Win free tickets to “Honiefaith” in Tokyo
I am pleased to inform Japan Probe readers that the Tokyo International Players will be once again offering readers of this site an opportunity to win free tickets to one of their stage productions.
The free tickets will be for their second production of “Honiefaith”:
When a Filipino hostess’ dismembered body is discovered in a Tokyo coin locker, Manila newspaper reporter Victor Balmori is dispatched to Japan. Balmori is looking for a story, he finds a nightmare.
Written by long-time Tokyoite Monty DiPietro, “Honiefaith” is a three-act play about people pushed into extraordinary circumstances demanding difficult choices. The premiere of “Honiefaith” at OUR SPACE in Hatagaya, opens the Tokyo International Players’ new “Second Stage” series, and is being directed by TIP president Jonah Hagans.Jonah Hagans (director): “I’m very excited to be working directly with the author on a production, this is the first opportunity I’ve had to build a piece up from the very beginning. ‘Honiefaith’ involves so much interpersonal dynamic — the challenge for me working with the actors has been developing the connection to the character and each other, and bringing out the genuine emotion and feeling to maximize the play’s impact.”
Monty DiPietro (playwright): “In the spring of 2008 I read a news report about the death of Honiefaith Ratilla Kamiosawa, and began imagining characters and their reactions to the tragedy. The ideas became notes and the notes became a script. I’m honored that TIP is producing ‘Honiefaith’, watching Jonah and the cast bringing the story to life has been thrilling, and a little terrifying.”
“Honiefaith” is based on real events. Some scenes contain violence that may not be suitable for small children.
The production will take place at Our Space near Hatagaya station in Tokyo from November 6th until November 8th, 2009. Show time and ticket information can be found here.
How To Enter This Contest:
To enter, send an e-mail to honiefaith@gmail.com with “Japan Probe” in the “subject” line, before Monday November 2. The tickets are for opening night, Friday November 6 at 7:00 pm, winners will be notified by e-mail. Good luck!
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Categories: General Japan
Otaku Rooms
An NTV “Zoom In” news report about the popularity of anime in the United States visits the home of an American otaku to see his treasures:
It’s John Patterson, a 42-year-old employee of Media Blasters. Patterson has a collection of some 8,000 items, totaling close to 50 million yen in value.
Similarly impressive otaku rooms can be found in the Otacool database on Figure.fm (which has been released as a bilingual book).
The rest of the news report, showing some fans at the NY Anime Festival:
The clip shows Americans learning manga drawing techniques, and representative from Del Rey Manga mentions how many new American comic books are heavily influenced by Japanese anime and manga. They also interview a few fans and find out about how they find the themes of friendship and loyalty present in anime stories to be very appealing. A few cosplayers also say they want to live in Japan.
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Categories: Otaku & Anime
Prince Hisahito encounters cute animals
Prince Hisahito, the grandson of Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, visited Ueno Zoo for a photo op with some cute animals:
The prince spent time petting and handling rabbits and guinea pigs and caring for Tokara goats at the Children’s Zoo.
When he encountered a rabbit, he asked staff how to hold it. He also moved guinea pigs from a raised platform onto the floor, where he crouched down to pet them
More photos can be found on the websites of the Sankei Shimbun, the Yomiuri Shimbun, and the AFP.
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Categories: Celebrity News
Details emerge in case of MSDF collision with Korean container ship
As an investigation into the collision of a MSDF destroyer and a Korean container ship proceeds, more details are becoming available. This story has been a big topic on 2-channel, where many theories are floating around and some users are putting a lot of effort into investigating the cause of the collision. The Asahi Shimbun’s decision to edit an online article and remove a passage suggesting that the Korean ship may have been at fault has fed the fury.
Here are some images created by Japanese netizens, combined with details that have emerged since yesterday:
Some details from the Chugoku Shimbun:
【速報】護衛艦接近側からの追い越し指示 関門海峡管制官
護衛艦くらまと韓国籍コンテナ船が衝突した事故で海上保安庁は28日、関門海峡をレーダー監視している海上交通センターの管制官が、韓国船に「前方の貨物船は左側から追い越してほしい。前から護衛艦が来ているので注意を」と、護衛艦に近づく形での航行を指示していたことを明らかにした。
In the incident where the destroyer Kurama and the South Korean container ship collided, the Japan Coast guard revealed on the 28th that, the control officer monitoring the Kanmon Strait by radar had advised the South Korean ship to “pass the cargo ship in front on the left side. Take note there is a destroyer approaching from the front”, directing it on a path that would take it closer to the destroyer.
