Golden Week Baby!
Rain and unreliable weather so far this Golden Week. Probably for the best. Can’t believe we are still in this situation a year later, but it is what it is. We are staying home, I am playing chess online and board games with my granddaughter, and hopefully going cycling with my wife if the weather improves tomorrow.
Hope you are doing okay out there!
Hospital Stay Article
I wrote another article for the Gainjinpot blog, about hospital stays in Japan. More than my recent experience, it is more about what you can expect from a hospital stay, and some things you should prepare in advance. Please check it out and let me know what you think 🙂
Charity: Water
I’m a big fan of charity:water and I’ve been supporting them for the last six and a half years. I can’t think of anything more important than having safe drinking water for my family, so I think they do a hugely important job. If you’re interested in doing some good, and have the financial slack to do so, I’d be thrilled if you joined me.
The forum this week
Nice mix of topics on the forum this week.
Covid Vaccinations in Japan
If anyone was foolish enough to follow me on Twitter, you may have noticed I am unhappy about the pace and details of the vaccination rollout in Japan. Seems be be getting better, but you can see all the data here if you are interested. You want the PDFs towards the top of the page for daily vaccinations (split into medical personnel and elderly)
This week’s books
The book Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, by James Nestor blew me away this week (heh). It is fascinating, and I’ve already changed my breathing habits according to the book’s recommendations. In a nutshell, it says we should breathe only through our nose, breathe slower, breathe less, chew more, and that is just the first half. Fascinating stuff, and I feel like it is making a difference already after a couple of days. My wife says I seem to be snoring less already.
This week’s links
- Love this guy’s videos: How to get a baby to clean the house
- Personal finance for elementary school students? We approve: 小学生こそ「お金教育」を始めるタイミング
- The most hypnotic and comforting geeky coffee videos in the world: James Hoffmann’s YouTube channel
- Found this Guide to Investing in Japan recently: gutted they didn’t mention RetireJapan!
- This guy definitely needs a film: Mad Jack Churchill
- I’ve been enjoying this Nihon Politics newsletter.
- This is the real disgrace with regards to vaccinations here: they have vaccines, they just haven’t made plans to adminster them: Japan’s unused 14 mil doses of COVID-19 vaccines point to logistical hurdles
- Income investing. I can see myself transitioning more to this style over the next couple of decades: Why Income Investing?
- This seems like a win-win. Hopefully Rakuten can help with some of the post office scandals too: Online, meet offline: Rakuten is teaming up with Japan Post to converge expertise
- This was pretty timely as I have started to think about semi-retiring and living off our portfolio: Why Retirees Shouldn’t Fear Market Volatility
- I have some of these, but need to apply them to my work: Five Superpowers
What do you think? Anything good in there? I really enjoyed #3 and #5 this week.
Regarding the hospital stay, before I went in for a small operation I researched about it on the internet so I was prepared. For folks in the US, at least, it’s a one-night stay but the doctor here said I’d have to stay 5 days! Obviously they had spare beds and eyed some easy cash. I refused and was let out the next day. His get-out response was “just because that’s what they do other places doesn’t make it right”. As a Brit who lived under the NHS, I thought it was a bit cheeky.