mu-da comments

@ marc laden

kasuhara is not referring to "newcomers". It is about Japanese customers used to overservicing.

To NOT just repeat "moshiwakenai" like an answering machine for sensible complains would sure help to prevent abuse by customers. There has been an inflation of using "moshiwakenai" compared to the good old times. My advice to usually helpful and friendly workers: Refrain from using "moshiwakenai" and never repeat it.

Afuera! (courtesy of Javier Milei).

Ursula von der Leyen, a corrupt leader and unelected too.

The problem is not her couch. Well, you can't fire yourself, so the next best is to fire her coach.

Starbucks should first improve the quality of the product they are selling and stop offering awful coffee made from overroasted low quality beans for a premium price.

Nothing useful to do?

Can't wait for his arrival in Japan.

The headline is wrong. China doesn't push rivals limits. It continues its frequent hostilities by entering foreign territories. It is an act of war and should be treated as such. Chinese ships flagrantly entering other countries territorial waters and Chinese planes entering other contries airspace without permission should be sunk or shot down. If China doesn't respect internationally recognised borders it should be treated as the rogue state it is.

I just lived there for a couple of years. The majority of people there don't vote for the "far-right" but it's a vote against the incompetence and authoritarianism of the Greens. The "far-right" is the only party which will insure that the Green party is not coming again into government through the back door by a coalition. The majority of Germans, including in the West hopes, that the Greens will be kicked out of the local governments altogether.

Any appeasement with China is an invitation for them to do it again. Take a page from Susi Pudjiastuti, the Indonesian minister for maritime affairs: Capture the ship, send the crew back to China and blow up the ship.

A Chinese student complains about not being consulted and "dictorial ways". Very funny. There is absolutely no problem that foreign students should pay more. They have the privilage to study there, even their parents didn't pay taxes in Japan and they themselves most probably won't pay taxes in Japan the future. It's like in most clubs: members pay less than non-members..

Macau or HK.it works well.

Yeah we saw how that worked: constant bullying and threats - then takeover - anybody resisting or protesting thrown in jail. Taiwan is not China. At least not yet, as long as the Taiwanese have a choice.

The bully state complains about lack of submission.

Shoot it down. Only language the CCP understands.

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China is a bully state. They bully Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Japan over claims in East Asian waters. The Indonesian minister blowing up Chinese boats talked their language.

The bigger question is why the Japanese govt is so intent on scaling up its whaling operations while demand for the meat in Japan has dwindled to such a low level.

You can thank Mr Watson for this. Commercial whaling would have quietly died in the early 2000's. The market for whale meat had been steadily shrinking over the years and there was no interest to save the "tradition". But then Watson came along with his television stunts (whale wars reality TV) which caused the Japanese government to dig in its nationalist heels while the Japanese support for whaling was reawakened and grew stronger than ever. Watson, with his high profile anti-whaling activism managed to reinvigorate the support for whaling in Japan and thus contributed more to the continuous slaughter of whales than anybody else before him.

I used to think of him as a visionary. But now, the more he talks, the less I listen.

Good decision. Now send him back to Japan. There he can use his activists acumen and do something really useful: protest against and try to change the Japanese criminal system.

I'm against commercial whaling. If it wouldn't be for Watson, commercial whaling would have quietly died in the early 2000's. The market for whale meat had been steadily shrinking over the years and there was no interest to save the "tradition". But then Watson came along with his high profile activism. His "heroism" caused the Japanese government dig in its nationalist heels while the Japanese support for whaling was reawakened and grew stronger than ever. Watson is a narcissistic attention grabber not a hero. He managed to reinvigorate the support for whaling in Japan and thus contributed more to the continuous slaughter of whales than anybody else before him. For that he deserves to be thrown in a Japanese jail for the rest of his life.

By maritime law Watson is a common criminal and should be thrown in jail. He then can use his activist acumen to improve the Japanese legal system.

A politician who doesn't know the meaning of political.

The mayor of Nagasaki is just following the current herd. The Iranians, Hamas and Hezbollah will applaud.

China accuses..... Anything else?

If it wouldn't be for Watson commercial whaling would have quietly died in the early 2000's. The market got smaller and smaller and there was no interest to save the "tradition". But then Watson came along, made the Japanese government dig in its nationalist heels with his 'methods' and the Japanese support for whaling was reawakened and grew stronger than ever, even only a few really wanted to eat whale meat. Watson is an attention grabber. He sure got attention but he didn't save one whale in the process. On the contrary, he managed to reinvigorate the support for whaling in Japan and thus contributed more to the continuous slaughter of whales than anybody else before him. For that he deserves to be thrown in a Japanese jail for the rest of his life.

They should call it tourist meiwaku-fine.

Please keep woke madness imports out. .

Biden like most of the commentators above lacks the understanding of meiwaku. Any outsiders, not only foreigners, in a rice growing culture are meiwaku because you have to redistribute resources (i.e. water) and you can't grow rice alone. That shaped society. My (Japanese) landlord who bought land and built a hose in a rural community told me that it took ten years until he was acknowledged and another ten years until he was really accepted. He was a daikusan so he could contribute to the repairs and maintencance of the local communities shrine. That was his ticket. He could contribute. I am not insinuating that there aren't xenophobic people in Japan, but a lot of complains of foreigners are similar to the experiences of Japanese "people from outside" organically grown communities - including teams at work. Both India and Japan are 'old' societies witha lot of a social undercurrents which are obvious only to insiders.

Xi Jinping's agressive and predatory politics are inflaming tensions, not Japan and not only with Japan, but with the Philippines, Indonesia and Taiwan as well. What contracts and consensus means to communist China we have seen in Hong kong.

The police overstep because most grudgingly accept it, including Japanese persons. Somebody had to make a stand and I'm grateful to these guys that they put in time and effort and go the legal correct way. Somebody had to do it.