Think the Energy Program

From the last month, I have been participating "電力の未来を考える会" which means “think the future of the energy”, a program for University students held by Mentor Diamond in Tokyo.

There is no wonder why this kind of program was organized for University students.

Since the 3.11 earthquake and the following explosions of the Fukushima nuclear power plants that brought blackouts & brownouts, there were a lot of discussions on energy in Japan.

Politicians, corporate managers, heads of the related organizations, decision makers, academics, etc. were involved in those arguments, but what they were talking with technical terms, jargons, was too difficult to understand for ordinary people - like us.

(Of course this is not applied to everyone. Some academics are putting out the information through their blog, website, Twitter or Ustream in an informative way.)

The main purpose of this 3-month-program is to get involve the University students into the discussion on energy by giving them basic knowledge and opportunity to talk to the relevant actors.

And at the end of the program, each of the participants is supposed to submit a report (提言書).

What should be discussed?

The first session was held on Sunday, October 16^th at Harajuku, Tokyo.

We had guest speakers from various areas.

Mr. Itaru Yasui, emeritus professor of Tokyo University,

Mr. Akihiro Sawa, Executive of The 21st Century Public Policy Institute,

Mr. Tetsunari Iida, Manager of Institute for Sustainable Energy Politics,

and Mr. Thomas Breuer, Head of Energy Department of Green Peace.

Mr. Sawa has been working in METI (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) and involved in promotion of the use of the nuclear energy. On the other hand, Mr. Iida is well known as a strong supporter of the renewable energy.

It was very interesting to hear both sides of the story.

Actually, Mr. Sawa’s statement sounded rather reasonable. He pointed out that we cannot quit nuclear energy like RIGHT NOW, but what we have to do is to think the ratio of the resource of the electricity. He insisted that we should not depend on only one resource (ex. 100% natural gas) considering the ‘risk management’, and it is needed to use several resources for a stable energy supply. Considering that, he said, we should keep the nuclear energy as one of the options of our energy strategy.

It was kind of surprising because I was supporting the idea that we should STOP nuclear energy AS SOON AS POSSIBLE and shift to the renewable energy.

What hit me was that, Mr. Sawa’s point weighs the growth of the economy.

Well, many says we need electricity to keep the current economic status, but is the electricity for the economy or the human being?

If it could do harm on people and the environment yet does good to the economy, would it be justified?

I think we should discuss not only whether to go on with nuclear energy or with 100% renewable energy, but also what does Japan aims at, what kind of society we are trying to design, and how much energy will be needed to realize that.

I am looking forward to the next session coming soon, November 12 – 13.

Yesterday, the news that the biggest earthquake ever hit Tohoku-Kanto area in Japan got spread to the world quickly. Magnitude 8.8 is worse than the Kobe earthquake (6,000+ died, 43,000+ got injured).

Fires, landslides, broken buildings, tsunami, after quakes, no lifelines (water, gas and electricity), bad weather, traffic jam, fake news, and other chaos stuff are happening around earthquake center point and in Japan. The damage is becoming bigger and bigger. People are confused even in other area in Japan.

When I felt the quake at first yesterday in Tokyo, I thought it was the biggest one I ever experienced in my life. People ran out from the buildings. Traffic lights were swinging. Trains stopped. But I still was thinking that I can go back home by night. Probably it was because I didn't see fires, ambulance cars or something 'unreal'. "Hmm, it was quite a big one. Okay I have to study for the exam day after tomorrow!"

However, then I started to see lots of lots of lots of tweets about information of the earthquake, and I found out that I can't go home before midnight. Suddenly I got so scared. It was a crazy idea to walk home which usually takes 40 min by train to go. (And I left my wallet at home that day..)

