It's 38C/100F in Tokyo (Why do people live here?)
38C = 100.4 F

Four die as heat wave hits Japan
Sydney Morning Herald,
A heat wave in Japan has killed four people, most of them elderly, and left at least 10 others in serious condition in hospital, officials said Friday. ...

Torrential rains flood buildings in Saitama Prefecture
Mainichi wrote:
SAITAMA -- Torrential rains hit northern Saitama Prefecture late Thursday, flooding seven buildings, police and a meteorological observatory said Friday.

WOT?! Campaign posters for Sunday's election in Japan

Campaign posters leave room for revision
Vox Populi, Vox Dei -- Herald Tribune/Asahi; July 9, 2004
The Liberal Democratic Party's poster reads: ``Konokuni-wo omoi/ Konokuni-wo tsukuru'' (Caring for this country/ Creating this country)
Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) ``Massugu-ni, hitamuki-ni'' (Going straight ahead with devotion)
New Komeito... ``Jitsugen-ryoku'' (Ability to get things done)
Social Democratic Party is brief: ``Ima koso `min'-ism'' (Now is the time for the people's will).
The Japanese Communist Party ...: ``Kaiaku nenkinho-no jisshi-wo yamesaseyo'' (Let us stop the government from implementing its poorly revised pension laws). Evidently, the party thinks the wordiness will induce voters to read its campaign poster, but it remains to be seen whether voters will stop to read it.

Posted by trek/taro at 12:22 PM KDT
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Japanese love-of-nature at their garbage beaches
Topic: Concrete Japan
Long ago during my first Endoshima (aka Garbage Island) swim, I managed to get a mouthful of dead cat as well as being covered with green oily dioxin film.

Losing battle being fought to keep Kanagawa beaches clean
The Japan Times: July 2, 2004
FUJISAWA, Kanagawa Pref. -- It's almost 5 a.m. and the sky is warming as the sun rolls up to burst open the horizon. The pacific rhythm of the ocean waves dominates the soundscape of the virtually deserted beach.
For Atsuko Sakurai, a local surfer, this is the best time of day to pursue her passion. She strides excitedly onto the beach, but her glee fades quickly into quiet dismay as she steps around the minefield of cracked bottles, smashed cans and other assorted trash.
Seeing such a messy beach, Sakurai can only sigh.
Summer is officially here and it's the season when piles of trash from weekend parties at the beach welcome early morning surfers and trouble the residents. The ocean debris is a serious environmental issue for Kanagawa Prefecture's popular beaches, and the condition gets only worse as summer wears on....
_________________
モ?ベッタ...DEATH for DUMBO!

Dinner of Death VS death for dinner
Topic: Me
Quicktime movie of my "fugu" poisonous blowfish for dinner this evening in Kannai Yokohama.

A "while" back I wrote this about my first encounter with THE FISH OF DEATH, FUGU...

Fugued!
It?s another gray day at Japan Inc. It?s a gray Monday morning for moaning, stretching and staring at battleship gray metal desks and concrete walls .
Ah, but last night ...
I was thrashing in the middle of Roppongi crossing baying at the moon. Two hundred and fifty thousand yen flopped out of my back pocket and whirled about in the wind as my date was hobbling about in her red miniskirt trying to fetch the bills. I was howling - laying flat on my back I could see her see-through pink lace panties. I definitely had found a friend in fugu.
An interesting fish, the fugu ...
The CIA uses its poison for dartguns. Japanese girls feed it to their men to get them "inspired". The blowfish, which is what fugu is called in English, was sliced up to be eaten raw at a neighborhood bar. The terribly charming Emiko had taken me there for a little hot sake and English conversation. Between her giggles and my gropes, she ordered the night's adventure, fugu, from a knife wheedling cook who had full control over my life. If I died from the little rubbery fish hors d'oeuvres, it's the cook's legal right under Japanese law to commit suicide. It seemed like a fair deal to me.
After fugu, she poured four bottles of hot sake into me , poured me into her husband's 4x4 pickup and sported me down to Six Trees, Roppongi, Tokyo's partyland. We were snarfing a couple of cheeseburgers while watching a Hamasaki Ayumi video when the fugu took hold. I felt hot flashes and then full-blown menopause followed by metamorphosis and a big blur that eventually dumped me at my desk at Japan Inc.
Fugu! Who needs drugs when you can eat little slices of raw death? But sitting here in my gray uniform, sprawled prone on my gray desk top, surrounded by gray walls and my gray job,
Well there you have it. I've only a few hours here to catch some sleep at my desk.... I?ll have to prepare myself for the evening's meal of more sake and something safe like. shirokarai, fermented raw squid guts.

