JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
-
- Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) in Kanto region
- RCS (RCSコーポレーション), Kanto
- Salary: ¥180,000 ~ ¥250,000 / Month includes performance bonus
-
- Assistant Language Teacher - TOKYO - late-March start
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥230,000 ~ ¥255,000 / Month
-
- Assistant Language Teacher - Kanagawa Prefecture - late-March start
- Interac, Kanagawa
- Salary: ¥230,000 ~ ¥255,000 / Month
2
ADK99
It's ridiculous to suggest that the shinkansen should have 2 drivers for safety reasons. It's not a plane, and it doesn't just carry on at 200km/h in the event of something happening to the driver. It stops, quickly and safely. Where's the problem?
Posted in: Bullet train driver stops train because he forgot his glasses
1
ADK99
I'm not sure what's going through the heads of people who can't understand why this woman was arrested. It's blatantly obvious, and quite right too. Even assuming that everything she is reported to have said is correct, she found a 4-year-old in the streets at 4am then took her home and kept her FOR 19 HOURS.
Is there a single person out there who considers this to be normal behaviour? Is there a single person here who - even if they knew the child or mother - wouldn't have either taken her home within a reasonable period of time, or informed the police?
The mother may or may not be a hopeless excuse for a parent but give me a break - 19 HOURS.
Posted in: Missing 4-year-old girl turns up safe; 21-year-old hostess arrested
2
ADK99
Nice to have the writer here to "defend" his piece - good on you, Mike.
I have some sympathy as I can imagine the situation to be somewhat awkward (although based on the limited info available I tend to agree with others - you appear to have over-reacted).
I do, however, disagree with this quite strongly:
I couldn't even begin to list the number of situations in which foreigners here are NOT expected to understand and adapt to Japanese culture. In fact, we are often given a free pass in situations where a Japanese most certainly would not be. This may be difficult and confusing at times but I don't see it as a double standard.
Posted in: Was I a date, a friend or just a potential English teacher?
4
ADK99
Do you think, just perhaps, he might be being sarcastic??
Posted in: Patrol officer arrested over convenience store toilet camera in Kagawa
0
ADK99
It seems more likely that the driver forgot that the drink driving laws in Japan changed in the last few years, rather than that he completely forgot. It's not so long ago that 2 beers would have been within the legal limit for an average sized Japanese man. Not as ridiculous a situation as it sounds.
Posted in: 3 Kanagawa teachers disciplined for various infractions
0
ADK99
It's quite possible there were no witnesses as this is a looong platform (it's my home station) and probably there weren't so many people waiting on it at 10am. Incredibly (or perhaps not so incredibly) another person did the same thing there today. Kiosk and bystanders apparently unhurt.
Posted in: Woman jumps in front of express train; body propelled into station
0
ADK99
Monkeyz, to be fair none of us have the faintest idea how many false accusations are made. Could be zero, could be thousands.
Posted in: Mother of falsely accused groper who killed himself files damages suit
0
ADK99
It's not tax. It's a surcharge. Personally I think fuel is part of their overall costs and should be included in the total price of the ticket. Tacking it on as an extra - often at the last minute - is deliberately intended to disguise a price increase as a tax.
Posted in: Airlines say they have no choice but to pass the increase in oil prices on to passengers in the form of a higher fuel tax? Do you agree?
0
ADK99
The idea of Hatoyama criticizing any prime minister makes me sick. He had his chance and proved himself to be an utterly incompetent spineless weasel incapable of running his own affairs, let alone a nation's. He should actually be in prison for tax fraud.
Kan has been dealt a tough hand (even before the quake) and is playing it reasonably well.
Article Unavailable
0
ADK99
Klein2 - actually that's incorrect. You don't have to go very far inland from many of the affected areas to find life functioning fairly normally - kids are going to school, shops are open, combinis functioning as usual etc. Cash in hand will give some people who have almost nothing a little bit of independence and choice. The issue of "fairness" is more complicated though given that no shelter has received exactly the same help as the next one, I'm not sure if we should worry too much about it.
Zenny - don't be ridiculous. You're telling me the police ought to take money from a private citizen, that they received as a gift, because the name of the person who gave it to them is unknown? There is no evidence whatsoever of any wrongdoing by anyone, no matter how misguided you feel the donation is. The tax office might have something to say about it at some future point after the end of the tax year but beyond that it seems to me that it's nobody elses business.
Posted in: Donors hand envelopes with cash to evacuees in Ishinomaki
-1
ADK99
Not able to comment with any authority on how well Tepco have managed the nuclear accident (I fear the worst) but in Tokyo I think they've done very well. The rolling power outages are clearly a necessary evil, and the fact that they've scheduled power outages and in some cases not had to implement them is a good thing. National government - so far I have to tip my hats to them, I'm really not sure what more they could have done in the circumstances. Kan and Edano aren't inspiring characters but they seem to have handled things calmly, competently and rationally. Help from outside has been admitted, the jietai were mobilised quickly. Huge amount of work to be done, but so far so good.
Posted in: What do you think of the Japanese government's response to the earthquake-tsunami disaster so far?
