This just in: My beard

Well... I done did it now. I went and made my own report. Start to finish. And by finish I mean, "presenting
my story live on national, network television in Japan". As you can see, it aried 5:25 in the morning, but after that it also aired on our cable, news channel numerous times throughout the day!
I did everything myself, as much as any story can be, but I sitll couldn't have done this without the help and support of my colleagues. The story is about how popular beards are in America/New York, and what effects that has created.

You can see it here, in Japanese of course, so here is my translation. with one note added about how insanely nervous I was under my beard!

Yagi-san: It's time for "Catch the World" from our JNN foreign bureaus. Today is Greg in New York. Greg?

Me: Good morning! I want to tell you about a popular fashion trend here in America. Any idea what that might be? It's this: (rubs beard)

Yagi-san: Do you mean your beard?

Me: That’s right. Recently, you see more people with beards.  I went to Brooklyn where beards are especially popular, and as you can see, it's a wash of guys with beards, more than half! This started with a prostate cancer awareness campaign (Mo-vember), where you don't shave for a month. Popular actors, sports stars and more started growing beards, and having a beard came to be thought of as manly.

Yagi-san, what do you think of guys with beards?

Yagi-san: Well, I wouldn't mind if they took care of it and it suits them.

Me: Indeed! I also asked the women here what they though:

Girlfriend

And what do you prefer?

GF: Beard. All the way. It’s pretty hot

(Boyfriend says “YES!”)

GF w/dog

It’s just, he looks much younger. He’s still a cutey, but yeah… I like it like this.

Husband and wife

He looks good with it! I think it goes with the hair and has kind of a Richard Gere look to it, a little bit, so that’s fine.

Me: So it seems beards are popular in women's opinion as well. 

(At this point, I completely blanked on what came next. I really didn't want to look at my script while on camera, and once I did, I realized, I didn't even know where on the paper to look! You might notice I kind of laughed at myself on camera, but I found my place and carried on.)

However, there are some men who can't grow proper beards, right? In fact, there is a surprising surgery that has grown in popularity

This is Jose, 27 years old. Jose can only grow a little facial hair, so he has come to a plastic surgery clinic for a procedure:

                 Jose

                 The more you think about it, the more you notice it, the more you look at yourself in the                        mirror and compare yourself to other people and, yeah, complain about it.

Me: This plastic surgeon is well known for facial hair implants, and demand for his procedures has been growing. 5 years ago, he was doing 4 or 5 a month, but now that number has grown to around 15 times a month!

Yagi-san: I'm not really clear on how the beard is actually implanted?

Me: With the doctor and Jose's permission, I went inside the operating room:

                 "This is the operating room, where a beard implant procedure is starting"

First, laying on his stomach, hair is taken from the back of the head, down to the root. Next, they numb Jose’s face and the doctor chooses where to place the hairs.

The doctor makes tiny incisions, and the recently removed hairs are inserted one-by-one. This time Jose received 765 hair transplants and took around 6 hours total. The doctor said back of the head and face heals up after about 3 days and the roots remain in the face. After about 9 months the hair begins growing like a normal beard. Jose said he couldn’t smile because of the anesthesia, but he was very happy.

Yagi-san: Wow, they say fashion requires patience, but that looked painful, and it takes 9 months? It really shows you how popular beards have become.

Me: Yes. Here in New York where there's a beard-boom, you can also find places open like this: This is a "beard spa". The shave beards, style them, and you can even get skin treatments for your face.

                John Rivera, barber: It’s cool. It’s the trend right now, what’s “in” right now, is to have                 a beard that’s kept really nice.

      Me: How's it feel?

      Miguel: It feels good, actually. Like a million bucks! Haha.

This is the first time beards have become popular again since the 70s, and for now the trend shows no sign of going away. That’s all from me, in New York. 

What’s in a UN? 国連とは？

本当の国際安全保障理事会の大統領席に座っている私

As a journalist, I have some pretty amazing access to the United Nations. Maybe that sounds impressive, but as an American I feel most people don't actually know or care much about it. So here is what will hopefully be the first in a series I'll call:  "A day in the life". Today is: The United Nations. 

レゴセットになったほどニューヨーク市にある国連は有名です。この中に私はよく働いています。只今国連は工事中で,
臨時施設「ノース・ロン・ビリデぃング」(NLB)というビルがありますが、このレゴセットにはありません。

First, let's break it down into pieces...:

The United Nations has many organizations that do amazing work around the world, especially UNICEF, the PKO (Peace Keepers), and OCHA (Humanitarian aid), but other than the infrequent press conference, I rarely get to cover them. I spend most of my time at the headquarters dealing with the three main bodies: the General Assembly, Security Council, and Secretariat (including the office of the Secretary General). 

The Secretariat - 国際連合事務局

国連事務所長パン・ギムン何回もみたことありますが、所長はほとんどこの会見の部屋に来られていません。

Most people think Kofi Annan when they think "Secretary General", but the current SG is a Korean named Ban Ki Moon. 

国連が大すき？ネット上で生放送はみれますよ。

His office, holds press conferences down the hall from the Security Council in the Press Briefing Room. These are always broadcast by the UN's own media division UNTV and can be watched online, always, for free. If you watch the Spokesperson for the SG's daily noon briefing, you'll likely see me, or at least a half-dozen people I know. It's especially fun to watch 15 minutes before the noon briefing starts because the reporters forget they're on camera and you can catch them being silly!

