しばらく日本語で書く。

今日、那須の山々がきれいに晴れ上がった。なにか、すごく寒い日々が続いてきたので、本当にやっと晴れたという感じがする。芝生もまだまだ白いままで、緑の芽は数少ない。これから、気温の上昇と安定とともにやっと緑溢れる季節になるのだろう。そうあってほしい。もう寒さも疲れる。いまだ、ストーブ使ってんだから。

連休といっても、会社員でない僕はあまり関係ない。町の中が車だらけになるのがむしろいやだけれど、でも、人々の表情が仕事モードから遊びモードにかわってるのがわかるから、それも多少リラックスできる。

最近、目の前を走る車を見てて思うけれど、外車が多くなったなあ・・ってこと。かつて、外車ってのはそれなりにステータスな感じだったけれど、今はまったくそう感じることもない。むしろ、デザインがかっこ悪いのも多いから、よほど国産のほうが好きだったりする。その上、外車は故障を前提に乗ってないとならない。日本車なら安心して乗ってられるけどね。そのくらい、日本車の性能はすぐれていて、単に外車に乗りたいって気持ちはゼロになった。

今日は、ベンツにのってる隣の住人が代車で走ってた。故障したんだって。それで、部品がないとかなんとかで、1ヶ月くらいはお蔵入りらしい。ベンツなんて故障怖がってたら買えないしね。代車を楽しむくらいじゃないとね。でも、せっかくのゴールデンウイークが代車じゃちょっとかわいそうだなあ。

Today I will write in Japanese.

ちょっと最近の世間を見てて思うこと。何故に日本のテレビ、メディア、下手すると企業などはこうも日本に不利なことを推し進めるような傾向があるんだろうか。特に、隣の国の情報になると日本より優遇して伝えてくるって、なんとも変だ。金も流れてるからってのはわかるけれど、社会構造自体に明らかに問題がありそう。

ま、いろいろすでにネットでも言われてるから、敏感な日本人ならそんな現象があることや、その理由も含めてほｔろんどわかってるんだろう。でも、この傾向はどこかで修正しないとおかしいだろうに。

それと、時々東京眺めてて思うけれど、外人旅行者（または定住者）増えたなあ。10年前はこれほどの多国籍人は街でみかけなかった。今はカメラ抱えて渋谷の交差点にいたり、団体でわからない言葉話してる外国人多くなった。観光にきてくれるわけだから、日本も有名になったんだわね。

でも、ユーチューブとか見ててひとつ思うことがある。大抵は日本を褒めてくれるものが多いけれど、中によく見かけるのが「日本は人種差別の国」という文言で文句言ってるビデオ。これ、わからんでもないけれど、誤解がある。

まず、大前提として異人種が混ざったときなんらかの「区別意識」がはたらくのは当然。まして、世界のどこにいっても人種差別（まあ、区別程度も含めて）かならずある。僕の経験からすると、ニュージーランドなんて凄い差別意識残る。ニュージーランドには住んでたからわかるけれど、露骨に「アジア人は帰れ」って町中で堂々と人種差別キャンペーン張ってる。移民は帰れじゃなくて、アジア人。150年くらい前に、英国からわたってきて勝手に国を原住民から手中に収めて統治した白人が今度は「自分の国からアジア人は出てけ」というのも聞いてて愉快なはずもないわけだ。ある意味、アメリカの差別よりひどい気さえする。アメリカにも住んでたから比較してしまうけれど・・・

で、日本でこういう差別っておそらく相当少ない。もちろん、日本だって害を受ければそれは排斥する方向に進むだろうけれど。日本でホテルなんかでかなり荒らされて「外国人お断り」になることもあるらしいけれど、それは本人達が悪いだけ。日本人の心の奥に、人種で人を排斥する「人種差別」は存在していないと思う。あるとすれば、われわれが単一民族だからどうしても、「違う人」が目の前にいるとき、どうすればうまくコミュニケーションできるか、という相手に対する「ケアー」や「戸惑い」に似た感覚からの反応なんだとおもう。日本人は「違う人」だから丁寧に接したいと思う気持ちのほうが強いようにすら思う。その反応がある人には差別に見えるのかもしれない。でも、それが「親切」と受け取る外国人もいるのも事実。

また、よく聞くことだけれど、外国人は「長年すんでも絶対に日本人には受け入れてもらえない」という言葉。これは間違い。それは個人の問題だって。個性次第でだんだん友達も増えれば、心も通うのは人間同じ。

いわゆる、「人種の違い」はなくならないんだから、そこで「オレは日本人だ」といっても、日本人からすれば見た目で最初は「あ、外国から来た人なんだな」と判断するのは当然。

その違いは当然のことと思わない限りいつまでもどこか心で「受け入れられない」と感じるってことなんだろう。実際に、僕も海外じゃ「異人」なわけだ。だから、会話ではかならず「違い」は話題になる。いつまでも「違い」を乗り越えられないのはむしろ本人側に問題があることも多い。

