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Partygirl reporting from Tokyo Japan

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posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 04:42 AM
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Hello ATS, I don't know how many of you remember that I was here in Tokyo during the earthquake and subsequent events last year. To provide a brief rundown, I was doing missionary work in Tokyo at the time and stayed for a few weeks after, but being rather badly "rattled" (ha-ha) I had a kind of nervous collapse plus became worried about the radiation and other things, so I returned back to the USA, my home, and worked as a clothing salesperson in a mall for most of the year since then.

Now I have returned to Tokyo after being very fortunate to get a job teaching English in Japan (a common job for foreigners here). I am very happy to be back! I will be here for at least a year if all goes well!

Last night I had dinner with Mr. Silent Thunder, an ATS member whose business takes him back and forth between Tokyo and Vladivostok, Russia pretty frequently. Mr. Thunder was a real generous gentleman to take me out to a fancy kaiseki ryori welcome dinner in Ginza, for which I thank him!!! It was just about the best meal I've had in months, yearrs, maybe ever. Very tasty! Thanks Silent!


Mr. Thunder and I had a long talk in which he stated that he had a more or less negative experience last year "reporting from Tokyo" for ATS during the events of 2011, and he wants no part of doing that anymore, but I have a slightly different feeling about things, so I will be happy to answer questions, put up photos when I can, and generally make myself available to do legwork checking things out around Tokyo for ATS, if you guys want. I have a small dosimeter geiger counter so I can take readings from the air and will be doing so while I'm here. Thus far, my readings have been normal. I will tell you if it gets dangerous! Of course I cant measure the food and water this way, which makes me nervous. But it is a risk I decided to take!

So, this thread will be about my experiences here. Like I said, I'll be answering questions and checking things out for anyone who is interested, but I have come up with a few ground-rules, so here they are:

  • I'm kind of busy so if I don't get to your questions or can't answer them, please have some understanding.
  • I'm poor, I don't have the money to be running all over the place checking things out. It's a pretty spartan gig I have for myself, I can barely feed myself on the cheap salary they offfer but I'm not complaining! At least I have a job in a place I want to be, right? But my mobility is limited.
  • I'm not going to try to prove I'm here, because its impossible. This is the key lesson Mr. Thunder taught me. You either believe it or you don't. And I don't want to give out info that could compromise my privacy. I will, however, be putting up some photos, probably starting tomorrow. I hope you guys like them!


I really want to try to get as close to Fukushima as possible by taking a train-trip up there but it will probably be a while before I can do that, so I'm basically stuck in Tokyo now (not a bad place to be stuck!
)

OK, that's all for now. My job starts real soon and I'm excited! See you guys later, love, gaijin-house-living partygirl.
edit on 4/24/2012 by Partygirl because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 04:55 AM
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I really want to try to get as close to Fukushima as possible by taking a train-trip up there but it will probably be a while before I can do that, so I'm basically stuck in Tokyo now (not a bad place to be stuck! )
reply to post by Partygirl
 

Good luck with your new job and "second chance" in Tokyo. I do think that being stuck in Tokyo is a really bad situation though. If another large quake hits Japan I fear the worst will happen and much of northern Japan and possibly Tokyo itself may be rendered uninhabitable. Please take a look at this video and give it some serious thought.

The real truth in Tokyo

Not trying to fear monger you I just wanted you to be aware of the very real danger you are in by being there.

edit on 24-4-2012 by Nucleardoom because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:14 AM
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Originally posted by Partygirl

  • I'm not going to try to prove I'm here, because its impossible.



  • Should be a piece of cake for a Mod to trace the IP back to its origin ..



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:19 AM
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    reply to post by Nucleardoom
     


    Is it just me or Arnie Gunderson is the only person reporting this type of fear mongering about Fukishima. I have no clue if it's accurate or not as I'm not a nuclear engineering/expert/whatever else. I googled his him and these came up.

    atomicinsights.com...
    atomicinsights.com...
    modernmarketingjapan.blogspot.com...