Post subject: Crash college classes for 'classroom collapse' in Japan
学級崩壊 gakkyu hokai = 'classroom collapse'

Shiga Univ. to train teachers to fight classroom chaos
Kyodo / July 07
Shiga University will offer four new courses next spring designed to train would-be teachers to resolve pervasive school-related problems such as classroom chaos and truancy....
Education expert Naoki Ogi said existing programs to train teachers generally put excessive emphasis on teaching subjects even though bullying, truancy, severe disruptions and other serious problems are becoming prevalent.
--Also refer to the education research here and here.

"Far-Out Far East Rickshaw Rally Race"

"Far-Out Far East Rickshaw Rally Race" will have children participating in a simulated race through Japan... "We call it racing to meet Jesus. The ultimate prize of the race is becoming closer to him...Kids come and participate in music and arts and crafts. They learn about the Bible but also about other cultures."

A different Vacation Bible School theme package every year!

Posted by trek/taro at 3:22 PM KDT
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Big Mother is Watching You
Topic: Japanese Tech
Japan Firm's Chip Tells Mom if Kids Out of School
Tue Jul 6, 8:58 AM ET
TOKYO (Reuters) - Forget the notebook and the multicolored pen, a Japanese firm has developed the latest in school supplies -- chip-embedded student ID cards.... make it easier for parents to keep tabs on their youngsters, said Toru Hasegawa, a spokesman for software firm NAJ Corp, based in western Japan.... Students scan ID cards on passing through the school entrance and the time is recorded and sent via email to their parents' mobile phones or computers, he said. Parents are also alerted if their child fails to arrive at school... when school is over, so parents know when to expect their children to arrive home.
Despite safety worries, many education-obsessed parents send small children to late-night cram schools. It is not unusual for primary or junior high school students to be returning home at 10 p.m.

Posted by trek/taro at 1:56 PM KDT
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Tokyo takes 9 years to 'find' their nat'l police chief's hitman, A COP
Mystery shrouds gunman in police chief attack
MDN / Tue, Jul. 06, 2004
Mystery continues to shroud the actions of the gunman who shot and injured former National Police Agency chief Takaji Kunimatsu in 1995, despite Wednesday's arrest of a former AUM Shinrikyo suspect who has admitted pulling the trigger.
Police said Toshiyuki Kosugi, 39, a former AUM cultist and senior officer at the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) who was arrested Wednesday in connection with the shooting, told police he had carried out the attack.
But because of inconsistencies in his statements to police, his actual role in the crime, including whether he even shot the director general, remains unclear.
In 1996, Kosugi told police, "The first to third shots (I fired at Kunimatsu) hit him, but the fourth one missed." He also said, "After the shooting, I nearly lost my way" -- things that only the person who committed the crime would know....
Most likely it took 9 years to fake all the evidence since it was impossible that AUM did it.
Four Japan Cultists Arrested in Shooting
Associated Press / Tue, Jul. 06, 2004
TOKYO - Four members of a Japanese doomsday cult were arrested Wednesday in connection with the shooting of the national police chief nine years ago, authorities said.
Takaji Kunimatsu was shot and seriously wounded while investigating Aum Shinrikyo, the cult later held responsible for the nerve gas attack on Japan's subway system that killed 12 people, injured thousands and crushed the country's sense of safety. He was shot 10 days after the subway attack in March 1995.

Posted by trek/taro at 1:03 PM KDT
Updated: Wednesday, July 7, 2004 4:51 PM KDT
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Traitor & moron, Charles DUMBO Jenkins is getting Japanese protection
Mood:  incredulous

DEATH for DUMBO!

