2021/6/12(土)SMC

Today we have a relatively small group at the meeting. But overall we had a vivid discussion and the mood was inviting. The coordinator was K. Narisawa, lecturer Y. Narisawa.

<Lecture>

Yoko Narisawa presented us with various things from riddles to proverbs. Some of them are as follows.

(riddles)

1.A dog had three puppies, named Mopsy, Topsy, and Spot. What was the mother’s name? (What)

When you see the sentence, ‘What’ cannot be the mother’s name, because the question mark is attached at the end, but when it is spoken, we never know if the sentence is a question or a statement. If it is a statement, the answer surely is ‘What’.

2 When is the best time to have lunch? (After breakfast)

(calculation)

The name of the genre is calculation but it might be better to name it ‘arithmetic’ Though the questions were written in English, the questions themselves were kind of easy. So we omit them.

(Logic)

It was a guessing game. Our job was to make a guess at how many dots the dice had under certain conditions. The lecturer demonstrated how to solve the questions by using a real dice of her own. The other questions that call for logic seem like riddles. It would be too much for me to write all of them, so let me take up only one of them.

*You’re at a fork in the road in which one direction leads to the City of Lies ( where everyone always lies) and the other to the City of Truth ( where everyone always tells the truth). There is a person at the fork who lives in one of the cities, but you are not sure which one. What question could you ask the person to find out which road leads to the City of Truth?

(Proverbs)

There were six proverbs with the blank in them. Your job was to put a suitable word in each blank. Some of them are as follows.

1) No gain without ( pain ).

2) Where there is smoke, there is ( fire ).

<Table Topic Speeches>

1) The speech title ‘What lifts your spirits when life gets you down?’ went to SM Noro. He talked about physical exercise in the gym like swimming. And also he confessed the fact he was making it a practice to meditate when he was down in the dumps.

2) What is your greatest strength and your greatest weakness? (SM Kaneko)

He used several words like unique, shy or deep thinking to describe his characters. On the other hand, he also used the word like not cooperative and not positive. But overall one’s strengths and weaknesses overlap. What you may think is your weakness may turn out to be your strong point.

3) What will you never do ? (SM Yoko Narisawa)

This is a kind of vague question, The speaker beautifully interpret this as something you never do in the future even if you are asked to. So she referred to dangerous sports like sky diving and bungee jump. Sports are surely not worth risking your life, aren’t they?

4) If you could instill one piece of advice in a newborn baby’ mind, what advice would you give? (SM. Koizumi)

He said that smiling is very instrumental in human relation. He said this with his grandchild in mind. Sure enough, we need smiling in this day and age of confusion. Now people often say boys need intelligence and girl amiability, but we all think both qualities should be needed whether it be boys or girls.

5) What are your favorite simple pleasures? (SM Takahata)

She talked about how relaxing taking a bath is. It is not just washing your body but it ‘is’ the time for SM Takahata to feel grateful for the day being uneventful. Though nothing wonderful may not happen, we should be thankful nothing awful didn’t happen to us. We were able to share her thought.

<Prepared Speeches>

1) Trouble in garbage (SM Takahata)

It is fast becoming a universal problem that there are people who ignore the rule and don’t separate combustible and incombustible garbage. Local people find out who don’t follow the rule, but don’t know how they can make him comply. They turned to the management office of the apartment the guy lives in for help. But that was all they can do. Since we may have the similar problems, we put our heads together and had a vivid discussion.

2) Sense of Acceleration (SM. Kaneko)

The speaker really has a unique point of view. We are now faced with extreme climates and a rapid technological development. His contention is there is always causes and effects in everything. After Ichiro came Shohei, and After Habu Fujii Sota. And as for technology, blue tooth is rampant. Life is surely not easy for older people. I agree with that. But I don’t 100 % agree with his contention that everything is caused by the radiation of the sun. The radiation may have something to do with what we are witnessing now, but not all.

3)Review (SM Koizumi)

He divided his whole life in four stages. The first stage is education. The second working stage. The third finding yourself. The forth stage I don’t know. He said that he joined SMC at his second stage. We knew SM Koizumi through our mutual friend SM Yamazaki. We should always be thankful to him. Now, SM Koizumi sang SMC song with emotions, which, by the way, was composed by him. We are really appreciative of SM Koizumi’s devotion to SMC.

1) Tax System for wealthy people (SM Noro)

He talked about wrongful tax system in America. The most striking fact is that the total value of the top 25 wealthiest people increased by about $400 billion between 2014 and 2018. On the other hand, the federal income tax revenue increased by only 3.4 %. There should be something to be done. The speaker made proposals.

1. If the assets of stocks and bonds are increasing, a part of them, for instance 5% is regarded as deemed capital gain.

2. Asset holders should be taxed on the deemed capital gains, but they can pay taxes with their asset.

3. GPIF(Government Pension Investment Fund) is entrusted with asset management of the paid stocks and bonds.

Surely, nothing is certain but death and taxes.

Schedules of meetings ahead

June 14 (Monday): Zoom meeting 7:30 to 21:00 p.m.

June 26 (Saturday): In-person meeting 9:30 to 12:00 a.m.

(Small conference room of Oyama Community Center)