Maybe his point was "it could have been a lot worse", but I read it more like "everything went as planned and life went on without missing more than a few beats". The latter certainly doesn't seem to be the case.
This is a disaster localized to a small portion of a big country. That was certainly not a given: Tokyo could be burning right now, and the situation at the nuclear plant which literally had a tsunami hit it could be the situation at every nuclear and chemical plant in the country. (Or the plant could have suffered immediate, catastrophic failure, rather than immediate work-as-designed followed by a deterioration which gave us enough time to evacuate everyone.
Food distribution and trains got a hiccup in Tokyo -- they're now operating normally. (They're decidedly not normal in the towns destroyed in Miyagi, obviously. 500,000 people were displaced at least temporarily.)
People do not live in Apple stores. They stayed there one night while waiting for train service to be restored. If you're worried about displaced folks, look to the evacuation sites like e.g. schools in Miyagi, which is where folks who don't have a home to go back to are staying temporarily.
My brother lives in Auckland. We had a lot of people asking if he was OK after the quake in Christchurch. They are ~700 miles away on different islands, so he wasn't affected at all by the quake there, but we patiently explained this. It seems silly to get so haughty when people are expressing genuine concern for your well-being.
I'm going to agree here. I went to high school in Tokyo and I hadn't heard of Gifu until patio11 mentioned it. This is not really a problem due to the availability of these things called "maps", however.
Oh, how I wish this were the case. (The lady from the New York Times excepted, this has been a repeated issue when speaking with reporters. I have been falling back to my "If Japan were the United States..." explanation quite a lot.)
And the availability of this thing called 'the periodic table' means everyone knows and understands basic chemistry.
You can't really expect professional TV reporters to be any better informed than my 80year old grandmother.
Japan is a relatively small country, but the current atmosphere is considerably different in different locations. My experience near Tokyo has been quite interesting, but it is nothing compared to the disaster that has unfolded north of here. For those close to the big earthquake and tsunami, life has been completely changed if they are lucky enough that it was not ended.
Life is nowhere near back to normal where I live. It is surreal: with trains stopped and few cars on the road, the neighborhood has become very quiet, with the exception of public announcements through loudspeakers and "incoming quake" alerts through mobile phones. The rolling blackouts are likely a significant factor of the atmosphere. Some train lines in my area were stopped completely while others are only stopped when the power is out. The queues of people for trains have been very long, so it is difficult to commute. As a result, most stores in my area are completely closed. Some stores open when electricity is on, but many shelves are empty of goods that are in demand. Other stores have special security to allow small groups of shoppers (at a time) through a fence into the entranceway in order to purchase in-demand goods, while entrance to the actual store is blocked. Most apartments require power to pump water, so our water goes out as well when the power is off. With strong earthquakes continuing to roll in and blackouts scheduled for some time, I do not know how long it will take for things to return to normal here.
I do not have direct experience of what it is like where patio11 is at, but without the rolling blackouts, I am sure that the atmosphere is very different.
I have more that I would like to say, but this comment is long enough already, and my power is scheduled to turn off in five minutes.
Good luck to you.
A lot of people are staying home to help reduce load on the transportation and electrical infrastructure. Once the power plants start to come up (and people stop hoarding groceries), things should start to approach normality in the Tokyo area at least. Areas closer to the epicenter will need more rebuilding, however.
Basically, areas are assigned to one of five groups, and the electric company announces when each group will be without power. A given group may be without power for one or two ~3-hour periods between 6:20am and 10:00pm. The schedule is rotated for fairness, as power outages have significant impact on business. Note that south/west Japan is not part of this because they use 60hz AC while north/east Japan uses 50hz AC and the technology to convert on a large scale is not in place.
The power outage schedule has been a bit frustrating, but we cannot really complain when we think of the larger context and the extreme difficulties that people are going through in other parts of Japan. The electric company said that they would post the schedule for a given day by 18:00 of the day before, but I have yet to see that happen. The schedule often changes, and this afternoon was my second time to wait for a power outage that did not come. Japan uses loudspeakers to give out current information, but I live in between two loudspeakers and am unable to make much sense of either one, particularly with the echoes. When the power did not go out this afternoon, I checked the electric company website again and see that it was updated; my power is now scheduled to be out from 3:20pm to 7:00pm. A chart on a recent newspaper article looks like a sane schedule, and I hope they stick with it! http://mainichi.jp/select/weathernews/20110311/news/20110316...
I have not been to downtown Tokyo lately myself, but stories from friends indicate that the atmosphere is very different there as well, despite the fact that they always have power. I would love to go check it out myself, but I refrain from doing so in fear that it may difficult to return home if something happens while I am out. (I was returning from Tokyo on Friday afternoon and enjoyed a long hike home then, after being evacuated from a train.)
Thank you very much for your wishes. Personally, I was very close to the epicenter of a M7.0 earthquake years ago, and with that experience behind me, I remain quite calm and unworried. I quit my job last year and am bootstrapping a lean startup, so I am working at home and do not even need to worry about commuting. :)
Sometimes when people write from a contrarian or polemical viewpoint, overstatement occurs in the effort to create balance. I can certainly understand if Patrick's case was slightly overstated. The situation has evolved since his article was posted, but his overall point of the success of Japan's preparedness remains true and still under-reported.
Remember, this earthquake was one of the most powerful in history[1]. I think for many it's difficult to imagine just how much worse the devastation could have been from this compound disaster. I shudder to think of the physical destruction and social chaos that would ensue should such an earthquake and tsunami strike my beloved Bay Area; compared to Japan in this context our social fabric is a very loose weave.
The nuclear power plant is 160mi from Tokyo. You'd think that there's some difference in the conditions across that distance?
When the 2004 tsunami happened in South India, a town on the coast would be devastated, while a village 2km inland would be completely unaffected.
From this Google Maps link to driving between http://bit.ly/g4hfPm Tokyo & Okuma you can see that the road runs along the coast and might have been hit by the Tsunami, causing lack of supplies.
So most likely explanation
1. On the coast, esp. in the Miyagi province, a lot of things are screwed. It could have been much worse if there was not the Japanese emergency training/response.
2. 5km inside the coast-line, there will be earthquake damage, no tsunami damage, and life will be near normal by now.
[edited for grammar/formatting]
But no matter how excessively prepared for a 7.0 or a 7.5, it may not be possible to prepare for the utter destruction of a 9.0 followed immediately by a tsunami.
This all came up from a joke, we were watching the news broadcasts, and my friend said 'you know there is no looting in Japan' and I said 'that is because they don't have a word for it'. I ended up looking it up, and it seems true - can you confirm?
edit: link to definition - http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/leaf/je2/79721/m1u/%E7%95%A5%E5%...