Gov't to invite abductee's family to live in Japan
Mainichi Shimbun, Japan, July 6, 2004
The Japanese government will invite the husband and two daughters of former North Korea abductee Hitomi Soga to live permanently in Japan when the four meet in Jakarta on Friday, officials said.The Japanese government will invite the husband and two daughters of former North Korea abductee Hitomi Soga to live permanently in Japan when the four meet in Jakarta on Friday, officials said.....
The husband, Charles Jenkins, is reportedly reluctant to come to Japan because he is afraid of being handed over to the United States for his 1965 desertion of the U.S. military in South Korea when he went to North Korea.
Japanese officials are discussing how to persuade the U.S. to abandon its plans to detain Jenkins, while at the same time trying to convince him to settle in Japan with Soga and their two daughters

How I came to Japan by mistake
Topic: Me
I studied Chinese not Japanese in grad school and when I graduated I landed a post in Shanghai Teachers College to teach linguistics. This is in the dark ages, 1983, when it was unheard of for a Lao Wai to be doing this. Nevertheless, I had a valid job contract with cash advance, assistant professorship slot, a rare ?Western" apartment and a paid R/T airfare with a short stopover in Tokyo to do couple lectures and to collect my work visa from the Chinese pseudo-Embassy in south Roppongi.
To make a long story short, I waited for my Chinese work visa one week, two weeks, three weeks*?. On the third week, Seiko-Epson asked me why I was still waiting and offered me twice my US wages. I smiled. Japan Inc. slapped me on my back and declared me their ?computer expert.? I?ve been here ?by mistake? ever since.



*It turns out that back in the early 80s, a ?parasite of society? like me (gimp) was not eligible for a Chinese work visa but nobody at the pseudo-Embassy was brave enough to tell me that to my face.


That's why I'm cadillacin' nowadayz! 8)

Lil' Kim's a-hole....
Kim Jong-il is a Bragging Golf Emperor
Donga, South Korea - 06 July---... The North Korean press once reported that in his first round of golf in 1994, Kim scored an eagle on his first hole and hit a hole-in-one on the next ...
----------------------------
Teeing Off With the 'Dear Duffer'
NYTimes.com > Week in Review > July 4, 2004. **vile free registration required** By CHARLES McGRATH
.... North Korea, on the other hand, does not have much of a golf heritage, though it does boast of having possibly the best player in the world. That golfer is none other than Kim Jong Il, North Korea's dictator, who in addition to all his other duties, according to reports in the North Korean news media, plays regularly and routinely scores three or four holes in one a round.
Mr. Kim took up the game in 1994, and on his very first outing at the Pyongyang course he eagled the opening hole, according to the North Korean media. He then proceeded to ace five holes (or 11, according to some reports) on the way to shooting a 34 - or 38 under par. (The lowest recorded score in P.G.A. history is 59, and that has been attained only three times: by Al Geiberger in 1977, Chip Beck in 1991 and David Duval in 1999.)
Mr. Kim's score was so low that some disbelievers (though not in North Korea) at first suggested that it must have been for nine holes, not 18, but the 18-hole total was later verified not only by the club pro but by 17 bodyguards who accompanied the dictator on his round....

Did you see 640 million yen lying around anywhere?
SLOPPY OR OVERWORKED: Harried post clerks misplace millions
Asahi Shimbun, Japan -July 6
Careless, overburdened clerks at post offices nationwide lost track of about 640 million yen in cash in fiscal 2003, according to a Japan Post internal review ...

Sony screws up, AGAIN! The electronic book reader from hell, the Sony Librie
Mood:  don't ask
Topic: Japanese Tech

Sony's new Librie electronic book reader

REVIEW: Sony E-Book a Revolution for Eyes apnews.excite.com
COMMMENT
Would it hurt Sony so much to have put WiFi in it?
They can disable the cut-&-paste function to protect their damn holy DRM....but... Oh Buddha, the E-Book has got the screen and the keyboard so why not make it a huge value to traveling biz people by giving the Librie electronic book reader the functionality of email and/or web browsing via WiFi? Sheesh.
But wait... you can't copy and paste passages to another computer or device. And copy protection built into the software garbles your books into useless data after two months.

Get text messages on your mobile via the dead Lucie Blackman
Topic: Japanese Tech
Tragedy inspires text service
ic NorthWales, UK - 5 July
The father of British hostess Lucie Blackman, who was murdered in Japan more than three years years ago, has launched a personal safety service based on mobile phones. ....Tim Blackman came up with the idea for Safetytext while searching for his daughter, who disappeared in 2000. Her dismembered remains were found seven months later.
The new service allows customers to leave a delayed message explaining where they are going and with whom.
Users decide how long to delay the message, from 30 minutes to 24 hours. If they do not return within the stated time and cancel the message, it is sent by text to a chosen friend or relative.

