The Language Barrier

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #12, 2008)

Living in a country where you don’t speak the language can make life interesting. Sure, I studied Japanese at university, but that doesn’t mean I can actually speak Japanese properly. I can sit down and read or write an essay in Japanese, but with the help of two very important things: an extensive online dictionary and lots of time. When I’m having a conversation with a Japanese person I don’t have those luxuries and am forced to fumble my way through on my own. (It doesn’t help that I finished studying Japanese two years ago – language ability generally disappears if you don’t use it. This is why many rugby players eventually forget how to speak English.)

My two main problems are that normal people speak fast and don’t always use full, grammatically correct sentences. This is downright rude, if you ask me. Then there are my high-school students, who speak a whole new type of Japanese, full of slang and dropped words. (Not that I’d understand what they were talking about anyway, what with all their ‘hip-hop music’ and ‘Nintendo 64s’). On top of all this, people in the Osaka region speak a different dialect to the standard Japanese taught at university. And then there are the extreme cases, such as the vice-principal of my school, who even the other teachers can’t understand. The man speaks in an unintelligible hoarse whisper – kind of like the Godfather, only more Japanese and far more interested in unnecessary paperwork. 

For work, language isn’t a problem, as I’m not expected to use Japanese at all in the classroom. Casual conversations with Japanese people are fine, too. If there’s something I don’t understand, then we can just shrug it off and continue talking. It’s when I’m dealing with important things, such as buying a phone, that it can get a little hairy. If I don’t get what they’re talking about, I can’t just laugh it off and move on. Plus there is a lot of industry-specific vocabulary, like ‘connection fee’ and ‘monthly installments’,  that I never learned at university. Often the conversation will be going swimmingly and then in an instant the whole thing gets derailed. “So if you pay for your phone now, then (something), but if you (something) then you’ll (something) 24 months (something).” “Uh… What were the options again?” If I don’t get it after a few tries, I’ll sometimes just nod blankly to end the conversational stalemate. (Lets just hope that I didn’t at some point agree to have my number listed in the neo-Nazi member directory.) Talking on the phone is the worst: without the aid of body language and hand gestures, I often have no clue what is going on. “You want to deliver what? And when is this? Do I want an extra pair of who?”

I am getting there, though. The trick is, of course, to just spend a lot of time talking with Japanese people and listening to them talk to each other. Give me a few more months and I’ll be speaking Japanese like a pro. Then who’ll be the one giving out 24-month phone contracts, hmmm? Well, probably not me since I don’t work in that line of business. But still.

Taste Test

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #11, 2008)

One great thing about living in Japan is that there is so much new food to try. For a start, there are the traditional Japanese dishes that haven’t quite taken off overseas, such as takoyaki (octopus balls) and okonomiyaki (which are kind of like a thick, savoury pancake). Then there are the numerous Japan-only snacks that can be found in most 24-hour convenience stores  (which, incidentally, are placed on about every second street corner). But even Western food that has infiltrated Japan still has a certain Japanese spin on it. For example, bread can usually be found in only one style (white) and one thickness (insane). Seriously, we’re talking about five slices of bread to a loaf. Today I decided to go down to my local supermarket and look for some intriguing products that are unique to Japan. Here’s what I found:

Uguisu bird balls: Despite the off-putting name, a quick scan of the ingredients told me that these balls contained no actual bird. I guess it’s just a cute name. The snacks turned to be rice balls covered in caramel. They tasted not at all unlike caramel popcorn, and were actually quite nice. This pleasant surprise gave me enough confidence to try my next purchase…

Tokyo karinto (unknown kanji): The picture on the outside of the packet led me to believe that I had just bought a bag of week-old turds. (As I was opening the packaging, I made a mental note to look up the number of the local hospital for future reference.) Once I had one of these ‘snacks’ in my hand, I still wasn’t convinced that I wasn’t about to bite into a stale piece of old shit. Thankfully, this was not the case. These turds were in fact some kind of smoky, sickly-sweet caramel rice log, with a hint of fish. Better than eating crap, but only just.

These are the turds of Satan himself

Nameraka double jam bread: Thankfully, this delivered exactly what it promised: a bread roll with a shitload of jam in it. “The deliciousness is doubled!” the packaging proclaimed in Japanese. Personally, it was little jammy for my tastes – but thank god they have Single Jam Bread for pussies like myself.

Fujiya LOOK A La Mode fruit chocolates: These chocolates come filled with either pineapple, strawberry, caramel or banana cream. The strawberry and caramel chocolates were palatable, but the other two were way too sweet and tasted nothing like the fruit they were meant to represent. But hey, I just chose this one for the name. (It was a tough call between these and Oh! Chips).

Morimori Cooking Rose and Mary apple pie: This product tasted pretty much as you’d expect (except that it was an apple Danish, not an apple pie – but I could see that through the transparent window anyway). What made this one interesting was the packaging: bright pink, with pictures of two extremely camp-looking cartoon men on it (named Rose and Mary, one can only assume). One is saying “Let my SWEET have it!”, while the other adds “Now eat our LOVE.” It’s not often something is both creepy and delicious, but Japan delivers yet again.

Teaching English

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #10, 2008)

Before I began teaching I had heard that my school was a little rough, that the students were difficult to keep in line. This didn’t worry me one bit – I’d just get in there and use my inspirational tactics to turn classes full of low-achievers into model students with perfect English. Sorted. Sadly, it turns out that a few fun worksheets and an amusing last name aren’t quite enough to turn these kids around. To be fair, Japanese high school students are notoriously overworked, and I can understand that it’s hard to get excited about English when you’re struggling to just stay awake. But is it too much to ask that my students at least pretend that they care? Or pretend to listen to me? I could be up there playing the trombone and they still wouldn’t pay any attention to me.

I’ve had to introduce myself to every class I teach, which means I’ve said the same self-introduction about twenty times now. I begin by explaining the meaning of my last name, which is usually enough to rouse the students from their sleep-deprived haze. “Huh? Deinjaafiirudo?!”, I hear them ask. I usually follow by asking the students if they know anything about New Zealand. A lot of them yell “koala!”, although a few have surprised me by dropping “kakapo” in there. The best answer I ever got to that question, though, was a loud “Deinjaafiirudo!”. True, I guess. During that same class, I asked if anyone knew the name of the New Zealand rugby team. There was a short pause, followed by another “Deinjaafiirudo!” I know someone who’s getting an A.

This term I’m teaching the senior students about advertising, so in my first week I showed them a few classic New Zealand commercials to start things off. The next week, I began the class by recapping the previous lesson. “Does anyone remember what ‘L&P’ stands for?”, I asked. The kids remembered ‘lemon’ easily enough, but ‘Paeroa’ was understandably harder to recall. After a long silence, one girl yelled out, with incredible enthusiasm, “pants!”. Trying not to laugh, I told her that she wasn’t quite right. “Pants sandwich!’ she yelled again, undeterred. I’m not entirely sure which ad she was watching, but I’ve got to get me some of these pants sandwiches.

