"Now when Jesus had heard" - What is Abenomics?

Around Tokyo

What is Abenomics?

Whatever it is, it has increased financial assets of wealthy Japanese and foreign investors as the following figure on the trend of Nikkei Index of the Tokyo Stock Exchange tells.

This rise of the Tokyo Stock index by Abenomics has been a direct consequence of the drastic fall of the value of the yen against the US dollar.  As the Bank of Japan started to supply abundant yen to the financial market through purchase of government bonds circulated there in March 2013, the yen became weaker so suddenly from 85 yen to 100 yen per dollar.

So, Abenomics is not yet fully backed by an economic boom in Japan.  It is a result of monetary operation by the central bank of Japan.  Due to increase in financial assets of businesses, some major businesses have started to increase wages.

But, the policy focus of the Abe Administration is on ending 15-year-long deflation.  It means an increase in prices.  However, if financial assets have been multiplied and prices of goods have risen, Japanese consumers and taxpayers will not be satisfied without a sufficient increase in wages and incomes.

The yen has become weaker; stock prices have risen; prices are in the upward trend accelerated by a consumption-tax rate increase from 5% to 8%, but we will see if Japanese workers can enjoy a pay hike, which means ending of deflation for them in 2014.



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Mat 4:11 Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
Mat 4:12 Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee;
Mat 4:13 And leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim:
Mat 4:14 That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying,
Mat 4:15 The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles;
Mat 4:16 The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.

"the mystery of the kingdom of God" - Reality of Decontamination Work in Fukushima

Around Senso-ji Temple, Tokyo

Reality of Decontamination Work in Fukushima

Decontamination around the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant is going on.

It is unbelievably exhausting work by human hands.  The central government of Japan decided to carry out all-out decontamination work in roads, public facilities, agricultural facilities and fields, drainage structure, individual houses and affixed gardens, etc. around the Plant.  The Ministry of Environment issued a guideline for this work. (http://www.env.go.jp/jishin/rmp/attach/josen-gl-full_ver2.pdf)

The central government has been directly in charge of decontamination in 11 hard-hit cities, towns, and villages close to the Plant.  The Fukushima Prefectural office has taken responsibility in conducting or supervising decontamination projects in other 36 autonomous bodies.

They totally cover 235,208 houses, 5,335 km roads, 24,067 hectares of agricultural fields, and 4,085 hectares of forests and woods near residential areas or industrial areas.

Each decontamination task for a house, a field, or a section of a road is ordered to a vendor.  A vendor hires workers who are expected to carry out manual decontamination work using some tools.

In the guidance document, locations and corners in a house to be focused on in decontamination work are specified as below.

According to a rule the Government specified, each worker should record a dosage he has received in each work from radioactive materials.  The allowable limit of a dosage per man per year is 50 mSv.  In five years, the maximum limit is 100 mSv.  As an ordinary person is allowed to be exposed to radiation up to 1 mSv per year, decontamination workers take a big risk on their health.

But as a contractor uses a subcontractor that might also hire other companies, it is not expected that this rule is strictly applied.  What is worse, there is no legal penalty to violation of the request to correctly and honestly keep a record of an amount of exposure to radiation per worker.  If a vendor has come into a situation where all the workers it employs have exceeded the allowable exposure amount, it cannot contract to do contamination work.  Vendors would naturally put lower figures in their report to regulatory agencies.  

The total amount estimated for this large-scale decontamination work is about $50 billion.  Each worker is reportedly paid a day wage of $100 to $150.

In three years, many houses have been decontaminated or applied decontamination work to.  And some towns have started to lift a ban on living for their residences.  But, as a whole, decontamination in the Prefecture is delayed for various and practical reasons.  It is expected that the work will be completed around 2017.  Nonetheless, a decontaminated house does not show a state of decreased radiation at a level of a house, for example, in Tokyo.　

As an example, a house in Naraha Town marked 0.85 uSv before decontamination but showed a decrease to 0.44 uSv after decontamination (while Tokyo records less than 0.1 uSv nowadays).  They say that the work has lowered the dosage level by almost 48% in Naraha.  

So, some evacuees are starting to return to their old houses located 20 km or more from the Fukushima Daiichi Plant as radiation dosage has decreased to some extent.  But still there are 130,000 evacuees from their homes in Fukushima Prefecture due to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident which was set off on March 11, 2011.



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Mar 4:11 And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables:

"He shall give his angels charge over thee" - Apocalyptic Prophecy and Wealth Distribution

Tokyo Views

Apocalyptic Prophecy and Wealth Distribution  

In this money-controlled world, we can easily see how much and where wealth is exchanged and generated by focusing on major security exchanges in the world.

