H5N1 outbreaks in Korea, Japan, Bangladesh

These stories were posted today: Bangladesh reports first human case of H5N1 bird flu, and Korea and Japanese outbreaks believed to be linked.

This story was posted May 5: Five suspected H5N1 human cases reported in Seoul and in April:
Seoul hospitals on alert for bird flu
S. Korea confirms 25th outbreak of H5N1 strain of bird flu

Is suicide sticky?

Figures show the suicide rate among 11-17s in Wales, although small, is five times higher than in England.
- BBC

In Malcolm Gladwell's book The Tipping Point, he describes a runaway suicide craze in Micronesia. Gladwell writes that before the 1960's suicide was unknown in Micronesia, and after the first suicide, it caught on quickly so that by the 1980's Micronesia had the highest per capita suicide rate in the world. Suicide was hot.

Exactly how hot? Well the USA has a rate of 22 per 100 000. Micronesia's rose to 160 per 100 000. Gladwell says that teens would commit suicide if they saw their girlfriends with other boys.
"On seventeen year old boy hanged himself after being rebuked by his older brother for making too much noise." - writes Gladwell.

Even more shocking is the ideation of suicide. Kids start to want to 'try' hanging to 'see how it feels'. There's excitement and daring involved. Gladwell calls it a contagious epidemic of self-destruction, engaged by youth in the spirit of experimentation, imitation and rebellion...it becomes an important form of self-expression.

South Africa has their own brand of suicide crazy youngsters. They're called train surfers. Check it out:
Train surfer buried
'Disturbing' child suicide rate
While Micronesia took the suicide world by storm once upon a time, the Japanese are consistent performers. Anything from bankruptcy to failing one's exams is grounds for jumping in front of a bus.
One Japanese suicide every 15 minutes
But the leading contempers today are indians girls.
Indian teens have world's highest suicide rate

The average suicide rate for young women aged between 15 to 19 living around Vellore in Tamil Nadu was 148 per 100,000. This compares to just 2.1 suicides per 100,000 in the same group in the UK.

The global suicide rate stands at 14.5 deaths per 100,000, with suicide the fourth leading cause of death in the 15 to 19 age group. However, in the Tamil Nadu study, suicide was the number one cause of death among these adolescents.

Notably, young women were much more likely to kill themselves than young men - the reverse of the rest of the world. In Western countries, men are three times more likely to commit suicide than women. Hanging was the most common method used, followed by poisoning using insecticide.

SKY NEWS: Dolphin Slaughter Underway in Japan

It's a grim picture. Beautiful dolphins being shepherded into a bay, the backdoor closed by nets, and the bay filling up with blood. Click here for Sky News video page.

Global Surf News has a story on a bunch of surfers who are getting involved, trying to protest the slaughter, which conventionally starts now and ends in December. Sky News footage showed a young blond surfer in tears.

Actress Hayden Panettiere has been involved in a violent confrontation with Japanese fishermen as she tried to disrupt their annual dolphin slaughter.

Click here for that story.
Fishermen defend dolphin cull.

NVDL: It's an emotional rather than a logical reaction. Should we not eat certain animals just because they are more or less like us? So no dolphins, chimps or monkeys, but pigs, cows and chickens are fine?

It does make sense to me to consume lower down the food chain, especially from the point of view that vegetarian foods suit the human gut better than meat. Have we become flesh eating chimps, and as such, aggressive, insatiable, at times suffering a kind of carnivorous blood lust not just for food...?

Chimpanzees do fight to death when tribes encounter other tribes, and bizarrely, the winners eat their victims. This cannibalisation may be to instill a terrible fear in their opponents, as human cannibals did once upon a time. But this trend can sometimes be modified into a more generalised love of meat. I've seen cockatiels that start to enjoy eating the yokes of eggs that they crack open accidentally, and then they become involuntarily addicted to the taste.

Meanwhile, back to the story at hand. When I was in Korea for the Fifa World Cup there was a domestic sense of putting aside dog meat - at least until the visitors left. The Asians tend to eat everything fishy, from jellyfish, to eels, seaweed, to those poisonous spiky blow fish (despite a fair amount of people who die every year for the privilege) and so it's no surprise that dolphin is part of the menu.

I'd expect the Japanese to get a LOT of flack once again over this. It's a big PR blow to that country. Then again, the Asians think we are sick in the head to be drinking a white liquid that cows feed to their calves - that we put that stuff over our cornflakes, and put a rotten form of the stuff into our salads and sandwiches.

