thinkbefore comments

Fruits can be expensive in Japan. I am not sure what the zookeeper is earning. Not condoning what he did. This is first time I have heard of such a crime.

he advised others who might witness crimes to prioritize to avoid putting themselves at undue risk and contact the police as quickly as possible.

Wise advice!

There is a lot of poverty among the elderly in Japan now. The pension is not enough. The government needs to do more to help them.

Yeah, this is why Japanese people are healthier and live longer than westerners.

Actually meat is not the problem in the Western diet. It's all the processed carbohydrates and foods with tons of sugars that come with it. You see a lot of people eating lots of meat, eggs with high cholestrol that live well into their nineties. They eat naturally and avoid all the processed rubbish.

A lot of Japanese men don't communicate well with the opposite sex so cannot have a normal conversation with them. Many watch porn often and this leads to perversion. This is a case of both property damage and perversion.

It's tradition. It started as early as 1991 apparently. It's a little bit unhygienic.

I wonder if they will introduce T20 cricket one day. It's international, it's popular. I was surprised when they decided to introduce breaking.

I would have thought the owner would have at least some record of their names and nationalities. Not recording any identification is an invitation for someone to commit a crime. I hope the police catch them. I can't stand badly behaved tourists.

Police where are you? Stop worrying about trivial things such as whether bicycles are locked or not. This is an incident you need to take a look at. Animal cruelty cannot be tolerated.

These pensions are going to get rough later on.

its already terrible enough that you only get a small percentage of what was taken out of your paycheck.

It's a terrible investment. So much in for so little return. My understanding of it is it needs a large working population for it to work well. The working population in Japan is dropping while the elderly population is increasing. Maybe it's best to abolish the pension all together one day and let workers keep the money that would otherwise be paid into the fund and invest in other things.

A big fan of him. I have always preferred old school comedians. RIP Bob Newhart.

This seems too harsh to me. Very cold too by the Association. Cold as ice. She made a mistake. Just punish her in a suitable way such as a fine. Let her continue her training and let her compete in the upcoming Olympics.

Be prepared to face the warmest and the coldest people you have ever encountered in life. I have had some Really Good honest and helpful staff and some Horrible ones too.

Absolutely! Fortunately for me none horrible but some were cold. Some of them can be quite aggressive when they talk with you. I have encountered some very kind people though. My worst experience with a public servant was at a drivers licence center in Gifu. Horrible man!

I like his work ethic but breaking the law was not good.

To be fair, it was not the passengers fault getting on and off. A lot of Japanese sleep on the train and they probably thought he was sleeping. Many Japanese often get an inadequate amount of sleep and consequently have the need to sleep during their journey.

When I first arrived I thought the rubbish disposal system was complicated. However I couldn't read much Japanese and the other thing is I came from a place which was the complete opposite. There was very little separating, no way near to the extent of Japan. I think they should give new arrivals a bit of slack. It takes time to get used to the language. It's similar to a Japanese moving to an English speaking land and trying to understand all the rules written in English. Overall the rubbish disposal system is not really hard to understand, just very detailed! It takes alot of effort to prepare each types of rubbish and many foreigners and Japanese find it a hassle to do.

I've always wondered if there was a better way. How about 2 big bins. One for burnables and one for non-burnables and give employment to local people in doing the separation at the disposal area. People don't mind paying extra taxes to make life a bit easier. Large items like furniture are an exception. You can call a contractor to pick it up. What I don't like is paying for all those bags and paying to dispose of certain items. Just tax citizens a bit more so you have revenue to pay people to provide a rubbish disposal service. Too much onus is put on residents when it comes to putting out rubbish.

Good on her! Fully deserved! Japan must be very proud of her! Everyone likes to see someone victorious!

Maybe he has none.

True. Where are the social workers?

Police said Yuya Kuwagaki, a graduate student from Osaka, has admitted to making the threat and quoted him as saying he did it “to ease his stress,” Kyodo News reporter

Poor guy! Needs psychological help. Where is his family? They should be taking care of him!

Police in Shizuoka City have arrested a 26-year-old man on suspicion of assault after he punched a 35-year-old man who tried to get into a taxi ahead of him on Sunday morning.

Looks likely the 35 year old man did try to get into the taxi ahead of him. I abhor blatant selfishness like this. I don't condone violence but I can understand why the 26 year old threw a punch at him. It was straight out inappropriate and uncivilized.

Japan will need to make a lot of changes. They need workers and they're not getting them from their own so need to recruit outsiders. Outsiders shouldn't be treated any different. They are here to perform a job competently.

Does the restaurant have some footage of the incident? Is there any video surveillance in the restaurant? Plenty of witnesses. The man should be punished accordingly.

She's very successful albeit there isn't a lot of competition compared to other eras of music. On pure vocal ability she wouldn't make the top 30 greatest female singers of all time. I'm personally not a fan of her but she's done extremely well for herself and good on her. I still don't get why she is so big along with Ed Sheeran.

I have worked out that I will get ¥30,000 a month on the standard pension I have paid into here in Japan when I retire.

Looks like you are only contributing about 20 years of payments. To get the full payment you need 40 years of payments. That will give around 67000 yen a month. The other pension scheme doesn't pay that much either. WIth both employer and employee contributions of 40 years you get around 160 000 yen a month. The Japanese pension doesn't pay enough so getting other investments going is necessary if you want to live a comfortable retirement.

Looks like some Japanese men have difficulties communicating with the opposite sex in a normal way. What he did was weird however he probably thought it was normal. He could have tried to strike a conversation first. Then ask her out if it goes well. Much better options to try to get together with her.

Only 24 percent of Japanese have passports and of that 24 percent only 16 percent travel. The remaining 8 percent have it for identification purposes. A lot of Japanese aren't interested in overseas travel I discovered before I found out the statistics.

Young children and water is a dangerous mix. They should be supervised or their parents should insist sternly they are not allowed near deep water unless supervised. I am not sure if water safety is taught at schools to young children. I'm guessing it is not.

It is currently ¥66,000 per month, per person. Despite decades paying into it. The law changed a decade ago about company pensions for the wife of husband dies. Before she wife got very little.

Self employed were suppose to have saved their own money, paid off the house and sitting on a safe full of cash come retirement, pension was just a top up. Didn’t work that way once the bubble popped in early 1990’s.

I gather there are a fair number of pensioners struggling to live. It's amazing after 40 years of payments you only get 66000 per month. If you were enrolled in an employees pension scheme, the average payout is only 150 000 a month despite payments by the employer and employer over 40 years.

If you can’t afford kids, don’t have them.

Agree with that part. I see too many people throughout the world having kids and they really can't afford them. It's similar to getting a mortgage of 400000 (that is the average home loan in Australia by way) and you really don't have enough income or future income to meet the repayments. On the subject of the Japanese pension I would be very wary of expecting a pension in 30 years time. With a dwindling population the pension system is not sustainable.

I don't have any worth as a person. I have no choice but to kill a lot of people and get the death penalty

I have no choice?? He does have a choice! He can turn his life around for the better. Kyota Hattori is a weak human being!