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Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

bbc.com

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Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#131

Post by analog8374 »

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #21

Every time I read an article about people trying to solve the 'loneliness epidemic' I can't help but wonder if we're not trying to solve the wrong problem. Maybe the solution should not be sought in trying to increase social connections but in eliminating our need for social contact. This dependence on other humans has always felt like a flaw to me. Note that I'm not saying that human contact is bad, just that our pa…

The part of the brain that needs human contact could be chemically or surgically neutralized.

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#132

Post by keyringlight »

Another variation on this is La Poste in France have a paid service "Watch over my parents" where you can get the postie to do a short regular visit to them (presumably alongside any deliveries) for distant children who can't.

https://www.laposte.fr/services-seniors/visites-du-facteur

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#133

Post by nephihaha »

ViktorRay wrote: post #95
nephihaha wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The BBC is a state broadcaster which claims to be autonomous, but that doesn't apply when it comes to foreign policy or the royal family.

This isn’t true. The content of the BBC is independent of the UK government. Even for the royal family and for foreign policy. I am not British so I could be wrong however. If you have evidence that the BBC lacks autonomy when it comes to foreign policy or to the royal family please share it with the rest of us.

The BBC coverage of the royal family is always crawling. They tried to bury the Andrew story several times. The entire BBC is under royal charter.

As for supposed autonomy from the government... Watch BBC News, you can always get a good idea of who the UK will go to war with next... Before it happens. Their coverage of the Troubles was also reflective of the British government.

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#135

Post by numpad0 »

pixelready wrote: post #84
hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm so glad I visit different countries to see what they are actually like so I don't get brainwashed into thinking GDP is anywhere near of good measure as people think it is.

The case against GDP, by its own creator: https://gnhusa.org/gpi/the-case-against-gdp-made-by-its-own-... It’s not that GDP is a poor measure, just that it is isolated as the only measure most policy is based on improving rather than being one metric in a portfolio of related metrics that balance technological progress, accumulation of wealth, and human thriving. As Gary Stephenson rightly points out the culture of E…

IMO the problem with GDP is it's basically always normalized in USD, and USD isn't that universally representative of units of production/utility.

I mean, not to be political, but there's probably a place somewhere on Earth selling 10 standard chicken eggs for 540 local coins that's equivalent to $0.01 by the official government rates then-and-there, and the idea of GDP being meaningful means they must be either producing something like thousands of eggs per hour per employee or they live with something like a single pieces of chocolate worth of calories per day. And it's really not like that.

I'm sure GDP figures normalized on local consumer price index will have its own flaws, but especially USD-normalized GDP feels wrong to me in that regards.

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#136

Post by hamasho »

I grew up on a small village in a small island. The yogurt lady was an essential part of the community.

Many stay-at-home moms (including my mom) seemed to enjoy her visit. She and my mom talked a lot, sometimes for hours (I still can't figure out how she completed her job when she spent so much time with one person). They chatted about recent events, like the daughter of the fisherman gave birth, the great-grandpa of the liquor shop died of cancer, a newly opened restaurant in the nearest town sucked, and sometimes shared even personal struggles or family matters. It really helped a lot of people combat mental struggles caused by the isolation of being traditional stay-at-home wives in a super rural area. The only downside was anything you shared with her would be spread in the entire village before dawn.

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#137

Post by cgh »

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #21

Every time I read an article about people trying to solve the 'loneliness epidemic' I can't help but wonder if we're not trying to solve the wrong problem. Maybe the solution should not be sought in trying to increase social connections but in eliminating our need for social contact. This dependence on other humans has always felt like a flaw to me. Note that I'm not saying that human contact is bad, just that our pa…

Username checks out stares into abyss

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#138

Post by layer8 »

pan69 wrote: post #89
qingcharles wrote: post #54

Yakult is a Japanese company? I always assumed from the name it came from mainland Europe somewhere. They did a Häagen-Dazs on me. Especially as the Japanese often come up with Western names like this that aren't even spellable in kana.

> Yakult (ヤクルト, Yakuruto) is a Japanese sweetened probiotic milk beverage fermented with the bacteria strain Lacticaseibacillus casei Shirota. It is sold by Yakult Honsha based in Tokyo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakult

You should have also quoted the next sentence: The name "Yakult" was coined from jahurto, an Esperanto word meaning "yogurt".

Re: Yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Japan

#140

Post by boomboomsubban »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #115
pipeline_peak wrote: post #79

“The yoghurt delivery women combatting loneliness in Minnesota” HN’s interest in this article is so “thing vs Japanese thing”

That trope only applies if the non-Japanese version of the thing exists. Which, if you live in the US, it doesn't. I would be just as interested in an article about Minnesota yogurt delivery women, but they don't exist, so...

Minnesota did have home ice cream and other frozen food delivery until Schwan's finally shut down a few years ago. Usually men, but they did tend to be chatty from my experience.

So there is a US equivalent, but it would have been interesting to read about them too.

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