まして、日本の中でさえ、性格があわなかったりセンスが異なってたりすれば、仲良くならずに相容れないことなんて当然。日本人間で差別すらされることだってあるのかもしれない。人間になんらかの共通意識や相違意識があるのはむしろＤＮＡの問題であって、消えることなんてありえない。

移民が移り住んだところで我が物顔になれるわけない。自分で努力してそこに馴染むしかないわけだけれど、なぜか、時々移り住んだ国にイチャモンつける移民がなんとも多くないか・・・？最近フランスなんかでも、移民に対して「フランスがいやなら帰れ」とかインタビューで言ってったけれど、それも真なりってことじゃないか。

外国人が増えてくると、お褒めにあずかることもあるけれど、まあ、反面多くの批判を受ける。日本はどこか面白いからなのか、特に日本のそういったマイナス側面を知った顔で英語で語る外国人がユーチューブに本当に多い。日本語では語らないのが釈然としないところもあるけど。日本人には言わないことを、ネットで拡散して愚痴を共有してる場合もあるんだろう。海外暮らしは不満もでるから、気持ちはわかるけどね。でも、中には日本人は英語を話さないからダメだ、なんてのも堂々と愚痴ってる外国人もいるから驚く。日本じゃ日本語が公用語なんですがね。困ったもんです。

あまりにいやならやっぱり母国に帰るしかないんだよね。僕達日本人だって海外に行くときは同じことなんだから。

最近、日本が随分変わってきたと思う。とくに長く海外に住んでて戻ってきたので余計にそう思うんだろう。日本は欠点もあるけれど、美点もある。それを守れるような国であってほしいと思うし、市民が頑張るだけでなく、異常なマスコミや企業にも注意が必要なんだろうと思う・・・そんな昨今でした。

I’m not a student any more. But a long time ago, I was a student.

Then we sometimes thought that it would be fantastic if we could go abroad for studying in high schools or universities. The realistic idea we had was…it’s such a dream fantasy. For avarage students of Japan then had no enough money for that dream.

But today’s students have freedom to choose any schools they like in the world. They became richer than 20 years ago.

Recent research on the students of Japan and other countries say that Japanese students don’t want to study abroad compared to other counties students. In spite that Japanese students have chances to choose where to study now, they don’t choose world’s universities. They seem to like staying in Japan rather than going abroad with reasons like ” Japan is better for them, they are comfortable being in Japan “.

I don’t think it’s good for younger people stayin in domestic situation all the time. However, I agree with them something.
Certainly Japan is a good country for Japanese people. I don’t know how foreigners think about Japan, but I like Japan best in the world even after I stayed and visited in many countries. When I first went out Japan, I strongly thought Japan was a kind of bad country with hard working condition and hard competition in any life aspects. It’s true in some cases. But at the same time, I feel really comfortable when I’m in Japan.

It’s natural because I’m Japanese. But if I observe the reasons, I notice that Japan has safety, trustful people, or the mind comfort in many aspects. We have safe medical system with national health security system, and we have good police service ( not always good but at least we can be helped by police system), kind and helping minded people’s society, standard or average life consciousness ( not big wealth gap), freedom to choose, or more like beautiful seasonal nature, good foods, traditional and modern culture and entertainments, cheaper houses ( now it’s far cheaper than other countries, I think), technology for helping our life,….maybe I can list up 10 or more thing for why I like Japan.

Japan is not perfect, either. So I can list up also the negative things too. But good thing outnumber the bad ones easily.

Interestingly, I noticed these good aspects of Japan when I stayed in other countries.   Amount of stress in my self is far smaller in Japan than being in other places.  I will live in Japan until I die and it’s the best choice for me.  I understand it.

But I still have many countries in my mind for the next trips. It’s fun.

I know the comfort of Japan. But I strongly recommend the students of Japan go abroad for study. I think

I’m not a baseball fan. Only occassion I got excited before was when Hideo Nomo made sensation in the major league baseball in the USA.

But today I again was glad to know Darvish made a good result in the game with Yankees.  Although Yankees pitcher was also a Japanese player, Kuroda, I’m not interested in Kuroda at all.  Darvish has something special enough to excite me from the first time I saw his play in Japan.

It’s a little sad to see him in the USA because he is not in Japan any more, but his great play encourages me all the time.

I feel fine today because Darvish did it well.

The last time I went to Kyoto was already more than 10 years ago.

I decided to take a trip to Kyoto and Nara, including the shrine of Ise, Ise jingu, in this May. The reason for my interest in Kyoto and Nara is mainly the historical facts on how we Japanese and our country Japan were formed during the time of Kyoto capital period, called Heian time. Many different studies are found at present time of Japan about this mysterious time of Japanese genesis. Actually Japan has more than 2000 year history, but the precise records of country history starts appearing in Heian time with many remaining cultural assets and historical record in writings.

