Stories about Japan from July, 2010
Wikileaks’ Japan data on Afghanistan
Richard Smart at the Tokyo Digital Journalism blog posted a summarized list of Wikileaks’ Japan data on Afghanistan. Raw data can be found on his blog.
Japan: Abandoned Building Clock
@MaripoGoda crowd sourced Flickr photos to build Haikyo Tokei, which shows a different photo of broken clocks in abandoned buildings to tell the time every minute. @mazzo shared [ja] his communication with the developer, who acknowledged that the images for 11:02 and 08:15 represent the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and...
Japan: Art on an island
Nazra Zahri blogged – with gorgeous photos and a video – about her trip to Teshima, one of the seven islands that's celebrating Setouchi International Art Festival.
Japan: How to Enjoy Fireworks Displays
After a video on Cherry Blossom Viewing [en], the team of Legon produced an instructional animated video on How to Enjoy Fireworks Displays (Hanabi) [en] in Japan. Both in English and Japanese, it illustrates the basics of the firework festivals that often light up the summer night sky in Japan.
Japan: Agriculture and Entrepreneurship
Barnali and Anirvan (who traveled from the U.S. to Japan by ship!) blog about interesting Agriculture 2.0 projects that they encountered at green drinks Tokyo. “About sixty young people crowded into an event space to hear speakers talk about “Agriculture 2.0,” projects connecting urban dwellers with healthy local food, while...
Japan: Eating unagi eel to battle the heat
It's Doyo No Ushi in Japan today – the day to eat grilled eel to bolster your energy for battling the summer heat. TsukuBlog gives a comprehensive explanation of the tradition and A Radiused Corner has some beautiful pictures of the dish.
Japan: Mob collusion soils the sumo ring
After the National Police decided to crack down on the connections between crime syndicates and sumo wrestlers, sumo fans question the image of sumo as a sacred sport.
Japan: Rice paddy art
Pink Tentacle published several pictures [en] of wonderful examples of rice crop art, “which is created by carefully arranging different colors of rice plants in the field.”
Japan: Basic English skills, a must for today's workers
In a post titled English necessary for today’s Japanese workers? [en] Adumu at Mutantfrog reflects on a recent debate on the state of English in Japan.
Japan: A short documentary-post on Tuvalu
Photographer Ken Umemoto dedicates a post [ja] to Tuvalu [en] and the disastrous effects of human intervention and climate change on the island. The post also includes fascinating “auteur photos”,
Japan: Artistic manhole covers
Jamaipanese reviews [en] Drainspotting, a book dedicated to the artistic manhole covers located all over Japan.
Japan: Manga blogging on Mexico
Mexico based Ohtoh Ryoko manga-blogs [ja] on her Mexican daily life and the unfamiliar customs of the country. The main character is a little girl with pigtails, who wears a yellow luchador (wrestler) mask.
Japan: A tryst in the starry sky
Look at the sky on the night of July 7 for this is the only night in the year when the two stars Vega and Altair are destined to be reunited, or so the legend foretells.
Japan: Decline of Students Studying in the U.S. and Overseas
Despite the increasing number of people studying abroad via study abroad programs, the overall rate of Japanese college students studying abroad seems to be decreasing across the board — even accounting for Japan's declining birthrate. What is the cause of this remarkable decline?
Japan: Bits of Beat Takeshi's autobiography
In a post titled Kitano delivers a beat-down to today's Japan, Ryuganji translated some excerpts from an autobiography of director Takeshi Kitano [en], that will be released in Japan on July 7.
Japan: Party leaders campaign for upper house election
Buddhika Weerasinghe uploaded pictures of Japan’s main party leaders [en] addressing speeches ahead of an upper house election, that will be held on July 11.
Japan: Tech-savvy freelancers break down the monopoly in information
While in many countries around the world ordinary citizens learn to take advantage of the new technologies to make their voices heard, in Japan it's the free-lance journalists who take up the battle against establishment media from which they are determined to remain apart.
Japan: Hashima Island, the abandoned island
Craig Schmeizer at Make A History wrote a post on Hashima Island [en] (also dubbed Warship Island), a small island in the south of Japan that was abandoned in 1974. According to the blogger, it was “a center of a major mining complex owned by Mitsubishi Corporation” until it was...
Japan: The art of cutting paper
Japanstyle dedicates a post [en] to kamikiri, one of the traditional crafts that uses paper and that is also a stage performance. Attached to the post a video where popular kamikiri artist Hayashiya Imamaru creates splendid silhouettes with scissors and paper.
About our Japan coverage
Nevin Thompson is our Japan editor. Email him story ideas or volunteer to write.
