Japan News for January 8, 2007

Some Japan-releated news/links for today:

• The Korea Times has printed a pretty good article on Gachon University’s refusal to renew English teacher Gerry Bever’s employment contract because of his blogging about the Dokdo/Takeshima territorial dispute.
• Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited Meiji Shrine in Shibuya Ward, Tokyo, and offered a prayer Saturday in an apparent attempt to placate conservatives. Some political observers said the visit was intended as a substitute for a pilgrimage to Yasukuni Shrine so as not to upset China and South Korea.
• A new article discusses how Japan, the most energy-efficient developed country, offers a lesson in using technology to reduce energy consumption. Don’t build insulated houses with central heating; just gaman……..
• Former South Korean Prime Minister Goh Kun is considering making the construction of an undersea tunnel linking South Korea and Japan as a key campaign pledge for the Dec. 19 presidential election. Under the proposal, both an undersea railroad and a highway would connect Koje Island in South Kyongsang Province to Kyushu in Japan, he said.
• As part of the Education Ministry’s attempts to look like it’s doing something about the recent spate of school bullying-related suicides, Minister Bunmei Ibuki has written a letter to every single school in the country urging youngsters to stop bullying their “friends.”
• The New York Times reviews Steven K. Vogel’s new book “Japan Remodeled.” which shows that all through its lost decade of the 1990s, as well as recently, Japan has experienced not paralysis but a frenzy of restructuring.
• A military emergency on the Korean Peninsula could trigger an exodus of between 100,000 and 150,000 refugees from North Korea, swamping Japan’s ability to cope, according to government estimates. As Japan is far from ready to handle such a large number of “boat people,” the central government is now drawing up contingency plans, sources said.
• A group of Aum Shinrikyo cult members close to the current leader Fumihiro Joyu visited the Tokyo subway’s Kasumigaseki Station, one of the sites of the deadly subway sarin gas attacks by the cult in 1995, and offered prayers there, they said Saturday.
• 7-Elevens all over Tokyo are now selling PlayStation 3′s, according to Q-Taro.
• Nearly half of all Japanese get less than 6 hours sleep, according to a recent survery results.
• Hoga News has translated statistics showing the 2006 Box office top 10 for Japan.
• Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to visit the United States for talks with President George W. Bush most likely in late April or early May, Japanese and U.S. government sources said Friday. The trip will probably take place during Golden Week, which runs from April 28 to May 6 this year.
• The story of a Filipina woman who came to Japan on an “entertainer” visa and eventually set up her own sucessful English language school.
• Momofuku Ando, the Japanese inventor of instant noodles, has died, according to Nissin Food Products Co., the company he founded. He was 96.