JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
-
- English Instructor (Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe)
- Berlitz Japan, Inc. (ベルリッツ・ジャパン株式会社), Kansai
- Salary: ¥125,000 ~ ¥250,000 / Month
-
- FT English Teachers for Kids - Osaka
- Kohgakusha Co., Ltd. （株式会社興学社）, Osaka
- Salary: ¥255,000 ~ ¥275,000 / Month Travel Expenses, Encouragement of Japanese learning*
-
- Translator
- ZAIHON, Inc. (日本財務翻訳株式会社), Tokyo
- Salary: ¥6.0M / Year Negotiable
0
tkoind2
Not much reason for it in Japan. Phones here can run circles around this one and several companies will soon release superior versions that are very similar in type and funcation. So if you don't have an Ipod and want one, maybe. But other than that, keep your fast effective camera phone and ipod separate. Helps with battery issues not to have it all in one anyway.
Posted in: Apple's iPhone could find Asia tough to crack
0
tkoind2
This is another poorly thought through idea by a government with no clue how to govern Japan.
So I'll offer our legislative friends some ideas for a better plan.
Enforce labor standards for overtime and make it possible for people to have work life balance. Shutting offices at a rational hour will save more electricity.
Extend train times to allow limited overnight runs and get people out of cars and taxis. And follow that with benefits for companies who swap over the Hybrid Taxis.
Fine companies/stores that have blasting airconditioning that makes the street outside cold in mid summer. Offer incentives for companies, shops etc... that set their cooling at a higher temperatures and who implement solutions to limit how much cooled air they are bleeding into the streets.
While you're busy paving over the entire nation, how about paving in some bike lanes so more people can ride bikes without fear of being mowed down by traffic. Same goes for pedestrian lanes.
Implement the human energy generation solutions such as the floor and street tiles that generate clean electricity.
Start to localize products. We should go back to the Shotengai system where products are from closer at hand. It is better for communities to have products made and sold locally to save on transportation costs and to boost local economies. Already more companies are talking about this in the Oil issue. Japan is well placed to encourage this kind of local business and the resulting, though modest, environmental gains.
Ok Guys. Get started!
Posted in: Plan to cut convenience store hours 'playing with fire'
0
tkoind2
There is very little I respect or like about GWB. This decision adds to the long list of other mistakes this worst American president has made.
In 1936 the world pacified Hitler by attending the Berlin Olympics. It was a chance for the Nazi regime to show off their progress in the post depression world. It was a chance for them to project and image of who and what they wanted the world to see. And shortly after the Nazis proved exactly what kind of nation they are.
I love China and her rich deep history. And I have nothing but love and respect for the Chinese people. Which is why I am against support for the Olympics.
In addition to the political issues of Tibetan and Uyghur autonomy, there is the issue of just what China has done to the working poor population to achieve these games. Farmers have been left without water to cultivate a living so it could be diverted to Beijing. Money's needed for infrastructure, health care and education in poor regions has been diverted to putting a shine on Beijing. And the ongoing suppression of religion, ethnic groups, political groups, free speech and even freedom of information contiues to leave the Chinese people behind a wall of repression. And all this is before you even consider the ongoing threats against Taiwan, a clearly sovereign and independent nation that China wishes to intimidate into unification.
Mao may have had dreams of a society of equals. But as with most revolutions, corrupt and selfish leaders simply replace old oppressors with new ones. The Red China we knew from the 60s is gone. It has been replaced by a growing priviledged class in Beijing and Shangahai who are living off the suffering of China's majority poor. The Olypmics benefitst these people while leaving the nation's poor out in the cold.
Bush has no positive track record for good decisions. But I hope the rest of do. Boycott the Olympics, do not watch it, do not by the promotional products and do not contribute to the ongoing rationalization that China has become a wonderful and open nation just because the corporate world is looking to make a profit there. The facts show what the nation is like and what the people there contend with. Change will not come from this kind of patronage. It did not in 1936 it will not in 2008.
