Nouvelles du Japon / News from Japan

[Ingrid]

je viens d'avoir des nouvelles de la part de mes amis à Tokyo et Yokohama, ils vont bien. Ma copine de Yokohama vient de me confirmer qu'à 4h50 le matin, elle est encore à son bureau et attend la reprise du transport public.

[danse-0pera]

Bon courage à eux tous...

[mizuko]

Thank you for the thoughtful message. It's been almost 24 hours since the strong earthquake, and we still have aftershocks very often even in Tokyo. The trains and subways, the main public transportation in Tohoku and Kantou area, includes Tokyo, were all down yesterday and so many people couldn't get home. I was very lucky that I could walk home from work last night. The transportation is now already getting back in Tokyo. I'm thinking of the people in Tohoku area, near the hypocenter. The scenes of Tohoku area on TV are beyond description. Such a disaster...
I hope everyone of readers is fine.

[yiannakis74]

To all our Japanese friends our thoughts and sympathie are with you in this moment.

[mizuko]

Thank you. So many people died, injured or lost their loved ones, relatives, friends, homes... So sad
We are still having aftershocks and there another earthquaks occured in the middle part of mainland today (yesterday's were in the north parts of mainland.) We still have to be cautious.

[serenade]

I've just got some good news from a friend of mine. She and her family are fine but I can't help to feel so useless. Such an horrible feeling...
More than ever, all our thoughts are with you.

[haydn]

Les nouvelles du Japon ne sont malheureusement pas très bonnes. Si notre amie et modératrice Mizuko est, aux dernières informations, en bonne santé, des coupures d'électricité vont être programmées à Tokyo, où elle réside. J'espère que nous pourrons garder, le cas échéant, par d'autres moyens, le contact avec nos infortunés lecteurs de l'Empire du Soleil Levant.

[haydn]

A l'instant même Mizuko m'informe qu'un nouveau tremblement de terre à lieu, et qu'elle doit couper - provisoirement j'espère - la communication.

[haydn]

Il s'agit selon Mizuko d'un tremblement de terre (réplique?) assez fort dont l'épicentre se trouverait à Sizuoka, ville située au sud-est de Tokyo, mais qui a été apparemment assez violemment ressenti également dans la capitale, où se trouve en ce moment Mizuko.

Pendant ce temps, chez nous, certains s'inquiètent d'une baisse des ventes des sacs Vuitton et autres babioles de luxe aux touristes japonais...

[haydn]

Le Tokyo Ballet annonce que tous les spectacles prévus jusqu'au 31 mars sont annulés.

[mizuko]

Hello. I'm back. I'm OK. Tokyo looks OK. The media is still gathering information about the effect of the earthquake occured in Shizuoka, actually the epicenter was at the foot of Mt. Fuji, 2 and half hours ago. That was very much scary. We still have to be prepared. I'm anxious. But well, it comes when it comes.

Tokyo has been safe after the strong earthquake in Tohoku-Kantou area (north parts of Tokyo) last Friday. The serious matter for Tokyo now is the electricity since four of the nuclear plants in Fukushima in Tohoku area are down by explosion. Tokyo Electric Power Co., announced on Sunday night to go ahead with the planned power outage, rolling blackouts, to deal with the shortage of electricity. That brought down some confusion to Tokyo. And TEPO actually implemented it from today. It might go until the end of April.

Well, it seems some other earthquakes occured in north and also in west parts in this 2 and half hours...


And, it's the National Ballet of Japan, the New National Theatre, Tokyo, not the Tokyo Ballet, which cancelled all the performance scheduled in March. The ballet was triple bill - Concerto Barocco (Balanchine)/Take Five (Bintley)/In the Upper Room (Tharp). sad...

http://www.nntt.jac.go.jp/english/release/r575e/r575e.html

[mizuko]

Thanks again for caring about me and Japan, haydn. I'm quite ok and go to work as normal.

The situation here is changing everyday, but I think it's getting better and calm, except for the nuclear power plant in Fukushima. Still sad news are coming from the Tunami disaster area, but the good thing is there's no looting nor robbery nor violence. People are in calm and helping each other in the difficult situation. There are still some parts with no electricity, no heating oil, no medicine, no enough food nor everyday commodities. The severed roads and shortage of gasoline are disrupting the transportation. And it's very cold tonight...

Tokyo is safe. The planned blackouts are still affecting on our daily life but it's only in some municipalites in the Kanto region, and no power outage would be implemented in the middle part of Tokyo at this moment. The shortage of electric power is also still reducing train services in the Tokyo area, which brought some problem to the people who work in the metropolitan. The situation is getting better day by day. Now most of the train/metro companies are operating about 40%-100%. We seriously need to save electricity, and we 'are' already trying, which is causing some inconvinience, but to think of the people in the disaster area, it's nothing.

There is one more little problem in Tokyo. People here bought up gasoline, oil, food, water, daily commodities, flashlights, batterlies, emergency kits, etc. in stores, from anxiety for power outage and fear for another strong earthquake might hit Tokyo. So now it's hard to get them. We should have delivered those things to the people who need them in disaster area.

The biggest concern now is the nuclear power plant in Fukushima. The situation of the nuclear reactors seems serious.
http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201103150145.html

But the radiation levels in Tokyo area are not harmful. ( http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20110316D15JFA16.htm ) We should not over-react, and remember there are people working so hard at their peril to remedy the situation there.

[haydn]

Thank you very much Mizuko

I hope our other japanese readers are safe too.

The news we get here in France about the situation in Japan are quite frightening and I hope our other Japanese readers are safe too.

We all hope also ardently that a solution will be found to cope with the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Do you have news from the dancers of the major Japanese ballet companies?

If there's something we can do to help our Japanese friends, please let us know Mizuko, and we'll take all inventives that are in our reach.

[haydn]

Après toutes les images sinistres qui nous sont venues de l'Empire du Soleil Levant, quelques cerisiers en fleurs ne feront pas de mal... C'est aujourd'hui la fête du Printemps, l'une des plus importantes au Japon ; c'est d'ailleurs jour férié là bas.

Petite pensée pour Miho Fujii, la Japonaise du Ballet de l'Opéra de Paris, et dont, heureusement, les proches vont apparemment bien.

[mizuko]

Beautiful picture
The season of cherry blossoms is right around the corner. They will bloom very soon in Tokyo.
And it's holiday in Japan but it's cold and raining all day.
Today is a Buddhist holiday, the middle day of "Higan." Traditionally families get together and visit their ancestor's grave to thank them. Well, it's holiday, nevertheless.

Here're the links for the viedos of Japanese TV news reports of Japan Tsumani Appeal Concert with Miyako Yoshida and her friends from the Royal Ballet, Yuhui Choe, Valeri Hiristov, Hikaru Kobayashi, Ryoichi Hirano, Kenta Kura, and Akane Takada, which was held at Linbury Studio, the Royal Opera House yesterday.

NHK : http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20110321/t10014804661000.html
TBS : http://news.tbs.co.jp/newseye/tbs_newseye4679667.html or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTcstIAfdtU