Japan Today

Saki Endo comments

Posted in: Osaka woman causes 8 separate traffic accidents in 35 minutes See in context

I dislike the irreverence of this writing style, she could have killed someone. Would we be having quotes like "Yo dude that's how I play Mario Kart!" if someone had been due to her reckless actions?

24 ( +35 / -11 )

Posted in: Japan Post to stop delivery of live reptiles See in context

And yet they panic every time I take a postcard in that I want to send overseas, flapping about wondering what to do. Should have just sent a frog overseas instead. :)

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

Posted in: Honda and Nissan to begin merger talks, Nikkei reports See in context

Will they call it Honsan or Nisda when merged

Nah they'll go for 日本 :)

-1 ( +4 / -5 )

Posted in: 15-year-old girl fatally shoots teacher, student; wounds 6 others, then kills herself at Wisconsin school See in context

Thoughts and prayers.........

8 ( +10 / -2 )

Posted in: Japan museum named 'world's most beautiful' at French award ceremony See in context

Dear Editor, There appears to be a mistake with the photo as a flooded portakabin hire yard next to a prison wall is shown on an article for the world's most beautiful museum. Maybe this can be switched out for the photo of the museum?

-5 ( +10 / -15 )

Posted in: From anime to fine art: Yoshitaka Amano celebrated with major retrospective See in context

I went to an exhibition / art sale of his work in Ofunato in Iwate I think it was about 2 years ago. Just spectacular seeing his work in the flesh.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Posted in: Japan average pay hike tops ¥10,000 for 1st time See in context

I wonder if this years temporary income tax and residential tax has had any impact on these figures… my pay hasn’t risen in 3 years and I’ve asked 3 times and next year I am moving on. Voting with my feet.

8 ( +8 / -0 )

Posted in: Ishiba on shaky ground as voters go to polls See in context

Yesterday driving down Route 1 through Kameyama, election car driving in the opposite direction, speakers on full blast shouting stuff that nobody would make out what they are saying as they were driving along at 60kph or so, all they were doing was blasting out noise pollution with loads of white gloved hands waving out the windows...Like why bother, could it be that nobody thought for a second hang on a minute we're on a fast by-pass road with nothing around us except passing cars let's rest our voices and hands for a second before we pull off at the next exit and and start making a racket with extra vigor when we pull off the bypass.

9 ( +9 / -0 )

Posted in: Six-time Olympic cycling champion Chris Hoy says he has terminal cancer See in context

I have a lot of sympathy and can only wish him well for his treatment, and such a blow for his wife to also be succumbing to MS. In the last month or so I learned my mom has also succumbed to stage 4 cancer, spreading originally from the breast into the bones, spine and elsewhere and it sounds like Sir Chris Hoy will have similar medication as my mum will have.

It's a reminder, make the most of your life. And don't waste a day to tell those you love, that you love them.

8 ( +8 / -0 )

Posted in: Trainspotters to Trump whisperers: Contenders for Japan PM See in context

One thing that stands out to me is I now have a good idea who the possible candidates are.

But I have absolutely zero idea what they believe in and what their vision for Japan is. Maybe that's more important than whether they like to make models?

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Posted in: Japan lifts megaquake warning See in context

‘In the past have come in pairs’….and those pairs have, at times been 2 years apart. If this warning (not based on any real science) was really necessary then shouldn’t it last for at least another 2 years to cover the ‘pair’ criteria?!

Posting this with a view to inform, not to highlight being incorrect.

Last week's quake was sizable and was at the southern most extent of the so-called Nankai Trough. It wasn't considered "the big one" or "one of the pairs", but it was large enough to be considered a potential foreshock. It's also worth noting back in April there was another smaller but not insignificant earthquake in the same area, I was in Kobayashi, Miyazaki at the time and felt it half way up a volcano, despite the epicenter being off Nichinan's coast. So there has been more seismic activity in that area this year.

The "big one" would be considerably stronger, and if it follows the general pattern of Nankai Trough mega-quakes, it would be followed by another significant earthquake within 2 years or so.

It was worth informing the public, there are risks both ways, boy who called wolf etc. but if they didn't, and something did happen... damned if you damned if you don't.

And there is precedent, in 2011, on March 9th 2011 there was a sizable 7.2/3 earthquake in Tohoku. At the time it wasn't considered to out of the ordinary, just another earthquake with minimal damage, and many at the time said, you will know when it's the big one. But very few people were saying this could be a foreshock.

2 days later, just over 48 hours later, Japan experienced one of its strongest earthquakes and subsequently tsunamis in its history, the 9.0 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami on March 11th 2011. The March 9th earthquake that was largely ignored, has in time become recognized as the foreshock. Subsequent to the 2:46pm 9.0 earthquake on March 11th, many many aftershocks were felt.

The economic and social aspect is regrettable, but if nothing was said, and something did happen....is it worth the risk?

The positive to take from this is Japan is somewhat ready, and it has given many people a chance to reflect on whether they are ready for such an emergency with a decent non perishable food supply, water, sanitary products etc. Please look at it like that, make sure you are ready.

Having lived within 50m of the tsunami wall in Miyako, Iwate and having been evacuated before, I can assure you, be glad Japan takes this kind of thing seriously, it saves lives in the long run.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

Posted in: Bear takes bag of rice from front door of home in Iwate Prefecture See in context

When the rice expands in the moisture in its gut that bear is going to have one heck of a belly ache.

He’ll just have to grin and bear it…

6 ( +9 / -3 )

Posted in: Japan's rice inventory hits record low See in context

Look at all the problems, that foreign tourist are causing.

Because you are being fed the stories that only highlight the negative, and multiplying that up to to assume all foreign tourists are potential troublemakers.

On a daily basis I see multiple drivers in Japan, most likely to be Japanese running red lights, driving over pedestrian crossings when pedestrians are waiting to cross, and using smartphones when driving - does that mean Japanese drivers are dangerous law breakers? No, it means some people are.

13 ( +13 / -0 )

Posted in: Japan's rice inventory hits record low See in context

I'm sorry but I can't think of any other country's press that would infer that tourists are responsible for the reduction in food stocks. What are you trying to say, that tourists are coming over here, paying for food (sometimes more than locals now) and eating all of it?

Everyone knows JA strictly controls the production and this can be changed by next year.

Only last year they were bemoaning a surplus. And for a long time the reclaimed land in Oga in Akita was described as a bit of a white elephant in terms of rice production capacity. Well if it's so bad, time to start making use of land like in Ogata.

This continual raising of the "demon tourist" specter is just horrid, what a ridiculous whiny tone to link people who want to eat Japanese food to a reduction in rice stocks.

11 ( +13 / -2 )

Posted in: Yoshizawa, Akama win gold, silver in street skateboarding at Paris Games See in context

Fantastic achievement for Japan. Awesome, as a skater myself I am constantly amazed and stoked on how dedicated and talented so many Japanese kids are at skateboarding. Even if they don't become professionals or champions, they all have so much fun doing it, often with a parent. It's so rad to see. As a 41 year old skater myself, seeing Japan's girls rise to occasion was awesome, and hats off to them - very well deserved.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Posted in: Yoshizawa, Akama win gold, silver in street skateboarding at Paris Games See in context

It's crazy that Japanese are among the world's best skateboarders. My Tokyo park is festooned with about a dozen signs saying "No skateboarding!" And it's about the only place for miles around that offers any potential skateboarding terrain.

100% agreed. I'm constantly amazed skateboarding is seen in such a light, yet corruption in the Tokyo Olympics was punished with lenient suspended sentences and politicians can arrange lap dances to raise political funds under the guise of diversity. Speaks volumes about standards.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Posted in: Yoshizawa, Akama win gold, silver in street skateboarding at Paris Games See in context

nonu6976Today  07:19 am JST

Ridiculous this activity is even allowed on the Olympics. These are not athletes in any sense.

You can tell you have never tried skateboarding to any degree of competency. The years of training, battling and constantly practicing to get to this level is insanely difficult. Celebrate their success for heaven's sake. Skateboarding is extremely physically demanding to perform at this level.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Posted in: Surge in inbound tourists pushes Japan to explore dual pricing See in context

@Samit Basu

It depends on your external appearance.

Isn't that a depressing thought.

As I say, othering only leads to dark places.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

Posted in: Surge in inbound tourists pushes Japan to explore dual pricing See in context

Just a thought, I'm pretty fluent in Japanese. If I leave Japan, and come back as a tourist, and enter a restaurant. Speak 100% fluent native level Japanese, polite and observing manners, what price do I pay.

