Opinion One Chance in 1,000 Years By JOHN GATHRIGHT	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
千載一遇のチャンス 千載一遇のチャンス コンピューターの2000年問題が騒がれているが そんなことを恐れるより 2000年を迎えるというまたとないチャンスを 大いに楽しんでは…？

Are Japan and its big companies Y2K ready? The news is plastered with Y2K paranoia, but where is the upside of Y2K? Should a little computer cliche really steal our millennial madness?

Welcoming a new millennium should be the most exciting thing in 1,000 years! Where is all the fun, creativity and excitement?

On my most recent trip to Canada and the United States, I found it exhilarating to speak with people excited about their year 2000 plans. One fifth grader was superanimated when she talked about her class project.

The students have made a worldwide e-mail map and had a goal of making 2,000 new friends worldwide by the year 2000. But in their first week they already had made 8,500 friends from every continent except Antarctica. "I'm so excited about going to school, I love year 2000!" she said.

A 70-year-old Scottish Canadian with whom I spoke said, "I am so excited that I am living to see year 2000! I am going to make history and walk on the wild side! I plan to get 2,000 bagpipers from all over the world to march one mile (1.6 km) at midnight while playing the pipes.

"I have sent out 200 letters to bagpipers to start the ball rolling. Even if we don't succeed, the dream has made this last year the best in 70 years!" When I asked him what he was going to wear under his kilt, he said, the wildest underwear he could find.

Tommy, a skateboarder from Atlanta, is going to try and cover 2,000 miles (3,219 km) by skateboard to start 2000. Cathy, 12, will listen to the Beastie Boys 2,000 consecutive times.

The Little Christian Church in Atlanta is going to send 2,000 books to illiterate children in South America. Everywhere I went I met and found people excitedly setting goals and making plans for 2000.

Personally, 2000 is going to be a very busy year for my family. I have agreed to walk a mile in my kilt while playing the pipes at midnight, Scotland time.

Over the last few months we have also been organizing a worldwide tree climb 2000. The goal is to get 2,000 people from all over the world to climb a tree at midnight Dec. 31, 1999. My family plans to spend New Year's 2000 camping in a huge oak tree. We wish to encourage a more tree-friendly world.

2000 is just around the corner, and where is Japan in all this? The Education Ministry has declared the need for more creativity in Japanese education and more community-minded schools. Unfortunately, most of the principals and teachers that I have talked to don't have any special plans for 2000.

Most families that I talked with are going to watch New Year's TV shows. And most talk concerning the year 2000 seems to center around the negative Y2K bug.

This New Year's is not only the opportunity of a lifetime but of 1,000 years. What better way to teach children the importance of seizing the moment and grabbing an opportunity than to do something fun and exciting for 2000? What better way to encourage charity and kindness than to do a year 2000 volunteer project?

This is the opportunity of the millennium, let us seize it and make the very most of it. My hope is that the joy and newness of this coming millennium will far overpower any technical glitches. Let's celebrate our humanity rather than worry about our technologies.

Shukan ST: Oct. 22, 1999

(C) All rights reserved