Each column of a stack exchange in the above figure shows an amount of transaction for each year between 1998 and 2013.  The right blue bar for each exchange indicates an amount for 2013.

Specifically, as of October 2013, the total of the market value in all the stock exchanges in the world reached $63 trillion.

Indeed, those who live on $1.25 per day accounted for 22% of the global population in 2008.  It corresponded to one billion 290 million, but the number of the poor in the world was one billion 940 million in 1981.  In 1981, a half of population in developing countries was poor.

This must be the reason why mankind can still survive on the earth.  Wealth has been distributed into more wider regions.  But detailed data tells that most of those who have escaped poverty are Chinese.

In this context, the US and China are the two most responsible nations in terms of responsibility of one who occupies a majority of wealth in the world, at least financial assets, and another who has been rising out of poverty.

As for Japan, it is also responsible, since it has been the key nation to economic development of China.  China has succeeded in development of its industries by importing and introducing technologies and funds from Japan legally and illegally.  It is apparent that without help from Japan in these decades China could not achieve that scale of economic success.
 
The US is the most Christian nation among the three at issue.  Its failure means also a failure of Christianity.  China is a country whose society was unified through adoption of the communist ideology and socialist systems that were both first formulated in Europe.  Chinese failure will mean that of those European-born philosophies.  In contrast, Japan has balanced itself on traditional Japanese spiritualism and American-style democracy introduced after WWII.  

However, it is impossible for only one strong nation or one block of nations survives in the 21st century.  The globalization economy has made all the nations share the same fate.  We have to take into consideration the global economy and politics from one level above that where we are used to observing the world so far.

The apocalyptic prophecy is concerned with the whole world.




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Luk 4:10 For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee:
Luk 4:11 And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.
Luk 4:12 And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

"All these things will I give thee" - American Religion

Around Tokyo

American Religion

It is said that the Italian Mafia in the US had a wider ethnic support base but Jewish gangs did not have.

Rather the Jewish community in the US has had made a reasonable effort to stop bad influences of Jewish gangsters on the general Jewish community.

Of course Italian Americans must have a special feeling to the Vatican while Jewish Americans have a specific pride in their status in the human history.  Their views of the US society must be very different if the both group of people have a common sense of being not a main-stream group in the US.  But they have accepted the American way of living and social structure.  They have eventually adapted themselves to the society of American democracy and American Dream through unique ways, respectively.

According to the word of Christ Jesus, a new religion is needed in a new world.  So, Protestants have been given chances enough to fully expand their religious activities and thoughts in America since the era of Columbus.  The reason why the US has achieved great success in history consists in it.  The great freedom in religion assures great chances for academic and business success.

But for the US to have become a super-power in the world, it must have achieved a great degree of religious tolerance, tolerating Catholicism and Judaism, as well as elimination of racism.  This movement finally fuse together those religions and various denominations together into the American Religion, so to speak.    

Now under the American Religion, Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism are still active as critical elements of the society.  They all use the magic term God to show their spiritual ties.

But America must also take Islam into their society as a legitimate element of the American Religion.  It is the religious conclusion of the War on Terror that was triggered by the 9/11 Terror.  And, in future, it would need to take Taoism, Hinduism, and Buddhism if it should allow Chinese, Indians, and East or Southeast Asians to become fair members of the American society.

The last group of people in the world to be included in the American society with their own religious root must be Japanese.  Japanese Spiritualism is only meaningful in Japan.  In this context, there is a possibility that in the end in this world there will only remain the American Religion and Japanese Spiritualism.

But what is the Japanese Spiritualism?  Probably it is a religion that has significance of existence especially against the American Religion.



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Mat 4:8 Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;
Mat 4:9 And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
Mat 4:10 Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.

"some thirty, and some sixty, and some an hundred" - Japanese Invented Flash Memory

Tokyo Views

 Japanese Invented Flash Memory

In 1980s, Japan became the number-one semiconductor country, though Intel was leading the microprocessor field.

However, today Japan cannot enjoy the status as it did before.  Major Japanese semiconductor manufacturers are also large electronics companies that deliver various electronic products for consumers and industry users, including TVs, refrigerators, and nuclear plant equipment.  They did not put the highest priority in semiconductors.  Those Japanese makers were also contaminated by red-tape management and bureaucratic processes.  They had almost nothing to do with the venture spirit.  Accordingly, some Japanese engineers in major companies, their subsidiary companies, or even their vendors became frustrated.

Accordingly, Chinese, Taiwanese, and South Korean businesses never turned a blind eye to this situation in the Japanese industry.  These Asian makers tried everything to gain access to Japanese advanced technologies, virtually stealing key technical information.

