happylife

Drifted Away

I have been in Abashiri, one of the north end cities in Japan since the day before yesterday. It's not that I am drifted away in this cold city, but the reason I have been here was drifted away on the right day I arrived here. It's drift ice. About a week ago, I heard a news report that drift ice arrived alongside the coast in Abashiri area and a few minutes later, I booked the flight and hotel to watch it. However, I have not seen it yet. Drift ice is created at the mouth of River Amur and literally drifts on the sea to reach Japan. Though it once reached here last week, it is offshore now because it is always drifting. It comes to Japan in this season every year but the number of its staying days has been decreasing especially in the last decade. Global warming might be the reason. I hear that only ten percent of short stay visitors here can watch it. It's a challenge, but I have a perfect chance to win. I'm thinking about staying here until I see it.

 

Summer has gone.

Summer seems to have gone away here in Kushiro while most part of Japan Islands is just in the middle of the hot, humid and sticky season. It is so cool that even I, who is sensitive to heat, sometimes feel that a long sleeve jacket is necessary. It is cooler than I had expected and it means that I'm really satisfied with this pleasant weather for now. However, I was a little bit surprised to find a heater was on when I went into the usual restaurant for lunch. I was thinking about staying in this city until September, but it might get colder than I am expecting within two months. As I know Tokyo is too hot in September while Kushiro is too cold, I may have to find another moderate city to stay in. Sapporo, Otaru or Hakodate, all of which are the cities on Hokkaido Island, are the next proposed sites.

Between spring and autumn

The weather pattern of this year in Tokyo seems to have been the best for cherry blossoms. The warm days in the middle of last month followed by the ordinary cool weather since the end of March brought the gorgeous cherry blossoms and hold them for a couple of weeks. As it is the first experience for me to see Japanese cherry blossoms in the last few years, they look more beautiful and is even touching. It is really enjoyable to walk under the trees, look up at them and sometimes take pictures of them. Anyway, spring does not come only for cherry trees; I found these blossoms which are not so conspicuous as cherry blossoms. As you know, this tree is maple. The leaves are going to glow until this autumn and change their color into red. In this picture, I spotlit this autumn star on the background of cherry pink. This is my spirit of perversity.

Snow in Tokyo

We had snow today. It was rather a heavy snowfall in Tokyo and all the streets were covered with the damp, white snow about three centimeters in thickness. I like to find that the view from the window has totally changed into the white world during a night, but I missed the wonderful experience this morning because I had known about the snow in my bed before looking out of the window; the small icon on my cellphone display had let me know about weather before I actually got up. Convenience sometimes interferes with a mood. It kept snowing almost all day long, but it has changed into a cold rain by night and the white world has almost vanished. It will be very cold Monday morning because of the melting snow. I am happy as I don't have to get up early to go to work.

The season has changed

I came back from Obihiro to Tokyo a few days ago. It is completely autumn not only in Obihiro but also in Tokyo. I think it is the best season in Japan; we don't have so much rain as in Vancouver. We Japanese often say that autumn is the season for appetite, reading, sports, traveling and so on. We can be happy whatever we do because the weather is good. I have a new project now and I'm thinking about spending the rest of this year for that here in Tokyo. I don't like living in this noisy, cramp and ugly city, but all those defects do not matter at least while working towards the PC in my room. Plus, the happy feeling in Obihiro still remains in my mind and makes me happy. I think I can survive for a while by writing about it in this blog.

Tropical nights on AMeDAS

Nights with the temperature more than 25 degrees are called "tropical nights" in Japan. It has been tropical nights every night for a couple of days in the most area in Japan. This picture shows the result of AMeDAS (Automated Meteorological Data Acquisition System) in which the orange points imply more than 23 degrees and the red one more than 30 degrees. Can you believe that it is the figure at midnight? This island is really tropical, isn't it? Anyway, thanks to the AMeDAS, we can get accurate weather forecast based on the sufficient meteorological data. The system, which was build more than 30 years ago, is made of 1,300 robots scattered all around the country. Each robot keeps measuring the temperature, precipitation, wind and snow fall at a regular interval and the data gathered from all the robots are compiled to be shown to public. It's so useful that I often see it instead of the rough weather forecast.

It's a good place but ...

After three hour land trip from Tomakomai harbor, I arrived finally at Obihiro city and got the key of my new room. All of the containers arrived just on time at night too. The forwarding agencies in Japan are really great! Everything seemed to be working just as I thought except for one thing. The first reason for this move is to avoid the unpleasant summer weather in Tokyo, but the weather forecast said that it is as hot as Tokyo this week in Obihiro. Furthermore, this city is usually so cool that air conditioners are not popular and my apartment has no such thing. I didn't think this electric fan, which I had sent from Tokyo just in case, plays such an active part. I hope this warm air surrounding me goes away as soon as possible.

The important factor

Tokyo is such a huge, artificial city with skyscrapers and paved roads that we can hardly feel the power of nature in there. We can't even tell whether it is raining or not from an underground shopping mall. What I realized most in Vancouver was that the nature heavily affects our mood, thought and behavior. We can be happy in a fine day without any other special reasons and can become uneasy by a rain cloud. This picture and the one on my yesterday article prove the fact. I know that we can intentionally change our mood to some degree, but it's difficult to keep our mind in a good condition for a long time under bad circumstances. I think it's a very natural idea to think about moving our places in search of better circumstances. I've been testifying the idea for years and my next target is Obihiro. I hope it is a bright and hopeful place just like this picture implies.

Dehumidifier

Tokyo is still in the rainy season. We don't have much rain except for the typhoon this year, but the air is so wet and heavy that we can easily recognize it. My house has a basement where a dehumidifier is working day and night. It looks like a magic because the machine creates water from nothing. Surprisingly, the built-in large water tank gets full in four hours these days. I can't help getting aware of the existence of the water in the air when I drain it away. The basement is now used just for a storage because it is unpleasant to live in. We know that it is a waste of energy to keep the machine always on, but there is no way. It is necessary to keep the room dry, otherwise every thing in the room would be soaked.

Fighting over Japan

This is not a story about political subject but about weather. Japan Meteorological Agency announced today that rainy season has begun in Tokyo. Different from the weather in Vancouver, it is rather obvious in Japan. In this season every year, northern cold airmass and southern warm airmass bump over Japan Islands and create seasonal rainy front, which moves slowly from south to north over the island and brings consisting rain for weeks. Of course we don't like this consisting, unpleasant and irritating rain, but it is indispensable for us to overcome the following dry summer; little rain in this season means serious water shortage in summer. To tell the truth, it was one of the important reasons why I lived in Vancouver for years; I dared to escape from this terrible wet season. Unfortunately I'm now in Japan and I'm really afraid of it. I'm already sweating only by thinking about it.