Bad News: 2, Good News: 0

So.. I bet everybody who has a blog is making a post with this topic. So, I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do. I mean, the earthquake and tsunami were bad, but not bad enough to stop an exchange. But then the nuclear power plant decides to go and explode...

Well, I know that there were some Rotary clubs that cancelled their exchanges, and AFS severely postponed the yearlong exchange, turning it into a semester exchange. Too bad you can't really do that with a summer exchange. Hopefully, I will still be able to go to Japan, but at this point, I really don't know. I emailed EIL a couple hours ago, and I am impatiently waiting for them to respond.

So, for all of you that haven't had their faces glued to msnbc.com, earlier today, the wind started to blow the leaking radioactive particles out to sea where they would dissipate before they reached California. But now the wind started to blow south. Right towards Tokyo. There are some scientists who say that the particles will dissipate before they reach Tokyo, but I personally think that is a load of crap.

According to an article I read (I'll link it at the bottom), the radiation levels around Tokyo have risen 40 times their normal level. Even though this level is "no threat to human health," it is still enough to cause a panic. Foreign embassies are encouraging foreign citizens to evacuate Japan and to avoid traveling near Japan.

I hope this clears up, I really do. But the sad thing is, it may not. And I'll just have to deal with that. The really bad thing is, if Japan doesn't pull through, I don't know if I'll get to choose a different country to go to this summer, or if I'll have to wait until next summer. But I have a couple countries as my backups. My first is Thailand and my second is China, both of which will probably not get any of the radiation from Japan.

And just so you know, I haven't forgotten about the Philippines!! I have about 1000 pictures and I'm still looking through them because I can only post so many. So a post about that will be up soon. And I'll update you about this summer as soon as I can. And in case anybody was wondering, I heard from my friends in Davao. It turns out that the tsunami had weakened by the time it hit them, so the beach waves were just a little bigger than normal.

So,

See ya!

じゃね！

再见!

แล้วพบกัน!

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