Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.
Japan (Page 1636)
For those of us living in cities, the idea of moving away to a country home surrounded by vast meadows of these pretty white autumn flowers sounds nice doesn’t it? However, this year, in Fukui Prefecture, where crops of thousands of these soba (buckwheat) flowers are grown, residents are perplexed that all these little blossoms literally smell like an ocean of sh*t.
In pretty much any major city around the world, you’re bound to run in to a person collecting money for some cause or other. It could be in aid of curing a deadly disease, cutting world hunger, protecting the environment or even animal rights activists PETA asking for donations when they’re not making online videogames…
In Japan, it’s not uncommon to encounter Buddhist monks, standing still in the street with a bowl in hand, asking for donations. This is a tradition that has existed in Japan for centuries, and, while few busy city-dwellers stop to drop a few yen in the bowl, even fewer would begrudge the monks for doing it since they have scant income and bring a lot of comfort to many people.
A photo that appeared online earlier this week, however, showing what appears to be two monks sitting in a side-street laughing and smoking while counting their takings for the day, has caused quite a stir among Japan’s internet users…
Most people think the art of juggling is played out. We think we’ve seen it all from balls to batons to even the point that flaming chainsaws gets yawns from spectators. But a performance at the 2012 Japan Juggling Festival by a mysterious juggler called Yanazo drew gasps and a standing ovation from the crowd.
Even only using a single ball he is captivating to watch. If you can catch a ball with the outside of your elbow then congratulations: You can do about a half a second of this six minute act.
Pokémaniacs, ready your credit cards because Amazon Japan launched their Pokémon Store, a special page dedicated to the sale of all things Pokémon, on October 17.
Following Japan’s 1-0 victory over France in the friendly football (soccer to our North American readers) match last week, a French variety show host made a joke that has touched a nerve here in Japan.
Alluding to Japanese goalkeeper Eiji Kawashima’s impressive skills on the field, the show presented an edited image of the player, showing him with four arms.
The show’s presenter then suggested that Kawashima’s additional limbs might be the result of “the Fukushima effect” and that they had grown after exposure to radiation leaked from the nuclear plant damaged by the earthquake and tsunami in March 2011. While the joke went down well during the show, many Japanese are understandably very upset…
“It just goes to show that we really do live in a peaceful country.”
A quote from an internet user sums up the mood perfectly after Japan’s Self Defence Forces unveil a unique attack helicopter covered with manga-influenced designs and colours.
Presented as part of an air show in Chiba prefecture last weekend, the quirky new helicopter quickly stole the show, with hundreds of people taking photos and video to share on the internet.
Whether we’d ever see a helicopter like this fly into battle or not, there’s no denying that it has an awful lot of charm.
Gundam has been standing watch over Diversity Tokyo Plaza in Odaiba all by himself for quite some time now. He’s been holding down the fort fairly well, but it looks like Gundam is in need of some flower power. That’s where the Tokyo Gundam Project 2012, an initiative aimed at promoting the green movement and tree planting, stepped in. Thanks to this initiative, Flower Gundam, with the strength of 10,000 flowers, is now helping normal Gundam keep watch.
Remember Google’s 8-bit Google Maps April Fools’ prank from earlier this year?
Japanese four-piece all-female rock band, Negoto, have taken the idea to the next level by integrating their new music video with an 8-bit map of Tokyo so that it tracks the singer’s location as she goes on a grand adventure across the city.
Major Japanese fast food burger chain Lotteria is celebrating its 40th Anniversary this year. In commemoration, they have brought back the infamous Tower Cheese Burger, five beef patties with five cheese slices, and introduced a five layered shrimp patty burger— each for only 500 yen (about $6.25 US) !
Sounds like great value for anyone with a carnivorous appetite, and, in case five patties sounds too overwhelming, you can also knock the tower down to three or four. Either way, they stack ’em high! …or they try, at least…
As you can probably tell from the picture above, we recently found out that reality isn’t always what the advertisements make it out to be. Is this supposed to be a lesson in facing up to the truth? Read More
It’s great that we have the Nobel Prize to give credit to the often unspoken heroes of the scientific community who continuously change our lives for the better. For example, Professors Sir John Gudon and Shinya Yamanaka’s work on stem cell research could potentially save countless lives and improve everyone else’s.
With that in mind, after a recent cabinet meeting Minister Makiko Tanaka unveiled their plan to present Prof. Yamanaka with – cue Price is Right music – a brand new washing machine!
We Japanese love rice; we’re quite obsessed with rice, in fact. We all have our favorite brand of rice, depending on the specific type of rice and the location it was grown (yes, location is very important and can greatly affect the price of the rice), and some people shell out a fortune to buy super-expensive “high-end” brand rice. But not many Japanese people are familiar with biryani, the spicy flavored rice common in India and some Muslim countries as well.
