Amidalism comments

I'm sure this next door patient is going to say something along the lines of: "His constant coughing was annoying so I murdered him."

He probably didn't have much longer to live in the first place at that age with pneumonia. What a horrible way to go out.

7 kids in total? It is expensive enough to raise one or two children here, let alone that many. Sounds like they were most likely doing it to score extra welfare money, which was most likely promptly blown at pachinko.

They should be locked away for the rest of their lives for this heinous crime, but here is betting that they end up getting a 2 year suspended sentence and their other children returned to their custody shortly afterwards.

Even if the government required pensioners to come in to their local government office once a year this would have been stopped earlier. Is an hour or so once a year really that much of an inconvenience? For those who wouldn't be able to make it do to health issues they could still easily have a government employee visit them at their home.

Why did it take them so long to catch him? Do they not have caller id?

Talk about fear mongering. Unless that brownie was laced with something asides from pot, I can't believe that it was entirely responsible for him doing this. Sounds like he must have had a screw loose to begin with. I understand that 19 is still considered a "teenager", but they are spinning this to make it sound like she gave drugs to a young child who had no idea how to cope with them. If this happened in Canada he would have been considered an adult.

Wouldn't be surprised if this was done by someone in the government to give them reason to put restrictions on drone usage by the public.

Can't think of a better way to spend a Monday afternoon! /s I really can't understand how people can get off to things like this, let alone think that they can get away with doing it in such a public place as a train station. Clearly missing a few screws.

34 times??? What took them so long? They didn't realize that after warning them for the first 4 or 5 times without results that something was wrong? Or maybe after the 10th time? Or the 20th? Shame on the city for being so pathetic and spineless. It doesn't even feel right to commend them after hearing how long it took them to get off their asses and do something.

There are plenty of great pets in shelters that need homes. Even if you buy these cute tiny pets, they are going to grow up to the size of the animals in shelters in a short amount of time. Quit feeding the demand!

Foggia and Seawolf have it covered above, but the matter can't be stressed enough. The APA group is as right-wing and anti-Chinese/Korean as they come. This is all outlined in the books written in both Japanese and English left in the rooms. When I asked Korean friends who were staying at an APA if they saw the books they claimed that there were none in their rooms, yet were found in rooms of all of the Westerners. Not sure if this was by chance or if the hotel tries to avoid controversy by removing the books from rooms with people with Chinese/Korean sounding names. Regardless, this is not a company that anyone should be giving money to - especially foreigners. I really wish some news organization with a backbone would do some more in depth reporting on this issue and call for a boycott now and during the Olympics.

So is he still a teacher at the school or did he get fired?

I think inshikoku is on to something. Dude probably blew his collected money at pachinko hoping to double down but ended up losing it all.

I often get asked by Japanese people in the countryside if we eat rice in Canada/America. Some of them seem to think that we are strictly on a potato/bread/pasta starch diet. While we may not break the top 50, at least we have far more types of rice available at supermarkets. Really wish that rice import tariffs weren't as bad as they are here so I wouldn't have to pay ridiculous amounts for jasmine or basmati online.

I really can't understand the mentality of these people who need a body for closure. Whether they find the bodies or not (very unlikely) it isn't going to change anything. Not trying to be rude, just practical.

Not only is it sad to hear that a 61-year old woman is working at a convenience store (I doubt it is because she likes it there), but why would she attempt to chase the guy for a couple of comic books? What could the possible value be? Most of them are printed on dirt cheap recycled paper. It is obviously too bad what has happened to her, but I really can't feel all that sorry for her needlessly putting herself in danger for a handful of yen.

I can understand their interrogation scare tactics, but saying that he has done it 100 times is pretty amazing. You'd figure he would try and play it down like saying he has only done it a couple of times.

The issue of Takeshima/Dokdo has been disputed between the two countries since before the war, so I have no problem with them teaching that in their textbooks. The "Nanking incident" is something that I can't get behind at all though. I've talked with young Japanese people about the rape of Nanking and for the most part none of them know of the atrocities that occurred there thanks to this white-washing of history.

