Asiaman7 comments

Japan Airlines Co CEO Mitsuko Tottori  Image: REUTERS file

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… based on investigations of fiscal 2023 financial statements released by the end of August.

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Didn’t Mitsuko Tottori become CEO in fiscal 2024?

Via BBC …

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It is hard to think of an attack more calculated to sow fear and confusion.

Hezbollah relies heavily on pagers for the group’s communications.

Mobile phones have long since been abandoned as simply too vulnerable - as Israel’s assassination of a Hamas bombmaker demonstrated as long ago as 1996.

But today’s attacks were terrifying in their scope.

Hezbollah members were blown up in supermarkets, on the street, in their cars, at home, next to their children.

Incidents were reported from all across Lebanon, from Beirut to the Bekaa Valley. Even from neighbouring Syria.

Each explosion may have been small, but some resulted in catastrophic injuries.

One particularly graphic image showed a lifeless young man slumped in a barber’s chair, his face bloodied.

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https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpw5rqzz5jjo

He fled the country in disgrace in 2000 when leaked videotapes showed his spy chief, Vladimiro Montesinos, bribing lawmakers. The president went to Japan, the land of his parents, and famously faxed in his resignation.

Some readers might not realize that Fujimori was a dual citizen (Japan does not extradite its citizens) who lived in Japan in exile for five years. He even unsuccessfully campaigned for a Japanese diet seat.

just hours after Trump and Harris faced off in their first-ever debate. 

A laughing stock. Trump has become what he most feared.

“This was a bad night for Trump,” Brit Hume, the sage of Fox News, concluded.

“In Springfield, they [migrants] are eating the dogs” — Donald Trump 

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Kudos to ABC’s David Muir for setting the record straight by clarifying that this claim is untrue.

Are NHK news program reporters ever allowed to go off-script?

On this topic, I listened to longtime NHK voice Murray Johnson severely criticize the head sumo judge repeatedly for a poor decision that gave Kotozakura an unjustified victory yesterday. (By the way, Kotozakura’s father is head of sumo’s judging department, but we’re probably not supposed to discuss that too deeply.)

I loved Murray’s critique, particularly when replay supported his assessment.

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Photo: https://x.com/kuru2obake/status/1833431111789101076

Trump’s eyes have that particular shine which often distinguishes geniuses, alcoholics, and hysterics.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo plans to keep the massive multicolored rings that were attached to the "Dame de Fer" ("Iron Lady") for the Paris Olympics until at least 2028, when the next Games will be held in Los Angeles.

The family of Gustave Eiffel has a valid point. Those rings don’t really belong on the graceful “Iron Lady.”

At the longest, keep them until 2028.

Japan PM candidate Taro Kono risks sinking campaign with nuclear sub plan

Just to clarify, Kono is not proposing that Japan’s submarines be armed with nuclear weapons. The subs would be nuclear-powered so that they can remain submerged for up to three months.

His rivals are trying to turn it into the idea that he wants to make Japan a nuclear power.

"If the U.S. government becomes unstable,

I guess that means “If Trump is elected”

She is for a strong Japan to stand up to the US and China. That’s why she’s popular.

Popular?

All we need to know, as reported by Asahi:

“Takaichi said her economic package of measures would be known as ‘Sanaenomics’ and mirror the direction of Abe’s policies that focused on ‘three arrows,’ including monetary easing and fiscal stimulus measures.”

Interesting fact: “Shogun” was filmed entirely in British Columbia, Canada.

Did you know that every single bag of rice from Fukushima is tested?

According to the Ministry of Environment’s own website, “random monitoring” has occurred from fiscal 2020 onwards.

Those of us who live in Japan fortunately have many other sources for exceptional peaches — Nagano, Yamanashi, and Yamagata to name three.

Asiaman

as you may have noticed, Japan is overpopulated as it is, Tokyo is overrun with tourists to the point where it is getting increasingly difficult to live here. Canada is a huge country and has plenty of space.

I can certainly agree with that rationale.

stickman1760

please go somewhere else.

Why?

The eternal question: Is gambling a tax on stupidity?

Do large casino resorts have a positive impact on the people among us?

A former diplomat said embassies often reached out to film festival organizers when Japanese films were planned to be shown.

"We are required to assert Japan's position, whether it be from a cultural or economic standpoint, …

Should bureaucrats be determining the people’s position on cultural topics?

For example, if a film about whaling presents data from the independent Nippon Research Centre showing that 95 percent of Japanese residents very rarely or never eat whale meat, should the Japanese government be using our taxes to push an opposing viewpoint?

Amid concerns over stable continuation of the imperial family, the male succession rules have been questioned on a number of occasions, most notably under the government of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in 2005 when an expert panel called for allowing women to succeed to the throne as well as scrapping the rule allowing descent only through the male line.

But the debate quickly lost steam when Prince Hisahito was born in September 2006 as the first new male member of the imperial family in nearly 41 years.

More precisely, the debate was paused when the news of Princess Kiko’s pregnancy was whispered to PM Koizumi by one of his advisers during a televised diet session months before Prince Hisahito’s birth.

NHK Close Up Gendai did a special on insulating houses yesterday.

Can’t imagine who downvoted this contribution.

Modern insulation, allowing us to be comfortable year-round, has certainly had a positive impact on my life. No longer cold in the winter and hot in the summer.

I recall a Canadian acquaintance mentioning 30 years ago that he had never been as cold in Canada as he’d had in Japan.

in the fall, when people often travel by car.