Now, not all of my students are loud and uninterested in class work. There are some who sit quietly in class and complete all the activities with near-perfect English. Sadly, I couldn’t tell you who any of those students are – it’s the noisy, disruptive students who I remember. They’re the ones who I recognize in the hallway (and will high-five, if prompted). They’re the ones who often make me laugh out loud at their bizarre antics in class (which is probably bad form for a teacher). Hopefully as time goes on I can get to know the kids who actually care about the lessons, since they deserve some attention as well. Still, it’s the students who yell out things like “please can I have my desk move now!” in the middle of class that make my job interesting. And I can’t complain about that.

A Few Surprises

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #9, 2008)

Before I came to Japan, I thought I had the country pretty much sussed out. Everything I needed to know about Japanese society I had already learned at school. You know, the bowing, the nodding, the politeness – I had that shit on lockdown. Even the more unusual aspects of Japanese life were no mystery to me. You think I was going to be fazed by the control panel on the toilet in my apartment? Not a chance. Being the down-to-earth Kiwi bloke I am, I unplugged that joker right away and was left with your standard, no-nonsense toilet. However, there are still a few things about Japan that have surprised me, small things that people didn’t think to mention (and somehow escaped my notice on my first trip here).

For a start, almost all the dogs I’ve seen in Japan so far have been tiny. Not being a dog expert, it seems to me that everyone owns some kind of variation on the Chihuahua. Even quite tough-looking dudes will walk around with these tiny, fluffy dogs. I suppose it makes sense, since most people in the city live in small apartments where space is at a premium. But does that explain why some people have to dress their dogs in tiny clothes? Or why they carry their dog around as if it were a baby? At least they stop short of carrying around toilet paper for their dog. Well, apart from that one guy I saw. That… that wasn’t right. On the other end of the scale, the insects here are huge. The cicadas are at least five times as big as the ones in New Zealand. I swear a few of them could team up and devour a small dog if they wanted to.

I also didn’t realise just how many people cycle in Japan. It’s nice to see that, in such a technologically advanced country, most people still jump on their bike if they need to get somewhere. Every street in Fuse is teeming with people on bikes: on the road, on the footpath, cycling towards oncoming traffic… People will steam right across an intersection without so much as pausing to see what’s coming, even if they have children on the back of their bike. Did I mention that no one wears a helmet? It’s all a little alarming, although thankfully I haven’t seen anyone get hurt yet. Even worse than the possibility of seeing a terrible accident, though, is the fact that no one ever oils the brakes on their bikes. You can’t walk down the street without someone braking right beside you and producing a screech so loud and high-pitched that you swear the world is coming to an abrupt end. I know there’s a big noise music scene in Japan, but if this is some kind of weird social avant-garde noise experiment then things have gone just a little too far.

So, there have been a few small surprises since moving over here, though thankfully nothing has really shocked me so far - although the pornographic junk mail did come close. Bizarre.

Big Night Out

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #7, 2008)

In Osaka the trains stop running at about midnight, so if you want a night out then you have to make the call: do I go home for a relatively early sleep, or do I stay out until the first train at 5am? There’s no middle ground (unless you want to drop an extortionate amount of money on a taxi home). One Friday, myself and some of my fellow teachers decided to stay out all night in Osaka to see what would happen.

The night started off fairly quietly with a few drinks at a local bar. The Australian in our group, trying to pick up Japanese girls as usual, found competition in a pair of older, balding Americans. “These guys don’t even speak Japanese!” he hissed to me at one point, after one of them barged in on a conversation he was having with a girl. It turned out that these guys, who for some reason latched on to our group after we left the bar, were in Japan for one night and were hitting the town with one purpose in mind: to root Japanese girls. I watched with morbid curiosity as they sleazed on to every girl we encountered, even if they were with a boyfriend. “Oh, you two are sisters?” one of them said to a pair of girls we met on the train. “Perfect, haha.” The girls politely excused themselves from the train at the next stop. “Get away while you still can!” I yelled after them. At one point the sleazier of the two Americans, with a rather smug air, announced that “the fucking Australian guy was pissed that we don’t speak Japanese! Well, I’ve had dozens of Japanese girlfriends, and they didn’t speak any English either!”  Check. Mate.

We managed to shake these sleazemeisters and headed to a Japanese live hip-hop venue, where we had to drop over three grand just to get in (or about forty New Zealand dollars – but it sounds much more impressive in Yen). It was hard to appreciate what the MCs were doing, since I had no idea what they were rapping about (the mean streets of Fuse, perhaps?), so it was not really worth the massive cover charge. However, I’ll never forget seeing a large Japanese gangsta on stage, yelling out phrases like ‘resupekuto!’ and ‘biggu-apusu’!

With the hip-hop proving unsatisfying and several hours until the first train, there was only one thing for it: karaoke. I was excited to finally be doing karaoke in its home country, but the private room we rented was pretty much the same as you’d find in Vivace or any other karaoke bar in New Zealand. Still, that didn’t stop us from doing throat-shredding renditions of all the karaoke classics, with a surprising amount of soul given the late hour. When our time ran out we stumbled wearily outside, where it was already light, and made our way to our respective trains. At 6am I lurched my way into bed, vowing not to do that again for a while. (Update: I went and did it again the next weekend. Shit.)

The First Week

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #7, 2008)

After two days at the Tokyo orientation, I travelled with the other Osaka-based teachers by bullet train to Osaka itself. One of the members of the group was an Australian who took great delight in loudly saying coarse things about girls who walked by, knowing that they (probably) couldn’t understand what he was saying. He also described – at length – to the other males in the group how easy it was for Western guys to pick up Japanese girls. Any queries about how fulfilling that would be, knowing that many of these girls would only be interested in us because we were white, were laughingly dismissed.

Of course, it’s hard to feel like some kind of Western sex god when you’re constantly dripping with sweat and your face looks like it’s about to explode. Every day the temperature has been well into the thirties and extremely humid – apparently Osaka is the hottest part of Japan at the moment. If you’re shivering down there in Dunedin and thinking ‘hey, that sounds kind of nice’, then believe me: it isn’t. I’d take the icy embrace of the North East Valley over this any day. Seriously, I can barely even think in this weather: my brain is slowly turning to mush, which makes writing a coherent column a little tricky. I’ve accepted that things will be a little nasty for a while, although for some reason I was still offended when I woke up on Sunday morning and found it was just as hot as Saturday – I guess subconsciously I felt entitled to a day off from the exhausting heat.

