SDCA comments

I feel like at least half of my office have or possibly had depression, other mental issues

I see many on their phones while riding their bicycles, it's crazy watching them wobbling onto the streets.

Many of these movies won't even be remembered.

I love adding brussels sprouts in my cream stew.

I almost thought it was an award for the actual age and mindset of the government.

I do think it is "変" that salaries are still relatively flat despite all the promoting.

UAE Tatemae: Let us all care for the environment, together

UAE Honne: Buy our oil

@Yubaru

Okay got it, thanks!

@virusrex

Thanks for the input.

@Yubaru

Thanks for the clarification. And yes, since I personally have not gone to a Uni in Japan, I likely don't know much about the system compared to the folks on here. I understand that the scholarships are still loans that are obligated to pay, but can someone clarify as to what happens to the scholarship after the intended sport has been removed? Are there any consequences?

Recruiters arent going to know a thing, unless the person personally decides to add "football" on their resume!

I agree for the most part on what you are saying. But I have been to some group interviews where they would look at what university you went to and start bringing up unrelated things just to put you in a bad position. I witnessed another person at an interview almost cry on the spot. Luckily I didn't have to go through that because no one knew my school, but they still managed to bring up something completely unrelated to make me feel uncomfortable.

I feel bad for those kids who came in on a scholar to play American Football. What will they do now? I hope this doesn't effect their ability to find a job. Those recruiters tend to look into these things and start shaming for no reason.

Or, hear me out, no one really likes going to those nomikais? It's basically still work, only you aren't getting paid and since bosses aren't paying anymore, why bother going?

I think people are worried about the amount of effort it takes to switch. I remember when I first came to Japan and I went to Docomo to get my phone, not only did it take hours, but they preinstalled apps that require a subscription and needed for me to come in on a separate day to have them take the subscription off. Not only were the prices outrageous, but at the time I only had 2GB of data. Everything can be done online in minutes with Rakuten with e-sim.

I used Y-mobile after that, it was okay. But then I tried Rakuten mobile due to the amount of money I could potentially save which was needed during the pandemic. In terms of coverage, yeah it isn't the best but really nothing to complain about since you barely pay for anything. I mostly live and commute in areas with coverage and travel to inaka during weekends and it has been fine for the most part. The fact that you have the ability to use unlimited data is fantastic, and if you are usually home and on wifi, your plan is automatically cheaper that month. Those who don't have wifi at all need not to worry with unlimited data.

They definitely did a crummy job at marketing with their ads. I feel like Japan is one of those unique markets. We still have Yakult ladies, insurance companies knocking door to door, eigyou-man travelling 1000s of Kms just to greet their client, etc. Perhaps Rakuten needed to first build a client base by going door to door instead of relying on their E-commerce clientele.

Fami-chiki entered the chat

As much as I like Maeda, this contract seems a bit much for a reclamation project. Was kind of hoping he'd return to Japan.

I usually don't do this unless I seriously have to on say 3 hour sleep days, but energy drinks do the trick for me. The key is to drink caffeine 90 minutes after you wake up, apparently this helps with reducing your chances of mid-day crash according to Andrew Huberman. But nice suggestions above that I might try next time.

I love these guys, always smiling, they do a great job of hiding their urgency even though they are in a hurry. My area has really cool people working for both Yamato and Sagawa. It is a shame they do not get the same treatment by their employer as say UPS who has a good track record of raising salaries and employee benefits. If these companies want to tackle labor shortage, they need to start with retaining them first.

Additional pay topped the list across respondents whether they were working in-person, remotely (44%) or in hybrid (50%) roles. However, just 4% of HR representatives whose companies have introduced new policies to get employees back to the workplace say that higher compensation is among them.

Employees who are already going into the office — either entirely or part-time — indicated that other incentives such as commuter benefits, in-office childcare, free food and social gatherings could also add at least “some” more satisfaction with returning to the office.

I don't know, maybe this is just me but more pay which is likely a minor bump won't really entice me considering all the other massive benefits of working from home. The extra time saved is just too precious.