At least, Japan was influenced by Chinese culture and some more different cultures through Silk road in the ancient time.  Influence from middle east area seems to be true in the old Japanese history, too.

Some DNA research say that Japanese people have similar DNA structure with people in the middle Asia ( not China or Korea ) and the old Jewish people, too.  Japan is an insular country, so that unique nation and the culture was formed before some other people came to Japan across the ocean.  Gradually  people from those area started arriving to Japan.  That was the beginning of Japanese cultural growth by new stimulation from the world.

I’m looking forward to my trip to Kyoto and Nara.

This blog has been JAPAN PRESS, today it’s changed as titled above.

Topics about politics or any social things of Japan can be obtained from many websites now. From now on, I will focus my main concern, entertainment of Japan.

This music is not one from any famous musicians in Japan but from my own works.  I love creating music. When I used to work for radio media, producing music is one of my works then.

Not having been working for long time on music, something told me to start it again.

Today’s recording technique is really advanced compared to the one we knew before.  If we prepared all the necessary recording equipments by ourselves, maybe it would have been more than 10 thousand dollars AT LEAST.   For  enough situation, actually we needed to pay more than 20 to 30 thousand dollars.

But now, DTP or desk top music changed our music creation style.  Probably the cost needed for that is about one thousand dollars for starting, and all the melody and rhythem can be created inside the PC.  This is really amazing.

That change of recording environment moved me to tackle music creation again.

Please check next song if you have time.

It’s strange feeling for me to hear there are people who want to live in Japan from the other parts of the world. To be honest, from my eyes it’s hard to find nice aspects enough to encourage people to live in Japan coming far away across the ocean.

Probably there are not many who actually want to come in Japan to live, but the fact that there are even some wishing to live here amazes me enough.

When I was a child or very young, friends around me had dreams to live overseas by pointing out Japan’s faults one by one. They often said ” Japan is too quiet and group minded. America is good because personality is admitted importantly”. Maybe their insight was correct. Japan has been often criticized like no individual country, or too quiet country with no personal opinions. And this character of Japanese is still the same.

But today, the people who want to live here often say ” My country is too arrogant with strong individualism” ” I prefer harmonized country like Japan”.

Ummmmm, both my Japanese friends view and the foreigners’ view to Japan are telling the same thing. So Japan has not changed, nor the USA either. Point is that which nature we like better.

If some people really want to live in Japan, I think it means value of life for people might have changed over recent hard time. we can’t find the best answer about this. Human feeling changes from time to time. I also wanted to go abroad to study or for business, and when I did so, I noticed my nature matches Japanese way of life rather than Western’s. Now I’m comfortable being in Japan with THE harmonized society with less stimulation among people.

Internet media might have helped to create new Japan lovers, but they again might be back soon to their own country after certain period of time in Japan with final judgement of their heavenly places.

However, even if there were some the misunderstandings, it’s nice to welcome more people to Japan. They will know more about Japan and the real understanding could be possible only through the personal contact.

Yoshiki of X JAPAN did it again.

This time Yoshiki composed the theme song for Golden Globe Award of the United States for the first time in the history of Golden Globe Award.  Yoshiki says that it’s such an honor to do that, and he added that he never dreamed this kind of event over himself when he started X JAPAN.

Yoshiki is already recognized as the icon of Asian rock stars, but fans and people around him know his talent is not limited only in rock music.  Yoshiki’s talent has no border.

Together with the increasing popularity, Yoshiki once composed a song for Emperor of Japan.  It means, at that moment, nobody in Japan can deny his irreplaceable talent of music. Also Junichiro Koizumi, the ex-prime minister of Japan, often said he is a fan of X JAPAN. After all, Prime Minister Koizumi invited Yoshiki to the welcome meeting for American President, George Bush in Japan.

As we all know, X JAPAN broke up in 1997. However, their fans never forgot their music.  When they got back in front of us as X JAPAN by reunion, lords of fans filled the concert stadiums of Japan in 2007.

More than 35 countries gave them concert offers soon after the reunion. This is really incredible.  Who imagined this phenomena when they said ” that’s it ” in 1997?

Yoshiki writes super hard rock music, moreover, he also writes tear-dropping beautiful songs that never leave from human heart.

He is already in the middle of 40′s in his age.  But he never looks old.  Anything related with Yoshiki, or X JAPAN never gets old.  Fans know it.

Today a Sumo wrestler, Baruto ( Balt) got the victory in the 1st season of Sumo series in Japan. It’s the first championship for Baruto, also for Sumo wrestler from Estonia.

It’s still in the middle of the champion battle race, as today is the 13th day of 15 day competition,   he won championship with no loss without waiting for the final day match.

Congratulations !

It’s easy to suppose how his life was hard in this far east land without knowing language or custom of Japan.  Now he speaks fluent Japanese and behaves like a champion in a gentle and traditional way that Sumo champions should be.

I hope fans in his country, Estonia, also is glad to hear this news.