Luckily my apartment has an air conditioning unit, which makes things bearable. That’s about all it has, though – apart from that, the place was completely bare when I arrived. You never truly appreciate curtains until they’re gone, especially when you have a light that flashes outside your window all night and the sun comes up at five in the motherfucking morning. Thankfully another Kiwi in the area is about to leave Fuse, so I’m looking to buy pretty much every piece of furniture he has.

As I look out my apartment window, it’s hard to believe that this place will actually be my home for the next year or so. There’s so much bizarre English everywhere that I don’t know where to start. There’s so much bizarre everything that I don’t know where to start. There’s the PA system on the main street which plays creepy, carnival-style music. There’s the department store which has a jingle so infuriatingly catchy that it has even infiltrated my dreams. Last night I ate at a restaurant that was run by the Yakuza. The Yakuza! In fact, there is so much to take in that my brain has just kind of switched off and accepted it, rather than trying to frantically process all this new information. Once I get settled in and begin to understand things a little better, I hope to give you some poignant insight on life as a foreigner in Japan. That, and some hilarious English.

In-Flight Ramble

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #6, 2008)

Well, here we are. The last-minute preparations have been preparated, the heartfelt goodbyes have been felt in my heart, and I am now off. Like chatter-rings and Paul Holmes*, Dunedin is now a mere memory. I’m even having trouble remembering which city Dunedin was now – it’s the flat one with all the racism, right? Of course, all great journeys must start with a single step, and the first leg of my journey was the humble flight from Dunedin to Christchurch. It was a surreal feeling to finally be on my way, and this was only intensified when the stewardess announced that our captain for the evening would be David Bowie. At least, I think she did – looking around the plane, no one else seemed to even bat an eyelid at this outrageous claim. Was I so exhausted from preparing to leave that I was having aural hallucinations? Perhaps, but there was something undeniably Bowiesque about the way that plane was flown.

Now I’m hurtling towards Tokyo, which is perhaps one of the most intense places I have ever visited. Walking the streets is an audiovisual overload, with flashing neon signs, huge numbers of people and an insane amount of stores squeezed into every block. Sadly, I don’t think I will get much of a chance to explore Tokyo this time, as I’ll be spending most of my time in a hotel for an orientation to prepare me for living and teaching in Japan. Thankfully, I hear the hotel is rather swanky and fully air-conditioned, which will save me the embarrassment of having my brain melt under the intense heat and trickle out my ears. (Yeah, it happens.) The orientation consists of a series of speeches as well as seminars on how to cope with Japanese society, with topics including (but not limited to): how to operate vending machines effectively, how to choose the right power-ballad at karaoke and how to eat live octopus without the tentacles attaching themselves to your tongue.

In fact, the schedule for the next few days is so jam-packed that I fear I won’t get a chance to write my column from Tokyo itself. Thus you get this instead, a sleep-deprived ramble written between movies on the plane from Auckland to Tokyo. (Incidentally, I would highly recommend watching Be Kind, Rewind.) There are quite a lot of Japanese people on board the plane and the announcements are made in both Japanese and English, so things are already starting to feel a little, y’know, Japanesey. In the last hour Air New Zealand almost scored another strike against themselves by forgetting my vegetarian meal, but I suspect that someone else may have actually been at fault there. So we’re cool, Air NZ, we’re cool. I do fear using the plane’s toilet though, purely because the sound it makes when I flush is so intense that I fear it will suck my soul down with it. Hmm, perhaps I should get some rest. Next week, I promise this column will have actual stories from Japan. Honest.     

* Obviously, since this column was written in 2008, this was referring to the death of his career, not his actual death. That would've been pretty rough.

Fuse City

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #5, 2008)

Finally, after weeks of padding – sorry, build-up – the time to leave for Japan is almost here. In fact, when this edition of Critic comes out I’ll already be in Tokyo for my teaching orientation, sweltering in the intense heat and drowning in the humidity. Apparently temperatures have been getting into the high thirties recently, which is hard to imagine as I sit here shivering away at my keyboard. “Never mind, I’ll buy some ultra-light clothing to help me deal with the intense heat!” I thought to myself, before remembering that I was living in Dunedin. In July. I guess I’ll just have to roll with the whole ‘being sweaty and disgusting’ thing until I can buy some light t-shirts over there. Preferably those ones that say “Grandpa Fuckin Spaceshuttle” or “Spread Beaver: showing the vaginal area.” (Incidentally, I have an album by Spread Beaver and it’s not too bad.)

After a few days in Tokyo I’ll be moving on to my swingin’ bachelor pad in Osaka. Well, technically I’ll be in Higashiosaka (Eastern Osaka), which is a city in its own right and is in turn made up of three smaller cities. I will be living and teaching in Fuse city, a place I know very little about. When I asked my supervisor what the view from my apartment balcony was like, he hesitated before telling me that Fuse was a dirty city, but luckily I would be facing Westward towards Osaka itself. Another source told me that Fuse was quite a dodgy place. When I asked if he meant seedy or dangerous, he laughingly replied ‘both’. Now, as far as I know Japan is a relatively safe country, so I don’t think I need to worry about getting knifed on the street. In fact, being a middle-class white male, I love the thought of living in a gritty, urban area to gain a bit of street cred. I’m picturing a Dangerous Minds style scenario, where I inspire classrooms full of underprivileged teenagers to become much more than they ever hoped to be. Except I won’t show as much thigh as Michelle Pfeiffer. Or maybe I will.

But, ridiculous conjecturing aside, Fuse is still a mystery to me. The only information I can find about it on the internet is in Japanese, and my Japanese is rusty enough that I’m having trouble understanding it. I found the Japanese Wikipedia entry on Fuse, threw the first paragraph into an online translator and was given this: “As for offering ([hu] [se]), in language with you call, administer the property to others with the heart of mercy. In offering “the commodity” “law” “nothing” there are three kinds (large degree of Satoshi theory).You call the person who offers the shelf patty, client ([se] palpus), Dannotsu (being, it is, is it is to obtain), vain (being, it is with) and so on you are translated.” So, I’m still none the wiser. Still, I look forward to being offered that shelf patty. My mouth’s watering already.

Taking Things

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #4, 2008)

When moving overseas, you start to ask yourself the big questions. Questions that make you break out in a cold sweat as you lay awake at night, unable to sleep. Can I survive without The Office Complete box-set for an entire year? Will I miss my book of Monty Python transcripts? I finally have to decide which of my belongings are essential and which are not. And let’s face it, most of what I own is crap. When I went flatting I took the bare minimum of what I needed to get by, but over the years I somehow accumulated a lot of unnecessary things. Now that I’ve returned home temporarily, I am confronted with even more boxes full of useless stuff that I left behind. Why did I think it was a good idea to buy a robotic gorilla that danced the Macarena last time I was in Japan? Why?