"I'm at Gotanda stn. and hung up now. Does anyone know any evacuation space I can stay?", I tweeted feeling aftershocks. Many kind people, those I know and those I don't know, tried to help me online and I could move to a safe, warm place. The girl who offered me a place didn't know me at all but she found my tweets and helped me. She made salad and a rice ball for me and gave me a cup of hot tea for free. It was not only her who said I'm welcomed to come to stay. I felt their warmth and kindness a lot. "People can be so kind and cooperative even during a hard time..", I thought. Mobile calls and text messages were not working well at that time because too many people were trying to use, but Internet connection was alive. It was literary a lifeline for me, and probably for many people.

After a few hours, (around at 8pm) I moved a place. I could contact to my future boss and he said I can stay at the office over night. I walked for like 30 min to reach there. Actually he tried coming to my place to pick me up but the traffic was sooo crowded and it would take 5 hours to come so he gave up! It was cold and 30 min walk seemed long, but I didn't feel alone. Many people were walking instead of using stopped trains.

"Oh my god..." That was the only words I could manage to say when I watched a news on TV at the office. I saw the fires in Kesen-numa City. Tsunami was like amoeba eating up all the boats, houses, cars, rice fields and even people. That was when I realized this is not Jishin (an earthquake) but Shinsai (quake disaster). I was talking with a girl at the office and what we could do was just to pray for those in Tohoku area.

Today, I arrived at my friend's house around at 3pm and I'm staying there now. Here are 7 people and I feel less lonely, which is nice. We can share information and we feel safer.

バングラデシュで実行した、Educational Speech Event。

そのイベントでスピーカーをつとめてくれたHelalと約束したことが、「私も、日本でSpeech Eventをする！」というものでした。

バングラデシュでは、地方の生徒は大学進学できないという”常識”があります。高額な予備校代、地方よりも高い生活費、宗教による価値観、物理的距離・・。そんな「教育の地域格差」を、日本人が関わったプロジェクト、E-education（http://eedu.jp/）を経て乗り越えたのがHelalです。

頭も良く若さと熱意にあふれている彼を見て、そして彼の話を真剣に聞いている生徒の姿を見て、（私も日本の学生をInspireしたい！）と思いました。

日本の地方の一都市、岐阜県中津川市って、ものすごい田舎でもなければ、都会でもない、中途半端な感じなんです。スタバもない、タリーズもない、でもマックとミスドはある・・・みたいな。でも性質的には田舎に近くて、しがらみや慣習が多く、タテマエ・世間体に対する意識なんかが強い土地柄であると思います。

高校生までに間に外の大きな世界を実感するっていうことがあまり無いなぁというのが私の感想。そして外の世界をもっと知って欲しいなぁと言うのが私の思い。もっともっと、やりたいことにチャレンジしてみようよ！ということを伝えたくて。行動すれば、今見てる”世界”よりもっと広い世界が見えてくるんだってことを伝えたくて。

だから、母校の恵那高校に協力を打診して、講演会（というかセミナー）を開こうと思っています！

目指せ、3月中の開催！

今日、告知用のプリント（案）が完成したので早速明日先生に送る予定です★

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Happy Valentine's Day!

It's snowing heavily outside and I'm at home with my family.

Cultural shock hit me over the month because of the changes happend to me while I was in Canada, DR and Bangladesh. So I had to think about my identity and if I should change or hide myself to fit in this society or not. I'm practicing one idea which is to partially change me so that I can get along with people around me but keep things I gained abroad in my mind. I'm not sure this is the best idea because I tend to do what I think as it's very natural to me (probably to everyone), but in this case I'm not doing what I think. Well, I'll see.

Another thing I found out is now I can see Japan objectively than before. There are many great things in Japan but not many people are aware of it. For example, they don't know how big Japanese food trend (especially Sushi) is, that Kanji is cool, that some believe that Ninja still exist, that  black hair and black eyes can be considered to be beautiful, that Japanese galapagos muti-task mobiles are amazing, that we have so many choices for snacks, that Japanese cosmetics are reasonable but have high fanctions, that our culture and history is precious, that standard mannar level is quite high, and that our dairy life is surrounded by so many convenient stuff.