March 13, 2014 6:39 pm JST
Man arrested for allegedly giving Toshiba data to South Korean company

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Tokyo police on Thursday arrested a man suspected of illegally providing a South Korean company with Toshiba Corp. research data from on flash memory.
     Yoshitaka Sugita, 52, from Fukuoka Prefecture in southwestern Japan, was an engineer at SanDisk Corp., a semiconductor maker that had formed an alliance with Toshiba in flash memory production, and was able to obtain research data, according to the police.
     It is rare for a technology leak to a foreign company to result in a criminal case.
     Toshiba said later in the day that it had filed a damages suit with the Tokyo District Court against SK Hynix Inc., the predecessor of which allegedly obtained the data from the suspect, asserting that the South Korean company wrongfully acquired and used its proprietary technical information.
http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Comp     

The shares of world makers in sales of NAND-type flash memory in 2012 are as follows:

No. 1  Samsung (South Korea)...........37%

No. 2  Toshiba (JAPAN)........................31%

No. 3  Micron Technology (US)..........14%

No. 4  SK Hynix (S. Korea)...................11%

Others..............................................................7%


Truly the flash memory was invented by a Japanese engineer of Toshiba, named Fujio Masuoka.

Fujio Masuoka: Inventor of Flash Memory
BY RD BENTLEY ON AUGUST 26, 2011 IN TECHNOLOGY 

Flash memory is a term that applies to two types of chips — the NAND and the NOR. The NAND is used in: memory cards, USB flash drives, solid-state drives, and more. Both NOR and NAND types were invented by Dr. Fujio Masuoka around 1980. 

Examples of both types of flash memory include: personal computers, PDAs, digital audio players, digital cameras, mobile phones, synthesizers, video games, scientific instrumentation, industrial robotics, and medical electronics. 

Flash memory turned out to be one of the greatest inventions of the 1980's. According to a Forbes report, approximately $76 billion of these chips were sold in 2001 alone. According to BusinessWeek, flash memory sales hit around $25 billion in 2006 alone. While these figures may not be totally accurate, it gives us a good idea how important this invention was. 

Toshiba and Samsung have been two of the world's top flash memory producers.
At the time Fujio Masuoka had discovered flash memory, he was working for Toshiba. However, because he lived in Japan and worked for a powerful company, he didn't get the full credit that was due. 

...

Masuoka had been working on DRAM when he came across his discovery in the early 1980's. It was the year of 1984 when he would announce his invention, during an IEEE meeting in San Francisco, California. 

Dr. Masuoka eventually got promoted to the head of a department, but he would leave Toshiba in 1994. Masuoka later became a professor at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan.  
http://thecyberdaily.com/2011/08/fujio-masuoka-inventor-of-flash-memory/

It is said Mr. Masuoka volunteered for sales business in the US when he was a young engineer of Toshiba.  It is because no matter high quality memory he designed in Toshiba office in Japan, sales of advanced memory products were low.  So, he wanted to promote sales in the US for himself.  But his business performance in the US was so poor, and thus soon Masuoka was called back to Japan to settle in his old R&D department.  But Masuoka learnt that US customers wanted inexpensive products with the minimum necessary functionality.  This experience led to his future invention of the flash memory.  A kind of technical rationalization was a key to the invention.  

However, Toshiba did not give more opportunities for research and development to Mr. Masuoka.  Later he became the deputy director of a research center of Toshiba but was not given resources enough to drive his own study on semiconductor.  So, he eventually left Toshiba, one of the best manufacturer in Japan to take a position in a university.    

Put simply, foolishness, arrogance, and even evil in the Japanese industrial community have triggered a large scale technology transfer, legally or illegally, or overtly or covertly, to Samsung and other South Korean countries as well as Chinese and other makers.





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Mar 4:8 And other fell on good ground, and did yield fruit that sprang up and increased; and brought forth, some thirty, and some sixty, and some an hundred.

"shalt thou not be accepted?" - Whale Flesh or Beef

Around Tokyo

Whale Flesh or Beef

The most important areas of human activities are related to foods (agriculture, fishing, etc.), medical care, housing, clothing, education, religious activities, and so on.

But the Gospels most impressively depict Jesus eating or being related to foods.

U.S. Places 21st in Ranking of World Food Systems 

BY JAMES ANDREWS | JANUARY 15, 2014 

Despite affordable prices and high food quality, the United States tied with Japan for 21st place in a ranking of the world’s food systems, according to the international advocacy confederation Oxfam. 