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:21 AM
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    reply to post by Partygirl
     





    Mr. Thunder and I had a long talk in which he stated that he had a more or less negative experience last year "reporting from Tokyo" for ATS during the events of 2011, and he wants no part of doing that anymore,


    yea.. I couldn't agree more, his thread should have been 20 pages long with 133 flags ..

    to be sure



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:31 AM
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    reply to post by Nucleardoom
     


    Thanks for the well-wishes! I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous.


    reply to post by H1ght3chHippie
     



    Originally posted by H1ght3chHippie

    Should be a piece of cake for a Mod to trace the IP back to its origin ..


    We already went through this last year, apparently the IPs are encoded or something to protect members privacy so they only look at them in exceptional circumstances, if I understand correctly, and this doesn't count as an exceptional circumstance. But yeah, if they want to take a peek and verify it in my case, that's fine I have nothing to hide. I sort of get the feeling they won't do that, though. And even if they did that wouldn't be enough proof for some people here, they'd claim I was colluding with the reptoid occupation government to re-route my posts through a fake server in Roswell or something. There is no end to it. So like I said, you either take my word for it or you don't.

    reply to post by RealSpoke
     


    I don't know, I don't really read the alt press stuff on Fukushima all that much. Jeff Rense (www.rense.com...) puts up doom-style headlines about Fukushima pretty regularly and sometimes I check those out. But its all a little too close to home for me, so I don't indulge in the doom-heavy articles about Fukushima too much. For my own sanity.


    reply to post by Komodo
     


    You'd have to ask him why he didn't like it, I'm not my brothers' keeper. But I think he was stressed out dealing with business at the time and couldn't take the ATS snarky trolling from some members.

    Anyways this threads not about him, so whatever. I'm not as stressed now as I was then either so hopefully the trolls and meanies won't drive me off. I will ignore them.
    edit on 4/24/2012 by Partygirl because: (no reason given)


    +10 more 
    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:34 AM
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    Originally posted by Komodo
    reply to post by Partygirl
     





    Mr. Thunder and I had a long talk in which he stated that he had a more or less negative experience last year "reporting from Tokyo" for ATS during the events of 2011, and he wants no part of doing that anymore,


    yea.. I couldn't agree more, his thread should have been 20 pages long with 133 flags ..

    to be sure





    I do not think he cared about stars and flags.

    I remember his thread, and I did enjoy it very much. Unfortunately, I agree with Mr. Thunder on this point. There is no shortage of ATS members who have zero manners, and are just all around douchebags, who seem to go out of their way to make things as hard as possible.

    I have said it a million times, and I will say it again. If I was a whistle blower or had any kind of solid inside info, I honestly believe the last place I would choose to talk about it would be ATS.

    Partygirl: Welcome back. Good to see you are happy and I hope things work out for you well in Japan. Speaking only for myself, I love seeing reports from "on the ground".
    edit on 24-4-2012 by MrWendal because: (no reason given)



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:48 AM
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    Hey, what an interesting story! Sounds like quite the adventure, but it's such a shame the meltdowns had to occur in your paradise. I think some of the most important work you can do would be getting as much food as possible tested from a wide range of products. I would select food that Fukushima is known to produce and test those first, especially labels that indicate it isn't from Fukushima. The point being to catch companies that are illegally rebadging Fukushima produce as coming from other prefectures. On top of that, you would still have the indications of the types of isotopes and the extent of contamination in each sample. Aren't there centers in Tokyo where you can take samples to scintillation counters for free or cheap? That would give us a decent indication of what isotopes are in the food let alone how much radiation and the type. I would also think if you could interview doctors, especially pediatric, and try to find out about any diseases that have increased incidence after the meltdowns began.

    I don't know what model dosimeter you have, but I'm going to assume it is like a Soeks. There really isn't a need for further evidence of hot spots in Tokyo. What I mean is that contaminated food should take precedence over hot spots, as you are ingesting it on purpose. Finding hot spots is still important, but the food is not just local it is shipped throughout the country and the world. If you come across areas above .2 uSv/hr, that would probably be worth reporting even if it was from such a device. Those results could be corroborated with other models that I am sure others have there and are willing to help you. If you can afford it, I would look into building your own optical scintillation counter and preferably buying one. There are many blueprints and guides online and you can actually build a pretty accurate device. It would at least allow you to test food and figure out what radionuclides are in it, if you can't use those machines I talked about before.

