earthquakes and rumors in southern Japan

from the The Asahi Shimbun​:

Residents of quake-hit isle in southern Japan begin evacuating

Residents of Akusekijima island in the remote and sparsely populated Tokara chain began evacuating voluntarily early July 4 following a strong earthquake the evening before. The southern Japan island chain has been hit by an earthquake swarm over the past two weeks.

earthquakes are common in Japan but this one is making experts worry:

and then you have this manga prediction making some who believe in prophecies worried;

.....

so should we here in the Philippines worry? if there was a superquake in that area, it would affect not just Japan but Taiwan and the Northern Philippines. 

....

ScienceTimes discusses

What is happening seems to be a slow slip earthquake...

The article notes that these small earthquakes are not only in the Tokara Isalnd area but in the in Southwest Japan, because the news notes that an earthquake swarm continues near Ryukyu Island

The earthquakes are making the government advise people to take precautions but there already has been an impact: Lost tourism.

... the Phil Inquirer discusses LINK

“The real disaster will come in July 2025,” followed by “the ocean floor between Japan and the Philippines will crack,” aren’t exactly very comforting words to see on a book said to have previously and accurately predicted natural disasters.

“The Future That I Saw” by Ryo Tatsuki, first published in 1999, gained notoriety after a baseless premonition, “massive disaster in March 2011,” ended up coinciding with the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, which resulted in the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.

the good news?

seers don't always get things right: One famous lady predicted the big one for Manila in 2024, only to have a minor tremor occur, which of course these minor tremors happen all the time...but of course if the prediction is vague enough or you make enough predictions, eventually one will happen.

well, anyway, right now the problem is a tropical storm bringing oodles of rain into Luzon, and we are worried the rain will wash away the rice seeds that we recently planted. 

Traditionally farmers plant seedlings for the main harvest, but the price of rice is so low that we literally can't afford to buy and plant (by hand) the seedlings. But even the farmers who planted seedlings could see their crop endangered:

Sigh.

summary of Trump the president

.......

Trump has made peace between India and Pakistan, DRC and Rwanda, and is busy trying to make peace in the Ukraine.

But what about Gaza?

Hamas says it is studying new proposals for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, after US President Donald Trump said Israel had agreed to a proposal for a 60-day truce.

🔴 Follow our LIVE coverage: https://t.co/GPGtl1DYX2 pic.twitter.com/by6A7nNIXa

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) July 3, 2025

...

,,,.......................

more from Instapundit:

and he points out the political reality of the BBBill, which is too expensive and too huge:

And an important point about DOGE is that while yes, it saved money, it’s biggest impact was to defund the government-funded left — which turns out to be most of the left, especially the activist left — thus preparing the battlespace for other issues down the line. Elon, et al., are right that the debt is an existential threat, but you can’t get at the debt and at spending without first taking apart the coalitions that created the problem. That’s what Trump is doing.

history lesson for the day

animation in film: a short history

so how did they do it way back when:

...

.....

the way they made Princess Mononoke:

...

and the evolution into CGI:

but before there was film and computers, there were flip books:

Hummel figurines: The history you might not know

Photo from Little Things website which has more information on the figurines history and how they became popular collector's items after World War II.

in the USA, many people have one of these figurines: And a lot of people have small collections of them.

but what they might not know is that the figurines were based on drawings by a German nun Maria Innocentia Hummel who was a teacher who drew and painted in her spare time; 

Wikipedia points out:

The sisters were impressed with her art and sent copies to ...a publishing house in Stuttgart which specialized in religious art, to which Hummel reluctantly agreed. The company decided to release copies of the works in postcard form, which were popular in the early 20th century.... 

 Soon afterward, Franz Goebel, the owner of a porcelain company, was looking for a new line of artwork, and happened to see some of these postcards in a shop in Munich.

One would think Hitler would have been pleased with her art, but he hated it:

Leading Nazis attacked the art, denouncing the depiction of German children as "hydrocephalic, clubfooted goblins". Although the Nazi authorities allowed Hummel to work, they banned the distribution of her art in Germany.

The Nazis closed all religious schools, and she live in poverty in the convent during the war, supporting the sisters left behind with money from her art work.

 Sister  Maria Inncensia Hummel died after the war of tuberculosis.

more here: https://youtube.com/shorts/ZOgjOM5Sl8U?si=jyP7ooLQAtR6uPg6

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

More background here.

Little Red dots

 BehindtheBlack reports that the Webb Telescope has discovered a new phenomenum:

Using the WebbSpaceTelescope astronomers have begun to compile a small catalog of what they call “little red dots” [LRDs], objects in the very early universe that are very small, too small to be galaxies and are thus a mystery.,,

The present most popular theory to explain the dots...is that the dots are newly formed black holes, their red light caused by material falling into the hole at millions of miles per hour.