Luckily, these days you can store a surprising amount of your life on your laptop. For example, I no longer have to face the agonising choice of which CDs to take ("will I listen to The Essential Spandau Ballet in Japan...?") because they’re all right there on my hard drive. So, that greatly cuts down on the number of things I need to take. Good thing, too, as my bass is going to take up half of my 20kg baggage limit. Now, this is not a complaint: it’s my choice to take an instrument to Japan and I shouldn’t be entitled to any more weight than my fellow passengers. However, what does irk me is that if my bass was instead a bicycle or another piece of sporting equipment, I would get an extra 10kg baggage allowance free of charge. Why are sportspeople favoured in this way? Why is it that a golfer can check in their bag of golf clubs for free, while your average fantasy speed-metaller pays $35 for each kilogram he goes over the weight limit? (Also, if I reserved my bass for purely competitive use, such as band competitions or porno groove-offs, could it then be counted as sporting equipment?) Strike one, Air New Zealand. Show a Wayans Brothers movie during the flight and things are going to get ugly.

Of course, my space limitations will continue once I arrive in Osaka. Yesterday I was given four apartments to choose from and they were all pretty damn cosy, the biggest having a floor area of 27m². They were all roughly the same design: a long, narrow apartment consisting of an entranceway/kitchen, a bathroom and a living room/dining room/bedroom. In the end I just went with the apartment that appeared to have the best view, i.e. one that wasn’t dominated by the neighbouring building. Of course, one person doesn’t need a lot of space anyway. In fact, I think having a small apartment will be a good exercise in minimalism: living in a single room with the bare essentials may help me attain a liberated, zen-like state of existence. Let’s just hope I can resist buying that orangutan that dances the electric boogaloo.

Ninja Warrior

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #3, 2008)

In the first column I mentioned my ambition to compete in the Japanese television show Ninja Warrior (or Sasuke, as it is known is Japan). Was I joking? Even I’m not entirely sure. But hey, if I can fit it around my teaching schedule then why not? I could even turn it into a field trip for my students. The sight of me slamming face-first into a wall could be a vivid metaphor for the impact of Western culture on Japanese society.

Upon discovering Ninja Warrior, I was impressed to see a Japanese game show on New Zealand television. Better yet, one that hadn’t been over-dubbed by terrible American voice-actors (yes, MXC, don’t think I can’t see you hiding over there). Ninja Warrior is essentially a giant obstacle course that is broken into four stages, each one significantly harder than the last. This in itself makes for fairly entertaining viewing. However, after watching several competitions, I began to see Ninja Warrior for what it truly is. It is not merely a simple tale of man vs. obstacle, but in fact an epic saga worthy of the ancient Greeks (or at least an airport bookstore). You see, the Ninja Warrior course is near-impossible to complete. Furthermore, if no one completes it then there is simply no winner and everyone goes home empty-handed. It is seeing the same competitors return again and again, desperate to finally achieve victory, that makes the show so compelling. (After twenty competitions, only two contestants have actually completed the course.)

It is hard not to form an affinity with these regular competitors. There is the tragic figure of Kazuhiko Akiyama, who completed the course in the early days of Ninja Warrior but now struggles, with increasing desperation, to make it past the first stage. More laidback is Shingo Yamamoto, a gas station attendant who casually strolls through the course like it ain’t no thang. However, beneath that relaxed exterior lies the fiery urge to win: he is the only person to have appeared in all twenty competitions. However, the most dedicated competitor must surely be Bumpei Shiratori, who has built a replica of the Ninja Warrior course in his back garden. This is surely a sign of true dedication to his quest, as well as one of slight insanity.

I imagine these Ninja Warrior all-stars hang out outside of the competition. They get together, exchange training tips, talk about the wife and kids. On weekends they go over to Bumpei’s place, sink a few beers in his hot-tub and then drunkenly attempt his replica course out the back. Who knows, maybe I’ll make it to the fourth stage of the competition and earn myself a place in this exclusive inner circle of Ninja Warrior. Or maybe I’ll just fall head-first into the water in the first five seconds and earn myself a place on the blooper reel. I could live with that. 

Last Time in Japan

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #2, 2008)

Last time I was in Japan was 2002, on a two-week school trip in seventh form. The trip started on a strange note just after we arrived at Tokyo's Narita airport. When I went into the airport bathroom, I noticed that airport security had cordoned off one the cubicles. Peering inside, I saw an empty pair of shoes on the ground, facing the toilet, as if some guy had just vaporized whilst taking a leak. My friend tried filming the bizarre scene, but he was told by security staff to turn the camera off and we were ushered out of the bathroom. Whoa. The only other thing that came close to being that surreal was seeing two Japanese punks put on horse masks and use them to scare schoolchildren.

For the first week we stayed in a hotel in Tokyo. Naturally, the fourth-formers were given the worst rooms in the entire hotel: the basement suite. Instead of windows, these rooms had grates that looked up at people walking on the footpath above. Now I think about it, I’m sure someone could have run a lucrative internet business from down there. (What? I’m just saying.) The seventh-formers’ room, on the other hand, had the advantage of being several floors above the ground. The one drawback was that one of the windows couldn’t be opened as the neighbouring building was in the way. That was definitely a memorable view.

For the second week we were billeted with host families in the town of Kyotanabe. My friend and I stayed with the Kobayashi family, who were brilliant fun and broke almost every stereotype about Japanese people (many of which are untrue, anyway – but that’s another column). One time we went to a restaurant where everything was half-price, so instead of enjoying a cheap meal my host father simply ordered two of every dish. (In hindsight, perhaps I misunderstood and the restaurant was actually offering some kind of two-for-one deal. Either way, we ended up with twice as much food as we could actually eat.)

Kyotanabe is actually very close to Osaka, so I’ll be able to visit the Kobayashis with ease. I imagine it will be quite strange meeting them again: last time they saw me I was an awkward teenager with greasy hair and bad skin. This time… well, I’ll be a bit taller, I guess. According to my host father, the Kobayashi daughters have now left home and are enjoying the ‘shingaru raifu’ (single life) in Kyoto and Tokyo. Is he trying to hint at something? I guess we’ll find out.

Finally, it was on this trip that I discovered what is perhaps the greatest pastime of all: finding Japanese versions of famous people. The two best ones I spotted were a Japanese Ray Liotta and a Japanese Lori Loughlin (better known as Rebecca from Full House). This time, I’m hoping for some A-listers. And maybe some pictures too, if I can be discreet enough. I’ll keep you posted.

