The Monday Read

Go To Your Home and Stay There Please edition

What’s up, happy campers? Here in Sendai we are having a very mild summer. This appears to be the new normal. The end of September is then really hot for some reason.

The government stubbornly went ahead with the Go To campaign even though pretty much everyone in Japan hates it. I guess they didn’t want to give the 42 million yen that they received from the travel lobby back, eh?

Back to reality, here are three Covid info sites I like: the Japan COVID-19 Coronavirus Tracker site, the NHK Covid site, and the Asahi Covid site.

Here are this week’s links

  1. Who knew? Japanese Aquarium’s Flowchart Illustrates the Complex Relationships of Their Penguins
  2. This is wonderful, especially at the moment: Open a new window somewhere in the world
  3. The world has changed, perhaps for good: The Sixth Sense 2: 7th Sense
  4. For the visually inclined: COVID Risk Chart
  5. The first post on this thread is good: How do you brand yourself as a freelancer?
  6. Interesting stuff: Here We Are: 5 Stories That Got Us To Now
  7. This requires more discipline than I currently have: Procrastination on High Mental Load Tasks
  8. This unthinking policy is doing damage to Japan’s reputation: Re-entry ban causes foreign firms and talent to question long-term plans in Japan
  9. Japan still has a long way to go: new rules for plastic shopping bags
  10. More Ken Seeroi: The Mysteries of Japan
  11. Unemployment in the time of corona: Unemployment Benefits Guide & Navigating Hello Work When You’ve Been Laid Off Due to COVID-19
  12. There is no try: Don’t try, intend
  13. These are great: Dad Photoshops Kids’ Drawings As If They Were Real, And It’s Terrifyingly Funny
  14. Good news: Revisions in Pension laws Enacted

Phew. Bit of a mix this week. Anything good in there? I enjoyed #13 more than I should have.

14 Responses

  2. #8 – It’s not effecting me personally but after almost 20 years living here it really does make you think about a future here, doesn’t it?

    1. Absolutely. Not so much the policy in itself, but what it reveals about the government’s thinking.

      Naturalising just got more compelling (especially post Brexit).

    2. I’ve been wondering why they put this strict of a policy in place. Are they concerned about all of the permanent residents and long-term visa holders? Or, are they focused on a select few, but couldn’t create such a targeted law without appearing unfair? Even though they want foreign tourists to come visit, they strictly limit the number of immigrants. Their treatment of people claiming refugee status seems abominable.

      1. I suspect it is nothing more than indifference. They simply aren’t really thinking about non-Japanese residents, which is why we are largely lumped in with the tourists, and seemingly behind business travellers in terms of priority 🙁

        1. They would have liked to have been able to do it to everyone, all citizens included, but their legal ability to do so ends where citizenship starts. Plus, it is simply actually true that most ‘regular’ Japanese would have no reason to deliberately go overseas when asked not to, just to thumb their noses at the authorities, ‘because it’s my right.’

          Foreign nationals who hold permanent residency, however, are much more likely to decide that they would rather be ‘home’ at a time like this. In particular, they were thinking about preventing the many Chinese who hold residency from going back to China and then coming back here, effectively rendering the restrictions on visitors from certain countries ineffective.

          1. Yes, a big thank you to the J-gov too protecting Japan from free thinking foreign influences. /sarcasm

            Just FYI, for foreign nationals who hold permanent residency, “home” is Japan. It’s sort of implied in the terminology, in case you didn’t get it.

  3. #2 and #13–Fantastic!

    #8–uses a narrow, Japan-only POV (take the blinders off). Why not compare Japan to ROK, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Australia, NZ, Hawaii, and maybe Europe, which, correctly IMO, has banned arrivals from the US.
    And #10–I don’t get it. Is there a point? (Maybe it’s an attempt at humor?)

    1. The 42m was campaign contributions to the LDP from the travel industry, so… no? Unless you are one of the LDP politicians that took the money.

      1. I knew i chose the right job! damn! lol

        Do you know in general any incentive for used camping car? Anyone knows something? or good deals?

  5. I am using the “GoTo Japan” gig twice. Already set up for Kyoto and Shimoda.

    Went to Kyoto early this month and was fantastic. No tourists. Super careful
    with masks and hand washing etc.. Disinfectant sprays everywhere.

    Our photos looked like they came out of a professional photographers American
    style coffee table travel high end books.

    Have you ever seen the Bamboo Forrest with no humans in any photos?

    Great time to travel. Just be kind, clean, polite and thankful.

    Yeah, rainy season in Kanagawa not so nice.

    Yukkuride

  6. #2 and #12 sum up corona time for me. I spend so much time just looking out my window. Thanks for providing me with some other views.

    #12 I erased my looming and guilt-inducing ‘to do’ list recently. If I am not already doing it, I ain’t gonna. Financial reading, looking out the window, getting to the still-open pool. And yelling at the tv as the Go To campaign unfolded.

    Thanks for your Monday reads, they’re great windows.