One of our reporters at the Pouch site recently had the chance to taste some excellent biryani right in the middle of Tokyo and shares with us her experience. Her report follows below. Read More
While most of us use YouTube to upload homemade productions and watch funny cat videos, much of Japan still turns to their domestic video sharing site, Nico Nico Douga.
Yet whereas YouTube sees content from users across the world, Nico Nico Douga has remained primarily an exclusive club for Japanese speakers since it began in 2006. An English language beta website, Niconico.com, was launched in early 2011, but failed to generate interest even among foreign users of the Japanese site, due in part to the separation of Japanese and English videos between two domains.
Perhaps realizing that they’ll never be able to attract a sizable userbase from YouTube, Nico Nico Douga has shifted its strategy away from encouraging original English content to making its Japanese content more accessible to English speakers, replacing the English website with an English interface for the Japanese domain, nicovideo.jp.
The Porsche 962C was the premier car of the 80s, winning back-to-back 24 Hours of Le Mans in 86 and 87 along with a slew of other series during that decade. It was an inspiration for one Japanese man, whose dream was to own one himself.
So he purchased one of the very few street legal Group C Porsche 962’s in existence. And he allowed us a peak at a simple afternoon drive behind the wheel of one of the greatest race cars ever.
Whichever way you look at it, life in Japan is expensive.
As well as Japan’s food, drink and fuel ranking among the world’s most expensive, compared to many western countries, land in particular is sold at a premium, meaning that accommodation can be costly, and even those with enough capital to consider purchasing a car often abandon the idea when they realise that they cannot afford to buy or rent the necessary parking space.
CNN’s “World’s Most Expensive Places to Live 2012” placed Tokyo and Osaka first and third, respectively, and thanks to the strong yen and weak dollar/euro/everything, coming to live in Japan has never been more financially challenging.
With this in mind, budgeting expert Yoko Hanawa at Yahoo! Japan shares some ways in which Japan’s businessmen and women tackle everyday life in this tough financial climate, and introduces a few ideas of her own that are worth paying attention to.
Those of you fortunate enough to have been introduced to Studio Ghibli’s animated feature films will know that they’re of the highest quality and easily rival Disney’s own productions.
Back in my native UK, comparatively few people have met with Ghibli’s heart-warming animated creations, with some people, in fact, falling into the trap of thinking that anything foreign and “a bit manga” is probably not for them. Thanks to the UK’s relative reluctance to embrace the movies, it was not until I was 15 years old when, one rainy Sunday afternoon, My Neighbor Totoro was shown on cable TV that I first became aware of Hayao Miyazaki’s work. At the time, I had no idea what I was watching, but have been a huge fan ever since.
Over in the studio’s native Japan, however, Studio Ghibli has become something of a national treasure since its establishment in 1985, with the studio’s near-annual releases always eagerly awaited, and usually met with both an abundance of praise and mounds of cash.
For most Japanese, Ghibli characters like My Neighbor Totoro’s Satsuki and Mei, Spirited Away’s Chihiro, or broomstick-riding Kiki from the movie of the same name, form a part of their childhood or are attached to fond memories, perhaps even more-so than Mickey, Donald and pals are toWesterners.
So when one hawk-eyed Twitter user suggested that perhaps certain Ghibli characters have cropped up in more than movie without us realising it, internet users understandably paid attention…
What do you think of when you hear the word Zen? For most people, “organized religion” probably isn’t a phrase that pops up immediately. This can be a bit of a predicament for Zen Buddhist missionaries working in places like Europe and North America.
The word, which comes from a Japanese translation of the Chinese word chán, literally means meditation, and has developed a romantic sense of being purely in the moment and devoid of all thought. This concept has been focused on by various artists in Western culture like Jack Kerouac, with a diminished emphasis on the less sexy doctrines and worshiping of Buddha that are very much a part of the whole religion.
This image dichotomy is something that the Headquarters of Missionary Work for the Soto School of Buddhism in Europe has to deal with all the time.
Excite News Japan recently went to interview them on the state of modern Soto Zen Buddhism abroad. Check our rundown of their findings below!
Let’s play a little game, shall we?
You’re walking down the street one day when you stumble across a watch on the ground. On closer inspection, you realise it’s a rather swanky gold Rolex, and it looks genuine. You look around for the owner, but no-one is in sight, and there are no residences or open stores nearby.
What do you do?
Pocket the watch to sell later or make your own, or hand it in at your nearest police station? Be honest now…
How about if, instead of finding a watch on the street, you discovered a small stack of cash, sitting unattended beside an ATM? And it’s no paltry sum either- about US$2,000. Would you take it or leave it behind?
A middle school vice principle in Kōchi prefecture, Shikoku, decided on the former… Read More
As smartphone usage continues to grow in Japan, more Japanese developers are tinkering with the devices to make apps of their own. And since developer tools and information are made available for free online, just about anyone can break into app development so long as they have an idea and the willingness to learn.
