From Tourist to Toxic Avenger

Friday was the quiet before the storm. Unable to film Mt. Fuji because of overcast skies, we visited the park that housed Meijingu Shrine near Harajuku station.



Enormous trees expelling fresh oxygen and dampening the urban din were so refreshing…and Zen.



Then we did a bit of shopping in an area called Shibuya – basically the Yorkville of Tokyo. We picked up a few souvenirs and then saw this cute little box…



We couldn’t resist. Inside, we chatted up Noboru, the bartender in charade-esque broken English. Hearing we were from Canada, he soon pulled out every bottle of Canadian booze he could find.



Then it was off to Roppongi, only this time at night…and what a difference! A Beatles tribute bar followed by Japan's finest reggae brought us well into the next morning...sorry, no photos.

The next morning Dr. Shige-san, an environmental geochemist from the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology met us at the hotel. He is a leading expert on persistent organic pollutants (POP’s) like PCB or DDE absorbed by pre-production plastic pellets. These pellets are what plastic manufactures eventually turn into bags, cups, you name it.



Joined by two graduate students, Shige-san took us by train to the Pacific Ocean to collect more pellets from a popular beach for surfers.



As luck would have it, he wasn’t the only one interested in plastic litter. A university group just happened to be cleaning the beach...



...and the surfers quickly joined in. What luck!



After a few hours of filming, we had a quick lunch of sushi and tempura. Gado-san had tempura.



Then it was 3 hours travel to Shige-san’s laboratory where the pellets would be tested for POP’s. Previous samples have shown more than a million times more toxic chemicals in these pellets than the surrounding sea water. The big concern, according to Shige-san, is when birds or fish eat the pellets, those toxins could be leeching into the tissues of the animals…and if we eat the fish…



Shige-san is also testing the plastic for such things as flame retardants and other nasties used in the manufacturing of plastic. He continues to travel the world testing everything from rivers to garbage dumps. More research is definitely needed on the potential health effects to humans but Shige-san already avoids drinking his beer out of plastic cups or microwaving food in plastic. Food for thought.



We arrived back at the hotel for dinner around midnight. It was a long day but well worth the effort. Our thanks go out to Shige-san (a.k.a. Samurai Mass-Spec) for being so accommodating and for starting this long-overdue research. You are a true Samurai.

Out.

G+I