Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.
Master Blaster is the two-man translating team of Canada’s Steven Le Blanc and Japan’s Masami M, a pair who in addition to writing work are in English education and created the StudyNow app for Japanese students of English.
Together they have written somewhere around 1,500 articles for RocketNews24 covering such diverse topics as Chinese men selling sanitary napkins to each other and a Japanese guy dragging an ear of corn around the Tokyo train system. A few of these were actually good, but don’t take our word for it! Here’s what our beloved readers had to say:
“One isn't always in the mood for bold tastes. But when I'm in the mood for bold flavor I turn to you.”
“Stupid article. Who cares what the Japanese think it's cool. You don't call a monkey, "gorilla".”
“You know, this is about the most cogent explanation of how a turbocharger works that I have ever seen in the non-motorsports world.”
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“It's people like you who make exploitation possible.”
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Posted by Master Blaster (Page 118)
Recently Nippon Steel & Sumikin Metal Products unveiled a new type of deer bait that is not only highly effective, but also works exclusively on deer. It’s called a Yukuru and as you can see in the picture above, it’s pretty much just a regular salt lick but it contains one very important ingredient: iron.
That’s right, deer apparently go crazy for the great taste of the metal. It’s a fact that went widely overlooked until now.
It’s that time of year again. The time when the world waits with bated breath to see who was voted as Earth’s greatest contributor to peace and receives what may be the highest honor a human can receive. I’m talking, of course, about the Confucius Peace Prize.
The Confucius Peace Prize is an annual award given to those who work towards peace as seen “from an Eastern perspective”, with past laureates including Vladimir Putin and Fidel Castro. This year, the selection committee announced that the Confucius Peace Prize will go to none other than Zimbabwe President, Chairperson of the African Union, and one of Forbes’ “10 Worst Dictators” in the world: Robert Mugabe.
Two days each year, once in the autumn and again in spring, the setting sun passes behind an NTT antenna tower in the Taruyamachi area of Akashi City, Hyogo. Due to the arrangement of dishes and other receivers, as the sun moves behind them, for the briefest of moments the face of a giant cartoon panda appears, like some benevolent forest god looking down on the town below.
This autumn, on 12 October at 5:28pm, people all over Akashi City gathered to witness the biannual moment of celestial cuteness—an event which has come to be known as the Sunset Panda. However, with cloudy skies and light drizzle it became unclear whether the roly-poly sun bear would come out to play this time…
When you think of “cool Japan,” it’s hard to overlook ninjas, those stealthy spies and assassins with more tricks up their sleeve than a magician in a parka. And yet it seems these timeless icons of Japanese culture have largely been overlooked by the national government’s Cool Japan in favor of AKB48 spin-offs and abacuses.
So instead, a band of 11 Japanese governors and mayors have assembled to create the Japan Ninja Council (JNC) with the sole aim of reminding everyone how cool ninjas are. Having officially launched on 9 October they aim to collect every bit of information on ninjas, including their history and culture, and provide it to anyone who wants to learn more about these elusive figures.
Our Japanese reporter Ahiruneko is an admitted gari (pickled ginger) maniac. Whenever he goes into a sushi restaurant he’s sure to polish off as much of the pink sweet and sour flakes as he does actual sushi. Yes, for Ahiruneko, sushi just wouldn’t be sushi without gari.
But one day he heard some troubling news. Word had it that Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants in Russia were selling a chicken sandwich topped with gari. “What are the Russians thinking?!” thought our reporter as he set out in search of these mythical creations…
I’d like to fancy myself a man of refined tastes. When I eat ice cream it certainly ought to be rose flavored. My colas? Well, they better be of an unexplained taste. And when it comes to crackers, I accept nothing less than those doused in the essence of sea urchins.
And now you can too! All you have to do is pick up a pack of Waza No Koda Wari Noko Uni Shoyu crackers at your local food vendor this winter season.
