Mount Tsukuba
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Volume 17, Number 1 Telephone Numbers to Change
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Remember to start dialing the 8 before all local numbers after January 10. Up until now, any number with the 0298 area code could be called locally with only the 6 digit number, but from Jan. 11 (at 2 am), the area code will be changed to 029, and you will have to dial local numbers with 7 digits, beginning with the 8. From outside the 0298 area, however, calls will be identical to the present.
Salut la Compagnie! Hi everyone!
Do you speak Francais? Parlez-vous English?
Where is the home of the Moose, the Beaver, and the Loon? No, not the zoo. Poutine? No, not the president of Russia. Pogey, the deke, and the toque (pronounced tuke)? Jim Carey? No, not Hollywood. Bilingualism and multiculturalism? No, not viruses, although difficult for people to understand, explain, and accept at times. Hockey (Ice hockey of course!)? Celine Dion? No, not Las Vegas. Are we getting warmer? The Maple Leaf? Maple Syrup, le Carnaval de Quebec, Niagara Falls, the Great Lakes, and Montreal Smoked Meat? The First word of the National anthem is "O", eh? Are we there yet?
Canada is the place! Ah yes, a very popular country with Japanese tourists, but is Canada only Vancouver, Banff, Anne of Green Gables and Northern Lights? Is Canada just a vast expanse of snow and ice? What's a Canadian? What's the "Quiet Revolution"? Is there rice in Canada? How about tofu and shoyu? Let's discover some of Canada's uniqueness and similarities, and have a laugh with a two-plus-year resident of Tsukuba originally from Montreal, this month's guest: Mr. Cyrille Vandoorne (but please call him Van). Van is an English teacher, and a coordinator of International Relations with a neighbouring Ibaraki municipality.
Date/Time: January 22 (Wed.) 14:00-16:00
Guest: Mr. Cyrille Vandoorne (Canada)
Place: Tsukuba Information Center
Russian School Near Vladivostok in Need of School Supplies
By Maria Marchuk
Popov Island is near Vladivostok, in the Primorskii Krai Region of Russia's Far East. There are 2,500 residents on the island. Only about three hundred people are employed, the others have no jobs. Lots of people are retired or unable to work due to sickness. Many families have to live on their grandparents' pension, which is too small, only about 1,400 roubles a month (about US$40).
There is only one school on the entire island with about two hundred students in it. I visited this school on Earth Day this year (April 21) and discovered that most children have no English books in their school and no other supplies needed for their classroom and their studies. The address of the school is: School Number 29, 9 Podgornaya Street, Vladivostok 690901 Popov Island, Russia.
If anyone would like to donate school supplies or books for the children on this island, the donation will be recognized and much appreciated.
For more information contact Maria Marchuk (a teacher in Vladivostok). Her email is marchukm@mail.ru.
Feb. 3rd is the traditional "beginning of Spring" festival (seems a little early, doesn't it?) when a kind of "Jack-and-the-beanstalk" ceremony is performed, with beans being thrown out the door. No mythological giants in the sky await a magical beanstalk to reach them, however, as this tradition is meant to keep the "giants" (that is, demons) from entering into one's home and bringing bad luck. "Oni wa soto, fuku wa uchi" ("Demons (stay) outside; happiness (come) inside") is the phrase chanted as the "setsubun" (literally "dividing of the seasons") beans are tossed out the door.
Much pomp and ceremony surround this festival, and various shrines and temples compete with each other to come up with their own innovations. Tsukuba's own Mt. Tsukuba Shrine is a picturesque place to take in this bit of Japanese culture, and you can include a cable car ride to the top for a great view if the weather is good. Not being an official holiday, when Feb. 3 falls during the week as it does this year, itfs not so crowded. Nevertheless, plan to go early if you are driving, as parking places may be hard to find.
It seems that not only is the Ibaraki Immigration Office moving to a place that is probably even more inconvenient for those of us in Tsukuba, but now the main Tokyo office that has been at Otemachi is also moving, effective February 3, 2003. The new address and phone number are:
5-5-30, Konan, Minato-ku, Tokyo
Tel. 03-5796-7111
The office is a 15 minute walk from Tennozu-Isle Station on the Tokyo monorail or the Tokyo Rinkai Line.
Please see the December 2002 issue of AT for information about the Mito Immigration Office.
Articles of interest not included in this issue can be found at www.alientimes.org. For instance, articles on January festivals including kite flying events, the Fukuroda Falls (frozen waterfall) Festival and the Winter Peony Flower Festival can be found in the Jan. 2002 issue. While the dates may be slightly different, the general information is probably basically the same.