The tourist price? I'm not making use of any of the English/translated related expenses, so why am I paying more to get the same product?

--

I understand some of these establishments probably have some nightmare situations from time to time and I do have sympathy for it, but that's the hospitality industry, you're gonna get a problematic customer from time to time, but we can't assume because one Korean, or one Chinese citizen was rude that all of their respective nations are. The other day I was carrying some rubbish into a convenience store to dispose of it, my hands were full and in front of me a Japanese person opened the door and let it slam in my face without a thought. That's pretty normal here, in my own country 9 times out of 10 someone would hold the door open, hands full or not. Does that mean I now think she was rude, or that all Japanese people are rude, no. Holding doors open here is not a customary thing to do, you just have to adapt and understand.

The point I am referring to, is that I think quite a few Japanese people in the service and hospitality industry positively freak out when dealing with someone who can't speak Japanese, because they are just not used to it. But it's all in the manner of how to deal with people in general, be calm, and rely on other cues, pointing, smiles and other facial expressions, gestures and accept that sometimes doing this is not rude, it's a means of communication. But I think some people here are quick to see that as rude, but it's really not.

Sure a few basic words of Japanese would be a good thing, arigatou gozaimasu, onegaishimasu and this kind of thing, but it's unfair to think a tourist who may only ever come to Japan once in their life for 2 weeks is going to become travel proficient in Japanese. I wouldn't expect a Japanese person to be English proficient for their holiday in the UK. In fact I have direct experience of that as I was visiting family last year and coincidentally met a family from Aichi being taken on a tour. They couldn't speak a word of English according to the tour guide, but I spoke with the family and said I lived in Mie, and was able to relay to their guide they were really enjoying the trip, and he said, oh that's good to know but I thought that was the case because they always seemed happy and grateful. He was looking for gestures, facial expressions, non verbal cues - that's what we have to do in the service industry. How do they deal with a Japanese person who can't speak for a host of reasons, charge them more because they have to provide braille, or spend more time understanding their speech which is impaired due a stroke or something else?

if we keep othering in life, it leads to dark places.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

Posted in: Kyoto study finds nearly 500 translation errors for foreign tourists; new guidelines released See in context

I hate pointing these things out because I understand how difficult it can be to learn another language, and therefore mistakes can and do happen. But the best example of this gone wrong has to be in Aichi prefecture where signs on the beach day in Japanese no barbecues. They literally have the word barbecue written in katakana. All they had to do was use the English word it comes from, barbecue and all would be well. Nope…

the signs on the beach in English read “No Cock Outs”

Someone over complicated their job and swung so hard they ended up face down in the ground.

14 ( +17 / -3 )

Posted in: 'Foreign travelers are Japan’s guests' – Governor against charging tourists more than locals See in context

I will say this, if in my country, some foreign visitors were visiting, and they were charged more money, there would be outrage.

As I have said before, this is a result of Japan's 35 year long economic stagnation, combined with a recent pandemic that put a lot of pressure on these kinds of sectors, and combined, some business operators are seeing this as a way to claw back lost income due to the pandemic, and, a way of alleviating the stress of a stagnant economy.

The wealth of everyone needs raising, Japan deserves better than developing two tier economy, its people should not be becoming poorer like they are on the whole. The miserliness of Japan can sometimes be seen all around, in the more provincial towns, it's astonishing how tatty and run down Japan can actually be. My local supermarket run by a very well known chain "that has been around for a long time" just looks so tired.

The whole economy needs to face some harsh realities to get it truly moving again, and you can't do that by dissolving the yen's worth with flaccid economic policies of low to minus interest rates, throwing good US currency reserves at it, and pork barrel politics.

5 ( +21 / -16 )

Posted in: New Tokyo restaurant charges higher prices to foreign tourists than Japanese locals See in context

It's not a good thing. If this spreads, it will further entrench the justification for Japan's low pay by the corporate overlords. The locals won't be able to afford the prices if they are raised to the "tourist" level, creating something a two-tier economy, making Japan's economy in tourist destinations even more vulnerable to "shocks" such as experienced during a recent pandemic... The bottom line is Japan needs to take some hard decisions to shake off the 35 year long economic stagnation off its back.