記者は会見の方によって沢山来ますが、満席はあまりなりません。

The Security Council - 国際安全保障理事会

普段、私が国連にいる時間の6割はこんなかんじです。

The Security Council is made up of 15 countries; 5 permanent members, the "P5", and two other groups of 5 countries representing their regions of the world through their own countries' self-interests, and these countries are chosen by a vote of the General Assembly to serve two-year terms in the SC. 

Each month, in alphabetical order, one of these 15 countries takes a turn as President of the SC, meaning they chair all meetings and set the agenda for the month. The SC passes resolutions affecting global policy, but many of the countries who are obligated as members of the UN to follow these resolutions do not comply when it doesn't suit their interests. Also, the P5 - the U.S., China, Russia, France, and the U.K. have the power to veto any resolution for any reason they choose. For these two reasons, along with a simple lack of consensus which is often the case, the SC is often ineffective. Even when they do reach consensus, the UN is mostly ignored by the U.S. public, but not the Japanese! Of all the foreign media, Japan is the most disproportionately present, with every television network, newspaper, and wire service present for all major events and a lot of minor ones that don't even make the news.
I spend a lot of time waiting outside the Security Council. Most of the serious topics discussed inside are closed to the media, so we rely on delegates, press liaisons, and the ambassadors themselves to come out and fill us in. They also come out sometimes to use the restroom, and we get all excited over nothing! When they do approach the podium (also recorded and broadcast live by the UN online) where we stakeout, you get a strange and rare sight. Ambassadors who are normally whizzing in and out private meetings, actually stand and listen respectively (usually) along with us, to their counterparts, patiently waiting for their turn at the podium. 

If we can just watch online, why spend so long staking out the podium? Often countries will speak off to the side of our media stakeout area, and being there is how we find out about countries tensions, future plans, and more. Of course the biggest scoops are made elsewhere, walking one-on-one in hushed tones down empty hallways. 

シリアの国連大使が安保理の外で申します。

The speaker pictured above is the Ambassador of Syria, Ja'afari.

記者の使っているスペースはとても狭いです。

ロシアのチュルキン国連大使

While "unity in the security council" is the often over-used and truly best thing for making progress on serious issues, I can't help but enjoy when the P5 ambassadors arguing at the stakeout! The verbal pokes and jabs they take at one another show their truly masterful grasp of wit. No one is more skilled at this than Ambassador Churkin of Russia. His - usual, deadpan humor, and classic Russian accent reminds me of Rocky and Bullwinkle's Boris mixed with Rodney Dangerfield, all while driving home exactly what he means to say.

安保理の近くに偉い方が使うラウンジ

This is the "North Delegates Lounge" down the hall from the Security Council chamber. It is mostly reserved for Ambassadors and delegates, and some press. With lots of art and vaulted ceilings, it is a great place to sneak off for a coffee during all that stakeout downtime, or grab a beer with a delegate and create a contact. Here, I thought I would be coyly leave it at that, but while writing this, a scathing article came out about the more deviant side if the room, and I encourage you to read it!

The General Assembly - 国際連合総会

改造中で去年から今年の夏まで完成させる予定です。

Okay, this may look impressive, and when President Mahmoud Abbas of Palestine received a standing ovation from nearly every country (not the U.S. or Israel obviously) in the standing-room-only, packed hall, for his speech asking for observer-state UN membership in 2012, impressive would be an understatement. However, the General Assembly Hall has been moved to a temporary building for remodeling and currently looks like this:

総会の臨時施設です。この写真撮った時の公演者がわかりますか？

Aesthetics aside, because I never follow their daily meetings outside of the UN General Assembly every late September/Early October when the world's heads of states come to speak, I tend to subconsciously assign less importance to their proceedings. But reflecting, I realize things like last year's arms trade treaty, the sudden election of Jordan to the Security Council to substitute Saudi Arabia, and special speakers like Steven Spielberg (above) for the Holocaust day of remembrance, all make it an equally important branch that should not be ignored. Much the way the U.S. 435+ members of the House of Representatives, are (sometimes disappointingly) essential to the design of the full congress in our legislative branch, everything at the U.N. relies on their member states.


It's fascinating to work where some of the biggest names across the full spectrum of fame. I've seen current and former heads of state - including dictators, Bill Gates, Stevie Wonder, Malala on her 16th birthday, Ted Turner, and royalty. Here are a few:

ヨルダンの王子様が国連大使です。

Ambassador and Prince of Jordan, His Royal Highness Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein

スティーヴィー・ワンダー

Stevie! (A couple months later I also got to hear him perform live!) On this occasion he spoke about freedom of accessibility for the disabled.

去年ビル・ゲーツの奥様メリンダさんが何か国の元首と一緒にパネルディスカッションしました

Melinda Gates chairs a panel of heads of states during last year's General Assembly.

去年の総会でイランのローハニ大統領とザリフ外務大臣のトゥーショットが撮れました。

The newly elected President of Iran Rouhani and his Foreign Minister Zarif. 

パン・ギムン事務所長とマララさんとイギリスの元総理大臣ゴルドン・ブラウン氏です。

Gordon Brown, introducing Malala Yousafzai before her first public speech since being shot by the Taliban. It was also her 16th birthday that day.

第二次世界大戦でオスカー・シンドラーに命救われた生存者レナ・フィンダーさんが先月総会の前で語りました。

Rena Finder, who survived the Holocaust thanks to Oskar Schindler, speaks before the GA and thanks Steven Spielberg for "making it easier to tell" her story, by making people genuinely interested. It was a beautiful speech. 

That's IT! Plenty, I think. I leave you with this gorgeous view of the UN from the East River and the UN's rose garden! See you in a couple weeks!

イースト川から見える国連の姿はいいですね。