Well, of all the things I could have thought of, I never expected to get a guided tour of the 119 Emergency Services dispatch room today.
119, the Japanese equivalent of the 000 emergency number, deals with fire trucks and ambulances. For police, you have to dial another number, 110.
Theyve got a very advanced system, and I think more efficient than the setup in Australia in that each individual city has its own dispatch centre, rather than it all going through to a central place somewhere hundred of k's away. One wall has a big map of the city, and flashing dots showing the position of each fire truck or ambulance at the current time. As expected, the moment you place a call to them their screen flashes up with your address and lights a dot on the map as to where you called from.
Not the hive of activity I would have thought though; as you can see by the photo I put up.
Oh yeah, photos have moved, as the more astute of you may have noticed. They are currently being stored on Yahoo Japan's photo storage; which unfortunately means the majority of the page is in Japanese. Dont worry..., you won't need to use anything that is written in Japanese, just click on the albums in the middle with the names in English. If your computer insists you download Japanese text software; its up to you, but the page should still work without it.
Last night in Okazaki tonight, last night to enjoy the glow in the dark bath. Spending tomorrow night in Tokyo and on Friday move into the english school in Saitama. I'm betting that because its a school, there will be internet access available easily... otherwise I'll have to hunt down an internet cafe here and there to keep writing this! Would still love to hear from everyone, and in case youve forgotten my email address, theres a button over there on the right, the one that says 'Get In Touch' and 'feedback'.... click that and you can email me!! I promise to reply as soon as I can!
Saitama means an end to potatoing and a start to being productive. Hoping that this school is lots of fun... im sure it will be... and hoping against hope that there will be at least an internet connection, hopefully a phone.
Anyway, Shall let you know how it goes.
Till next time,
166
Thursday, February 19, 2004
Monday, February 16, 2004
Yay... the photos are up! Went and bought a new memory card for my digital camera today, a little bigger this time so I can fit more photos on.. convinced the bloke in the electronics shop to make it cheaper and throw in a connector to plug the card directly into the computer too. So.. here we go, photos are up at last.
Sorry if the page takes a while to load.. hopefully soon I'll be able to figure out how to make a much better photo gallery, thumbnails and stuff... for now though the photos are gradually appearing. Might try and take a photo of the glow-in-the-dark bath tonight (NOT with myself in it...) depends if it turns out well or not.
I'll write more later... actually havent done anything else today, just lay in my burrow and munched on carrots...
168
Sorry if the page takes a while to load.. hopefully soon I'll be able to figure out how to make a much better photo gallery, thumbnails and stuff... for now though the photos are gradually appearing. Might try and take a photo of the glow-in-the-dark bath tonight (NOT with myself in it...) depends if it turns out well or not.
I'll write more later... actually havent done anything else today, just lay in my burrow and munched on carrots...
168
For the last few days I've been staying here in Okazaki with one of my host families from when I was here last time... they've recently rebuilt their house, and are definitely using the latest in bathroom technology.
Im actually getting used to ceiling lights having remote controls (coz its such a long way to walk to the wall to change the light setting), and have the remote for my room's light on the floor beside my futon, next to the remote control for the heater. All the bedrooms and living areas have fixed lights, but the hallways and corridors are set up on motion sensors and timers, as are the lights in the garage and on the front porch.
The toilet lights are also on a motion sensor: simply walk into the toilet and the light comes on... but it gets better. Step closer to the actual unit and the lid lifts up, (and for some reason there's a light in the bowl too...?), sit down and the seat is already nice and warm. Until youve become used to this experience in winter you dont realise what you're missing! Anyway, if you stand close to the toilet and DON'T sit down, after a short while it even lifts the seat up as well. Very kind of it. It also detects when you walk away from it back to the hand basin, and operates the flush by itself. For the first couple of days I really had to make a conscious effort, telling myself "Dont touch anything, it all works by itself", but now I'm more used to it. This is going to come back and bite me when I go to Saitama for sure, I'll be expecting the toilet to work by itself but its going to need some human manipulation...
The bathroom is similarly hi-tech; but requires at least a push of a button to turn the lights on. What is fun about it though is sitting in the hot water up to my neck, and pushing the little grey button beside my head. The lights dim, and from under the bath lights shine in, and the water glows blue.. or green.. or orange.. or light blue.. or red.. or purple.. you can change the colour to your liking.
This from a country in which Eftpos doesnt exist...
Im not sure if it works or not, but Ive put a Guest Book up on the right hand side of this page... If it works the way I think it will, you can leave notes up on there for me to see - though unless you check 'Private' I think everyone else will be able to read it too.
Its getting cold and late - time to write an email then go to sleep.
169
Im actually getting used to ceiling lights having remote controls (coz its such a long way to walk to the wall to change the light setting), and have the remote for my room's light on the floor beside my futon, next to the remote control for the heater. All the bedrooms and living areas have fixed lights, but the hallways and corridors are set up on motion sensors and timers, as are the lights in the garage and on the front porch.
