The Aftermath of Fukushima

Beruthiel

I'm just wondering, for you guys living in Japan, are there any special precautions you are now taking since Fukushima?

For example, food and water.
Does the consumption of that concern you at all?
Do you go to the trouble of making sure your food came from no where near Fukushima?

As I am going to be eating out on a regular basis when I visit in November, I'm wondering if this is something I should be concerned about.

Do restaurants make an effort to source safe food?

Or am I being overly paranoid?

cocoshovel

Being overly paranoid There's probably more radiation in the fish from the Irish Sea.

funky penguin

Where exactly are you going?

As Hibby pointed out in his recent blog post, a lot of food in Japan is locally sourced. To be honest, I've never worried about it since I got here about a year ago, but I'm pretty far away from the danger area.

Beruthiel

cocoshovel wrote: »

Being overly paranoid There's probably more radiation in the fish from the Irish Sea.

With Sellafield across the water, that wouldn't surprise me at all.

Funky, I'll be in Tokyo and Kyoto mostly.

funky penguin

You'll be grand, don't worry!

hibby

Absolutely not an issue. I haven't heard anyone express concern about it, and in any event there's no evidence that low levels of radiation are harmful to people. I would be happy to support people from the affected areas by buying their produce.

Beruthiel

But don't you have no go zones around the area?
People still have not returned to their homes?

I have to say, I'm very surprised (in a good way) at all your relaxed attitude.

cocoshovel

Tokyo and Kyoto are nowhere near the effected area. The only no go zone is a 30km radius around the nuclear reactor itself. Crappy news agencies and poor media have blown this way out of proportion. Its not Chernobyl thats for sure.

osarusan

I live in Tokyo with 2 young kids. We have been buying a lot of bottled water for them, though I just drink the tap water myself. If I'm being way too careful about it, that's fine with me.

There have been a few reports of shops mislabelling Fukushima produce as coming from elsewhere in Japan, which concerned me. The Japanese government responding to radiation levels breaking permitted limits by just raising those limits worried me, but it was just because those limits were very low in comparison to Europe and the USA.

I'm less relaxed than other posters on here about it, because of my kids basically.

But given where you'll be going, I'd say you have nothing at all to worry about.

cocoshovel

Hi Beruthiel. You mentioned you are going to be in Tokyo and Kyoto only so I thought you might be interested in a trip report I recently wrote up about my time in Tokyo and Kyoto. (Its very picture heavy and very long, so if you have a slow connection beware!). You can find it here.

I drank bottled water and a lot of water from public fountains in parks and subway stations. It seemed fine to me. Also dont be surprised at the sheer amount of people who wear surgical face masks. Thats completely normal in Japan and doesnt have much to do with the nuclear reactor, rather its just for hygeine more than anything.

I have no idea where restaurants source their meats from but it wasnt glowing with radioactivity so I assume its all fine .
There have been no health effects on me yet, maybe in 30 years time :pac:

Beruthiel

cocoshovel wrote: »

There have been no health effects on me yet, maybe in 30 years time :pac:

I can't afford to wait that long.