Shin’nen Kai – A New
Years Party (Sunday, January 8, 2012)
Join us for a fun filled pot-luck brunch to welcome
in the Year of The Dragon ( 辰年, tatsudoshi) on
Sunday, January 8, 2012 from noon until 2 PM. The
party will be held at the JASV offices at Fort Ethan
Allen.
March 31, Aikido
of Champlain Valley Festival
Aikido of Champlain Valley is planning a day of
workshops and demonstrations of traditional Japanese
arts at their dojo on Pine Street, Burlington. They
will also include a demonstration of Aikido. More
information will be announced shortly on their
website. http://www.aikidovt.org/
March 20 – April
27, The National Cherry Blossom Festival
Centennial Celebration
The National Cherry Bloosm Festival will commemorate
the 100 year anniversary of the gift of trees from
Tokyo to Washington, DC with a five week 2012
Centennial Celebration, March 20 – April 27. For
more information and opportunities to participate,
visit their website at
http://nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/
Special Project: Christmas Cards from Friends
Around the World.
The
Consulate-General of Japan's Seattle office
received an inquiry from a Professor Emeritus of
Chuo University who has a project titled
"Christmas Cards from Friends Around the World."
He has launched a campaign to gather holiday
cards for children in the Tohoku area from all
around the world. This is an
especially interesting project for school
children; pass it along to teacher and families
with school age children. If you would like
to participate, please use the following
address:
(To Boys and Girls)
c/o Mrs. Mayumi
Hoshi
Shichigahama-cho
Saigai-Volunteer Center
Noyama 5-9,
Yoshidahama
Shichigahama-cho,
Miyagi-Pref
JAPAN 985-0802
First class
postage to Japan is $1.18 for the first office;
your local post office can assist in special
mailings.
Share your good
thoughts and wishes! (via The Japanese
Cultural & Community Center of WA ワ州日本文化会館)
Membership Reminder
JASV memberships are on a calendar year basis and
expire on December 31! Please renew now! Let
us know if you've left Vermont and we'll refer you
to the local Japan America Society chapter.
News from Tottori
In mid-November, the 11th-15th, four representatives
of Tottori Prefecture and guides from JASV and Green
Across the Pacific visited high schools, college,
and local government organizations in Vermont. The
visit was designed to assist planning future GATP
exchanges as well as introducing participants
in the program. Visiting from Japan were Takehiko
Ueno and Akiko Tanabe of the Tottori Prefecture
International Exchange Foundation (TPIEF), and Seiji
Kadowaki and Alexander Ginnan of Tottori Prefecture
International Affairs.
Recent Resources: Books on Japan
Mark Pendergast,
Japan's
Tipping Point: Crucial Choices in the
Post-Fukushima World, 2011.
In the post-Fukushima era, is Japan is the “canary
in the coal mine” for the rest of the world? Can
Japan radically shift its energy policy, become
greener, more self-sufficient, and avoid
catastrophic impacts on the climate?
In 2010, Mark Pendergrast, a journalist living in
Colchester, Vermont, received an Abe
Fellowship that allowed him to go to Japan to study
renewable energy and specifically to visit several
so-called Eco-Model Cities in Japan. He was already
scheduled to visit Japan in May 2011, but the events
of March 2011 helped him reformulate his study.
He has just published a short, easy to read book
called
Japan’s
Tipping Point: Crucial Choices in the
Post-Fukushima World. He summarizes
his experiences on his blog (
http://markpendergrast.com/marks-blog):
"Japan is at a
crucial tipping point and I discovered that I
had been naive in thinking that the country was
ready to make a massive change. The Japanese
boast of their eco-services for eco-products in
eco-cities and yet they rely primarily on
imported fossil fuel and nuclear power, live in
energy- wasteful homes, and import 60% of their
food. That may be changing in the wake of the
Fukushima nuclear disaster. Maybe. But as I
documented, Japan lags far behind Europe, the
United States, and even (in some respects) China
in terms of renewable energy efforts. And Japan
is mired in bureaucracy, political in-fighting,
indecision, puffery, public apathy, and cultural
attitudes that make rapid change difficult."
Japan's Tipping Point is available on Amazon, both
as a Kindle eBook or as a paperback.
