Tokyo nights

Confused

I was talking with students yesterday afternoon about Obama winning the elections. Most people were excited and pleased (or clueless) about the win and had high hopes for the future. One student though, made a comment that puzzled me. She said that Obama had made comments about his dislike for Japan/Japan's policies and it made her worry about future relations between the two countries.

Now I have looked on the internet for ANY reference I could find about Obama and his views on Japan to no avail. All I keep getting is links about that damned town in Fukui called Obama-shi. I see no information at all that says Obama has a hate-on for Japan. Does anybody else know about this? Help me out if you have a link.

Elections

Even though I'm a Canadian living in Japan, I care about the election results being announced today. I'm sitting in my office and refreshing my browser ever five minutes to see who wins.

I knew that with elections you can never safely call the winner, but I really thought Obama had it in the bag. Now as I refresh my browser and see the states colour in with blue (Obama) and red (McCain), I realize that McCain really stands a chance of winning. Even in the states that border with Canada, which really surprised me.

It puzzles me how americans could want Palin as their Vice President. Even worse than someone who will continue Bush's policies, it frightens me much more to think of a  leader so totally clueless about foreign policy. Also, Palin doesn't strike me as someone who is in it for the greater good (and don't even get me started on her ideas about drilling for oil in Alaska!!!).

Well, the fate of America rests in the hands of Americans. We foreigners can only sit back and watch. I hope America makes the right choice, whatever that may be.

To eat or not to eat whale, that is the question

So the boyfriend and I don't tend to fight a lot over philosophical issues. It's commonly understood that he has his opinions (which are wrong) and I have mine. The only thing I tend to get vocal about is the whaling situation in Japan.

Please don't get me wrong. I'm not some bleeding heart liberal who petitions for the preservation of marshlands or donates a large chunk of my salary to the WWF or chains myself to trees. I'm too busy being selfish to save the rest of the world. But I do believe hunting whales is unnecessary.

When the whole controversy of Japan's Taiji dolphin hunt blew up earlier this year my boyfriend started ranting about everyone's dislike for Japan and the "experimental" whaling it does. "You wouldn't care if the animals weren't cute!" he accused. Oh contraire mon ami. I don't think whales or dolphins are cute. In fact, I don't know many people who could look at the barnacle covered skin of a humpback whale and say "Awwww, isn't it the most pwecious widdle thing?"

So I told him flat out that blaming national disapproval on the whole  "don't kill it because it's cute" argument wouldn't cut the mustard. Then he started arguing that hunting whales is a tradition of Japan and they should preserve it as part of their cultural heritage. Woopdeedo. Committing suicide was part of your heritage too. Should we continue with that? Oh wait, I forgot. That's what delays my train several times a month.

We argued back and forth until I brought out my ace, "You do know a lot of whale meat in supermarkets is mislabeled right? You're really buying dolphin meat." *boyfriend looks surprised* "And that dolphin meat has a mercury content 37 times higher than what is considered safe for humans?" *boyfriend looks more shocked* "Just like Tuna." *brow of boyfriend furrows* The rest of the conversation went as follows:

Boyfriend: Wait a minute! Tuna has a high mercury content?

Me: Yes.

Boyfriend: Like in Minamata?

Me: Exactly.

Boyfriend: That itaiitaibyou or whatever it was called?

Me: *slowly* yeeeesss.

Boyfriend: Wow. Maybe I'll stick to salmon. But we should still be allowed to hunt whales!!!

Me: *sigh* Whatever.