Posted in: Bush says not attending Olympic opening ceremony would be 'affront' to Chinese people
0
tkoind2
Cleo read my post before suggesting channel switchers. Just because I don't watch J-TV does not mean I don't wish there was quality TV to watch. The desire for quality TV is something I think a lot of people share. And no one is saying stop the mindless shows. It would just be nice if switching channels had the desired outcome of leading someone to something a little less... uninspired and dim.
Posted in: Japanese game shows coming to America
0
tkoind2
With the attitude that the retirement and healthcare departments are taking with their loss of public information, I am surprised someone hasn't done this earlier. A recent news conference the responses from the retirement representatives was essentially "We'll get to you when we decide to. Until then deal with it." Not a response that people worried about all the money they have put into the system and may never see again want to hear.
The government needs to come up with a rational solution and a very strong apology of I expect that news like this will become common place around the country. Let's hope cooler heads and smarter solutions prevail.
Posted in: Man drives car loaded with gas, kerosene into city hall in western Japan
0
tkoind2
I'm happy people are showing their anger. G8 supports business at the expense of everyone else. Time we demanded a voice for the people.
Article Unavailable
0
tkoind2
Isn't it bad enough to have to suffer through the mindless slapstick idiocy of shows here? Now we have it to look forward to having it added to the long list of uninspired TV when visiting the US. I am so happy that my TV is really just a monitor for DVDs and very select shows. J-TV makes me want to toss out my TV. US TV has an edge in producing some truly great shows with a little depth. Sadly the other 90% is pretty lame too.
Posted in: Japanese game shows coming to America
0
tkoind2
Wonder what the economic impact on the cities with reduced or lost service will be?
Posted in: American Airlines outlines service cutbacks
0
tkoind2
Another sickening example of conspicuous consumption by people who can find no value in this world beyond flaunting wealth. "Look I am someone, I matter because I have money and can spend it on pointless things."
Meanwhile a lot of people in Japan and around the world are going to bed hungry. So what kind of people are we if we spend on crap like this while others suffer?
Posted in: Golden keyboard
0
tkoind2
MPLS2. You are right about both the impact of oil prices and the limited impact of bio-fuel on consumption and the negative impact upon food production.
There are currently no calorie for calorie replacements for oil. We are just not there yet.
What makes sense for food it what several leaders have already proposed. The leading economic powers should invest heavily in the development of African agriculture. Teaching farmers modern methodologies to assure that food production can rise significantly and address both food reserve and supply needs. This will work. And it will bring added stability.
It will cost money. But it will pay off in the end in benefits. This needs to be done. Then and only then can surplus production be retooled to bio-fuel solutions.
Posted in: Everything spinning out of control
0
tkoind2
Wonder how much they will charge for this. $15 per min.?
Posted in: American Airlines to test in-flight Internet access for passengers
0
tkoind2
weedkila I do agree that a lot of what we spend our time being afraid of is manufactured or designed to keep us under control. We make women fear they are not beautiful so they spend so much energy trying to meet the model that the media has set for them. We guys feel inadequate unless we fit the Armani suit wearing sports car driving mega male image.
The news tells us something is always out there waiting to kill us.
From Bush and the Patriot act we've seen what fear can empower governments to get away with. And we are seeing more and more control of government by corporations and a growing gap of rich and poor that will certainly leave a lot of us with very little say in things.
That said. There are real immediate problems. The environment is a real problem with real consequences. Same goes for Peak Oil. And dozens of other very real dangers we face. The trouble is sorting which ones are real and which created to keep us afraid.
Despite all this, I still believe very strongly that we can fight back. We can start taking steps to assure that we preserve rsources and moderate the impact of some of the real problems. But it will take a lot more of us standing up and trying to be heard. And that may be the most real danger in this age. But it must be done.
The poor and working people have to find a voice and start demanding change.
Posted in: Everything spinning out of control
0
tkoind2
Shouldn't best mean highest quality of living, lowest crime, best health care, best transportation, most rational working hours, best education, good elder care, strong social fabric etc...
