of my English pet hates is people using “dice” as a singular word, when they should be using “die”. But this article takes it one further, and introduces a new word into the Engrish language called “dices”.
Right – that’s that out of the way and now onto the story itself. Is this even a story? Well, according to Okinawan news agencies it is. So this first guy stole a pair of dice from a snack bar. Those dice, unless made from platinum or some special Louis Vuitton dice, would cost around 100 yen (70p) from the local cheap product store. Although given that in these places a beer can 
cost over 1,500 yen (£10) then maybe it’s plausible. But can you imagine the police’s reaction when they got the emergency call?
Bar owner: “Hello. We have an emergency here at bar Papa Rich (not the name of the club in question but a similar snack bar). Someone has just fled the scene stealing property from the bar. Please come quickly!”
Police: “Calm down, ma’am. Take a deep breath. What has been taken”
Bar owner: “A pair of dice. He’s getting away!”
Police: “…”
Bar owner: “It’s a foreigner!”
Police: “We’ll be there right away, ma’am!”
The last bit is a little tongue-in-cheek, but it’s not a big stretch of the imagination. You think there must have been something else that would cause the police to take action, but maybe not given the stories that make the Okinawan headlines regarding members of the US military here.
And then the second story is another bizarre one. The guy was arrested for being asleep on her doorstep, or did he try to break into her place? By the sounds of it he knocked on the door and there is no mention at all as to whether she even answered it (although answering the door late at night is usually a no-no unless, like me, you are woken at about 5am by a dozen police officers as your neighbour has been murdered, but that’s beside the point). It seems very unlikely that someone should normally be arrested for knocking on a door when it’s late at night, otherwise I’m sure the vast majority of salarymen throughout Japan would have been arrested at some point in their lives!
Maybe the police were just under their “US military personnel arrest” quote for September, and needed to get a few final arrests in before today. Either way, it does look pretty pathetic and that they are really scraping the barrel for stories to put the old “round-eyes” in a bad light.
Hold the Phones, it’s Happened Again!
Posted By Dave on July 17th, 2009
In the NBA they have March Madness, but it definitely appears to be a case of summer silliness here in Okinawa, with foreign teachers seemingly trying to rival Marines as foreign scapegoats. Incidentally, the Marines have very surprisingly been out of the news in recent weeks, which is odd as any stepping out of line or drunk & disorderly behaviour gets pounced on. Maybe they’re just working on something big! As long as there’s not a repeat of Lockdown ‘08 then I think everyone will be happy!
But back on topic. Was kind of hoping I wouldn’t have to post the red pill thumbnail next to a story for a while, but alas it wasn’t to be. Was told by a colleague today that they’d heard yet another JET Programme participant, American Martin S (should note American is not his first name, although that would be impressively Patriotic if it was), has been fired in Okinawa, in addition to the two girls involved in the previous “mind candy” incident (for which public prosecutors dropped a case most widely thought to be on the condition that a job termination was on the cards and so they would most likely be leaving the country anyway). From what’s been said it was related to this initial incident and has been reported on Okinawan TV today.
At the same time, a letter has been sent through from CLAIR (the organization administering the JET Programme) reminding ALTs of their duty and responsibility while they are in Japan. My reaction to this is probably best summed up by the picture you see to the left. There really isn’t much to say beyond what has been said before. Hopefully this will be the last incident we hear about for some time here in Okinawa. It has been relatively quiet down here for about 4 years and then the past 12 months have just been a little crazy.
LDP Loses Tokyo Election, Lower House to be Dissolved
Posted By Dave on July 13th, 2009
Election fever is starting to grip Japan with a bunch of recent local and gubernatorial elections. The general election is no more than a couple of months away but nobody still knows the exact date as Prime Minister Taro Aso is holding off, maybe hoping for more hostile moves or rhetoric by DPRK to give him ammunition for him and his party. Just editing my post as I type though as one news report has just dropped into my inbox saying the lower house could be dissolved by Tuesday, according to rumours coming out of the Diet. This could mean an election as soon as August 8th. I was just thinking that what everyone really needs now is 3 weeks of even louder campaign buses and people in white gloves waving at me from every intersection, as well as getting asked by numerous students if I know “Japan erection” (those “l” and “r” sounds are killers). On the odd occasions I feel hospitable to wave back (usually when there is a decent song playing in my car drowning out the megaphones) there is frequently ecstasy that someone is responding to their waving, and then confusion as to why the foreigner is waving. Got to do something to get through the day.
But I have digressed, as this report was supposed to be about big political news from Tokyo, where the LDP has achieved its worst result in history in the Tokyo assembly. Out of 127 seats, the LDP won only 38, with the power moving to the DPJ who have won 54 seats. New Komeito (can someone fill me in on who they actually are?) won 23 seats. That represents a loss of 14 seats for the LDP and a gain of 20 for the DPJ, and acts as a further blow to Aso. Can’t really be shedding too many tears at the loss for Aso and Nobuteru Ishihara, leader of the LDP’s Tokyo chapter and son of Tokyo governor & noted anti-foreigner Shintaro Ishihara.
The big question is whether or not this result will be matched in the big general election, whenever it is. And I suppose you have to ask whether the DPJ, if brought to power, will deliver the stimulus that Japan desperately needs to get it moving forward again, both economically and socially. Or will it be more of the same policies but just under a different name? Only time will tell.