A Google Earth view of the location where the collision took place, created by this Japanese blog:
The red arrow indicates the Japanese ship’s course, while the green arrow indicates the correct course for the Korean container ship. The yellow arrow shows where the container ship crossed into the path of the destroyer.
An English article from Mainichi has also provided some interesting information, including a phrase pointing out that the destroyer might have been able to take evasive action and avoid the collision:
Defense Ministry and other officials said it was a rule for vessels passing through the Kanmon Strait between the Japanese islands of Kyushu and Honshu to keep to the right. The Kurama, which was heading west, was on the Yamaguchi Prefecture (Honshu) side of the strait and the Carina Star was on the Kitakyushu side. However, coast guard officials said the collision occurred on the Yamaguchi Prefecture side, and a freighter was traveling in front of the container ship.
Based on an explanation from the company that owns the container ship and on the state of damage of the two vessels, officials say there is a high possibility that the accident occurred when the container ship steered to the left to pass the freighter in front of it and entered the path of the Kurama. Coast guard officials are investigating whether the destroyer’s crash avoidance measures were insufficient.
Keep an eye on the comments section of this post for more details, as this site’s readers are really good at finding up-to-date information. Almost all of the information of in this post comes from comments left by Helical under yesterday’s post about the collision.
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Categories: General Japan
Former comfort women want another apology from Japan
The Associated Press has an article up about former Korean comfort women gathering in Tokyo to demand that Prime Minister Hatoyama follow through with statements he once made in support of further apologies and compensation:
The women gathered in Tokyo to pressure Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who as opposition leader in 2002 told lawmakers the Japanese government should “offer compensation to the victims and restore their honor.”
Lee Yong-soo said Hatoyama has been supportive of the so-called “comfort women” since she first met him as opposition leader over a decade ago in Seoul.
“Now Mr. Hatoyama is prime minister. It’s time for him to settle the issue,” said the 80-year-old Lee, who said she was forced to become a sex slave in Taiwan after being abducted from Korea by Japanese soldiers in 1944.1
Historians say up to 200,000 women, mainly from the Korean peninsula and China, were forced to provide sex for Japanese soldiers in military brothels during the war.2 Many more women were raped as Japanese troops rampaged through the region. Only hundreds of the women are believed to still be alive.
Under the 1965 treaty normalizing relations between Japan and South Korea, Japan paid 180 billion yen in indemnity and aid to the South Korean government with the understanding that South Korea would then shoulder responsibility for compensating individual victims of the colonial period.
After the comfort women issue started getting a lot of attention in the 1990′s, the Japanese government issued a unambiguous apology to victims and set up the Asian Women’s Fund to distribute directly compensate former comfort women. Most of the fund’s financial backing came from government money, but many former comfort women in Korea rejected the compensation because it the AWF was not a government agency and the Japanese government’s apologies were not in the form of diet resolutions. The AWF dissolved in 2007 after concluding that it had done all it could to locate and pay those willing to accept compensation.
According to the Japan Times, DPJ lawmakers are now working to introduce an official comfort women apology bill to the Diet.
Notes:
1: This will inevitably appear in the comments section of the post, so I might as well mention it now – Lee Yong-soo has given many different accounts of how she became a comfort women. In some, she was forcibly abducted by soldiers. In others, she ran away from home.
2: Estimates range from 20,000 to over 400,000. Some historians, such as Ikuhiko Hata, estimate that close to 40% of comfort women were Japanese – more than any other individual nationality.
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Categories: Politics
Sloped station platform causes wheelchair death in Tokyo
The Asahi Shimbun reports on the death of a wheelchair-bound elderly woman:
The woman fell from the platform at Tamagawa Station, of the Tokyu Toyoko Line in Ota Ward, on Sept. 13 and died the next day. Her chair began to roll down the platform after she and her daughter exited an elevator.
The daughter, 61, had just released the grip on the wheelchair to press a “close” button inside the lift so it would quickly return to pick up people waiting on the lower level.
The fatal fall has underscored a danger at heavily used public transportation facilities.
Experts warn that platforms can be dangerous not just for wheelchairs but baby buggies as well, because they are built with a slight slant to stop the pooling of rainwater.
Most stations have a slope of just 1% (a decline of 1 centimeter to a distance of 1 meter), but this particularly station, which has a history of similar accidents, had a slope of around 2.5%. Experts consulted for the article recommend that all stations with sloping platforms install some sort of safety barrier to prevent accidents.
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Categories: General Japan