    I think the most effective way to help would be to find out what diseases have increased since the meltdowns. If you can find those that are statistical anomalies and they are related to radiation, you could add more evidence to the already growing body. I am sure you could talk to doctors and nurses, again pref children's doctors, and find out if they have noticed any increases in certain diseases like acute childhood leukemia or heart attacks. Maybe, you could convince them to create studies examining the disease rates and the ages at which the different diseases occur.

    The other would again be testing the food and water/drinks. You could just take 3 samples a week and after a few months you could have compiled a nice list. That is if you can use those public machines. I don't know the situation with pricing, if it's free or not. If the testing costs a substantial amount of money, then I would seriously consider building your own. You could easily test three samples a day then. Once you get some baselines and you calibrate the machine, it would be accurate enough to sound the alarm on contaminated food and drinks. You could then compile information concerning purchasing location and date, as well as the stated origins of the food and the manufacturer.

    Besides that just be smart and be safe. I wouldn't be overly worried about external radiation so much as I would the contaminated food and water. I'm sure you know how pathetic the government and industry are concerning the testing of the food. Jesus, even if they did test all the food precisely, the limits are arbitrarily so high contaminated food would still pass anyway. Watch the pollen as well. That is often very high in concentrations of Cesium isotopes and I am sure there are many others that they don't usually test for. Keep the contamination you eat to an absolute minimum and you should be ok, at least until you are older and you will have forgotten about Fukushima anyway. Why do you think they always said, "No IMMEDIATE health problems." It's very subtle to catch, but the wording is on purpose. So, if you could figure out how to test the food and water/drinks and compile a list with relevant information, I think you will make your mark on this tragedy. I also think trying to convince doctors to author more studies on childhood disease rates, other ages of the population would be great too, would be an important step in getting the word out. At least, you could interview doctors and get their own personal experience with abnormal incidence rates. Thanks for your time and I hope you can do some of what I suggested. I feel they are more important than external dose rates, concerning lower than .2 or .4 uSv/hr dose rates. Be smart, be safe, and don't let ignorance harm you. I mean ignorance of contaminated food, pollen, ash, water, etc. - Ignorance of what isotopes you are inadvertently ingesting. That is no fear mongering by the way.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:53 AM
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    reply to post by RealSpoke
     


    I don't know how much you know about Arnie, but he is the real deal. He is a nuclear engineer who was working at 3 Mile Island when they had a partial core meltdown. He has since become a whistle blower on the nuclear industry, and now devotes his time exposing threats & coverups involving the corrupt nuclear industry. He has a very informative website as well. Sadly he seems to be one of the very few exposing the real truth behind the nuclear industry.

    Fairewinds

    My apologies if you already knew all of this, I just want to make more people aware of this info.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 05:56 AM
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    reply to post by KillThePoor
     


    Thanks, that's a great post.

    The dosimeter I have is from China, all the writing on it is in Chinese, I can't read it. I don't know how reliable it is, but its supposed to be the real deal. I'm going to try to verify its accuracy by testing a known source of radiation soon. Do you have any suggestions for doing that?

    Also, this thing deals with the air, I was told it can't deal with food and water. Is there a good way to test food and water with it? Just hold it close to the food/liquid? Would that work?

    Thanks for you post, that's the kind of thing I was hoping for with this thread.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 06:02 AM
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    OK, just took some readings.

    1) Outside, balcony, western Tokyo (exact location not stated to protect privacy). It's raining now. Reading: 0.15 uSv/h.

    2) Indoors, same place, middle of the room: 0.18 u/Svh

    3) Indoors, same place, held real close to running tap water: 0.11 u/Svh

    I don't know...what do you think?

    I have to get the accuracy of this thing verified somehow, too.