*in-office childcare :** *Do I really want to be taking my child onto those morning commuting trains? Unless I live next door to my company, I would say pass on this one.

free food and social gatherings : Free food is nice, considering it is much cheaper to make lunch at home and any food sold near my office is just too expensive. But with free food comes cost cutting elsewhere so I am skeptical on this.

Minakami still has the potential, I go there because it is close, has a ski area, has an onsen, and I can drive home afterwards. Not to mention they have a few onsen spots that you can enjoy together with the Mrs. It is a shame Gunma is not getting a lot of attention lately, but I do realize many older buildings are interfering with the overall scenery.

This man has guts, can't say I'd do the same unless they threatened me directly. On the news, they mentioned that a woman employee first came out with the pole but froze before the robbers who blatantly ignored her. Maybe this was Suspender Man's time to show off his kendo skills to impress the ladies. lol

Some of the time off people take will be for mundane things, not R&R

Sports day for each kid at school, renewing your driving license, trips to the docs, and health checkups. Looking after kids or PTA stuff too as grund says.

agreed, don't forget most bank tellers are also only available during weekdays.

Hey, not bad at all! But I wonder what the average amount of days per person was used? Someone could have very well used only one day and that counts as one using their leave last year. Lots of companies are also forcing their employees to use their leave even if the employee doesn't want to so that the company can write that on their recruiting page (ratio of employees taking leave: 100%).

It still baffles me whenever I hear someone state that they never use their leave and have x amount of days. The thought of those workers coming in to work while being sick is very selfish in my opinion. Stop spreading your germs so that the other workers can work to their full potential!

In other words, please don't shoot down our precious satellite that took our entire country's GDP to research and develop.

Japanese anime/ manga/ J-pop is still pretty relevant and has it's ups and downs when it comes to trends. I personally don't watch anime, but apparently One Piece the Netflix live action series was a hit and this is especially the case because companies like Disney continue to put out garbage. J-pop may not be as popular as K-pop currently, but the past couple of years, we have seen a trend in genres like City Pop (80's Japanese music) being a hit amongst enthusiasts. Sumo being a recent trend because of Netflix, etc.

Think of Japan like Sony's Xperia, it is a hit amongst enthusiasts, but most people still buy the iPhone or Galaxy.

awkwardly bowing while leaving a conversation instead of waving my hand and say "good bye"

Great pitching and amazing postseason for Chikamoto!

Visiting Fukushima right now on a hiking trip. Great place that deserves more love and not hate over Tepco's prior failures.

Have they established the root cause of why they are flocking towards urban areas? Bears generally stay away from humans as they are also afraid of us but only attack if they feel threatened or are in need of food and you happen to be near it. Perhaps using that money to help repopulate their food source in their natural habitats will allow for them to move back and stay there as a long term option?

JR should sue this guy.

Kishida saw the prices of lettuce last week and decided that 3,333 yen per month should do the trick.

On the bright side, I'm starting to notice more part-time job listings in my area for 1,200 yen per hour (not late night shifts). This is likely due to less people looking for part-time jobs and the demand to fill in their crew for daily operation is on the rise. I'm hoping this leads to more companies increasing salaries to retain their employees. We have a high turnover rate at our company as well and many are saying their new job is paying them more. This is happening very slowly, but let's wait and see what happens in a few years.

I second to JeffLee. You don't see job listings for senior level positions that say the salary will be lower for a particular gender. It's not like women get paid lower for doing the same job role in the same seniority level compared to their male counterpart. I talk to some of my colleagues who are Labor specialists, and I figured out that Japan actually has a really good Labor Standards Act that fairly favors employees over employers, if you feel you are undercompensated, you can always take this to the Labor Standards Inspection Office if negotiating or unions don't work, and they will be able to look into your case. Many black kigyos and employers who overwork you are actually doing these acts illegally and could be penalized if more people spoke up, but everyone just stays quite and gaman or shouganai.

Now if women are clearly not promoted because of their gender even if they are well deserving, that's a separate issue that should be addressed.