Yesterday afternoon I had a visit from the gas company; they wanted to check my gas equipment. I have a gas heater for hot water in my kitchen, and also the kitchen stove is using gas.
The service man checked the heater for damaged parts and when he turned on the hot water, he used a mirror to look outside and check if the exhaust fan is working. He also checked the gas faucet that connects to my stove, and advised me to move the stove a bit away from the back wall because there is a rubber tube connection that might get burned otherwise.
In the end, he also said that if I ever smelled gas the very first thing to do was to open the windows. I have a gas detector in one corner of the kitchen and showed it to him. Apparently it’s a rather old model and I could get it replaced with a rental one for 350 YEN/month. I declined because it’s not my apartment, and old doesn’t automatically mean not working.
The whole check was over in 10 minutes or so, but I have learnt something interesting: In one corner of each of my rooms, there is a little terminal, for what I didn’t find out until yesterday: It’s extra gas supply! So, in the winter, you can use a gas heater and connect it there rather than using liquid gas which I find very unsafe to be honest.
I’m not using gas heaters and I have no plans of doing so. Ever so often, there are accidents where people are poisoned by carbon monoxide (CO). I would need some sort of heating in my bedroom where I sleep on the floor – and CO is heavier than air… Just to be on the safe side, I’ll pass on any kinds of gas heaters and keep using my electric one, even though this is much more expensive than using gas. Yes, I have said that I want to stay in Japan until I die, and I’m still planning to do so, but there’s no need to hasten the arrival of that day…