Archive for December, 2009

Japanese views of China becoming more positive

According to the Yomiuri:

According to the survey conducted jointly by The Yomiuri Shimbun and a weekly magazine published by the official Xinhua News Agency, 45 percent of Japanese say the bilateral ties are good compared with 50 percent saying so in China.

Meanwhile, 47 percent of the Japanese respondents and 43 percent of the Chinese said the relationship was bad, according to the survey.

However, the percentage of the Japanese respondents who viewed the bilateral ties positively increased by nine percentage points from 36 percent in the previous survey conducted in July 2008.

Meanwhile, the Chinese government has launched an international PR campaign to improve the image of “Made in China” products. I haven’t seen any of their commercials on Japanese TV yet, but they are apparently targeting Asian markets through ads on channels like CNN. Here is an example [via China Smack]:

Seeing as Japanese tend to have negative views of the quality and safety of products from China, airing this ad on normal Japanese TV networks might be a good idea.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)

Vandals target churches in Kansai

It looks like somebody doesn’t care much for the presence of Protestant churches in Kansai:

Windows were smashed and fire extinguishers thrown inside churches in the prefectures of Osaka, Hyogo, Kyoto and Shiga, the Asahi said, citing local police. Some of the fire extinguishers were stolen from nearby apartment buildings, the report said.

The church vandalism cases in Osaka were confirmed by a spokesman for the prefectural police who would only give his last name, Okamoto. He declined to comment on a possible motive. Ashiya, west of Osaka, recorded two attacks in October, police spokesman Yusuke Matsushita said, while three attacks were reported this year in central Kobe.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)

A spiked temple bell & a rockin temple bell

An oddly-shaped bell at a temple in Nagoya:

The bell was designed some 45 years ago by famous Showa period artist Taro Okamoto. The spikes coming out of the bell are meant to represent human hands launching into space.

If you want to see this bell, here’s a map showing the location of the temple:

View Larger Map

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While we’re on the topic of unique temple bells, here’s a clip of a bell at a temple in the town of Shinano, Nagano prefecture:

The bell is actually a rock. The temple used to have a real metal bell, but it was taken and melted down by the government in 1942 because of wartime material shortages. During the war, a rock was hung in place of the bell. The owners of the temple have decided not to replace it with a real bell, as they now consider the rock to be a sort of memorial. When there are no more wars in the world, the temple will remove the rock and put a new bell in its place.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)

Johnny Depp at Narita Airport

A crowd of screaming Japanese fans greets Johnny Depp as he arrives at Narita Airport:

Depp is in Tokyo to promote Public Enemies, which will hit theaters in Japan on December 12th.*

*The delayed release is a grand example of how many popular foreign films have ridiculously late release dates in Japan. According to the timeline at IMBD, Public Enemies was released in over 50 countries between June and August of this year. The film has already been released on DVD in several countries.

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)

Kate Bosworth to star in “Lost Girls and Love Hotels” movie

According to Hollywood Reporter, Kate Bosworth will be starring in a movie based on a novel about a foreign girl who goes to Japan to teach English and ends up taking lots of drugs and having a lot of sex:

“Young Victoria” director Jean-Marc Vallee has found his next project: “Lost Girls and Love Hotels.”

Kate Bosworth is attached to star and is also producing with Relativity Media.

Nadia Conners wrote the screenplay, which adapts Catherine Hanrahan’s 2006 novel.

Here’s a Publishers’ Weekly description of the book featured on its Amazon page:

Margaret, a 20-something Canadian, has fled to Tokyo to escape her past and now instructs aspiring stewardesses in “cabin-crew and airline interview English.” By night, she numbs herself with drink and dangerous sex. Her story, as readers learn in alternating chapters, features an imploding family and a dangerously schizophrenic brother. Though Margaret is less than convincing as a narrator, her surreal Tokyo encounters propel the book: a barkeep who communicates with lines from Beatles songs, speakers in public bathrooms that broadcast flushing sounds, a rent-a-dog park, a Western slacker who gigs as a fake wedding minister. And, of course, the automated love hotels that Margaret frequents with a Japanese gangster. The plot lurches forward—Margaret becomes fixated on a missing Western girl, gets fired and hooks up with a man whose name she never learns before her roommate flees. There’s redemption to be gained, but the fractured narrative feels like a string of bizarre moments.

Yakuza gangsters, wacky toilets, gaijin wedding ministers, and renting pets? Sounds like it’s got all the exotic and strange stuff that a Western audience would like and expect to see in a story about Japan. Maybe they can also throw in some robots and sex dolls?

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)

Trucks collide near tunnel entrance

A pretty crazy photo from a traffic accident that took place in Yamaguchi prefecture:

The traffic accident experts at 2-channel have been speculating about how the trucks ended up like that. Here are three possible explanations:

[via Itai News]

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• Akihabara News – Gadgetry from Japan (Subscribe)
• Dannychoo.com – Your portal to Japan (Subscribe)