In these days of modern video games, people seem to be losing sight of what gaming is all about. In all the glitz and glamour of motion control and Hollywood actors lending their voices and likeness to games, it sometimes feels like we’ve forgotten that games are meant to be incredibly difficult, repetitive tasks performed for an arbitrary and intangible reward system of “points.”
This is incredibly valuable experience to prepare young minds for entering the workforce, but thanks to free-roaming environments and checkpoints-a-plenty, we’ve gone from a generation of Mr. Do!‘s to bunch of Mr. Don’t!‘s.
But this nine-year-old kid, whose art class project based on a classic arcade shooter is shown above, gets it. And mark my words, he will become the future leader of this nation.
Among brands who like to get adventurous with the flavors in Japan such as Kit Kat or Häagen- Dazs, Pepsi is certainly one of the most prolific. Past Pepsi flavors have included cucumber, strawberry milk, and salty watermelon.
This time, everyone’s favorite alternative to Coke has unleashed a new flavor called Pepsi Ghost, especially for the Halloween season. They’ve really outdone themselves too, because for this limited-edition outing the special flavor is unknown.
So unknown, in fact, that even after drinking about a litre of the stuff I still can’t quite put my finger on it.
Among the many problems presented by using fossil fuels such as petroleum, one of the more pressing issues is their limited and rapidly decreasing supply. Unfortunately, it would take thousands of years of organic matter decomposing and compressing under layers of the Earth to replenish the supply in the manner in which it was first made, and that’s an unlikely business.
But now it’s been reported that a professor from Kyoto University and his team have found a way to create petroleum efficiently and cheaply. Their method uses no energy-consuming high pressures or temperatures and only requires water, petroleum, and carbon dioxide. As a result, it can be done so cheaply that KTV reported 100 yen (US$0.83) of oil can be synthesized using only 3 yen ($0.02) worth of electricity.
It all seems to good to be true, and in fact it may not be true. With published peer-reviewed studies, mysterious television appearances, and lack of mainstream media coverage. We honestly can’t figure out is this amazing breakthrough or not. And neither can anyone else as science enthusiasts take to Twitter to find answers.
It’s been recently announced that AKB Group, the idol conglomerate responsible for AKB48, NMB48, SKE48, HKT48, NGT48, JKT48, and SNH48, will be adding another serial number to the roster in the form of MNL48, which is planned to operate out of Manila in the Philippines.
This new group will be formed through a project by the publicly funded Cool Japan initiative which, contrary to what Gackt may think, appears to be doing something tangible with all their funding after all. In fact, this is especially tangible as yet another source of revenue for Yasushi Akimoto, the head of AKB Group who also just happens to be the chairman of the Cool Japan Council.
Do you like cats? Do you like video games? Do you believe we all exist in a infinite number of dimensions simultaneously and our consciousness can shift between these coexisting realities depending on the choices we make?
If so, I think I know a game you might like. It’s a fun little time waster called 100 Neko by PDC Okinawa, in which the goal is to lure adorable little cats onto your screen with treats and one of those furry wand things. It’s also quite charming.
Let’s see how it works, shall we?
Eating catfish is looked down upon by many people in Japan who regularly enjoy a plethora of ocean-raised fish. Even though the Japanese diet is no stranger to aggressively aromatic food such as natto, diners here simply cannot get past the stink of these bottom feeders.
Eel on the other hand is a much-loved freshwater fish that is a summer hit across Japan served on top of rice with a sweet sauce. But with this popularity comes a threat of overfishing and depletion of the species. Faced with this problem, Associate Professor Masahiko Ariji of Kinki University has found a way to raise catfish which taste like eel.
Since its announcement earlier this year, there has been a lot of curiosity over this flavor-modified fish. Now, attendees to the Catfish Festival in Hashima City, Gifu Prefecture will get to try a very limited supply before it gets released for public consumption.
Today (October 1) is Citizen’s Day in Tokyo, celebrating the independence and welfare of the area’s residents. And what better way to do that than by giving them free access to over 20 of Tokyo’s cultural attractions from museums to art galleries to gardens and even zoos.