OK, there are uncool aspects in Japan. But I don't understand why people (actually Japanese media) say we don't have energy or it's hopeless or we are, like, on the ship sinking into the sea.

There's a line that I heard on a TV drama around 10 years ago which I still remember.

"Everyone can complain about how bad thigs are, but can't say how to improve them."

That's why I like innovation. It shows solutions for the issues, not the reason. Fortunatelly I have many great friends and one of them support me to launch a project at my high school. There are many problems in education in Japan, but I'll try not to critisize on it but to solve it by taking action.

カナダの友人たちに、バングラTripのエントリを書くよ！と言って、約1ヶ月。

Facebookで写真は公開したものの、ブログという形では書けていないことは、彼らに申し訳ないなと思う。

ただ、書こうと思う前に考えてしまうのです。

「旅行記録として書くにはあまりにもったいない、そういう形で伝えるのは私がすべきことではないのではないか」と。

GCMPというプログラムで経験してきた、バングラデシュ8日間の私的記録をどうやって伝えるのか・・。

実は、ドラフトはGoogleDocにこっそりと上げてあります。

スケジュール、何をしたか、何を話したか、何を考えたか、嬉しかったこと、悔しかったこと・・・。

GCMPが終わった直後から少し時間がたち、報告会があり、個人的な反省が少し増えたりもしました。

・・・もしかしたら書けないのは、正直に書くと自分のかっこ悪いところも出さないといけないからかもしれない。

でも、そういう考え方ってもっとかっこ悪いな。

「何でも出来そう」とか「優等生っぽいよね」とか「大人しそう」「静かそう」なんて印象が多い私。

だからなんとなく、そういう風にしていなきゃいけないのかなって、思ってました。

でもそんな私の中身を変えてくれたのは、ドミニカで、カナダで、バングラで、そして日本で出会った色んな人たち。

今は、第一印象も悪くないでしょ、でも意外とギャップもあるんだよ、見てみて！なんて思えるようになりました。

私、変わったなぁと、思うし、これからも変わっていくなぁと、そんな予感がします。

実はカナダ後に考えていた院進学から、バングラを経て就職も考えるようになり、そして日本のTokyoで、もう一年休学しようと思うようになりました。

まだ正式には決まっていないけれど、東京で働けるかも。

都会だと思って行った大阪にいる頃から感じていた、東京との差があります。

情報・人・施設・イベント・・・このどれにおいても、東京っていいな、と思っていたんです。（自然は岐阜が一番;)）

何度、高速バスに乗って東京のイベントに参加したかなぁ。

そして去年カナダのトロントに住んで、更に大都市の魅力を実感しました。

そんな経緯で「Tokyoに住みたい！」と思っていた私の願望が、もしかしたら意外に早く叶うかもしれません。

それが今の状況。

こんな「東京話」が出る前にお会いした、キャリアカウンセラーの方がいるのですが、その方がまた言葉の操りが上手いんです。（エストレリータという、留学生向けのカウンセリングをしている会社の方です。）

操りが上手い・・なんて言うとダークサイドに聞こえますが(笑)、まったくのほめ言葉で。

私の強み、性格などを素敵に言葉にしてもらいました。

その方とお会いしていたときに私が書いた、”なりたい自分・目指している自分”が、以下。

★自分のやりたいことを実現するため、まっすぐに生きる。そのための努力を惜しまず、協力してくれる人へ最大の感謝を表現する。

★自分が好きだ／面白い、と思うこと＆他の人がしあわせになることを仕事にする。

うーんひねりもなく直球な文ですが・・・。

こういうまっすぐなことを、誰に向かっても、胸を張って言えるように生きて行きたい。

日本って、そういう姿勢には馴染まない独特な雰囲気があるけれど、胸を張って。だってそれが正直な気持ちだから。

日本での私のテーマは大和撫子です。明るく、優しく、芯を強く。

さおり

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