The report, released Tuesday evening, judged the food systems of 125 countries according to four major metrics: food quality, abundance of food, affordability of food and eating habits of citizens. 

High diabetes and obesity rates in the U.S. brought down the nation's score, ranking it just behind 20 European countries and Australia. 

The top 25 overall scores are listed below: 

1. Netherlands 

2. France and Switzerland (two-way tie) 

4. Denmark, Sweden, Austria and Belgium (four-way tie) 

8. Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Luxembourg and Australia (five-way tie) 

13. Spain, Greece, Germany, United Kingdom, Norway, Finland, Cyprus and Iceland (eight-way tie) 

21. United States and Japan (two-way tie) 

23. New Zealand and Israel (two-way tie) 

25. Canada, Brazil, Estonia, Slovakia and Hungary (five-way tie) 

http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2014/01/u-s-places-21st-in-ranking-of-world-food-systems/#.U0LAKvl_suc

Though the US and Japan are ranked the same, the ratio of food self-sufficiency is so different between them.

USA - 130%

JAPAN - 40%

That is why Japanese have to eat whale flesh, if it has become too poor to buy and import beef from the US.
 
Whale for Japanese are originally the same as cows for Americans.




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Gen 4:4 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering:
Gen 4:5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
Gen 4:6 And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?
Gen 4:7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.
Gen 4:8 And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him.
Gen 4:9 And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother's keeper?

"the time of my departure is at hand" - Dying People in Japanese Immigration Center

Mt. Fuji and Shinkansen Super-Express Lines

Dying People in  Japanese Immigration Center

People died over the Indian Ocean.

People died in Kiev.

People died in Chile.

People died in Afghanistan.

Some soldiers were killed in the US.

People are being killed in Syria.

But recently two people died in Higashi Nihon Immigration Center of Japan around the end of March.  They were a male Cameroonian in his 40's and a male Iranian in his 30's.

The Cameroonian man was applying for asylum, but he was most likely to be sent back to his home country.  Since he came to Japan in the last fall, he was detained in the Center while he was diabetic.  However the concerned Japanese authority did not allow him to fully receive medical care, though the Immigration Center is not a prison.  He evidently died of deterioration of the disease.

The Iranian man died as he choked in his food.  Officials of the Center carried him to a hospital, but it was too late.  The authority said that no criminal act was involved and no delinquency was found on the management of the Center.

Now there are 300 foreigners kept under restraint in the Immigration Center; they can freely communicate with the outside but cannot freely move around.

Higashi Nihon Immigration Center (East Japan Immigration Center aka. Ushiku Shuyojo, Ushiku Detention Center) http://www.bekkoame.ne.jp/~pyonpyon/fjc/visit/0401.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higashi_Nihon_Immigration_Center


Of course there are some volunteer groups or NGOs/NPOs in Japan that help asylum seekers:

Japan Association for Refugees

Toll-free service for refugees/asylum seekers
0120-477-472 (toll-free; refugees/asylum seekers only.)
(if the toll-free number is not available, call 03-5379-6003)
Open: 10AM- 6PM Weekdays. 

ATTENTION: Regarding the organization called "International Association for Refugees (Kokusai Nanmin Shien Kyokai)" 

Japan Association for Refugees(Nanmin Shien Kyokai) is a non-profit organization that is officially registered in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. We do not have any relationship with an organization called "International Association for Refugees (Kokusai Nanmin Shien Kyokai)". We never ask asylum seekers any payment for legal or social assistances we provide.

For lawyers and other legal personnel at law firms
About pro bono opportunities
We at Japan Association for Refugees (JAR) provide pro bono opportunities to lawyers and other legal personnel at law firms where they are able to utilize their professional and specific skills. 

Details
Refugees and JAR
Did you know
- there are refugees and asylum-seekers in Japan?
- very few people are recognized as refugees in Japan?
- there is no time framework set forth for the administrative procedures of refugee recognition, and there was such a case as taking 9 years (!) to reach a final decision?
- while the application for refugee status is processed, the status of an illegal stayer will not be regularized and hence she or he will not be subject to public social services?
Who is a refugee?
http://www.refugee.or.jp/en/#04

Though the Japanese Government plans to increase the number of foreign laborers, workers, and professionals in Japan, its policy on asylum seekers is not friendly and permissive at all.  While the population of Japan is decreasing, industries need more workers for various projects, including recovery work from the 2011 Great Tsunami and Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident and construction projects related to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.  But, humanity must come first in dealing with foreigners.

Jesus said to be kind to foreigners, since ancestors of Israelites, such as Abraham, had been once foreigners in Egypt.





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2Ti 4:6 For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
2Ti 4:7 I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:
2Ti 4:8 Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.