Big Danger in Little Osaka: Introduction

(Big Danger in Little Osaka #1, 2008)

For the next year I will be living in Osaka, Japan, where I will be teaching English at a local high school. Each week I will chronicle what it is like to live and work in a country that is, at times, very different to our own. Laugh along as I embarrass myself in front of my superiors! Weep as I inspire classrooms full of impressionable young children to pursue their life-long dream of speaking English! Read in awe as I attempt to compete in the epic contest of strength and agility that is Ninja Warrior (allowing for time constraints and how chilly it is on the day)!

Having majored in Japanese at Otago, I feel I have a deeper and more nuanced understanding of Japan then your average man on the street. You won’t be reading crap like “hey, wow, Japanese people are CRAZY!”, or “whoa, Japanese comics are so WEIRD!!!”  in this column. In my hands, those same observations will become “it appears that the rapid industrialisation of Japan has resulted in an unnaturally fast and, some might say, incomplete modernisation of Japanese society” and “Japanese post-war manga represent a community-oriented masculinity that contrasts with the Emperor-worship and militaristic obedience enforced during the period of Japanese imperialism.”

Hey wait, come back! It’ll be fun, honest. There’ll be heaps of stuff about weird vending machines and bizarre Japanese television shows, I promise. And hey, I hear there are bars in Japan where you can drink all you want for a flat rate – that’ll be good times, right?

But sadly, this will all have to wait until I actually get to Japan. For some reason, the Japanese government was unwilling to start the school year five weeks earlier to coincide with the Critic schedule. Seriously uncool, Japan. Because of their lack of cooperation, I will have to pad out the next five columns with miscellaneous facts about Japan, anecdotes about my previous visit and, if I get desperate, long-winded rants about gun-control in the US. So please, bear with me.

Finally, I should clarify that just because I studied Japanese doesn’t mean I’m one of those fanboys who has an unhealthy obsession with Japan. I’ve never really been into anime, I’m not going to Japan with the sole intention of finding a Japanese wife and I don’t casually drop Japanese words into the middle of sentences like it ain’t no thang – because believe me, it is a thang. However, I do think that Japan is a fascinating place and have met many fantastic Japanese people over the years (many of whom I look forward to seeing again). Although integrating into Japanese society may have its difficulties, I’m sure that Japan will be a subarashii place to live. Uh, I mean a great place to live. Remember: not a fanboy.

Final Questions

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #14. 2008)

Well, here we are at the final installment of Dangerfield, BSc. To those who wrote in, I hope you have found my answers satisfactory and informative. If your question did not appear in one of my columns, never fear: not every query sent in required an entire column to answer. Several needed only a few lines of explanation, and I have saved some of these answers for this final column.

Firstly, I received a number of questions about health and the human body. Sharon Parker: most doctors recommend that one checks oneself for at least five minutes a day to avoid wrecking oneself. Thomas Stone: it’s called a ‘vagina’. Hugh James: it’s not unusual for corpses to smell unpleasant, and I would suggest that you return your grandmother’s to where it belongs before things get any worse. Lisa Thompson: don’t pick at it, you’ll only make it worse.

There were also many questions about the animal kingdom. Shaun King: birds do not actually fly: it is just an illusion. They merely hover in the air while the earth rotates beneath them. Hannah Montgomery: it is a myth that one million monkeys working at a million typewriters will produce the works of Shakespeare. However, it is true that one monkey sitting at a computer can (and did) produce The Da Vinci Code. Michael Anderson: no, so far no attempt has been made to splice Superman’s DNA with that of a shark. And no, I don’t want to read your fan-fiction about it. 

Several of your questions concerned physics and mathematics. Lisa Thompson: trigonometry was never discovered. It is in fact a myth, originally created by parents to scare children into eating their vegetables. Matthew Stern: no, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle doesn’t explain why it takes you ten fucking minutes to decide what you’ll buy for lunch. For god’s sake, just step aside and let someone else order. Peter Gray: the densest material known to man is – you guessed it – you. Or yo’ momma. Whatever works.

And finally, a few miscellaneous queries. Nigel Tufnel: yes, D minor truly is the saddest of all keys. Rowan Stevenson: no, the Doppler effect has nothing to do with the guitar solo in Sultans of Swing. You’re thinking of the ‘Knopfler effect’. Sarah Jefferson: yes, a team of scientists has indeed discovered which is the most vile nation on earth, but it will be several months before they publicly reveal their findings. I’m sure you can guess which one it is though. Yup, that’s the one. Bunch of dirty…

I hope my column has been enlightening and informative for you all. With each edition I have persevered to adhere to the Scientician’s Code by bringing you accurate answers, informed by recent and cutting-edge scientific studies where possible. To everyone who has read this column, I congratulate you in your quest for scientific knowledge. Perhaps, one day, you too will have what it takes to become a Registered Scientician.

A Life of Despair

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #13. 2008)


I saw an advertisement on the internet for a ‘pheromone spray’ that allegedly increases one’s chances with women. Is there any scientific basis for this kind of thing? (Dave Walters, Opoho)

Well, while some companies claim that their sprays contain pheromones that arouse the opposite sex, as of yet no scientific study has been able to back up these claims. But in your case, Dave, I’m afraid that your question is irrelevant. No amount of spray, ointment or cologne can change the fact that the chance of you, Dave Walters, ever finding a woman is effectively zero. This crushing fact is the culmination of six years’ hard work for two Dunedin-based statisticians, Dr. George Anderson and Dr. Amy Fitzsimons. The pair has recently published a paper entitled A Life of Despair: A Multivariate Analysis of Dave Walters, in which they use a variety of statistical methods to show that the probability of you ever finding true love is less than 0.0001 – even less than the chance of seeing a balanced report on Fox News.

In the initial stages of their research, the pair discovered that every past encounter you have had with a female has been hilariously awkward and incompetent. Extrapolating from this data, they began to suspect that a meaningful relationship between you and a woman could never happen. This suspicion was confirmed with the help of linear regression. “If we plot the number of girlfriends (N) Dave has ever had at certain points in time (t) and then calculate the line of best fit, we obtain the equation N = 0” says Dr. Anderson. “In other words, the number of girlfriends Dave has had will stay at zero as t tends towards infinity, by which time Dave will have long since died, miserable and alone.” Of course, there were a number of other factors that led the pair to their conclusion. These included your awkward mannerisms, irritating laugh and inability to speak without spraying crumbs everywhere.

Dr. Fitzsimons points out that with such tests there is always the danger of drawing false conclusions. “It was possible that, despite our rigorous calculations, Dave could still one day find true love. Dave’s inability to get a woman could have been due to a number of random factors beyond his control, rather than his numerous shortcomings as a human being” she says. However, a quick look at the state of your toenails soon confirmed that their conclusion was indeed correct.

The pair has also produced several other meaningful statistics about your life. For example, the probability that you will ever find a fulfilling job is less than 0.05, while the probability that your friends laugh at you behind your back is 0.99 (i.e. near-certain). So Dave, regardless of how effective they might be to most people, there is not a single spray in the world that can save you from a pathetic life of misery. Thanks for writing in!