The reviews on this place also shed light on the owner's reasoning, that supporting non-Japanese patrons and their food waste due tourists not being able to appreciate the differences in food culture. Whether that's a valid reason/logic I'll let the patron of the restaurant decide.

10 ( +10 / -0 )

Posted in: Arrest proves a common Japanese saying about apologies and police See in context

Where's the article about police recently holding a 70+ year old woman for interrogation for 3 days allegedly for stealing some inarizushi, which after a few days turned out she was telling the truth that a friend had given it to her?

These kinds of news stories do a disservice to Japan by trying to "cutesify" or play down the nature of the crime because the outcome was "Oh so Japanese", rather than doing some actual investigative journalism to shine a light needs to be shone on "the law" overstepping their mark.

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/japan-woman-mistakenly-arrested-on-suspicion-of-shoplifting-fried-tofu-sushi/

8 ( +10 / -2 )

Posted in: Kishida questioned over scantily clad dancers at LDP party See in context

It's interesting reading the excuses given for things in Japan, once translated into English they seem like the words of a child caught with its hand in the candy jar by a parent.

"The suspect can't remember what happened."

"The suspect didn't feel like talking about it."

"We invited the dancers after studying from various viewpoints, including whether it matches the theme of diversity,"

Sad.

11 ( +12 / -1 )

Posted in: Japan to revise official romanization rules for 1st time in 70 years See in context

This makes a lot more sense. If the major form of romanization in public was Kunrei style, then fine, but it's not, pretty much anywhere where Romaji is used uses Hepburn style.

In addition this causes no end of confusion at school at the elementary level and continues all the way through school and adulthood as there is a conflict between the romaji system taught at 3rd grade EHS, which directly conflicts with the dominant target foreign language taught in school (English) and so Kunrei style directly conflicts with everything they've been taught about romaji as they see at that point leading to a heck of a lot of confusion. It leads to continued issues with spelling and reading English, issues with pronunciation (compounded by the near absence of teaching of phonics decently in English due to time constraints).

This is just one of the many things that chips away at the chance of kids getting a basic handle on English, it's difficult enough for them as it is given the big differences between the languages and Kunrei-shiki has only compounded the issue.

Romanization of Japanese is fraught with issues, but at least this is a step in the right direction to remove one of the biggest issues with it. Then we can go back to deciding whether it's Ohtani, Ootani, Ôtani, Ōtani, Otani....

10 ( +10 / -0 )

Posted in: 3 foreign-born residents sue over racial profiling by Japanese police See in context

Japan law prevails..

GO JAPAN!!!..

This is part of the problem, if somehow any part of Japan is criticized or scrutinized, many people can't separate the problem from Japan itself, and they get all offended like Japan can never do any wrong. Like how dare you criticize my country.

The reality is Japan can, just as any country can sometimes do wrong. Repeatedly stopping and searching people based on racial profiling is a problem in Japan, some areas more so than others. If you're on the receiving end of it, repeatedly, then that is reason enough to complain. The fact that this has been raised over and over and no noticeable change in attitude in some areas by the police means it needs to be taken further.

If this problem can be addressed, Japan will be stronger and better for it. If it doesn't avail itself to any criticism or scrutiny, then the entrenched problems get worse and worse; this is how corruption and stagnation breeds.

Change doesn't preclude Japan from being Japan, but it helps it grow and advance as a nation; but this reflex of any criticism of the country as being bad is just too sensitive. You can love your country whilst acknowledging it's not perfect.

11 ( +12 / -1 )

Posted in: Coming-of-Age Day ceremonies held across Japan See in context

They've just become Adults, yet go to hangouts designed for children. Ironic.

I agree, next year get them to hang out at the local nenkinjimusho and have it large.

-8 ( +3 / -11 )

Posted in: Scandal-hit biggest LDP faction execs asked for voluntary questioning See in context

"We deeply regret our actions, and will be renaming the faction to Hush Up, which should resolve all remaining issues and concerns."

-2 ( +6 / -8 )

Posted in: Japan considers raising truck speed limit for faster goods deliveries See in context

Absolutely not. Japanese drivers are some of the worst tailgaters I have known in my 20+ years of driving in countries all over the world. All this will do is increase the overall speed of some vehicles to 130kph or more leading to even more tailgaiting. I rarely see a truck on the Meihan doing the signed 60/70kph limit.

0 ( +4 / -4 )

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