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doing it wrong

On the morning of 2 November a man armed with a kitchen knife entered a bank in Munakata city, Fukuoka Prefecture.  Upon seeing the man, the clerk asked “What can I do for you?”

“Hand over the money.” he said quietly.

Then the clerk summoned all her years of training and experience as a bank employee and dealt with the intruder the best way she knew how.

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Japanese Clothing Ad Gives Us a Glimpse at the Real Japan

People often ask me why I moved to Japan and I say “to be with people like me – with blonde hair and blue eyes.”  Japan is a homogenous country to be sure, but a recent advertisement from clothing chain COMME ÇA ISM boldly challenges this mistaken stereotype that Japan is full of Japanese people.

It’s actually full of white people!

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Anti-Japanese demonstrations have been sweeping across China since Sunday in response to Japanese activists unfurling Japanese flags on a disputed island in the South China Sea, four days after Chinese activists landed on the same island.

Undoubtedly the most high-profile of the protests was in Shenzen, where some Chinese protesters burned Japanese flags and even turned violent, vandalizing Japanese cars and breaking into a local Japanese restaurant.

What the angry Chinese mob didn’t realize was that, like most Japanese eateries outside of Japan, the restaurant they ravaged was owned and operated by Chinese.

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Disclaimer:  This article contains some graphic depictions of doo-doo and is not  for the faint of stomach.

One of the great things about visiting Thailand is that everything is so cheap.  Especially if you want to buy souvenirs for a lot of people, it’s a very shopping friendly country.  However, even with these low prices, travelers are still faced with the dilemma of what to get loved ones.

You don’t want to spend your whole vacation picking out the perfect gifts but you also don’t want to be like your aunt Grace who gave you a lame souvenir spoon from her trip to the Grand Canyon last year.

Luckily we stumbled upon a toy store in Thailand that lets you confront your fear of buying a crappy present by selling literal pieces of crap.  Small coilers will run you about 50 baht (US$1.60) but a larger log will cost 150 baht ($4.80).

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Time limit, cutoff, due date. AKA “deadline”. Of course the concept applies to any number of jobs. But let it be said that the real experts on the subject are cartoonists / comic book artists.

These professionals truly know the possibilities of pre-deadline behavior. Today, we present to you 99 ways comic book artists find themselves approaching, or avoiding, their day of reckoning. See if you compare… Read More

On the 16th of this month, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department announced the results of a bicycle safety enforcement campaign they implemented on the 10th. In those six days, 1571 people were issued warnings for illegal behavior, and over half of those were to people wearing earphones or headphones while riding. An additional 27 people were issued tickets. Read More

How to Open a Beer With Your iPhone

You buy a beer on your way home, happily thinking of that moment when you can crack it open and relax with a frothy brew. But then you can’t find the bottle opener! You know it was around here somewhere, but no matter how much you search, you can’t find it. Everyone one has had this frustrating experience, right?

Actually, you can get that cap off even without a bottle opener. Of course, a bottle opener is best, and the other methods carry certain risks, but desperate times call for desperate measures! We decided to try out various different methods for removing bottle caps, including one that puts your iPhone to a new use. Read More