Hmm. I would love to see the data on this.

I would have guessed that peak personal-car travel would have been during the New Year holiday, spring school-year break, Golden Week holiday, or summer school-year break — none of which occur during autumn.

Perhaps it’s the changing of the leaves that’s “driving” this car travel in autumn.

What's with the cop's ridiculous stance?

He certainly seems fearful of placing a foot on that covered manhole — for some strange reason.

mountainpear

Can you name one famous visual artist who went to Harvard!!

Why do you continue to search for visual artists at Harvard?

Those students go to schools like the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), Parsons School of Design, and the Savannah College of Art and Design.

mountainpear

@Asiaman7 You are talking like everyone who applies at Harvard can enter! 

YOU chose to compare MAU’s tuition with Harvard’s, not me! I suggested the Savannah College of Art and Design as a better comparison school.

No student should waste their time applying to Harvard unless they have a demonstrated history of excellent in a certain field.

mountainpear

@Asiaman7 But those private elite universities are already charging exorbitant prices! (As of the 2024-2025 academic year, the tuition for undergraduate students at Harvard is **approximately $59,000***, 

An MAU comparison school better than Harvard would be SCAD, the Savannah College of Art and Design.

Its average annual cost is $45k, its graduation rate is only 70%, and the median earnings of graduates is only 46k.

mountainpear

*@Asiaman7 But those private elite universities are already charging exorbitant prices! (As of the 2024-2025 academic year, the tuition for undergraduate students at Harvard is approximately $59,000, excluding room and board, fees, and other expenses. When you factor in room, board, student fees, and other miscellaneous expenses, the total estimated cost of attendance is around $84,000 per year.)*

Musashino art university's fees are pittance in comparison!

This article is not about the fees at MAU vs. Harvard.

However, since you bring it up, at Harvard, for families (including internationals) with annual incomes below $85,000 (12.4 million yen) the expected contribution is zero. That includes room and board, books, and other expenses.

Families with annual incomes between $85,000 and $150,000 contribute between 0 and 10 percent of their income.

Those with incomes above $150,000 are asked to pay proportionately more than 10 percent based on their circumstances. 

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Tuition and other expenses at MAU are about 1.65 million yen per year. So for families making less than 16.5 million yen ($113,000) a year, Harvard would be cheaper than MAU.

Harvard and Yale universities, Williams and Amherst colleges, and the like — basically all the elite private universities and colleges in the U.S. — do not charge higher fees for international students.

I should clearly indicate that no private university or college in the U.S. charges higher fees for international students — regardless of whether the school is considered to be “elite.”

Most nations' universities charge higher fees for international students. 

This is a bit of a non-story.

In the U.S., higher fees are charged for international students if the university or college receives public funding.

Harvard and Yale universities, Williams and Amherst colleges, and the like — basically all the elite private universities and colleges in the U.S. — do not charge higher fees for international students.

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Musashino Art University (MAU) is a private school. However, private universities in Japan do receive public subsidies to fund their capital development. Therefore, an argument can be made that international students at MAU should pay more because public subsidies are being used to support the school.

However, an argument could also be made that private U.S. universities and colleges receive public support/benefit in the form of government student aid and research grants and exemption from taxation, but international students at those schools are still not burdened with additional fees.

The government should follow the Fanuc example and give incentives to good-paying companies to locate in small towns outside major cities.

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From “How one small town in Yamanashi manages to have high birthrate,” Nov. 5, 2023 

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FANUC is a manufacturer of robots and other factory automation products. In 1984 it moved its head office to Oshino from Tokyo. Oshino is beautiful. Mount Fuji towers beautifully over it. The air is fresh, bracing, stimulating. It breeds ideas, so the thinking went, and ideas are what a cutting-edge high-tech venture like FANUC needs.

It’s a generous employer. The salaries it pays rank 20th among corporations nationwide, Playboy notes, citing 2023 figures from Toyo Keizai Online. Moreover, it hires some 100 freshmen employees a year. What does this have to do with Oshino’s birth rate? Everything.

It brought a sleepy old village to new life – or is it old life? – because, youthful dynamism and futuristic technology aside, there’s something just a little old-fashioned about FANUC’s transformation of Oshino.

The company compound is the size of three Tokyo Disneylands. It contains company housing, a company culture center, a medical clinic, a daycare center, a children’s park – just about everything a family needs to dispense with the outside world altogether, if so minded.

The compound swarms with rich young men – for FANUC’s researchers are overwhelmingly male, Playboy reports. With stable employment and salaries averaging 12.5 million yen a year, they are good catches for women looking for husbands in uncertain times. In times not long past they came from miles around, filling local coffee and tea shops in the hope of being noticed by FANUC men. A lot of families got started that way.

That’s considered undignified now, so it’s back to an even older recourse: the miai or marriage party bringing singles together to form, if the gods smile, couples.

The miai are often company events, the women coming from the local teachers’ union, the local nurses’ union, the local bank employees’ union, and so on. The trouble is, complains a FANUC researcher, “all the women tend to be of the same type.” He doesn’t say what type but he sounds discouraged. “Or,” he says, “we might get introduced to the single friends of colleagues’ wives.”

However it happens, happen it does, and the results, if fruitfulness is a  measure of happiness, are decidedly happy.

There’s no economic need for wives to work, and by and large they don’t. They bear and raise children instead.

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https://japantoday.com/category/features/kuchikomi/how-one-small-town-in-yamanashi-manages-to-have-high-birthrate?comment-order=oldest