Archive for July, 2008

Wooden statue of Kannon replaced with fake

A historical wooden statue held by a temple in Shizuoka Prefecture seems to have been stolen and replaced with a cheap fake:

Local police began investigating the case on suspicion of theft since the lock of a side entrance to the temple was found damaged.

A multi-armed statue of the Goddess of Kannon, or “Senju Kannon” in Japanese, was found missing from Hozoji Temple in Shimada by a supporter of the Soto sect temple at around 10 a.m. on Monday.

The 101-centimeter-tall statue, which had been placed in the Kannon hall next to the main hall at the temple, was replaced with a two-armed, 60-centimeter-tall wooden statue sprayed in gold.

The original multi-armed statue was made during the Muromachi Period (1336-1573) and was designated as the city’s cultural item in 1984.

The figure is usually stored in a miniature shrine deep inside Kannon hall, but was slated to be subject to exposition in 2009 — an event that comes only once every 60 years.

FTV’s report on the story (embedded in the top of this post) reveals that that the temple in question didn’t have much protection for the statue, while other temples containing valuable statues use special security systems.

Shibukawa belly button festival

A Reuters report about a belly button festival in Gunma Prefecture:

Children and adults, many of them sporting painted stomachs, took part at the annual Belly Button Festival in Shibukawa, north of Tokyo, where dancing in the streets is compulsory.

“The belly button is traditionally believed to be located in the middle of the body and the most important part. Our town, Shibukawa, is also called the belly button of Japan, and that is how this festival began,” said festival organizer Kazuo Yamada.

The festival is based on a traditional Japanese form of entertainment where revelers paint a face on their torsos and stomachs and pretend it is a head.

A kimono is then wrapped around the waist and the person’s real head is hidden by a large cloth hat. The belly button is traditionally painted into a mouth.

A Kit Kat for all seasons

From cherry blossoms to samurai to housing, the Japanese sure have a thing for the short lived, and especially for 限定商品 (gentei syouhin) — seasonal, regional or limited edition products. Restaurant menus and convenience store goods often reflect the tastes of the times, and offerings may range from the more mundane, like oysters as a wintertime topping for your okonomiyaki, to the more unexpected, such as the elusive cucumber-flavored Pepsi.

While products may come and go, one ever-changing supermarket staple continues to be the new and often unusual flavors of Kit Kat. Personally I am a big fan of the sakura variety that hits every graduation season, and I’m always sad when the soft pink boxes disappear from conbini shelves come the end of Spring. But just because something is new and different of course doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s particularly good, as was the case when I encountered grape Kit Kat, so I was a bit wary when I found the latest summer offering at my local suupaa:

すいか (watermelon) would not be the first on my list of “flavors matching chocolate and wafer,” but the further enticement of added salt (because, really, what’s watermelon without salt?) convinced me to ignore Better Judgment and drop a bag into my shopping basket.

After ample refrigeration, I finally tore open the packaging and had my first taste of the promised watermelon-salt-chocolate-wafer goodness. The stalwart chocolate and wafer were definitely making their contribution but the watermelon and salt… not so much. It did have some vague “fruit taste” but no distinct watermelon notes. Certainly no competition to the sakura variety, but happily still Kit Kat and still edible.

Oil paintings on old train tickets

FTV recently did a special report on French artist Luc Grateau, who paints portraits of people on old Paris metro tickets:

Grateau started his project in 2004, and has since painted mini portraits of over 1,000 metro passengers. The FTV report shows Grateau painting two individuals on a train, as well as the Japanese reporter who interviewed him. Despite Grateau’s claim that it is difficult to paint the eyes of Japanese people, the reporter’s portrait turns out well.

For more on Luc Grateau’s paintings, check out his blog.

Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry’s third great-grandson

The other night, a TV show tracked down the descendants of famous figures in Japanese history. Here’s a video of Commodore Perry’s descendant:

The man in the video is Dr. Frederic Hone Nichols, the third great-grandson of Commodore Perry. Nichols displays the original print of the famous photograph of the Commodore that can be seen in school textbooks all across Japan. He reveals a little-known secret about the picture: one of the button’s on Perry’s uniform was missing, so the photographer painted the button onto the photo.

Japanese cinema complexes fight back against the home theater trend

The Yomiuri reports that Japanese cinema complexes are attempting to win back movie fans who have been choosing to watch rented movies on wide-screen TVs instead of going watching films in theaters.

Some of the new things theaters are trying out:

• digital projectors to provide enhanced colors and images
• cutting-edge audio technology and devices, including large speakers that are normally used for music concerts.
• “platinum seats” that cost 5,000 yen (about $50)
• “platinum rooms” for couples that cost 30,000 yen per screening (about $300)
• a luxurious atmosphere with a night view and cafe bar outside of the screening rooms

The article does not mention Japan’s movie ticket prices, with some theaters charging the equivalent of $18 for a normal ticket – well over doubled the average price movie-goers in the U.S. pay for tickets.