Last weekend, I took a walk around my new neighbourhood in Tokyo, and ended up near Tokyo Dome just as a baseball match had finished. Caught in the motion of a tight crowd, I drifted to where a wheelchair-bound woman sat, singing at the top of her lungs 'Genpatsu tomeyou!'; in English, 'Let's stop nuclear power', to the tune of 'We Shall Overcome'. She sang savagely, making those around her uncomfortable in the way that loud sincerity tends to.
Such protests have been a common sight in Tokyo of late. And the public's large-scale rejection of nuclear power has been heard. Last Saturday, Japan's last functioning nuclear reactor was switched off for good. It's the first time since 1970 that Japan has been nuclear power-free.
I arrived in Japan from Bougainville six weeks ago. In Bougainville, I had been living without white goods, and, for parts of the day, without electricity.
I adapted fairly easily to hand-washing and cleaning, to patiently waiting out the blackouts. At one hungry point of a blackout, I considered baking eggs under the glare of the equatorial sun. Instead, I ate a pineapple. I wasn't comfortable with someone else washing my dirty clothes, so a lot of the time I just dealt with the new and interesting odours my clothes conveyed. No one seemed to mind.
Living without convenience revealed the privilege of my upbringing. I adapted. We always adapt.
Tokyo, then, came as a shock. I arrived at Narita airport after dark, and let the flat escalator do the walking as I was zoomed through the gates, beneath a banner that repeated, 'Japan. Thank you. Japan. Thank you.'
I took the train into central Tokyo, my bum warmed by the heated seats. Each time we stopped at a station, the train's engine shut down briefly, and the bum heater switch off for a few seconds. Over the loudspeaker, I heard, 'Setsuden chu,' the catchphrase meaning, 'We're currently using less electricity,' which is posted all around the city, part of a campaign to emphasise corporate and community roles in reducing energy consumption.
During my first few days here, I was horrified by the dazzling lights and endless vending machines. It was grotesque. Having paid exorbitantly for power in Bougainville, I couldn't stop imaging how much it cost to run all of the electricity. An incalculable amount, and for what? A warm bum?
Needless to say, I adapted very quickly again to refrigeration and hot showers, and even the weird-tasting hot milk tea you can buy for a dollar at one of Tokyo's 100 million vending machines. Everything's so convenient in Japan, and convenience leaves one with more time to do things that don't revolve around survival.
The campaigns to consume less energy are powerful, and are changing attitudes about energy consumption. But there's an absurdity to this austere message coming from within a city whose main attractions are electronic conveniences: robots, heated toilet seats, hot meal vending machines.
From World War II until the 1990s, Japan's power usage doubled every five years.
The reality of a nuclear-free Japan is only that there'll be less to go wrong during the next major earthquake. But another major earthquake will, with or without a nuclear reactor, have devastating consequences.
Further, the move away from nuclear doesn't reduce the environmental and human impacts of fossil fuels, nor does it change the fact that we've become utterly dependant on such damaging energy sources. Despite our desire, our need, for truly green alternatives, nuclear energy remains the cleanest viable means of supporting our vast and growing energy needs, as evidenced by the comfort and convenience of the Tokyo lifestyle.
Although the Fukushima meltdown directly killed a handful of people, the majority were not caused by radiation poisoning. Some died of dehydration while awaiting rescue teams. One committed suicide instead of leaving her village; the great tragedy was the loss of homes and communities many people suffered, and continue to suffer.
But compare this with the 3000 Chinese coal miners who died mining for coal in 2008. Are Chinese workers worth less than Japanese consumers?
The effort against nuclear power feels misplaced. The problem with nuclear power is not nuclear weapons; they are a problem of the persistence of militarism in international relations. If radiation poisoning in the aftermath of a disaster is a concern, responsible governance is the answer. If there is a legitimate fear of sabotage, contact your city water authorities. If the environment or the safety of humans are at the heart of the matter, coal and oil are far more culpable.
The real problem preventing nuclear power from being safe is the inability of humans to manage it without killing each other; without developing weapons with it, or preventing preventable disasters and their aftermath.
And if we can't manage the cleanest (available) energy source that can actually sustain our convenient, comfortable lifestyles, then perhaps we don't deserve it.
Ellena Savage is a Melbourne writer who edits Middlebrow, the arts liftout in The Lifted Brow.