(The Suruga Bay, Shizuoka, Japan, with a survivor of the recent earthquake of intensity 6 lower...)There are various speculations on a result of August 30 voting in the general election that is going to allow for the second regime change by election in Japan in this half century.
The American Democratic Party-compared-to Japan's DPJ is going to take over power from the American Republican Party-likened Japan's LDP, according to Japanese media reports without exception.
I think that the DPJ will take 250 or so seats while the LDP will garner 170 or so seats among 480 seats in the House of Representatives of the National Diet.
The new prime minister will be Mr. Yukio Hatoyama; that famous Ms. Makiko Tanaka, pro-China ex-Foreign Minister and now a newly joined DPJ member, might hold a ministerial post; and other notable DPJ leaders, such as Mr. Ichiro Ozawa, Mr. Naoto Kan, and Mr. Katsuya Okada, will be named to a Cabinet post, respectively, in very early September.
Yet, as a regular election is scheduled next year for respectable members of the House of Councilors of the National Diet, lawmakers and politicians in Japan will be requested to work as hard as U.S. President Mr. Barack Obama, till the summer of 2010.
SECTION I: Chinese History Till A.D. 1st Century
It is said that the Han people came from Central Asia down to the Central Plain of the Chinese continent, 4000 or 5000 years ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Plain_(China)
Their relatives invaded Tibet and other nearly or remotely associated tribes went down eastward along with the Chang Jiang or the Long River.
Some different North or East Asian races such as Turkeys, Huns, Mongolians, Manchurians, Koreans, and Japanese spread widely north of the Han's territory.
(Main Japanese ancestors are believed to have come from a region around Lake Baikal, East Siberia, to the Japanese islands over Mongolia, Manchuria, the Korean Peninsula or Sakhalin [Karafuto Island]. Yet, there had been original inhabitants on the Japanese islands who belonged to a southern racial group that spread from Indonesia, the Philippines, and Taiwan.
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC%E4%BA%BA)
So, the Han or the main Chinese tribe is truly continental inlanders, though they have absorbed various minor tribes.
Yet, some of them were uniquely trade-oriented rather than farming- or pasturage-oriented from early days.
Even their farming was originally based on wheat-growing rather than rice-growing, since wheat is northern and inland, while the northern Han was dominant against the southern Han and associated tribes living along the Chang Jiang with their own unique ancient culture against the main Yellow River Civilization of the northern Han.
(Japanese islands have been well connected to Southern China and South East China through channels over the seas, so that rice cropping prevailed from more than 2000 years ago, though rice fields are covered by snow in half its land in winter.)
The ancient Chinese Civilization, still often called the Yellow River Civilization, proved its value in the Spring and Autumn Period (from the second half of the 8th century BC to the first half of the 5th century BC). It is so since the Period produced so many excellent scholars and practical persons:
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List of important figures
Bureaucrats or Officers
Guan Zhong (管仲), statesman and advisor of Duke Huan of Qi and regarded by some modern scholars as the first Legalist.
Baili Xi (百里奚), famous prime minister of Qin.
Bo Pi, （伯噽）the corrupted bureaucrat under King Helü and played important diplomatic role of Wu-Yue relations.
Wen Zhong文種 and Fan Li范蠡, the two advisors and partisans of King Goujian of his rally against Wu.
Zi Chan, （子產）leader of self-strengthening movements in Zheng
Influential scholars
Confucius（孔子）, leading figure in Confucianism
Laozi （老子）or Lao tse, teacher of Daoism
Mozi, known as Motse (墨子 Mò Zǐ) or "Mocius" (also "Micius") to Western scholars, founder of Mohism
Historians
Confucius（孔子）, the editor of Spring and Autumn Annals (春秋)
Engineers
Mozi（墨子）
Lu Ban（鲁班）
Welders
Ou Ye Zi（歐冶子）, literally means Ou the welder and mentor of the couple Gan Jiang and Mo Ye
Entrepreneurs and Commercial personnel
Fan Li（范蠡）
Generals, military leaders and authors
Rang Ju, （穰苴）elder contemporary and possibly mentor of
Sun Tzu, （孫子）the author of The Art of War
Assassins
Yao Li, （要离）sent by King Helü to kill Qing Ji（庆忌）.
Zhuan Zhu,（专渚） sent by He Lu to kill his cousin King Liao
Mo Xie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_and_Autumn_Period
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The merit of the ancient Chinese Civilization consists in the mind work of scholars and philosophers who lived between the 8th century BC to the first half of the 5th century BC.
Though the natural environment and climates, in addition to racial and tribal situations, in East Asia did not lead people to a need for a monotheistic or a transcendental religion, the ethical level of ancient China, though with so many wars and atrocities, reached a higher and a deeper points than those of ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greek, and Indus Civilizations.
As living an ethical life and a holy life is also a practical and realistic aim of a monotheistic or a transcendental religion, Confucianism is regraded as a religion.
It is so, since a man is not created to think and worry about his own death and the other world but to live an ethical life and a holy life even according to the teaching of Moses, Jesus Christ, and the Koran.
(To be continued...)
(Au cours de l'âge de la guerre du Vietnam, ma princesse, certains jeunes ont chanté: «Nous sommes les enfants, sans la mémoire de la guerre." But, some grown-ups then in Japan protested against this song for its lack of respect for fallen soldiers of WWII. So, it is a complicating song for the summer...
http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~UD3T-KRYM/902-jasrac/40507-sensouwoshiranai.htm )
Luk 8:16 No man, when he hath lighted a candle, covereth it with a vessel, or putteth it under a bed; but setteth it on a candlestick, that they which enter in may see the light.
Luk 8:17 For nothing is secret, that shall not be made manifest; neither any thing hid, that shall not be known and come abroad.
Luk 8:18 Take heed therefore how ye hear: for whosoever hath, to him shall be given; and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he seemeth to have.