That theory has of course problems. For example, it doesn’t explain why we don’t see these dots in more recent times. Nor does it explain why the dots are dim in X-rays, a radiation expected from accreting black holes.

..

the witnesses to colonialism; The Horror The Horror

The peace deal negotiated by the US/(Rubio) and Qatar has elicited a yawn by the western Mainstream media

 but the history of atrocities in that area from western colonialsm are also ignored , as are the Arab slave trade to Muslim countries that went on for centuries before the west decided to stop that slave trade, but then let a vacuum for western sociopaths to do the same thing). 

We know about these atrocities because western witnesses, often missionaries, documented what was going on. Bernardo DeLasCasas comes to mind but the Catholic Mambo press doumenting the civil rights abuses under the white regime when I worked in then Rhodesia comes to mind. (the publishing house is Mambo press: Mambo means Lord, not the dance of the west). Alas the horrors didn't stop with getting rid of the white Smith Government: the Gukurandi and Operation Murambatsvina come to mind. But next to the atrocities in Rwanda and central Africa, one has to admit that these are not the worst things happening in post colonial Africa.

Hence my interest in the new peace deal there.

a good summary of the sins of colonialsm can be heard in this podcast which has a series about King Leopold's fiefdom that decimated what is now the DRCongo. Listen and shudder. 

and what stopped it was the courage of a bureaucrat who saw it and became a whistle blower, inspiring others to check what was going on:

.....

the story has gotten some publicity thanks to a recent non fiction book. King Leopold's Ghost, but it is the novel by Joseph Conrad that might make it harder to bury history, because novels are forever:

\

the famous quote from that book: The Horror The horror could be applied to many other horrors of the twentieth century, as was done in the film Apocolypse now which was inspired by Conrad's book.

of course, atrocities were not only done by the west nor were atrocities against innocent civilians limited to colonialist powers: The horrors of the Gulag, the many civil wars and atrocities of Chinese imperial and nationalist and communist governments, come to mind....and don't forget the Islamicist massacres: Armenia anyone?

twentieth century horrors abound.

Among all the democide estimates appearing on this website, and in the table on the lower right, some have been revised upward. I have changed that for Mao's famine, 1958-1962, from zero to 38,000,000. And thus I have had to change the overall democide for the PRC (1928-1987) from 38,702,000 to 76,702,000. Details here. I have changed my estimate for colonial democide from 870,000 to an additional 50,000,000. Details here. Thus, the new world total: old total 1900-1999 = 174,000,000. New World total = 174,000,000 + 38,000,000 (new for China) + 50,000,000 (new for Colonies) = 262,000,000.  

 

 Plenty of horrors in history.

Link

Never again.

compare and contrast

 

"They did not spare a child or adult or anybody."

If the global refugee population were just 100 people, 33 would be children, each in need of protection https://t.co/9jCZLiajFR pic.twitter.com/kfsdOg0Hke

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) June 29, 2025

//////

full article here.

And this part surprised me:

Out of 100, 21 are from Afghanistan, 20 from Syria and 14 from Venezuela

But how many of the rich elites are helping out? Anyone? Anyone?

COmpare and contrast:

‘Eat the rich’: Venice protests shadow Bezos wedding https://t.co/NF1CcKxuAh

— Inquirer (@inquirerdotnet) June 29, 2025

...

CNN reports joyfully:

In the afternoon, the some 200 members of the celebrity guest list, including the Kardashian-Jenner family, Bill Gates, Karlie Kloss, Oprah Winfrey and Usher ... After much speculation (and not-so-subtle sightings of designer Domenico Dolce in Venice), it revealed her dress was a custom design by Dolce & Gabbana and was a year and a half in the making. The high-necked lace corseted gown had 180 silk chiffon-covered priest buttons dotting the front.

,MORE HERE:

The three-day affair is taking place until Saturday, with some 200 guests joining the billionaire Amazon founder and the former journalist in celebrating their marriage after a two-year engagement. The events are estimated to cost some 40-48 million euros ($46.5-55.6 million), according to Reuters.

tech headline of the week

Windows’ infamous ‘blue screen of death’ will soon turn black

old fashioned food hints

 take a ride into nostalgia:

   

 These tricks were used by my mom, so the video makes me nostagic.

Why aren't they used now? Well when moms work, they need fast foods to feed the hungry kids and don't have time to make things from scratch.

Hmm... since RFJ Jr is blaming fast foods and prepackaged foods for the obesity epidemic, maybe these tricks should be resurrected.