0
ADK99
Goddog, LinkedIn is extremely useful, I use it almost daily and have both gained clients through it, learned a lot of very useful information, exchanged views and made valuable contacts. Can't say I've tried to find a new job through it, but as far as I can see that is far from being its primary purpose.
Posted in: Google, Facebook consider buying Twitter
0
ADK99
I don't pray but I do own a small business. If we have a bad year then a bunch of nice people will get fired, and the same can be said about an awful lot of companies in the coming year. There are non-selfish reasons for praying for financial prosperity,.
Posted in: Praying for a good year
0
ADK99
I'm English so was naturally hoping that football would go home, but I can just about live with Russia - biggest country in the world, proper football culture, never hosted it before. A case can be made.
Qatar is a bad joke. It's FAR too small to host a world cup, it's too hot, you can't get a beer, they don't have anywhere near enough hotel rooms nor any sensible plan to build them - how does a country of 1.6 million plan to accommodate 400,000 visitors? There is simply no justification for this, and the only conclusion for this is that a lot of Fifa delegates made a lot of money on this. Shameful.
Posted in: Qatar and Russia World Cups make sense
0
ADK99
I think it's worth pointing out that since the new "jury" system was introduced, common sense has generally prevailed and sentencing for violent crimes, especially murder, has generally been significantly stricter. I don't see him getting off the murder charge with a defence of "I was only trying to quieten her down whilst attempting to rape her". That may wash with an addled old judge more interested in the finer points of the law; it's not going to get past a bunch of normal people who (quite rightly) are going to see forensically confirmed rape, bound and gagged corpse, fleeing the scene, nationwide manhunt and plastic surgery. They're going to find him guilty of all charges and the only question is whether they hang him or lock him up for life.
Posted in: Lindsay Hawker's accused killer appears determined to fight murder charge
0
ADK99
What an odd question - Japan have been RUBBISH pretty much since winning the Asian Championships in 2003 (or 2004, I forget). Brief signs of life under Osim, but they have been truly dreadful. In a more competitive region than Asia, they wouldn't have qualified. I'm really happy that they're doing well, but even Japanese people didn't think they were going anywhere.
Soggygyoza - If anyone can win it, perhaps you can explain why in 80 years only 7 teams have managed? In fact, if you take out the the 2 nations who have won it only on home soil but have never reached a final away from home, and Uruguay who won it twice in the tournament's infancy, we're really only looking at FOUR teams. I guess they must be REALLY fluky.
Posted in: How come so many people were prepared to write off Japan's chances at the World Cup before the tournament even began?
0
ADK99
As has been pointed out TWICE, they were NOT JR employees.
Posted in: Police nab 77 in 3 prefectures during one-week crackdown on train groping, molesting
0
ADK99
It depends on whether you want to insert the word "comparatively" before the word "healthy" in the question. White rice may not be an ideal staple but compared to french fries, which seem to be the de facto staple in America, Britain, and to a lesser extent Australia, I'd suggest that it's pretty good. Similarly, green tea v coke stands up extremely well; given that Americans get over 20% of their daily calories from drinks, that makes a massive difference. That's more an issue of diet than cuisine though. And in general I'd suspect that the average Japanese eats a healthier diet than the average westerner. For example, I was in a cheap chain izakaya last night and we ate bamboo shoots, edamame, a seafood salad, fried chicken (sorry Cleo) and onigiri. I think that probably compares pretty favourably to what I would probably have eaten in a similar price range British pub - fish and chips, lasagane and chips, pie and chips, sausage and mash, or American bar - buffalo wings, french fries, ribs.
Posted in: How healthy is Japanese cuisine?
0
ADK99
Wheelchair basketball is, to pardon the pun, a handicapped sport whereby each time is allowed a certain number of "points" on the field at one team. e.g. a fully able person might be 10 points, and a heavily disabled person might be 3 points (I don't know the system exactly). So each team has to decide how many players of each level of disability to have on the field. Seems to me that this system makes it eminently suitable for non-disabled and people of varying disabilities to participate on a reasonably equal footing. As such I think it's far from disgusting, it should be encouraged. All part of the "normalization" of disabilities, which is surely a good thing.
Article Unavailable
0
ADK99
Whilst this individual undoubtedly deserves to rot, I'd like to take issue with the various comments about nutter J-women, J-trash, watching NHK news, and that Japanese society takes family murder lightly. The repeated singling out of the "Japaneseness" of this story is not only ridiculous, it's ignorant at best and racist at worst. It's also not borne out by any measurable FACT (something in short supply on the JT discussion boards).
Here's a fact for you:
Violent deaths of children per million children in Japan stands at around 16. This compares to about 46 in the US. OK, I hear you say, the US is a special case due to gun laws etc. That may be so, but here's another fact:
The child violent death rate in Japan is considerably lower than in Germany (around half). Same compared to England. It's also lower than in England and Holland. It's about the same as Australia and Canada.
I'm curious to know how this fits in with the views of those here who seem to think that Japanese people treat their children worse than those in other countries, or value human life less.
Posted in: Woman held over fatal abuse of 5-year-old stepdaughter