Soft Drinks and Nutrishun

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #12. 2008)


Are these so-called ‘diet’ soft drinks really any better for you than the regular kind? (Margaret King, Caversham)

Well Margaret, the question of whether or not the artificial sweeteners contained in ‘diet’ soft drinks are harmful has been debated for years. While beverage companies contest that they are harmless, several studies have shown otherwise. However, a recent study undertaken by two young scientists has shed new light on this debate. These up-and-coming academics, David Cooper and Chris Matthews, revealed their ground-breaking findings last Tuesday at their school’s Year 11 Science Fair, in a presentation entitled “Are Soft Drinks Bad For Your Nutrishun?” (sic).

Their study was unconventional for a number of reasons. Instead of using the standard technique of chromatography to determine sugar levels, Cooper and Matthews opted for a more practical approach. The pair purchased a number of leading brands of soft drink (in both the regular and diet varieties) and proceeded to test the substances on themselves, their mothers and Chris’ little sister Molly. They had also hoped to run tests on David’s dog, Tupac, but were unable to secure the necessary animal ethics approval.

Their tests involved consuming the various beverages and then rating them using a range of criteria, such as sweetness, taste, and after-effects. Their findings were astonishing. “The diet stuff tastes like shit” says Matthews. “According to the outside there’s, like, less sugar and shit, so I guess that’s why.” However, this lack of sugar did not appear to change the beverage’s nutritional value. “I didn’t, like, feel any better after drinking the diet stuff” says Cooper. “I think it’s all a load of shit.”

The pair’s presentation at the Science Fair generated much interest from their peers in the scientific community. “When I saw their display, I was like ‘wow, these guys are totally random!’ Plus David’s hot.” said Suzie Harper, a young chemist who specialises in the fusion of baking soda and vinegar. “Man, I can’t believe they got away with just drinking shit for their project! I wish I’d thought of that” said Philip Wang, a leading expert in the field of comparative battery life-times. However, not all comments on their findings have been positive. High school science teacher Mr. Morris Greene had this to say on their research: “This project has been given very little time and effort, and has no scientific merit whatsoever. I am very disappointed in these boys.”

Matthews has tried to stay positive in the face of such harsh criticism, acknowledging that an unconventional study such as theirs will always have its detractors. “Greene’s a total Nazi,” he said. However, Mr. Greene’s criticism does have its consequences: the young scientists will not be able to attend next week’s Regional Science Fair, a crushing blow to their project. Not only would attending the fair have given them a chance to report their findings to a larger group of academics, but it would have allowed them to miss an entire afternoon of school - including English, a class Cooper describes as “totally gay”.

Bling and Anti-Bling

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #11. 2008)


Is there a theoretical limit on the extent to which one’s ride can be pimped? (Shannon Barker, Portobello)

Indeed there is, Shannon. The pimposity of one’s ride is measured by the Sick Index (SI), a quantity that relates to how loudly and emphatically rapper Xzibit proclaims that a pimped vehicle is ‘sick’. After observing several ride-pimpings, scientists were puzzled to find that while many rides had SI-values that came close to 50, none actually reached it. One scientist soon realised that the answer lay in Newton’s third law, which states that “for every pimping, there is an equal and opposite mis-pimping”. In other words, if one ride is pimped to an SI-value of 13, then somewhere in the world there is another ride that is simultaneously mis-pimped to an SI-value of -13. A mis-pimping, of course, is a situation in which one attempts to pimp their ride but instead only makes it more wack. For example, one may add some blingin’ rims to their whip, only to find that it makes them look like a muthafuckin’ fool.  

Thus, the upper limit on how much one’s ride can be pimped is actually related to the lower limit on how much it can be mis-pimped: an SI-value of -50 is the lowest one’s ride can reach, at which point it is officially the most wack shit in the entire goddamn universe. But while Newton’s third law explains why this upper limit exists, it does not explain why the universe needs to balance out pimping levels in this way. The answer may lie in a new theory put forth by scientist Dr. Margaret Swift, which states that there are equal quantities of bling and what she has dubbed ‘anti-bling’ in the universe. Examples of anti-bling include fake Rolex watches, lopsided grillz and cracker-ass muthafuckas who think dey all that, but homie, dey ain’t all that. Thus, when a ride is pimped (and another is correspondingly mis-pimped), the levels of bling and anti-bling created cancel each other out, leaving the universe blingin’ at a constant level.

Of course, some believe that the level of bling in the universe is not constant but is in fact increasing. Furthermore, when this bling reaches a critical mass the universe will collapse under its weight and begin to contract, eventually shrinking down to a blingularity. This hypothetical event is known in scientific circles as the ‘Big Crunk’. Rapper Chamillionaire is particularly concerned about this scenario. “If we don’t put an end to the bouncing cars, the pimp goblets and the diamond-encrusted hoes, then we may be looking at the sad demise of life as we know it” he said. “Now that shit is whack”.

However, these concerns have not slowed the trend of ride-pimping; if anything, the number of rides pimped per capita seems to be growing worldwide. When asked if he regretted potentially upsetting the balance of the universe, Xzibit hesitated for a few seconds before turning to the camera and declaring that it was ‘sick’. 

A Spherical, Rotating Earth

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #10. 2008)


No matter how far I walk, I can never reach the edge of the Earth. Can you explain why this is? (Norman Sharpton, Mornington)

You are not alone in your observation, Norman. For centuries scientists have pondered this bizarre phenomenon, but so far no one has been able to give a conclusive explanation for it. However, there is one theory that, though ridiculous, is gaining in popularity. This theory states that the Earth is not a flat disc, as all reasonable people believe, but in fact a three-dimensional sphere. This ludicrous notion was first introduced in 1999 by Dr. Jonas Wilhelm, although he claims that it has been “common knowledge for centuries”.

Unsurprisingly, Dr. Wilhelm’s theory was instantly met with scorn from real scientists. Not only was his theory completely counter-intuitive (does the Earth look round?) but he had presented no real evidence to support his wild claims. As one renowned academic said: “if we could somehow actually leave the Earth in some sort of ‘space-ship’ to see what shape it is, then great, but I hardly think that’s realistic.” Furthermore, Dr. Wilhelm’s theory had one glaring problem: if the world is spherical, then how do people on the underside of the sphere avoid falling into the cold, eternal abyss of space?

Since the introduction of Dr. Wilhelm’s ridiculous theory, there have been some weak attempts to explain the gaping holes in his argument. Dr. Mary Schreiber, for example, claims that the Earth produces its own force, which she calls ‘gravity’, and that it is this force that stops people falling from the Earth. What she fails to address, of course, is why people are not sucked towards other large spheres, such as the moon or novelty-sized beach balls. Predictably, Dr. Schreiber was “away on leave” when asked to back up her questionable claims.

