A day has passed since news broke of insecticide-laden frozen dumplings from China, and the media frenzy has yet to die down. Mainichi reports that 62 more people are claiming to be victims of the poison gyoza. Although few of the new victims had experienced anything more than diarrhea, one can be sure [...]

Kyoto’s most well-known geisha district, Gion, is facing a major problem: poop attacks! Here’s a hard-hitting news report on what’s going on:

Summary:

As a few geisha are commenting on how one must be careful walking on the streets, a young man is suddenly hit by bird poop! The white bird feces stains his dark-colored [...]

The wacky folks at Haneru no Tobira come back at us with another bizarre challenge! This time they are supposed to swing on the rope and use the rolling thing to aid them in a jump to the yellow platform. Those who fail fall into extremely hot water:

After eating some gyoza for lunch today, I returned to my apartment to find that today’s top news story was about insecticide-tainted Chinese gyoza [not the brand of gyoza I ate today, thankfully]:

Five family members in Ichikawa, Chiba, were taken to hospital suffering from vomiting and diarrhea after they ate the dumplings, while another two [...]

Remember that cool trick bowler featured on Japan Probe back in April 2007? He recently appeared on TV again with a new ramp-jumping bowling feat:

Here’s a pretty interesting Fuji TV news report on the current popularity of Japanese language and culture in East Asia:

A quick summary of the Shanghai portion of the video:

-The couple interviewed at the beginning of the segment says they are buying anime stuff because they’ve watched and enjoyed anime since they were children.
-We are shown [...]

The AFP reports that Japan has dispatched coast guard officers are now helping whalers in the Antarctic Ocean:
Japan’s coast guard said Tuesday it has sent a team of officers to protect its whaling fleet against intensifying protests by environmentalists.
The whalers have repeatedly clashed with environmentalists in the Antarctic Ocean and halted the hunt two weeks [...]

I just came across this video clip of a news report about an anti-terror training exercise held by Japanese police. In the exercise, police are confronting international terrorists who have smuggled themselves into Tokyo in shipping containers:

The YouTube version of this video was labeled “cool terror training” [かっこいいテロ訓練] by the Japanese user who uploaded [...]

A waterfall in Aomori Prefecture has frozen over, creating a beautiful pillar of ice:

For more information on this waterfall (Nio Waterfall), check out this site about the Nio Waterfall Ice Festival.

Earlier this month, it was mentioned that the Japanese government was considering rules to make Japanese language a criterion for certain residency visas. A new announcement reveals that this idea could be put into practice soon:
Conditions for resident visa status of skilled foreign workers such as engineers may be relaxed if they attain a [...]

If you live in Japan, chances are that you’ve heard “KY” mentioned, and that person was not talking about the sexual lubricant. “KY”, for those who don’t know is short for “kuuki yomenai” (空気読めない）, meaning you can’t read the air. The kids I teach throw this out all the time. Any time [...]

A very cool way to celebrate Valentine’s Day:

The Hawks Town Mall shopping center in Fukuoka has put up on display models of Fukuoka Castle and the Nagasaki Kaido road made out of sweets.
A total of 287 students at Nakamura Culinary School in Fukuoka spent four months creating the models. They crafted them using eggs and [...]