Heating and Air Conditioning Appliances
1. Take out the plug when you are not using heating and air conditioning appliances (especially during the off season).
2. Clean the air filter regularly.
3. Raising or lowering the temperature setting by even one degree will make a difference.
4. Use curtains or blinds to keep the sun out (summer), and the heat in (winter).
5. Use electric carpets and heated tables (kotatsu) when possible instead of air conditioners.
Refrigerators
6. Change the settings on your refrigerator according to the season (high in the summer, lower in the winter).
7. Let foods cool before putting them into the fridge.
8. Don't open the fridge door more than necessary.
9. If you can fit a business card between the door and the fridge (when the door is closed), you need to replace the sealant.
10. There should be nothing on top of your fridge. There should be 10 cm between the back of your fridge and the wall. There should be 2 cm between sides of your fridge and anything beside it.
11. Don't pack your fridge too full and make sure to throw out items that are past their best before date.
12. If you fridge is always full, it may be cheaper in the long run to buy a bigger fridge.
Lighting
13. Turn off lights that you aren't using.
14. Change fluorescent lights when the edges turn black.
15. Use fluorescent lamps rather than regular lamps.
Television
16. Turn off the TV when you are not watching it.
17. Lower the brightness and colour settings on your TV to a reasonable level.
18. Buy a TV with a smaller rather than larger screen.
Laundry
19. Use hot bathwater (after everyone has finished their Japanese-style bath) to do laundry.
20. Wait until you have a full load before doing laundry.
21. Use the speed course rather than the regular course if the clothes are not very dirty.
22. Only use the dryer when you have a proper load, not just individual items.
23. Use the washing machine to spin wet clothes as dry as possible before putting them into the dryer.
24. Clean the filter on the dryer regularly.
25. If you take your clothes out of the washer and hang them immediately, you may not need to iron them later.
Rice Cookers and Water Heaters
26. Don't leave rice on "keep warm" mode for longer than 6 hours.
27. Pick rice cookers and water heaters (for tea) that are a reasonable size for your household.
28. Use a water heater (for tea) that lets you choose the "keep warm" setting, and put it on the lowest setting.
Vacuum Cleaners
29. Dust and sweep before using the vacuum cleaner.
30. Set vacuum cleaners on low for curtains, medium for flooring or tatami, and high for carpets.
31. Vacuum carpets slowly and carefully, paying attention to the places where people walk the most. Vacuum flooring and tatami quickly, but pay more attention to the edges of the room and the places where people don't walk.
Bathroom
32. If you use a heated toilet seat, keep the lid down.
33. Turn the heated toilet seat off when you are not home.
34. Change the settings according to the season.
Cellular Phones
35. Unplug the recharger when you are not using it, and remove the phone from the charger as soon as it is finished charging.
General
36. Unplug all devices that you do not use regularly, especially CD players, VCRs, faxes, answering machines, as they use a lot of energy even when not in use.
37. Unplug as many devices as possible when you will not be home for a long time.
38. Choose homes or apartments that have insulation and a southern exposure.
Summarized and translated from the Tepco (Tokyo Denryoku) handbook on saving energy by Shaney Crawford.
Things I Learned from TAIRA and TIF (Nov/Dec 2002)
Compiled by Shaney Crawford
AIKIDO IN TSUKUBA
www.ki-aikido.jp/index.htm
ARUDO DEBITO WINS CASE AGAINST HOKKAIDO ONSENS
www.asahi.com/national/update/1111/010.html
home.kyodo.co.jp/all/news.jsp?news=japan&an
www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=2&id=238037
www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20021112a3.htm
mdn.mainichi.co.jp/news/20021111p2a00m0dm021001c.html
www.yomiuri.co.jp/index-e.htm
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2442411.stm
AVOIDING COMPUTER WORMS
1. Keep your operating system and applications up-to-date and apply the latest patches when they become available.
2. Avoid e-mail attachments both when sending and receiving e-mail.
3. Configure Windows to always show file extensions.
4. Never open e-mail attachments with the file extensions VBS, SHS or PIF.
5. Never open attachments with double file extensions such as NAME.BMP.EXE or NAME.TXT.VBS
6. Do not share your folders with other users unless necessary.
7. Disconnect your network or modem cable when you're not using your computer - or just power it down.
8. If you feel that an e-mail you get from a friend is somehow strange - if it is in a foreign language or if it just says odd things, double-check with the friend before opening any attachments.