Now, considering it’s Citizen’s Day you might be thinking that such a deal is only open to people living in Tokyo, but no! Anyone who can get out here today and today only can get free admission to the following places.
Doctors are generally regarded more highly by society than the rest of us schlubs, and rightly so: they bring us into this world, sometimes guide us out of it, and all the while in between they do their best to keep us alive.
But of course doctors are just people too, and they’re prone to the same vices and character flaws that anyone might have. For example, one MD at a hospital in Aomori Prefecture let his short temper show recently when he punched a patient in the gut during a late night visit.
But was the doc just a hothead? Or was this particular patient just so obnoxious that the assault was warranted?
The long-running Japanese music program Music Station recently held a nation-wide survey polling 10,000 people on what they thought were Japan’s most world-class songs. Respondents told the TV show which songs they felt best represented Japan, throwing up popular artists such as Arashi and Mr. Children, and the results were aired on 23 September.
As with any music ranking, the results are open for debate, and this list is certainly no exception. However, looking at the top 10, it’s hard not to wonder where Music Station found the people who were asked to name Japan’s greatest ever song, and many Japanese netizens are calling the list “a national embarrassment”.
Are they right? Let’s find out by kicking things off with the 10th Best World Class Song: “Koi Suru Fortune Cookie” by AKB48.
In Japanese, one word for slouching or stooping over is nekoze or “cat back,” which is a term I never really understood until now. For years (maybe even longer) we humans have been deceived by these creatures into thinking that they’re elegant as they smoothly jump to impressive heights and stealthily crawl along the ground into narrow spaces.
But when it comes time to stand on two legs like you or I often do? Bah! Cats have all the grace and poise of one of those damn teenagers who listen to Ray Parker Jr. on their boomboxes and play Burger Time all damn day on my lawn.
In Japan “straps” can be found everywhere. They’re like key chains, but with an elastic band. People primarily attach them to their mobile phones, but you can also spot them on anything else under the sun like gym bags or sleep apnea machines.
Now it seems that mother nature is getting in on the action by creating an eggplant with a loophole just right for attaching straps to. And attach straps is just what the lucky owner did.
A little over a year ago, someone in Japan tweeted that they would “love to live in Junkudo”, one of the country’s largest book store chains. Little did they know that someone at that very company would not only see the tweet, but decide to make that pipe dream a reality, inviting a small band of book lovers in Tokyo to spend the night in the giant bookstore with sleeping bags, giving them entirely free rein to pick up any book or magazine they pleased.
This year, the company is bringing the “Try Living in Junkudo” project to an even bigger three-story shop in Osaka—and on Halloween, no less!
A rare legal video game document was unearthed recently by a Twitter user which outlines the eight laws that true “super players” must follow to be certified as such by the makers of the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2, still known to this day as one of the most difficult games ever made.
However, like many constitutions this was made during different times and might not apply too well to modern life or in this case modern gaming. Still, if you want to see if you’re a true old-school super player take a look at the eight articles you must adhere to.
Some of you may have noticed during the royal rumble that ensued in the Japanese Parliament late last week, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe quietly slipped out while members of his party continued to fight back a horde of angry legislators so that they could usher in changes to the way the constitution is understood. At first, I wondered why he would duck out at such a moment, but then I remembered: it’s his biiirthdaaay♪
Yes, on 21 September, Japan’s fearless leader turned 61. Unfortunately his age is really starting to show in his lack computer savvy. We already know the PM has his own Twitter account after Abe revealed that he pays his Twitter fees just like the rest of us. But apparently he still hasn’t grasped how to use the “@” symbol properly when a message of thanks to the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi accidentally went to the wrong guy, who also just happened to help develop Twitter.
