Archive for June, 2009

Stealing from a shrine collection basket

Another report about the usefulness of buying surveillance cameras (once again from NTV’s “Real Time News”):

This time the news is from Kagawa Prefecture, where the chief priest of a shrine installed a security camera after noticing a sudden drop in donations. Sure enough, the camera revealed that a thief was stealing from the shrine’s collection box.

When the chief priest confronted the thief, he discovered it was a man who had twice before been caught stealing from the shrine’s donation box. The man had recently been released from prison and had no home and no job. He had been using stolen money to live while visiting unemployment offices and searching for work. The thief seemed almost relieved to be arrested and on his way back to prison.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Bicycle helmets for children in Japan

TBS news investigates what happens when a child riding on their parent’s bicycle gets into an accident:

Unsurprisingly, having the child wear a helmet dramatically reduces the amount of possible head injury. (Update: As noted in the comment section, the law is weakly worded and has no serious penalty for noncompliance.)

Last year, a law was passed requiring all children under the age of 13 to wear helmets when riding bicycles. Unfortunately, many parents are not following the rule, with a recent survey finding that the helmet-wearing rate in Tokyo is a mere 30%. (One woman interviewed said she tried to make her kid wear a helmet, but gave up after he displayed an unwillingness to wear it!)

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Pigeon builds nest on bicycle

The Saga Shimbun has posted this video of a pigeon oriental dove that built its nest on a bicycle:

The owners of the bicycle first noticed that a bird’s nest was being built on there back in May. After trying to remove the nest, they found that the bird rebuilt it in the same spot a day later. They gave up after the bird laid eggs in the nest, and have since been protecting the area.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Taro Aso in trouble…

The approval ratings for Taro Aso’s cabinet have sunk to 17.5%. Quick, somebody air footage of him making minor gaffes!

• He mixed up Ayumi Hamasaki’s name during a speech, calling her Ayumi Iwasaki.
• When trying to remind an audience about the fixed amount economic stimulus they received from his government, he confused them by calling it “employment adjustment grant money.”

(From FTV news)

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

NTT helps Twitter stay up during Iranian protests

Hats off to the U.S. branch of Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. for their cooperation with Twitter in delaying a scheduled downtime so that the service could stay up and continue aiding the efforts of protesters in Iran:

A critical network upgrade must be performed to ensure continued operation of Twitter. In coordination with Twitter, our network host had planned this upgrade for tonight. However, our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran. Tonight’s planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran).

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)

Japanese Tea Ceremony Wedding

Apparently there is a “Japanese-style wedding boom” going on right now, with many couples ditching fake churches and Western-style wedding dresses in favor of kimono. Here’s part of a FTV report about the subject:

The clip shows a tea ceremony wedding between a Japanese woman and a American man. They live in New York, but they flew to Kyoto to have a Japanese-style wedding. It was a small private ceremony, and only cost about 150,000 yen – a bargain compared to most weddings in Japan. The American didn’t particularly like having to sit Japanese-style for so long, but he thought the ceremony was beautiful.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)
• Kirainet.com – A geek in Japan (Subscribe)