To each his own...?

VISA Run - Osaka

This and the previous picture were only taken just before and just after I got my E2 Visa respectively.

The Korean Consulate is in here, and if you were the guy on the bike, coming from Namba (behind him), you'd make a sharp turn to the right obviously (his left). McDonalds is about 5 minutes walk from here, and Namba about 10-15 minutes.
From here to the airport is 50 minutes minimum, and much longer if you go with the slow train and miss one that has just left. The RAPID trains go every hour. I arrived back at 2:50pm, even though I was supposed to be back closer to 4pm. The thing was my return RAPID ticket was 4pm, and my flight was 5:25pm. Despite talking to my director, he would not change the ticket times, so it was left to me to try to salvage the situation.

Every Minute Counted

I was the first person to arrive here during the lunch period (it's possible some foreigners arrived before lunch, but I didn't see them). An American from Seattle and I were playing tag in Namba, doing a few u-turns. I got here first, but went downstairs and spoke to the Korean lady for a while, and then headed upstairs just after Mr Seattle.

E2, 620, No: 9 and Mr Seattle

Even though, having been to Osaka before in pursuit of the E2 I had a rough idea of where to go and what to do, I nevertheless researched getting here (as in exactly how to get here) on the net, since I had no margin for error, and needed to have my application done first so I'd be finished first. In retrospect I think had I deviated from this plan I believe I would have faced some pretty dire consequences. Every minute counted, and by the time counter 9 opened, my form was filled in, my photo ready (already had photos from Korea although there is an expensive photo making machine in the building) and my next-person-please ticket.
Mr Seattle took one before me, but I found one on the counter that was 620, and his was 621. The glowing red number above us, with the arrow, was 619. Even though I had 619 I asked him if he minded me going ahead of him, explaining my flight situation and all. He said he didn't mind.
Once the counter opened, a little early at 1:20pm I explained my problem, and the women asked which airline I was on. "Not Asiana" she said, and then I remembered, last time I had flown Asiana, even watched a movie (Jurassic Park 3), and migrated here with the flow of about 10 other teachers.

3:45 Please

I explained that the absolute latest I could get my passport back was 3:45pm. She pointed to the sign. I explained that I knew their policy, and had explained it to my director, but he had simply refused to listen, and please, could she help me. She said she couldn't, that the latest was 4pm. I asked her to at least 'try', and if it was 'possible', to do what she could. She was very resistant, but she didn't explicitly say no, and seemed, implicitly, to say 'maybe'. She suggested that I return at 3pm and wait. Concerned, a little anxious, but not worried, I left the building.

Penalty of Failure

I have to add that if you think I was overreacting, or am being overdrammatic, the
penalty of failure is that you lose your job and get deported to your home country at worst, at best you pay huge amounts of money to make another trip here, or stay in a hotel, or buy another air ticket and miss another day of work. I saw a guy arrive and basically shouted as he arrived, huffing and puffing, for the forms. Sweat was bubbling out of his face and a thick aroma of sweat salted the air around him. He was an overweight lumbering tank of sheer panic. And he wasn't the only one.

In For A Penny

Another guy who I met at 2:55pm didn't bring enough money. He'd already scored Y1000 from someone who didn't even give him his email address (for a refund). I offered to give him all my coins (about Y700) but then discovered that his Y1200 was enough to afford the Y950 ticket back. I only reflected later that he'd also need busfare back. But we both agreed that my situation was even worse, because I might miss my flight altogether. In the end a lot of my coins spilled into the seat on the RAPID on my return, so I wished I'd given them to him. Coins can't be exchanged anyway at Foreign Exchange* counters, and maybe he could have bought himself something to eat. He had apparently drained his bank account in Osaka of his last pennies to come up with the Visa fee (quite expensive). I also had to borrow money when I visited Osaka in February 2002. I shudder to think what I would have done if my colleague couldn't, wouldn't or hadn't loaned it to me.

The Visa Trip to Osaka is a Trial By Fire, make no mistake. It's not a nightmare, it's not Mission Impossible, but it certainly is Be Very Careful You Get It Right The First and Only Time You Try It. And that's a bit of pressure.

*I was advised that it is better to exchange Yen for Won back in Korea, as the rate is better than in Japan.