Unbelievably, some scientists have gone so far as to suggest that the Earth is not only spherical but is also rotating. These so-called ‘experts’ believe that this theory explains such things as why we have as day and night. This preposterous idea has understandably been met with skepticism. “The theory is unnecessarily complicated.” says physicist and avid geocentrist Dr. Philip Murray. “The Earth is huge while the sun is just a small ball in the sky – the simplest explanation is that the sun rotates around the earth. That’s what has been happening for centuries, and there’s no reason to believe that things are any different now.”

Furthermore, this ‘rotating Earth’ theory contradicts the already flimsy concept of gravity. “Consider ants crawling on a basketball” argues Dr. Murray. “Sure, they may stay on due to ‘gravity’, but as soon as the ball starts spinning they spiral off towards a tragic and untimely death”. But even in the face of such damning refutations, there are still some who believe in a spherical, rotating Earth. Hopefully the public will soon realise that, just like global warming and evolution, this is yet another myth about our planet that simply isn’t true. 

Bullshit Receptors

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #9. 2008)


Is there any hope of ever finding a source of power that will replace fossil fuels? (Susan Greenwood, Normanby)

Excellent question, Susan. As we all know, the world’s supplies of petroleum and other fossil fuels are diminishing. While advances have been made in solar and hydroelectric power, they are still not enough to reduce our current dependence on fossil fuels. However, there is hope: a team of Australian scientists is currently researching a new source of power that may finally provide a solution to our troubles. “We realised that there is one energy source that has been overlooked,” says Dr. Kevin Johnston of the Australian Alternative Energy Unit. “It’s something that is all around us and is completely untapped: bullshit. Bullshit is incredibly powerful. It influences the way people vote, what products they buy, and ultimately how they think.”

The difficult part, of course, is finding a way to harness that power. Dr. Johnston’s team has created what they call a ‘bullshit receptor’, a device that converts bullshit into electrical energy. Several prototypical bullshit receptors have been placed in bullshit-dense areas, such as parliamentary buildings and commerce lectures, and so far they appear to have been successful. Using these devices, a mere minute of bullshit can power ten light bulbs, while five minutes of complete and utter horseshit is enough to power a small building. In addition to bullshit receptors, the team has also designed a special ‘bullshit-enabled engine’ for motor vehicles. The engine is powered by the vehicle’s stereo system, which is permanently tuned to right-wing talkback radio. The team has also designed a bullshit-powered plane that intercepts the bullshit transmitted by television satellites whilst in the air.

Many academics have hailed bullshit as an environmentally friendly alternative source of power. While fossil fuels are on the decline, bullshit levels are steadily growing. “The beautiful thing about bullshit is that it is self-propagating,” says Dr. Johnston. “One may hear a politician talking bullshit and pass it on to their coworkers, who will in turn pass that bullshit on to their friends and relatives”. What’s more, bullshit will allow businesses to become entirely self-sufficient. An advertising firm in Sydney has adopted Dr. Johnston’s technology and its office is now powered by nothing but its own bullshit. Dr. Johnston predicts that one day every home in the world will run on bullshit-based power, saying “there’s certainly enough bullshit to go around.”

But is bullshit really as clean and green as it seems? Some academics worry that the use of bullshit-based power will lead to rising levels of ignorance and stupidity worldwide. However, Dr. Johnston is dismissive of such claims: “As with any form of power there will be some negative effects on the world, sure, but these are negligible when you consider the immense benefits. Like it or not, bullshit is our future.”

Dr. Johnston’s team also tried to create energy generators that ran on the power of truth and honour. However, their attempts were quickly dismissed as ‘unrealistic’ and the project was abandoned.

The Tri-Harmoniser

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #8. 2008)


How exactly does a tri-harmoniser work, and can I build one myself? (Kyra Robertson, Green Island)

Well Kyra, as we all know, a tri-harmoniser is made up of three essential components: the triangulator, the resonator and the sub-compressor. However, beyond this basic configuration there is a wide variety of tri-harmonisers, all of which operate in subtly different ways. To simplify things I will refer only to the THX5051, which is the most widely-used model and can be found in most schools, hospitals and rest homes.

The THX5051 is surprisingly simple in its operation: once activated, the THX5051 triangulates incoming data via its triangulator – assuming, of course, that the pressure bulbs have been given adequate time to warm up. This data is then sent to the resonator, at which point it is converted into a series of electromagnetic impulses, which are subsequently transmitted to the conducting coils located on the bottom of the device. It is here where the THX5051 differs from most other models, in that the conducting coils are placed perpendicular to, rather than parallel to, the vibration monitors. Finally, the sub-compressor emits a series of infrared pulses, triggered by interference from the auxiliary compressors.

While this will all seem fairly obvious to anyone with a basic knowledge of high-school physics, it is worth remembering that when the tri-harmoniser was invented in 1972, terms such as ‘partially-emitting diode’ and ‘quasi-unstable interference’ were not part of our day-to-day vocabulary. In fact, some physicists credit early models of tri-harmoniser, such as the CM52, with single-handedly introducing sub-harmonic fusion to the general public – hard to believe now, when you consider how much we take it for granted.

Now, building your own tri-harmoniser is not impossible, especially if you have some background knowledge in harmonic synthesis (and who doesn’t, these days?). It is generally not too hard to find a triangulator in your own home: they can be found in such household appliances as vacuum cleaners, microwaves and waffle irons. Sub-compressors are similarly easy to come by. Most electronics stores will stock them, although they are often sold under the retail name ‘Hyper-sphere’. As you probably know, it is obtaining a resonator that poses the most difficulty. This is because they are custom-built in Austria and are very expensive to import, given their high levels of gamma radiation and extreme fragility. (Urban legends of resonators appearing on the black market for prices as low as $500 are most likely untrue.)

Once you have the parts, assembling a tri-harmoniser is fairly intuitive. The most important thing to remember is that the pressure bulbs must be aligned with alternating parity to avoid the risk of fatal exposure. Once assembled, remember that you must never operate your tri-harmoniser within close proximity to infants, invertebrates or large bodies of water (although lagoons are generally safe). While there are only a few dozen tri-harmoniser-related fatalities a year, it is always worth remembering the old maxim: “if you sub-harmonise, somebody fries”.