In fact, making a smartphone app is so easy, even a grade-schooler could do it— just look at 12-year-old Gaiya Ohara, Japan’s youngest smartphone developer and sole creator of the award-winning iOS app, Math RPG.
I think I’ve just found my new favourite YouTube channel.
Thanks to a tip-off from an awesome RocketNews24 reader, I’ve discovered Eclectic Method; audio-visual remix masters and providers of horribly funky beats, whether the sampled videos were intended for musical enjoyment or not.
The video that pulled me in, however, was the group’s fantastic Japanese TV commercial remix…
Starbucks Japan unveils new sakura cherry blossom collection for hanami season 2026
One Piece creator has hidden secret of anime treasure’s identity in chest at bottom of real-world ocean
Is Tokyo Station’s startlingly expensive wagyu bento boxed lunch worth its high price?[Taste test]
Live-action One Piece’s Luffy teaches Sesame Street’s Elmo a Japanese word for friendship[Video]
Taste-testing Japan’s real-world Dragon Balls and Senzu Beans at Marugame Seimen
Last chance coming up for amazing east Japan for all-you-can-ride Shinkansen-inclusive train pass
The best Hobonichi diaries, covers and stationery for 2026
Yakuzen ramen restaurant in Tokyo is very different to a yakuza ramen restaurant
7-Eleven Japan’s sakura sweets season is underway right now!
McDonald’s Japan adds the flavour of okonomiyaki to its menu for a limited timeStarbucks Japan unveils new sakura cherry blossom collection for hanami season 2026
Starbucks Japan releases first-ever Hinamatsuri Girls’ Day Frappuccino
Japanese restaurant chain serves Dragon Ball donuts and Senzu Beans this spring
Japan Extreme Budget Travel! A trip from Tokyo to Izumo for just 30,000 yen [Part 1]
Japan’s craziest burger chain takes menchi katsu to new extreme levels
Japan Extreme Budget Travel! A trip from Tokyo to Izumo for just 30,000 yen [Part 2]Is Tokyo Station’s startlingly expensive wagyu bento boxed lunch worth its high price?[Taste test]
Japanese drugstore sells onigiri at pre-stupid era prices, but how do they compare to 7-Eleven?
Viral Japanese cheesecake from Osaka has a lesser known rival called Aunt Wanda
Lawson adds doughnuts to its convenience store sweets range, but are they good enough to go viral?
Japan’s newest Shinkansen has no seats…or passengers [Video]
Starbucks Japan releases new sakura goods and drinkware for cherry blossom season 2026
Foreigners accounting for over 80 percent of off-course skiers needing rescue in Japan’s Hokkaido
Super-salty pizza sends six kids to the hospital in Japan, linguistics blamed
Starbucks Japan unveils new sakura Frappuccino for cherry blossom season 2026
Foreign tourists in Japan will get free Shinkansen tickets to promote regional tourism
The 10 most annoying things foreign tourists do on Japanese trains, according to locals
Take a trip to Japan’s Dododo Land, the most irritating place on EarthStarbucks Japan unveils new sakura cherry blossom collection for hanami season 2026
Naruto and Converse team up for new line of shinobi sneakers[Photos]
Survey asks foreign tourists what bothered them in Japan, more than half gave same answer
Japan’s human washing machines will go on sale to general public, demos to be held in Tokyo
Starbucks Japan releases new drinkware and goods for Valentine’s Day
We deeply regret going into this tunnel on our walk in the mountains of Japan
Studio Ghibli releases Kodama forest spirits from Princess Mononoke to light up your homeJapan’s newest Shinkansen has no seats…or passengers [Video]Starbucks Japan releases new sakura goods and drinkware for cherry blossom season 2026
Major Japanese hotel chain says reservations via overseas booking sites may not be valid
Put sesame oil in your coffee? Japanese maker says it’s the best way to start your day【Taste test】
No more using real katana for tourism activities, Japan’s National Police Agency says
Last chance coming up for amazing east Japan for all-you-can-ride Shinkansen-inclusive train pass
The best Hobonichi diaries, covers and stationery for 2026
Yakuzen ramen restaurant in Tokyo is very different to a yakuza ramen restaurant
7-Eleven Japan’s sakura sweets season is underway right now!
McDonald’s Japan adds the flavour of okonomiyaki to its menu for a limited time
Well-known Old Testament stories manifested as cute zippered pouches【Pics】
We visit Tokyo’s Reversible Destiny Lofts, the apartments designed to make you live forever【Pics】
566 million yen in gold bars donated to Japanese city’s water bureau
Japan Super Budget Dining – What’s the best way to spend 1,000 yen at Yoshinoya?
You can now visit a recreation of Evangelion’s Tokyo-3 and live there in miniature form in【Pics】
Tokyo Skytree turns pink for the cherry blossom season
Out-of-business Tokyo McDonald’s gets brutal but kind sendoff from rival Burger King branch
Children’s slippers stolen in night at Japanese preschool, police identify weasel who did it【Vid】