    It's quarter after 8 pm here now. I'm still tired from jetlag, I'm going to try to get some sleep. This place is a dump, really run-down, I have a tiny littel closet for a room and a bunch of weird people Im living with. But I'm still happy to be here! I'll check this thread when I wake up tomorrow morning.
    edit on 4/24/2012 by Partygirl because: (no reason given)



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 06:43 AM
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    Your quite the brave one! I've always wanted to visit Japan (Takashi Amano's museum was no. 1 priority, he's a legend in aquatic flora sculpture circles) but the horrid events of recent have swayed my plans.

    If you would not mind, please thank Silent Thunder from me personally. I hope he gets a chance to read this! But what he should know is that sometimes informative posts are all a large cluster of us need. The negativity of the net is just something that must be gratingly put up with. Read up on any product online, and most of the personal responses are negative, I guess its human nature to whinge when upset, but not bother when an item is perfectly usable. ST your words are always powerful, and I will do my part in apologising to you for not vocalising my appreciation toward you.

    But there is always a person out there to whom your words may have a profound effect on their lives - don't despair!



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 07:36 AM
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    What a wonderful adventure! My only request is to stay safe and have the time of your life in your new job and adventure. Pics are always enjoyed .Oh and maybe a little "man on the street" reporting about the average Joe in Tokyo's view on the North Korean actions of late!


    One note though, stay in touch with your parents dammit. My daughter going one state over manages to scare me to death by not calling... dont give ya ma any more greys than she deserves.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 07:40 AM
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    reply to post by Partygirl
     
    I agree with you when you tell those that will not accept your for real and in Tokyo to move on. I will read your reports with interest.

    A bit of advice. I work in a fairly dangerous environment and have a rule of thumb to keep myself safe. If you start to think you may be unsafe you should have already got out. Make sure you have your 'escape' planned.

    Keep safe and have a good time.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 10:58 AM
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    reply to post by Partygirl
     





    I'm not going to try to prove I'm here, because its impossible.


    Sure it is.
    Take a pic of yourself in front of a landmark in Tokyo with an iPhone or other smart phone that can tag the picture with a latitude and longitude..
    Post a link of it on a file sharing or image site. Such as Post Image.
    www.postimage.org...
    And not facebook.

    We can then look at the pictures metadata and see where it was taken.

    IT for the win!



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 11:10 AM
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    Thank you for updating starting a thread to document your return to Japan. I hope you have a safe and enjoyable time while teaching English and discerning the truth.

    We will return to Iwaki, Fukushima next week.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 12:44 PM
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    Welcome back partygirl....always enjoyed your posts.

    2nd


    +1 more 
    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 01:11 PM
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    Originally posted by grey580
    reply to post by Partygirl
     





    I'm not going to try to prove I'm here, because its impossible.


    Sure it is.
    Take a pic of yourself in front of a landmark in Tokyo with an iPhone or other smart phone that can tag the picture with a latitude and longitude..
    Post a link of it on a file sharing or image site. Such as Post Image.
    www.postimage.org...
    And not facebook.

    We can then look at the pictures metadata and see where it was taken.

    IT for the win!



    She doesn't have to prove anything. For privacy reasons, it's completely understandable as to why someone wouldn't want their face plastered on ATS as "evidence". Take her word, or don't -- but she isn't obliged to go out of her way and do anything, considering this is her thread and she has provided useful information.



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 01:19 PM
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    I lived in Iwakuni near hiroshima for a year, there were alot of teacher positions and alot of americans who lived in Japan. Its not far fetched, its not as if she was stating that Hogwarts is real bahahahah she is lucky to see the beautiful land and people and strong and brave enough to go to a new place and learn something besides sitting behind a computer and looking at it through a looking glass...Yoku dekima#a



    posted on Apr, 24 2012 @ 01:22 PM
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    reply to post by grey580
     




    Why would someone lie about being there?
    Doesn't really make any sense... well I suppose there are reasons why someone would but It's not like she's claiming she's seen Godzilla.... she's not making far fetched claims... just asking people to ask questions and so on.


    There is no reason to doubt her.




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