Relocation Update on Tokyo- Wednesday 23rd March

It has been a pretty emotional couple of months. First my home town of Christchurch was smashed in a huge earthquake, and then within a month my second home of Japan has been devastated with the earthquake and tidal waves. My thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected. Luckily, my family, all the people I work with and their families have come through this with no problems. I am truly blessed.

This brought a tear to my eye last night. If you don't get a little bit worked up by this beautiful message from Satomi-san, you are a better person than I am....



You will notice I left the nuclear reactor out of the introduction of today's message and there is a reason. In the big picture, in my mind, the nuclear reactors are 10% of this disaster. A large part perhaps, but the other 90% has caused the deaths of probably near 20,000 people, and 350,000 people have been evacuated; most of whom don't have a home to go back to. The deaths related to the nuclear reactors at this time are in single figures, and while some have been evacuated from the 30km radius of the plant, outside of this area there really is little concern for one's health.

Here is an entry from a "Japan-US Discussion Forum" thanks to Peter Ennis. I quote "Here is the situation: The reactor at Fukushima Daiichi Unit #3 uses a fuel mixture of uranium oxide and plutonium oxide. Some analysts have argued that since plutonium is such a toxic substance, this means that any radioactive particles that escape into the atmosphere from the plant will be especially dangerous. But Professor John Lee, a professor of nuclear engineering and radiological sciences at the University of Michigan, and author of the forthcoming "Risk and Safety Analysis of Nuclear Systems,"says it is not that simple. Even in the unlikely event the containment mechanisms at Unit #3, especially the reactor pressure vessel that contains the reactor core (the fuel rods), were to breach, the plutonium product released into the air would not be severely toxic like pure plutonium. The fuel is actually plutonium oxide, which would not be much different from uranium oxide. Bottom Line: No significantly greater risk. And how big a danger is a worst-case scenario? Dr. Lee says that for people outside the boundary of the Fukushima plant, the increased exposure to radiation would be equivalent to, at most, a CT scan (which is about 100 chest x-rays). In other words, no threat to human health."

I have just arrived in Tokyo this morning and if you didn't know about the earthquake up north, you would not know the difference. The Shinkansen was on time. The Yamanote Line was as packed as it has ever been. And, I just called into the convenience store, and while there were a few items missing here and there, 80% of those convenient items we are used to are back on the shelf.

If you left last week in fear of your safety, my advice would be to wait this week out (once this week passes without further event, word is that the risk of anything happening at the nuclear reactors signifcantly drops) and make travel plans to be back next week. We are all waiting, and the people up north need everyone's financial and moral support.

Finally, if you have space and can offer a family a room, please do check this site out (Japanese only) and get yourself registered to help; http://roomdonor.jp/top.html

DON'T GIVE UP TOHOKU....