Here’s an intimate monorail for couples—this “Slope Car” for the exclusive use of the residents of Nagasaki, Japan.
View a larger version of this photo and others at h3f3f’s flickr photostream.
For a further explanation of the Tenjin-kun slopecar, refer to this machine translation from h3f3f’s Japanese description at: tunawatari21.blogspot.com.
I went to the beach just north of Enoshima today and noticed this weird sign…
“Beware of Hawks”? WTF?
Embiggen to 640×480
I scratched my head for a second about the “Hawks” and realized that the warning sign was referring the crow-like scavengers, the kazillions of Kites.
Enoshima is infested with tobi nest in large groups that defecate huge piles of stinky fishy poop. I don’t think that it is weird at all that Kites are called “an abomination” in the Bible, Leviticus, 11.14.
Other Japanese beaches have the more solitary Osprey (Pandion haliaetus), also colloquially known in English as a seahawk or fish hawk. 
However, no bird in this country can boss around Japan’s national bird, the pushy, mutant Crow. (3yen link)
Weirdo Japanese language factoid: The Japanese Kanji for tobi/kite is 鳶 but most people just write the word in Katakana トビ . Oddly Japanese more commonly pronounce it tonbi トンビ .
Dear Taro,
I will be spending a week in Tokyo at the end of the month. What should I see?
Thanks
Weird things you must see:
Typical Tokyo tourist things you don’t want to see:
Hint: Get the Japan Rail Pass (must be purchased outside of Japan) will pay for itself if you want to go to somewhere more than 2 hours away from Tokyo. Otherwise, the local Tokyo Zone Pass is the bargain you want.
Japanese Bunraku puppetry is Japan’s and perhaps the world’s dullest performing art. To save you from the boredom, you can check out these videos showing the most “exciting” part.
Brain fart 1:
Yes, I know these YouTube videos have been floating around the Internet a long time, but I just suffered through three hours of Bunraku (Wiki) yesterday on my knees on tatami mats, so I felt compelled to you save you from the pain, ha, ha.
Brain fart 2:
My favorite current gaijin author who writes about Japan, Isaac Adamson, became bogged down when he used bunraku as the hook to his last novel, Kinki Lullaby.
The YouTube content filter labels this four-part series as safe general audiences (safe for work) so enjoy what they describe as Japanese fish porn–”the most advanced on the PLANET!”
I wander through this area in Tokyo’s Kabukicho district all the time going to my friend’s bar in “Golden Gai” (which I think is “golden” because it’s downhill from the public squat toilet). Like most of trashed-out Tokyo, it looks very sketchy in the photo below but it’s actually quite safe and comfortably cosy.
It seems this a day of oddity posts…So here’s more Japanese oddities from the 5-dan Master of Odd, Rob Pongi.
This japanesey ’60s Polaroid comes via Kelliente’s splendiferous “Who laughs last” blog.
The retro-licious vintageninja.net brings you….
Sengoku yaro (Warring Clans)
embiggen to 600×793
Check out the ninja cowboy KAIKETSU KUROZUKIN press stills from vintageninja.net.
embiggen to 425×900
Tokyo street corner at 2009-aug-24-18:51:53
View the full-size photo, 800×606
Frequent commenter here on 3Yen, MARKed TRAIL, sent in these gems of engrish signs in Tokyo centered around the Japanese spelling of Ass/Earth, which are homonyms in their Katakana writing system.
First is a security company, “A.S.S.”
Second is the Assfairy fragrance—“The perfume the snares the man for whom Miss Hippopotamus aimed at in an instant.”
And finally is the perennial engrish favorite, “Asse Chocolate.”
- 
