Saturday, June 25, 2005

VS Traffic safety

Nine months have passed sicne I stopped watching TV and reading newspaper.
This world is filled with much information. Then I want to reduce noise information.
This is the reason why I stoppped them. TV program in japan is silly. Newspapers in Japan have bias.
But much boring information still come to me.
Two famous Sumo wresthler brothers, Waka and Taka, are critisizing each other on mass media. They are denying each other's personality. This is one of big news in Japan now. Silly!

The theme in last discussion class was Traffic safety in Japan.
A big train accident happened a few month ago in western Japan. Many people died.
The time schedule of train in japan is correct. Train comes to stations just in time.
It's very convinient. But sometimes the driving of train becomes dangerous to keep their schedule. The accident above was caused by this reason.

In discussion class, we talked about the solution.
I have two solutions; social solution and cultural solution.
Social solution is to regulate the speed of train officially.
We have the regulation of speed on car traffic. But not on train.
Each train company have thier own regulation but such a self-governance is weak.
We should have more strict one.
Cultural solution is to hire old age drivers for train.
In general old people is slow. And their driving is also slow.
Maybe many passangers are irritaed by their slow driving.
But respecting old people is japanese most strong culture.
We can't complain to the old. We can keep our safety.

After the class I ate Tofu for lunch.
Tofu is a very safe food. It has low calorie. It's soft. It's white. It's not aggressive. It's kind. It's peaceful. It's gentle. No taste. No smell. It has perfect flexibility. My hook hand must be like a Tofu.

3 comments:

AKIO KOBAYASHI said...

Hey pat, did you find the security hall to contact us from China? I hope you can find another blog spot in China. We wait for your report of crazy Shanghai life!

Mike said...

On Long Island I can take most safe train. It goes from the end of Long Island to Manhatten. There are maybe four separate lines governed by Government's Company. The train is SLOW and always LATE. But we know that we can't crash because of slow speed. Then we can relax and take long naps on the train.

Akio, you should read the Economist magazine for good information. It is the greatest publication in the world. Unfortunately, it is in english. But you can understand. Do IT!

Have a great trip Pat! Enjoy DUI Go-Kart driving!

Lance said...

A train being 30 seconds late in Japan is surprising and not acceptable. In America it's considered on time. I guess in Japan there is no window to try and be at the station, you are either on time or not on time.

When the train accident occured in Japan the driver was under great pressure. The commutors had maybe 30 seconds to change trains at the next station. This is what caused the driver great stress. There was no room for error and in turn a catastrophe occured.