Owing to staff shortages, Mount Fuji will be closed to climbers this summer - but only on Sundays. The authorities have been having trouble finding people willing to spend the whole season on the mountain, and so have decided to restrict access on Sundays. This effectively means that those who want to do a weekend climb have to be off the mountain by midnight on Saturday, although the most detailed news report I found made no mention of penalties. Perhaps they’ll leave you stranded up there…

I’m also not sure if this means the Self Defence Forces will have to find somewhere else to train as well, although to be honest, no-one really cares about them. Especially North Korea.

(more info here.)

Japan is internationally renowned for its love of cute. This is oft exaggerated, but isn’t entirely without merit. What is often missed is the side effect of this obsession, whereby nearly every business, organization, event - or indeed, just about anything - irrespective of size or purpose, seeks to get itself a mascot.

The Aichi expo had these guys -

The Japanese police have this guy -

Hikone Castle has this guy -

The Japanese military settled, famously, on this guy (the one on the left, who won’t be fingerprinted on coming to Japan) -

Nara, one of Japan’s most popular tourist destinations, site of the ancient capital, and famous for deers and temples, didn’t have a mascot. This oversight needed correcting, obviously, so the city government contracted themselves a nifty looking logo that they thought would sum up the charms of their city as cutely as possible.

This is what they got -

According to Yahoo news, there have been a few complaints that it isn’t cute enough. I’m inclined to agree.

source - Yahoo news (only Japanese)

Remember Gunkanjima? The little rock in the ocean, off the coast of Nagasaki, that once saw duty as a coal mining town? No? Well, you can review the original post from way back when here, and perhaps you might want to take a look at the wikipedia entry here. It’s a beautiful, haunting place, a testament to how we interact with our environment and what happens when we just stop.

It would look really, really good filled with zombies.

Something more grounded in reality, and a lot more moving than that suggestion can be found below - a video taken when someone who grew up on the island in its heyday goes back to see the ruins. Stunning, moving and fascinating.

via videosift.com

A kirin - or qilin - is a mythical beast, orginally from China, who brings luck and prosperity wherever it goes. Somewhere along its colourful path through history, it managed to get itself confused with the giraffe, in case anyone was wondering about the modern meaning of the Japanese word. Interestingly, Kirin brewery like to play for both teams; their Kirin Lemon brand of lemonade features a lemon with a giraffe’s head as its character. The qilin shows up on the product I myself am most acquainted with - the various beers that Kirin are probably most famous for.

What then is this secret of which I speak?

Next time you’re out and you see Kirin’s qilin logo, have a closer look. For the beast bears three tattoos upon its back, spelling out its name: there’s a キ(ki), a リ(ri)　and a ン(n). Now, the only one that’s easy to find is the first one - it’s nestled just behind the qilin’s ear. The other two? Well, I did a rough approximation and I’m not even sure I got them right. Hard to tell on a low pixel shot like this -

You’ll just have to check yourself - before you sink the third one.

Konishiki. This name may mean something to some and nothing to others. Konishiki is a Hawaii-born wrestler that attained the second-highest ranko in Sumo Wrestling (”Ozeki” - the first being “Yokozuna”). His main claim to fame is that he also is the first foreign born wrestler to attain this rank. He weighed around 270kg during his fighting career and was nicknamed the “Dump truck”.
Dude is huge.

Anyway, watching a Discovery Channel docco this evening on Sumo prompted me to post this as they even ventured into Konishiki’s Hip Hop career :

Nowm you can see Konishiki on Nihongo de Asobo (にほんごであそぼ) on NHK TV - Teaching kids Japanese. Awesome.

I got an email the other night, which I presumed to be an elaborate wind - up. But no, it turned out to be true. And with it came the intriguing knowledge that Taro Aso, Japan’s Foreign Minister, still serving under Abe Shinzo - the new PM - is a dab hand with the old rifle.

He represented Japan in the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal at Clay Pigeon Shooting, and is Chairman of the Japanese National Clay Pigeon Shooting Society.

I love the internets and all its tasty trivia goodness. Taro Aso is still a little troll though.

Thank you, Tony Rosetti for the heads up on Mr. Aso’s history.