Schinge Samsara comments

It really is quite pathetic. Grow up and talk to people instead of chanting the required pleasantries and you might not need a chair to hug you. Stop wallowing in your own inner dread of everything around you. It isn't an attractive quality.

Well, surely much easier said than done. Why do people assume that everyone makes friends easily? I've never been good at it myself, but at least was lucky enough to find a nice husband who hugs me. There are so many different people out there, some are self-confident, some are very shy. That's the way it is, you can not dictate someone else's character. I've heard people calling other people loosers, because they were too shy. Makes them looking very arrogant, in my opinion. So, why not buy this chair if it makes you happy? Apart from that, the chair is actually designed for older people, imagine your partner with whom you had been living together for 60 years dies, must be suddenly a terribly lonely feeling at home. Threw my own grandma into depressions.

and avoid going out when mosquitoes are most active, at night.

Well, I learned that the little beasts that are flying around at night are not tiger mosquitos but some other, "normal" type which can't transfer the dengue virus. You can get dengue only from tiger mosquitos which are only flying during daytime (I was bitten by one in April and that was definitely around noon). So protecting yourself at night will keep you only from being bitten by normal mosquitos, but it will not protect you from the tiger mosquitos. So you need to use long clothes and repellants during daytime, while at night you are relatively safe. Or is that information wrong and they are active at night as well?

I just had a discussion with my Japanese husband about this topic tonight and he thinks the regulation for food from Fukushima might be strict, but he does not trust the test results. They might be fake. Can't really say anything against it as long as I don't have any contamination meter to test the food by myself. However, I found an article in a Swiss newspaper, saying that the EU raised the limit to 2500 becquerel/kg for food after the Fukushima catastrophe. So, food in the EU can't really be safer than food from Fukushima.

JaneM, thanks, you said what I am thinking, too. Just did not see your comment before I posted mine. And yes, I can't remember my parents checking every single food they bought, either. And we lived in south Germany, where the ground was quite contaminated and still is in some areas. But nobody I know in Germany worries about that.

I read in a newspaper that after the Tschernobyl catastrophe the limit for food that was imported into Europe was 370 becquerel per kg for dairy products and 600 becquerel for other food, which was more than thrice/six times the standard of Japanese authorities now. And as far as I know there was no increase of health problems caused by radioactivity in Europe (except for the areas directly affected by the catastrophe of course) during the last 30 years. I mean I grew up in Germany during that time, so I ate all this food and I am still healthy. Apart from that, hearing about all the meat scandals that happened in Europe lately, and if they really get genetically manipulated vegetables and chlorine chicken from the US in future, I am not so sure if eating in Europe isn't more dangerous that eating food from Fukushima.

But having said all that, I have to confess that I cannot help panicking. My husband and me avoid buying food from Fukushima and all neighbouring prefectures as well >.<

She might need to change her number very quickly. Similar thing happened to me in Germany, I pretended to be very friendly, gave this guy a completely wrong name and telephone number and I never heard from him again. I would live in fear if I gave my real number to such a guy.

That's why I always wear at least knee-length skirts. Makes these guys' lives quite difficult.

Daniel NeagariJUL. 09, 2014 - 05:28PM JST Deutschland, Deutschland, über alles!!!

For those who want to put a but in everything... I know it is not the National Anthem of Germany... but it expresses exactly what I want to say.

I understand what you want to say, only that part of the song was used by the Nazis, so it has a very bad taste and we don't use it in Germany anymore (except for the right-wing extremists, probably).

what a nice birthday present today for me :-) Although I feel sorry for the Brazil team. Even in the German media commentators said that was actually not the kind of game they wanted to see, they were hoping for a more competitive match. Just what happened to the Brazil team, they started very well, but then??? Anyway, I am hoping now for a final against our favourite neighbour country, the Netherlands. Go Oranje, go! :-)

This is very sad. Mobbing is hard even for strong minds, but I wonder if the girl did not have any self-esteem at all? Was she so totally depending on her boyfriends opinion? Sometimes I think that women in Japan are too obediant/weak against men. For example, if a husband in my country required his wife to prepare a hot bath for him in the evening and to cook at least 3 different types of dishes for dinner, she would probably ask him if something is wrong with his brain.

For example, even though Germany caused as much harm to its neighbour countries during WW 2, Europe succeeded in re-establishing friendly relationships. I wonder why this is not possible in Asia? Does regret/apology and forgiveness depend on money? On culture and mentality? On geography? On religion? I don't think so. Anyway, I hope one day this will happen in Asia as well - without another war.