Monday, March 15, 2004 - 9:09 AM JST

My Japanese school owner was busted and he returned to business in less than 6 months. The guy will "confess" to all 8,000 charges and just pay fines.

The real question is where the hell did they find 8,000 Japanese guarantors for those 8,000 study visas? !

Monday, March 15, 2004 - 9:29 AM JST

Easy seals....

The student-visa guarantor also needs a "Residence Certificate" so maybe the seal was easy....




Then again, finding guarantors is easy for the yakuza, who often use loan shark victems as "straw men."

Monday, March 15, 2004 - 9:56 AM JST

I just stumbled across this story about hanko preliterate foolishness.


High-tech security gadgets yet to seal fate of Japan's hanko tradition
AFP- Technology - March 15
TOKYO (AFP) - Old habits die hard. The use of carved personal seals in Japan has survived technological leaps which could have rendered them obselete despite their widely acknowledged vulnerability to fraud.
The culture of the hanko (personal seal) is even strong among those who are involved in development of the very biometrics technology which one day is bound to replace it as a method of identifing people. ...