And maybe flex times so moms can come home earlier and cook a decent meal.

Rubio and Qatar deserve the Nobel Peace prize

Qatar emphasises peaceful resolution of conflicts after DRC-Rwanda deal https://t.co/SL2CZIdDPn

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) June 27, 2025

full story here at AlJazeerah

Qatari diplomat Mohammed bin Abdulaziz al-Khulaifi has welcomed the peace agreement between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), saying that it came after several rounds of talks, some of which were held in Doha. The deal, signed in Washington, DC, on Friday with backing from the United States and Qatar, will see Rwandan soldiers withdraw from the DRC and the two countries set up mechanisms to enhance trade and security cooperation..

 

The agreement has sparked hopes of ending the conflict in the DRC, where the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group has been advancing in the resource-rich east of the country....

 

The renewed violence had raised fears of igniting a full-blown conflict, akin to the wars that the DRC endured in the late 1990s, involving several African countries, which killed millions of people. .

----------------

-one that got alas little publicity in the western MSM.

 

and don't miss this little snippet about Qatar (that runs Al Jezeerah):

Qatar has played a key role in securing diplomatic deals in various conflicts across the world over the past years. Most recently, it helped mediate the ceasefire agreement that ended the 12-day war between Israel and Iran.

RICE: let's hear it for the drones

 we grow organic brown rice, which is healthier, but more expensive since a lot of the weeding by hand (instead of using herbicides) and other methods cost more.

But what about the poor who live in cities?

the dirty little secret is that you need cheap rice or other foods (often grown with chemical herbicides and fertilizers) to keep the price down. 

A lot of NGOs pushed organic ideas on Africa, and even influenced countries like Zimbabwe to refuse cheap American grain during their famine because it might contain GM or other modern changes, so the excuse was they were worried about the health of their people: The people of course were dying of infectious diseases because they were malnourished, but never mind. The green ideas in the NGOs and even those associated with churches (yes I am talking to you Pope Francis) triumphed over the need to feed the poor.

but the good news is that China doesn't worry about people getting diabetes or cancer at age 55: They remember starvation is always a danger and are willing to grow hefty crops using modern techniques.

And luckily for Africa, China is there buying farm land and encouraging farmers in these countries to learn how  to grow abundant food to prevent famine.

introducing hybrid rice and modern techniques to increase the yield: including the use of drones to apply pesticides.

Hmmm... we don't use drones yet on our fields, but the IRRI is introducing drone technology here in the Philippines.

Drones serve various agricultural purposes, including irrigation planning, crop health monitoring, damage assessment, soil health analysis, and fertilizer and pesticide application

Right now, this is done by walking through the fields and analyzing if additional minerals or fertilizer is needed. 

and walking through the fields monitoring the crop if problems occur during the rice growing season: weeds, blight, insect infestation, etc.

We still have small farmers with small rice crops, but as the farmers age and sell their land (because their kids prefer other easier jobs) then mechanized farming will start, so that is where the drones come in.

.\\

and of course drones can apply  pesticides, herbicides, fertilizer, etc. to fields at a lower price than a farmer doing it by hand.

Increased efficiency and speed, reducing manual labor Precise application, leading to reduced waste and damage to crops Accessibility to difficult or remote terrain Ability to cover larger areas in a shorter period of time Real-time monitoring and data collection for better decision making.

 

Rice: The unknown history of rice

 We grow organic brown rice.

There are many versions of rice that we grow, but in checking the history of rice I found out that Asian Rice is not the only form of rice: 

Africans developed/domesticated another rice: Oryza glaberrima

Native to sub-Saharan Africa, O. glaberrima is thought to have been domesticated from the wild ancestor Oryza barthii (formerly known as Oryza brevilugata) by peoples living in the floodplains at the bend of the Niger River some 2,000–3,000 years ago

   

This video discusses:

the original rice that made South Carolina rich was the African variety, but soon replaced by the Asian variety. And local farmers made sure they got their slaves from rice growing areas of West Africa who knew how to cultivate and irrigate the fields.

BBC article here.about the connection of the slave trade, rice cultivation, and how the African type of rice was the original rice grown in this area.

One thing not mentioned about why the African farmers transitioned to grow Asian rice: Easier to harvest (the seeds stay on the stem and don't shatter) and a better yield.

When I worked in Liberia, rice was one of the staple foods. and when the government increased the price of rice, there was a revolution, that eventually led to years of civil war and unrest. 

So yes, if you can find it, buy some African rice.

but remember: If you want to save this heritage plant, you need an affluent middle class who is able to afford it.

-----------------------------------------