The US has a massive military that is not so well suited to the current world situation. We have the most money, at the moment. But our infrastructure is falling apart, we have terrible mass transit, people are working more and more hours, a big percentage of us have no health care, Education is poor or expensive and exclusive. If you are old and not well off, you are in trouble. And our social fabric looks like it has been dragged across a shredder.
So if that means great than GO AMERICA!!!
I'm with Simon. There are some countries with low work hours, better holidays, good economies and positive points on a lot of these criteria. Sad thing is that the US could be there. If we stopped letting greed drive us and started thinking a lot more about social and human values.
Posted in: Everything spinning out of control
0
tkoind2
$250 pb oil will spell disaster that will make the great depression seem not so bad. Just think of the number of dead companies within weeks of that event. Think of food prices. Think of the impact to travel, transportation, shipping etc... Small businesses will vanish and big ones will fall over as both clients and partners become unable to do business.
We've all been afraid of terrorism, bio warfare and knife weilding maniacs in out train stations. But this, $250 per barrel oil will impact your life in ways that you cannot imagine. And a lot of people will perish. We should be taking this prosepect very seriously and looking for ways to avert it.
Posted in: Everything spinning out of control
0
tkoind2
With all the smut out there who cares if this girl wants to make a little money. It is her body, her phone, her data cards. So who cares... except that she is doing it outside the usual Yak smut world. Maybe the Yaks found out and asked their police buddies to crush this tiny threat to their business.
Posted in: 25-year-old wife arrested for selling nude photos of herself
0
tkoind2
120,000 a month. Unless he lives with family, how does he get by. I hear a lot of stories about people living on similar amounts. Most frightening is that the other people I hear about are working.
At least he didn't hurt anyone.
Posted in: 'Dogman' robs convenience stores to feed pets
0
tkoind2
This is a bad idea. A tiny bandaid on a mortal wound.
Everyone should be looking for ways to reduce the amount of energy we use. But closing conbinis early and locking all the late and night working people out of resources is an idiotic suggestion.
A better solution would be to force buildings to reduce airconditioning usage. Fine places with open doors and cool breezes flowing outside.
If you really want to impact power consumption. Enforce labor laws and make companies close up at 8pm. Charge them carbon points for every active floor in their offices after 8pm and use the revenue to seek more green solutions for the city. This solves two problems by helping to reduce overwork and giving people time at home.
There are a lot of little ideas that will help. But this conbini idea shows a real lack of reality checking of what role the stores serve in society by the government.
Posted in: Convenience stores oppose calls for shorter business hours
0
tkoind2
My parents always said that the current times were not as good as times that came before. They said "what is the world coming to?" and they felt down about it. This kind of thinking isn't unique to now nor is representative of some impending doom on the horizon. It is our natural ability to realize that things are not what they could be. And sadly, generation after generation we get over this feeling without having done anything tangible about the cause of it.
So let's take stock. We have two active wars on. Neither going well and neither with a clear resolution plan. The war on terror has become the war on freedom and privacy. And the US is now torturing and rendering people. Not exactly our idea of the heroic United States and won two world wars now is it. This is the first major crack in our image and in our self perception.
Next the world looks at us differently today. Before we were pretty popular, but our awful unilateral decisions and sword swinging has put a lot of people off. So we are less welcomed, less praised and less loved world wide. Call this crack number two.
At home we've surrendered a relatively prosperous late 90's to a travesty of leadership from our dear brother Bush. In addition to putting an idiotic face on our executive leadership he has ignored a lot of what our nation has needed in order to carry on his own little crusade. The economy is bad, infrastructure bad and more. And he doesn't seem to care.
Add to this natural disasters, greedy profiteers destroying the housing market and the prices of fuel making everything harder and you have not much to be rejoicing about. Or do we?
