Q: So how does the new Google Video Search see Japan?
A: Not very well and only as a techno outpost of America

SEE LEFT:
PBS Network - Mon Jan 24 2005 at 7:00 PM PST - 30 minutes
Nightly Business Report
… as Lucy Craft reports from Tokyo…cellphone addicts, Japan is the closest thing to Paradise….
SEE RIGHT:
KRON4 - Wed Jan 12 2005 at 7:00 PM PST - 30 minutes
One, two, three, “insider” Camera crews capturing every single Brad pitt angle in Tokyo….

Caption: “…train station in Chiba. Yes, those are Hello Kitty figures all over the front dash.”

Ahhhh, now here’s my idea of good Valentine date…A girl that shows up in a dress that begs to be eaten.

TOKYO, JAPAN: French Ambassador to Japan Bernard de Montferrand (R) listens to French chocolatier Jean-Paul Hevin (L) showing him the chocolate evening dress he designed during the opening ceremony of the 2005 Salon du chocolat at a Tokyo department store….

Via “Mulboyne” at the TokyoDV forum I bring yet another proof of Japanese government superiority. This time, Nara Japan’s prefectural government has given the judges’ special prize to “Mama, marry with me” as a winning dream about marriage and stopping a declining birthrate

World’s happiest words announced, Nara Pref.
The Nara prefectural government has announced 100 proposal words selected from those publicly invited to enhance people have dreams about marriages as a measure to stop a declining birthrate. Including those from overseas, 3,621 words were sent, and the top award, the Happy Word Grand Prize, was given to Chika Kuribayashi of Hyogo Prefecture whose words are ‘Do you want to wear?’ and whose URL picture is a wedding dress, a picture in an e-mail from a sweetheart.
In the proposal prize and adoration division, selected was ‘Can I be with you even after becoming a hag?’ In the proposal and happiness division, ‘Clocks tell time, but you make me forget time’ was picked. ‘Please marry me on condition of acquaintances with me!!’ was selected in the proposal and dramatic division. And the judges’ special prize was given to ‘Mama, marry with me.’

Japan’s toothless watchdog, the FTC, to stiffen Japan’s govn’t construction competition law. BAH! That “competition law” has micro-penalties that are levied by the FTC —so small that they are less than a construction office’s petty cash for paper clips. This problem of repeat “dango”/bid-rigging is found in EVERY SINGLE Japanese construction company. No exceptions—all Japanese construction companies are involved and the Japanese government encourages “dango”.

Japanese watchdog raids 30 building companies
Tokyo — Japan’s regulatory watchdog yesterday raided the offices of about 30 construction companies in Utsunomiya, a city north of Tokyo, seeking evidence of bid-rigging for public works projects.
Utsunomiya Kensetsugyo Kyokai, the local construction industry association, and 30 member companies suspected of bid-rigging were previously penalised in 1995 by Japan’s Fair Trade Commission and fined Y1.5bn in surcharges…..

In the understatement of the year this story says that, “Hikaru Utada’s first English-language debut album, Exodus, did not do as well.” Hell, of course J-pop singers like Utada fail with they foist off insipid lyrics like, “I still remember the ways that you touched me./Now I know that I don’t mean anything to you./You’re easy breezy, and I’m Japanesy.” Sheesh.

Yahoo! News - Japan makes big push to aims to take Western music world by storm
CANNES, France (AFP) - After taking the world by storm with its video games, manga cartoons and cars, Japan now wants to its get music better known around the globe…….”We want to promote our music more vigorously to the rest of the world,” the President of Japan’s external trade organisation, JETRO, Hiroshi Tsukamoto told AFP in an interview here…
… not many Japanese artists have managed big hits to date outside of their home country. Crossover New-York born singer Hikaru Utada’s first English-language debut album, Exodus, did not do as well in the United States last year as hoped.

The Japanese tax authorities have no idea how swift foreign tax accountants and lawyers move. Japanese firms would dither for years trying to figure out the “proper” response to tax changes: Gaijin just DUMP-n-RUN.

Equity Strategists: Funds May Sell Japan Holdings
— Japanese stocks such as Asahi Tec Corp. and D&M Holdings Inc. may decline because proposed tax changes are likely to prompt private equity firms to sell shares….
…The government last month proposed a 20 percent tariff on profits made by non-residents and overseas companies in limited partnerships. The changes would also require foreign corporations and trusts to declare capital gains on sales of stakes in compaies owning real estate.

No here’s a fun and enterprising Japanese girl. I especially like the part of her rationale when she says, “…..the more I realized they [the Am. servicemen] were the victims of war, too. I wanted to do something to help them….There’s no way I got rich out of it.” Oh, that’s just precious.

Japanese human shield now
the Madam of Baghdad
A Japanese woman who went to Iraq as a human shield is now copping flak in the war-torn country for opening a Baghdad brothel for American servicemen…
….Yukiko Muragishi came to Iraq with her friends to act as a human shield and stayed there when the war had finished. She stayed because, inside Baghdad’s Green Zone being protected by the U.S. military, she is running a whorehouse for U.S. servicemen and Iraqi politicians and it has made her very rich….

What a cruel joke! This article LIES and says that a “credible [teaching]certificate should be at least 120 hours”—sheeee-it. A certificate in teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) is a masters degree after a regular BA. Then, you have to live in in the Land-of-Concrete(tm) to make real money at it.

Is the classroom your passport to a new, exciting life?
Idyllic locations, a laid-back lifestyle and lots of fun %u2013 those are the images conjured up by some of the hundreds of ads for native English teachers…..Mr Gunn, who also runs an informative website for English teachers at http://bogglesworld.com, said: “Aspiring teachers need to ask themselves what they will fall back on if they decide teaching English is not for them. It is a great profession in that you can be provided with a ticket, accommodation and a decent income in a foreign land. It can provide instant gratification for wanderlust.