201
LDP politician Onoda Kimi makes the (baseless) charge again that foreigners are sucking money out of Japan’s social safety net and it needs to be stopped.
The ironic thing, though?
Onoda is a half-American born in Chicago, Illinois. twitter.com/8ueBd6tf29iYRp…
202
The hottest new product in Japan is...hot water? Sayu is water heated to between 50 to 60 degrees and sold from the warm drink section of stores. Asahi was unsure it would sell but it's being snapped up by young consumers who drink it for its supposed health benefits.
203
At a press conference, former SDF soldier Gonoi Rina responded to five men from her unit being discharged for sexual harassment: “If I hadn’t spoken up under my real name, they’d have done it again. In my unit, sexual harassment was used as a form of communication.”
204
File under “Japanese is Hard” - someone partially graffitied “kenka” (fight, brawl) on this beam. Says OP: “They couldn’t remember the ‘ka’ and gave up.” twitter.com/sewashi__/stat…
205
“Hit-by-a-car-yesterday deer sashimi, 900 yen” twitter.com/ami105610/stat…
206
The latest ep of anime Lycoris Recoil shows images of characters smoking red spider lilies (彼岸花) in the interstitials. Small catch: the flower is poisonous - leading fans online & even the lead illustrator to warn others "don't try this at home, kids."
huffingtonpost.jp/entry/lycoris-…
207
It's been days since Prime Minister Kishida Fumio fired secretary Arai Masayoshi for saying he didn't want LGBTQ people near him. But the firestorm isn't dying. Could this lead to actual action on LGBTQ rights in Japan? We rounded up some of the best commentary below.
208
"Mei-chan the sea otter just loves attention 😍 #TobaAquarium"
twitter.com/TOBA_AQUARIUM/…
209
Snow has come early to parts of Hokkaido, resulting in a beautiful “collaboration” of fall and winter.
210
User grabs a nice pic of the Imperial train (お召し列車) carrying Japan’s Emperor in what they describe as the most nerve-racking experience in their life as a train enthusiast. (They had to submit to a body check by police to even set up.) twitter.com/azu351_photo/s…
211
After well over a year, the first major news related to Miyazaki's newest (and likely final) feature film, How Do You Live (君たちはどう生きるか). The film will release on July 14th, 2023, in Japan. The very first visual for the described "epic fantasy" film is shown below. twitter.com/JP_GHIBLI/stat…
212
The LDP’s Aso Taro, who’s previously scolded women for not having enough babies, is now saying he doesn’t see the value in compulsory education beyond elementary school: “Adults don’t need to know differential & integral calculus or factorization.”
213
“Assassin’s pasta” (暗殺者のパスタ) is a recipe from Japan-resident Italian chef Marco Macri generating buzz on JP Twitter. It involves first frying the pasta in oil, garlic, and tomato sauce before boiling it slowly in a ladled tomato soup base until cooked through. twitter.com/c_chan1110/sta…
214
"In the deep mountains, remote from anywhere, where not even the streetlights shine. Only this telephone box shone out; around it was only darkness."
twitter.com/urbex_34/statu…
215
“Sorting through my pics and chortled by myself over Jaws drowning” twitter.com/nekozenoshin/s…
216
"Doraemon failing to read the room"
A parody poster for Shinkai Makoto's "Suzume no Tojimari," currently in theaters in Japan.
twitter.com/Mini_VqVq/stat…
217
The envelope says “reward/honorarium” (謝礼) but the writing makes the kanji 礼 look like the hiragana れ so it looks like it reads “apologize, dammit!” (謝れ). twitter.com/polandball_200…
218
Japan is dealing with an outbreak of wild boars & other animals, leading to some close calls. The issue? Hunters are getting old & dying. In response, some areas are now deploying "hunting drones" using simulated barking to drive animals toward hunters.
219
Akiyama Kiiro, the songwriter for My Hero Academia who was arrested for assaulting a woman in his home in Tokyo, will not face charges. Prosecutors declined to explain why.
220
JP basketball player Hachimura Aren is speaking out after another JP player, Monica Okoye, publicized racist DMs she received: “It’s easy to ignore such slander, but I think it’s important to speak about the reality of our lives.” Both are half Japanese. huffingtonpost.jp/entry/story_jp…
221
Trending on JP Twitter: #月食写真下手くそ選手権 (Crappy Lunar Eclipse Pic Champion), in which users duke it out to see whose photo of the eclipse is the greatest failure. User below someone got theirs to look like a mochi donut. twitter.com/mariko78_k_b/s…
222
Step into any Japanese grocery store, and you’re sure to see rows of tiny bottles of Yakult lining the dairy aisle. This instantly recognizable probiotic beverage has taken the world by storm. But what is Yakult? How did it become so popular? And who is the mastermind behind it?
223
“My kid suddenly said ‘I wanna eat a dinosaur cake!’ so I threw something together with a roll cake, cheesecake, and soufflé from the supermarket. It’s rough but they loved it.” twitter.com/OOYA3/status/1…
224
What appear at first to be photographs of Japanese urban spaces are actually highly-detailed pieces of paper cut art. Impressive work by artist Saito Hiroki.
twitter.com/kiriehiro/stat…
225
OP calls out English speakers “dangling made-up philosophies on Japanese words” - specifically calling out the treatment of “ikigai”, rattling out one EN explanation (“an ancient Japanese philosophy…for making money”) and asking “What the hell’s that mean?” twitter.com/wanwanO/status…
The Japan you don’t learn about in anime. Staff account.