The toilet lights are also on a motion sensor: simply walk into the toilet and the light comes on... but it gets better. Step closer to the actual unit and the lid lifts up, (and for some reason there's a light in the bowl too...?), sit down and the seat is already nice and warm. Until youve become used to this experience in winter you dont realise what you're missing! Anyway, if you stand close to the toilet and DON'T sit down, after a short while it even lifts the seat up as well. Very kind of it. It also detects when you walk away from it back to the hand basin, and operates the flush by itself. For the first couple of days I really had to make a conscious effort, telling myself "Dont touch anything, it all works by itself", but now I'm more used to it. This is going to come back and bite me when I go to Saitama for sure, I'll be expecting the toilet to work by itself but its going to need some human manipulation...
The bathroom is similarly hi-tech; but requires at least a push of a button to turn the lights on. What is fun about it though is sitting in the hot water up to my neck, and pushing the little grey button beside my head. The lights dim, and from under the bath lights shine in, and the water glows blue.. or green.. or orange.. or light blue.. or red.. or purple.. you can change the colour to your liking.
This from a country in which Eftpos doesnt exist...
Im not sure if it works or not, but Ive put a Guest Book up on the right hand side of this page... If it works the way I think it will, you can leave notes up on there for me to see - though unless you check 'Private' I think everyone else will be able to read it too.
Its getting cold and late - time to write an email then go to sleep.
169
Sunday, February 15, 2004
Valentines Day is quite a big deal in Japan. Girls spend hours on the day before melting chocolate down and re-casting it in little silver foil patty pans, or making chocolate cakes, or chocolate chip cookies, putting them in little plastic bags and tying them up with ribbons, and giving them all to boys or whatever on the day.
Handmade stuff (meaning bought chocolate melted down and re cast) is supposed to mean that there is some genuine affection or whatever between the giver and the reciever, but pre-packaged stuff is more often than not 'giri-choco', chocolate given out of a sense of duty, or not wanting to be seen as not giving any.
The first time I was in Japan over Valentines Day, for some reason I recieved a chocolate or two from a few different sources, this time though... not a sausage. Yuka K did let me sample the biscuits she was making yesterday, and these ones count as real 'handmade' (I've yet to see anyone melt down and re-form a biscuit and the result be successful). Choc-chip too, so, very yummy.
I guess its a cultural thing, but over here its strictly a girls-give-to-boys situation. The confectioners cash in on this by having a repeat performance on the 14th of MARCH, where anyone who recieved chocolates on Valentines Day is supposed to give chocolate back (hopefully not the same ones, though if its Nana's after dinner mints, I guess thats OK). They call that one White Day. No idea why.
Still havent quite got used to the idea of Valentines Day being anything important - its to me just always been a 'Hallmark Holiday'. If you need a special day to be with the one you love, something isnt quite right. But.. I guess, its as good an excuse as any to have some fun, and that fun is always much better had when there isnt ten thousand kilometres and the worlds largest puddle in the way. In about an hour or so Sarah should be awake, so I'l give her a call then.
This time difference thing wouldnt be that much of a problem if I got up really early, ive decided, but that happening regularly is about as likely as a camel weaving a tapestry. Who knows.
Seems that I cant actually post photos on this website without paying for the privelidge, so I guess setting up a seperate photo page is the way to go for now. You can get there by clicking on the wombat to your right, and should be able to get back to here from there as well. I'll make sure to take good care of that page too, once I get a way of connecting my camera up... Ive gone and left the USB cable with my computer in Sendai, instead of bringing it, so I cant do anything yet...
Have a good weekend everyone!
170
Handmade stuff (meaning bought chocolate melted down and re cast) is supposed to mean that there is some genuine affection or whatever between the giver and the reciever, but pre-packaged stuff is more often than not 'giri-choco', chocolate given out of a sense of duty, or not wanting to be seen as not giving any.
The first time I was in Japan over Valentines Day, for some reason I recieved a chocolate or two from a few different sources, this time though... not a sausage. Yuka K did let me sample the biscuits she was making yesterday, and these ones count as real 'handmade' (I've yet to see anyone melt down and re-form a biscuit and the result be successful). Choc-chip too, so, very yummy.
I guess its a cultural thing, but over here its strictly a girls-give-to-boys situation. The confectioners cash in on this by having a repeat performance on the 14th of MARCH, where anyone who recieved chocolates on Valentines Day is supposed to give chocolate back (hopefully not the same ones, though if its Nana's after dinner mints, I guess thats OK). They call that one White Day. No idea why.
Still havent quite got used to the idea of Valentines Day being anything important - its to me just always been a 'Hallmark Holiday'. If you need a special day to be with the one you love, something isnt quite right. But.. I guess, its as good an excuse as any to have some fun, and that fun is always much better had when there isnt ten thousand kilometres and the worlds largest puddle in the way. In about an hour or so Sarah should be awake, so I'l give her a call then.
This time difference thing wouldnt be that much of a problem if I got up really early, ive decided, but that happening regularly is about as likely as a camel weaving a tapestry. Who knows.
Seems that I cant actually post photos on this website without paying for the privelidge, so I guess setting up a seperate photo page is the way to go for now. You can get there by clicking on the wombat to your right, and should be able to get back to here from there as well. I'll make sure to take good care of that page too, once I get a way of connecting my camera up... Ive gone and left the USB cable with my computer in Sendai, instead of bringing it, so I cant do anything yet...
Have a good weekend everyone!
170
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