Maternal Obesity

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #7. 2008)


Damn! Why yo’ momma so fat? (David Kemble, Waverley)

The reason for your mother’s excessively large girth is a mystery that has plagued scientists for years. Though there are several different theories, none are conclusive. Dr. Grant Peterson of the Chicago Maternal Obesity Unit has monitored your mother for several years, and believes he understands the reasons behind her staggering waistline. “It seems most likely that her extreme corpulence is caused by her reliance on energy-dense fast foods, combined with a sedentary lifestyle. As her weight increases, your mother finds it increasingly difficult to perform any kind of physical activity, thus further exacerbating her weight problem. Furthermore, she consumes excessive amounts of foods that are high in sugar.” says Dr. Peterson. “Bitch loves her cake,” he added.

However, there may be other factors at work too. “I think self-image issues also contribute to your mother’s morbid obesity,” says Dr. Susan Chambers, who works alongside Dr. Peterson at the CMOU. “Your mother is depressed about her weight, and her depression makes her turn to the one thing that gives her comfort: food. And shitloads of it, too.” To test her theory, Dr. Chambers had several members of her research team work undercover, performing actions intentionally designed to reduce your mother’s self-esteem. These included claiming that she had her own area code, pretending to mistake her for a taxi whilst she was wearing a yellow raincoat, and hypothesising that her blood was in fact gravy. Sure enough, the team measured a 5% increase in your mother’s waistline with each successive comment, lending weight to Dr. Chambers’ hypothesis. Dr. Chambers also believes that your mother’s impressive size allows her to exert authority over you and your family members. “Not only is she large, but she is also very much in charge,” she says.

The exact weight of your mother is unknown, although several estimates have been made. A member of Dr. Peterson’s surveillance team believes her weight to be 90,210kg, based on what your mother saw the last time she stepped on to the scales, though this figure is yet to be confirmed. Dr. Chambers says that she has anecdotal evidence suggesting that your mother is so large that she exerts her own gravitational force. “For this force to be significantly felt, your mother would have to have a mass of at least 3 × 10²² kg,” she says. Another estimate comes from the New York Police Department. Detective Inspector Lars Mueller says that “although we have no concrete estimate of your mother’s weight, we do have evidence to suggest that, were she murdered, we would run out of chalk before finishing her outline.”

At the time of writing, your mother could not be reached for comment, having recently jumped into the air and become stuck.

The Irritation Quotient

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #6. 2008)


What is the most irritating noise known to man? (Kurt Bunkall, Dalmore)

To answer your question, Kurt, I must refer to a scale known as the Irritation Quotient (or RQ). Any noise has an RQ, which measures the level of irritation the noise will induce in an average human. However, this definition raises a troubling question: how does one define an ‘average human’? In the context of irritation, this cannot include anyone who is prone to irritability. Thus, when testing the RQ of a sound, we must ignore its effects on people such as taxi drivers, school principals, alcoholic parents, right-wing talkback radio hosts, religious fundamentalists and the elderly. Nor can we include anyone who is too mellow to get annoyed at anything, such as coma patients and smooth jazz aficionados.

In fact, the only way to truly measure the RQ of a sound is to measure the irritation of an ‘ideal listener’ – one whose irritation corresponds solely to the aural stimulus they are currently receiving and is not tainted by any other factors. Of course, there are no true ideal listeners: such a person exists only within the bounds of philosophical theory (see Kant’s seminal work, On the Irritation of Man, for more details). But although we cannot determine the true RQ of any sound, we can at least gain an approximation by irritating a large number of near-ideal listeners.

So, which noises rank highest on the RQ scale? Even taking into account the margin of error when approximating RQ, three sounds emerge as being clearly more irritating than any others. The third most irritating, with an RQ of 132, is the sound of someone picking spinach from their teeth in a movie theatre. As its RQ is higher than 120, this sound is technically rated as being ‘fucking annoying’. The second most irritating noise is the sound of two hipsters debating, with a vague air of detachment, which indie label lost its credibility first. This teeth-grittingly annoying noise has an RQ of 145, and is best avoided if one wants to maintain a healthy blood pressure.

However, the most irritating noise known to man, with an astonishing RQ of 278, is the sound of an earwig licking jam off a crab’s back, magnified ten thousand times. When exposed to this noise, most people will become irritated enough to kick a family pet and go have a bit of a lie down. While this unpleasant situation is unlikely to occur, it is recommended that you safely store all jam inside airtight jars as a precaution.

Some scientists have attempted to measure the RQ of more complex things, such as humans themselves. However, the problem with humans is that there are several variables to consider: not only how annoying they sound, but also look, taste and smell. But although a multivariate formulation of the Irritation Quotient is not yet complete, scientists predict that it will only be a matter of years before we can finally put a concrete numerical value on just how annoying Chad Kroeger really is.

The Existence of God

(Dangerfield BSc, Registered Scientician, #5. 2008)


Has anyone ever tried to scientifically prove the existence of God? (Diane Thompson, St. Clair)

Well Diane, there have in fact been several attempts to do so. The first such attempt occurred in 1978, when a team of British scientists were inspired by a story they had heard about the image of Jesus appearing inside a nectarine. The team isolated hundreds of pieces of fruit in a contamination-free chamber and monitored them closely, hoping for any sign of produce-based manifestation. Disappointingly, after 40 days of observation there were no divine images to be seen – just the face of Richard Nixon on a guava. The study was abandoned and the fruit given to a flock of hungry gulls.

The next notable attempt did not concern divine manifestation but instead took a more direct approach. Michael Wilson, a New Zealand physicist, decided that to prove God’s existence he would speak to God one-to-one. On August 10^th, 1992, he aimed a satellite dish heavenward and started scanning the radio band in hope of hearing some kind of divine voice. After hours of searching, he finally came across a voice that was so powerful and filled with self-importance that it could only be that of God Himself. Wilson proceeded to use his radio transmitter to ask this divine voice several questions, and was amazed to find that it had an apparent answer for everything: how to find peace in the Middle East, how to solve world hunger, how to govern the country effectively, and so on. It was only when Wilson was asked to clear the line for the next caller that he realised he had inadvertently tuned in to his local talkback radio show.

The latest attempt occurred in September 2003, when a team of American scientists went one step further and decided to actually capture God, thus proving His existence once and for all. Working with the few measurements they could find in holy texts, they estimated the size of God (roughly 64 million cubic metres) and found an aircraft hangar large enough to house Him. The hangar was fitted with reinforced-steel doors, programmed to close automatically if a theological disturbance was detected. Using a copy of the bible as bait, the team activated the divinity sensors and hid in the bushes opposite the hangar. After waiting for several hours, one of the junior members of the team pointed out that if God was truly omniscient, surely he would know their plan? The other scientists quickly dismissed this idea and told him to be quiet before God overheard. Needless to say, the test was a complete failure: God never showed up, and on the way back to the lab the team was attacked by a flock of hungry gulls.

To this day, no one has successfully proven the existence of God. However, it’s not all bad news: after years of extensive testing, a team of German scientists are finally on the brink of discovering the true meaning of Christmas. Stay tuned for more details.