Tokyo's Panda-Head Killer to serve a life sentence in the "zoo"
Life sentence demanded for 'panda-head killer'
Mainichi Online, July 5, 2004
---Tokyo's "panda-head killer," who is accused of stabbing a female student to death in 2001, should be jailed for life, prosecutors told the Tokyo District Court on Monday.....Yamaguchi approached the 19-year-old from behind in April 2001 with the intention of molesting her. When she turned around, he mistakenly thought she was making fun of him and he flew into a rage, stabbing her in four places, including the back, prosecutors said.
The killing attracted headlines because the killer was wearing a panda-shaped headpiece. Police tracked Yamaguchi down because he had been spotted wearing the panda headpiece almost every day near the murder scene over a one-week period leading up to the incident.

Lil' Kim & Koizumi avoid pesty alien/gaijin reporters
Topic: Media
Foreign Reporters Battle Kantei [Prime Minister's office] for NK Access
July 5, 2004, The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan
Pyongyang II was a sequel the foreign media in Japan didn't want.
On Monday, May 17, the Prime Minister's office (Kantei) told the Foreign Press in Japan (FPIJ) that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi would be going to Pyongyang on Saturday, May 22. Two of 27 media seats on the PM's plane were for foreign reporters...losing wire services -- Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse -- the news brought a flurry of scathing e-mails.
..."In normal emergencies, reporters rent planes. Why don't we charter a plane, call it Koizumi's press plane, and tag along?" suggested the New York Times' Jim Brooke in an e-mail. "I realize [the] Gaimusho and North Korea are two daunting bureaucracies...

Topic: Japanese Tech
Q: What's the Japanese word for videoblog?
A:ビデオブログ (Videoblog)

Momentshowing ask: " I expected to find all these Japanese sites with videoblogs. Why?"

Sheesh. They're Japanese: 100 years in the hardware future and 100 years behind in software.

My standard Japanese company joke:
Q: "What do you call a salaryman with an opinion?"
A: "Unemployed."
Blogging is not as big in Japan because having an opinion is gauche.


オーディオブログ（Audioblog）、写真ブログ（Fotolog）、法律ブログ（Blawg）、ダイジェストブログ（Digest blog）Warblog、マット・ウェルチ発明）、日記ブログ（Journal blogとDiary blog）、知識ブログ（Knowledge Log、Klog、K-Blog）、ニュースブログ（News blogs）、専門家ブログ（Pundit blog）、技術ブログ（Tech blog）、グループブログ（Group blog）、移動ブログ（Moblog）、などが挙げられる。

"blogs are the equivalent of public urination on the web"

---ultragaijin

Pink & blue are the standard hair colors of the Japanese race
According my extensive understanding of Japanese culture from watching anime and reading manga, pink and blue are the standard hair colors of the Japanese race.

_

Second Yankee diagnosed with parasites
Associated Press /Thu, Jul. 01, 2004
NEW YORK - Kevin Brown was diagnosed with intestinal parasites, joining Jason Giambi as the second member of the New York Yankees to test positive for the ailment this week....Brown suggested he might have gotten the parasites during the Yankees' season-opening series in Japan against Tampa Bay in March. Hershon said the Devil Rays had no cases.
But Hershon said parasites are rarely found in developed countries. "It's no more likely to happen there than here," Hershon said. "Japan is a very clean country."

D'oh! A huge percentage of the Japanese population has sushi parasites which is why I Guess I like Frozen Sushi, an IHT/NY Times article. I don't think we'll ever know how many Japanese people get sick from food. Research has found a link between sushi consumption and a high incidence of stomach cancer in the Japanese population. Hell, they only just finish litigating the mercury poisoning cases (from contaminated fish) some 50 years after the fact--- valid illness comparisons are hard to come by.
If you DARE...full-size NSFW picture here.

Hello Kitty gets freaky with Gundam
Bandai, Sanrio in 10 Bln Yen Character Venture, Nikkei Says
July 2 (Bloomberg) -- Bandai Co., Japan's largest toymaker, agreed to work with Sanrio Co., the maker of Hello Kitty goods, to license character products with a target of 1 billion yen ($9.2 million) in sales in the first year...Tokyo-based Bandai, which makes game software and Gundam, Digimon and Power Ranger character goods plans to increase sales this year by expanding its toy line to target young girls as well as boys....