JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
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- 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
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- Assistant Language Teacher - TOKYO - late-March start
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥230,000 ~ ¥255,000 / Month
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- Assistant Language Teacher - Kanagawa Prefecture - late-March start
- Interac, Kanagawa
- Salary: ¥230,000 ~ ¥255,000 / Month
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cleo
If they don't want people eating and drinking on trains, they need to do something about those ladies who stand on the platform selling tea and ekiben.
Posted in: Good manners
2
cleo
Arrogance and refusal to integrate.
They assumed people would continue to pay for the Sony brand even when the CDs they produced wouldn't play on the computers/iPods people wanted to listen to them on (ended up returning the CDs to the shop for a refund), when files recorded on Sony voice recorders had to be processed to death to get them to play on free software with a big drop in sound quality and not always even then, when DVDs recorded on Sony equipment will not play back on non-Sony equipment even though the manual says they will (Ask customer support for help and they say 'ask the person who recorded the DVD.' Very helpful I don't think).
I used to search out Sony products for the quality, now I avoid them because they're not compatible with the other stuff I need to use them with.
Posted in: Sony is forecasting a 220 billion yen loss for fiscal 2011, its 4th straight year of red ink despite massive cost cuts and restructuring efforts in recent years. What do you think are the main reasons for Sony's decline?
0
cleo
Japan is having its coldest, snowiest winter in years, ditto Eastern Europe... so to balance things out, who's getting the nice mild winter?
Posted in: Death toll climbs as heavy snow grips northern Japan
-1
cleo
No wonder the rich think the poor are a burden. How about providing more jobs so that people can earn a living wage?
Posted in: After Florida win, Romney makes gaffe on poor
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cleo
That may be the ideal, but in real life it would mean that if you live in a poor neighbourhood you go to a poor school.
I agree with you that there is a lot of room for improvement, but it needs to come from the parents, not the schools. Neither of my kids were pressured to go to juku, and they did just fine.
Posted in: Japan job treadmill grinds down workers and firms
0
cleo
No they don't. Only if Mum and Dad insist, and most don't. The only 'test' my son had to pass to get into the local kindergarten was an interview with the head. She asked him, 'Of the food your mother cooks for you, what's your favourite?' he answered 'Strawberries'. He got in.
Elementary and junior high schools, being compulsory, can be entered without tests. The problem isn't so much 'everyone has to take tests' as parents pushing average Taro to get into a much-better-than-average school.
Posted in: Japan job treadmill grinds down workers and firms
0
cleo
Well said, that man!! ♥
Posted in: Lots of chocolate, but little love on Valentine’s Day in Japan
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cleo
I don't think whether people buy expensive chocolates for Valentine's Day or not is a reliable indicator of whether or not they're an 'emotionless cyborg'. More an indicator of whether or not they're susceptible to advertising.
If I thought I'd get a new top-of-the-range food mixer in return, I'd give my man a box of chocolates, and help him eat them.
Posted in: Lots of chocolate, but little love on Valentine’s Day in Japan
-1
cleo
In Japan? You take your girl to places where they don't expect you to pay at the cash desk by the door? In the few times I've been to top class joints, I've never had the waiter bring the change to the table.
Being in charge of the family finances, I always do the paying. The change never gets given to anyone but me 'cos Mr cleo isn't hanging around, he's out in the car park bringing the car round.
Being a vegetarian means every meal out involves a discussion with the staff about whether the food has meat/fish/stock/gelatine/all of the above in it and if so what can be done about it. By the time the order's in, the waiter/waitress knows there's no point asking anyone else at the table about my food.
Posted in: What do you think of the quality of waiters in Japanese restaurants?
2
cleo
Rolled cabbage is good in oden. My favourite ingredients - boiled egg, chikuwabu, daikon, whole carrots, whole eringi mushrooms, whole potatoes, aburaage bags with omochi inside, ganmodoki. All washed down with a tumbler of whisky.
The good thing about oden is that you can leave the pot simmering on the fire and eat sitting round the telly watching a film or video.