9. When you receive e-mail advertisements or other unsolicited e-mail, do not open attachments in them or follow web links quoted in them.
10. Avoid attachments with sexual filenames.
11. Do not trust the icons of attachment file.
12. Never accept attachments from strangers in online chat systems such as IRC, ICQ or AOL Instant Messenger.
13. Avoid downloading files from public newsgroups (Usenet news).
CLIMBING THE WALLS
Does anybody know about a climbing wall in Tsukuba or near Tsukuba?
Tsukuba You World on the south side of Tsuchiura Noda sen (route 354) about halfway between Nishi and Higashi Odori. The You World is also known as the Cineplex. The following two messages posted at TIF may help.
groups.yahoo.com/group/Tsukuba_insight/message/177
groups.yahoo.com/group/Tsukuba_insight/message/93
COOKING WITH PERSIMMONS
www.epersimmons.com/recipes.htm
DENTISTS
Can anybody recommend a good English speaking dentist in Tsukuba?
Mei-jin, 0298-563789. Speaks English extremely well and is also very good at his job (which is kind of more important).
Okada.san 0298-52-5500 on the Tsuchiura-Gakuen Sen direction Mitsukaido, maybe 2 Km from the Mitsui building.
DRIVERS LICENSES
See this site for information about getting a Japanese license.
www.pref.ibaraki.jp/kenkei/english/e_menu.htm
See more details on the AT website (corrected since originally published).
www.alientimes.org/2002/16-09october.html#recent
ELECTRICITY
Electricity in Ibaraki is 50cycles at 100v AC
TEPCO charges user per kilowatt hour (kWh). The basic charge depends on which kind of circuit breaker you have installed in your apartment. Most of you would probably have a 20A (yellow) one. (www.tepco.co.jp/custom/priceSystem/faremenu/juryo-j.html)
The average Western home has a 200A connection to the power grid AS A MINIMUM. More if the home is centrally electrically heated. This is why the circuit breakers trip so often here.
The average ceramic heater is about 1100 watts. This information should be clearly printed on the heater. If not, the heater should have a sticker stating that it draws 10 amperes at 110v or something like that. You work out Watts using this formula: Amperes X Volts = Watts
If you have a Yellow circuit breaker (20A) and Ibaraki has 100v, then 20 X 100 = 2000w for everything electrical in your apartment. If you use 1100W for a heater, that leaves 900W for other things in your apartment (lights 20w per neon tube, microwave 800w, computer 200w average, TV 80W, Toaster Oven 800W . . . . ..). 900W is not enough to power a second 1100W heater, especially if you plan to use any lights at night. So you'll need to contact TEPCO to arrange to change that Yellow circuit breaker for a higher value one (and pay a higher basic charge).
Another thing. Sensitive electronic devices don't take kindly to having their power suddenly turned off with no warning. So save yourself a repair bill and upgrade the circuit breaker before you need to replace anything.
INFORMATION SOURCE
groups.yahoo.com/group/Tsukuba_insight/links
INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL
Take a survey on the need for an international school.
www.shandar.net/survey
LAPTOP SAFETY
Don't put your laptop directly on your lap. (See TAIRA archives for a rather detailed explanation why, or just take my word for it.)
SCHOLARSHIP FOR ASIANS
www.imf.org/external/np/ins/english/scholar.htm#Japimf
TRAVEL AGENTS
Please check the profile of your travel agent in the roster of the Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA) members before booking.
www.jata-net.or.jp
TSUKUBA LIBRARY ENGLISH NEWSLETTER
Go to the library to get a copy of the December 2002 issue of Inforay (Tsukuba Public Library's English newsletter.)
WORLD AIDS DAY
www.unaids.org/
gbgm-umc.org/programs/hiv/wad.html
www.worldaidsday.org.au
Join these mailing lists to stay on top of current Tsukuba information:
Tsukuba Area International Residents Association (TAIRA) (eve.bk.tsukuba.ac.jp)
Tsukuba Insight Forum (TIF) (groups.yahoo.com/group/Tsukuba_insight)
Meetings every Wednesday night at Hot Stuff from 9pm. Future walks and information at eve.bk.tsukuba.ac.jp/twmc. Please contact Tadashi Takemori at takemori@eve.bk.tsukuba.ac.jp.
Join the Ibaraki Hash House Harriers, the international drinking club with a running problem. Check our homepage at ibarakih3.infoseek.ne.jp and join the mailing list at groups.yahoo.com/group/IH3.