Mt Fuji convenience store becomes “lawless zone” as tourists hurl abuse at security guards
Eight unforgettable hot springs, as recommended by Japan’s “Professor Bath”
Travel tip: Fukuoka has a great luggage delivery service that’s cheaper than a coin locker
Man with snake face tattoo arrested for assault, neighbors shocked he would do such a thing【Vid】
Dark and edgy Jujustu Kaisen teams up with bright and cheery Sanrio for new merch line【Pics】
Taking the Kyoto overnight bus for the first time
How much money do you need for a studio apartment in downtown Tokyo?
Moving to Tokyo? Real estate agent picks five best neighborhoods for single residents
The 10 best hotel hot springs in Japan, as chosen by Japanese travelers
How often do Japanese people search for their ex online?【Survey】
Studio Ghibli releases new range of cardigans for anime fans
Berserk T-shirts coming to Uniqlo for launch of new Manga Curation line【Photos】
Kyoto Whopper divides customers at Burger King Japan
Japanese burger chain no longer serves onion rings, but offers intriguing replacement【Taste test】
Celebrating Good Couple’s Day in Japan…by getting our significant others to dress us
7-Eleven Japan releases fukubukuro lucky bags filled with convenience store surprisesTaking the Kyoto overnight bus for the first time
Starbucks Japan reveals new holiday goods for the 2024 festive season
Beautiful Totoro bag returns, still requires jumping through an extra hoop to get, still worth it
Yakuza vending machines coming to real-world Tokyo neighborhood that inspired Like a Dragon games
Nintendo’s controller capsule toys are so cool, even the machine you buy them from is awesome【Pics】
One of Japan’s most beautiful hot spring towns announces new limits on number of day trippers
Ghibli’s Princess Mononoke teams up with Foxfire for outdoor apparel collaboration【Photos】
Ghibli Park debuts first winter illumination display with Howl’s Moving Castle theme
Tokyo Disneyland loses top-attendance crown for Japanese theme parks for second year in a rowStudio Ghibli releases new range of cardigans for anime fans
Sanrio and magical girl anime PreCure join forces for new merch line【Photos】
Pringles releases a limited-edition sweet flavour in Japan
Japanese job-quitting service contacted by other job-quitting service because employee wants to quit
After cancelling Halloween, Tokyo’s Shibuya neighborhood cancels New Year’s Eve too
McDonald’s new Happy Meals offer up cute and practical Sanrio lifestyle goods
Foreign tourists on Shinkansen bullet train break suitcase etiquette, angering local passengers
[Deleted] Article written for April Fool’s Day 2018
Japanese government to make first change to romanization spelling rules since the 1950s
Foreigner’s request for help in Tokyo makes us sad for the state of society
Ghibli founders Toshio Suzuki and Hayao Miyazaki contribute to Japanese whisky Totoro label design
Japanese convenience store Family Mart announces abolishment of eat-in spaces
Princesses, fruits, and blacksmiths: Study reveals the 30 most unusual family names in Japan
Life-size vibrating Legend of Zelda Master Sword for sale from Nintendo【Photos】
Studio Ghibli releases free-download board game — Here’s how to play it without reading Japanese
Taking the Kyoto overnight bus for the first time
How much money do you need for a studio apartment in downtown Tokyo?
Moving to Tokyo? Real estate agent picks five best neighborhoods for single residents
The 10 best hotel hot springs in Japan, as chosen by Japanese travelers
How often do Japanese people search for their ex online?【Survey】
7-Eleven Japan releases fukubukuro lucky bags filled with convenience store surprises
Is Tokyo’s ultra-expensive Satsuki sweet bean bread worth it?【Taste test】
Do cold noodles from a Japanese vending machine fill us with joy or regret?
New Japanese bowl-shaped donburi rice cooker cooks rice and toppings at the same time
Owner of ridiculously long tongue is also a former idol, does cool tongue tricks
Kyoto Whopper divides customers at Burger King Japan
W.T.F. Japan: Top 5 strangest kanji ever 【Weird Top Five】
Kyoto green onion theft victim becomes Kyoto green onion thief