Posted in: Oden, mixed stew, sukiyaki most favored 'nabe' dishes in winter
0
cleo
Got tropical fish, does that count? Or does it have to be goldfish? (Mucky little blighters, harder to keep clean than guppies and they eat the ornamental water plants.)
Posted in: Drink up
0
cleo
Some want kids, dogs, cats and birds. Is that a problem?
Posted in: Drink up
0
cleo
Wilke, if she already has basic (broken) English, it will gradually become less and less of an effort when she has to use it every day in everyday situations. It may be hard at first, but give her enough room to sort herself out and she should be fine. Being able to speak in Japanese with you will ease the strain, and it sounds like she'll get plenty of help from her new family.
Posted in: How foreigners’ daily lives change when they live in Japan
1
cleo
No worries, in no time at all the kids will be speaking 'strain with the best of them, and from there it's a short step to English. :-)
Posted in: How foreigners’ daily lives change when they live in Japan
-4
cleo
Better idea, be open and honest with your partner. Works out way better in the long run.
Yeah right, they force you to put your unprotected manhood into dodgy situations. I wonder why there isn't more coverage of all these male rapes in the crime section on JT.
Yeah 'cos driving around alone in a souped-up expensive car is so much better than being part of a warm, loving family ..... not.
Posted in: Zapping testicles with ultrasound could be male contraceptive
2
cleo
Again, not American....My UK family were not only not upset about the prospect of their only daughter marrying a Japanese, they were so pleased (after Dad met Mr cleo and gave him his unconditional seal of approval) that they contacted the local newspaper and had them write an article about it. Dad was also very proactive in sending out books, tapes, videos, toys etc., to aid the kids' English acquisition, which was a huge help. When son went to stay with my brother and his family, he was gleefully and proudly introduced to friends as 'our Japanese cousin'. So, No Problems Whatsoever.
I only wish we'd had Skype when the kids were little and my Dad was alive.
Posted in: How foreigners’ daily lives change when they live in Japan
-7
cleo
Babysitting your own grandkids is one thing, babysitting someone else's is a different matter. No thank you.
Posted in: Japan's population to shrink two thirds by 2110
-1
cleo
I agree. I understand that people don't like change, especially change that is imposed upon them; but there are times when change has to be accepted because things simply aren't the same any more. Nothing stands still for ever.
Yes.
So his home is no longer the familiar comfortable place it used to be. And he doesn't understand that if you live in a place 'for decades' it tends to become familiar?
Posted in: What is important in your life?
2
cleo
With all due respect to your FiL, unless you're moving in with the in-laws and taking over the running of their house, whether you can/will cook and clean is your husband's problem, not his.... Maybe I'm lucky in marrying into a family that isn't hung up on anything racial/cultural. MiL was more excited at the prospect of coming to ours for new exciting never-before-tried furrin food than she was concerned about her son not getting his regulation rice and misoshiru. I can still turn her into a purring kitten with a loaf of fresh home-baked bread and a pot of homemade jam. (FiL was quite a dab hand in the kitchen and around the house - rare for one of his generation - so the idea of their precious son having to stand in the kitchen or go round with the vacuum cleaner occasionally was never seen as a minus.)
Don't fear the kid thing. Kids are well worth a few verbal fisticuffs. :-)
Posted in: How foreigners’ daily lives change when they live in Japan
2
cleo
Yes of course, why shouldn't they? A well-educated, healthy woman with no obvious physical or mental defects who is obviously very much in love with their son who is also in love with her. What's not to accept?
FiL was a bit dischuffed at first that he couldn't do the whole formal exchange-of-yuino thing that he'd been looking forward to, but he and my Dad were in contact before the wedding and became great friends after, visiting each other and having lots of laughs even though neither spoke a word of the other's language. MiL sometimes comments fondly that she imagines them on the Other Side having a beer together and maybe at last understanding each other's jokes. That's not to say she and I haven't clashed in the past over how to raise the kids, but my Japanese friends seem to have much greater problems over much smaller differences of opinion.
Posted in: How foreigners’ daily lives change when they live in Japan