We are still one of the richest nations on the earth. We are complaining over food prices but we CAN eat. We have shot ourselves in the foot for years by not building good public transportation because we were too selfish to give up our private cars. Now we are paying for it in bad roads and crazy gas prices.
We elected Bush. Not once, somewhat forgivable, but twice. So again we can blame ourselve for allowing his post 911 approach to take hold. I didn't see millions resisting it. Only small bands of protestors. Where was everyone else?
We don't hold our government accountable. We don't demand the things we need. We don't organize labor and make ourselves stronger against exploitation. And as consumers we gladly consume away while complaining about the companies we buy from.
We have power to change things. We have power to make government and companies listen to us. We have power to demand better transportation, better energy usage, better leadership, better products, a better environment and many many more things.
So what is it going to be fellow Americans. Depression, self pity and moping around the house feeling sorry for ourselves? Or are we going to do something about things and make change? I say change is possible, hope is possible and the future can be better. But it requires YOU to help. Not the other guy. You, your partner, your parents, your kids and your friends. Target something you don't like or are worried about and get involved in the solution. Moping is not the American self image, but it has become the American reality. Time to wake up, turn off the TV and get working on things that matter to us.
Posted in: Everything spinning out of control
0
tkoind2
I am now a little worried that those crying wolf will mask the people who pose a real danger. This guy sounds bored and thought it might be nice to get his name in the papers and have someone front his living costs for a while. I can't help but think that we'll see a lot of this kind of thing now. Like the latest trend to make threats and go to jail for a bit.
More evidence that this nation seriously needs to address mental health issues and to start programs that will help reclaim the masses of alienated and disenfranchised.
Posted in: 19-yr-old man held for threatening stabbing spree at Tokyo Disneyland
0
tkoind2
This article is one of the best I've seen on this topic. But is both on and off target with the conclusions here.
I agree in full that what drove Kato to murder was not his Otaku habits but the isolation and alienation he felt as a result of his lifestyle, employment and social condition. Hopelessness and a life divested from society is a dangerous place for someone unhappy and frustrated to end up. Anger at self and others is almost inevitable. And I feel this accounts for a lot of the violence, suicide and murder we see on the rise in Japan.
Where the article is off is in identifying the Akiba community as disfunctional. And for that matter as a community. What Akiba is, is a collection of many communities. Gamers are not necessarily Lolita fans, are not necessarily anime fans. Though some people may cross over into many of these categories.
There are most certainly unhealthy circles in Akihabara. And there are certainly Otaku who are hiding away from reality in the fantacy world. But it is unfair to blanket all Otaku and Akiba communities are disfunctional.
I believe that Akiba, and the subsets it represents do serve a valuable role in Japanese society. Games, fantacy and other hobbies offer overworked and stressed out people an outlet for their stress and frustrations. Game allow people to vent anger in a healthy manner. The distractions allow many to have something outside mad work hours. And some communities there are not clans of isolated non-connected people, but are groups that interact and share a love for something.
Now while I don't subscribe to any of the Akiba subsets or their hobbies, I respect that people should be free to pursue their hobbies and to enjoy what they like. Provided it does not comprise the law or harm anyone.
Kato represents a real community that can be identified. He represents the working undreclass who are alienated and disenfranchised. He represents the isolated tens of thousands who are left out of growth and prosperity with no net to catch them.
If we want to blame someone for Akiba we can blame the government and ourselves. The goverment is to blame for not making mental health care a priority in a country that sorely needs it. They are to blame for poor economic and social policies that leave so many people locked out. They are to blame for not having better programs to recycle people into new opportunities when old ones dry up. And they are to blame for responding with idiotic solutions rather than addressing the root of the problems that cause these rampages.
We are to blame for not holding them more accountable for solving these problems. For stereotyping people rather than looking for ways to help them. And for putting walls up that isolate people when we should, as the public, demand and work for ways to better connect and bind the fabric of our society.
If we want to avoid more Katos. We need to solve the problems that created him. Only then can we have hope that we have seen the last of this kind of tragedy.
Posted in: Murder in lotus land