Japan News for May 12, 2007

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    Today’s Japan-related news links:

    • The latest Japan Blog Matsuri has been posted over at Rocking in Hakata! [Link]
    • Japanese motorists may one day pump their cars full of sake, the fermented rice wine that is Japan’s national drink, if a pilot project to create sake fuel is a hit with locals in this mountain resort. [Link]
    • Public attention is again focused on the proposed construction of a undersea tunnel in Busan that would link Korea and Japan, an idea that has long been reviewed and discussed by both countries. [Link]
    • A special committee of Japan’s upper house, or the House of Councilors, approved on Friday evening a bill to set procedures to amend the country’s pacifist Constitution. [Link]
    • A Japanese gas exploration company is at the center of a dispute with Australian Aborigines who say it is conducting a drilling program on their traditional land. [Link]
    • Kansai Time Out has printed an article about the Gaijin Hanzai File magazine and the foreign crime rate in Japan. [Link]
    • Japan should take steps to ensure that films and exhibitions planned in China on the Nanjing massacre do not distort the truth, a government official said on Friday [Link]
    • Plans to urge Japanese mothers to breast-feed and sing lullabies to their babies and for families to turn off the TV during meals have been scrapped. [Link]
    • A study by Japanese scientists of the brains of crows has found that the birds have a large cerebrum, which governs learning and thought, and that the parts of their brains connected to intelligent behavior are well developed. [Link]
    • The office of President Roh Moo-hyun on Friday asked Japan to accept South Korea’s latest proposal that the waters between the two countries be called both the “East Sea” and the “Sea of Japan” in global charts to be updated by the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO). [Link]
    • The Japanese government is planning to improve its industrial training and technical internship program for young foreigners after revelations that Japanese firms exploited the program to save costs. [Link]
    • According a year old article from Yomiuri Shinbun quoting Yonhap news, South Korea agreed to pay the IHO 100,000 US dollars annually as part of their campaign demanding that the IHO to rename the Sea of Japan to “East Sea”. [Link]
    • With Mother’s Day fast approaching, Tokyo’s subways and billboards are plastered with advertisements for chocolate and flowers. But one of the most visible ads, running every few minutes on the TV monitors inside subway cars, suggests that you give your mom Nintendo’s portable videogame system and load it with software like Nintendogs, Brain Age or an interactive cookbook called 1000 Recipes. [Link]
    • Women can lose weight and look more beautiful simply by tugging on their pubic hair, according to Shukan Josei . [Link]
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