EDIT: NHK is reporting that a general election has been called for August 30th. The clock is ticking…
Posted in News
Foreign Teacher Arrest Update
Posted By Dave on June 20th, 2009
Well the story I wrote about last night has made the national headlines, with the Daily Yomiuri carrying the story, as well as the 47 News website. As Jay commented on the original article, it looks like these “party pills” which contain benzylpiperazine were the ones imported, although 47 News is reporting that it is methamphetamine. That latter report does appear to be the only one stating that though. It’s also alleged that 44 pills were imported, which you would think is a little above what they could class as personal consumption.
It is this benzylpiperazine which is a banned substance in a number of countries, including Japan, New Zealand, USA and the UK. The stories are also reporting the pills were purchased from a British company online in mid-April and were seized on arrival in Tokyo. If these pills do contain this substance then the defence that they didn’t know it was illegal looks very shaky considering the same pills are illegal in their home country.
All education staff at my school are now fully aware of what has happened if they weren’t already, following it getting a hefty mention in this morning’s staff meeting. The superintendant of education in Okinawa has already made a statement on the matter, saying it has damaged the trust placed in the education system, and, as expected, the incident was described as “regrettable”.
2 Foreign Teachers Arrested in Okinawa for Importing Illegal Substances
Posted By Dave on June 19th, 2009
Pretty unfortunate news as foreign educator in Okinawa today as two teachers were arrested on suspicion of importing illegal substances into the country. The police have immediately gone public on the case (as is the case with foreigners being involved in crimes) and the two have been named as Americans Ashley L (22) and Kristin Z (23), working with the JET Programme.
There’s not a huge amount of information yet on the case except that the substance was bought online and both suspects are claiming they didn’t know it was illegal in Japan. Tough to say what will happen to these two, but the authorities take a very stern view of any drugs offences, and especially those involving foreigners. Speculation at this point, but it’s tough to see them being able to keep their jobs.
This was the top story on Okinawan TV news and is currently the leading story on the Okinawa Times website (story link in Japanese). What this will also mean is that now a shadow of doubt is put over all foreign teachers within Okinawa. It’s like I’ve mentioned before with incidents involving members of the US armed forces in Okinawa, if one person messes up it’s made to look like everyone is a criminal just waiting to be caught.
I’ll report more on this breaking news story as I hear things. It’s certainly going to be an interesting day at work tomorrow.
High School Students Apprehend Police Officer for Stealing
Posted By Dave on June 6th, 2009
I haven’t posted a story about Japan for a while, but I read this one and knew it had to go up here. It just sums up Japan wonderfully and I defy you not to smile as you read this!
Two teens collar cop who steals purse from 75-year-old woman in Okayama
A 29-year-old Ehime prefectural police officer, whose duties mainly involve investigating theft, was arrested Thursday for allegedly snatching a purse from a woman in the city of Okayama in Okayama Prefecture, police said Friday.
Naofumi Nomura, a police sergeant, is suspected of snatching a purse that contained about 10,000 yen in cash from a 75-year-old woman around 7:50 p.m. Thursday, according to the Okayama prefectural police.
Nomura has been dealing with robbery and theft cases, including purse snatching, for over three years at Matsuyama Minami Police Station, Ehime prefectural police officers said early Friday, adding that his family said he had about 2.5 million yen in loans.
The police said he had not shown up for work since Tuesday.
Nomura fled on foot after taking the purse, but two high school students, aged 17 and 15, heard the woman’s cries and chased after Nomura by bicycle for some 250 meters before overpowering him, according to the Okayama police.
‘‘I won’t run any more,’’ Nomura was quoted as saying when the high school students seized him.
‘‘A detective investigating theft cases has committed a crime like this. We deeply apologize to the victim and those concerned,’’ said Kimiaki Hiraoka, chief inspector at the Ehime police.
Later, one of the boys told reporters, ‘‘I cannot believe that a policeman who is supposed to arrest people has been arrested.’’
The other boy said, ‘‘I thought this could be the end of the world.’’
What can you say, really?! All credit to the boys though – maybe society here isn’t in complete decline and has a small light or 2 at the end of the tunnel. Have to note one comment someone made. It is likely that these boys will get some recognition for their heroic deed in keeping the peace, maybe in the form of a certificate. And who will be expected to hand out this certificate? Well, in all likelihood, the local police!
It’s really piptful though where you’ve got a 29-year old police officer – someone instilled with a lot of trust to protect the public – stealing bags from old women so they can pay off their debts. Any thoughts on this one?
May 15th is Reversion Day in Okinawa; Protests Planned
Posted By Dave on May 14th, 2009
Tomorrow, May 15th, marks the 38th anniversary of Reversion Day in Okinawa, the day that control of Okinawa was handed back over to the Japanese from the US. There are lots of demonstrations and protests planned for tomorrow (think the right-wing groups send down a lot of people from the mainland for these events) around the bases in central Okinawa but which may stretch as far south as Naha. Traffic on the 58 could possibly be backed up more than normal if any protests move over there and don’t be surprised to see plenty of the blacked out uyoku dantai (right-wing extremist) vans driving around blasting the nationalistic music out at ungodly volumes. And finally, expect more of the annoying kids on bikes riding up the 58 in the evening at about 20kph with the police doing nothing to stop them (times like these make me really wish the Evo was back on the road).
Just thought I’d let you know. Please pass the word on to anyone living in Okinawa who might be affected by these demonstrations.
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