I second what cleo said. If you are crying too much from cutting onions it is most likely a sign that you need to get your knife sharpened, or quit using a cheap knife.

Lots of parks have signs up in them specifically saying not to feed the birds. If this one didn't have a sign like that, perhaps he could have gone to the local ward office and petitioned for one instead of leaving thumbtacks everywhere.

Somehow I doubt that his goal was to stop people from feeding birds. Probably another one of these geezers who are angry about all the "noise" children playing in the park were making.

Nice to hear some uplifting news for once instead of all the heinous crimes we read about on here.

What makes this ambulance special is that it has a 2,600cc engine

Too bad I doubt this engine will ever be pushed hard as all the ambulances I see driving around here tend to drive under the speed limit.

Sure I wouldn't mind not having to see all the ugly power lines everywhere, but this just seems like the wrong time to throw it into the budget. The Tokyo Olympics will almost most certainly bring about a negative profit like so many Olympics have in the past, so is tacking on unnecessary extra expenditures like this really in their best interest?

Somehow I really don't think it matters how they try and promote it overseas. They certainly aren't going to be able to tap into the middle aged men audience overseas, as being fans of underage girls is not acceptable there. Maybe they can aim for elementary and jr high girls, but then again I doubt they have much interest in listening to music that they don't understand the lyrics of. Good luck getting the majority of high school students and up to be interested in happy-go-lucky music with girls in cutesy outfits dancing as there is no edge like current popular artists in the West.

She was in a futon and a T-shirt was twisted tightly around her neck, with her hands still on the shirt.

Hopefully this scumbag follows in her footsteps. 17 years is far too short for these crimes.

Initially, the school said it did not think the bullying was a direct cause of the boy’s death

This sounds like such a cop out. I'd really like to see these people subjected to the same torture that this boy was so they could truly put themselves in his shoes. Regardless of what other problems he may have had going on in his life, I doubt anything could have been worse than the bullying he went through that was brushed off by teachers. It makes me sick to my stomach to think that adults can witness a child being bullied and just "brushed off the abuse as a joke." I hope they have a hard time sleeping at night knowing they could have stepped up and done something about it.

I always love how honest these people are after they kill someone. Not sure what the ratio of people who try to hide the body vs. confess instantly after the crime is, but I'm sure there has to be more people confessing here then elsewhere. It's just like a child naively admitting to their parents when they have done something wrong.

@Sensato: I can't agree with you more. It drives me crazy when they translate it as cardiac arrest. Especially when they find the corpse(s) days after death. It seems that the EMTs are unable to officially verify that they are without vital signs (no clue why) and it has to be confirmed at a hospital. What a joke.

Not sure what is worse: this advertisement or the fact that it somehow warranted a news article.

After all the trouble that NK caused Sony, I doubt that Sony cares at all if these 10,000 copies are all bootlegs.

I think that she is very lucky to have gotten off as easy as she did. If ignorance of Japanese law was really the case, then shame on her for not bothering to look it up. If she willingly knew - even worse.

Adderall is to my knowledge one of the most commonly prescribed drugs for ADD. If it is illegal in Japan, what is the most common Japanese medication for treatment of it? Or is it just another mental disorder that is just swept under the carpet and ignored?

I still only charge about 1,000 pears an hour.

At Japanese fruit prices, that is pretty expensive!

I know that he isn’t going to be returning home from school anymore.

Well from everything that we heard, he wasn't going to school in the first place to return from it. This should have been a red flag for her. Sure she is the victim here and nothing can be done to bring her son back, but I ask all you parents: if your child stopped going to school, would you not do everything in your means to figure out what the problem was and solve it? If your child came home bruised like he did, would you sit by idly? It is terrible that this boy felt comfortable telling his friend on Line that he thought he may be murdered, but was not able to sit down with his mother to discuss his fears. Just because she released an emotional statement does not mean that we should turn a blind eye to the surrounding situation. I feel that this problem is bigger than a single parents responsibility and warrants discussion on the current state of affairs of Japanese society, as this was not the first or the last incident of its kind.